In 2012, the RCA began to break apart over homosexuality. One faction –the more mainline end — wanted inclusion. The other — the culture warriors — wanted to the denomination to be bigots-for-Jesus. That breakup completed this month, with 43 congregations full of culture warriors leaving. They’re joining a new denomination, ARC (Alliance of Reformed Churches). All this, over a culture war evangelicals lost over a decade ago!
The other day, I was thinking about Christian conversion testimonies. In a lot of ways, they function as narrative stories. However, their similarity to well-told tales mostly ends at having a general three-act structure. They can’t actually stand as good stories because they don’t reflect anything real in the human situation — and they’d be bad that way even if their tellers didn’t try to work miracles into them so often.
I’m guessing that Catholic leaders’ massive misogyny, entrenched sexism, and endless horrific bigotries are indeed quite a dealbreaker for younger adults. I’d worry about someone who didn’t consider that stuff a dealbreaker.
Christian leaders know that abuse allegations will open them up to a lot of uncomfortable questions and scrutiny. In demanding silence, they simply act to protect their livelihoods and reputations.
With the base cunning of a narcissist, Biff recognized—probably very quickly—that boring testimonies bring in many converts.
For years now, America has been teetering on the very edge of a downright breathtaking cultural shift: Christianity’s stunning decline in members, credibility, and cultural power. This astonishing development shows no signs of stopping any time soon, either. Recently, I saw a writer for Yahoo News describe that decline as Read more
What matters most is the legacy we leave behind. It’s how we’re remembered and what we learned and shared with others. It’s what we’ve built that lasts and makes a positive difference.
Whenever things go hideously wrong in any evangelical group, evangelicals tend to think that The Big Problem Here was a lack of accountability. Had proper accountability existed in their group, nothing bad would have happened because nothing bad could have happened without someone noticing it and addressing it. Scandals, in particular, happen because whoever caused that scandal drifted away from their accountabilibuddies.
Had we left the Duggars to their own business all this time, Josh Duggar would still be molesting little girls and consuming child pornography so horrific that one veteran investigator called it “the top five of the worst I have ever had to examine.”
Of late, some of you have heard some rumblings about Roll to Disbelieve making a platform move in the near future. These rumblings are true.