Note: Every day I make a discipline of reading the lectionary texts scheduled for each day. These are the readings for today, February 7, 2025, as presented by the US Catholic Bishops. Reading 1 Hebrews 13:1-8 Let brotherly love continue.Do not neglect hospitality,for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels.Be mindful of prisoners as if sharing […]
A Very Short Homily on Today’s Readings
Note to Readers: I preached this sermon on January 5, 2025 at Genesis Church in Royal Oak, Michigan. My assignment was to talk about how to create an ethic around the person of Jesus and how to do that in community. So even though this was Epiphany Sunday, I chose a text from the other
As I write, it is four weeks until the election. The polls on reputable sites like Fivethirtyeight.com are giving the Harris-Walz ticket a very slight advantage, with the results coming down to one or two states. Those of us who lean left in politics frequently find ourselves in ultimately fruitless conversations in which one or the other of
Illiberal America Has Won Many Times Before
After a tumultuous and fascinating two months in American politics, here are some things I see as this election year moves into its final stretch. After the June presidential debate, Joe Biden’s candidacy was doomed. He was right to drop out. There was no unseeing the feebleness we all saw. Afterward, the polls were showing Biden
Regarding Election 2024: Eight Things I See
The 248th birthday of our country will be celebrated this year under dark shadows. Personally, I will not be doing much celebrating. Let’s review our situation, shall we? Former President Donald Trump already was leading in the presidential election polls before the June 27 debate between him and President Joe Biden. In that debate, this is
My newest book, The Moral Teachings of Jesus: Radical Instruction in the Will of God, will be out from Wipf and Stock Publishers (Cascade Books) on September 10. Pre-orders are now available. What I do in this book is dig into forty moral teachings of Jesus as presented in the Gospels. Each of these teachings is addressed
My New Book: The Moral Teachings of Jesus
Donald Trump appears to be leading in most meaningful election polling. According to the authoritative Real Clear Politics, Trump leads slightly in overall polling and in every single swing state. Betting averages have him up on Biden 50% to 38%. We all must prepare ourselves for the possibility that Donald Trump will become president again. For anyone
Trump Is Leading: What Does This Say about Us?
History may well record that April 16-17, 2024, marked a breakthrough moment in the emergence of an organized post-evangelical Christian movement in the United States. It certainly felt like a breakthrough to this participant-observer, as I had the privilege of attending the third and by far the largest national gathering of the Post-Evangelical Collective last week. Stuffing 300
The Post-Evangelicals Take Their Next Step Forward
I begin by saying the obvious: We enter an election year in a time of great political and cultural division in our country. That could have been said every four years since 1968. But today we also can add that we enter an election year with very high levels of social mistrust, loss of confidence in
Thinking Biblically about Government in an Election Year
We’ve just celebrated Martin Luther King weekend. The great Baptist preacher, scholar and activist would have been 95 years old. We rightly honor him. The Civil Rights Movement led by King was not that long ago. We still live with the reverberations of that era. Indeed, I would suggest our own miserably divided politics still reflect
Racism’s Absurdity in Light of the Gospel