As Mike Johnson ascended to the House of Representative speaker’s chair in October 2023, he quickly showed off his evangelical Christian faith. He led the GOP caucus in prayer at a press conference, declared during his acceptance remarks in the House chamber that God…
‘Loyal to the oil’ – how religion and striking it rich shape Canada’s hockey fandom
Déjà vu is a common occurrence in the world of sports, and the Edmonton Oilers are no strangers to repeat matchups. The Canadian team faced off against the New York Islanders in both 1983 and ’84 for hockey’s biggest prize, the Stanley…
Pope has phone call with Putin same day Trump does
As tensions between Russia and Ukraine continue to escalate despite international efforts to broker a ceasefire, Pope Leo XIV Wednesday afternoon had a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Does Trump Actually Think He’s God?
“I’m supposed to be dead,” Donald Trump said, the day after he got shot at his rally last summer in Butler, Pennsylvania. “I’m not supposed to be here,” he said four days after that. “But something very special happened. Let’s…
He Attended Prayer Meetings in the White House. Now He’s Chairman of a Gaza Aid Group.
As the world condemned the killings this week of dozens of hungry Palestinians near U.S.-backed aid sites in Gaza, the group responsible for distributing that aid quietly appointed a new leader: an evangelical Christian with ties to the Trump administration.
‘The Ritual’ A Refreshingly Earnest (If Unoriginal) Return To The Exorcism Genre
Americans — and Hollywood studios — never seem to get tired of exorcism movies, whether it’s two starring Russell Crowe within a year of each other (“The Pope’s Exorcist” and “The Exorcism”), another “The Exorcist” sequel (“The Exorcist: Believer”), a…
PEPFAR and the Uneasy Conscience of American Christianity
We are so accustomed to seeing every public argument as a cage fight that it can be genuinely surprising to see a mind changing in the course of a conversation. On The Joe Rogan Experience last week, songwriter Bono laid out for Rogan…
Pope Leo XIV Returns to Tradition
When the monks of Canterbury Cathedral prepared Thomas Becket’s body for burial in the year 1170, they discovered a hairshirt hidden under his vestments. The British faithful considered it evidence of the martyred archbishop’s piety. G.K. Chesterton considered it symbolic of the…
Faith leaders, health care advocates arrested while protesting GOP budget bill in Capitol
A group of clergy, faith-based protesters and disability advocates were once again arrested in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on Monday (June 2) while praying against the Republican-led federal budget bill, including a wheelchair user who said potential cuts to health…
Streaming Has Killed Attention Spans, Taste and Community: Will Faith Be Next?
Across America, a growing number of people of all ages are communing with the Holy Spirit via their smartphones and laptops. Once the stuff of pews and pulpits, faith now flows through fiber optics. It’s convenient, sure. No parking, no…
Duane Rollins’s Life Testified to the Cost of Abuse
Duane Rollins died on Friday, May 23. I never met him, but his story met me when I needed to know I wasn’t crazy and I wasn’t alone.
Watching Rome from Chicagoland: Muslims measure new pope’s promise
The announcement of the first U.S.-born pope is important for all Americans but resonates especially strongly in Chicago and its larger community, known locally as Chicagoland. Born on the city’s Southside and raised in the nearby suburb of Dolton, Robert…