Can you think of a word more maligned than “politics”? Some people believe it’s a dirty term affixed to a despicable craft. That’s because, for the most part, it’s practiced so poorly. People watch politicians engage in politics, and they…
On the collapse of Christianity into politics
A friend sent me this piece in Salon, posted under the provocative title, “How Evangelicals Abandoned Christianity and Became ‘Conservatives’ Instead.” I was not familiar with the author, Nathaniel Manderson, who identifies himself as an evangelical pastor trained at a…
Listening and learning from the SBC: Does the buck stop here?
Tom Buck, pastor of First Baptist Church in Lindale, Texas, was quoted last week after the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting as stating, “We gave more than $225,000 to the SBC, and we feel like we have no voice.” Earlier…
Continuing our retreat from Jesus
This is a photo of me with my father in the upper deck of the New Orleans Superdome at the Southern Baptist Convention in June 1990. We were two of the nearly 40,000 messengers who gathered that year for a…
Kentucky scholar warns the U.S. risks ‘losing its soul’ through hatred
The United States needs a “movement of heart and spirit” to address a moral crisis that places the country in danger of “losing its soul,” warned the leader of a seminary institute dedicated to Black church studies. In an opinion…
When politics becomes religion
Politics sometimes becomes religion for people. This is a fact. It is dangerous when politics becomes religion for people. This is my conviction. This phenomenon seems most likely to happen when a culturally established religion fades to become merely politics,…
Beth Moore and a lost Southern Baptist Convention
Religion News Service reporter Bob Smietana broke the story this week that famous Bible study leader Beth Moore is leaving the Southern Baptist Convention and ending the mutually lucrative publishing relationship with their Lifeway group. She claimed that the SBC…
New surveys connect the dots between politics, race, religion and vaccination
Recent surveys of adult Americans may connect the dots between the role of politics, race and religion and attitudes about the pandemic and COVID-19 vaccines. A study by Pew Research Center examined respondents’ intentions to get vaccinated, while a report…
Two words, two virtues, to help America move forward
On Inauguration Day evening, I went to bed exhausted with the mix of the day’s emotions. Joy over the beginning of a new administration; relief there had been no violence; and sorrow — sorrow over all the human lives lost…