Voices
Debie Thomas
The hope I’ve arrived at
I used to put a positive spin on everything. The effort didn’t serve my children—or my own heart.
Debie Thomas
Which church is dying?
The church of empire might be. But I’m not ready to call time of death on the mystical body of Christ.
Melissa Florer-Bixler
Women posing problems
In the gospels and in the world today, women get in the way and make the world new.
Philip Jenkins
Is religion good for human flourishing?
The Global Flourishing Study is producing a dazzling amount of data to help us answer this sort of question.
Yolanda Pierce
Small creatures
“There’s a frog in our house!” My daughter and I said the words together, but only one of us was excited.
Julian DeShazier
God cares nothing for our algorithms
Embracing the random can open us up to the agitations of the Holy Spirit.
Isaac S. Villegas
Present together
When I was a chaplain intern working with people with disabilities, there was one man I visited every Sunday right after worship.
Yolanda Pierce
The spirituality of waiting
If God is present in the planting and the harvest, then God is present in the time when nothing seems to be happening.
Brian Bantum
Cycling my way to peace
Turning the pedals over again and again, I began to feel the fullness of who I am and how I was made.
Rachel Mann
Virtuous friendship
Prudence and constancy might not sound like much fun, but they create the load-bearing relationships communities need to flourish.
Julian DeShazier
The great man theory is poison for the church
The problem isn’t just that it exists. It’s that so many ministers fall for it.
Yolanda Pierce
Phoning home
God, like an attuned parent, hears not just the words we say but also the hidden parts of our hearts.
Philip Jenkins
Praying the hours with W. H. Auden
The poet’s Horae Canonicae sequence is an underappreciated spiritual classic.
Alejandra Oliva
Feeling God in a modernist cathedral-in-progress
While other churches have filled me with wonder, Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia brought tears to my eyes.
Samuel Wells
What does it mean to be an inclusive church?
Being a community means welcoming those with diverse views, not cocooning oneself with like-minded people.
Jonathan Tran
What does ‘Christian nationalism’ even mean?
Could it really be all the different things people say it is?
Rachel Mann
Facing a world on fire
The contemplative life is about getting closer to reality, not retreating from it.