The Power of Unconditional Love

Overview

Gil Rendle says in the intro that this conversation with Father Greg Boyle is “one of the richest conversations I’ve ever been in.” How grateful we are to have recorded this beautiful and rich back and forth between Gil, Rev. Lisa Greenwood, Father Boyle and Rev. Justin Coleman! Father Boyle’s approach to gang intervention rehabilitation and re-entry at his organization Homeboy Industries is not really about providing services, although they do provide holistic services from education to tattoo removal. The real heart of the work is relationship and creating a culture of kinship, tenderness, and joy. Boyle returns again and again to the heart of God and the heart of Jesus, inviting us again and again to embrace our own belovedness and everyone else’s belovedness.

In this conversation, you’ll hear:

• Gil shares the difference between the work of improving and the work of creating (1:00)
  

• The short game of trying experiments and the long game of deep institutional work (4:45)
  

• Father Boyle’s vocational journey that led him to start Homeboy Industries (16:41)
  

• Providing services vs being in relationship (23:00)
  

• The theology that guides Father Boyle (32:00)
  

• When there is so much grief and pain, how do you not get caught up in a constant cycle of desolation? (37:00)
  

• Creating a culture of the Gospel (42:00)
  

• Why Father Boyle says “Gang members have taught me everything of value.” (51:00)