Next Sunday, people in the United States will wish Easter felt like it did three years ago. They will put on new shoes and wonder if they should have gotten a half size larger. They will consider going out for…
It’s time to do something about the beast of corporate money in politics
In the spring of 1994, I enrolled in a course on deviance in the sociology department at the University of Texas at Austin. The course was taught by renowned sociologist Gideon Sjoberg, author of The Preindustrial City. The course wasn’t…
No, we will not take down an article you don’t like
Among the many ways Americans have anointed ourselves as armchair quarterbacks, some have determined they should be editor in chief of Baptist News Global. Not for the first time, but with renewed vigor this week. Some folks — mainly those…
Subterranean hope in Ukraine
The stories, morning after morning, of the horrific war in Ukraine overwhelm us. For self-defense, I look away at something else in the news. Yet in the back of my mind the images still play, pictures of destruction, death. We…
Untamed: The meaning of Jesus in these odd times finale
“We don’t live in Ukraine, but we do,” said our minister, Glenn Pettiford, as he began a pastoral prayer on a recent Lenten Sunday morning. His words have stayed in my head on the way to Gethsemane and Golgotha 2022,…
We need more but different churches
The number of church closures continues to rise. According to a study published by Lifeway Research last May, about 4,500 churches closed their doors in 2019 while only 3,000 churches were started. This is a shift from 2014 when Lifeway…
The futility of framing one another as progressives and evangelicals, devils and dummies
In politics, “framing” is the attempt to alter reality by selecting words, slogans and tropes that convince the public to see the other side in a certain negative way. As Robert Entman explains, “To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived…
I teach the things Republican legislators are trying to outlaw; here’s what we actually teach
Once again, I’m so grateful I live in Oregon. Across conservative states, legislators are interfering with what’s taught in K-12, colleges, universities and workplaces. They’ve targeted content that addresses issues of race, gender and sexuality, with a special emphasis on…
Dear Willy Rice: We’re sorry to hear how you’ve been treated
Dear Willy, We’re sorry. We know we don’t know each other but we’re your brothers in Christ. As former Southern Baptists, we’re deeply sorry about how you have been treated over the past few days. We don’t understand the complexities…
Letter to the editor: Evangelicals — save an unborn baby or save a soul?
Letter to the Editor April 7, 2022 Dear Editor: Evangelicals are going to have a lot of explaining to do when we meet the Heavenly Father. We have gotten so entangled in the anti-abortion movement, and subsequently in the Republican…
Living in the highlight zone
“I’m not actually in the line, sir,” he said with a smile framed beautifully on the topside by a well-trimmed, white mustache that matched exactly in tone and texture his full, snowy head of hair above. “I’m just waiting on…
In the war of words over guns, ‘wisdom is better than weapons of war’
We fight the “gun battle” in many ways. Some hurl statistics like darts, trying to puncture the other side’s position. Their opponents are adept at this, too, reminding us: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics”…