Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
‘Thou Shalt Laugh’
Hollywood has issued the 11th commandment: Thou shalt laugh. That's also the title of a DVD, released today, featuring seven comedians—all Christians—delivering some of their best stuff. "Thou Shalt Laugh," hosted by...
Court Filing Says Tennessee Baptist Exec Recommended Belmont Charter Change
Belmont University filed an amended charter allowing it to elect its own trustees four days in advance of the 2005 Tennessee Baptist Convention because the convention's executive director told it to, according to a...
Religious Right, White House Seek Distance from Haggard Scandal
Religious Right leaders and the White House distanced themselves from fallen leader Ted Haggard, touted last year by a national magazine as one of America's 25 most influential evangelicals because of his access to the...
Embryonic Theology
Across the nation embryonic stem cell research garners media attention and political discussion. Numerous religious leaders have jumped into the debate. In <Missouri the issue remains especially contentious leading...
Unnecessary Divisions in the Body of Christ
With mid-term elections just a day away, every political action group in America is working full throttle to get out the vote for their candidate, party and favorite issue. Not least among these politically active are...
Voting Baptist Convictions
It is election time again and we have a civic responsibility at the ballot box. Notice the word "civic." When we step into that voting booth, what values and vision will guide our hand? Every Baptist grounded in...
BCE Director Addresses Faith and Politics on Election Eve
The Religious Right has too long claimed that the Republican Party was the only party of God, said Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics, said on the eve of Tuesday's mid-term election "The...
BCE Breaks Technological Ground, Posts Videos to YouTube
The Baptist Center for Ethics has become what appears to be the first Christian organization to post its videos on YouTube, once again using cutting-edge technology to inform and empower churches and Christians....
Report Alleges Cover-Up of Pedophile by Baptist Church
A TV station in Jacksonville, Fla., reports that leaders in a prominent Baptist church in the city knew for years their former pastor was a pedophile, but covered it up for fear public knowledge would harm the church's...
Missouri Baptists Protest Wal-Mart’s Outreach to Gays, Hint at Boycott
The Missouri Baptist Convention passed a resolution Wednesday protesting "pro-homosexual" policies by Wal-Mart and urging the state's Baptists to "exercise moral stewardship" in where they shop, a phrase leaders...
What I Learned from Tommy
Tommy, not his real name, was a good friend of mine. We met in the '80s at our local Southern Baptist Church, where I served as a deacon and Sunday school teacher. At the time we were both young, single and took our...
Zero Tolerance for Political Attack Ads
If you believe what Harold Ford Jr. and the Democrats are saying, Bob Corker is millionaire booster of big oil companies, was an irresponsible mayor of Chattanooga who allowed 911 calls to go unanswered, and made a...
Evangelical Support for War Slipping
Evangelical support for the war in Iraq has slipped sharply in the last month, according to a recent survey. A study released last Thursday by the Pew Research Center for The People & the Press found roughly six in...
After Halloween
The appearance of Halloween candy on convenience-store counters and supermarket shelves usually coincides with the arrival of crisp autumn mornings, an extra hour of sleep, and a vast array of costumes and pumpkin...
Missouri Baptist Leader Warns Muslims Want to Take Over America
A Southern Baptist leader in Missouri believes Muslims are plotting to take over the United States, according to a newspaper report of the opening session of the Missouri Baptist Convention. "The real threat we are...
BGCT Probe Finds Evidence of Misspent Funds
Three church planters received $1.3 million between 1999 and 2005 from the Baptist General Convention of Texas to start 258 churches in the Rio Grande Valley, only five of which appear to remain active, according to a...
Falwell Terms Clergy Sex-Abuse Case ‘Bump in the Road’
Jerry Falwell called high-profile allegations that a former pastor of a prominent independent Baptist church molested and raped numerous children over the course of decades a "bump in the road." "When you hit a bump in...
A Christian Response to Tennessee’s Racial Mudslinging
Republicans have triggered their "Southern Strategy" in the Tennessee Senate race, as evidenced by a bare-shouldered white woman--an actress playing a blond Playboy bunny, who winks and whispers for African-American...
Voting is More Than a Civic Duty
One more week and it will all be over! All the campaign ads, the mudslinging, the distortions, the character attacks—after next Tuesday it will all end, and we can get back to other things; we can have our televisions...
BGCT Head Pledges Accountability in Possible Funding Scandal
The chief executive of the Baptist General Convention of Texas promised to hold accountable any parties accused of wrongdoing in an internal probe of possible misuse of church-starting funds scheduled to be unveiled to...
Compassion, Justice, Needed to Fight Poverty, Ethicists Say
While Christians can do much to fight global poverty through compassionate ministries of relief and development, ethicists agree the long-term solution is economic justice. "Charity is feeding people when they are...