What Redemptive Social Action Looks Like

Kandi Robinson and Ezekiel Johnson accompanied by Dr. Deborah Henson-Governor, Assistant Professor for the School of Religion, attended the inaugural Embrace Conference held on the campus of Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky.  Faith and social justice were the topics of discussion. What does our faith look like when we subtract the cultural values and systems we’ve been raised in? That’s the question Asbury University’s Embrace Conference had students and guests from across the country pondering during the two-day event. 

The conference provided a series of sessions and events that allowed conference attendees to analyze what redemptive social action looks like in the context of Christian faith. The conference featured keynote speaker Christina Edmondson, who serves as the Dean of Intercultural Student Development at Calvin College and co-hosted the Truth’s Table Podcast. The conference featured keynote speaker Christina Edmondson, who serves as the Dean of Intercultural Student Development at Calvin College and co-hosted the Truth’s Table Podcast. Edmondson’s podcast co-hosted Michelle Higgins and Ekemini Uwan via live recording in the University Student Center. During the podcast, Edmonson spoke in depth about the cost of creating false theologies that are convenient to the current political climate or that make a majority group comfortable to the detriment of minority groups.

Several of the breakout sessions touched on areas such as, “Double Life”- The Experience of Being “Too American” or “Too Hispanic” for Second Generation Hispanics, “Wakanda”- The African Experience in America, “Cultural Appreciation vs. Appropriation”-Learning to Value Other Cultures Without Disrespecting or Exploiting Cultural Elements, and “Are We Getting It Right?”- The Process of Biblical Redemptive Social Action.