Clarance Goode, Jr. is innocent.He has spent nearly nineteen years on Oklahoma's death row for three murders he did not commit.No DNA. No fingerprints. No weapons. No physical evidence of any kind placing him at the Thompson house on the night of August 25, 2005. What the state had was the word of a woman who had threatened her brother's life and was never charged, the word of a man who told police he was blacking out on a drug cocktail the night of the killings, and bullet...

There is no clean way to take a human life.For a century, we have pretended otherwise. The rope became the chair. The chair became the gas chamber. The gas chamber became the needle. Each method was sold as more humane than the last. Each one proved to be a lie.Now, Idaho has made the firing squad its primary method of execution. The first state in modern history to do so.Somewhere south of Boise sits a chair with straps for the ankles, the waist and the arms. Facin...

On August 18, 2026, the State of Florida executed William Silvia. The Rev. Dr. Jeff Hood was in the chamber. His hand was on Will's leg when the poison started.William heard voices. Conversations constantly all around him, and nobody was ever there. In 2012, this very sick man asked the State of Florida to help him die faster. The State said yes and held him to it for fourteen years.Nobody Is There collects seven essays written by Hood in real time...from the signi...

Dennis Sochor was scheduled to die at Florida State Prison. The state called him condemned. Scripture says otherwise.In these six pieces, author, activist, and death row spiritual advisor Jeff Hood accompanies Dennis through his final days...a man who refused a last meal so he could fast and pray, who renamed the gurney his "journey gurney," who gave away everything he owned while the state prepared to take the only thing left. Kept from the execution chamber by a deadline Dennis n...

When Alabama carried out the first execution by nitrogen hypoxia in January 2024, officials promised the public a humane, painless death.Jeff Hood was in the execution chamber. A priest who has accompanied condemned men to their final moments, Hood witnessed the nation's newest method of execution firsthand. What he saw—and what he documents here—stands in stark contrast to the assurances offered by government officials.Part eyewitness testimony, part legal history, part in...

The path Rev. Dr. Jeff Hood took is a long way from the ministry he imagined when he was ordained as a Southern Baptist minister at The Rock Baptist Church in Rex, Georgia, in June 12, 2006. Since then, he's marched in protests, attended twelve executions, become a priest in the Old Catholicism tradition, and written countless sermons, op-eds, and blog posts about love and justice.This collection celebrates the twentieth year of his ordained ministry by anthologizing twenty pieces ...

Dusty Ray Spencer was seventy-four years old. He was a Marine. He was a man Florida decided to kill.Too Old to Kill is Jeff Hood's real-time chronicle of the final weeks before Spencer's execution on June 25, 2026...the oldest person put to death in Florida's modern history. It moves from legal argument to open letter to sermon to grief. It shows a case built on a death sentence imposed without a jury...on mental illness the state's own experts could not dispute...on a man...

Homelessness is not just a social problem. It is a theological location.We have built entire theologies around buildings, budgets, and belonging. We have almost none built around not having a place to lay your head.In Matthew 25, Jesus does not say "you served the homeless." He says, "you served me." That small shift changes everything.The Least of These is a collection of essays by Dan Kiniry and Jeff Hood, two theologians...

Everything was quiet. Small towns are known to move a little slower. Grand Saline, Texas, was no different. In the midst of such a pace, United Methodist pastor, Rev. Charles Moore, got out of his car at Dollar General, doused his body with gasoline, and torched himself. In time, it became apparent that Charles died due to a deep concern about issues of social justice. The notes are very explicit. In the midst of great evil, Charles knew that resurrection is not possible without death. The...

Psychosis has taken over. God's brain is gone. There is no cure. There is only God. There is only us. The Psychosis of God is about exploring the divine through the mentally ill amongst us. The image of our creator is the only tool we have for liberating God. The prison of our normative expectations steals our capacity for divine connection. Wake up! The mentally ill God is here to set the captives free. Think right! Perfection is now found in defection. Look out! Crazy is the only way out...

On November 18, 1978, over 900 people died in Jonestown, Guyana. Some perished willingly and others did not. Regardless of the means, Rev. Jim Jones was the killer. Though evil reigned, the community did not die alone. God was there. In this exegesis of their last words, you will discover a faint light. It will guide you home.

The Cathedral is a work of fiction. These are the wild encounters of a minister named Christian. From Mississippi to Texas, this is a tale of Jesus and sex. I'm sure you will find it an incredible religious experience. Though any resemblance to reality is purely coincidental, I'm sure many will find the people and places of these pages very familiar.