history
The Klan Never Ends
When Gospel According to the Klan was published in 2011, the reactions to the book surprised me at first. I had some white people, including scholars, tell me that the Klan was an artifact of the past, or a fringe movement of little consequence. While I might have written about the 1920s Klan, they were…
Not Weird Enough
According to the author of a new Catholic handbook, eucharistic adoration should be the new yoga.
Battle Flag
I’ve lived my entire life in the South, first Georgia and now North Carolina, but I’ve never paid much attention to the Confederate battle flag, the so-called stars and bars. Despite some ancestors who fought for the Confederacy and several childhood family vacations spent navigating cannons, split-rail fences, and museums filled with the tattered remnants…
Saint Frances and the Minimum Wage
What does Saint Francis have to do with Seattle Mayor Ed Murray’s proposal to raise the city’s minimum wage from $9.32 to $15 an hour? Other than befriending and becoming one of the poor, the Italian Catholic friar that preached to the birds has nothing to do with the lowest hourly remuneration in the birthplace…
This Mutant Genre
The introduction to a new anthology Radiant Truths: Essential …. Essays on American Belief
The Day U.S. Evangelicalism Died
As reported in Religion Dispatches, on December 16th, 2012, U.S. evangelicalism uttered its last breath. On this day, Fox News pundit Mike Huckabee (a.k.a. Mr. “More Conversation, Less Confrontation”) joined forces with Dr. James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, and American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer to proclaim that the school massacre in Newtown,…
Monumental Lies: Jefferson, Reconstructed
Why we should be afraid of the vision David Barton–and Kirk Cameron–hold for America. Somewhat afraid.
Files from The Family: The Psychotic and the Spy
The other day I had lunch with a Presbyterian minister who had some minor but firsthand experience with elitist theology of the Family, the avant-garde of American fundamentalism that I’ve written about in two books, The Family and C Street. The clergyman had read The Family and wondered, in the end, whether the Family’s abuses of…
The Queer Smithsonian?
During my recent stay in San Francisco, I happened into the press opening for the GLBT History Museum. Located in the Castro District, the museum bills itself as the “queer Smithsonian.” It holds one of the largest archives of GLBT historical materials anywhere in the world. Upon entering the museum’s 1,600 square feet of gallery…
Norway Worships Warship, Not Its Namesake
Attention, everyone: the Norwegian navy just got a new warship. It is 440 feet long, featuring anti-surface naval strike missiles, Sea Sparrow missile air-defense missiles, and an anti-aircraft gun and torpedo system. I’m not usually a follower of Scandinavian military technology. But this ship has an unusual name: HMNS Thor Heyerdahl. Maybe you recognize it.…