Editor’s note: Last weekend, the Dallas-based Turtle Creek Chorale performed Considering Matthew Shepard, a Grammy-nominated three-part oratorio composed by Craig Hella Johnson. The author serves as artistic director of the Turtle Creek Chorale. This piece first appeared in the Dallas…
Mohler again endorses Trump for president
Al Mohler is a lifelong Republican who sees the choice in this year’s presidential election as “clear” in compelling him to vote for Donald Trump. Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and a leading voice of theological interpretation in…
Vote for us, because in the economy of God, there is no them
I never have told anyone — not even my children — how to vote. Today, though, I shall ask you to consider for whom to vote, if you have not already. I encourage you to vote for your neighbor, for…
Two LGBTQ British Baptist ministers ordained in Canada
A Canadian Baptist church and association ordained two ministers from the United Kingdom Oct. 27 because they could not be ordained in the Baptist Union of Great Britain. First Baptist Church of Halifax, Nova Scotia, and the Canadian Association for…
‘When you’re wrong, confess and seek forgiveness,’ Richard Hays says
When you come across something in your history that is wrong, “the thing to do is to confess and seek forgiveness,” Richard Hays told a large gathering of LGBTQ Christians and allies Oct. 25. Hays, a New Testament scholar who…
Legal group ADF seeks to ‘reshape America into a Christian nation’
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”…
What happened to ‘friendship evangelism’?
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…
Republicans seek votes with ad campaign warning of ‘radical trans agenda’
Three decades after Christian conservatives sought to rouse voters’ fears of a “radical gay agenda,” Republicans are spending $65 million on election advertising about a “radical trans agenda,” according to The New York Times and other outlets. “Kamala is for…
When white male pastors challenge Black female leaders
Supporters of the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists expressed surprise and shock when leaders of the American Baptist Churches in the USA recently sent a cease-and-desist letter asking to be removed as a “partner” on AWAB’s website. The original…