The loudest voices want you to believe the only way forward is to pick a side and dig in. Jesus shows us another way.

In this episode, Bishop Wright has a conversation with Bishop Sarah Fisher, 9th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of East Carolina, about a different kind of strength: the courage to stay centered on Jesus when everything around you begs for distraction. Bishop Sarah shares what it feels like to begin a brand-new bishop with 66 worshipping communities. They get honest about labels, social media noise, and why identity can be both something to honor and something that cannot be the headline. The headline, if we’re reading the bible right, is that Jesus is Lord and the Church is called to witness to good news in the 21st century.

They dig into why church matters right now, when people feel worn down by division, war, and purposelessness, and start looking again for meaning and community. From Flannery O’Connor’s “truth makes you odd” to Walter Brueggemann’s “dangerously odd,” they explore how Christian leadership offers an alternative to the status quo without doing harm. They close with a shared anchor verse, Ephesians 3:20, and the invitation to stay astounded by what God can do “infinitely more than we can ask or imagine.” Listen in for the full conversation.

In no particular order, Bishop Fisher loves Jesus, the Church, organization and congregational development, poetry, Holy Scripture, her family in all of its delightful and quirky forms, thrift stores, singing, practicing and teaching yoga, vegetables, laughter, playing in the kitchen and sharpie markers.

She hopes to love, in as much as it is possible, the way that Jesus loves; to serve the Church with fierce compassion and care; to learn as long as it’s possible. She seeks to see and respond to the needs of the world, specifically with an eye to racial injustice; to love those who the world casts to the margins; to use her voice to heal and never harm.

Bishop Fisher is a native of Athens, Georgia and has served parishes in the Diocese of Chicago and the Diocese of Atlanta. She and her spouse and best beloved, Mandy, who is an Episcopal priest, live in New Bern, where they frequently function as human tennis ball dispensers to their two black labs, Bayton and Maggie.

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