Editor's Desk

Extremists seem to be in charge everywhere. ISIS has taken over a huge geographic area and forced Christians to leave their homes or convert.

The Supreme Court reflects the politics of the moment. And two recent decisions are in line with a shift of the current court toward the right.

The conflict over divestment seems to divide Presbyterians more deeply than past struggles. Old friends are barely speaking to one another.

I love the Declaration of Independence and the radical notion that every human being has unalienable rights, innate worth, and dignity.

I've always sensed a poverty of praxis in my own Reformed ecclesiology. But these days we Reformed Protestants are taking practices seriously, too: anointing, laying hands on the sick, imposing ashes.

Our granddaughter's uncertainty about confirmation was typical and appropriate. After eight months of class, though, she told me she had decided to declare her faith.

It’s time for mainline Protestant churches to invite mainstream Jewish organizations to sit down and figure out what we can do together to support the Israel-Palestine peace process.

Isn’t it possible for both Israeli and Palestinian narratives to be true? Dialogue ends when each side demands that the other “let go of past suffering” and “get over it.”

Donna Tartt’s novel The Goldfinch connects to both head and heart, while Doris Kearns Goodwin’s The Bully Pulpit tells of Theodore Roosevelt, an endlessly fascinating figure.

Frightened disciples—cowering behind a bolted door—emerged from hiding as fearless and fierce followers. What changed them was the conviction that their crucified friend was alive.

In every age, the crucifixion has compelled artists with its raw human drama, as well as with its deeper meaning.

Many of us love the busyness and energy of a robust church. And yet all of us pastors must summon an uncommon discipline if we are to reflect the priority of preaching.

Years of experience don’t ease the journey toward a family waiting in an ICU. We pastors feel terribly inadequate, and at the same time incredibly grateful that the vocation allows us into the most intimate situations.

In divinity school, professors engaged my heart and mind—and began the process of helping me figure out what I believed and whether it was important enough to give my life to it.

I don't much like the days and weeks after Christmas. Christmas takes so long to get here, with preparations and anticipation building from mid-November on. And then, sometime during the day of December 25, it all collapses.

When the church was under siege, passing the peace was important to members meeting in secret. Today, it’s a part of the service I dread.

We've been told that millennials are selfish, greedy and narcissistic. But the young adults I know don't fit this stereotype.

The miracle of love is that the more you love, the more alive you are. Keeping Christmas is believing in the transforming power of love.

God loves the creation. In response the creation sings praise and adoration to God.

The proximity of Thanksgiving and Advent evokes in me an awareness and celebration of the ways God comes into the world.