January 6, Angela Rigas, and the way forward

Yale historian Timothy Snyder has posted a 15-fact summary of the January 6 committee’s report. You should stop now and read it if you have not already. I said yesterday (in a FaceBook post) that no one can be surprised by continuing revelations of Trump’s misdeeds. Anyone with clear moral vision knew what Trump was,Continue reading “January 6, Angela Rigas, and the way forward”

Acquiescence is complicity; love requires truthtelling

Until we have agreed that we will speak truthfully and respectfully to and about each other, and that we will not choose as our representatives people who are unable to do either, we cannot hope for progress on anything else.

Why Christotrumpians admire Putin

The people who reduce the Trump-Biden choice to anti-abortion versus pro-abortion are victims and perpetrators of the same malignant fallacy as those who reduce the Russia-Ukraine situation to anti-transgender-rights to pro-transgender-rights.

Illegitimate totality transfer (on praying Psalm 44)

Warnings from biblical lexicography James Barr was for many years, I think, the scholar most feared by other members of the biblical-studies guild. He had a knack for spotting and exposing fallacies that were widely accepted by his peers as standard practice. Probably the best-known example of his work was his book The Semantics ofContinue reading “Illegitimate totality transfer (on praying Psalm 44)”

Trump-Russia is not a hoax

If you are not yet reading Heather Cox Richardson’s daily Letters from an American—why not? I am an ordinary US citizen with the education of a theologian, biblical scholar, and pastor, and I work as a religious book publisher. My interests in current American politics are theological, ecclesial, pastoral. Heather Cox Richardson is a historyContinue reading “Trump-Russia is not a hoax”

How COVID-19 has sorted us out

Thomas Paine wrote: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” The trials of the American Revolution would distinguish the “summer soldier and the sunshine patriot” for the true patriot. Well, any crisis tries the souls of those who live through it. The crisis puts a spotlight on actors who must respond to it, andContinue reading “How COVID-19 has sorted us out”

Evangelicalism in the USA: Discipleship failure owing to catechesis failure

The components of the recent discipleship disasters in evangelical Christianity in the United States. The evangelical churches were left vulnerable because they did not catechize well.

One Ring to Bind Them All: Conservative Christians and the Theocratic Impulse

For conservative White Christians in the USA, theocracy is the Ring of Power, and abortion is their reason for wanting to use it. But it has its own purposes.

All day long (Romans 10:21)

“ALL DAY LONG I HAVE HELD OUT MY HANDS TO A DISOBEDIENT AND OBSTINATE PEOPLE.” —Romans 10:21, citing Isaiah 65:2 How to feel about the recalcitrant? (Here is just another lesson in the long course in imitatio Dei that is the Christian life.) They just don’t get it. Are they incapable of understanding? Do theyContinue reading “All day long (Romans 10:21)”