In this final episode of 2025 I share some thoughts on the year from a personal perspective before diving in to a recap of the journey we've been on together this year as a podcast. We've had some really wonderful humans on the pod this year and here are just a few highlights.
Check out the links below to connect with this year's guests or keep up with their work.
Jaimee Van Gemerden
Sign up to Metanoia's emails at metanoianz.com
Or find them on Facebook or Instagram
Sharon 'Rocky' Rogio
Check out the 1946 film - to find out where to view it, head to 1946themovie.com
Find more from Rocky and the team on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok
Cathy and Steven
Check out the Changes Ahead podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Follow them on Facebook or Instagram.
Phillipa Hunt
Check out Satisfy Food Rescue on their website, on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. Kate and Alex
Check out Common Grace Aotearoa at commongrace.nz or find them on Instagram or Facebook Ben Cremer
Check out Ben's weekly newsletter, Into the Gray, and find him on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and BlueSky.Lindy Jacomb
Check out Olive Leaf Network on their website, Facebook or Instagram.
And check out the Cult Chat podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Petra ZaleskiFind Petra on Instagram at @therevpetrazaleskiJess Hall
Check out Jess's art on InstagramDale Campbell
Check out Dale's article that we discuss on the podcast here
And as usual I'd love to hear from you if you have any thoughts or feedback. Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
Facebook: facebook.com/downtoearth.conversations
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Email: downtoearth.conversations@gmail.com
Dale Campbell has a diverse background in justice related jobs and has done a lot of good thinking about how not to do more damage while trying to be helpful. He also challenges us in this kōrero to think well about what it actually looks like to love our enemies - how to resist evil while still seeing the humanity of others.
A content warning, issues of sexual and physical violence are mentioned in examples given, so be kind to yourself.
Here is a link to an article Dale wrote that has illustrations that show some of what we talk about in this conversation, so you may find it helpful to have a glance at that as you listen if you're not driving or whatever, or go and read the article later to embed what Dale is saying more deeply.
But for now, prepare to be challenged, encouraged, and emboldened to live a life of love, even in the hardest of spaces.
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Music by Strahan:
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Jess Hall, current Master of Theology student, joins me to talk about both her post graduate research project and her art, both of which explore the intersections of living as an embodied human and faith.
While talking about things like menstrual bleeding on a podcast might be a bit jarring for some, it is important to normalise things that are actually very normal for many people, and help to reduce the stigma. By exploring this topic and how it might actually be helpful to spiritual formation, Jess takes it a step further and shows how engaging with faith through our lived experience can be highly beneficial to our faith journey, our identity formation, and our feeling comfortable in our own bodies.
Check out Jess's art on Instagram
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
Spotify: Strahan
Facebook: facebook.com/StrahanMusic or facebook.com/commonerscommunion
Instagram: @strahanmusic or @commoners_communion
Petra Zaleski is a chaplain at Auckland University, which we talk about a little in the kōrero. However, the main focus is on her own story of finding transformational love in the midst of pain. Complex PTSD leading to substance abuse threatened to ruin Petra's life but, instead, she found how powerful love is and began a journey towards wholeness. Her journey has filled her with compassion and shapes how she lives out her life as a priest.
Content warning, we talk about substance abuse in the episode, and the subject of suicide comes up in passing, so look after yourself and take a break if you need to.
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
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Having grown up in the Exclusive Brethren, Lindy Jacomb came to a crisis point where she no longer believed everything she was being asked to believe.
Years later, having made a life outside the Exclusive Brethren, Lindy is now heading up efforts to offer support to anyone else who is looking to leave high demand religious groups.
We talk about her own experience in the Exclusive Brethren Church and the challenges of leaving, what the Olive Leaf Network is and how it works to support those leaving high demand religious groups, and we talk about red flags and green flags when looking at the health of any group you may be part of.
Check out Olive Leaf Network on their website, Facebook or Instagram.
And check out the Cult Chat podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Benjamin Cremer is a pastor who spends his time these days in the online space in the intersection of Christianity and politics. Having grown up in white Christian nationalism in the U.S.A. Ben now gracefully explores how faith in Jesus offers a critique to policies and ideologies that many Christians actively support.
We talk about his upbringing, the changes in his faith, the costs of those changes on relationships, and how his more open understanding of God has given him the ability to better love others. We also discuss how he interacts with people by challenging their beliefs and ideas, while still holding grace for them, even when he feels their beliefs are causing harm, which makes it an encouraging, but also very challenging, conversation.
Check out Ben's weekly newsletter, Into the Gray, and find him on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and BlueSky.
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
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Facebook: facebook.com/StrahanMusic or facebook.com/commonerscommunion
Instagram: @strahanmusic or @commoners_communion
Kate and Alex are the co-founders and co-directors of Common Grace Aotearoa.
Common Grace is an organisation doing advocacy work and organising the church around key justice issues. While the Church is involved in much justice work at the coal face, there is also a need to work towards changing systems that oppress and marginalise, systems that cause some of the problems we then see. Common Grace Aotearoa is working at that systems level, striving for change.
Kate and Alex and I talk about how they became passionate about this kind of advocacy and campaigning, what the focus of Common Grace Aotearoa is, and how they connect with the wider church to train and equip people for action. We also spend a bit of time talking about the upcoming referendums around Māori wards in local government, and why they see this as a matter of justice.
Check out Common Grace Aotearoa at commongrace.nz or find them on Instagram or Facebook
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
Spotify: Strahan
Facebook: facebook.com/StrahanMusic or facebook.com/commonerscommunion
Instagram: @strahanmusic or @commoners_communion
Phillipa Hunt is a wife, mum, engineer, and the founder and chairperson of Satisfy Food Rescue. We talk about the environment, food poverty, Satisfy, working to our strengths, partnering with others, and where faith fits into all that for her.
Check out Satisfy Food Rescue on their website, on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn.
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
Spotify: Strahan
Facebook: facebook.com/StrahanMusic or facebook.com/commonerscommunion
Instagram: @strahanmusic or @commoners_communion
Cathy Marston and Steven Goulstone, the hosts of the Changes Ahead Podcast, a Baptist New Zealand podcast hosting conversations that discuss the changes the church needs to think about if it is to have a meaningful presence in the future.
We talk about the unheard voices of our church communities, the desire to be faithful by keeping things the same, when perhaps faithfulness demands change, hearing people's stories rather than discussing theology abstractly, and why the church might be worth changing to save.
If you like this conversation then make sure you check out the Changes Ahead podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Follow them on Facebook or Instagram.
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
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Sharon 'Rocky' Roggio has spent years in the film and television industry, working in a variety of roles on many well known shows (e.g. House of Cards, Parks and Recreation) and films.
In this conversation we discuss her directorial debut film, '1946: The Mistranslation That Shifted Culture'. The film has won over 25 awards at film festivals around the world.
The film documents the first time the word homosexual was included in a Bible translation (as recently as 1946), the subsequent decision by that same committee to take the word out again in their next revision, looking at how and why the committee came to those decisions.
The film features personal stories of the key characters which makes it compelling to watch.
Rocky and I discuss her career, why and how the film came about, why she included a storyline of her own journey with her dad, who believes very differently to her, and what she is hoping for as people watch this film.
Spoiler alert, we obviously discuss elements of the film in the episode, so if you want to see the film before listening, head to 1946themovie.com
Find more from Rocky and the team on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
Spotify: Strahan
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Jaimee van Gemerden holds a PhD in theology but, unlike some academics, is great at connecting deep thought about God with real issues in and around the Christian faith in a way that the average person can connect with.
With her friend Andrew, she is the founder of Metanoia, a platform for hosting conversations about faith in public spaces that might otherwise be held behind closed doors, if they are had at all.
We talk about how deliberately bringing her understandings and experiences as a woman into her theology has helped her see different angles on things, what Metanoia is and how it came about, the church's response, or lack of it, to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into abuse in care report that came out last year, and the idea that we aren't supposed to empty ourselves of who we are as Christians, but in fact to embrace all of who we are in partnership with God to live our fullest lives. We talk about what the church might need to be saved from, and indeed, whether it should be saved at all.
Sign up to Metanoia's emails at metanoianz.com
Or find them on Facebook or Instagram
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Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
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As I release this, today marks one full year since the atrocities committed by Hamas in Israel, and the beginning of a horrendous campaign of genocide that Israel began in Gaza as a result. Violence that has, in the past week or so, spread into surrounding territories as the western world sits back and watches.
Today's guest, Cole, is a visual journalist, capturing stories through photos and videos. While many of us were simply getting on with our lives, Cole left the safety of Aotearoa New Zealand for the land of Palestine, spending two months in and around the West Bank.
Cole shares stories of the people he met, the resilience he saw, and the oppression that they face in everyday life. What Cole describes is both heart-warming and heart breaking. It gives some understanding as to why things exploded a year ago, and why this so far from Israel simply defending itself.
Cole tells the stories of humans who are trying to keep their humanity and dignity in an environment that is dehumanising and oppressive. He also challenges us about what we are doing to help give hope to those for whom life has become quite hopeless.
This is one of the most important conversations I feel like I've ever had on this podcast. And that is no slight on all the amazing conversation partners I've had so far. But this one just has a weight to it. For that reason, wanting to do this conversation some justice, I didn't stop us to fit my usual timings, and so this episode is much longer than my others. It felt like it needed to be. Feel free to listen in smaller chunks as you are able. Cole and I specifically discuss some of the stories behind some of his photographs and videos, so you may want to go check them out on his Instagram page before listening.
See below for a range of resources to become educated on the situation, and to keep up with what is going in in real time. Check out the amazing list of resources at Aotearoa Christians for Peace in Palestine and follow them on Instagram.Find Across the Divide Podcast on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.Here is a 90min Course, "Deconstructing Israel's Apartheid Against Palestinians" from Amnesty InternationalAnd read this Open Letter from Palestinian Christians to Western Church Leaders and Theologians INSTAGRAM accounts to follow:@cole.in.a.box @christians4peaceaotearoa @christatthecheckpoint @youthofsumud @mohammadhureini @samihuraini @wizard_bisan1 @tariq.hathaleen @awdah.hathaleen @savealmakhrour___
Connect with me at downtoearthconversations.com or at:
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Music by Strahan:
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