One reason there is such a dissonance between the church and the culture in the United States is because the church has gotten lazy. In the early days of my time in Abilene, Texas, at Crescent Heights Baptist Church, Hardin-Simmons…
We need more faith spaces that affirm the LGBTQ communities
Earlier this month, the conservative evangelical “King’s Army” spewed homophobia at Londoners and I was transported back to being a closeted queer teenager. Hearing those same sentiments at a young age was what made me realize my childhood church was not a…
Struggling for words these days
What’s a four-letter word that means feces? Dung. What’s a four-letter word for something many people love to do with a partner multiple times per month? Golf. Thus, if you need to instruct someone to hit a manure ball with…
In Lebanon, sexual abuse and economic abuse go hand in hand
“I don’t know if I’ve started ignoring everything because I got used to the ugliness, or because the smell of cannabis makes it easier not to care.” With these words, Ftoun, 15, a Syrian refugee working in cannabis fields in the plains…
Farewell to a Church Triumphant
The current run of failures in leadership and difficulties applying our disciplinary processes won’t be the death of the Anglican Church in North America. Far from it. I make that prediction as one of a small group of people who…
The Million Man March 30 years later
October 16, 1995, will forever be etched in my heart — not just as a moment in history, but as a defining moment in my own life. I was a 19-year-old senior at Coatesville Area Senior High School, just outside…
MAGA is making America dizzy again
In 2015, a military training exercise called Jade Helm became the basis for a right-wing conspiracy theory which claimed that under President Barack Obama, the federal government planned to impose martial law. Conservatives went crackers over an unfounded prospect that…
Lisbon to Auschwitz to Alligator Alcatraz: Cruelty and the human face of evil
There are few things more characteristic of the Trump regime than cruelty, often gratuitous cruelty. It is the human face of evil in one of its most repellent forms. Susan Nieman, in her masterful work Evil In Modern Thought: An…
Cracks in the fascist facade
A remarkable thing happened this week. I don’t know how to explain it or what to do with it. Last Friday, my grandson Sam (a high school senior in Charlotte) texted me a question: “What do you say when people…
It’s not just the Young Republicans we need to worry about
Despite how often you hear that America no longer is racist, we remain a racist culture. The difference between the racism of 1950 and 2025: Racism then was proudly displayed in public. The language, the signs, the laws, the culture…
The Young Republicans are old enough to know better
Vice President JD Vance’s comment about the outrageous 29,000 text messages sent by the New York Young Republicans being about “kids” acting foolishly does not hold up under thoughtfulness. First, many of those involved are at least 20 years old….
Trump’s poop-bomb video shows us what his base wants
I recently witnessed, in the course of a few hours, a stunning contrast between three presidents. First, our nation’s current president shared an AI video depicting himself as a crown-wearing fighter pilot who bombs No Kings Day protesters with liquified…