I know very little about my family history, partly because it is so complicated. My ancestors came to Canada and the United States from Scotland, England, Sweden and Germany (and who knows where else). It’s easy to get tangled up…
An American Taliban?
Has the Christian Right morphed into an American version of the Taliban? Are these folks trying to transform America into a fundamentalist theocracy? Don’t they talk about making the Bible the law of the land? Don’t they speak of “taking…
‘The Sin of Certainty:’ Peter Enns’ journey from belief to trust
Like most seminary professors in the 1970s, Bill Treadwell wrote a lot of stuff on the blackboard, but I only remember two simple messages. The first day of class, he strode to the board, picked up a piece of chalk…
Do not despise the day of small things
Then he said to me, “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: Not by might, not by power, but by my Spirit, saith the LORD of hosts.” … For whoever has despised the day of small things shall…
The African-American roots of Bonhoeffer’s Christianity
By Alan Bean Dietrich Bonhoeffer was the only prominent Christian in Germany to grasp the hideous spiritual implications of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis from the outset. Martin Niemoller’s famous ”first they came for” litany sketched out a typical pattern…
Forgiveness breaks the Devil’s back
Fresh from wrestling with the Devil through forty days and forty nights, Jesus shows up in his home church of Nazareth and uses the ancient words of the prophet Isaiah to lay down his manifesto: The Spirit of the Lord…
Dylann Roof and the sound of silence
Fools said I, You do not know Silence like a cancer grows. The slaughter of nine innocent people gathered for prayer at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., was horrific, deplorable, sickening, cruel and heartless. It was not senseless.
How corporate America changed our religion: A review of “One Nation Under God” by Kevin Kruse
One Nation Under God could change the way we think about civil religion in America. Forget about the 1970s, or even the 1950s, Kevin Kruse says, this story begins in the heart of the Depression. Exiles from the Southern Baptist Convention who…
When God changes His mind*
It wouldn’t be the first time, you know. If Fox News wants to see what “fair and balanced” looks like they should check out National Public Radio. You know the folks at the helm are left of center, but they…