For several years now, Harold Heie has been engaged in one of the more noble initiatives on the Internet, an online project he calls Respectful Conversation. A former Christian college professor and administrator, Heie found himself appalled at the sad state of public discourse in contemporary society, including the realm of politics, the media, and … More How Do Pietists “Follow Jesus”?
I was out of town over the weekend at one of my daughter’s softball tournaments, so I didn’t get a chance to curate my usual set of interesting links. If I had, I’m sure several of them would have collected around a surprising finding from the Public Research Religion Institute. Its 2020 Census of American … More Is Mainline Protestantism Actually Growing?
Even as we start to get back to something like a pre-COVID normal, this summer I want to do even more of one of my chief pandemic hobbies: reading books. Here’s some of what’s on my reading list for the next three months. History Most of my more academic reading will be devoted to boning … More What I’m Hoping to Read This Summer
If last year we celebrated Easter amid the physical death of a pandemic, this year of the COVID vaccine we remember Jesus’ resurrection amid the apparent dying of his church in the United States. Having hovered around 70% since Gallup began polling, the share of Americans who belong to a faith community is now below … More Don’t Look for the Living Among the Dead
Although I just wrote a biography about a man dedicated to the art of practical joking, I can’t stand April Fool’s Day. Because even if I were clever enough to come up with hilarious practical jokes, I’d feel guilty about making other people to look foolish. But driving to work today, it struck me that … More In Praise of Folly
One of my favorite projects in recent years reached fruition last December, when Baylor University Press published Faith and History, a devotional featuring reflections by 40-some members of the Conference on Faith and History (CFH). I know that many of you picked up a copy, and I’ve heard enough positive feedback to feel like we … More Our Free Lenten Devotional Series on Faith and History
Six months from now, my religious biography of Charles Lindbergh will officially come out. So while there’s still much to be done between now and then, it feels like a good moment to start turning serious attention to my next book project. While I’d love to return to the genre of biography before too long, … More How You Can Help Me Start a New Book on Christian Higher Ed
I’ll never forget February 1, 2016. I had just got back from the first meeting of a spring course and barely sat down in my office when the phone rang: G.W. Carlson had had a stroke. I was stunned. Not just because GW was my friend and mentor, or because he had seemed so hale … More Five Years Later… The Legacy of GW Carlson
For about a dozen years now, I’ve been active in the Conference on Faith and History, serving on its executive board since 2016. This week that board voted not only to endorse the American Historical Association’s condemnation of the January 6th insurrection in Washington, DC, but to publish our own statement, which I’ve reprinted below. … More The Conference on Faith and History Condemns the Assault on the U.S. Capitol
Yesterday Vice President Mike Pence declined to invoke the section of the 25th Amendment that would allow him temporarily to assume presidential powers from Donald Trump, setting up a historic impeachment vote today in the House of Representatives, with Democrats and even some Republicans likely to vote to send Donald Trump to a second Senate … More “A Time to Heal”
