When I review Alpha Course evangelism videos, I double-check my ideas by consulting a printed manual for the entire course. This time around, when I reviewed its fourth video, the manual contained an interesting discrepancy between its syllabus and the video’s actual contents. Today, let’s dive into this very telling Read more
In the fourth Alpha Series video, Christians try very poorly to explain how religious faith works and how someone acquires faith in their religion. Unfortunately, they don’t understand what faith is themselves, nor how faith sparks to life in the first place. Today, we’ll review this video and explore what Read more
In recent days, a strange new ChatGPT trend has been sweeping TikTok. Right-wing Christians perform an ecstatic devotion they call speaking in tongues, and then try to get ChatGPT to guess the language they used. Some claim ChatGPT has told them they spoke in exotic Ancient Near Eastern and Mesopotamian Read more
For years after my deconversion, I found myself at loose ends about how to view the universe and my place within it. Christianity had given me a simple cosmology, but Christianity’s claims had turned out to be false. After deconverting, I wanted to build my worldview on claims that were Read more
In recent years, more Christians are facing doubt than ever before. But their communities and leaders still haven’t learned how to respond to it. They’re still largely using the same toolbox they had in decades past. Let’s explore that toolbox—and see where it fails to fit into real-world doubters’ experiences. Read more
Throughout the first two episodes of Alpha Course, we watched its creators do everything except provide tangible evidence that could spark belief in their claims. The third video is no different. This time around, we watch Christians do everything except explain in concrete terms why Jesus just had to die. Read more
Within the serried ranks of nepo babies, Franklin Graham reigns supreme. Out of all of them, he might be the best known and most successful. He’s parlayed his daddy’s evangelism empire into a generational dynasty by playing upon his audience’s biggest fears. But that audience has aged, and he along Read more
For years now, I’ve considered it a major red flag to find the presence of a church discipline policy in a church. These policies grant church leaders enormous, unchecked power over congregants—who don’t realize how that power may be misused until they themselves are caught in its crosshairs. Usually, the Read more
Evangelicals have always been leery of new technology, and AI is no different. It’s just so big and so all-encompassing that I fully expected them to oppose it as they do. While some evangelicals embrace and try to harness AI for their own benefit, others warn ominously of its potential Read more
Alpha Course is a venerable evangelism-focused Bible study about Christianity. As such, its creators brought their A-game to making it as persuasive as humanly possible. But to call it underwhelming would be an understatement. In the series’ second video, “Who is Jesus,” we explore various bad apologetics arguments and emotional Read more