Somebody is lying. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin examined 116,366 lies told by 632 participants over 91 days. Participants self-reported their lies, which raises the question, “Wouldn’t liars lie about lying?” Maybe that’s why the statistics around lying are…
Navalny died for freedom. Will we live for it?
Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most prominent voice for freedom, is dead at 47 — murdered outright or worn down by the police state that relentlessly arrested him, jailed him, poisoned him, tormented him and finally sent him to the brutal Arctic…
Hope roots in truth-telling and grows with action
“People speak of hope as if it is this delicate, ephemeral thing. … It’s not. Hope has dirt on her face, blood on her knuckles, the grit of the cobblestones in her hair, and just spat out a tooth as…
One thing that must happen in 2024
For the sake of the world, for the sake of the church, for the sake of the nation, for the sake of the truth, one thing must happen in 2024: Donald Trump must be defeated. Not just defeated in the…
The nail in the board: Careless words always leave a mark
A good friend recently shared an analogy with me that made a deep impression. When he was about 10 years of age, his Sunday school teacher told his class of boys: “You can drive a nail into a 2-by-4 and…
What really happens with Christian deconstruction on a college campus?
“Deconstruction” is a buzzword today for people who seek to unravel the constrictive faith of their childhoods. But the same word might be used to describe the educational process that often happens when students like me go off to college….
Holding two truths together
Words fail to express thanks for the prayers and messages to me and our group traveling in Israel as war broke out. About half our intended group of 30 did not make it to Israel because the war broke out…
Why we must go there
“The first part of the book was great, but then why did you have to go there?” I was talking to my brother-in-law’s book club, a group of Lutherans who call themselves the Churchies. (I don’t think they’ve registered that…
The real religious crisis in America
In a recent NPR interview, Russell Moore, author of Losing Our Religion, told a story about a pastor who preached a message from Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount. During his message, the pastor quoted Jesus saying things like “Turn the…