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Can Christians Lie? How Conservative Evangelical Bible Interpretation Has Shaped ‘Truth’

…accepting biological evolution like virtually all professional scientists today, writes of a private conversation he had with Morris one morning in the hotel cafeteria they both were staying at following their public debate the evening before. Miller questioned Morris with the aim of getting him to admit in private that this was all a charade, and that Morris was knowingly perpetrating a fraud on the public. Miller expected a “charlatan,” but dis…

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The Tense History Behind Jimmy Carter’s Liberty U. Commencement Address

…. The same elite establishment that Jesus condemned remains the real enemy today. Falwell Jr.’s need to make Carter acceptable to the Liberty crowd (who Carter joked was larger than Trump’s crowd the previous year) did not end there. Unlike his father, Falwell Jr. praised Carter for his 1976 Playboy interview because Carter was willing to follow the teachings of Jesus in Matthew 5:27-28: “You have heard it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not…

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The Atheist Encounter with Christianity: A Failure to Disbelieve?

…y view on this topic may change as I grow older and (hopefully) wiser, but today I think that the kingdom of God is about the here and now, which is all we really ever have, and not about the hereafter. This is not the orthodox view, of course, and many Christians disagree with me, and I take their disagreements seriously. But my overall point remains: Christianity is not formulizable and it is not about the checking off of belief boxes. These car…

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Why Anti-Gay Bullying is a Theological Issue

…old Tyler Clementi, 13-year-old Seth Walsh, and 19-year-old Raymond Chase. Today, it is very clear to me that profound sadness and stunned silence is no longer a suitable, appropriate, or adequate response. From Lamentation to Indignation My sadness began to change into something different with each successive news story about another gay teen hanging himself, shooting himself, or jumping off a bridge. As I saw the faces of these young victims and…

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Prophets of the Environmental Apocalypse

…ghtmares. In somewhat the same way that climate change denialism functions today, the Atoms for Peace campaign merely divided public opinion, allowing some to sleep easy and the most knowledgeable people even more distraught and fearful. Events like the recent reactor meltdown in Northeastern Japan can bring even the sleepers back to the edge of anxiety, and then there’s the persistent fear that a nut job or a terrorist will decide to usher in apo…

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Southern Baptists Embrace Minorities, but Not Gays

Southern Baptists are feeling pretty good about themselves today. Eleven years after the denomination apologized to African-Americans for supporting segregation and slavery, it elected a black man as its first vice president of the convention—“the highest position yet held by an African-American” in the denomination, the New York Times notes. Fred Luter Jr. pastors a largely black church in New Orleans and is apparently an “overwhelming favorite…

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Seeking Jobs, Beach Clean Up Workers Come From All Walks of Life

…ng to save?” Kumrits asked his friend. “Man, he sounded just like we sound today.” But if you ask them what they are, they really don’t know. And they’re fine with that. They don’t know where they will be spiritually in a year, but they don’t seem very much preoccupied by it. Today, their spirituality comes from the Tao Te Ching. They are dedicated to shedding their possessions. Kumrits lives year round in a camper. The two men are constantly chal…

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When Welcoming the Stranger Was Not Just a Religious Value

…stem works, and that good can come when we choose to be our better selves. Today, as was the case in 1979, religious leaders have set aside their divisions and have stood united in their strong commitment to aid and resettle Syrian refugees. Last week, as Congress debated the fate of Syrian refugee resettlement, organizations representing the entire gamut of American religious communities—Muslims and Jews, evangelicals and Unitarians, Catholics an…

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The Oil Spill and “Real Deathliness”

…utives or incompetent engineers or Obama or who-the-hell-ever we turn into today’s whipping boy. But the truth that everyone wants to deny is that the whole culture is sick from top to bottom. We’re all addicted to oil in ways we can’t even grasp, and nobody—nobody—has any plausible idea of how to break free from the system. There are plenty of ideas floating around, yes, but there are no easy answers to put into practice today. If there were, we’…

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Modern Vampires: Your Neighbors and Spouses

…(Praeger, release date: May 30, 2009). What inspired you to write Vampires Today? What sparked your interest? Some people think I study vampires simply because they are unusual. I’ve even been asked if I am a vampire myself. The reality is that I became interested in the vampire community when I learned of a massive survey being conducted by the Atlanta Vampire Alliance (AVA). Their project was relevant to the sociology of knowledge: instead of de…

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