Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Richard Land Must Go
Now we have a chance to see what the Religious Right is made of--if it truly stands for ethics and values, as its leaders profess, or whether its leaders can continue to engage in gutter politics and get away with it....
Peace in the valley
I write this after almost 23 hours of wakefulness, almost 14 of them spent in airplanes and airports. But I also write with gratitude.I'm in Honolulu, of all places, for a meeting of the Baptist World Alliance...
Faith in America: Believers on Pilgrimage
The Los Angeles Times recently featured a new study from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. The results offer a snapshot of faith in America--although "home movie," might be a more accurate description of the...
New Baptist Covenant: Process More Important than Product
Baptists of North America recently participated of a true Baptist gathering called "Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant." Judging by the name the organizers chose, they seem to believe at least two things about...
SBC Leader Uses Obscene Slur to Describe Jewish Senator
A Southern Baptist leader lecturing at Criswell College used a gutter word to describe a Jewish U.S. senator. During the Jan. 29-31 Criswell Theological Lectures at the Dallas school, Richard Land, president of the...
Shoulders on which I stand
Writing was a creative outlet for me, not a contemplated career move. That is, until my friend William T. (Bill) Neal III started giving me writing assignments when I was doing campus ministry at Georgia Tech.His...
Jailhouse flock
Nobody puts 'em away like the U.S.A.That's the mind-boggling gist of a new study showing that more than one in 100 American adults are currently in jail. That's 2,319,258 jailbirds, at an average annual cost of more...
United Methodists Join Anti-Torture Campaign
WASHINGTON--The United Methodist Church's social policy office is circulating a petition that tells President Bush, a fellow church member, that torture is immoral and ineffective. The petition cites the Methodists'...
The Faith of Jesus Refuses the Politics of Fear
On Sept. 11, 2001, Americans entered into a daily existence that much of the world already experienced; living with the continual threat of terrorism. Yet, since that tragic day, we have been gripped by the oppressive...
Advocate Says Theology of Submission Hampers Southern Baptist Response to Sexual Abuse by Clergy
The Southern Baptist Convention will have a hard time addressing either the problem of sexual abuse by clergy or domestic violence as long as its leaders persist in the theological view that women are subject to men, a...
IRS Investigating United Church of Christ Over Obama Speech
The Internal Revenue Service is investigating whether a speech last summer by Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama to a United Church of Christ national meeting violated rules for tax-exempt charities...
A true pioneer lost
News that Larry Norman died last Sunday — at the very young age of 60 — was shocking. He was a true pioneer of what grew into the popular genre known as Contemporary Christian Music.In 1969, Norman recorded his first...
Pray or Prey: Take Your Pick
I was listening to NPR the other day and learned of a prayer movement called Light the Highway that runs prayer vigils along Interstate 35 from Texas to Minnesota. The group asks God to do away with systemic poverty,...
Richard Land Misrepresents Baptist Groups
A Southern Baptist official who has been a frequent critic of the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant inaccurately attacked the Celebration and those present for not focusing on evangelism. Richard Land, president of...
Legislator Featured in ‘Golden Rule Politics’ Running for Congress
A Missouri legislator and pastor's wife who appears in a Baptist Center for Ethics DVD about faith and politics is running for Congress. Two-term Missouri State Representative Judy Baker announced Monday she is seeking...
Americans practice fluid faith
A massive study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life has found that the religious landscape of the U.S. is shifting beneath our feet. The results should not be surprising to those who keep an eye on religious...
Study Says Baptists Losing Ground in America’s Religious Landscape
Americans are leaving Baptist churches at nearly twice the rate that others are joining them, according to details of a study released Monday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. The U.S. Religious Landscape...
Don’t Worry, Live Abundantly
Midway through the Sermon on the Mount there is the passage from Matthew 6:25, "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear."...
Global Warming Worsens, New Ethic Needed
Global warming is worse now than when I first wrote about it in my out-of-print book, Loving Neighbors Across Time: A Christian Guide to Protecting the Earth, published in late 1991. Scientific evidence is more...
How does one celebrate a 400th anniversary?
At Baptists Today, we are busy planning a special April edition and a big celebration on April 3 to mark the 25th anniversary of this uniquely independent, national news journal. It is staggering, however, to think of...
Article Says Preacher Charged With Killing Wife a Sexual Predator
A Texas magazine is reporting that a former Baptist pastor accused of murdering his wife and staging it to look like she committed suicide has a long trail of allegations of sexual abuse. A 9,500-word cover story in...