Latest Articles

c. 2013 Religion News Service...

Do Republicans have an evangelical problem in a party that’s been both derided and heralded as God’s Official Party?...

I was with a group of folk from another congregation recently, introducing them to NEXT Church and talking about my involvement as co-chair....

I'm puzzled by Sally Quinn's take on Hillary Clinton's tweeting debut this week: There were two surprising things about Hillary Clinton’s first tweet. Clinton broke her Twitter silence this week with this bio: “Wife, mom, lawyer, women and kids advocate, FLOAR, FLOTUS, US Senator, SecState, author, dog owner, hair icon, pantsuit aficionado, glass ceiling cracker, TBD . . . .” A photo by Diana Walker showing a serious-looking Clinton in black and looking at her Blackberry through dark glasses is her avatar.

New today from the Century: Interview with UM pastor Lisa Yebuah, MaryAnn McKibben Dana on not being married to her church, more.

The latest six-song effort by Beki Hemingway—a distant relative of Ernest—finds her in fine voice, singing with a poised balance of tough and tender....

For some churches in North Dakota, the oil boom is a threat. For others it's an opportunity to relate to new neighbors.

Wrigley Field and Fourth Presbyterian Church both opened in 1914. It's the perfect image of my lifelong connection to God and baseball.

The musical The Book of Mormon portrays two naïve Mormon missionaries in Uganda proclaiming that “in 1978, God changed his mind about black people.” The joke isn’t mere whimsy; the LDS Church is widely perceived as racist. The irony is that had the church followed its initial trajectory, by now it likely would have become the most racially integrated and progressive church in America.

New today from the Century: Amy Frykholm on the churches and the North Dakota oil boom, Daniel Schultz on Christians and the PRISM program, more.

Is the NSA electronic surveillance story about human rights? Is it about the common good, or loving the neighbor?

c. 2013 Religion News Service...

In a slum settlement outside Cairo, Coptic Christians do a dirty job that no one else wants to do.

A vengeful howl among political leaders in North Carolina has silenced God’s voice as legislators try to resume executions of those on death row....

Recently, I was lucky to sit in on a meeting with a church’s governing board, their interim pastor and a church consultant.  The congregation had planned to seek a settled, full time...

New today from the Century: Cairo's garbage city, privacy and terrorism, more.

A new WaPo/Pew poll finds that 56 percent of Americans thing it’s acceptable for the National Security Agency to secretly access millions of Americans’ phone records. Sixty-two percent favor investigating terrorist threats “even if that intrudes on personal privacy.” Do people just not give a damn about privacy anymore, what with their dreams of reality-TV celebrity and their willingness to function as a Facebook or Google product?

The civil war in Syria is tragic. But Obama is right to be skeptical of direct military intervention.

c. 2013 USA Today...

“The story of Naboth is old in time but daily in practice,” said Ambrose of Milan. “Who of the wealthy does not strive to drive off the poor person from his little acre and turn out the needy from the boundaries of his ancestral field?” Our world was and is ruled by those who control militaries and cartels, banks and corporations—the heirs of King Ahab’s insatiable desire and unrestrained power.