As America prepares to celebrate its 250th anniversary, our latest report, “Competing Visions of America at 250: Politics, Religion, and Identity,” surfaces a troubling signal for the future of our democracy — and it centers on the nation’s youngest citizens. Generation...
Listening to a Trump rally speech is like driving in a major city with no traffic lights, stop signs, cautions or rules. “Hammer down, pedal to the metal,” demolition derby from start to finish. Trump, long a master of not…
Former Southwestern Seminary evangelism professor Matthew Queen changed his mind Oct. 16 and pleaded guilty to one count of making false statements to the United States Southern District of New York attorney’s office and the FBI in a June 2023…
It is only a matter of time before Donald Trump’s hateful fascist rhetoric incites some of his followers to engage in violence against immigrants, women, people of color, LGBTQ people, members of the news media, election officials and others who…
The juxtaposition of experiencing the “Kingdom to the Capitol” tour followed by the “Faith and Democracy” tour in North Carolina on Sunday was a contrast in theology and politics that demonstrates the fracturing of American Christianity unlike any pairing of…
Donald Trump’s recent announcement that, if sent back to the White House, either the government or insurance companies would pay for IVF “for all Americans that get it, all Americans that need it,” was greeted with a mixture of surprise…
Research and painful experience consistently demonstrate domestic violence is as prevalent in churchgoing families as it is in the general population, author and domestic abuse survivor Geneece Goertzen said. “I want pastors to acknowledge and admit this is an issue…
Thirty years ago, James Dobson, Bill Bright, D. James Kennedy, Don Wildmon and two dozen other conservative Christian leaders who were frustrated with the direction of the nation’s courts founded a new legal group called Alliance Defense Fund to “protect”…
My grandpa, Edwin Penner, mortgaged his house to build our hometown Baptist church in Chico, Calif. Once built, he drove his Dodge pickup over every Sunday at 6 a.m. to turn on the heat or air conditioning for the comfort…
I taught my first children’s Sunday school class at the age of 16. I was responsible for teaching all children under the age of 12 for the summer. I was given no curriculum or direction. However, I felt called to…
In the summer of 2016, I was serving on staff at a large United Methodist Church in downtown Raleigh, N.C., while attending Duke University Divinity School. One day I walked into the senior pastor’s office to speak to him on…
Thirty years ago next month, Marv Knox and I warned Southern Baptists about the rising influence of Neo-Calvinism in their ranks. To most, this was shocking news at the time. Our words were more prophetic than we possibly could have…
“The Lord is summoning A Million Women, Esthers, young and old with their husbands and children to gather to the Washington, D.C., Mall October 12, the Day of Atonement, in a LAST STAND moment for America,” said Lou Engle’s announcement…
