What does it mean to call someone a heretic? Guest blogger Joey Cochran surveys the history of heresy — and wonders if the word now functions as anything more than "name-calling." Read more
What does it mean to call someone a heretic? Guest blogger Joey Cochran surveys the history of heresy — and wonders if the word now functions as anything more than "name-calling." Read more
Greetings from Dry January. This special season, introduced a few years back, invites men and women to take a month-long break from alcohol in order to feel better and get control of their intake. Too bad American evangelicals never thought up something so cool as abstaining from alcohol in service of better health and social good. A British group, Alcohol Change UK, initiated in the trend 2013 with a few thousand participants. Dry January counted a few million Brits by... Read more
Today I have one substantial post, about American Anglicans, but also a shorter note on a wholly unrelated topic, namely a remarkable scandal in the academic world of religion scholarship. My main post is about American Anglicans, of whom I am not one: I am an Episcopalian, from another and (somewhat) competing branch of the tradition. If one word of the following emerges as critical or uncharitable, I certainly do not intend it that way. My intention is rather to... Read more
This Monday, the Clemson Tigers face off against the LSU Tigers in the College Football Playoff National Championship. For Dabo Swinney, Clemson’s coach, the game will not only be a contest of athletic skill, but also a testimony to religious faith. Under Swinney’s leadership, the Clemson Tigers have earned a formidable record—they are the defending champions, and Monday’s game will be their third appearance in the championship matchup in four years. But Swinney is famous not simply for leading his... Read more
I recently encountered an article that made me yell “Preach!” It was about single women in the Australian church, but everything it said resonated with me as a single woman in the American church. Australia has fewer men than women overall, and this ratio is exacerbated within the church. So many Christian women who assumed they would be married by now have instead found themselves still single. I assumed similar statistics were true for the contemporary American church. Turns out... Read more
If you're considering sending your children to a Christian college, Chris has some advice. Read more
I have been reviewing some of the highlights of the decade just past, as they affected Christians and Christianity. That includes events within the US, and the films of the era. Here, let me shift my focus to the global stage, as I offer my own listing (tentative and perhaps idiosyncratic) of the key developments of that era. In each instance, I focus on a particular year, although the event that I highlight might epitomize a larger trend that in... Read more
This post concerns a prayer of which I am fond, and which should be better known. It also offers a good argument for liturgy, for set forms and words echoing through the centuries. Oddly too, it is a highly seasonal topic. If you go to a church in the Episcopal or Anglican tradition, then every Sunday you will hear the following collect near the beginning of the liturgy: Almighty God, to you all hearts are open, all desires known, and... Read more
On the fourth Sunday of Advent, I attended worship at a mainline Protestant church. The text was Matthew 1:18-25, which describes Jesus’s virgin birth as the fulfillment of ancient prophecy (Isaiah 7:14) The minister began with the issue of translation. He observed a discrepancy between the Greek and Hebrew words used in the texts. The Hebrew Almah suggests a young woman who has reached the age of childbearing. The Greek Parthenos, by contrast, refers to a virgin. He concluded that... Read more
David reviews a fascinating memoir entitled *Rebel Mother* Read more
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