Some think that defenders of President Trump’s dealings with Ukraine are a threat to the United States’ constitutional order: If Trump does something that he believes will get him get elected, “in the public interest,” then it cannot be “the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment.” In other words, Trump can do whatever he wants because he believes his presidency to be in the national interest. As several commentators have been pointing out in the last couple... Read more
This is huge! It explains the worship wars and so much more. Worshipers who frequently attend religious services are the least likely to own a pet, according to a new study analyzing data on religion and pet ownership from the 2018 General Social Survey. But not all animals are created equal when it comes to uncovering the truth about cats and dogs and religion. “We find a strong, negative association between worship attendance and cat ownership,” wrote researchers Samuel Perry... Read more
In 2016 lots of evangelicals voted for Donald Trump — I’ve heard EIGHTY-ONE PERCENT!!! did. Since then many Protestants have wanted to distance themselves from evangelicalism. They go by the name exvangelical. They even merit attention from elite media (though the video in question is no longer on-line). Of course, a primary reason for separation from evangelicalism is the movement’s identification with the Republican Party and especially the President. One of the bigger names to leave evangelicalism over politics was... Read more
In previous posts I have wondered about heightened attention to racism in the United States. This was even before the New York Times turned up the volume with its 1619 Project. Now I come to learn that in 2004, the song, “Everyone’s A Little Bit Racist,” from the show, Avenue Q, won several Tony Awards. Here are some of the lyrics from the song which appears to be part of a dialogue, spoken and sung: You’re a little bit racist.... Read more
George Weigel has lots of counsel for Roman Catholics in the New Year, especially how to endure a church going through a serious crisis on many fronts. None of his advice involves other Christian communions as an alternative: During and after the grim martial law period in the early 1980s, many freedom-minded Poles would greet each other on January 1 with a sardonic wish: “May the new year be better than you know it’s going to be!” As 2020 opens... Read more
The peak of controversy among Protestants over worship (especially Praise and Worship versus traditional) was the 1990s. By then, the rise of Jesus Rock and other popular Christian music from the 1970s had trickled into the evangelical mainstream to be adopted by megachurch icons like Bill Hybels at Willow Creek. At the time a member of a Reformed church in nearby Wheaton, Illinois, I still remember the pressure to conform to Willow Creek’s casual style and popular music if we... Read more
With the news of Daniel Harrell’s appointment as editor of Christianity Today, I could not help but see the long lines of influence that post-World War II neo-evangelical leaders had on what we know now and complain about as evangelicalism. Here is Harrell’s biography: Daniel M. Harrell is Editor-in-Chief of Christianity Today. Formerly, he served ten years as Senior Minister of Colonial Church, Edina, Minnesota, and for 23 years before that as preaching minister at Park Street Church, Boston, Massachusetts.... Read more
Imagine the editor of a major magazine running a column that aims multiple layers of criticism at the United States and its leadership (including President Trump). Imagine, too, that this editor takes lots of flack from scholars for distorting criteria for assessing the nation and POTUS. Imagine, finally, how readers are supposed to figure out which side in this debate is right. Is the editor in a bubble of political assumption that is distant from the way rank-and-file Americans understand... Read more
This is a re-post from 2015 but the length of seasons greetings — from Thanksgiving to the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl — makes the idea of returning to regular activities downright appeal: April is the cruelest month, at least according to T. S. Eliot. When he wrote that line in ‘The Wasteland,’ of course, he had not experienced the seasonal doldrums that mark the month of January now that we have merged Thanksgiving and Christmas into one month-long party. After... Read more
Wayne Grudem is not one: I am guessing a lot of my readers have never heard of Wayne Grudem. He is an evangelical theologian and the author of a very popular one-volume treatment of evangelical systematic theology. He is also well-known within evangelical circles for defending a “complementarian” view of gender roles in the church and society. Grudem is the quintessential evangelical insider. He speaks and writes for evangelical churches and rarely ventures out of this subculture to engage a... Read more
Putting the Protest in Protestant
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