Red Letter Christians

It’s not until the fifth person calls me “blasphemous” that I put down my phone. It turns out people don’t like it when I describe my experience of God as disabled. A sound bite of a podcast where I talk about my experience of God quickly amassed more than fifty thousand views, more traffic than a California freeway at rush hour. Never mind that Scripture tells us in Daniel a...

Suddenly commentators act like they’ve discovered a brand-new species: the Christian who actually sounds like Jesus. David French wrote that James Talarico is “one of the few openly Christian politicians in the United States who acts like a Christian.” You can really only write a sentence like that if you have one kind of Christian in mind. Because if the Black church is in y...

Editor’s Note: Previously published on Religion News Service on September 3, 2026. (RNS) — I was graced just once in my life by the presence of Wendell Berry, the farmer-poet who died earlier this week at age 92. Over 20 years ago, I heard Berry speak at the annual conference of the largest professional association for my academic discipline. I was intrigued that someone know...

I often wonder if Jesus suddenly appeared on the modern political scene, would we recognize him as a leader—or would we reject him because he did not look like the leaders we are accustomed to? The question itself reveals something important about how we understand power. Every political campaign begins with someone seeking authority, influence, and the ability to shape the f...

You never know the day your life will change—or the person who will change it. For me, her name was Om Hassan. I was alone. She was alone. Her rusty metal door creaked open. She stood behind it in a black chador, her eyes twinkling above a smile. Then she motioned for me to come inside. Every alarm bell in my military training told me to turn around and leave fast.