Rhett Burns
When I was a young boy I met someone who seemed like a giant to me. At six-foot-seven-inches Jose Rondon was the tallest person I had ever seen in person. He was also incredibly kind, a good baseball pitcher, and loved Jesus. Originally from Venezuela, Jose lived briefly with my grandparents before staying long-term with […]
My denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, held its annual meeting last week. In response to current cultural trends, namely the #MeToo movement and the Paige Patterson fiasco, leaders and messengers spent a significant amount of time addressing women’s issues. The convention passed resolutions on the dignity of women and on abuse. But a lot of […]
Adam Ford has sold the Christian satire news site, The Babylon Bee. Launched in 2016, the Bee employs The Onion-style satire to spoof American evangelicalism—its popular pastors, authors, and fads—while taking occasional jabs at our larger secular culture. It has been mostly funny and wildly successful. So why did Ford sell? He gave several reasons […]
Last week was crazy. The United States moved its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Hamas greeted the move in their usual manner, which means with bombs and human shields. Major media outlets portrayed Hamas in their usual manner, which means referring to them as “protestors,” ignoring the bombs and the children sent into a […]
By now the tragic story of Alfie Evans is well known. The English toddler with an undiagnosed neurodegenerative disorder died last week, five days after doctors extubated him and abandoned all treatment, except palliative care. A judge denied Alfie’s parents the right to transport him to another hospital to extend treatment and life-support, even though […]
Last week, I posted my article on just war and the ascendance of foreign policy hawks in the White House on the same morning President Trump tweeted this: Two days later, President Trump, along with his British and French counterparts, ordered a limited missile strike against the Assad regime in response to its alleged use […]
Three weeks ago, I wrote a response to Michael Gerson’s essay in The Atlantic about evangelical support of President Trump. I found it hypocritical that Gerson, a senior policy advisor to President Bush and a member of The White House Iraq Group, was lecturing evangelicals about Trump’s rhetoric when his own administration’s war caused such […]
A few weeks ago, I reviewed Andrew Peterson’s beautiful new EP, Resurrection Letters: Prologue. His new full-length album will release on Good Friday, and in advance of that, The Gospel Coalition premiered the video for Peterson’s Revelation 5-inspired song, “Is He Worthy?” Soon thereafter, Peterson found himself treading the stormy waters of woke Christianity. His […]
Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush, published a takedown of Trump-supporting evangelicals in the latest issue of The Atlantic. Gerson attempts to answer the question of how a once confident and influential cultural movement became an anxious minority seeking protection from a very un-Christian president. He is at his best when […]
The news cycle following a mass shooting is predictable. Thoughts and prayers are offered, outrage and demands are expressed, and the cable news stations fill up time with people yelling for or against gun control. The week after Parkland has been no different. Yet, the narrative heats up after each successive shooting, and pressure is […]
Several years ago, I was riding in a taxi on the north side of Istanbul. For a good portion of the ride, the driver explained to me how bad America is. It was the usual diatribe: George W. Bush is bad, war for oil, Islamaphobia, and so on. He knew I was American—my southern-accented Turkish […]
The best music is imaginative in the Chestertonian sense. It does not attempt to create a new world. Rather, it seeks to uncover and reveal the truth, goodness, and beauty God has already placed in this world, but remains hidden because we do not have eyes to see. Andrew Peterson translates this type of imagination […]
The Philadelphia Eagles won the Super Bowl Sunday night to conclude a controversial NFL season. This year, pregame inaction eclipsed the action on the field, as many players refused to stand for the national anthem, choosing instead to take a knee in protest. Former San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick started the trend in protest of […]
Mixed martial arts fighter Ronda Rousey became a professional wrestler Sunday night. The UFC women’s bantamweight champion agreed to terms with WWE and appeared unexpectantly on the pay-per-view Royal Rumble show in Philadelphia. Rousey, who won a bronze medal in judo at the 2008 Olympics, took over the mixed martial arts world, winning her first […]
It has been two weeks since President Donald Trump allegedly referred to Haiti and some African nations as “s***hole countries” in a meeting with congressional officials discussing immigration policy. In the wake of these comments, his detractors offered their collective outrage online for a few days, calling President Trump racist and xenophobic. Many Christians joined […]
When Tua Tagovailoa woke up Monday morning, he was a relatively unknown backup quarterback for the University of Alabama. Sure, he was a touted freshman signal-caller, perhaps the future for the Crimson Tide. But on Monday morning, few college football fans outside of Tuscaloosa knew who he was. By the time the clock struck midnight […]
Iran is once again embroiled in national protest. The demonstrations started a week ago as an economic protest, but have taken on an increasingly anti-government tone, resulting in twenty-one deaths and over 450 citizens imprisoned. This protest marks the largest demonstrations in Iran since the Green Movement of 2009, when disputed presidential election results sparked […]
Fight, laugh, feast. You’ve no doubt heard and read those words around the CrossPolitic podcast and website, as they capture our vision of cultural engagement. Faithful Christians are joyful warriors. They are mighty in battle with their enemies, yet they fling jokes at the stars while gathered around a table teeming with friends and their […]
After another dismal football season, the University of Tennessee has now fumbled its coaching search. Last week, the Volunteers had reached an agreement to hire Ohio State defensive coordinator Greg Schiano as its head football coach. However, the deal was dropped because of allegations that he knew about a sexual predator and did nothing—allegations which […]
So…witches are on the rise. Sadly, this is not the beginning of a stand-up comedy routine, but a religious trend in the United States. According to this report, millennials are trading traditional religion for witchcraft and astrology. A majority of young adults consider astrology to be scientific, while the psychic services industry has grown two-percent […]