Latest Articles

On Tuesday, the general assembly of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) approved a resolution calling on the church in all its expressions to affirm the faith, baptism, and spiritual gifts of everyone, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. This was timely, given the Defense of Marriage Act decision, though the resolution doesn’t specifically mention same-sex marriage. Nor does it mention ordination—the other hot-button issue around sexuality in the church—though it does affirm that neither sexual orientation nor gender identity is “grounds for exclusion from fellowship or service within the church.” 

Eric Cassell reminds us that people experience sickness in profoundly individual ways. Physicians should learn to heal patients even when they cannot cure their diseases.

c. 2013 USA Today...

Barton Swaim, reviewing Elesha J. Coffman’s The Christian Century and the Rise of the Protestant Mainline for the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), wrote this: Nor were the editors [of the Christian Century] above dirty tricks, at one point even hiring an investigative reporter to find some impropriety in [the Billy Graham] organization’s finances. None came to light, but in something of a scoop, Ms. Coffman has discovered documents linking the revered historian Martin Marty to the rough anti-Graham campaign. As far as Coffman’s book goes, I have only the usual quibbles that a historian voices when reviewing the work of another historian. It is Swaim who is unfair to the magazine.

New today from the Century: Richard Lischer reviews John Sexton, Kelly Baker on the secular apocalypse, more.

In the opening scenes of World War Z, a news montage assaults the viewer. Clips document epidemics, wolves, global warming, reality television, pundits and others forms of dangerous nature. They evoke a world in seeming decline, in which one pivotal moment could lead to the global disaster from which we might not recover. Chaos and inevitable decline set the tone for the film. But what ends us in World War Z are zombies.

Baseball continues to receive elegiac tributes. John Sexton's latest joins company with the works of some impressive lovers of the game.

c. 2013 USA Today...

Despite a promise by the Sudanese government to grant its minority Christian population religious freedom, church leaders there said they are beset by in...

I was walking home when Vicki ran up to me. Vicki and I had become acquainted over the last few months because I regularly walked past her hangout in Old Louisville....

I don't have any brilliant insights on the George Zimmerman verdict. Some say the story's about racism; others say it's about guns; others say it's about Florida's horrible self-defense laws....

There is a long history in Florida, in the South, in the United States....

The median church size in the U.S. is 75 members: there are lots of little congregations, and a few very large ones. That in turn leads to this fun figure: asking a 75-member church to absorb $50,000 in increased ministry costs works out to about $666 per person each year, a 44 percent surcharge on the average worshiper's contribution.

New today from the Century: Tammerie Day on George Zimmerman and the history of colonial Florida, Kathryn Reklis on Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing, more.

Joss Whedon's adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing is an enchanting modern take on the 16th-century romance and a nearly perfect movie.

The answer that comes out of a tornado is not the kind of answer we want.

My grandmother died in 2005, on the eve of the feast of Saints Mary and Martha of Bethany. The next day I went to the weekday eucharist at St. James Cathedral in Chicago, and the story of Martha and her sister brought me instantly to tears. Like so many women of her generation (and not only hers), my grandmother was deeply identified with her hospitality and service. She was a lot like Martha, and I loved her for it. I am more troubled now than I was then at the way this story is gendered in our reading.

New today from the Century: Crystal St. Marie Lewis on the Zimmerman verdict and the desire to escape, Rodney Clapp on prayer amid a whirlwind, more.

When I heard the words “not guilty" on Saturday, I closed my eyes and wished that I could escape the system we’ve built here in America.

For my money, John’s is the only Gospel in which Jesus seems really lonely.