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Today, we continue: "Theologians in SUV's Coming Back from the Airport".

Listen in on an unfiltered conversation with Sho Baraka about creativity, Christian hip hop, and the hidden forces shaping the modern church. We start light and personal, talking Atlanta culture and the “many hats” Sho wears as a writer, cultural critic, speaker, and artist. From there, he walks us through his origin story: poetry, West Coast influences, freestyling, and the slow work of developing a voice that doesn’t sound like anyone else.

Then we zoom out to the music industry and the attention economy. Sho challenges the pressure to overproduce and to live inside the algorithm, and he names why promotion can feel less like honest communication and more like manipulation. If you’ve ever wondered why so much music feels rushed or hollow, you’ll hear a clear diagnosis and a better vision for making art with patience, maturity, and depth.

The conversation gets even sharper as we talk about the Western church, “relevance,” and the danger of being tethered to empire. Sho argues that what masquerades as church can become Christendom, Christianity shaped to please power. He also reflects on justice work, the temptation to let anger become condemnation, and the hard but hopeful path back through confession, repentance, and real community. If you care about faithfulness, public theology, racial solidarity, and the integrity of Christian witness, this one will stay with you.

Sho came to Waco on he and Malcolm's "Good Culture In An Empire" Tour. If you missed it here, reach out and see if they're coming to your city. They have dates in Denver and Atlanta already lined up.

Check all things Sho Baraka out at www.shobaraka.com/

His Book: He Saw That it Was Good

Latest Album: Spotify: Midnight of a Good Culture / Apple: Midnight of a Good Culture

The Bootmaker's Ballad (Music video)

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
https://www.theologyinpieces.com/
Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing hello@theologyinpieces.com

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.

Send us a Question!

“Christ Is King” is everywhere right now and that’s exactly why we needed to slow down and ask what we’re actually confessing. We’re recording during Holy Week, and we feel the tension: the Resurrection is the center of Christian faith, but the name of Jesus keeps getting pulled into arguments about power, violence, and national identity. So we put the slogan on the table and ask whether it’s being used as comfort, as a threat, or as a shortcut to baptize the politics of empire.

We discuss imprecatory psalms, the difference between the oppressed crying out for justice and an empire asking God to bless its weapons. Also, are there prayers that God ignores? Does God listen to the prayers of the wicked? The Pope recently warned that God doesn't listen to those who wage war.

We also take a look at our Mail Bag and there is one consistent theme.... $ Hope you enjoy! Keep writing in!

Sho Baraka & Malcolm's Good Culture in an Empire Event - April 17th! Get your tix.

Resources discussed

Power Over vs. Power Under in Two-Kingdoms by Greg Boyd

The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church by Greg Boyd

Pete Hegseth's Prayer

Terrible tweets:

"the worst of the worst"

Robert Morris released

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
https://www.theologyinpieces.com/
Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing hello@theologyinpieces.com

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.

Send us a Question!

“Christian socialism” can sound like a contradiction if you’ve been taught that Christianity and capitalism belong together. We slow the whole thing down and ask a better question: what does the gospel actually announce, and what kind of economic life should that announcement produce? Along the way, we respond to a debate clip that tries to shrink the gospel into “Jesus’ finished work” while treating justice as merely an implication. We argue that the good news is bigger, more public, and more demanding than that, without turning works into a way to earn salvation.

Then we get honest about how systems shape souls. Capitalism is not just private property and Starbucks choices. It’s a moral formation built around profit motive, endless growth, and “voluntary exchange” that often isn’t voluntary when it involves housing, healthcare, wages, and survival. We connect modern wealth to empire history, including the doctrine of discovery and the long chain of dispossession that set the table for today’s inequality. If the top owns staggering wealth while the poor are crushed, the question isn’t only “did you personally exploit?” but “what does it mean to retain excess while your neighbor suffers?”

We also define socialism in plain language, talk about why so many “failed socialism” examples ignore U.S. intervention, and bring the conversation back to Scripture: Jubilee, debt forgiveness, gleaning, Acts 2, and Acts 4. Our bottom line is not blind faith in the state but a call for the church to offer a real economic witness in the shadow of empire, so there are no needy among us.

Books, Articles, and Notes:

John Perkins Stood Almost Alone - (Russell Moore) The civil rights leader treated love of God and love for others as inseparable.

Tax the Rich: How Lies, Loopholes, and Lobbyists Make the Rich even Richer

It's Basically Just Immoral to Be Rich

Malcolm's Debate

Thaddeus Williams RECAP of the debate.

The Case for Christian Socialism

Christianity and Capitalism are Incompatible

Institute for Christian Socialism

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
https://www.theologyinpieces.com/
Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing hello@theologyinpieces.com

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.