Nearly five years after a German pastor sparked controversy with comments about homosexuality, the legal dispute appears to be over with a settlement of 5,000 euros (about $5,550 USD). Olaf Latzel, pastor of a conservative congregation in the state-privileged Protestant Church, called homosexuality “degenerative” and “demonic.” He condemned what he called the “hobbylobby” and slammed…
If you feel like it’s hard to keep up with the cascade of new worship music, you’re not alone. The industry is producing new releases at a quicker clip, and the typical lifespan of a worship song—the time a song remains in regular rotation for church worship teams—has shortened. Faced with a seemingly endless supply…
On June 25, 2024, Eastern Nazarene College announced that it will close at the end of the year. I specify the date because it matters: The news came well after faculty members had begun planning syllabi and courses for the fall semester. To say this was a bombshell for them and their students is an understatement. Six…
When the waiter brought out my long-awaited high tea that day, I didn’t expect I’d still be grieving it decades later. I was 21 and enjoying my first “real” spring break during a debt-building week away in London. After years of devouring chaste romances set in England, I’d learned that Harrods was the best place…
As the famed disability advocate nears 50 years of ministry, a friend reflects on her legacy. It’s said you should never meet your heroes. But Joni Eareckson Tada is different. I first heard Joni speak when I was 15 years old, sitting in the balcony level of the Waterfront Hall in Belfast. I had heard…
An exodus of educated and generous families has pinched ministry budgets—and threatened the lavish lifestyles of mega-rich pastors. In the last two decades, over 400,000 South Africans have left their country to set up a new life abroad in the US, Europe, Canada, Australia, and the United Arab Emirates. They are mostly highly educated and…
The Indonesian series by Joko Anwar reveals the horror of a spirit-filled world without a savior. Indonesia is an enchanted culture full of folklore involving ghosts, demons, and djinns (shape-shifting spirits from Arabian and Muslim mythology). These stories usually involve a moral of some kind: Do not leave a house unattended, for this invites the…
With few nones entering the US, religious immigrants are stalling secularization. The world’s 280 million immigrants have greater shares of Christians, Muslims, and Jews than the general population, according to a new Pew Research Center study released Monday. “You see migrants coming to places like the US, Canada, different places through Western Europe, and being…
I joined Christianity Today not as a trite multicultural experiment but to contribute to the wonderful weirdness of building the kingdom. The word weird is weirdly being thrown around by politicians as if it’s an official political critique. Once that label is hurled at someone, they return to middle school ethics and recite the gospel…
While Hindus publicly confront mob violence against their community, Christians are apprehensive about speaking out. Bangladesh’s religious minorities have reported looting, arson, and vandalization following Sheikh Hasina’s abrupt resignation as prime minister last month. Thousands of young people first took to the streets in June to protest a court ruling that reinstated a civil service…
