Evangelicals Lose Bush?

After Bush’s recent interview on Nightline, media networks have creating hype around the fact that Bush made several comments relating to the Bible that wouldn’t jive with most evangelicals.  (I’m sorry friends–it was on Fox News, so it must be true! ;o)  In fact, according to some definitions of an evangelical, Bush is officially outside [...]

The Bailouts

All week there’s been so much chatter about the auto industry and the big question: to bail out or not to bail out?
One of the things I hope this whole debate teaches Americans is that the government is always involved in shaping the business world in some way or another–from billion dollar bail-outs and trade [...]

Christmas Carols

I tend to be a “humbug!” sort of person when it comes to Christmas music due to its annual repetitions, but the past two years, I have paused, at least for a moment, to listen to the lyrics of the songs played in every shop and restaurant across America during this month.
Last year, I was [...]

New Frontiers

The original Maverick wasn’t a fighter pilot. He was a cowboy.
Who is the tall dark stranger there?
Maverick is the name.
Riding the trail to who knows where
Luck is his companion
Gamblin’ is his game.
In Campbell and Kean’s American Cultural Studies, a brief discussion of the effect of the Western mythos on our culture states, “anyone who seeks [...]

Evangelical Politics in the South

“This is a diverse state. If you get in your car in downtown Raleigh you can be in the equivalent of Silicon Valley in 20 minutes, feel as if you are in Alabama in 25 minutes, and get a sense of Berkeley in 30 minutes. You don’t have to leave the state to find places [...]

What Kind of Witness?

As I have been reading Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw’s Jesus for President, I have struggled to reconcile the kind of Christianity he presents with the kind that seems to be my own.  Shane writes in a way that moves me unlike very many other authors.  And more than his language, his life has a [...]

Recognizing the Other Within Ourselves

In his book Mission and Menace, Robert Jewett devotes a chapter to what he outlines as three millennial crusades that took place in the 20th century, leading to a disillusioned city on a hill, as well as some pretty disastrous foreign relations positions which, though not directly related, are ideological cousins under the same millennial [...]

Her Role

So much of the hype about the election has been about the first black first family entering the White House.  What more often going under the radar at this point is the significance gender still has in this race.
And, no, not Hilary Clinton’s or Sarah Palin’s.  Michelle Obama’s.
Her sex doesn’t come as a surprise, of [...]

Presidential Scarlett Letters

About 20 minutes ago, Barack Obama gave his acceptance speech as the President-Elect of the United States. I, an Obama supporter, felt incredibly patriotic. I looked at the faces of the people in the audience crying, I listened to Barack’s words as he addressed our country, and I couldn’t help getting a little emotional myself [...]

Even bigger history?

Tonight I saw a series of “If Obama wins…” videos from Newsweek* with various analysts weighing in on the task faced by the Republican party at this point, and one of the questions mentioned was “Why Obama?  Was this about Bush?  Or is this about the issues?”
I ask myself a similar question: Why this level [...]