Episodes

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Last week, I talked about the two ditches on either side of the spiritual path: thinking we are better than we are, and thinking we are worse than we are. This week, I want to stay in that second ditch a little longer, because I think a lot of us were taught we have to...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. A few weeks ago, I was sitting with my therapist, trying to put words to something I've wrestled with for a long time. Some days it feels like I'm walking a narrow path between two ditches. On one side is the danger of thinking too highly of myself: arrogance, hubris, ...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. For the last two weeks, I've been talking about the Gospel according to Jelly Roll. First, that there's no asterisk after the word "neighbor." And second, that while we are fighting monsters, we must be careful not to become monsters ourselves. Not long ago I was visi...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Last week I talked about the Gospel according to Jelly Roll, how a country star with forty arrests and a face full of tattoos ended up preaching a better sermon on Jimmy Kimmel Live than most seminary graduates, busting the myth that Christianity is about being right w...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. It is good to be back with you after having just concluded a four month sabbatical from ministry. Those four months of rest, renewal, and study have invigorated my ministry. I also did significant work on a book I’m writing, tentatively titled Revelation Unbound: Inspi...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Today I want to talk about rest. And why so many Christians are terrible at it. The myth I want to bust is one that runs so deep in American Christianity that most of us don't even recognize it as a theological claim. It's this: that your worth is determined by what y...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. This week I came across a video of retired Anglican Bishop and renowned New Testament scholar N.T. Wright, and he was making a point that I think is worth sitting with: that Christianity is not primarily about your soul escaping this world and going to heaven when you ...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. This week, we're in the middle of the Holy Week and Easter observances, the most sacred time of the year. Some of you are hearing this closer to Easter, but the day I’m recording this (and the day the first version is being aired) is Wednesday itself, a day the church ...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John's Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today's edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Recently, a lot of our conversations together have been about questions where people have confused what is common or dominant (cisgender identity, male dominance in culture) with the depth of the divine life. The results is that anyone who falls outside the boundaries ...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Last week I talked about the myth that God is a man—and why Christian theology has always known that God transcends gender entirely. Today I want to go deeper, because some listeners pushed back with an obvious question: “But Jesus was a man, wasn't he?” And yes—histor...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Over the past few days, there’s been a good amount of controversy swirling around a comment from Texas politician and Presbyterian seminary student James Talarico. During a speech several years ago, Talarico said something that quickly went viral again this week: “God ...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. One of the biggest myths many of us carry about faith is this: that if your beliefs change, your faith must be failing. For a lot of people—especially those of us who grew up in evangelical environments—faith was often presented as a kind of finished product. The right...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Since most of you will be hearing this either on Ash Wednesday or sometime near the start of Lent, let’s talk about one of the most common myths surrounding this day. The myth is this: Ash Wednesday and Lent are about God wanting you to feel bad about yourself. I want...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. One of the most common myths about Christianity is that conversion is always sudden, dramatic, and once-and-for-all. Many people picture the blinding light, the voice from heaven, the instant turnaround of Saul becoming Paul on the road to Damascus. It’s a powerful sto...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Earlier this week I was watching the Grammys, and one of the moments that really stayed with me was the memorial tribute honoring Ozzy Osbourne and his work with Black Sabbath. I know that might surprise some of you—either because I’m a Christian priest, or perhaps bec...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. One of the quiet myths I hear all the time—especially right now—is this: “If I’m exhausted by the news, my faith must be weak.” If you’re feeling that way, let me say this as clearly as I can: that myth is false. And believing it does real spiritual damage. Exhaustion...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Lately, I’ve been feeling a real knot of anxiety as I watch the news—especially rhetoric and posturing that seem to treat long-standing allies as expendable or weak. When powerful nations start speaking about smaller ones as though they are merely pieces on a chessboar...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. In a moment when our society seems increasingly fractured—when fear, violence, and the abuse of power dominate political discourse—many Christians are asking a deeper question: What is the role of the Church when political authority itself becomes a threat to human dig...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Like many of you, I imagine, I’ve been deeply concerned with our country’s recent military intervention in Venezuela. Many have written and spoken about how problematic that action was from the standpoint of international law, foreign policy, and a host of other concer...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Some of you are hearing this on Christmas Eve itself. Others might be listening a few days later, on the Sunday after Christmas, or sometime else in the long glow of the holiday season. But whenever you’re hearing this, the myth I want to bust right now—and the truth I...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. This week I want to talk about something that’s been in the news again this Advent season: churches setting up Nativity scenes that depict the Holy Family as refugees, sometimes even showing Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus behind bars or with imagery associated with...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. With the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe coming up this Friday, I want to talk about a part of the Christian tradition that makes a lot of people—especially non-Catholics—a little uncomfortable: visions of Mary. For some, these stories feel strange at best, manipulative...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. One of the big myths this time of year is that Advent is basically “Christmas, but for a whole month.” We crank up the carols, deck the halls, schedule the parties, and treat these four Sundays as a long on-ramp to December 25—a kind of extended holiday season with a l...

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. With the Thanksgiving celebrations of this week, I want to take on a myth many Christians assume without thinking: the idea that Thanksgiving is, in its origins, a Christian holiday—something the Church established, shaped, and handed down the way we did Christmas or E...