You’d think that evangelicals would have learned a decade ago just what awful optics it is for anyone to vociferously defend slavery. BUT NO. Here we are yet again, staring down at the abyss of atrocity apologetics. In recent months, I’ve seen a serious uptick in hardline evangelicals defending what Read more
In this blog’s first year, I spent a while outlining all the different elements that went into my deconversion. I haven’t formally talked much about it since. Now, here, I want to share my story with you. Today, let me show you how—and maybe importantly why—I deconverted from Christianity. (This Read more
Recently, a rising star in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), Matt Queen, fell to earth in the most singularly SBC way imaginable: By lying to the FBI about a sex assault that had occurred on the SBC seminary campus where he worked. After news of Queen’s guilty plea broke, one Read more
As we close out the month of October, I want to close Spooky Month out with what evangelical leaders are saying about the end of an evangelical marriage. For many years, both evangelicals’ troubled marriages and their divorce rates have been the subjects of observation from onlookers. For years now, Read more
Last time we met up, I told you about a Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) pastor named Chris Gore. Of late, he and his little Oklahoma church have been deeply entangling themselves in the divorce of one of their menfolk. (But to be fair, what else is there to do in Read more
Over the past couple weeks, a Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) pastor named Chris Gore has been making the news—and not in a way his Dear Leaders would like. One of his former congregants, Brenda Blake Bicskey, exposed spiritual abuse committed by Gore and his lackeys. He did his best to Read more
Many years ago, just before the whole David Koresh cult exploded into news in April 1993, I almost joined a cult in Waco just down the road from those guys. That entire period of my life feels almost like a fever dream. I was operating along mental lines then that Read more
Last week, a bunch of evangelical leaders agreed that what their religion needs is a bunch of revivals. Yes, revivals will totally and completely end evangelicals’ increasing right-wing extremism and entanglement with ultraconservative politics! They have no doubts about this startling assertion. This is far from the very first time Read more
Today’s story concerns the mostly-legal but entirely-sketchy money-making engine that undergirds evangelicalism these days. Even I had no idea how deep the rot goes—and I’m the one who began using that phrase to describe this exact bunch of conjobs! Come with me, and we’ll explore the various ways that evangelical Read more
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