Features
Ironic witness: Embodying faith in a postmodern age
Our age doesn't need theoretical answers to intellectual challenges of belief. It needs personal responses to people's spiritual problems.
What happened to Occupy? The divided left and the demise of a movement: The divided left and the demise of a movement
"We are the 99 percent" was a brilliant rallying cry. But those five words were Occupy's essential contribution, and they came at the start.
Christians in exile: Syrians take refuge in Lebanon
Syrian refugees have fled to Lebanon in massive numbers. The situation threatens to overwhelm a country already struggling to maintain a delicate peace.
The steeple dropout: Will Campbell, 1924–2013
When Will Campbell replied to my letter, I expected him to call me to fight “the Enemy.” Instead he encouraged me to love my enemies.
Being watched: Surveillance and the Christian community
We need a more developed theological ethics of what it means to live in an age when so much information about ourselves is so readily available.
Books
The Blackwell Companion to the Bible in English Literature
Biblical material pervades the works of English literature. Bible stories have been retold, recast and reinterpreted....
Transforming Church Conflict, by Deborah Van Deusen Hunsinger and Theresa F. Latini
Conflict can be destructive, constructive or even transformative depending on how leaders respond to it....
Divine Vintage, by Randall Heskett and Joel Butler
Wine was a major economic resource in the Near East and the Mediterranean world; in times of war, vineyards would be one of the first areas attacked by enemies to undermine the economy....
Francis of Assisi, by Augustine Thompson
When we think of the hagiography of Francis of Assisi, Qohelet’s wry musing comes to mind: “Of making many books there is no end.”...
Israel’s Protestant friends
The Six-Day War, as Caitlin Carenen argues, represented a turning point in American Protestant views of Israel.
Departments
The Irish nones
For centuries Ireland was synonymous with staunch Catholic piety. Now it seems to be undergoing a process of secularization as rapid as any in history.
St. Christina the Astonishing, by Cynthia Large
West Coast Quaker artist Cynthia Large came to her explorations of faith through her study of art history....
Fake marriage, real kids
The Americans is more than a spy show. It explores how a hidden identity is hard to nourish—and an identity embodied in habit is harder to disavow.
Sustaining a resource
My hope is that those of us who rely on the Century today will create the financial strength to guarantee that there will be a Century in the future.
Security at what cost? When safety is an idol
In our political climate, security enjoys a peculiar status: it’s an absolute priority, subject to little scrutiny or cost-benefit analysis.
News
Pope downplays threat of Vatican scrutiny of nuns
Weeks after authorizing a continued investigation of American nuns, Pope Francis told a group of nuns and priests from Latin America not to worry if they found themselves under similar scrutiny....
Anglican bishops abandon fight over gay marriage
Bishops in the Church of England, who had strenuously opposed a bid to allow same-sex marriage, have signaled that they won’t try to derail the bill after it received an overwhelming vote of support in the House of Lords....
SBC agrees to disagree over Calvinist trend
Can’t we all just get along? That was the question Southern Baptists, torn between Calvinists and non-Calvinists, seemed to be asking as they opened their annual meeting in Houston....
Southern Baptist numbers drop for baptisms, membership
Annual baptisms in Southern Baptist churches have declined by 100,000 in the past 12 years and last year dropped to the lowest number in 64 years....
City plans to bury bodies in Gosnell case
Despite repeated requests from religious leaders and antiabortion activists, city officials in Philadelphia plan to cremate and bury the 47 bodies recovered from the office of abortion provider Kermit Gosnell....
Republicans retool for evangelical outreach
Do Republicans have an evangelical problem in a party that’s been both derided and heralded as God’s Official Party?...
FBI widens list of groups subject to hate crimes
For Raed Jarrar, the FBI’s recent decision to begin tracking hate crimes against Arabs is a victory in a larger war....
A monument to unbelief erected on public land
After years of fights over religious monuments on public land, a county courthouse in northern Florida will soon be the home of the nation’s first monument to atheism on public property....