Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Forced Forgiveness Creates Another Layer of Abuse
The #metoo campaign has died down, but it has stayed with me. My stories, the stories I've read and the stories I've heard from people who weren't ready to share their stories in a public forum all continue to whisper...
3 Ways to Relate to Others Outside Your Faith – Part 1
Normal Christian folk are increasingly face to face with people of other faiths, especially Muslims but also with Hindus, Buddhists and others. This thought struck me as I was traveling recently through North America....
Religious Bias Motivates One-Fifth of ‘Single-Bias’ Crime
Religious bias was behind 21 percent of single-bias crimes in the U.S. in 2016, according to the FBI's 2016 Hate Crime Statistics released on Nov. 13. "A single-bias incident is defined as an incident in which one or...
November 20, 2017
86 Alabama Baptist Pastors Sign Letter Against Sex Abuse, But Don’t Mention Roy Moore (AL.com) Many Christian Conservatives are Backing Alabama’s Roy Moore (Chicago Tribune) Behind Religious Defense of Roy Moore, an...
A real horse town
Sunday at the annual Society of Biblical Literature meeting as a day of learning on many counts. If you're curious about things biblical and archaeological, keep reading ... Rather than reviewing all of the (sometimes)...
From arcane grammar to wilderness wanderings …
The annual Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) meeting offers an opportunity to hear from a broad variety of scholars addressing hundreds of topics serving an overflowing smorgasbord of interests. Sessions relate to...
What you don’t know …
An old saying claims "What you don't know can't hurt you," which is manifestly false, as anyone who's stepped in a hole they didn't know was there can attest. What you don't know can also slow you down and generally...
November 17, 2017
West Virginia Baptists ‘All In,’ Tackle Opioid Crisis (Biblical Recorder) Two Accidentally Shot at East Tennessee Church During Church Shooting Discussion (WATE) Moore, Trump and the Right’s New Religion (New York...
3 Lessons from TN Baptists’ Decision to Oust Church
The platform was stacked with white men when the members of the 143rd Tennessee Baptist Mission Board (TBMB) voted not to seat the messengers of First Baptist Church of Jefferson City. Many of the 858 messengers from...
Deborah Exemplifies Foolishness of Complementarianism
Preachers often avoid lectionary texts from Judges as they are not sure what to do with stories of violence (Samson), testing God (Gideon) and an ill-conceived vow to the Lord (Jephthah), to name only a few. It was a...
Why Some People Feel Cold or Indifferent to Your Church
Nobel-prizing winning author, Toni Morrison, assessing the times, asks this question: "Why should we want to know a stranger when it is easier to estrange another? Why should we want to close the distance when we can...
#EthicsDailyLocal: The Next Door
The Next Door (TND) provides a continuum of evidence-based services for women and their families struggling with addiction, mental illness, trauma and incarceration with Christ-centered compassionate care. The...
Ministers Have Few Resources to Help with Ethical Issues
The latter half of the 20th century witnessed a relative silence on the subject of ministerial ethics; seldom did theological seminaries offer training on the topic, and texts written on pastoral ethics were scarce....
Minorities Make Up Most of World’s Stateless Population
Minority groups currently make up more than three-quarters of the world's stateless population, according to a new United Nations report released on Nov. 3. The U.N.'s 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of...
November 16, 2017
Tiny Houses are Trendy, Unless They Go Up Next Door (ABC News) Study Connects Rise in Teen Suicide with Social Media Popularity (New York Post) Alabama Conservatives are Right: Roy Moore’s Behavior is Perfectly...
Profiles in Goodwill: Jesse Rincones
Jesse Rincones is the executive director of the Hispanic Baptist Convention of Texas. 1. Where did you grow up? Levelland, Texas (halfway between Brownfield and Littlefield). 2. What is your favorite verse, book or...
After Castro, Baptist Cuban Churches Poised for Growth
Christianity is beginning to flourish again in Cuba. This was evident during a mission trip that I took with a small group of clergy and lay leaders to Cuba through the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) in early...
‘I’m Just Not Angry Enough to Fit in with Christians’
A comment from a nearby table at a local coffee shop quickly grabbed my attention. A group of 20-somethings suddenly laughed when one of them said, "I love what Jesus was about, but I couldn't be a Christian. I'm just...
November 15, 2017
Alabama Baptists Rattled by Accusations Against Roy Moore (AL.com) Fundamentalist Home-Schoolers Think Grown Men Courting Teenage Girls is Natural (Slate) Congregation, SBC Tennessee Baptist Convention Split Over...
#EthicsDailyLocal: Center for Children and Families Inc.
The Center for Children and Families Inc. (CCFI) serves children and their families who have experienced or are at risk of experiencing child abuse, neglect and other adverse experiences. Through its strength-based...
3 Healthcare Lessons to Learn from the Lord’s Supper
I see our healthcare crisis as a crisis of communion. On Sunday mornings, when my congregation sets the table for the Lord's Supper, we set upon it loaves of bread, which we call the Body of Christ, and a cup, which we...