Features
The missing martyrs: Islam specialist Charles Kurzman
"Terrorism is not nearly as widespread as many people feared it would be after 9/11," says Charles Kurzman.
I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive, by Steve Earle
At a book signing,
Steve Earle was speaking when someone leaned
on a light switch and the windowless room went dark. "Did I die?" Earle asked in a quiet voice.
Fringe view: The world of Jesus mythicism
Scholars disagree about how Jesus understood his life and mission. Countless labels have been applied to him. But everyone agrees that he existed, right?
The case against Wall Street: Why the protesters are angry
The protesters sleeping in the cold do not claim that 99 percent of Americans agree with them. Their point is that the top 1 percent plays by different rules.
Dream House
Universal released Dream House without advance screenings, so critics weren't inclined to treat it seriously. The studio interfered with the movie so much that the director, Jim Sheridan, wanted to take his name off it. But though the movie is confused, it contains beautifully conceived sequences that suggest a genuine vision.
Post-Wobegon politics: Michele Bachmann and the moral recession
Michele Bachmann's frontrunner moment may be past. But she has shown how the Republicans can win in the restless small towns of the swing-state Midwest.
Books
I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive, by Steve Earle
At a book signing,
Steve Earle was speaking when someone leaned
on a light switch and the windowless room went dark. "Did I die?" Earle asked in a quiet voice.
The Anointed, by Randall J. Stephens and Karl W. Giberson
In high school I was taught that the Earth is about 10,000 years old. But I also learned the basics of evolution from my evangelical teachers....
Disrupted, by Julie Anderson Love
After her bleak diagnosis, Julie Anderson Love learned that hope has nothing to do
with passivity. She was, she writes, "the patient from
hell."
Spiritualized warfare
Americans went into the Civil War believing that God was on their side, and they ended the war believing the same.
Departments
In a dry season
Stretches of emptiness are not unusual in life, nor in the life of faith.
Vanishing Point
Artists and photographers—like prophets—have the ability to see what's around us with a particular depth of vision....
Faking it
Can I be a minister for others, many students wonder, if my own beliefs are in flux?
Gross inequity
Over 20 years, the CEO pay multiple went up 1,000 percent. Former bank CEO William J. McDonough calls this "grotesquely immoral."
Winter for Arab Christians?
An irony of Christian life amid the Arab Spring is that Christians have
frequently been protected by the authoritarian regimes that are under
attack.
News
Williams confronts Mugabe with dossier of abuses
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has asked Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe to intervene to stop attacks on Anglicans by allies of an excommunicated bishop who has seized church property and intimidated clergy and worshipers....
Greek Orthodox church to rebuild at Ground Zero
Ten years after St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church was destroyed by falling rubble from the World Trade Center towers, church leaders have reached an agreement to rebuild at Ground Zero....
Democrats name pastor to lead faith outreach
As President Obama gears up his reelection campaign, the Democratic
National Committee has tapped a well-connected Washington pastor to lead
the party's religious outreach. He is Derrick Harkins, senior pastor of...
SBC leader says Calvinism steadily dividing church
A Southern Baptist Convention official says one of the top challenges
facing the nation's second largest faith group (after Roman Catholics)
is the increasing influence of Calvinism in churches. Frank Page, who...
Accompaniment program launched in Colombia
An ecumenical accompaniment program has been launched to assist
victims of violence in Colombia, where internal armed conflict has
driven nearly 5 million people away from their land and property,...
Injury silences Greeley’s voice
Andrew Greeley is one of the best-known priests in America: a
respected and influential sociologist, a best-selling novelist and an
outspoken commentator on public and church issues for some 50 years....
Children feel stress as poverty rates rise
Eleven-year-old Sarai Camacho of Donna, Texas, tears up when she
tells why her mother let the babysitter go for her and her younger
sister this summer. It's the same reason her father brought the family...
Obama, evangelicals meet on religious concerns
President Obama formally extended his ear to evangelicals ahead of
the 2012 election, meeting with top leaders of the National Association
of Evangelicals in the White House for about 30 minutes in mid-October....
Charges dropped against ‘Rotunda 11’ protesters
A city court in Washington, D.C., has dropped charges against a group
of religious and civic leaders who were arrested in July during a
prayer vigil for the poor in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. The vigil, held...
New California law bars bans on circumcision
Jews, Muslims and their allies cheered recently as California Gov.
Jerry Brown signed a bill prohibiting all local bans on circumcision,
making it illegal for local authorities to restrict the medical or
religious practice....
Lectionary
Sunday, November 27, 2011: 1 Corinthians 1:3-9
Bring it on, commerce.
Sunday, November 20, 2011: Matthew 25:31-46
I'm not a big fan of reality TV, yet I'm drawn to one reality show: Undercover Boss.