Author: Chris Boyd

A Republican lawmaker called a Christian tweet “bigoted.” Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar came to religious liberty’s defense.

It started with a post on X (formerly Twitter)—an expression of Christianity with the brevity the site’s format demands: “There’s no hope for any of us outside of having faith in Jesus Christ alone.” The poster in question was Lizzie Marbach, whose X bio describes her as a Republican political activist who lives in Ohio.

Marbach’s post easily could have gone unnoticed outside her own following. But then a member of Congress decided to share it—and not just to share it but to dunk on it, hard, to an audience nearly ten times the size of Marbach’s own.

“This is one of the most bigoted tweets I have ever seen,” the congressman wrote. “Delete it, Lizzie. Religious freedom in the United States applies to every religion. You have gone too far.”

As angry replies accumulated under both posts, another, better-known member of Congress came to Marbach’s defense.

“No! Stating the core beliefs or principles of your faith isn’t bigoted,” the congresswoman tweeted, rebuking her colleague. It’s “religious freedom and no one should be scolded for that. It’s also wrong to speak about religious freedom while simultaneously harassing people who freely express their beliefs.”

If you’re already imagining these latter two characters, my guess is you’re imagining incorrectly—just as I probably would if I didn’t know the details here. The representative who dunked on Marbach is a fellow Ohio Republican, Rep. Max Miller. He’s a Marine veteran who served as a special assistant to former President Donald Trump—and he told 50,000 people that Marbach was a bigot for believing Jesus is the only hope of …

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“Rich Men North of Richmond” is disdainful towards people on welfare. Christians shouldn’t be.

As a native of Appalachia, I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t aware of the plight of blue-collar Americans. Mine is a region shaped by the struggle for fair pay and safe working conditions. To this day, “coal country” for many is synonymous with hard living and generational poverty.

So when I heard about Oliver Anthony’s viral hit, “Rich Men North of Richmond” (a reference to powerful elites in Washington, DC), I was excited for a song in the tradition of Johnny Cash, Pete Seeger, and Woody Guthrie—music that names the inherent dignity of the poor, lodges a protest against establishment excess, and echoes Old Testament calls for justice, like God’s condemnation in Jeremiah 5:28 of those who “have grown fat and sleek” yet “do not promote the case of the fatherless” or “defend the just cause of the poor.”

Then I heard these lyrics:

Lord, we got folks in the street, ain’t got nothin’ to eat
And the obese milkin’ welfare
Well, God, if you’re 5-foot-3 and you’re 300 pounds
Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds

Immediately, I was transported back in time.

I’m a 30-year-old mother of three again, standing in the checkout line of our local grocery store. Rhonda, the organist from the church that my husband pastors, has cued up directly behind me. She says hello, and I nod back.

Normally, I would ask about her grandbabies or garden, but instead, I mumble an excuse about having forgotten bread and navigate my cart out of line toward the aisles stocked with food. But I haven’t forgotten anything. It’s a charade, a charade brought about by the shame I feel because my family is on …

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The newly accredited school promotes a theological education that’s not at odds with culture.

Much of Terry LeBlanc’s adult life has been driven by one question: Can you be fully Indigenous and fully a follower of Jesus?

His answer has been a resounding yes.

Over the past three decades, he and others have built a seminary to offer theological education to Indigenous people in the United States, Canada, and the world, so that they can answer yes too.

NAIITS, previously known as the North American Institute of Indigenous Theological Studies, was founded in 2000 with a vision of seeing “men and women journey down the road of a living heart relationship with Jesus in a transformative way which does not require the rejection of their Creator-given social and cultural identity.” In 2021, it became the first Indigenous school to receive full accreditation from the Association of Theological Schools. NAIITS can now offer accredited master of arts, master of theological studies, and master of divinity degrees, as well as doctorates in Indigenous Christian theology.

Last year, NAIITS received two grants worth $6 million from Lilly Endowment to do just that. The school will use $1 million to develop a master’s program in trauma-informed spiritual care. The other $5 million will go toward creating the Canadian Learning Community for Decolonization and Innovation, a collaborative project with four other universities.

LeBlanc, who is Mi’kmaq-Acadian and holds a PhD from Asbury Theological Seminary, said NAIITS teaches people how to reimagine the relationship between faith and culture. The academic term is decolonization, which LeBlanc said doesn’t mean diminishing the power of Jesus or the gospel, but making space for Indigenous perspectives and learning to see Indigenous identity and culture as …

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The late pastor sought to glorify God in his devotional life, his marriage, and his ministry. How he did so in his illness was no different.

It was June 3, 2020. The subject line of the email from Kathy Keller made my heart sink: “Tim’s got pancreatic cancer.” The diagnosis was stage IV. With current therapy, life expectancy is less than a year. There is no stage V. Thus began a three-year journey that explored the cutting edge of experimental cancer therapeutics—but more significantly, the courageous approach to terminal illness by a man of deep faith.

Tim had been my friend for a decade. In the early years of BioLogos, he agreed to cohost intensely interesting and productive meetings in New York, where deep discussions about the complementarity of science and Christian faith took place. Though we didn’t completely agree on everything, Tim became my most significant spiritual mentor.

But now I was in a different role. As a physician-scientist and the director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), I reached out to help him and Kathy sort through the options for interventions. Chemotherapy can sometimes help pancreatic cancer, but only for a time. On the horizon, however, are new approaches called “precision oncology”—characterizing the unique DNA mutations in the patient’s cancer in exquisite detail and then teaching the body’s immune system to recognize the masked intruders.

Tim and Kathy, his partner in life, love, and faith, weighed the pros and cons and elected to sign up for an NIH clinical trial that had shown some initial promise for advanced breast and gall bladder cancers but for which there was so far very limited experience with pancreatic cancer. Tim was clear-eyed about the likelihood of benefit, but he wanted assurance that whatever happened, the medical research team would learn from …

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Once the capital of the Hawaiian kingdom, Lahaina was home to Maui’s first church and seminary.

In the aftermath of the worst disaster in memory on their island—the deadliest fire in US history—Maui’s Christians gathered on Sunday morning to offer prayers, continue to coordinate relief efforts, and mourn the loss around them.

At Grace Bible Church Maui, pastor Jonavan Asato likened the destruction to the death of a loved one. “When you look at that town and the memories that you’ve had there, it’s not just a home,” he said with tears in his eyes. “It’s a part of our culture. It’s a part of our island.”

Days before, his church had sent supplies by boat to Lahaina—the former capital of the Hawaiian kingdom, a landmark in 200 years of missionary history in Maui, and the site that bore the brunt of the brush fires that devastated the west side of the island.

Having witnessed the scorched cars, the embers of Front Street, and smoke dissipating from the more than 2,000 buildings burned, Asato asked his congregation to stand up and face in the direction of Lahaina as he repeated, “We speak life and light to you in Jesus’ name.”

In Lahaina, local Christians grapple with the widespread damage. While the leaders of Lahaina Baptist Church were “amazed” to learn that their church was still standing—despite everything around it “literally in ashes”—all but two of their church families lost their homes.

“I would estimate that over half the residents of our communities lost their homes and possessions. The big question is: Where will those people live? It will take years to rebuild,” pastor Barry Campbell wrote on Facebook on Sunday. “Another big issue is jobs. If the hotels and resorts are closed …

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Resurrection South Austin is the latest to go, citing issues around race, women, sexual minorities, and abuse response.

In the past year, two Anglican congregations in the US have left their more theologically conservative denomination for the mainline Episcopal Church.

Formed in 2009, the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) is known for taking in breakaway Episcopal congregations and clergy, though these two departing churches—Resurrection South Austin in Texas and The Table in Indianapolis—didn’t have previous ties to the Episcopal Church.

Both were church plants belonging to the Church for the Sake of Others (C4SO), an Anglican church-planting movement that predates ACNA and, for the past decade, has functioned as a diocese in the denomination. Its parishes span across California, Texas, the Midwest, and the South. Very few of its clergy or churches were Episcopalian before, and many of its members come from evangelical backgrounds.

Some Anglicans see C4SO as less conservative than others in the denomination due to its focus on justice and since it’s among the dioceses that ordain female priests.

Clergy at the departing churches attributed their decision to a range of issues where they felt out of alignment with the ACNA as a whole and for which they faced backlash from fellow Anglicans online.

They cited their convictions around the inclusion of women in leadership, hospitality toward sexual minorities, opposition to white supremacy, treatment of people of color, and response to abuse victims in the church (including a contentious investigation in the Upper Midwest Diocese).

Though LGBT inclusion was not named as the primary impetus for either church’s withdrawal, it became the impasse for the more theologically conservative minority who decided not to stay during the transition to local Episcopal dioceses.

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Wary of West African war and Western sanctions, Christian minority in the jihadist-plagued Sahel region nervously prays for peace.

The military coup in Niger has now entered its third week. Four days after the July 26 putsch, the 15-member Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) threatened military action if democratic rule was not restored within seven days.

That deadline has passed, and leaders are still mulling their options while imposing sanctions against the junta, the group of military officials that seized power. But worried by the seventh coup in the Sahel region since 2020, the remaining democratic nations in West Africa believe they must draw a line in the sand.

Neighboring countries Mali and Burkina Faso, both with military governments after their own recent coups, have warned that any foreign intervention in Niger will be considered an act of war against them as well.

Niger suffered its last coup attempt in 2021, right before the elected president—now deposed—was sworn in. The former French colony had been the last bastion of Western military cooperation against jihadist militants in the Sahel, amid the expanded regional influence of Russia through its Wagner mercenary unit.

Niger, meanwhile, is the world’s seventh-largest producer of uranium.

CT interviewed Illia Djadi, Open Doors’ senior analyst for freedom of religion and belief in sub-Saharan Africa. Though he resides in London, he is a citizen of Niger, a nation which ranks No. 28 on the World Watch List of the top 50 nations where it is most difficult to be a Christian.

Djadi provided the regional context, described the difficult but improving situation of Christians, and issued a strong appeal against military intervention:

How serious is the situation in Niger right now?

I am very sad. As a Nigerien, I find the situation difficult to watch.

But as an analyst, …

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Chosen by Sarah J. Hauser, author of “All Who Are Weary: Finding True Rest by Letting Go of the Burdens You Were Never Meant to Carry.”

The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness: The Path to True Christian Joy

Timothy Keller

When we connect every experience and interaction with ourselves, constantly overanalyzing what we’ve said or what people think, we can easily grow exhausted. In this brief book, Keller shows us the freedom we can experience when we understand our identity and worth in Christ. When there’s no need to perform or manage our ego, we find, as Keller says, a “blessed rest that only self-forgetfulness brings.”

Soul Care in African American Practice

Barbara L. Peacock

In our busy, frantic lives, practices like prayer, spiritual direction, and soul care can end up on the back burner. Using the examples of ten African American faith leaders, this book invites us to return to these practices to find the rest and soul transformation so many of us crave. As Peacock writes in her conclusion, “God has used servant leaders in the African American faith community to blaze paths of internal spiritual freedom that manifest externally.”

Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life

Henri J. M. Nouwen

Priest, professor, and theologian Nouwen writes incisive, convicting words with humble, pastoral gentleness. In this book, he reflects on three scenes in the life of Jesus to show us how communion with God through solitude enables us to live the Christian life with depth and courage. Out of Solitude helps us quit finding our worth in usefulness or accomplishments.

Analog Christian: Cultivating Contentment, Resilience, and Wisdom in the Digital Age

Jay Y. Kim

Our attention is divided now more than ever. With technology and social media, we’re endlessly distracted, constantly comparing, and inundated by outrage—all of which …

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Are we using this calamity to hide from our sins?

Since the beginning of May, more than 180 people have lost their lives in the northeastern Indian state of Manipur. Most of these victims are Christians from the minority Kuki-Zo tribe and, in turn, thousands from these communities have fled from the violence for shelter in other parts of the state or country.

Manipur is a hill-locked state with a fertile valley in the middle. The Meiteis occupy the valley districts, whereas the hill districts are the ancestral home of the various tribal communities, predating the British colonial administration. Both the hill districts and the tribal people are protected under a special act of the Indian Constitution that restricts land ownership in tribal areas.

The current conflict began after the tribal community’s peaceful protest against the Meiteis’ efforts to become a “scheduled tribe” (which would also give them access to this hill land) was met with violent retaliation by a radical Meitei mob. The violence was further fueled by explosive lies spread purportedly by the Meitei community themselves, which quickly spread to the state capital, Imphal. Violent mobs started ransacking tribal houses, churches, educational institutions, and hospitals, and attacking people, including women and children.

I am a pastor with the Evangelical Baptist Convention, and the following is an account of one of our pastors in Imphal who shared with me his experiences when the violence first unfolded.

-Chinkhengoupau Buansing

On the afternoon of May 3, 2023, we received news of clashes between the tribal community and the Meiteis in a village about 60 kilometers (about 37 miles) outside Imphal, the city we lived in. We were shocked but we did not expect the violence to escalate so …

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Many evangelicals have stuck with the former president through his legal troubles, moral failings, and public indiscretions

On the eve of former president Donald Trump’s indictment on charges that he attempted to overturn the presidential election of 2020, Franklin Graham, head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan’s Purse, appeared on Greta Van Susteren’s show on Newsmax to share his take.

“It’s a sad day for America,” Graham said.

The indictment—the third Trump has faced in the span of four months—“is an attempt to … inflict enough political wounds on this man to where it will be impossible for him to run” for president in 2024, Graham said.

According to Graham, this is but the latest attempt by Democrats to discredit Trump. First, there was Robert Mueller’s investigation on whether Trump colluded with Russia in the 2016 election. Then, a probe into the Trump Organization’s tax returns, and finally, accusations of sexual harassment by women that “seem to come out of the woodwork.”

Next week Trump may face yet more charges in Georgia for attempting to interfere in the presidential election of 2020. The investigation has taken nearly two and a half years and could bring charges to nearly 20 people.

After all the scandals Trump faced in his presidency and beyond, is he still susceptible to “political wounds”?

Trump’s political career has been morally fraught from the start, and a plurality of evangelical supporters stuck with him through the Access Hollywood tape, the white supremacist Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, revelations of Trump paying hush money to Stormy Daniels, his impeachments, and the Capitol insurrection.

Some conservative evangelicals may be turned off by Trump’s legal fights and pivot to a …

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