I founded @mereorthodoxy and work at @baylorisr. I write about theology, ethics, and politics. Quit Netflix. https://t.co/InUvXIOhRU
Nov 21, 2022 • 27 tweets • 5 min read
The debate on the right over whether to support bills like this in exchange for religious liberty protections has long fascinated me. I should probably write an essay, but here's a few thoughts anyway. apnews.com/article/religi…
There is a material argument over what this bill does, and whether the religious liberty protections that have been added to it are sufficiently robust.
But behind those disagreements lies a dispute about gay marriage's position within the political landscape.
Jun 24, 2022 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
One major step forward for justice in America.
This day belongs to the many people who have labored long and hard to make it happen--and to President Trump, who deserves our thanks for keeping a promise I did not think he would keep.
As @RyanTAnd notes, many of the people who labored for this have done so in total anonymity, and who (to borrow a phrase) will someday dwell in 'unvisited tombs'). Their labor was seen by God, and today is known before us all.
This was an ill-advised tweet, which I am sorry for.
Specifically, I am sorry for giving people on this platform occasion to conclude that I despise evangelicals on the (obviously) ludicrous grounds named.
In fact, my impression of evangelical audiences (academic or otherwise) is that they would not be offended or put off by the *mention* of "modus tollens" in a context where its general significance is clear (as I think is the case in my usage).
Jun 2, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
I was just told by an editor that an evangelical audience (reading an academic book) will not know what modus tollens is, just in case you're wondering about the state of the 'evangelical mind' project these days.
And people are worried about winsomeness. SMH.
Oct 19, 2021 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Here's the irony of the 'elite evangelical' discourse, as I see it:
Many of the people most vocally opposed to elites capitulating to our secular society *already have* themselves.
Only they don't know it yet.
I think we could look at the manner of rhetoric they have used, or to the reasoning they apply to issues of political consequence.
Yet as I have written much about sex and reproduction, I'll stay in that lane.
Apr 7, 2021 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Evangelicals routinely oscillate between reifying doubt as a mode of Christian living and rejecting it as "sinful."
The former is a reaction against unhealthy communal practices that the latter simply reinforces.
An anxious faith will invariably a brittle one.
At some point, we have to consider the possibility that people shaped by evangelical contexts routinely capitalize on "deconstructing" what they have received is an indicator that not all is well.
Apr 6, 2021 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
The odds of me experiencing a heart-attack during the #NationalChampionship are higher than I'd like.
If you don't hear from me by tomorrow, it's been real, Twitter.
Go Baylor.
Update: there was no heart-attack. That was a fun, fun ride. I was cautiously optimistic before the game, but that was far more decisive than I could have hoped for.
Apr 5, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
I was an early mask defender. But Fauci's missteps made that position a harder sell to the American public, not easier.
Ignoring Fauci's very real, very unacknowledged (so far) mistakes only emboldens MAGA. washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-t…
Even at this juncture, our public health establishment seems bent on doing everything it can to undermine its own credibility.
Even if there *is* a fourth wave, using the language of 'impending doom' is grossly irresponsible.
Evangelicalism's "social vision is fragmentary, often lacks substance and strategy, and focuses mainly on a one-issue or single-candidate approach." -- Carl Henry, 1980
In 1980, evangelicals were surging into politics. Henry: "Yet some observers fear--and with good reason--that this involvement may eventually become as politically misguided as was the activism of liberal Christianity earlier this century."
Oct 23, 2020 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
This is an admirable piece by @JohnPiper. But I'll confess I'm perplexed by the argument that pride is killing people equivalently to abortion, and that we should include that as part of our *political* reasoning. desiringgod.org/articles/polic…
One question is simply empirical: *does* a "culture-saturating, pro-self pride" actually kill people in the sense relevant that we could even compare it to abortion?
It certainly kills the soul, and we should fear that worse than the death of the body (Mt. 10:28).
Aug 28, 2020 • 18 tweets • 3 min read
I suspect many evangelicals have discounted the importance of the 'marginally committed' to our communities.
Those who are 'marginally committed' to a church might only show up once a month. They might even only show up on Christmas and Easter.
Yet when there are enough of them, they give a community a sense of energy and vitality that it otherwise would lack.
Aug 24, 2020 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
The scandal the Religious Right has brought upon the Gospel of Jesus Christ by protecting such degeneracy breaks my heart. reuters.com/investigates/s…
This is false. The reason the media is fascinated is because they hate people who demand traditional moral values *for others* while flagrantly violating them *ourselves.*
Evangelicals who spend their time opposing the 'false teachings' that are infiltrating the church so often miss the real task, namely, creatively rearticulating the faith so that the needs those 'false teachings' are responding to fall to the ground.
Discerning how the faith we have received addresses the needs of the hour can only be done by carefully hearing our critics, rather than reactionarily dismissing them.
Aug 2, 2019 • 8 tweets • 5 min read
If conservatives had adopted the standard of evidence for policy that @DavidAFrench assumes here, they would have never opposed gay marriage. nationalreview.com/2019/08/agains…@DavidAFrench I suspect the best way to think about @HawleyMO's bill is to treat it as supply-side regulation: it's not *opposed* to 'personal responsibility,' or individual freedom, but is aimed at altering the marketplace conditions in which those are expressed.
Jun 7, 2019 • 18 tweets • 5 min read
This is a good thread by @DouthatNYT, though I think conflating 'integralism' with an interest in preserving a soft establishment of religion is conceptually confusing given the way the former is explicitly grounded in RC doctrine.
I think it also lends credence to my suspicion that beneath the French/Ahmari debate lies specific differences in how evangelicals and Catholics are interpreting the failure of the 1980-2008 attempt to forge a socon consensus.
I've had a few more thoughts since writing yesterday's newsletter about civility, decency, and political discourse among conservatives right now.
If you sat down LGBT activists and asked whether "too much civility" was why conservatives are losing that cultural battle, I suspect they'd enjoy a very hearty laugh.
