“I am feeling confused right now about what I want to give my neighbor.” A letter from a friend captured the feelings of many Americans this spring. This was back when “the Head Cheetah” – the only name I’ve heard her use for President Donald Trump that could also be...
What to an Immigrant Is the Third of November?
Dhananjay Jagannathan
A nationalism rooted in values encourages us to be fierce in our opposition to injustices that lie outside our immediate gaze. It tends to foster fellow-feeling beyond the bonds of immediate affinity. It gives us orientation when difficult political questions face us, while also inspiring us to reject the politics of friend and enemy.
Observations of a New Citizen
Irena Dragaš Jansen
As 2020’s contentious election season builds to a climax, a former resident of the Communist eastern bloc, newly an American citizen, reflects on her political journey, one that traces the travails of Christianity’s own courtship of political cynicism.
Wrestling with Sovereignty in a Kairos Year
Amy Julia Becker
In late April, crowds of people gathered at the Pennsylvania statehouse to protest stay-at-home measures taken in response to the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Parked out front of the capital was the cab of a dark green 18-wheeler with the words “Jesus is my vaccine”...
One Church, Many Tribes
Anne Snyder
It’s no secret that we live in a secular age. Richard John Neuhaus coined an evocative term in the 1980s, “the naked public square,” which cemented the loss of enchantment in a discourse increasingly obsessed with utility and politics, slipping away from questions of...
From Politically Homeless to Political Homemakers
Rachel Anderson
Rather than waiting for the ideal political home, Christians should look for a different type of place in politics—one that works to maintain a social structure within which the diverse members and activities in our society can flourish together.
A Different Hope
Eberhard Arnold
Christians have long experienced the social and intellectual pressure to baptize the various “isms” of a given era. In the 1920s, German theologian Eberhard Arnold founded the Bruderhof, a community inspired by Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. In this text, Arnold works out a fresh political theology that won’t just be espoused in words, but lived. He presents a different hope, a way beyond nationalism, socialism, or the status quo.
Render Unto Caesar
Anthony Elenbaas
If all human wars stem from efforts to take the place of God, what needs humbling in this particularly fraught political hour?
Between Indifferentism and Tribalism
Bishop Robert Barron
There is a happy medium the Bible wants us to find between a bland religious relativism and a dangerous religious tribalism.
Politics at the End of the World
Onsi Kamel
All earthly happiness is precarious. Yet, as Augustine wrote, rather than filling us with despair, this should free us to reckon honestly with the world as it is while simultaneously persevering within it.