Recently a pair of mourning doves chose a high shelf on the front of our home to build their nest. They flew back and forth for days, twigs in their beaks, cooing excitedly. When the delicate construction was complete, it…
Progression or regression: Racism and women
He was tall, dark and handsome. As his ebony skin glistened in the sunlight, he looked like a Nigerian king. John Lawale was introduced to Jesus by the preaching of Josephine Scaggs, a Southern Baptist missionary from Sapulpa, Okla. She…
Now I know my grandmother was a person, not just an event
Note: This article includes graphic descriptions of suicide. In my life, she wasn’t a person. She was an event. My mother’s mother ended her own life with a shotgun blow to the head. It’s a conversation stopper if there ever…
Six lessons I’ve learned about doubt
“I have doubts. I have such doubts.” Those are the closing words of Doubt, a 2008 Academy Award-winning film starring Meryl Streep, Amy Adams and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. Those anguished words of doubt were spoken by Sister Aloysius,…
A church shopper’s guide to finding the right church for you
If I were trying to find a church in which to invest myself I would be a very careful shopper. Sure, I would pay some attention to the name on the sign (Methodist, Baptist, Episcopal, etc.), but not too much….
Preserving a sense of the ultimate
I want to make the modest proposal that there is a dimension of religion, including Christianity, that properly transcends world affairs to focus on the state of individual character and the health of the soul. I speak of the inner…
How any pastor, even if they’re not affirming, can love queer people
In recent news, a massive exodus of the church has come into focus. A New York Times series by Jessica Grose tracks and analyzes why “the largest and fastest religious shift is under way,” and back in the fall, Pew…
Making peace with my internal worship war
Walter “Buddy” Shurden is an esteemed historian who taught at Carson-Newman University, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and Mercer University. In a series of lectures in 1980, Shurden described two broad streams of practice in Baptist churches he labels the Sandy…
Weed the people: Our doobie brothers and sisters
I grew up in a home where we believed anyone who touched an illegal drug was working for the devil. I was 12 when Nancy Reagan was the guest star on a very special episode of Different Strokes. She told…
Kelly Clarkson changes ‘Piece by Piece’ lyrics into self-empowerment anthem
During her 10-day Las Vegas residency, Kelly Clarkson surprised the audience last Saturday night by singing a song many thought she’d never sing again, “Piece by Piece.” But this time, she rewrote the lyrics into an anthem of self-empowerment. First…
The sacrament of the Southern summer shore
Growing up in a doubly landlocked state, we were lake people. When my sixth grade Girl Scout troop went to Savannah and Tybee Island, many of the girls never had seen the ocean before. Instead of beach trips, people would…
Flynn tells preachers, ‘Put the Bible aside and read the Constitution’
Gen. Michael Flynn received a preaching lesson from me last year in a Baptist News Global article, “Don’t Take Preaching Lessons from General Flynn.” I quoted Flynn’s suggestion: ““What (preachers) need to be doing is they need to be talking…