Features
The making of Islamophobia
The West’s understanding of Islam has been shaped by centuries of superficial, deeply biased Christian teaching.
The bad king
Nimrod is the biblical archetype of the corrupt leader obsessed with his own power.
This political moment demands theology
As Christians, we need to protest authoritarianism and support the people it targets. We also need to underscore the deep foundations of this work.
Is fascism inherently Christian?
Antifascist writers of the last century grappled with the same bewilderment we do—and they made sense of their politics theologically.
Advent in all its terror
If we remove the difficult facts of history leading up to Jesus’ birth, the story loses its power.
The night the universe looked back at me
Sometimes we glimpse magnificence in common occurrences. Science stumbles into poetry. We get a taste of singularity.
Singing the Newsboys with Flamy Grant
The musician and drag queen is an exvangelical who came to see that holding on to a theology of self-loathing was just too dangerous.
A theology of impossible cheeseburger pie
A seminary cookbook from 1984 led me to revisit the potlucks—and the beliefs—of my midwestern childhood.
A tale of two Thanksgivings
Two adjacent items in a 1943 issue of The Saturday Evening Post highlight the conflict—and joy—inherent in our mythic meal.
Gifts you can read
What can we say? We love words.
Songs that call me home to Puerto Rico
Bad Bunny’s music and activism have reconnected me to roots I thought were severed beyond repair.
Pastors in exile
Clergy who have fled Russian-occupied Ukraine are finding new ways to provide pastoral care for parishioners who are still there.
Born a feminist
Phyllis Trible mesmerized scholars and preachers alike with her fearless biblical exegesis.
When Caesar gets demanding
“What will be God’s,” asks Tertullian, “if all things are Caesar’s?” It’s a challenging question at a time when the state is asking us to acquiesce to a secret, unaccountable police force.
“That girl from Andover”
Phyllis Trible gave me two gifts: her groundbreaking biblical scholarship and an unassuming friendship.
God’s relentless gaze
Like the surveillance state, the Christ Pantocrator icon asserts an omnipresent authority. But it also asserts divine mercy and love.
Sarah Mullally breaks the Anglican Communion’s glass ceiling
I celebrate the milestone of the first woman to become archbishop of Canterbury. But I worry there’s a glass cliff waiting for her.
The reverent, subversive Gilead
Marilynne Robinson’s Pulitzer–winning novel speaks unflinchingly of God, grace, sacred luminosity, and humility. This reads a lot differently now than it did 20 years ago.
Please, liberal Christians, read Eugene Peterson
I’m not too proud to beg.
DHS is lying about us
The protesters at the ICE facility outside Chicago are not an angry mob. We’re just people who believe in due process and free speech.