Finding God in All the Wrong People
At the Virginia Festival of the Book, in an auditorium at Newcomb Hall, every possible seat was taken. A number of attendees sat right on the stage. All came to hear Nadia Bolz-Weber; a tattooed, recovering, Lutheran “Pastrix,” the founding pastor at House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver, Colorado, help them find God in all the wrong people.
Bolz-Weber has published two books and developed a strong following. She said, “People wait in line to say thanks for not lying. How high is the fucking bar?” Bolz-Weber gave a sincere talk about having to speak to her congregation in December of 2012 shortly after the Newtown school shooting and her slow realization that even, as she said, “this horrible person Adam Lanza deserves to be remembered as a child of God.” She told the story of how an intern at her church convinced her that she needed to address this in her sermon that Sunday. “Ok, but I want to register my objection to God’s grace,” she said.
Bolz-Weber’s first book is called Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint. Read the Spirit’s web site defines the word pastrix as, “term used by certain unimaginative sections of the church to describe emergent female pastors,” a term she has not shied away from.
The honesty she is regarded for was apparent during her question and answer.
“I hope one day I can go through a yoga class without getting angry,” she said. “Your PC language doesn’t change the fact your great-great granddad was raping his slaves.”
When asked about how to talk about Donald Trump and his current political rise, she said she looks for, “where is the thing I hate about Donald Trump in me?”
