Commentary

I don’t think I’ve ever read a book quite like Jason Kirk’s Hell Is a World Without You. This book, a bildungsroman about a teen’s evangelical house of cards and the mounting life experiences, new friends, and cold fingers of doubt that threaten to knock it over, is a call coming from firmly inside the house.

Every morning, I drive my two sons, ages 11 and 13, to school. Normally these rides are mostly quiet as I listen to podcasts, and they watch something on their iPads. But this February, I told my sons we were starting a new tradition: Taking turns naming a figure of Black history and sharing why we believe that person was significant. To my surprise, my sons’ initial reticence quickly turned to enthusiasm. So far, we’ve talked about Louis Armstrong, Jesse Owens, Sojourner Truth, Thurgood Marshall, Rosa Parks, and Carter G. Woodson — the leader of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History who established the second week of February to be “Negro History Week” to counterbalance the ongoing erasure of Black contributions in the U.S.

On Sunday, I tuned in to watch my first football game in over a year as part of my discipline toward Christian nonviolence. That may seem odd, especially since I’m the person who wrote about quitting the NFL as an act of nonviolence just last year. But this weekend I tuned in for the NFL’s Pro Bowl competition, including the flag football game, to signal my support for player safety and wellbeing.

Payne details the creation, proliferation, and decline of CCM, tracing the industry’s relationship with conservative evangelical Christianity.

As far as coming-of-age stories go, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, a new Disney+ streaming series, is certainly an earth-shattering one

In July of last year, an estimated 50,000 fans flooded Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City to see Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour concert. Among those in the crowd was football tight end Travis Kelce, eager to woo Swift. Arrowhead has been central to Swift and Kelce’s romance ever since: After making their romance official last September, Swift has routinely joined the 76,000 Chiefs fans to cheer for Kelce and his teammates. From concertgoers to sports spectators, the thought of that many people in the same space is difficult to imagine. Equally hard to imagine, and significantly more heartbreaking, Israel Defense Forces have killed 25,000 Palestinians since Oct. 7, 2023; that number of people would fill about a third of Arrowhead Stadium.

This is a jarring image, but such is the reality of our present moment: While the state of Israel carries out a genocide against Palestinians, we are easily distracted by our adoration for Swift and Kelce, along with spectator sports.

The prevailing public narratives we have used to justify military strategies amid diplomatic fantasies are being exposed as meaningless: Unfettered Israeli military power can never impose a lasting solution nor quench Palestinian aspirations for sovereignty and justice. Likewise, Palestinian armed factions can never defeat Israel’s military power, backed by the unequivocal support of the U.S. These exclusionary self-vindicating visions dominate in a completely zero-sum game. Escalating violence wantonly kills, intensifying the compulsion to eradicate the human dignity of the “other.” In short, there is no military solution to the raging warfare spilling over our screens and tearing our hearts asunder.

Director Jeymes Samuel’s newest movie, The Book of Clarence, is not just a biblical epic but a Black biblical epic.

No Christian leader has influenced my faith and activism as much as Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. — but the day we devote to his legacy often leaves me frustrated. There’s a bitter irony in a nation that takes a day off to celebrate King’s life and work while that same nation is experiencing a deep backlash against racial justice.