Latest Articles
Pope Francis references Thomas Merton and Dorothy Day in address to Congress
In what was already the most widely anticipated speech of Pope Francis’s pastoral visit to the United States this week, the Pope’s references to two American models of Christian living—the renowned author and Trappist Monk Thomas Merton and co-founder of the Catholic Worker movement Dorothy Day—have surprised many.
How to Read the Bible, by Harvey Cox
For the Bible to belong not only to the church or the academy but to the people, a guidebook is needed. Harvey Cox provides one.
Should Catholic churches keep drilling for oil?
(The Christian Science Monitor) Some Catholic churches in the United States are leasing out their lands for drills by oil and gas...
As Francis arrives in D.C., fans of all stripes welcome, watch, and wait
c. 2015 Religion News Service...
Phyllis Tickle, a best-selling author on spirituality, dies at 81
Phyllis Tickle, a best-selling author on American faith and spirituality, died September 22 under hospice care at her farm in Lucy, Tennessee. She was 81....
Wendy Murray's 2004 profile of Phyllis Tickle
Phyllis Tickle died yesterday at 81. The writer, editor, and commentator on American religion was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer early this year....
Changing the face of American Jesus
Brooks students entered a dated and pretentious room with the feel of an old study. They sat in a circle as they listened to Professor Edward Blum. One lecture illustration was the defaced image of Christ from after the Klan bombed the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. The room transformed as Blum’s slide showed the stained-glass window with a hole where the holy face of Christ had been.
Clergy self-care
Sixteen years ago, I kept a journal of my first year in ministry. At the end, I remember pasting an illustration of a man who was white and naked, and was being pulled apart by different hands. It was almost as if he were on a medieval torture rack, except fingers stretched him. The drawing, I felt, perfectly illustrated my first year as a pastor.
Importance of theology?
I'm nearing the end of my time as an M.Div. student at Perkins, and I've been thinking about my the experience of taking seminary classes. Part of my own reflection process has involved reading the essays I wrote for admissions and scholarship applications from four years ago. In these documents, I almost always brought in my passion to develop my theology—I remember writing something along the lines of “our worldview shapes how we live.” I would then tie this into how admission into Perkins would equip me to accomplish this through a well-rounded, liberal education. I’m sure the admissions committee ate this up.
White space, black lives
After I received the request to review Kelly Brown Douglas's book, I kept seeing her main thesis displayed in the news.
Could Pope Francis' visit encourage reform in Cuba?
(The Christian Science Monitor) It was the longest, and most anticipated, journey of his papacy so far....
Bible should be at the center of Anglican meeting, global group says
c. 2015 Religion News Service...
Overlapping holidays prompt Jerusalem activists to work on overcoming divisions
c. 2015 Religion News Service...
October 4, 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time: Psalm 8
The psalmist is not alone in claiming that humans are only “a little lower than God.” Can it be any wonder, then, that our faith leaves a great deal of room to disagree about our power in creation?
China’s gospel valley: Churches thrive among the Lisu people
The Upper Salween Valley is an inhospitable, sparsely populated place. It may seem like an unlikely place for a Christian community to thrive.
A rabbi and an imam: The story of Isaac and Ishmael can be a source of hope
Tomorrow, as Jews end their Yom Kippur fast, Muslims will begin the Eid al-Adha holiday. Imam Haytham Younis and Rabbi Alana Suskin met for coffee and then exchanged the following e-mail dialogue about the two holidays’ convergence and the meaning of a shared story that lies at the intersection of both faiths.
Who's going to teach religion?
I'm embarrassed to admit it, embarrassed because it took graduate school to teach me something it's hard to imagine I didn't learn much earlier. I don't want to blame my teachers. I don't think of them as nincompoops. If I didn't learn what I should, I probably wasn't listening.
But I'll never forget working on some graduate school research paper—probably something about John Milton—and stumbling on history so elementary I was embarrassed I didn't know it.
Standing with Kelly Gissendaner
This is a message from Mercy Junction. I called. Would you? You could save a precious life......
Pope Francis in Cuba: 'We do not serve ideas, we serve people'
(The Christian Science Monitor) Pope Francis spoke out on the need to serve and the evils of pride to thousands of Cubans who attended...
Civil rights activist clergy see new generation rising for voting rights
(The Christian Science Monitor) Fifty years after the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act, two legends of the ci...