Last Friday marked the two-year anniversary since the attempted insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. On that day, I was living about a half mile away from the Capitol, and I remember sitting in my home, glued…
I asked people why they’re leaving Christianity, and here’s what I heard
For some time now, Christianity has been on the decline. According to a September 2022 Pew study, people identifying as Christian have decreased from 90% of the U.S. population in 1972 to 64% in 2020. But it’s not just researchers…
While many evangelical leaders are wary of Trump’s 2024 run, this Oklahoma pastor has launched a fan club
While many of Donald Trump’s former evangelical pastor supporters have distanced themselves from his run for the presidency in 2024, one failed candidate for the U.S. Senate from Oklahoma has launched a new Trump fan club. Jackson Lahmeyer, pastor of…
When hate speech meets the First Amendment, what should Christians do?
Hate speech, like an erratic stock market, rises and falls. The primary instigators of the last two jumps in hate speech have been Donald Trump (beginning in 2015) and Elon Musk, the new owner of Twitter. In Trump’s case, there…
God’s anointed politician: We’ve seen this act before
The word “anointed” has made a return to politics. Evangelicals, once giddy at pulling off the incredulous claim that Donald Trump was somehow God’s anointed, are not the ones currently attempting to return the “anointing” to presidential politics. Anointing now…
Trump’s toxicity: A first take on the midterm elections
On the morning after, with more results still to come in, so far the most important takeaway from the midterm elections is that Donald Trump keeps hurting the Republican Party, whose soul he has eaten, and this is grounds for…
The dangerous worldview of Republican election deniers
Around elections, we often hear variations of the claim that “democracy itself is on the ballot.” Because this declaration is, in some sense, a truism, it’s easy to nod and dismiss its concrete claims. But in the current context, this…
Former RNC head calls new DeSantis ad ‘ass-backwards blasphemy’
A new video ad released by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is “some of the most ass-backwards blasphemy I’ve ever heard in my life, and one of the dumbest political ads you could ever make,” a seminary educated former head of…
When lying becomes a virtue
Is lying wrong? The question would have seemed impossible even 50 years ago. Now, the ninth commandment becomes expendable: “You shall not bear false witness.” If, as philosophers insist, we live in a post-truth age, we also live in the…