In Alpha Course #12, its creators share how newly-converted Christians can make the most of the rest of their lives. But they’re not actually that great at it. Today, let’s check out their suggestions—and wonder together if, indeed, one could build a meaningful life out of them. (This post and Read more
In a 2025 article from Archaeology Magazine, Andrew Lawler suggests an interesting source of Jews’ cultural taboo about eating pork. He thinks it might have more to do with their hatred of the Roman Empire than anything else. The more I thought about this suggestion, the more plausible it sounded. Read more
Pseudoarchaeology holds a special place in the hearts of Christians who think the Bible contains real history. After all, this is the one discipline that should attest best to their claims about Jesus and his earliest followers—as well as demonstrate the veracity of the mythic tales contained in the Old Read more
Hi and welcome back! Earlier, we talked about Joe Battaglia’s book Make America Good Again. As we discovered, it’s chock-full of culture-war talking points disguised in a thick slathering of Christianese. So we spent a few days talking about Christianese. For today’s entry, I’d already planned to discuss this phrase. Read more