Suicide rates among American youth and young adults have taken a sharp drop, resulting in thousands of saved lives, according to a study published last week by the Journal of the American Medical Association. While suicide remains a leading cause…
Machismo culture and fear of threatening the movement
Last week, The New York Times published an investigation uncovering at least five instances of sexual abuse committed against girls and women by César Chávez, an influential Latino leader in the farmworkers labor justice movement. According to interviews from 60…
Jesus the asylum-seeker: A visit to the Church of Abu Sirga
A year ago, I traveled to Egypt with 12 other pilgrims from Wake Forest University School of Divinity to learn about the country’s rich religious history. Our mostly Christian group spent much of our time learning about religions other than…
Caring for ourselves during change-making conversations
Here we are, more than a month after the release of my “Non-Disclosure” podcast. And now that we’ve had some time to digest the lengthy, heavy and grief-filled material, I’d like to process some of that with you. The No….
The children are starving; God is screaming
James Talarico, a Democratic state representative in Texas, recently was interviewed on MSNBC and asked by hosts what his views are on the war in Gaza. He responded, “There’s a theologian who said, ‘I screamed at God for the starving…
New BNG podcast tells the stories of Kanakuk abuse survivors
A child is sexually assaulted every 9 minutes in the United States, according to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network. Over the past two decades, there have been more than 60,000 documented cases of child sexual abuse. Three out…
Coming soon: ‘Non-Disclosure’ podcast shares voices of Kanakuk survivors
“I handed my son over to the devil,” Joe Alarcon told me during an interview for BNG’s upcoming podcast, “Non-Disclosure,” which features interviews from survivors and their families about the serial sexual abuse that occurred at Kamp Kanakuk. Alarcon’s son,…
Pregnant veterans, criminalizing abortion and opposition to IVF
Reproductive rights continue to weaken in the United States under the Trump administration, and pregnant people are dying. It’s nearly impossible to keep up with the news as states continue to change their laws to make it harder for pregnant…
The attack on comprehensive sexual education, from federal law to the SBC
In initiatives to remove “woke” content from school curricula across the United States, comprehensive sexual education — or CSE — is under attack. CSE programs diverge from abstinence-only curricula by nature of the problems they attempt to solve. Abstinence-only curricula…
‘Wide open spaces’: Reflections from a summer camp chaperone
Earlier this summer, I was holed up in my temporary dorm room at Converse University, groaning at my laptop while my students and our other church chaperones were outside practicing their performances for the annual camp variety show. I heard…
Two more men accuse Michael Tait of sexual assault
Two more men have come forward alleging singer Michael Tait sexually assaulted them. This time, the survivors say, the abuse occurred while Tait still was in the band DC Talk. In an interview with The Guardian, former Evanescence bandmember Jason…
Mark Driscoll, Chip Gaines and toxic Christian masculinity
“You’re the one who farted in your own elevator, so you’ve gotta smell it,” said Mark Driscoll in a video reacting to a 40-second clip of Joanna and Chip Gaines’ new show, Back to the Frontier. The show aims to…