When Shrugging is Not an Option
- May/June 2025
- April 30, 2025
Bible-believing Christians understand their highest calling to be the Great Commission, Christ’s instruction to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19, 20, NIV).1 Unquestionably, inviting others
READ MOREA surprisingly optimistic view of the complicated relationship between faith and democracy in the American republic. In his 2018 book The Left Behind: Decline and Rage in Rural America, America’s leading sociologist of religion Robert Wuthnow exposed the seams of anger in small-town America that helped fuel Donald Trump’s successful presidential bid. In his most
READ MOREDutch politician Marianne Thieme, who served in her country’s House of Representatives from 2006 to 2019, passionately advocates for animal welfare. In 2006 she joined the Seventh-day Adventist Church, partly because of its promotion of a vegetarian lifestyle. As leader of the Party for the Animals, Thieme used a signature rhetorical flourish every time she
READ MOREGrand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 2021. Bad Faith: Race and the Rise of the Religious Right succinctly tells a story that has rarely, if ever, been told. In a small, readable account of some 88 pages, historian Randall Balmer takes on two important tasks. First, he shatters the myth that opposition to abortion was the engine
READ MOREHistory is replete with stories of public policy gone awry. One common tale—which is probably apocryphal—is from nineteenth-century India. According to this story, British authorities in Delhi were alarmed at the number of dangerous cobras in the city and offered residents a bounty for every dead snake they could produce. What officials hadn’t counted on,
READ MOREThey make an unlikely duo. A teenage “hijabi athlete” who is a devout Muslim with a passion for running. And an Ohio state senator, a self-described “hockey mom,” intent on making sure all student athletes, regardless of their faith tradition, enjoy equal religious freedom rights. Together they’re helping reshape how religious expression in sports is
READ MOREThe United States has been a deeply religious nation since its earliest beginnings,” President Harry S. Truman ardently declared as he opened his 15-minute address. It was the evening of October 30, 1949, and Truman delivered a major speech live on all four major television and radio networks. “The need which the founders of our
READ MOREDoes state support for Christianity help the church flourish? Or hasten its decline? Illustration by Jon Krause Thirty years ago the people of Zambia elected Frederick Chiluba, an evangelical Christian, to be the country’s new president. Chiluba strongly believed in the integration of faith and politics, declaring in his first presidential address that Zambia would
READ MOREAfter more than two decades at the forefront of U.S. international religious freedom efforts, a former State Department special advisor for religious minorities makes the case for leaving partisan politics at the water’s edge. Religious freedom matters. Consequently, it is a hotly contested issue within the United States. But if the stakes are high domestically,
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