When parents search the internet for “how to make sure your child is safe at summer camp,” about 84,900,000 Google results appear. Most of the links are lists of tips parents can keep in mind when sending children away for…
Josh Butler isn’t done talking about God and sex yet
When The Gospel Coalition and The Keller Center scapegoated Josh Butler due to his article about sex and the church — an excerpt taken from his Beautiful Union book they previously hailed as “the Protestant magnum opus on sexual ethics we’ve been waiting for”…
Stuck in the middle with Jesus: The future of C.S. Lewis evangelicalism
Since the 2016 election, pundits, preachers and politicians have been asking why more than 80% of white evangelical voters threw their support behind the most corrupt, ill-informed, vulgar and intentionally divisive politician in American history. Gradually, a consensus emerged. Donald…
Charles Stanley shaped Christian broadcasting and the Southern Baptist Convention
Charles Frazier Stanley, one of the best-known Southern Baptist preachers of the 20th century, died April 18 at age 90. Raised in the Pentecostal tradition, Stanley was ordained to ministry by a Southern Baptist church as a young man, then…
Tennessee Legislature passes another bill promoting atheism
I graduated high school in East Tennessee in 1984. My senior thesis was about George Orwell’s haunting apocalyptic novel 1984. In the 1940s, Orwell projected a future where an oppressive empire exercised authoritarian control presided over by an entity known…
I’m about to be a Pandemic University graduate; here’s what that means
In May 2021, Bo Burnham released the Netflix special Inside, a film self-created by Burnham during the COVID-19 pandemic quarantine. The film includes music and skits that cover an array of topics, including the psychological deterioration Burnham and many others…
DeSantis and Florida Legislature want to control pretty much everyone
Hardly a constituency or demographic in Florida has escaped the legislative onslaught of Gov. Ron DeSantis and his Republican supermajority in the statehouse. Over the past year, bills have been introduced or signed to impose strict controls on public and…
Preston Sprinkle’s strange interview with Sheila Gregoire and Rebecca Lindenbach
Ten days after defending his decision to endorse Josh Butler’s controversial book about Jesus, marriage and sex, Preston Sprinkle released a Theology in the Raw interview with Sheila Gregoire and Rebecca Lindenbach where he continued to prioritize the perspective of men. But this time,…
A Baptist’s guide to disaffiliation in other Christian traditions
While the Southern Baptist Convention — the nation’s largest non-Catholic denomination — has been in the news lately for removing churches from its fellowship, The United Methodist Church — the nation’s second-largest non-Catholic denomination — keeps making headlines as churches…
Let’s show Christian kindness to LGBTQ people and their advocates
Several years ago, when I was a professor at a Baptist university, a student told me he had encouraged a gay Christian friend to come talk with me. He assured him I was compassionate, understanding and non-judgmental. It wasn’t long…
In the Nashville shooting, talk of gender and mental health interrupt the conversation about guns
Confusion over the gender identity of the Nashville school shooter has allowed some commentators to flip the script and blame mental illness, not guns, for the death of three 9-year-olds and three adults at Covenant Day School last week. U.S….
Of Lent, Beth Moore and the role of women in church leadership
Our Lenten journey begins with ashes, followed by 40 disciplined days of charitable giving, fasting and prayer, trekking through an interior wilderness, waiting on grace, hoping it leads us back to God. On the evening of Ash Wednesday, though, I…