Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Churches Must Move Beyond Sunday-Morning Huddle
One of the final plays in Super Bowl XLIX will be discussed for a long time – the decision in the Seattle Seahawk's huddle to pass rather than run the football on the 1-yard line. That decision resulted in a...
Some Beliefs That Matter Don’t Matter to Everyone
Conversations among pilgrims along the faith journey can lead to interesting insights about the ebb and flow of things that matter. It isn't unusual to hear a veteran traveler say, "I used to believe (fill in the...
Churches Warm Up to Climate Change
When climate change protesters marched on Wall Street last September, their charge was to bring attention to a global urgency that requires a deep and abiding transformation of the way we think about, invest in and...
February 10, 2015
New York Church Taking Walmart to Court Over Gun Sales (Forbes) In Search of the Great American Bible (The New Yorker) Christian Group Fires Woman for Not Making Efforts 'oo Reconcile Her Marriage' and Now She Can't...
You Can’t Be a Disciple Until You First Become One
William Cumpiano is a Massachusetts luthier, which is a general term for a maker of stringed instruments. Someone who makes violins or dulcimers is a luthier. Cumpiano builds guitars and is the co-author of...
Why You Need to Free Your Stifled Imagination
We leave the imagination stuff to children – imaginary friends and Peter Pan's epic imaginary food fight come to mind. Certainly, higher thinkers and wise adults would have moved past imagination to knowledge. This is...
George Whitefield: From Humble Origin to Famed Preacher
In the fading light of a cool autumn evening, 25-year-old evangelist George Whitefield ascended a platform on Boston Common on Oct. 12, 1740. Before him stood 20,000 people. If the crowd estimates were reasonably...
February 9, 2015
Alabama Pastor Sees Same-Sex Marriage as Part of Civil Rights Struggle (LA Times) Creationists: To Dismiss Unicorns Found in Bible as Mythical Animals 'is to Demean God's Word' (Raw Story) The Little-Known Relationship...
Idealism — or faith greater than mine?
By John Pierce Yesterday, when reporting on the Islamic State’s continuous barbarism, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer discussed claims that an American hostage had been killed in Jordanian airstrikes. The conversations were...
Are they really working?
I allow my students to use laptop computers in class because I want them to take good notes, and most people can type faster and more legibly than they can write by hand. Though I warn them against it at the beginning...
Resolution Seeks Greater Religious Tolerance in Europe
The Council of Europe has adopted a new resolution calling for more acceptance of religious pluralism. The council is a human rights organization that promotes cooperation between European countries and "advocates...
Why Christians Can’t Change Culture Through Politics
Unless we've had the experience of living outside our culture for some time, we may not be aware of the particularities of our culture and have some difficulty articulating what distinguishes our own culture from any...
How Your Church Can Support Healthy Minds
We're facing a mental health crisis in this country. It's a problem that's been growing for a long time. Since the 1950s, publicly funded psychiatric care has dwindled, and the availability of hospital beds for...
February 6, 2015
Ashes to Go: Church Offers Drive-thru Ash Wednesday (Shreveport Times) Why Huntsville's First Seventh-Day Adventist Church is Starting a Sunday Service (Huntsville Times) Obama Praises Dalai Lama at Prayer Breakfast...
Baptist Vision for Church Abolishes Secular Life
Baptists did away with various traditional distinctions of Christian life in their beginnings. Although practicing ordination, we denied it established any set-apart hierarchy within the life of the church. We also...
Why Creation Out of Nothing is Essential Doctrine
Every once in a while, I meet someone who, while exhibiting every sign of being a true Christian, denies the traditional Christian doctrine of "creatio ex nihilo" – creation out of nothing. This belief that God is...
Why All Companies Should Pay the Taxes They Owe
Tax collectors had a pretty bad name in New Testament times. And perhaps rightly so. At the time, taxation represented subordination and injustice – collected by a Roman regime stripping wealth from the territories...
February 5, 2015
College Freshmen are Leaning Away from Religion (Wall Street Journal) Bible Will Not Become State Book of Mississippi (WMC Action News 5) 4000-Strong Christian Militia Forms to Fight ISIS in Northern Iraq (Newsweek)...
Can Christianity Be Reformed?
Pope Francis was recently asked about his process of reforming the Roman Curia and said that true renewal is the result "of the reform of the heart." Three important ideas emerge from the pope's understanding of reform...
Why Some Think Church Buildings Are a Waste of Space
I heard a pastor once emphasize the need for a "theology of place." His statement was a reaction to a discussion about Emergence Christianity, a movement within the faith with a particular aversion to buildings and...
Nigerian Baptists React to Kerry’s Visit Ahead of Election
With voters in Nigeria set to vote in a presidential election later this month, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry flew into the nation last week. His visit came amid violent attacks by the terrorist group Boko Haram,...