Hypocrisy is an endemic part of evangelicalism. All evangelicals are hypocrites, at least going by the official meaning of the term. In other words, they all behave in ways that run counter to the ideals they espouse. Evangelicals’ roadmaps are broken, so they cannot ever travel from Point Conversion to Read more
Chick tract evangelism is a subset of tract evangelism, which itself is a subset of personal evangelism. This rare evangelical beast has become endangered in recent years. Let’s see how it lives in the wild—before it’s too late to see it at all.
Not long ago, some evangelicals broke my heart. They were the family of a vibrant, impressionable, trusting, inexperienced young woman named Micah. In 2009, her husband murdered her. That husband, Thomas Pate, had pretended to be a true-blue evangelical to win her and her parents’ hearts. And he succeeded. It Read more
It seems very likely that the JW’s numbers look so humiliatingly bad that their leaders don’t even want to know what they are anymore.
Engaging meaningfully with new information is a process. Avoiding that engagement is called antiprocess. When it comes to people’s beliefs, antiprocess is how they avoid confronting challenges and contradictions, and still come out thinking that they totally nailed that fight.
Church attendance continues to tank across America. Downward trends already in place before the pandemic declined even further in the wake of it. It’s a tough time to be a business offering only one product—active church membership—in a country that increasingly doesn’t want it. In reversing the decline of their Read more
Chris Carpenter has discernment on his mind. Well, that and train travel, apparently. But discernment is his main preoccupation. Recently, he had a guest on his podcast who has identified ‘7 Lies That Can Really Mess Up Your Faith.’ You’ll be happy to know that proper discernment fixes all of Read more
Being lukewarm is the other side of being legalistic. A legalistic Christian is someone who is more obsessed with rules and behavior than the judging Christian is. Likewise, a lukewarm Christian is simply one who is less obsessed than the judge with such things. Lukewarm Christians can, in this judgment, Read more
It’s fun to watch evangelicals accuse other Christians of legalism. And we all know why, right? It’s because they’ll never, ever convince anybody else of their opinions. All they have to evaluate anything is their own Doctrinal Yardstick, and it is not marked with any earthly—or really even any meaningful—measures. Read more
In complementarianism, evangelical leaders demand that women reject leadership roles in their churches—alongside any hopes of achieving equality with men. And many women do obey these demands. It’s not uncommon at all to encounter evangelical women who gleefully stomp on other women’s talents and futures in the name of Jesus. Read more