In this age of alternative facts, when truth means whatever people want it to mean, I find myself longing wistfully for the Christian tradition in which I was raised — although, for the most part, it has long since passed…
Q&A with Walter Brueggemann: faith in a time of COVID-19
“Right now, too many churches have flown off into spiritualizing generalizations that are unhelpful to everyone.”
The Bible has answers. But it’s not a Magic 8 Ball.
Biblicists see the Bible as a flat text with equal authority given to all passages. They also tend to believe there is a Bible verse somewhere to answer every question imaginable.
BNG’s Top 25 of the decade
Presented here are BNG’s top 25 news and opinion articles during the past decade.
Evangelical leader: Trump’s refugee limit “dramatic and heartbreaking”
“Sadly, the issue gets caught up in some of our current polarized divides.”
No stranger to controversy, Alabama scholar critiques values of Trump, Southern culture
Wayne Flynt is a Baptist minister whose calling frequently lands him in controversy. “My role is to move the Kingdom of God one step closer, day by day,” says Flynt, 78, an acclaimed author and teacher on Alabama politics, Southern…
Faith podcasts providing downloadable fellowship and formation
It seems just about everyone is listening to podcasts these days, and on just about every subject imaginable – from sports and history to finance, politics and, yes, religion.
Magic takes minister places other pastors ‘can never go’
“I do not like to be called a Christian magician,” David Garrard, a retired children’s minister and magician from St. Matthews Baptist Church in Louisville, says. “I’m a magician who is a Christian.”
Pastor, judge, activist, agitator: As he strives for justice, Wendell Griffen stretches the lexicon of adjectives
Wendell Griffen, 66, is all of these things. But his persona is so large, his reputation so loud, his “rightness” so locked in and eagerly defended, that the man’s depth can be lost in the shallows in which he must wade.
Racially diverse church occupies campus where Baptist pastor once proclaimed racist views
In one of life’s delicious little ironies, New Millennium Church now meets on the campus associated with one of Little Rock’s most ardent racists of the 1950s.
Photo Gallery: Wendell Griffen
View the photo gallery of Wendell Griffen.
New American religious ‘types’ revealed in survey, quiz
Religion in the U.S. is morphing so fast that observers often are at a loss for words to describe it. Terms like “nones” and “dones,” unheard of just a few years ago, are now commonly used by universities, seminaries and…