Contributing writer Sarah Blackwell offers her thoughts on how the church's model of the larger group tending to the few in need was swept away during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our pastors were like skippers left on ships trying to throw out as many lifelines as they could while keeping the whole ship from going down and rescuing their own families. But now it's time to turn back to the boat and give each other some grace.

The community-based air quality monitoring initiative, AirWatch St. Louis, has been keeping track of what’s in the city’s air since December 2021. Low-cost sensors are placed on the roofs of Metropolitan Congregations United churches spread throughout the city to measure particulate matter, a mixture of solid particles and liquid droplets found in the air. Through the new digital map, the data collected is publicly viewable.

Rev. Dr. Michael Woolf argues that while much of the criticism of recent political stunts using immigrants has rightfully focused on the deception and cruelty, Christians ought to take it one step further: these American politicians have not only trafficked vulnerable Venezuelans, they have trafficked Christ. Jesus not only identifies with the poor, vulnerable, and imprisoned – Jesus is these people.

No one will deny that America’s immigration system is overburdened and in need of serious reform. But misleading migrants and sending them where resources to help them are both in shorter supply and less readily obtained is impossible to reconcile with the basic tenets of the Christian faith, which demand that all humans be treated with respect and compassion regardless of their nationality or citizenship.

With the pope surrounded by empty seats in Kazakhstan, critics questioned the efficacy of his diplomacy of encounter and his strategy of silence when it comes to outright condemning human rights violations in China, Russia and Nicaragua. But Vatican diplomacy insiders urge patience, arguing that even as the pope remains silent, the institution’s diplomatic corps is hard at work behind the scenes, advancing the cause for dialogue.

After a sometimes tense week that included passionate exchanges, the 11th assembly of the World Council of Churches approved a statement regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that denounces the war but does not single out the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, who has been widely criticized for outlining what is seen as the spiritual foundation for the invasion.

Word&Way Editor-in-Chief Brian Kaylor reflects on dangers of rhetoric by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as the Republican politician misquotes Ephesians 6 to demonize his opponents.

On Sunday evening, a man opened fire in a shopping mall in Greenwood, Indiana, killing three people and wounding two others before also being shot dead. What city officials said in response sparked some odd headlines.

Denker’s tales are of misguided, though sincere, followers of Jesus replacing the gospel’s message with poor substitutes. Like John the baptizer proclaimed long ago, she offers a prophetic message about our individual and collective need for repentance. In a new preface, she describes right-wing media attacks after the book’s release

Given the growing public conversation about Christian Nationalism and divergent understandings of the meaning of the term, in this edition of A Public Witness we learn from scholars studying Christian Nationalism in order to consider what we actually know about this dangerous ideology. Then we hear the witness of committed