The Hebrew prophet Jeremiah cried out on behalf of his people and nation. It was wracked by rampant greed and deceit, and the lives of the poor were being trampled upon. “Is there no balm in Gilead, is there no…
Have the fundamentalists won? And the future of liberal Christianity
One hundred years ago, May 21, 1922, Harry Emerson Fosdick preached his most famous sermon, “Shall the Fundamentalists Win?” He was at the time the preaching minister of the First Presbyterian Church in New York City. The Presbyterian denomination along…
What is a Baptist?
You must have a sense of humor to talk about being Baptist these days, with all the craziness associated with the word and with many Baptists today who are a contradiction to what “Baptist” has meant through the centuries. If…
The original sin of the church
Last week we observed Shoah, or Holocaust, Remembrance Day. It is well, then, to consider the original sin of the church. If America’s original sin is slavery, the original sin of the church is anti-Judaism and antisemitism. Before the New…
Who do you say that I am: ‘Jesus’ or ‘Christ’?
“Jesus Christ, Superstar, do you think you’re what they say you are?” A memorable lyric from the 1971 Broadway musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. And also a poignant question for today as American Christians seem to gravitate…
Autocracy as heresy
During the social revolution in South Africa that brought an end to the era of apartheid and a government of white supremacy, Allan Boesak, a Black South African theologian, wrote, “Apartheid is heresy.” And not only that, he later wrote,…
The recovery of prayer at the turn of the age
It is becoming clearer by the day that we are living at a turn of the age, as one era ends and another is beginning — religiously, socially, politically and globally. The words of the Irish poet W.B. Yeats in…
The urgency of humility for the healing of land and hearts
As we enter 2022 with no little trepidation, I write of the urgency of humility for the healing of our land and hearts. Someone has quipped, “Few speak of humility humbly.” Nevertheless, I proceed. The word “humility” comes from the…
The birth of Abba’s Jesus
As we kneel at the manger to worship the infant who would be Savior of the world, let’s turn our minds to the God Jesus called Abba, the One whom theologian John Cobb called “Jesus’ Abba.” Abba was the Aramaic…