Baptist News Global

Transitions for the week of 8-14-20

Please submit transitions — including staff changes, ordinations, anniversaries or deaths — to Barbara Francis. This page will be updated bi-weekly. STAFF CHANGES Parker Bowen, to First Baptist Church, Amarillo, Texas, as associate minister of music. Jerry Carlisle, to Texas Baptist…

How the ‘Suburban Lifestyle Dream’ and suburban church created Suburban Jesus

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson visited Charlotte, N.C., in January 2020 to announce changes to Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rules. AFFH was an Obama-era initiative that targeted ongoing racial segregation through exclusionary practices in the construction of affordable…

Touching Miami with Love hires locally for leader

It was a job interview that no one involved knew was a job interview and yet resulted in decisions that continue to transform Touching Miami with Love, a Cooperative Baptist Fellowship ministry that serves impoverished youth and families in South…

What Abe Lincoln tells us about Trump, Biden, guns, God and Falwell Jr.

In the land of the free and the home of the I-don’t-have-to-wear-a-mask-if-I-don’t-want-to-even-to-save-lives, we’re less than three months from the presidential election, and it’s getting nastier by the day. On the way to Nov. 3, apparently even God will not be…

How to say goodbye during a pandemic (in English or Spanish)

I had been a New Yorker for two days. At 5:15 on Monday afternoon, I told my wife, Carol, “I’m going to buy bagels.” This was the first time in my life I said, “I’m going to buy bagels.” I…

Americans want churches open but aren’t attending when they are open

Americans believe churches shouldn’t have special privileges to be open when other similar venues are closed, but they also believe their churches should be open already — even though few people are actually attending in-person worship. These seemingly contradictory views…

What about the science, faith and ethics of a coming coronavirus vaccine?

The race to find a safe and effective vaccine against the novel coronavirus is heating up, as society longs to get back to some sense of normalcy. But finding a vaccine is only one step on the journey that also…

What I fear as a white woman married to a Black man

Conversations on race and racial justice in the United States have become so polarized that too often these discussions result in people talking at one another, and an invisible distance is created between “the issue” and the humans affected. Today,…

Who is that man in a clerical stole at the protest?

Jonathan Redding is a Baptist minister from North Carolina who teaches apocalyptic literature at a Methodist university in Lincoln, Neb. But arguably the most unusual aspect of his ministry is a calling to serve as a chaplain at Black Lives…

Mom shaming is getting worse during the pandemic

In conversations this week with both friends and clients, all of whom are professional working women, I’m hearing the same thing: It’s all about feeling shamed. As schools announce plans for the fall, working parents find themselves facing a buffet of…

Ministry jobs and more

Baptist News Global provides a free listing of ministry-related jobs for Baptist churches, theological institutions and organizations across the United States. Each free posting is for 30 days and is limited to 150 words. Postings may be extended another 30…

The wicked are punished — or not

What Ryan Burge sees in America’s megachurches

We are a nation of immigrants

As worldwide deaths mount, Musk insists DOGE cuts didn’t kill anyone