I know I just reposted this piece a few days ago after the Buffalo shooting, but it continues to represent my thinking about these mass shootings. Here is what I wrote at The Washington Post in August 2019: In the...
evangelicals
Evangelical roundup for April 11, 2022
What is happening in Evangelical land? Beth Moore on Palm Sunday: Answers in Genesis on evangelical “deconstruction. The Family Research Council here. A Liberty University professor is not guilty of sexual assault. Eric Metaxas and Mike Lindell are still pushing...
Evangelical leaders “face reckoning over praise for Putin”
Here is Steve Rabey at Religion Unplugged: For most of the past century, America’s conservative Christians and conservative politicians were united in the firm belief that the communist USSR — and later, Russia — was anti-American, anti-God and a threat...
Bonus roundup: How are evangelicals responding to the Russian invasion of Ukraine?
The European Evangelical Alliance says there is “no justification” for Putin’s invasion. National Association of Evangelicals: Former Trump lawyer, court evangelical, and Liberty University Falkirk Center fellow Jenna Ellis smells an opportunity to politicize the invasion: The Russian Evangelical Alliance...
Evangelicals and small groups
Evangelicals love small groups. For many large churches, small groups are essential to building community, developing spiritual friendships, and strengthening the Body of Christ through the practice of prayer, Bible study, and fellowship. In an interesting and well-researched piece at...
The Author’s Corner with Daniel Silliman
Daniel Silliman is News Editor for Christianity Today. This interview is based on his new book, Reading Evangelicals: How Christian Fiction Shaped a Culture and a Faith (Eerdmans, 2021). JF: What led you to write Reading Evangelicals? DS: The book had...
Evangelicals talk abortion: round 2
Yesterday I posted a video of evangelical Christians Lisa Sharon Harper, Shane Claiborne, Randall Balmer, Ron Sider, Andrew Lucado, Rob Schenk, and others discussing abortion. Today I realized that this conversation took place just before the 2020 elections. Some of...
Evangelicals discuss abortion
All of these participants–Elaina Ramsey, Shane Claiborne, Andrea Lucado, Jerushah Duford, Tatiana Torres, Rob Schenck, Randall Balmer, Ron Sider, and Lisa Sharon Harper–identify as evangelical Christians. Rob Schenck’s remarks are especially revealing and powerful:...
“Bebbington but”
Ryan Hoselton, a postdoctoral instructor at the University of Heidelberg, asks a good question about my feature today at Current: Perhaps “Bebbington but” is the best way to define evangelicalism. I still use Bebbington when I define the term in...
Evangelical roundup for January 6, 2022
What is happening in Evangelical land? Evangelical anti-Trumpers are out there. Franklin Graham on the 1-year anniversary of January 6, 2021: Anthony Bradley on evangelical Reformed culture as an object of sociological and historical critique: True: A Southern Baptist pastor...
Another evangelical anti-vaxxer dies of COVID-19
His name is Marcus Lamb. Here is Michelle Boorstein at The Washington Post: Marcus Lamb, founder of the large Christian network Daystar, died Tuesday after contracting the coronavirus. Lamb’s network during the pandemic has made the virus a huge focus, calling...
Is it possible to respond to Greg Laurie’s invitation to accept Jesus tonight at Angel Stadium without also joining a political movement?
Thousands of Christians and their unbelieving friends will file into Angel Stadium in Anaheim, California on Sunday for Greg Laurie’s Southern California Harvest Crusade. They will be hoping for a good-old fashioned revival. Laurie is the pastor of Harvest Christian...
Are COVID masks and vaccination mandates a form of Christian persecution?
Short answer: No. Yesterday Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf issued a mask requirement for schools. I spent my evening talking/e-mailing with three different evangelical Christian friends who were upset about this. Two of the three people I communicated with were also...
Bethlehem Baptist Church drives out “the empathetic ones”
Trump. Race. COVID. #MeToo. Evangelical congregations will never be the same again. There is no back to “normal.” Reform is needed. Thanks to the reporting of Kate Shellnut at Christianity Today, we now know a lot more about what is...
Episode 16: “The Massachusetts Legislature Holds a Constitutional Convention”
Opponents of same-sex marriage in the Bay State try to pass a constitutional amendment Episode 16: “The Massachusetts Legislature Holds a Constitutional Convention” dropped last night. Subscribers to Current at the Longshore level and above receive this narrative history podcast. Here’s a teaser:...
Is evangelical Christianity a religious movement, or is it something else?
I first read historian Paul E. Johnson’s 1978 book A Shopkeeper’s Millennium: Society and Revivals in Rochester, New York, 1815-1837 in 1989 while I was studying church history at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. Johnson argued that evangelical religion in Rochester,...
The number of COVID-19 cases is rising, especially in communities with lots of evangelicals
Some disturbing news from Jack Jenkins at Religion News Service: As COVID-19 cases surge again, two things are true about many counties considered hot spots: Vaccination rates are low and white evangelical Protestant populations are high, according to a new...
What did evangelicals say this weekend about July 4th?
I was going to add this to today’s Evangelical Roundup, but I thought I would include it in a separate post. Now if we can get this kind of tweeting on Easter or Pentecost Sunday. David French offers a lesson...
Evangelical roundup for June 21, 2021
What is going on in Evangelicalland? Some pics from last week’s SBC meeting in Nashville. Jack Graham is glad to be a Southern Baptist: Christianity Today reporter Kate Shellnut on what she saw at the SBC Annual Meeting. Last weekend’s...
Evangelical Roundup for May 20, 2021
What is going on in Evangelicalland? Eric Metaxas interviews Os Guiness about his new book. I have not read the book yet, but will try to get to it soon. It sounds like the same stuff Guinness was pushing a year...