“Togetherness in Bed,” rt69, Flickr C.C. This week, I decided to go through former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams’ famous essay “The Body’s Grace” with our men’s group that we formed in response to the crisis of sexual violence on our campus. Every time I read the essay, I understand it a little better. Williams’ prose is beautiful but it wanders all over the place and makes a few British cultural references I don’t get, so the first two or three... Read more
Since it’s #GivingTuesday and non-profits across the country are mobilizing to raise money, I wanted to share several causes you should support today. Click on the name of the organization to go to the fundraising site. 1) NOLA Wesley You know I’m going to promote our organization, but honestly even if I didn’t work there, I’m excited about the unique space that it provides for college ministry and theological exploration. We are the only openly LGBTQ+ affirming Christian college ministry... Read more
The day before Thanksgiving, I went to a used bookstore in Sulphur Springs, Texas. It was mostly filled with harlequin romance novels and Tom Clancy thrillers. I couldn’t find any of my usual go-to authors. So I randomly picked out a book called The Spoils of War by Thomas Fleming. It’s a historical novel about a Yankee general who marries a Southern Belle right after the Civil War. They have a lavish lifestyle which includes annual summers in Europe. But... Read more
For the past several months, the nation of Australia has been locked in a bitter debate about whether or not to support same-sex marriage. The conservative government gambled by holding a mail-in, non-binding plebiscite vote, which was supposed to favor elderly, more conservative voters who actually still use snail mail. Unfortunately for the conservatives, through a highly organized campaign, the Yes voters were able to get support from 61.6% of the voters, which is pretty well a crushing landslide statistically... Read more
In an interview with the Religion News Service about alleged pedophile and Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore, Liberty University President Jerry Falwell said, “It comes down to a question who is more credible in the eyes of the voters — the candidate or the accuser… I believe the judge is telling the truth.” In a recent poll, 37% of Alabama evangelicals said they were now more likely to vote for Roy Moore because of the sexual violence allegations against him.... Read more
It really is starting to feel like something supernatural and apocalyptic is at foot in our country during the Trump Era. So many secret sexual sins are being publicly exposed. It’s like God is testing his people, especially the sexual puritans, to see how far they have deviated from any semblance of integrity in their political proclivities so they can be crushed utterly by the wrathful exposure of God’s truth and then resurrected into an entirely new reality. My people, the evangelical... Read more
Apparently there is a national movement started by white nationalists in the netherworld of 4chan to post sheets of paper on college campuses and other places that say, “It’s okay to be white.” This message appeared in several locations at Tulane this morning. The strategy according to the call to action is to bait politically correct leftists into lashing out against it so that “normies” can be recruited for the white nationalist cause. So what about the statement in and of itself.... Read more
I got to spend the weekend that marked the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation at the Reformation Project conference in Chicago. The Reformation Project was started by Matthew Vines as an organization that advocates for biblically grounded full inclusion for LGBTQ people in the church. But it’s about so much more than a single issue or constituency of people. The church’s current sexuality debate has surfaced a host of issues around the meaning of ethics, salvation, hermeneutics, and orthodoxy... Read more
I’m not a woman. That means that misogynist ex-pastor Mark Driscoll’s words do not violate me directly. When he refers to women as “penis houses,” I recoil but I’m not triggered the way I would be if I were a women who had been directly victimized by men like him. My experience with Mark Driscoll is that he’s a perfect representative of everything I’m against as a Christian. He’s the purest, most un-bashful version of patriarchal neo-Calvinism. Five years ago,... Read more
Every other summer, my family goes to visit my wife’s cousin on his ranch in Bastrop, Texas. He has a huge collection of Henri Nouwen books. This summer, I borrowed Here and Now: Living in the Spirit. I’ve been flipping through it the last few months. For some reason, last night I read a section I’d already read multiple times and it hit me powerfully. So I wanted to share some quotes from it with my reflections. We must learn... Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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