By Scott Dickison With the arrival of our first son about a year and a half ago, my wife and I have been more intentional about creating our own family holiday traditions. So last Easter, our first together as a…
Who’s really discriminating here?
Discrimination is a funny word. We hear it thrown around a lot today so it’s worth taking a minute and reflecting on what exactly it means. At the most basic level, discrimination is simply the process of choosing one thing…
A tribute to Dean Alan Culpepper: The man and the myth
By Brett Younger For four years at the Mercer Preaching Consultation, Alan Culpepper and I have led a discussion on each year’s Advent texts. The first year I compared us to Simon and Garfunkel. The dean responded that it was…
What is the direction and diversity of collaboration among Christian Ministries?
Building on the foundation of two earlier articles, let’s now address the direction and diversity of collaboration. The first article was Compete or Collaborate: The Dilemmas for Christian Ministries, and the second was Critical Understanding About Collaboration for Christian Ministries….
A new church is coming
By Molly T. Marshall I regularly read the Abbey Banner, which is the publication of St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville, Minn. I spent a fruitful sabbatical there in 2000, and this Benedictine community remains of interest to me because of…
Technology and a quality life: a delicate balance
By Nora O. Lozano Some Sundays ago I went to pick my son up from his church youth meeting. I was not paying much attention to the time, and until I opened the building door, I realized that I had…
How pastors should act during election season
Recently a certain candidate for the office of president announced her campaign and plans to attain our nation’s highest office. Immediately after her announcement via social media there was a flurry of responses and reactions. Naturally, being a minister, I…
Critical understandings about collaboration for Christian ministries
Building on a previous article entitled Compete or Collaborate: The Dilemma for Christian Ministries, I want to delve into the direction and diversity of collaboration among Christian ministries. But to do this I must first lay out some critical understandings…
What ‘religious freedom’ used to mean
By Corey Fields At the turn of the 17th century, an English lawyer named Thomas Helwys had become part of a separatist congregation in Lincolnshire (it is to this congregation that many Baptists trace their roots). They were dissenters from…
Savoring the ‘sacrament of the present moment,’ with a little help from The Decemberists
Christian thinking about the world we live in and God’s goals for it wrestles with a tension. What God envisions for the world is already being made manifest in the Easter reality of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead and in…
Searching for Sunday: A review
When I was fifteen, I was called into ministry. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that God wanted me to be a minister. There was only one problem. I was a Southern Baptist who happened to also be…
Civility and tolerance when absolutes clash
By David Gushee Follow David: @dpgushee My column this week is anchored by the wise insights of Professor Alan Brownstein, a constitutional law and church-state expert from the University of California at Davis. Professor Brownstein spoke at Mercer University the…