Contemporary Connections

Will Beth Moore Help Save Evangelicalism?

“Lord, I repent of ways I’ve been complicit in & contributed tomisogyny & sexism in the church by my cowardly and inordinate deference to male leaders in order to survive rather than simply appropriately respecting them as my brothers. Forgive me for being part of the problem.” Beth Moore tweeted (@BethMooreLPM) this just last week, […]

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Calling Out Sexual Harassment: The Implications Of Complementarianism

Meredith Stone, a Baptist female seminary professor, responded last week to John Piper. If you remember, John Piper recently posted the script of an interview on Desiring God. He argued that women should not teach at seminaries. Actually, that isn’t correct. John Piper argued that women are disqualified from teaching pastors because–according to his complementarian

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Jessica Hahn and Evangelical Silence on Sexual Abuse

We are so pleased to welcome back John Wigger to the Anxious Bench. John Wigger is Professor of History at the University of Missouri and author of PTL: The Rise and Fall of the Evangelical Empire of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker. #MeToo #ChurchToo In 1980 Jessica Hahn was sexually assaulted by one of the

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Medieval Christmas Tradition Behind Sausage Roll Jesus Controversy

Greggs, the largest UK bakery chain, recently sparked outrage among Christians. It created a Nativity scene to help promote its 2017 Advent Calendar. In one of the publicity shots, three (very white) wise men dressed in elaborate robes kneel by a straw-filled manger. But instead of baby Jesus wrapped in swaddling clothes, the manger boasts

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Romans 8:31, Chris Tomlin, And The Faith Of A Medieval Woman

“Water You turned into wine; Opened the eyes of the blind; There’s no one like you; None like you; Into the darkness You shine; Out of the ashes we rise; There’s No one like you; None like you” In 2010 Chris Tomlin recorded these opening lyrics to “Our God” at a Passion Conference. He couldn’t

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Evangelical Silence and Trump: A Reformation Irony

“Trump’s religious advisers have been mostly silent.” Tom Gjelten wrote these words for NPR just days ago, in his aptly titled article “Trump’s Evangelical Advisers Stand By their Man.” In the aftermath of Trump’s shocking response to Charlottesville, the silence emanating from his Evangelical Advisory Board screamed. It seemed even louder after prominent business leaders

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Should Women Rule? Netflix’s The Crown and Complementarian Theology

Riding the London Eye is deceptively peaceful. The city that slowly unfolds below seems a different place from the noise and heat of the crowded South Bank. I always look first for Cleopatra’s Needle, the 3500 year-old Egyptian obelisk shipped to England in the nineteenth-century and hoisted along the Victorian Embankment Gardens. The startling incongruity

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Wonder Woman and Complementarianism

It probably doesn’t surprise you that I have always loved Wonder Woman. My mother will testify that it is one show my little sister and I refused to miss. It is also my first clear memory of watching TV. The story of Wonder Woman, however, didn’t begin in 1975 with Lynda Carter as Diana Prince.

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Lysa TerKeurst, Bible Gateway, and Fides ex Auditu: the Biblical Heart of Medieval Faith

Several months ago I heard a catchy phrase preached in a sermon. But it wasn’t until recently, when I began to compare popular medieval Bible verses with popular modern bible verses (thanks Bible Gateway!), that I began to think about the phrase more critically. So what is the phrase? “Information does not equal transformation.” Not

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