“I recall a Sunday morning in the spring of 1968 when the pastor of the Southern Baptist Convention-related church in Mesquite, Texas, where I was youth minister, offered his sermonic response to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. It…
Litton and McLaurin urge SBC Executive Committee toward compassion and Christlikeness
The Southern Baptist Convention must address its “stains” of racism and tolerating sexual abuse, President Ed Litton told members of the SBC Executive Committee Monday night, Feb. 21. He spoke just hours after a group of sexual abuse survivors held…
New Baptist Covenant shifts gears to convene, connect and communicate
A combination of COVID-19 and increased national conversations around race have prompted New Baptist Covenant to announce a change in strategy. Launched in 2007 with impetus from former President Jimmy Carter, New Baptist Covenant sought to create a movement that…
Everything you need to know about the rise in efforts to ban books from libraries
Remember those quaint days when some people tried to ban the Harry Potter books from libraries because they were sure kids would learn how to cast spells if they read the fictional accounts of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?…
Letter to the Editor: A response from Oklahoma Senator Rob Standridge
Letter to the Editor February 15, 2022 Dear Editor: Per your article on Feb. 7, 2022, I was smeared for filing bills trying to protect the religious freedom of religious and Christian citizens in Oklahoma. Although I did remove the religious…
Christian masculinity, culture and racism: An interview with Kristin Du Mez
In a time when the descriptors “evangelical” and even “Christian” are taking on destructive meanings they have not heretofore known in America, we need wise guides who can help us unravel the political from the theological, who can help us…
‘Yes, they are children of Nazis, but we are Christians, and we will stand with those who suffer’
When the Nazis invaded Holland in 1940, Gerrit tenZythoff was 17 years old and leading the sort of life that was common for teenage boys even then — a life filled with schoolwork and sports and good friends. And then…
Lessons from Birth of a Nation (the second one)
A few years ago a controversial movie with an even more controversial title was released about the life of Nat Turner, a 19th century Black preacher who led a slave revolt in Virginia. Birth of a Nation was an ironic…
For Black South Africans, wearing traditional goatskin jewelry can cause bans from white Christian schools
Zandile never forgets the day her overwhelmingly white Christian high school asked her to leave classes. The offense of the 14-year-old from the Zulu tribe was donning the “isiphandla,” a traditional bracelet made out of goatskin and worn by the…