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In October 1936, a Roman Catholic priest and professor of moral theology at the Catholic University of America took to the airwaves to defend the New Deal from scurrilous attacks made by another Catholic priest, the demagogic radio personality of the day, Father Charles Coughlin. Monsignor John A. Ryan’s speech was titled “Roosevelt Safeguards America.” In many ways, the radio volley between the two priests still reflects debates raging in the church and in American society today.

In the wake of pre-election punditry that the Religious Right is dead and that the so called Culture Wars are over, I wrote a piece for The Public Eye: “The Culture Wars Are Not Over: The Institutionalization of the Christian Right.”1 The year was 2001, what many now consider to have been the high watermark of the power and influence of the Religious Right in American politics.

On July 17, the Oregon Secretary of State’s office approved signatures for Initiative Petition 22, a ballot measure that could repeal the state’s so-called sanctuary law. Oregon voters will now vote in November whether to keep or repeal the 1987 law—the l

Not since Thomas doubted the resurrection of Jesus (John 20) has a Catholic dubium caused a stir like the recent Vatican response to its own question about blessing same sex couples. As in the…

Last month in Louisiana, my home, a member of our state legislature introduced legislation designed to make it difficult for transgender young people to get physical and mental health care because of…

Last month, a global consortium of leading scholars released the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA), the product of a year-long labor to produce a new working definition of antisemitism that…

There’s a reason Tim Keller, Pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church (PCA) in New York, enjoys a greater degree of public respect than many conservative evangelical leaders who clearly crave…

The average American might not realize that the prejudices and superstitions that underlie the push to teach creationism in public schools, also undergird anti-LGBTQ bigotry. But the Arkansas…

Dear Beth: Confession: I am a clergywoman ordained in the Southern Baptist tradition who has completely denounced complementarianism as an institutional, theological, and scriptural concept. I am also…

The main reason why the Religious Right became powerful is not what most people may think. Some would undoubtedly point to the powerful communications media. Others might identify charismatic leaders, the development of “wedge issues,” or even changes in evangelical theology in the latter part of the twentieth century that supported, and even demanded, political action.