Preaching today is risky. In a “purple church”, where not everyone agrees on social issues, you risk losing your job if you preach about compassion for undocumented people. If you have a congregation that mostly agrees on social issues like immigration, you risk losing their trust if you don’t say enough. In every congregation, it feels risky to preach good news in a time when there is so much ill will between people.
If you, as a preacher, are concerned about those risks, but also longing to resist the de-humanizing ways that people are being treated right now, Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow has some words for you: “There is no resistance without risk.”
Rev. Reyes-Chow, who will be the keynote preacher at the May 2nd 2026 Reimagining Preaching Conference, wrote
As I have been traveling to different places over the past few months, it is clear that people are worried and yearning for ways to resist, not just in ways that feel good, but in ways that will actually make a difference. I say, find the act of resistance that truly presents a risk to you. Choose an action that brings you into solidarity with those who are responding out of their own places of risk. Show the communities to which you belong that this is so important to you that you are willing to risk something important to you for a movement greater than yourself. When we risk, we inspire others to risk, and the movement grows. When we risk, resistance becomes real.
Reyes-Chow knows what is on the line for preachers. He’s an ordained minister, and in 2008, he was elected Moderator of the Presbyterian Church USA–the youngest and first Asian American to hold the denomination’s highest elected office. Now he’s a speaker and writer who advocates for social justice both in the Middle East and on the streets of America. When he says “There is no resistance without risk,” he says that as a person who has been arrested for civil disobedience while protesting social injustice.
In the midst of bearing witness to the darkness in the world, Rev. Reyes-Chow is also pointing others to hope–see his books Everything Good About God is True and In Defense of Kindness. And sometimes, for both preachers and those who listen to them, hope feels the riskiest of all.
At the Seattle-area conference, Rev. Reyes-Chow will help preachers in the Pacific Northwest know what risky preaching means in their contexts. He’ll lead a workshop on “Preaching Politics as Curating Community” as well as giving a sermon titled “Preaching As Theological Crowdwork: How Interactive Preaching Expands Exegetical Practices, Rejects Generative AI, and Bridges Political Division.”
Until then, he has these words of encouragement for preachers and other activists:
For those who have been risking, truly risking, thank you, and keep it up. And for those who are wondering how and what you will risk in the future, know that you are not alone. In fact, the more of us that join together, risking more together, the more we will accomplish together.
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