Every single time something big happens to make evangelicals look terrible, a bunch of them start fretting about Bad Christians. So it’s not surprising that with the 2024 elections upon us, they’re starting to write opinion posts trying to sway the flocks away from what they view as distinctly un-Jesusy Read more
Last time we met up, I showed you an interview Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) leader Philip Robertson did with some evangelical dude on YouTube. Last year, Robertson became the Chairman of the SBC’s top-ranked Executive Committee (EC). Alas for him, he came to this position at a really bad time Read more
Christian publishers, it seems, are facing a downturn. Christianity is simply so entrenched in American society that I haven’t thought much about the implosion of this formerly-humongous industry. But after decades of fantastic sales, Christian publishers face a decline that they might not be able to stop. Sometimes, a sign Read more
When it comes to landmark freedom-of-religion cases, Kitzmiller et al v Dover Area School District et al (nicknamed Kitzmiller v Dover) might be one of the most powerful recent ones. Almost 20 years ago, this decision stopped evangelicals from sneaking religious indoctrination into public schools. Its lengthy memorandum opinion (archive) Read more
In Christianity, visions are supposedly divinely-granted peeks into the secrets of both the present and the future. But in reality, they work very differently. Let’s explore this exciting Christianese concept, see where it originates, and rightly divide the truth between what evangelicals in particular claim is the party line and Read more
An April headline announced that ‘Young Women Are Leaving Church in Unprecedented Numbers.” After many years of right-wing Christian men’s complaints about the ‘feminization’ of Christianity, one would think they’d be happy to hear this news. After all, that means their pastors now have a lot more time to cater Read more
On June 7th, Paul Pressler died (archive). For many decades, he’d functioned as the Kingmaker of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC). But he died in near-obscurity. Nobody quite seemed sure of what to do about his so-called legacy: the Conservative Resurgence of the SBC that turned it forevermore ultraconservative. You Read more
Paul Pressler, possibly the most influential evangelical in modern times, recently died. As evangelicals are wont to do when their leaders die, they are already hard at work analyzing his legacy. Well, sort of. One official Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) site seems eager to forget he ever existed. But they Read more
The 2024 Annual Meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), or #SBC24, just ended. Its attendees, called messengers, had a full plate this year: drilling down harder on the red herring of fetal personhood, condemning churches that dare to hire women as pastors, and generally posturing at each other about Read more
In the online world as in meatspace, complementarianism is a treasured ideology for the Religious Right. They might use different names for it, like tradwife/tradman, but these regressive marriage rules form a bedrock foundational belief for them. But it keeps failing. More than that, it fails spectacularly. But its failure Read more