Senator Lindsey Graham is dead at 71. He died the way he lived — in motion, at full throttle, pressing some cause or another into the next news cycle. He had just returned from Ukraine, where he met with President...
The 5,600-church Baptist General Convention of Texas apparently is paying close attention to new hiring practices at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship which would allow persons who identify as LBGTQ to be employed in some roles, though not others.
I am sick to death of decades of our ceaseless inability to avoid personal, spiritual and communal schism in our churches and ourselves. Truth to tell, however, 2,000 years of Christian history illustrate that the same Jesus Story that unites all Christ’s church often drives it apart. I’ve often teased that “Baptists multiply by dividing.” It’s not funny anymore. Never was.
I understand the need to be culturally sensitive when making hiring decisions, and I understand that applies whether you are sending missionaries to Nigeria or New Jersey. But the existing bylaws of the CBF leave those hiring decisions in the hands of the executive coordinator, and I trust Suzii Paynter. I trust her to be culturally sensitive, but I also trust her not to discriminate.
Does the idea of evangelism excite you or make you squirm? Does the Good News actually sound like good news anymore? In an increasingly post-Christian culture, how do we equip congregations to invite their neighbors to experience the way, the…
And in a few weeks, Easter Sunday falls on April Fool’s Day. Yikes.
Two self-described survivors of the True Love Waits phenomenon have produced a series of podcasts exploring faith, sex and life in the wake of the evangelical “purity” movement.
The failure of a church, at least according to the belief system baked into our American religiosity, is the personal failure of a pastor. As I’ve seen more and more of my friends (and myself) self-immolate in the face of institutional malaise, I’ve been wondering if the problem for most of us clergy folk is rooted in something a bit more elemental than a lack of training in millennial worship preferences and successfully interacting with people on your church Facebook page.
I do not expect a denominational body to reinforce all aspects of my conscience any more than I expect a congregation to match my convictions in every way. Most people don’t expect a perfect match — just space to grow together. So I’m not bothered by a conviction that differs from mine. I am bothered by the centrality given to a conviction that makes no space.
Our congregation went through 18 months of intense study, prayer and dialogue about LGBTQ inclusion, and we have the scars to show for it. And we would have had scars regardless of which way the decision went. But we are better for choosing the good over the easy.
Pastors of at least two Cooperative Baptist Fellowship churches say they are reconsidering affiliation with the 1,800-church network in light of a decision by CBF leaders to relax, but not totally lift, a ban on hiring LBGTQ people.
The Catholic church risks damaging its moral authority and plunging its followers into confusion if the Vatican presses ahead with an with the Chinese government, a group of influential Catholics has warned.
By elevating and blindly submitting to a single-issue politic, Christians endorse corrupt and immoral leaders and opt into ideological hypocrisy to uphold it. The risk for Christians is the loss of all ability to think in nuanced ways. It forces black-and-white thinking that moralizes some politicians based on a single belief.
