Many Old Testament passages have posed difficulties to readers through the centuries. I am presently wrestling with an epic dilemma. If I am reading a particular text right, then God deliberately and knowingly gave his people bad laws and statutes, to lead them on the wrong path. Can this possibly be the case? The idea that the Old Testament contains troublesome and troubling texts is nothing new. We look at the passages commanding extermination and genocide that I discussed in... Read more
In the winter of 1676-1677, a “malignant” fever swept through New England communities. In the town of Plymouth (in Plymouth Colony), one-year-old Josiah Cotton died. Josiah was the son of John and Joanna Cotton. John Cotton Jr., pastor in Plymouth for nearly three decades, is most known for his facility with the Wampanoag language and for the philandering that ultimately cost him his pulpit. At the time of Josiah’s death, it was only a few months since the end of... Read more
Evangelicalism can look a lot different across the Canadian border. Read more
Chris offers a free commencement address to the Class of 2020. Read more
In late seventeenth-century Boston a strange story was popular. As David D. Hall recounts it from the telling of Harvard president Urian Oakes: “A child that was born at Norich last Bartholomew-Day…being in the nurses arms last Easterday…being about 30 weeks old spake these words (This is an hard world): the nurse when she had recovered herselfe a little from her trembling, & amazement at the Extrardinariness of the thing said Why deare Child! Thou hast not known it: the... Read more
On Monday, I described Paul Matzko’s important new book, The Radio Right: How a Band of Broadcasters Took on the Federal Government and Built the Modern Conservative Movement. Paul described how far Right broadcasters like Billy James Hargis and Carl McIntire gained a mass following for their message, alarming both the Kennedy White House and the liberal mainline churches. In this guest post, Paul describes how the NCC responded to this alarming threat. When the National Council of Churches Went... Read more
How should we talk about white evangelicals during the coronavirus pandemic? On the one hand, there’s been no shortage of critical editorials highlighting the relatively small number of evangelical churches that have refused to comply with public health recommendations and government orders to cancel in-person services. Katherine Stewart’s March 27 op-ed in the New York Times is a case in point. Originally published under the provocative title “The Road to Coronavirus Hell Was Paved by Evangelicals: Trump’s response to the... Read more
As our series of non-religious turning points in religious history continues into the 20th century, Melissa, Kristin, David, and Chris look at an invention, a piece of legislation, and two related wars. Read more
Time will tell if COVID-19 produces lasting changes in Christianity and other faiths, but religious history is full of non-religious turning points. Today we look at three from before 1900, including a previous pandemic. Read more
An important new book explores the intersection between politics, religion, and media in modern US history. It’s going to have a major impact. Paul Matzko is a former doctoral student of mine at Penn State. His book, from Oxford University Press, is titled The Radio Right: How a Band of Broadcasters Took on the Federal Government and Built the Modern Conservative Movement. He began researching the world of conservative and far Right religious broadcasters between the 1940s and 1960s, radio... Read more
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