The God Who Riots

June 20, 2022
“The God of the Bible chooses the side of the oppressed,” suggests Garcia, a former youth minister, in his impassioned debut. Garcia details his efforts to reconcile his progressive values with the political conservatism of the Christian church, and argues that the New Testament calls Christians to radical action: “In response to injustice, this God riots alongside us, within us, and through us.” The author, disturbed by his church’s disinterest in Black Lives Matter and Trump’s Muslim travel ban, describes forgoing his pastoral license and leaving evangelicalism to stick by his belief in a social justice–oriented God. Garcia thoughtfully examines such topics as wealth inequality, LGBTQ rights, and colonialism through a Christian lens, advocating for prison abolition by chronicling the history of white supremacy in the U.S. and expounding on Jesus’s promise that the “last will be first and the first will be last.” Readers familiar with the writings of John Shelby Spong, Marcus Borg, and John Dominic Crossan won’t find much new in Garcia’s theology, but Garcia offers more accessible prose than these literary forebears, and the uninitiated will overall be well served by his exegesis and passion. This doesn’t break new ground, but the stirring delivery connects.

July 1, 2022

In his first book, public theologian and YouTuber Garcia argues that contemporary strikes, protests, and riots embody the radical message and revolutionary actions of the Biblical Jesus Christ who destabilized the Roman Empire. Garcia also draws on liberation theology to urge progressive Christians to prioritize justice over niceties and harmony. For instance, Garcia recounts the Biblical story of Jesus overturning money-changing tables and evicting other commercial enterprises from the temple, which he writes helped foment a revolutionary change in first-century Palestine. He makes the case that Jesus's message was to love others and free people from oppression; to help guide these initiatives Garcia asks readers to consider the actions of Jesus to be a guide. Over 10 chapters, the author utilizes Scripture, various Christian doctrines, personal anecdotes and the works of Paulo Freire, John Dominic Crossan, and Marcus Joel Borg to help readers gain a sense of the work that Jesus calls them to put into action. VERDICT Tackling issues often charged with high emotions, Garcia offers a guide to social change with an accessible and easy-to-understood model. Suited for readers interested in religious studies and social justice.--Jacqueline Parascandola

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July 15, 2022
In his accessible, impassioned debut, YouTube theologian Garcia argues against an anodyne Christianity that preserves the status quo, and in favor of a justice-oriented faith that aligns itself with the least powerful, most marginalized people in our society. "Through Jesus," he says, "God chooses sides." Though the church teaches charity and forgiveness, it often fails to live up to those values, and Garcia is one of many people of faith who have stepped away from their church of origin upon seeing the gulf between their community's actions and its stated values. But it doesn't have to be this way. To follow in the path of Jesus, says Garcia, Christians must focus on service within their communities, in full recognition that they may find themselves working alongside unlikely allies, as when a street gang took over a New York church in order to provide food, clothing, education, and other resources to their neighborhood. Drawing on intellectual and activist traditions ranging from liberation theology to police abolition, Garcia lays out a spiritual framework for practicing Christianity in a truly transformative way.

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