I had the privilege to spend the last week at the 5th Latin American Conference on Evangelization (CLADE V in Spanish), sponsored by the Latin American Theological Fraternity (FTL). FTL is well known for its emphasis on integral mission, a Protestant response to the liberation theology coming out of the Latin America during the 1970s. Sociologists would classify most of the people at the event as conservative or evangelical Protestants. The average participant reads the Bible regularly and takes a... Read more

Twenty years ago, author and psychiatrist M. Scott Peck gave a lecture in which he asserted that the biblical phrase “The Kingdom of God is within you” has been mistranslated and misunderstood throughout history. Dr. Peck said that if you go back to the original Aramaic, in which that piece of Scripture is written, what it actually says is: “The Kingdom of God is AMONG you.” That is, the Kingdom of God is in community. Wherever two or more are... Read more

Racially insensitive attitudes toward blacks cost Barack Obama some votes, and to a lesser extent negative views on Mormonism hurt Mitt Romney politically. But those are countered by a favorable tilt toward the candidates among Americans who express more awareness of racial discrimination or who hold favorable views of Mormons. The racial effect is the larger one, showing strongly in views of whether blacks are discriminated against. Sixty-two percent of non-blacks in this ABC News/Washington Post poll think blacks in... Read more

I study, among other subjects, black Catholics. When I tell people I study black Catholics, I am often met with blank stares. If black Catholics occupy any space in the American religious imagination, they conjure images of Catholic Masses with Gospel choirs and the politics of parishes like St. Sabina’s on the South Side of Chicago. Black Catholics sometimes baffle because they pose a problem for scholars and laypeople alike. African American religious studies, until relatively recently, may be one... Read more

by Crystal St. Marie LewisR3 ContributorFrom: Crystalstmarielewis I used to hate the book of Job. It’s about a guy against whom God and the satan conspired… the ancient story of a despicable prank. The satan approached God with a wager of sorts: “I bet you won’t find one believer in Israel who will remain faithful to you in the face of calamity.” God heard the bet and volunteered “his servant” Job– and immediately thereafter, all hell broke loose. As the... Read more

by Rashad GroveR3 Contributor The late Paulo Freire in his classic text The Pedagogy of the Oppressed once said, “Washing one’s hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral”. There is something remarkably fatal and simultaneously fertile in the ultimate pursuit, the protection, and the perpetuation of power. Power, when left unchecked, unchallenged, and uncritiqued, eventually destroys the holder of power and those who are subject to power.... Read more

Forty-four percent of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in “the church or organized religion” today, just below the low points Gallup has found in recent years, including 45% in 2002 and 46% in 2007. This follows a long-term decline in Americans’ confidence in religion since the 1970s. In 1973, “the church or organized religion” was the most highly rated institution in Gallup’s confidence in institutions measure, and it continued to rank first in most... Read more

David Goldfield’s article “Avoid the Carnage of War” (June 29 Viewpoint) may be provocative reading, but it is bad religious history. Goldfield does not like war, and he thinks the American Civil War could and should have been avoided. He labels the Civil War a “war of choice brought on by the insidious mixture of politics and religion.” In this thinly veiled screed, summarizing some basic ideas from his recent book “America Aflame,” Goldfield thus interprets the Civil War as... Read more

by Ebony UtleyR3 Contributor Rapper Meek Mill and Pastor Jomo K. Johnson have beef. I know. Before this week, you’ve probably never heard of either of them. Meek Mill is a Philadelphia rapper whose track “Amen” has inspired the ire of Pastor Johnson who has called for a boycott of Mill. I’ve written elsewhere about why rappers incorporate religious themes. It’s inevitable. Religion is in the hood nestled between the liquor stores and the churches on most urban corners. And... Read more

by Edward BlumR3 Contributor The novels of Seth Grahame-Smith are drawing a lot of attention these days. His books don’t sell as well as Dan Brown’s and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter didn’t do as well as producers would have liked, but with that novel in theaters, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies a smash-hit from 2009, and now Unholy Night released in April, he has quite a trilogy of tales. What has gone unnoticed, however, is how consistently his works are... Read more