Spiritual Misfits Podcast

Fr. Joash P. Thomas comes from a long line of misfits — literally: a St. Thomas Indian Christian whose people had followed Jesus since the earliest days of the church, but were labelled heretics by colonial missionaries who showed up fifteen centuries later.
In this conversation, Fr. Joash makes the case that justice isn't a side quest for the church, it's the main mission. We talk about the moment he realised he'd "sold his soul to Empire," what it means to decolonise the Great Commission, why deconstruction without decolonisation is pointless, and what ancient Celtic and Indian Christianity can teach a Western church that's forgotten how to hold doubt and diversity together. It's a conversation full of provocation, hospitality, and a lot of flavour!

Connect with Fr. Joash P. Thomas
Read his book: The Justice of Jesus
Subscribe to his newsletter: Masala Chai Theology Substack
Follow him on insta: https://www.instagram.com/joashpthomas

Want to reach out and let us know your thoughts or suggestions for the show? Send us a message here; we’d love to hear from you.
The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

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View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com

Adam Gowen is a Wiradjuri man with deep cultural ties to Ngunnawal and Yuin country, a husband, father of three, not-for-profit board director, and campus manager at the University of Wollongong. In this conversation with Carolyn Meers, Adam traces his path from a childhood where his family's Aboriginality was known but rarely spoken of, through the education journey that gave him language for his identity, to recent years of actively stepping into cultural practice.
The conversation centres on what Adam calls "the displaced middle": the experience of belonging fully to neither one world nor another, and finding that this in-betweenness can be a privilege rather than a deficit. 

SPIRITUAL MISFITS LISTENER SURVEY — We want to hear from you! Take 5 minutes to fill out our listener survey here and shape the future of Spiritual Misfits:
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Want to reach out and let us know your thoughts or suggestions for the show? Send us a message here; we’d love to hear from you.
The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

Sign up to our mailing list:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/

Join our online Facebook community:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/spiritualmisfitspodcast

Support the pod:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/support-us/

View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com

We continue our Future Church series where Will and Caro listen back to a highlight excerpt from Future Church Conference and then debrief what it sparks for them as they think about their lives and faith communities.

This time, we listen to 10 minutes from Tanya Riches' talk, where she invites us into a wider and deeper understanding of the 'Imago Dei.' Is the Image of God exclusively reflected in humans? Or might we find it in the face of a cockatoo?

Tanya Riches directs the Masters of Transformational Development at Eastern University and is an all-round fantastic human. Her reflections spark Will and Caro's imagination and they discuss a range of ideas you might want to try out in your own life and/or faith community.

Listen to Tanya's full talk from Future Church (and all other keynote sessions) here: 
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsFveo-xYmS3nYRJAMrVmew

SPIRITUAL MISFITS LISTENER SURVEY — We want to hear from you! Take 5 minutes to fill out our listener survey here and shape the future of Spiritual Misfits:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe9TY7zaFqW6Zlaq3h9gjKzp7LO2PNxVTqvBXhCzlKQjSJUeQ/viewform?usp=header

Want to reach out and let us know your thoughts or suggestions for the show? Send us a message here; we’d love to hear from you.
The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

Sign up to our mailing list:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/

Join our online Facebook community:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/spiritualmisfitspodcast

Support the pod:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/support-us/

View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com

Will, Mitch and Caro get round the table and discuss some listener questions, like: Is it actually unethical to have kids given the state of the world? how do you respond to thought-stopping church clichés? And then Will shares the question on his mind: do you believe in aliens, and would it matter to your theology if they showed up tomorrow? 
Take the Spiritual Misfits Listener Survey (5 minutes, helps shape exciting new things we're working on): https://forms.gle/Ce596SzAaDMFiXap7

Previous Spiritual Misfits episodes mentioned:
Blood, Wrath & Love: What Actually Happened on the Cross? (with Mitch Forbes) 
A More Christlike God: Bradley Jersak on Faith After Deconstruction
Future Church Series: Uncle Ray Minniecon and the Scarred Tree
The Documentary Will mentions:
UFOs: Investigating the Unknown — National Geographic documentary series on Disney+

Want to reach out and let us know your thoughts or suggestions for the show? Send us a message here; we’d love to hear from you.
The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

Sign up to our mailing list:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/

Join our online Facebook community:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/spiritualmisfitspodcast

Support the pod:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/support-us/

View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com

We're kicking off a new mini-series looking back at talks from Future Church Conference 2026 — after playing a short excerpt from the talk, Will and Caro unpack it together. 
First up: Uncle Ray Minniecon, a Kabi Kabi and Goreng Goreng elder of South East Queensland, with South Sea Islander heritage. Uncle Ray co-founded Scarred Tree Ministries in Glebe, Sydney, and has spent decades as a leading voice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander justice, reconciliation, and self-determination within the Australian church.
The full version of Uncle Ray's talk (and all other Future Church keynotes) is now available at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsFveo-xYmS3nYRJAMrVmew
Want to reach out and let us know your thoughts or suggestions for the show? Send us a message here; we’d love to hear from you.
The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

Sign up to our mailing list:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/

Join our online Facebook community:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/spiritualmisfitspodcast

Support the pod:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/support-us/

View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com