Weekly Roundup: May 16
Here’s the weekly roundup from A Public Witness. In addition to an analysis of presidential references to Jesus that is free for anyone to read, paid subscribers to A Public Witness received a look at contradictory responses to refugee claims.
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Top 5 at wordandway.org
Wait, We’re the Oppressed Ones? Will Wright wrote about religious liberty and Christian privilege.
Review: The Traveler’s Path. Robert D. Cornwall reviewed The Traveler's Path: Finding Spiritual Growth and Inspiration Through Travel by pastor and scholar Douglas J. Brouwer.
Quakers March Against Trump’s Crackdown on Immigrants Carrying On Their Long Faith Tradition. Luis Andres Henao reported on a 300-mile Quaker march to draw attention to the tradition’s long history of resistance and demanding religious freedom.
Can the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission Survive Trump 2.0? Bob Smietana reported on how the public policy arm of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination is again under fire from those who want it to be more MAGA.
Forced Out of His Pulpit Weeks After Trump’s Election, He’s Starting His Own Church. Yonat Shimron reported on a new church start by a progressive Baptist pastor in Charlotte, North Carolina.
by Brian Kaylor, Word&Way Editor-in-Chief
Earlier this week, I attended a book talk by NPR Morning Edition cohost Steve Inskeep. He mostly discussed his new book, Differ We Must: How Lincoln Succeeded in a Divided America. He joked at the start that in a time of intense political animosity, he likes to spend his time thinking about happier times like when the country had a civil war.
As his quip suggested, there are issues from Lincoln’s time that resonate with us today. So he discussed things like immigration, tariffs, racism, political divides, and presidential power. He cautioned, however, against ignoring the complexity of the past to instead treat it like a prooftext for today.
“There’s a risk of oversimplifying the past. Lincoln did blah, therefore Trump should do blah,” Inskeep said. “It’s never one for one.”
Inskeep also mentioned that he finds hope today as he looks back at history.
“We can look at the long view of history. And we can think about 1863 when the country was not only divided but in war. And when thousands of people were burying their children and when nobody knew what the future held,” he explained. “We can reflect that at that most awful moment, something really important and valuable was happening to America. We were ending slavery. We were resolving a great conflict that predated the creation of the United States. And when we look back at history, we have a sense of that. We have a sense of perspective and you realize that at the worst moment, something good may be happening.”
We don’t know where things are going right now, but we might enter a better chapter. That will require, in part, people of good will to work to make it come about.
Other News of Note
The faculty senate at the University of Arkansas passed a resolution condemning a new state law requiring the posting of an edited version of the Ten Commandments in classrooms. The faculty said they instead support “a universal right to religious freedom.”
Mara Richards Bim reflected at Baptist News Global about attending a middle-of-the-night hearing in the Texas Senate on a bill to require the posting of an edited version of the Ten Commandments in public schools.
Missouri lawmakers passed a bill allowing public schools to hire spiritual “chaplains,” sending the flawed legislation to the governor’s desk.
Minnesota Catholics urged state lawmakers to continue a program for undocumented immigrants to receive free or discounted health insurance.
A charismatic pastor in Nebraska defended President Donald Trump receiving a jet from Qatar by comparing it to Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey.
Nomia Iqbal and Mike Wendling of BBC News reported on how prominent MAGA voices are criticizing Pope Leo XIV for not being “America first.”
“We clearly have a pope who has a very clear idea about what Catholic social teaching is, where the preferential option for the poor is, where he should be thinking about how we deal with immigration and these social justice issues, and where he stands on that.” —Anthea Butler talking about Pope Leo XIV on WBUR’s On Point.
Mike Blanchfield of Politico wrote about the Catholic faith of Canada’s new prime minister as he heads to Rome.
Isabel Ong of Christianity Today spoke to Christians in India and Pakistan amid military strikes between the two nations.
Churches in Zimbabwe are seeking ways to help the nation finally address massacres committed by military forces four decades ago.
NBC News reported on a decadeslong effort by several women to stop a Pentecostal minister from raping more children after he did so in Arkansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma.
Kyle Whitmire of Al.com wrote a piece about the head of the Alabama Republican Party that involves a fake ID, a pseudonym, questions about residency, and fears of the “mark of the beast.”
Photo of the Week
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