Reading Time: 5 minutes God does nothing to explain his Plan and Christians don’t understand it, but that won’t stop them from defending it. Perhaps nothing is harder for them to justify than hell.
Christianity
Posted inWar and Peace
So this is 90 seconds to midnight
Reading Time: 4 minutes On January 24, the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists officially moved the hands on the Doomsday Clock, which for three quarters of a century has been used to depict humanity’s risk of global disaster from nuclear war. When the clock was first launched, on the cover of the June […]
Posted inLeaving Religion
An evangelical tries to explain Christianity’s decline, fails completely
Reading Time: 14 minutes Every so often, I get a stunning reminder about exactly why evangelicals’ decline won’t end any time soon. This was one of those times. A recent opinion post by a pastor in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), Dave Miller, lays out what he thinks is “wrong with [them].” He says he’s only trying to get […]
Posted inReligion
How Christians reframe prayer to sound exciting and effective
Reading Time: 7 minutes If there’s one universal complaint I’ve heard from Christians, one monolithic sore spot that seems to affect almost all of them, it is their inability to establish prayer habits. Even the most fervent and gung-ho of them willingly admit that their prayer lives are lacking. But instead of stressing the real-world good of cultivating such […]
Posted inThe Secular
Should Christmas trees be banned in tax-funded public spaces?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Although I’m a committed nontheist and ardent church-state separationist, I’m not inflexible about it. Which is to say I see no good reason to oppose Christmas trees, for example, in public, tax-supported spaces. It’s been a centuries-long American civic tradition to erect Christmas trees all over creation, so to speak—in public and private spaces—and these […]
Posted inReligious News
Disestablish it for its own good: The Church of England and gay marriage
Reading Time: 5 minutes OnlySky · Disestablish It For Its Own Good – The Church Of England And Gay Marriage | Daniel James Sharp I followed with amusement the recent fracas over same-sex marriage in the Church of England. For half a decade, the Church has been debating its doctrines relating to sexuality, and the thought of gentle Anglicans […]
Posted inReligion
Surprise! Empty pews are nonpartisan
Reading Time: 3 minutes It’s been common knowledge since the coronavirus pandemic arrived in America several years ago that empty pews have sharply increased, as churches, often controversially, closed their doors to protect congregants from spread of the deadly disease among their flocks. But in reading some year-old statistics on the pandemic’s effects on religious ritual, I was surprised […]
Posted inThe Secular
The Bill of Rights is the baby in the manger
Reading Time: 3 minutes It’s that time of year again. Red and green decorations dominate the landscape. Mariah has come out of her 11-month hibernation to serenade us with her Christmas carols. Time again to trade cookies with the neighbors and to watch a decked out pine tree die slowly in the living room. Jesus is hard to miss […]
Posted inReligion
Captive audiences: Why Uber and Lyft are evangelicals’ newest mission field
Reading Time: 10 minutes Recently, Hemant Mehta asked a very good question: “Why are Lyft and Uber letting Christian drivers preach at passengers?” It’s a very good question. Uber and Lyft have not, as of this writing, explained why they allow this. Another good question is how evangelicals got to the point where preaching at captive audiences has become […]
Posted inLeaving Religion
Not so much better angels: Celebrating with the ghosts of Christmas past
Reading Time: 3 minutes Despite Catholicism lurking in the background, Christmas was a magical time when I was a kid. Jesus was watching but from a respectful distance. Even when my old aunties came to visit, he kept quiet. Well mostly. He apparently insisted we give him thanks for our meals and upper-middle-class lifestyle in sunny 1980s Southern California. […]