Category Archives: Current Affairs

Another View on Obama’s Comments on the Crusades, Slavery, and Jim Crow

As I wrote last week, President Obama was both right and wrong in his comments at the National Prayer Breakfast when he brought up Western Christianity’s involvement in the Crusades, Inquisitions, Slavery, and Jim Crow Segregation in America. He was right to say that all religions can be corrupted and affirm things that are inconsistent… Continue Reading

Obama’s Right/Wrong Statements About Religion and Violence at the National Prayer Breakfast

Sarah Pulliam Bailey, in her first byline this morning for the Washington Post, writes about President Obama’s speech at the National Prayer Breakfast where he addressed issues of religious liberty, free speech, and the ways that religion can often be used by those engaging in violence to others. I saw most of the speech this… Continue Reading

Racism Is A Symptom of a Deeper Issue That We Don’t Want to Address

Christian groups like the ERLC and the Kainos Movement are moving toward hosting discussions on racism in America and in the church in the 21st century, which is a good thing. But, if we are not careful, we will miss the deeper issues that animate the entire problem. I sought to explore those deeper issues… Continue Reading

Poor Blacks Should “Go Back to Mississippi”?

I have been saying that what we are seeing in the conflict fault lines in America involves more than just Race. It involves economics, class, education levels, political affiliations, ideology, cultural differences, “way of life” issues, and other demographic divisons. Really interesting comments at the end of Rod Dreher’s post on Eric Garner related to… Continue Reading

Growing Modernization Resulting in Religious Decline Proved Spectacularly Wrong?

I was doing some research a while back and I ran across this perspective by Bill Bishop in The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart. Social scientists have been predicting for the past three centuries that religion would soon run its course and disappear. Sociologist Rodney Stark found he… Continue Reading

A Resolution on Ministry to Immigrants for Alabama Baptists

The 2014 Alabama Baptist State Convention will take place in Birmingham, AL on November 11-12. I am submitting the following resolution to the convention. It calls for holistic gospel ministry to immigrants in our state by Alabama Baptists. The resolution also encourages our elected officials to work together to agree upon equitable immigration reform. Alabama… Continue Reading