On Jan. 24, 2017 — less than a week after President Donald Trump took office —– I wrote a blog post that described him in one word: psychopath. I expanded on that assessment after Trump announced in April of this year…
A message to white Christian America: Remember the church at Sardis
I recently finished reading White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity, by Robert P. Jones, the CEO of Public Religion Research Institute. In that book, Jones comments about recent (2018 and 2019) public opinion survey responses from white…
America, these are self-inflicted wounds
The United States has now lost 150,000 people — almost three times the number of people we lost during the Vietnam War – due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic is spreading unchecked across the nation. Meanwhile, national, state and…
Arkansas Supreme Court declines to prevent pastor/judge from hearing attorney general’s cases
The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday refused to bar a Little Rock judge from handling cases involving the office of the state attorney general who in 2017 got him removed from execution cases after he demonstrated against the death penalty in his extrajudicial role as a Baptist pastor.
Arkansas Supreme Court, Attorney General, continue to tangle with pastor/judge
The Arkansas Supreme Court won’t restore the authority of a circuit judge who also serves as pastor of a Baptist church to decide death-penalty cases, and the state’s top lawyer wants him barred from any civil cases involving her office in separate but intertwined controversies that began with a prayer vigil protesting capital punishment on Good Friday in 2017.
Judge calls for hate-crime probe in monument defacement
An Arkansas judge and Baptist minister is asking that the chopping down of a tree planted in honor of victims of a 1919 race massacre be investigated as a hate crime.
Arkansas Supreme Court refuses to step down from case challenging its own ruling against anti-death penalty judge
Justices of the Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday refused to recuse themselves from a case claiming they improperly barred a Little Rock judge from hearing death penalty cases because he exercised his religious liberty by attending a execution vigil in his other role as a Baptist pastor.
Judge Wendell Griffen wants power to hear death penalty cases restored
An Arkansas judge cleared of ethics charges stemming from his participation in an anti-death penalty demonstration two years ago has petitioned the state’s Supreme Court to restore his power to hear and decide capital cases.
Report: Ethics complaint against anti-death penalty pastor/judge dismissed
The Arkansas state Judicial Discipline and Disability Commission has dismissed an ethics charge against a judge who also is a Baptist pastor for participating in an anti-death penalty demonstration on Good Friday 2017.