Books

We Pray Freedom

We Pray Freedom: Liturgies and Rituals from the Freedom Church of the Poor

Edited by Liz Theoharis and Charon Hribar

Broadleaf Press, available now!

A book of prayers, rituals, and liturgies that grows out of communities committed to abolishing poverty.

Prayer has long sustained movements for social change. Ritual gives shape to our desire for justice, and liturgy lends power to our work. In We Pray Freedom, we learn from activists and movement builders the songs, stories, and ritual practices that keep them going for the long haul.

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You Only Get What You're Organized to Take: Lessons From the Movement to End Poverty

You Only Get What You’re Organized to Take: Lessons From the Movement to End Poverty

by The Rev. Dr Liz Theoharis & Noam Sandweiss-Back

Beacon Press

Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, one of the nation’s leading anti-poverty organizers and moral voices, and her co-author, Noam Sandweiss-Back, argue it is possible to abolish poverty. But this won’t happen through the goodwill of the powerful or the charitable actions of well-meaning people alone. It will happen through a mass movement, open to all, and led by the poor themselves.

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Articles & Interviews

Interview: Gravity Commons Podcast

Interview: Gravity Commons Podcast

Interview: Gravity Commons Podcast
Liz Theoharis & Charon Hribar: Liturgies and Rituals from the Freedom Church of the Poor
October 28, 2025

We talked with Liz Theoharis and Charon Hribar about how prayers, rituals, and liturgies help to sustain movements for social change. Their book is full of prayers, resources, and stories that grew out of communities committed to abolishing poverty.

Dr. Charon Hribar (Cha-Ron Reebar) is a visionary leader, musician, and scholar. She serves as the Director of Cultural Strategies for the Kairos Center and Co-Director of Theomusicology and Movement Arts for the Poor People’s Campaign. With over two decades of experience, she empowers leaders and integrates rituals and arts into organizing efforts.

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Interview: Straight White American Jesus Podcast

Interview: Straight White American Jesus Podcast

Interview: Straight White American Jesus Podcast
Beyond Thoughts and Prayers: The Rituals of Freedom
October 27, 2025

Brad welcomes Liz Theoharis and Charon Hribar, editors of We Pray Freedom: Liturgies and Rituals from The Freedom Church of the Poor. Both guests are key leaders in the faith-based anti-poverty movement and longtime organizers with the Poor People’s Campaign. Together, they discuss how liturgy and ritual can be reclaimed as acts of collective resistance, solidarity, and hope among the poor and dispossessed.

The conversation weaves through Liz and Charon’s personal journeys—Liz’s formation in faith-driven social justice work and Charon’s discovery of liberation theology growing up in a steel town—and traces how decades of grassroots organizing through the Kairos Center inspired this new book. They explore how faith traditions, particularly Christianity, can serve as public, justice-oriented practice rather than private belief, what it means to “pray with your feet,” and how ritual itself can be political.

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Interview: This is Not Church Podcast

Interview: This is Not Church Podcast

Interview: This is Not Church Podcast
We Pray Freedom: A Conversation With Liz Theoharis & Charon Hribar
October 20, 2025

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trump-bible

You Can’t Worship God and Money

Theological Abominations in Trump’s America

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
September 9, 2025

It was a moment somewhat like this, 30 years ago, that turned me into a biblical scholar. In the lead-up to the passage of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, political and religious leaders quoted scripture to justify shutting down food programs and kicking mothers and their babies off public assistance. Those leaders, many of them self-described Christians, chose to ignore the majority of passages in the Bible that preached “good news” to the poor and promised freedom to those captive to injustice and oppression.

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In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer

Interview: In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer

In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer Podcast
September 2, 2025

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Interview: A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast

Interview: A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast

A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast
Liturgies and Rituals from the Freedom Church of the Poor w/ Liz Theoharis and Charon Hribar
August 21, 2025

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About the Author

The Reverend Dr. Liz Theoharis is a theologian, pastor, author, and anti-poverty activist. She is the Director of the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights, and Social Justice and Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. Rev. Dr. Theoharis has been organizing in poor and low-income communities for the past 30 years. Her books include: You Only Get What You’re Organized to Take: Lessons from the Movement to End Poverty (Beacon, 2025), We Pray Freedom: Liturgies and Rituals from the Freedom Church of the Poor (Broadleaf Press, 2025) and Always with Us?: What Jesus Really Said about the Poor (Eerdmans, 2017) and she has been published in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Politico, Sojourners and elsewhere. Rev. Dr. Theoharis is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA) and teaches at Union Theological Seminary. She has been awarded the Freedom Award from the National Civil Rights Museum, the Selma Bridge Award, the Women of Spirit Award from the Presbyterian Church (USA) and many others.