Yet another evangelical megachurch is repenting for mishandling clergy sex abuse. Every few days, it seems, we’re hearing about a different instance of a pastor or church leader who has abused women and/or children and a church (or denomination) that…
The two apocalyptic movements threatening America
Two apocalyptic movements bracket America’s democratic crisis. One predicts a future chaos; the other airs a past history of grievances. The future and the past impinge upon the present to paralyze the potential for positive action. One looks to the…
How the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy became a litmus test
“Do you affirm the doctrine of inerrancy as articulated in the Chicago Statement?” demands Denny Burk, professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, tweeting his line in the sand to defend what he thinks are attacks against historic orthodoxy by the ever-so-dangerous…
The seeds of evangelical angst over gender and sex were sown decades ago
If you want to understand the gender and sexual anxieties of evangelical Christians today, look at the seeds sown in their midst in the 1970s and ’80s, according to a couple of researchers recently posting on the topic. Marlena Graves…
SBC says church planters must pledge not to hire women as pastors just like they pledge not to drink alcohol
Faced with pressure from its rightward flank, the Southern Baptist Convention’s North American Mission Board issued a statement Oct. 14 promising that “only qualified men” will “serve as the communicator for teaching and preaching” at church plants endorsed by NAMB….
It’s time to pay the Piper
On a crisp November night in 2016, I stumbled upon a message from John Piper that changed my theological and ministerial trajectory forever. I was an eager high school senior with a passion for (what I perceived to be at…
Meet the Theobros, who want you to know they’re right about everything
In this world of spiritual warfare, theological compromise and Republicans losing the White House, there lives a group of men, mostly white, who put on their armor, saddle up and ride into the glorious battlefield known as Twitter. They alone…
Du Mez sees link between sexual abuse cover up and complementarian theology
The white evangelical inclination to cover up sexual abuse in churches and denominations derives in part from a complementarianism ideology, according to Kristin Kobes Du Mez, author of Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured…