In a reprise of a famous photo op from his first term in the White House, Donald Trump welcomed 17 evangelical pastors to the Oval Office March 19 to pray over him. The next day, a different group of religious…
Does God obsess about gender?
A few hours ago, I received a text from a friend who is concerned about their transgender child. It’s been easy to miss the exacting details of the barrage of executive orders flying across our new president’s desk these last…
Amid jubilation over Trump victory, a call to rewrite history at the Smithsonian
Southern Baptist leaders and many other evangelical leaders expressed jubilation at Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential race, while one podcaster said it’s time to revise the exhibits at the Smithsonian to reflect a different worldview. Josh Daws, a Southern…
The 3 temptations of Christ are similar to Trump’s temptations to evangelicals
Many distractions in this life take a person off of their true path. Even as I put these words together, I think about everything unrelated to my writing. I am thinking about my career and need to find work that gets me…
Jeffress gets a shoutout from Trump in Arizona
Southern Baptist pastor Robert Jeffress got a shoutout from Donald Trump last week at a rally in Phoenix. Trump was interviewed by Tucker Carlson, who was fired from Fox News for lying but who continues to be an ardent Trump…
From King to Trump
Watching Donald Trump take over the American political church months ago in Iowa on the holiday that celebrates Martin Luther King, it became clear how far the church has fallen from the teachings of Jesus Christ. In King, the American…
Was America born as a Christian nation? It’s more complicated than that
No one markets products like evangelical preachers and Donald Trump. While Trump sells Bibles and golden sneakers and politics, Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Dallas is selling copies of his coffee table book version of his annual July 4 sermon…
If only First Baptist Dallas could rebuild with more love and less hate
The past week has been a roller coaster of emotions. Every time I’ve refreshed a news app or checked my social media feed, something shocking and groundbreaking has occurred. In a world where the words “breaking news” have felt cliché,…
‘Notre Dame of SBC’ burns in Dallas
A church building the Southern Baptist Convention president called the Notre Dame of the denomination fell victim to a four-alarm fire Friday night, July 19. Firefighters have not yet determined the cause of the fire that took down the historic…
Trump’s evangelical base believes God spared him from an assassin’s bullet for a purpose
Many evangelical Christians who already have declared Donald Trump to be God’s anointed choice for president see his near-assassination last Saturday as further sign of God’s favor and protection. And other Christians who oppose Trump see his near-miss as a…
First we had election deniers; now we have justice deniers
This time, the problem is not with America’s justice system; the problem is with conservative evangelicals’ warped view of what justice means. The folks always screaming about “law and order” don’t really care about law and order when it works…
Journalist’s book explores ‘crack-up of the American evangelical church’
After covering the “crack-up” of the Republican Party in American Carnage, award-winning journalist Tim Alberta explores “the crack-up of the American evangelical church” in The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism. Four years…