How Western Christianity Got It Wrong
Replacing the God of Fear with a Spirituality of Healing
- Theology
- Publisher: Broadleaf Books (Augsburg Fortress)
- Published: 2026
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Publisher's Description
Jesus never intended to start a religion that would justify stealing land, enslaving people, or destroying creation. So how did we get here? In How Western Christianity Got It Wrong, acclaimed author Randy Woodley, of mixed white and Native American heritage, traces how a brown man from Nazareth who never lost his connection to the whole community of creation became the poster child for empire-building and environmental destruction. The faith that bears his name crafted theologies that rationalize greed, violence, and colonization--everything Jesus actually opposed. Woodley exposes the ideas that poisoned Christianity's well, how the Western church won a monopoly on sin and salvation, and how violent atonement theories replaced the healing message Jesus lived. Drawing on Indigenous wisdom that was flourishing on Turtle Island long before missionaries arrived, Woodley reveals what Jesus's liberating message looks like when freed from imperial frameworks. Picture communities where creation is family, not commodity. Where healing happens through relationship, not transaction. Where Creator speaks through many voices and welcomes all who walk in love. This is the Jesus Way as it was meant to be--not a system of control but a path of wholeness. Continue the conversation with the How Western Christianity Got It Wrong Discussion Guide.
Endorsements (6)
“Randy Woodley is a trustworthy prophetic voice teaching the harmonious wisdom of Indigenous peoples and the way of Jesus. How Western Christianity Got It Wrong gives us a much-needed healing vision for the future by looking honestly at Christianity's past, problems, patterns, and possibilities.”
“Our Chickamauga Cherokee prophet isga gua, who spoke of a need for 'universal brotherhoods-sisterhood,' nevertheless characterized the 'white man's churches' as desolate places filled with 'spirits of blindness' lying in wait to possess the unwary. Randy Woodley stands, a courageous voice in the wilderness, calling for the casting out of these spirits of blindness and the opening of eyes to see.”
“Honest, vulnerable, respectful, yet fierce. Anyone drawn to this book already knows that Western Christianity got it wrong. Randy Woodley's remarkable book helps us place the reasons why. By the end, you get that following Jesus is a journey largely disconnected from just about everything in Western culture and religion. But it's not all problems. Woodley lovingly affirms what your intuition already knows: that spirituality, even for us Western humans from the Christ tradition, is intimately connected with the aliveness of all creation.”
“I can't think of a book anywhere that does what this book does as powerfully as this book does. It gets to the heart of what's gone wrong in Western Christianity and then gets to the heart of what is needed. Randy Woodley is the right person to write this book, and he accomplishes so much in twelve hard-hitting, no-nonsense, deeply intelligent, clearly written, heartfelt chapters. Every seminarian should read this book, along with every pastor and priest, and every Christian and post-Christian.”
“Randy Woodley's critique of Western Christianity is so blistering and comprehensive that it would be easy for those of us still committed to some version of it to respond with defensive dismissiveness. Instead, in light of the manifest corruptions of our tradition, in the past and today, it is time to open our minds and hearts even to the most radical critiques. I urge all believers in Jesus to consider seriously both the critique and the winsome constructive account of the way of Jesus that our brother offers here.”
“In this radical, provocative, and refreshingly honest critique, Randy Woodley pulls back the curtain of two thousand years of Christianity and lets us reassess the drama through non-Western, Native American eyes. Western theologians may feel uncomfortable with some of Woodley's assessment of traditional disembodied theological doctrines; anthropologists, less so. By exposing how our worldview shapes and interprets reality, it becomes clear that the cliché 'The Bible says what it means, and means what it says' is not true, if it ever was. After exposing the many problems with Western Christianity, Woodley charts a path forward, focusing more on community-centered transformation than on individualism, restoring wholeness, challenging unjust systems, and mending broken relationships. With the rise of Christian nationalism today, we need this book now more than ever, despite how uncomfortable it may make some of us feel.”
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