I took the last week off to write. (More on that later). What happened in the world of evangelicals and politics while I was gone? Let’s check in: Jenna Ellis offers another “lesson” in the politics of human dignity: Jenna, […]
Way of Improvement
“Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction.”
Poem of the day: Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front Love the quick profit, the annual raise,vacation with pay. Want moreof everything ready-made. Be afraidto know your neighbors and to die.And you will have a window in your head.Not even […]
Why Study History?: A conversation with the guys on the Re-Integrate Podcast
Listen here. Here is the episode description: Both David and Bob are history buffs. But studying history is not as simple as watching a documentary, a biopic, or reading a bestselling narrative history. We need to be aware of how […]
Spring Break at The Way of Improvement Leads Home
I’ll see you on Sunday!
Sunday night odds and ends
A few things online that caught my attention this week: Not everyone at Howard University is happy Ibram X. Kendi is coming. Against “scholactivism” Ben Franklin and climate change Martha Nussbaum Udi Greenberg reviews The Solidarity Economy: Nonprofits and the […]
“Even a first-year law student knows that the federal government cannot dictate the viewpoint and curriculum of a private Christian school”
Here is David French at The New York Times: This might sound like a funny thing to say, but I’ve rarely read a more unconstitutional letter. On Monday, Ed Martin, the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, sent the […]
Movie clip of the day
A Christian Palestinian journalist worked on “Arab Sesame Street.” He has things to say about Trump’s cuts to USAID funding
Daoud Kuttab is an award-winning Palestinian journalist and a graduate of Messiah University, the school where I teach American history. Some of you may remember his Current piece on the one year anniversary of the Gaza War. Here is a […]
“If you oppose all tariffs, you are essentially signaling that you are comfortable with exploited foreign workers making your stuff at the expense of American workers.”Â
Chris DeLuzio represents Pennsylvania’s 17th Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives. Here is a taste of his piece at The New York Times: Many of my constituents support smart tariffs, particularly ones that target China, and so […]
Trump’s “bronana republic”
Dennis Jett is a former American ambassador to Peru and Mozambique. He teaches international affairs at Penn State University. Here is a taste of his recent op-ed at The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: …Perhaps the strongest case can be made, however, is […]
“I once believed university was a shared intellectual pursuit. That faith has been obliterated”
What should professors do about AI generated papers? When I returned to teaching from a sabbatical last year I noticed that the students in my general education history classes suddenly learned how to write. Were they using ChatGPT to write […]
The Trump administration is going after private faith-based colleges
David French is on the case:
A lot of Democrats and progressives still have no clue
If you listen to some progressives–including many Christians–Donald Trump won because white people are bigoted. Trump supporters are a bunch of Christian nationalists, patriarchs, and racists, they say. As a result, we must spend the next four years doubling down […]
Kenneth Woodward remembers Martin Marty
Woodward was the longtime religion editor at Newsweek. Much of his career on the religion beat overlapped with Martin Marty’s career as a scholar and interpreter of American religious life. Here is a taste of Woodward’s piece at Commonweal: In […]
David Brooks: “You can’t oppose Marjorie Taylor Greene and then think what Al Green did was totally fine.”
David Brooks on Trump’s speech to the nation on Tuesday night and the current plight of the Democratic Party: There were a lot of dramatic moments for people to think: Wow, that’s a good guy. The moment with that cute […]
Thinking about the impossible
Writer Jay Michaelson asks if Rice University religious studies scholar Jeffrey Kripal has gone mad, or normal?” Kripal’s recent book is How to Think Impossibly: About Souls, UFOs, Time, Belief, and Everything Else. Here is a taste of Michaelson’s review […]
We heard from Trump last night. But what do Americans really think about the issues?
Digby’s Hullabaloo shares information from Pew Research Center: Economy: 24% of U.S. adults say the economy is in excellent or good shape, while far more say it’s doing only fair (45%) or poor (31%). Looking ahead, partisans have very different predictions about what […]
Donald Trump says he was “saved by God to make America great again.” What are evangelicals saying?
Apparently God saved Trump to deport immigrants, fire federal employees without notice, start a trade war, cut aid to suffering people around the world, and bow to Russian autocrat Vladimir Putin. Let’s see what evangelicals are saying about Trump’s speech […]
Mike Pence is teaching at Grove City College
I was at the western Pennsylvania college a couple weeks ago and I didn’t see the former vice-president. But as Jim Martin reports at the Erie Times-News, Pence is teaching at Grove City College, a school that calls itself a […]
