Latest Articles
Lila in community
At the end of Marilynne Robinson’s latest novel Lila, the title character envisions heaven in an intensely communal way. In light of that communal vision, Century associate editor Amy Frykholm gathered together three avid Robinson readers—Rachel Stone, Peter Boumgarden, and Amber Noel—for a conversation about the novel.
Has church branding progressed too far?
Branding is all about claiming distinctiveness. What can your product do that others can’t? What looks or feels better than the others? What tastes stand out? Sometimes we treat faith communities the same way.
Sympathy for Pharaoh
Exodus: Gods and Kings has more in common with the 2004 sword-and-sandal disaster Alexander than with the other biblical epics of 2014.
How oil price slump is squeezing Hezbollah, Iran's Shi‘ite ally
(The Christian Science Monitor) Hezbollah, a Shi‘ite militant group, is facing a new enemy: financial austerity....
Tortured ends and means
Reinhold Niebuhr once broke with the editor of this magazine to argue that moral responsibility requires resisting evil with force. It’s a compelling argument, but it doesn’t justify torture.
Cuba’s future
U.S. churches have long sought better relations with Christians in Cuba. The political thaw will make this much easier.
Barriers between Israel and Palestinian territory also block relationships
(The Christian Science Monitor) When Linda Casher moved to an Israeli collective near the Gaza Strip as a young American woman in the 1970s, ...
The gift we don't understand
It was my first winter in rural South Dakota, and despite the worrisome weather, I was planning a road trip. On Sunday morning, one of my parish members came up to me and solemnly handed me a coffee can. It contained a roll of toilet paper, a candle, some matches, and a candy bar. “Put this in your trunk,” she said. I had no idea what this was. “Thank you,” I said.
Christmas should be materialistic
Maybe it’s because I’m a pastor and my social media is flooded with churchy headlines and hashtags, but I’ve grown weary of the Christmas tradition of bemoaning the commercialization of the season and criticizing others (usually referring to non-Christians) for being so materialistic about Christmas.
I mean, I’ve got my own gripes with Black Friday and Xmas music in late September but is there anything more cliché than surveying the wrapping paper debris on the curb and the pine needles on the floor and lamenting that we’ve missed the meaning of Christmas?
Sometimes government works
When it comes to conversations about government spending, two subjects tend to get conflated. The first is an ideological debate about whether or not the government is in general any good at doing things. The second regards the actual effectiveness of specific things the government does. And the second conversation is far more concrete, productive, and important, which is why it drives me crazy when the first one prevents people from engaging the second.
Ron Haskins's new book is pretty wonky, but the articles he's written to promote it are quite readable.
The war within: A veterans moral injury
In Iraq, my perception of good and evil began to erode. What I lost was a world that made moral sense.
Episcopal misconduct?
Two days after Christmas, Heather Elizabeth Cook, suffragan bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland, ...
Come to Jesus
I was part of a conference call recently with a number of young-ish pastors in our denomination where we were talking about Jesus’ prayer in John 17 that the his followers would be “one.” Anyone with even the most cursory understanding of church history will know that, well, we haven’t exactly done so well with this little ideal.
Indeed, we might be forgiven for laughing out loud at the idea that there could be such a thing as a unified church.
Sorry About That, by Edwin L. Battistella
In this anecdotal study of public apology, Edwin Battistella shows that our anxieties and confusions about confession are rooted in a deeper ambiguity: the tension between the culpable self and the apologetic self.
Open to a new year and new possibilities with God
It is at this point that Jesus reminds us that God completely throws off our human calculations of what will be constant and what will change, for “what is impossible for mere humans is possible for God” he insists.
Turkey plans to establish an Islamic university with a broader Muslim curriculum
c. 2014 Religion News Service...
After living without God for a year, former pastor Ryan Bell no longer believes
c. 2014 Religion News Service
(RNS) Ryan Bell—the former Seventh-day Adventist pastor who spent 2014 living as an atheist—is ready for his big reveal....
Islamic insurgency isn't just a Mideast problem, as Africans know well
c. 2014 Religion News Service...
What the church is made of
Churches need new thinking—on the part of denominational executives, pastors brave enough to walk into challenging situations, and people willing to let go of a church model that no longer works.