Category: Radical Discipleship
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I’m excited to be one of the presenters at the inaugural Whitehorse Worship Arts Festival and Contemplative Retreat this July alongside some amazing folk. It’ll be my first time in Yukon on the traditional and contemporary territories of the Ta’an Kwäch’än Council and the Kwanlin Dün First Nation. Check out all the details here: https://www.worshipartsfest.ca/…
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Years ago, at the height of my activist years, on the verge of a second or third burnout, I stumbled across a quote from that amazing, broken, paradox-filled Trappist monk, hipster, vow-breaking, activist, poet and monastic – Father Louis – known more popularly as Thomas Merton. This is the quote: There is a pervasive form…
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This article originally appeared in for the New Leaf Network in June 2019 and can still be found here. At some point in my undergraduate years I stumbled onto the idea of Permaculture, which is “a system of agricultural and social design principles centered around… utilizing the patterns and features observed in natural ecosystems.” I…
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It’s hardly a secret that, in spite of some history of cultural diversity, The United Church of Canada is known as a denomination that is predominantly middle-class, ‘white’1, anglo and liberal. It’s also got quite a reputation for aging and being in decline. However, I think that something is quietly changing – if you can…
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it’s been amazing to work with the incredible Amy Haynes on this Vocare Podcast which asks a simple question: where did you first experience the call to do what you’re doing now? for our latest 2 episodes (we’ve done 7 now), we turned the mic on each other. we’ve just posted my episode, here.
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Originally Published In Touchstone: Theology Shaping Witness June 2025 The Great Methodist Dumpster Salvage For me, the great dumpster salvage began one afternoon when there was no one around. I surreptitiously entered the abandoned church library in a building that had, until recently, housed a once-strong United Church of Canada congregation. Knox-Wesley United[1] was the…
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The good folks at the Clowns of God ‘zine recently asked me to be interviewed for their upcoming Advent issue. Here’s what I said: Tell us about yourself! What do you spend your time doing? I’m Rob Shearer – I guess I’m a bit of a walking contradiction of being a proudly nonviolent anti-fascist anarchist…
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This is a bit of a paper / presentation I wrote as part of my entry into the United Church of Canada outlining the history of radicalism (as opposed to progressivism or liberalism) in the United Church. Here’s a link to the pdf of the presentation.
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Way back in January 2016, in my heady Anglican years, I co-authored this ‘tract’ – a tongue-in-cheek manifesto of sorts, with my friend Matthew Cook – with some edits and support from Meagan C. and Jess Z-C, of course. Within a few weeks, it had jumped to over 13,000 views and numerous comments and emails…
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“It’s called direct action – and it comes to us highly recommended.” – Utah Phillips and Ani DiFranco – Direct Action. I‘ve been reflecting a bit on the direct actions for social and ecological justice that I’ve been a part of over the years that have shaped me as a human being. Here are some…