Weekly Roundup: April 17
Here’s the weekly roundup from A Public Witness. This week, we published a look at divergent Christian voices about climate change and broke the news of Pete Hegseth using a Pulp Fiction speech as a prayer during a Pentagon worship service.
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Top 5 at wordandway.org
A Flag Gained, the Gospel Lost. Michael Mellette reflected on the problem that for many American evangelicals, Israel is a theological object beyond moral scrutiny.
Review: Suicide and the Communion of Saints. Robert D. Cornwall reviewed Suicide and the Communion of Saints by Rhonda Mawhood Lee.
Church-State Separation Is a ‘Lie,’ Says Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission Chair. Adelle M. Banks reported on comments by Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and pushback from religious liberty advocates.
Pope Leo Says He Does Not Fear Trump, Citing Gospel As He Pushes Back in Feud Over Iran War. After attacks by President Donald Trump, Pope Leo XIV refused to back down: “To put my message on the same plane as what the president has attempted to do here, I think is not understanding what the message of the Gospel is.”
Archbishop of Canterbury Expresses Solidarity With Pope Leo XIV in Calling for Peace in Iran. The head of the Anglican Communion argued, “It is the calling of every Christian — and of all people of faith and goodwill — to work and pray for peace.”
Dangerous Dogma
This week’s episode features a conversation between Brian Kaylor, Angela Denker, and Beau Underwood about President Donald Trump’s attacks on Pope Leo XIV, Leo’s witness against the Iran war, Trump’s AI image of himself as Jesus, and the electoral defeat of Viktor Orbán in Hungary. Listen to the audio version here (or wherever you listen to podcasts) or watch the video version here.
by Brian Kaylor, Word&Way Editor-in-Chief
During a press conference on Thursday (April 16), Pete Hegseth took a break from quoting Pulp Fiction movie lines in a prayer to compare journalists to the biblical Pharisees. Referring to a sermon he heard in church on Sunday about Mark 3, he mentioned the story of the Pharisees criticizing Jesus for healing a man on the Sabbath. Hegseth then tried some creative interpretation to apply the passage to journalists writing critically about the Trump administration and the Iran war.
“Even though [the Pharisees] witnessed a literal miracle, it didn’t matter. They were only there to explain away the goodness in pursuit of their agenda,” Hegseth said. “As the passage ends, the Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel against him, how to destroy him. I sat there in church and I thought, ‘Our press are just like these Pharisees.’ Not all of you, not all of you, but the legacy Trump-hating press. Your politically motivated animus for President Trump nearly completely blinds you from the brilliance of our American warriors. The Pharisees scrutinized every good act in order to find a violation, only looking for the negative.”
Hegseth should definitely try to pay better attention in church because he really missed the moral of the story. Even worse, with his analogy he makes Trump out to be like Jesus and the U.S. military a miracle. Thus, any people who criticize Trump or the military are “Pharisees” who are automatically wrong. Clearly, Hegseth should tone down the self-righteous preaching and spend more time trying to live like Jesus. For as we’re reminded in the Bible … wait, I mean in Pulp Fiction: “Just because you are a character doesn’t mean that you have character.”
Other News of Note
Vittoria Elliott of Wired reported on how “government workers say they’re getting inundated with religion” (with several citations to A Public Witness reports on Pentagon and Labor Department worship services).
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey signed into law a requirement that public schools post a highly edited version of the Ten Commandments. The version differs some from the gerrymandered version adopted in other states but still does not match the biblical texts.
The only two candidates to qualify for the Republican gubernatorial primary in Colorado are two Christian ministers.
Trumpvangelist Franklin Graham defended President Donald Trump amid controversy for posting an AI image of himself as Jesus. Graham absurdly claimed Trump was right that it was a doctor meme and not a Jesus one.
Rev. William Barber II criticized Trump for attacking the pope and posting an AI image of himself as Jesus: “What we are watching is a war on divinity, an attempt by a human being to shift the moral compass and for us to engage in a kind of moral deregulation where nothing is sacred anymore except what he says and an AI image of him as Jesus.”
New survey results from Pew Research Center show that a growing number of Americans say Trump isn’t religious. Even a slight majority of White evangelicals now say that Trump is not very religious or not religious at all.
“Blessed are the peacemakers! But woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic, or political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth.” —Pope Leo XIV, speaking in Bamenda, Cameroon, on April 16, 2026.
A United Methodist church in Colorado held a witness against the Iran war during their Good Friday service, filing out of the sanctuary to pray next to 168 pairs of shoes on the stairs outside that represented the children and teachers killed when a U.S. Tomahawk missile hit a girls’ school in Iran.
In light of the U.S.-Iran war, Jayson Casper of Christianity Today wrote about Mennonites who have spent decades working to foster dialogue between Iran and the United States.
Kiera Butler of Mother Jones wrote about efforts of tech billionaires to get Christians to embrace AI.
Photo of the Week
Thanks for reading!
The item about the Colorado governor race is misleading. A third candidate, probably the favorite in the Republican primary, is State Senator Barbara Kirkmeyer. In Colorado, you can get onto the ballot via a party convention (as those 2 ministers did) or alternatively via petition (which Kirkmeyer has done).
The 2 paths can be confusing. The conventions are often dominated by extremists, especially on the Republican side, so the more mainstream candidates tend to go the petition route.