“They stole $77,000. And that was all of my savings.” Her voice was so soft I (Doug) had to lean in to hear her. “I’ve talked with the local police, the FBI and the Federal Trade Commission. The money is...
Chris Sanders knows theology and law, and he’s an advocate both for labor unions and social justice. That blend of life experience and life passion makes for an interesting conversation these days — with the dueling demands of holding police…
Norman J. Williams has been in the funeral industry business long enough to remember how the HIV epidemic changed not only the way they cared for bodies, but also for those who lost loved ones to the deadly virus.
It’s a fact that food insecurity is getting steadily worse in the United States in part because of the coronavirus, a Baptist mission expert reports. But it’s a myth that hunger and poverty are conditions Americans simply have to accept,…
Conceptualizing the American religious landscape can be a challenging task these days. We may think about Roman Catholicism’s prevalence in parts of New England or Lutheranism’s prevalence in the Midwest. Mormonism certainly composes a significant portion of the population in…
My spiritual birthplace was in a tiny Southern Baptist church in rural northwest Missouri. In the evangelical ethos of that time and place, spiritual maturity was defined in private terms. Confess Christ, get baptized, join a (cooperating Southern Baptist) church,…
As I write these words, President Trump is politicizing the fall reopening of schools for our children. I cannot imagine a more difficult set of decisions our public officials are having to make than when and how to reopen our…
As I write this, my colleagues and I have spent the last few days in complete bewilderment at the prospect of starting face-to-face instruction even as COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are on the rise. None of us relish the prospect…
I wonder how many congregations have taken time during this pandemic to consider their aesthetic. As worship services and other educational or community programming have transitioned to online formats, how have our ideas of beauty changed or remained the same?…
As a little Quaker girl, I read about the childhood of Lucretia Coffin Mott (Girl of Old Nantucket), who grew up to be a noted Abolitionist, and about a family of Quakers from North Carolina who journeyed with a family…
Of course, every life is significant — uniquely created by God and irreplaceable — and while I do believe every life matters, I don’t believe in #AllLivesMatter. I don’t believe in it because it is a cop-out, an attempt to…
After months of online worship, Barbara Aikens Walker was relieved finally to gather in-person with her church on July 5 — even if it was from inside her Jeep Cherokee parked inside a California parking garage. Walker said First Baptist…
In the United Kingdom, the coronavirus lockdown “has made every follower of Jesus a leader, every house a house church, and every street a parish,” according to a consultant who works with thousands of churches across denominational lines. Matt Bird…
