I grew up an independent Baptist. Among the many things that this might mean is that my church experience was never “high church.” There was little in the way of tradition, formality, and certainly no liturgy. I used to joke and say that our only “high church” experience...
Thinking about church in changing times. A lot has been said in recent years about the changing spiritual culture in the US and what it means to church life. I am not in a position to add much to the massive amount of writing that has accumulated on the subject, other than to offer my own...
There are a number of ways to distinguish contemporary American culture. One can do so economically or in terms of its entertainment focus. It is certainly possible to discuss our culture from a political perspective, or even from the point of view of current trends in American philosophy. But...
You’ve heard the phrase before, because it seems to capture well how much of journalism works: “if it bleeds, it leads.” The fact is, bleeding things tend to be pretty newsworthy. Potholes in the streets and traffic violations are hardly enough to capture the attention of the...
It seems to me that the sky is falling every four years. Every time we have an election I hear that someone is going to move to Canada if their candidate of choice does not win. Every election things are much worse than they were before and the stakes are higher than they ever have been. It is a...
The early days of the Baptist people in England were marked by disagreements. The disagreements were not necessarily loud and angry…but they did generate some debates and pamphlets. At one point in the early 1800s a new hymnal was written that did not include some of the older Baptist...
Juneteenth. It sounds strange because it has not benefitted by being embraced by popular culture. But if there was ever a holiday that made sense, this would be it. I mean c’mon, we “celebrate” Halloween. But this date actually has meaning. My experience has been that white...
I knew I needed to write a blog about this. But…how? I mean, what has not been said already? And what is controversial here? Who defends the practice of what happened to George Floyd? I think no one. And by “no one,” I realize there is some warped person who would try to...
I mentioned Sunday while preaching that I sometimes like to watch documentaries about World War 2. That was a perfect time to mention that it was Memorial Day…but I was preoccupied with the details of a unique Sunday of re-gathering. Sunday, I watched a few more of those...
It is fairly well known that the Christian concept of “hope” is profoundly different than the historic or secular version. We use the word in its secular sense every day: “I hope this coronavirus goes away soon!” We have no clue how soon it will happen, but it is our...