I don’t teach on Tuesdays, so when I called to schedule two long-overdue medical appointments a few weeks ago and both offices had availability on Election Day, November 5, I took them. The early morning air felt heavy with uncertainty as I slipped into my car to make the hour-long trek to Santa Monica, not having changed doctors since moving over the summer. I listened to an audiobook of historical fiction set in the Canadian West to distract myself from... Read more
My current work involves the critical role of empires in making and reshaping the world’s religions. I recently published the book Kingdoms of this World: How Empires Have Made and Remade Religions (Baylor University Press, 2024), and currently I am working on the specifically American aspects of that issue. As you will see from a couple of recent posts at this site, I argue that this imperial dimension is critical for understanding many aspects of the American religious tradition, including... Read more
Just a few months ago the German theologian Jürgen Moltmann died, and I decided to write about his legacy since he had made a big impact on my studies. In many ways he was the posterchild for Post-Holocaust theology and a host of other forms of Christian theological movements in the last few decades including liberation theology. Moltmann refused to let us forget about Auschwitz. But now he is gone. Now another titan of modern theology has also left us.... Read more
This is an edited version of an essay I wrote that helped form what would become my Master’s thesis at Yale Divinity School on the life of Elias Boudinot. I’ve used a few stories from that thesis on this blog before, but lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about his interracial marriage to Harriet Gold, and decided I would tell y’all the story. “It is through pride & prejudice–that all this clamour has been raised against the Indians.” ~Colonel Benjamin... Read more
People have expressed abundant feelings and analyses over the last week on the interwebs, as a result of the election. There is certainly no shortage of commentary on social, news outlets, substacks, and podcasts. Just prior to the election, I dropped my own passionate plea to get out the vote, indicating my anxieties and sense of urgency regarding the election. Ansley Quiros followed that up with a prayer for the election. Malcolm Foley offered some post-election grounding for Christians engaged... Read more
Did you hear about the election they just had in the US? It actually got quite a bit of coverage. So is there anything new to say about it? Well, I might have something different to say, because I am working with 20-20 lack-of-foresight. To be precise, I am writing a week before the election, and have no clue which of the two candidates, whom I will call Smith or Jones, is going to win. That gives me a wonderful... Read more
Note: These are my thoughts and mine alone. This is also raw, as I’m sure it is for many reading this. I just had to write some words down on it. “Make America Great Again” was a great slogan when Reagan used it and it’s been a great slogan for the years that the Trump campaign has used it as well. It taps into a primal desire of ours: the desire to be great. The desire to dominate rather than... Read more
I’m pleased to be able to welcome Dr. Katherine Goodwin Lindgren back to the Anxious Bench today! Dr. Goodwin Lindgren is Assistant Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at Hope College (Holland, MI). A historian of women and gender in Christianity, her research focuses on the intersections of gender, theology, and religious cultures of late medieval and early modern women. Her dissertation, “Praying with Syon: Compilation, Community, and Vernacular Theology” considered the hidden ways women contributed to theological production during... Read more
Well, it’s the day before. I have no useful historical analysis today, nor any punditry and certainly no predictions. Like so many, I feel on edge, uncertain about what will happen as the result of tomorrow’s election and what that may mean about us all. And so, I’m suggesting we hold some space today, some stillness, to pray. (Before we GO VOTE tomorrow.) Here is a collection of prayers from various Christian traditions and at the end a little liturgy... Read more
You cannot unsee what you have seen this past year. I don’t even really have to detail it for you. If Christianity Today has given abundant counsel to U.S. evangelicals on third way politics that abstains from voting or votes third party, then we have all seen who they really are. The evidence catastrophically indicates that evangelicals have lost confidence in their long alliance with the “Grand Ole Party”. It’s because they have shown us who they are. This is... Read more
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