It is midnight. Not the kind of midnight measured by clocks. The kind that settles into your bones. The kind that lingers long after the sun has risen. We all know this midnight. It is the midnight of the marriage...
The rocks were far from perfect. Our 30-year-old retaining wall had come tumbling down, and the stone masons were tasked with rebuilding it. They would reuse the rocks, but they’d have to shape them to fit the new design. The…
Many fans of Bruce Springsteen will not be surprised that this series of writings on the intersection between Lent and the minstrel from Freehold Borough, N. J., should come to a conclusion with “The Rising” on Easter Sunday. The song…
Several decades ago I was in a learning experience with a diverse group of people in terms of race. We were divided into small groups and given cards of various colors. We were asked to respond to questions by suggesting…
A good number of evangelical Christians self-identify as Bible believers. It’s a peculiar way for a Christian to self-identify when you think about it. A Christian is someone who has some kind of relationship to Christ. After all Christ is…
Please submit transitions — including staff changes, ordinations, anniversaries or deaths — to Barbara Francis. This page will be updated weekly. STAFF CHANGES Randy Ashcraft, to the Center for Healthy Churches, as congregational consultant. Most recently he served as pastor in…
A former Baptist state convention executive says what was reported last June as his resignation was actually a firing orchestrated by state convention leaders under pressure from the head of the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention….
In a tweetstorm on March 22, Moroccan-American and Muslim writer Laila Lalami bemoaned scripted American media reactions to terrorism and mass shootings.
North Carolina lawmakers convened a special session March 22 to pass a bill requiring public schools to allow access to multiple occupancy bathrooms and locker rooms based solely on the biological sex listed on a student’s birth certificate. The special…
Why are we in such a rush to get to Easter Sunday? In our efforts to make Easter celebrations the most extravagant Sunday of the year, when church attendance is expected to be beyond the norm, we forget — if not…
“This was like God showing up.” That’s how one victim of clergy sexual abuse in the Boston archdiocese described his family’s response when a priest came to visit. He added fatefully, “When a priest paid attention to you it was…
Good Friday services at Madison Avenue Baptist Church are traditional in many ways. Participants are reminded, through music, prayer and scripture readings, of the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ. Themes of sorrow and grief are experienced in an ornate…
The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments March 23 in combined cases to decide whether mandatory coverage of contraceptives under Obamacare violates the religious liberty of faith-based organizations that serve the public and hire non-adherents as employees. Charities including several…
