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July 15, 2020

Volume 137, Issue #15

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Features

How My Mind Has Changed

Finding God outside the church walls

The Spirit is God’s wild card, played over and over again when old forms fail.

by Barbara Brown Taylor

In Nigeria, Christians are fleeing violence—and fearing COVID-19

At the Agan Camp for internally displaced persons in Benue State

by Patrick Egwu

gravestone with a hummingbird decoration

First Person

I don’t forgive the man who murdered my cousin DePayne at Mother Emanuel

To insist on a narrative of forgiveness is dehumanizing and violent. It goes against the very nature of lament.

by Waltrina N. Middleton

Opinion

Why are so many white Christians suddenly standing up for racial justice?

It might help that our pews aren’t available to sit in and pray.

by Alan Sherouse

Opinion

The coronavirus lockdown was doomed before the mass protests began

Its demise came from the same system that killed George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.

by Benjamin J. Dueholm

Books

Essays for a time of isolation

Jordan Kisner writes about seeing the world and the self.

by Lauren F. Winner

We need our screens right now. But what about later?

Ed Cyzewski’s prepandemic takedown of the digital formation of Christians is still surprisingly useful.

by Katherine Willis Pershey

The white Christian nationalist scam

Journalists Katherine Stewart and Anne Nelson unveil the mechanisms behind the rise of a movement.

by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

Departments

Faith Matters

The good death in three stages

Finding peace with neighbors, ourselves, and God

by Samuel Wells

First Words

Becoming less defensive about white privilege

The Christian faith provides some tools for letting go of our defensiveness.

by Peter W. Marty

On Art

Last Scapegoat—A Requiem, by Alfonse Borysewicz

Catholic painter Alfonse Borysewicz often takes inspiration from scriptural passages and liturgical rites....

art selection and comment by Aaron Rosen

Screen Time

The podcast How to Survive the End of the World offers a unique view of apocalypse

Autumn Brown and adrienne maree brown explore the end of the world as we know it.

by Kathryn Reklis

From the Editors

Gorsuch’s textualism promoted justice for LGBTQ people—this time

Why we can’t rely on this or any other hermeneutical principle

News

Faith groups react to Supreme Court ruling against Trump on DACA

Faith groups are applauding the US Supreme Court’s decision temporarily halting the Trump administration’s efforts to rescind an Obama-era program granting legal protection to hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who were brought to th...

by Jack Jenkins

Police budgets used to be untouchable. The ‘defund’ movement is changing that.

While smoke still billowed from buildings in Minneapolis and pepper spray choked the air from Los Angeles to New York, a movement to reshape policing coalesced around a demand conveyed in hashtags and spray paint....

by J. Brian Charles

Oregon community program shows what defunding the police could look like

As citizens across the country filled the streets to protest police killings of black people, the violent response from law enforcement has added urgency to a national conversation about police brutality....

by Anna V. Smith

Groups cut ties with author Chris Heuertz following 'spiritual abuse' allegations

Zondervan, the Christian media and publishing company, is suspending promotion of two books and indefinitely halting a documentary by popular Enneagram teacher and best-selling author Christopher Heuertz after allegations by nearly three dozen peo...

by Yonat Shimron

Emerging movement suggests young Christians are hungry for liturgy, ritutal

Every service at the Cathedral at the Gathering Place begins with an incense-filled procession of the crucifer and the Gospel, followed by the singing of “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also known as the black national anthem, before Emilio Alvarez, ...

by Kathryn Post

People

Rolland Slade elected first black chair of Southern Baptist executive committee

Rolland Slade, senior pastor of Meridian Baptist Church in El Cajon, California, has been elected as the first African American chairman of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, the group that runs the business of the nation’s la...

by Adelle M. Banks

People

Javier A. Viera named first non-white president of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

In January 2021, Javier A. Viera will become the first person of color to head Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary. The native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, will succeed Lallene J. Rector, who has served as seminary president since 2013....