iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Look at the stars, see how they shine for you, and all the emails you choose ... and it was all ... wait, what? Blue?! What the actual, Gmail! Some of us need pschological preparation for that level of visual disruption.

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

My @abdndivinity.bsky.social PhD "The Power of the Bible in Bill Johnson’s “Normal Christian Life”” has gone live! A case study in charismatic theological interpretation – which, as work by @matthewdtaylor.bsky.social & others shows, is...consequential. abdn.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/44...

Abstract
This thesis explores the theme and deployment of biblical power in the de facto theological interpretation of Scripture practiced by celebrity neocharismatic megapastor Bill Johnson. For Christians confessing the Bible to be a medium of God’s Word, it is variously understood as discursively authoritative, spiritually transformative and supernaturally efficacious. Johnson expressly celebrates and lays claim to all of these dimensions of biblical power in his proposals for “the normal Christian life,” shaped by and influentially shaping the stance and practice of individuals and communities in the fastest-growing sector of the church around the world. I apply insights and recommendations of the scholarly Theological Interpretation of Scripture (TIS) movement to describe Johnson’s implied doctrine of Scripture and anthropology of the reader on the one hand and his observed interpretive practices on the other. However, I meanwhile demonstrate the TIS movement to be lacking in attention to structural sin and inadequate to critique epistemologically costly and socially dominating effects of power, including within its own proposals. I therefore draw on a bricolage of critical perspectives to help interrogate arrogations of power and epistemological blinkers in TIS scholarship as well as Johnson’s popular writings. My aim in doing so is to clarify some specific needs for “better” theological interpretation in communities formed by and formative of Johnson whilst keeping in view that the general need is by no means unique to such communities. In particular, I argue that the Bible in Johnson’s “normal Christian life” is captive to a societally-ubiquitous “positive thinking” ideology that preserves structures of domination and enables abuses of power in and by Christian communities. By way of response, I propose a critical retrieval of the often-weaponised confession of the transcendence of the mediated Word, and a renewed cultivation of interruptibility – including …

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

There’s something about dominionist visions of “social transformation” that make me think of Sapphira. Her actions are very pragmatic…but she fails to recognise the “radically new order” on display in the Spirit-filled community (to quote Willie James Jennings's wonderful Acts commentary).

DEEDS

you have not come to a mountain that can be
bought
or sold or let or leveraged
or hedged

or conquered and divided and apportioned

to a survey rectangle
a quarter section meted out and monumented
for your private exercise

sapphira
standing on your mountain like you own it
sister
split before it exegetes you

every man a priest and king
and to his seed a separate sleeping room
“as much as he so cultivates he doth
enclose it from the common”
to the nearest millimeter

fill your fragment and subdue it
to the nearest millimeter
over everything that moves upon the
nearest millimeter

you have heard it said
“his personality can be expressed through *things*”

sapphira
for a take in kind
is that your final answer?

carolyn (whitnall), 2021

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

A poem about understanding. It's dicey.

CRASH TEST SEMIOTICS

your body stands to somebody for something
stupid

hate to be the one to break [it to] you but
your body stands
a multitude

you do not mean
as little as you think

your body sinks
REFUSE REDUCE REUSE REPAIR REPURPOSE
put the rags between your armpits and the ropes
and we will get you

[out] in no time

everybody will be
“pleased to meet you”
in the place of meeting

we have set up signs for signs for signs for signs for
signs
for what
we do not see our
signs
there is no longer any prophet body standing
[for you]
multiplying kisses

i mean more to you than i intended
clearly
drown me in the surplus
and your children and their children after them and
send me down inchoate

nobody would fault you for it

(carolyn whitnall, 2021)

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

“Text generators are merely learning to predict the next probable word in a sentence and the next probable sentence in a paragraph.” (@karenhao.bsky.social, #EmpireOfAI) Profoundly unimpressed that we've replaced technology designed to inform with technology designed to *sound* informed.

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

The quantity of data supposedly encoded in those watch hands suspended my adulation of Nolan for just long enough to notice that my favourite ever director was disappointingly androcentric and plausibly authoritarian and I’ve avoided his films ever since with all the dedication of a “let down” fan.

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

A poem about understanding. It's dicey.

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

That’s twice in a week I’ve found myself behind a mic. The first time I quoted the wisdom of Octonauts. The second, Frozen 2. Nice to know I’m putting the PhD to good use 😅

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

When Gary’s “tax wealth, not work” meets Paul’s “your labour is not in vain…” Glad of an opportunity to guest blog about the brilliant @garyseconomics.bsky.social & what Christians can learn from his call for a “relentless & aggressive pursuit of common ground & unity." substack.com/@whitnall/p-...

substack.com

From Garys Economics to Paul’s Apocalyptics: Thinking Theologically About Wealth Inequality

Guest contribution from Dr Carolyn Whitnall

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

Some thoughts about the costs of allowing Alpha’s “Why Jesus?” to dominate how the UK Christian mainstream understands atonement. substack.com/home/post/p-...

substack.com

The Far Right, Christian Unity, and the Need for Better Answers to “Why Jesus?”

A guest blog from Dr Carolyn Whitnall

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Reposted by Carolyn Whitnall

William Temple Foundation @williamtemplefdn.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

'People...need a place to go with our grief that is neither hatred, nor despair … nor either the immobilising self-deception of obligatory positivity that the Christian mainstream all too often seems to mean by “hope.”' @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social: williamtemplefoundation.org.uk/the-bright-s...

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William Temple Foundation @williamtemplefdn.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

NEW BLOG: @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social examines lament, marketed Christianity, and 'positive thinking' in The Bright Side and the Rise of the Far Right Read here: williamtemplefoundation.org.uk/the-bright-s...

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Mthr Rosemary Hill @mthrrosehill.bsky.social · 19/03/2025

Regularly told I’m silly, that ‘nobody takes it seriously’, ‘it won’t happen here’ etc etc. because I have real concerns about the rise of the far right here in the UK. Where our treasure is that’s where our heart is.

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 02/02/2025

A sonnet for the Feast of the Presentation, celebrated 40 days after Christmas. #Candlemas

THE SACRIFICE IN THE TEMPLE

I saw the preparation of my death
And life, lie crying, cradled in the arms
Of maiden motherhood. I heard alarms
And consolations with each wailing breath,
And recognised that many, wise and fools,
Would fall … and many rise; an issued sign
To bring to light the heart of the Divine,
And to lay bare the "reasoning animals."
Blood and fire and balm ascending with
A forescent; I could taste the moment; feel
The coming counteract, like sharpened steel –
For who could stand the take of such a gift?
But I, among the hoping, holding fast
The word, rejoiced to see it flesh at last.

Carolyn Whitnall

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 29/11/2024

Advent is coming.

THIS HOUSE

Oh come, oh come Emmanuel, and hurl
Our order into holy disarray:
Upend the tables where we wheel and deal,
And scatter our accrued prosperity.
Awake us, dancer on the dancing deep,
From placid slumber; rock the boat; disturb
The peace that we content ourselves to keep,
And make us see the chaos we transfer.
Confound our clarity, cut short our too long
Prayers, take back the narrative and heckle
Sermons preached to itching ears. Throw down
Each stone in every separating wall.
Do what you’re here to do … but, come what may,
Rebuild the ruins of us, please – and stay.

(Carolyn Whitnall, 2019)

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Reposted by Carolyn Whitnall

Stop Funding Heat @stopfundingheat.bsky.social · 15/11/2024

Get out your absolute TINIEST violin: Nigel Farage is personally upset that advertisers don't want to fund his channel of division, disinformation and far-right conspiracy theories 🥺😢🎻

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Carolyn Whitnall @carolynwhitnall.bsky.social · 15/11/2024

Wrote a thing about church that made it into The Other Journal. Feels even more so right now. "i am in it to my neck belovèd as the water rises tell me that you notice tell me we are not ok with this" theotherjournal.com/2024/07/eccl...

theotherjournal.com

Ecclesiography - The Other Journal

i lay and listened to the rain last night it felt a bit like sleep and they were there in torrents laughing that i put my hand up to my sin at four “adorable” (i couldn’t win) j...

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