Latest Articles
Mississippi, too, struggles to rebuild: Still numb
Driving west from New Orleans along the water’s edge toward Mobile, Alabama, one sees that the boulevard stretching along the Mississippi coastline now has flora and fauna, but piers are ruined and...
Progressive nuns urge Bush impeachment: "Impelled by conscience"
A progressive group of U.S. nuns has called on Congress to impeach President Bush and Vice President Cheney because of their roles in the war in Iraq....
New life for old church buildings: Acceptable transitions
Dozens of children chattered with excitement in a space where the faithful of the former Heights United Presbyterian Church once raised their voices in worship....
Lesbian is candidate to be next Episcopal bishop of Chicago: Chicago diocese
The Episcopal Church’s struggle with the worldwide Anglican Communion over homosexuality and biblical interpretation took another turn just before the Labor Day weekend with news that one of five c...
PCUSA minister rebuked for lesbian wedding: Mildest form of punishment
A midlevel court of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has overturned a lower court ruling and declared that an activist lesbian minister should be rebuked for conducting a same-sex wedding ceremony....
Hymns celebrated on Charles Wesley's 300th anniversary: Hark the Herald
Hymn writer Charles Wesley, the younger and less celebrated of two brothers whose work led to the forming of the Methodist Church, is being honored at a London exhibition celebrating the 300th anni...
Group abandons plan to send troops 'Left Behind' games: Operation Straight Up
An evangelical entertainment troupe has abandoned plans to send a controversial video game in care packages to U.S. troops in Iraq....
Getting to no: Space for yeses to grow
A few years ago I bought a book on leadership called Getting to Yes....
The next chapter: Turning the page
Readers often ask, “Whence issue these columns?” Here’s the current answer. Last winter we traded our suburban home of 43 years for high-rise housing in downtown Chicago....
Face to face: Pentecost in an isolating world
Our culture’s ever-increasing individualism is about to take a decisive turn. Any day now self-checkout lanes in our stores will outnumber the lanes that lead shoppers to a human cashier....
At ease in Zion: Amos 6:1-7; Psalm 146
Amos was one prophet who knew how to afflict the comfortable. He seemed to have it in for those who had done all right for themselves....
Gangs and God: How churches are reaching out
Pastor Maria Edmonds is doing gang ministry in the mountains of North Carolina. As she puts it, "They’re not accepted anywhere else. So I figure Jesus would have me spend time with them.”Millions of dollars are spent each year at the federal level to combat gang activity and reduce gang-related violence in our big cities. And, as Edmonds has discovered, gangs are also a feature of life in many small towns.
Uncorrected: Failures of the juvenile justice system
At age 12 Lionel Tate killed his six-year-old playmate. He was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole....
Singing the blues: Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4; Psalm 137; Luke 17:5-10
Habakkuk has a complaint. There is violence. There is wrongdoing and trouble. Ruin and strife and contention are in his face. He cries out for help, but God doesn’t seem to be listening....
Courage to preach
In a recent essay, Marilynne Robinson attributes the struggles of mainline...
Fighting atheist
After you have written books attacking Henry Kissinger and Mother Teresa, what is left, really, but to write a book attacking Go...
Buried in the Bitter Waters
It is ironic that at the same time some conservatives have declared racial discrimination to be lar...