Latest Articles
TSA, airlines tread carefully on religious expression
(RNS) Air travelers want to feel safe, and federal security officials
want to make sure they actually are safe. If only it were that simple.
...
Most don’t blame God for disasters
We may never know why bad things happen to good people, but most
Americans—except evangelicals—reject the idea that natural disasters are...
Reading the Bible, sex and all
Since starting seminary I've had the opportunity to read
through the Old Testament with a thoroughness I haven't used since my...
Chosen Ones and Flight of the Outcasts, by Alister McGrath
Alister McGrath, one of modern Christianity's foremost theological voices, is writing children's books....
Scholars and believers: Growing pains at the SBL
As the Society of Biblical Literature has grown in membership, tensions have simmered over the degree to which religious apologetics fits into an organization devoted to critical research.
Missing the signs: The church and Gen Y
Most churches have the equivalent of Eat at Joe's signs, advertising religious services so that people will stop, come in and taste what is good. The signs are imperative; they command us to eat here and not there.
Democrat announces alternate hearings on U.S. Muslims
WASHINGTON (RNS) Barely two weeks after House Republicans held hearings
on the threat posed by radicalized American Muslims, the Senate's No. 2...
U.S. embassy condemns Quran burning at Fla. church
(RNS) The U.S. ambassador to Pakistan called the burning of a Quran at a
small Florida church "abhorrent" as Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari...
Anti-Christian violence continues in Pakistan
New York, March 23 (ENInews)--Anti-Christian violence in Pakistan continued to take a toll as two Christians were shot and killed and two were wounded after Muslim youths allegedly attacked them ou...
"The good old hymns" defined
As a church musician, I've been known to program what I thought were familiar Charles Wesley hymns, only to find my non-Methodist song leaders tongue-tied by the ambitious melodies and all-doctrine...
The train I ride
Sooner or later, and usually sooner, conversations about passenger trains and Amtrak in particular sputter with the dirty "s-word": subsidies. But all American means of transportation depend on "subsidies."
Sunday, April 3: John 9:1-41
Three centuries ago in the village of Olney, England, a new parish priest came to town....
Evangelicals resist Obama's childhood obesity push
WASHINGTON (RNS) Evangelicals are the only major religious group where a
majority opposes the federal government's efforts to reduce childhood...
The problem with "my neighbor"
See, the problem with using language like “my neighbor” is the
unintentional (or sometimes more intentional) demarcation that occurs...
Is Lent about self-denial?
I grew up around evangelical church leaders who were hardcore
about spiritual fasting, sometimes going a week on just water or 40 days on...
Missionaries grapple with leaving Japan
(RNS) Wolfgang Langhans, a Tokyo-based field director for missionaries, calls the week since the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan "the busiest and most stressful week of my life."
...
Pope neither condemns, endorses Libya attacks
VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Benedict XVI voiced "fear and trepidation" about
the "disturbing news coming from Libya" in a carefully worded statement...
Fla. pastor presides at burning of Quran
(RNS) The controversial Florida pastor who halted plans to burn a Quran
on the 9/11 anniversary last year oversaw the burning of the Islamic...
Methodists: Drinking still a touchy topic
Pastor James Howell knew he had a problem on his hands when several
teenagers arrived at a church dance drunk and had to be taken from the...
From the wilderness
Whenever the Israelites' "wilderness wandering" comes up, it presents a golden opportunity--especially in the current U.S. political climate --to talk about immigration.