Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
The Call of Justice
The historical documents of our nation are filled with poetic language. "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by...
Lawsuit Says Church Failed to Protect Children from Pedophile Sunday School Teacher
A lawsuit filed Tuesday claims a Southern Baptist church in Amarillo, Texas, was warned that a Sunday school teacher and paid childcare worker was a pedophile, and yet did nothing to keep kids safe. Parents identified...
Religion Plays a Surprising Role in ‘The Simpsons’
ORLANDO, Fla.(Religion & Ethics Newsweekly) They're silly, often irreverent, and sometimes downright wicked. But "The Simpsons" may also be one of the most interesting examinations of religion in contemporary pop...
How Do We Think about Evil?
The quick answer is that we seldom think about evil. If we do, we mostly projected it upon others. We almost never think about evil as something that our own nation does. No, if evil surfaces in our country, it is some...
America Pays $200,000 Per Minute in Iraq, Humanitarian Crisis Worsens
Every minute the United States government spends $200,000 in Iraq, as human suffering worsens, not counting the violence of suicide bombers and roadside bombs. So, where is the United States spending its tax revenue in...
IMB Prayer Guides Target Faith Groups
Years after interfaith leaders criticized the Southern Baptist Convention for producing prayer guides targeting adherents of other religions for conversion, the denomination's International Mission Board continues to...
Critics Say U.S. Farm Policy Benefits Wealthy, Call for Reform
Born as part of FDR's New Deal to protect struggling farmers coming out of the Great Depression from unpredictable weather and fluctuating crop prices, America's farm program has evolved today into the largest form of...
No Baptist Left Behind
A year ago, the Southern Baptist Convention issued a resolution urging churches and parents "to investigate their public schools to determine, among other things, whether they are endangering children in their care by...
Evangelical Leaders Challenge Unconditional Support for Israel
Evangelical leaders including a former ethics professor at a Southern Baptist seminary issued an open letter to President Bush challenging the notion that all American evangelicals are uncritically pro-Israel. Signed...
Jesus’ Most Distressing Disguise
"Donne-moi." (Give me). "Kusaidia" (Help.) I hear these two phrases a dozen or more times a day in the Democratic Republic of Congo. "Mzungu, donne-moi cinq cent francs." Give me a dollar. "Kusaidia, Mama." Help me,...
Credentials for the Kingdom of God
Jesus speaks community into existence and warns against all things that separate us from community. When Jesus is asked, "What is the greatest commandment?" he says: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your...
Why We Need to Encourage Women in Their Call to Ministry
I am looking forward to a day retreat this week in the heart of the Lancashire countryside. The North West Baptist Association has invited women ministers together, to reflect in peaceful surroundings on common issues...
Paper Withdraws Claim That Dobson is a Harry Potter Fan
A major newspaper backed away from declaring Focus on the Family founder James Dobson a fan of Harry Potter, despite articles on Dobson's Web site which fellow fundamentalists have long attacked as "conditional...
Prof Questions if Christian Right is Biblical
The Southern Baptist Convention controversy of the 1980s and 1990s was supposed to be over inerrancy--the view that the Bible in its original form (called the "autographs")--is literally true. But a University of...
White House Opposes Expansion of Insurance Program for Low-Income Kids
President Bush has threatened to veto proposed expansion of a program for families who earn too much for Medicaid but cannot afford insurance for their children, to be financed by an increase in the federal tax on...
The Offense of Fantasy
With seven bestsellers in the series, and five blockbuster movies, like it or not, Harry Potter is here to stay. And there are those who are not happy about that. Many Christian parents and church leaders fear that...
A Christian Response to ‘Acts of God’
"All your waves and billows have gone over me." (Ps. 42:7) The Psalmist was referring to a spiritual state of abandonment, using terms reflecting a sense of helplessness in the face of events beyond human control. The...
What Does It Mean to Be Reconciled?
If there's one thing I've learned from Congo, it's that most aspects of human nature are universal. Sometimes this place seems like another world altogether, but again and again I'm reminded that we're really not all...
European Baptist Leader Says British Baptists Should Apologize for Slavery
The head of the European Baptist Federation criticized British Baptists for failure to apologize for slavery at a recent Baptist World Alliance gathering to pursue racial reconciliation in Accra, Ghana. In a letter to...
Should Jesus Have Given Pharisees Equal Time in the Sermon on the Mount?
"Fair and balanced" is the trademarked moniker of Fox News Channel. The phrase is also in the title of Al Franken's 2003 book "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right." President...
International Baptists Protest Arrest of Pastor in Azerbaijan
The leader of Baptists in the central Asian republic of Azerbaijan has requested international support for a pastor arrested during a worship service May 20. Zaur Balayev, 44, is being held on charges of "violent...