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Former President Donald Trump is chiding evangelical Christian pastors who previously supported him but haven’t endorsed his new presidential campaign, accusing the faith leaders of “disloyalty.” Trump also appeared to blame evangelical leaders for the Republican Party’s meager showing in the 2022 midterm elections.

Robert D. Cornwall reviews "The Arc of Truth: The Thinking of Martin Luther King Jr." by Lewis V. Baldwin with a foreword from Beverly J. Lanzetta. This book is a scholarly and focused look at King’s commitment to truth, underscoring that he was not only a civil rights leader and pastor, but was also a deep thinker.

There is no legal remedy for LGBTQ students who claim they were discriminated against at their religious universities, a federal district court ruled in a high-profile case late Thursday. The judge dismissed the class-action lawsuit filed in 2021 on behalf of about 40 students and former students at religious schools nationwide.

This issue of A Public Witness reviews the position of congressional chaplain before analyzing last week’s House prayers during the battle to elect a new speaker. Then it offers a benediction contemplating a better way of thinking about religion and politics.

For years, Southern Baptist Convention leaders refused to listen to abuse survivors, ignoring their concerns and labeling them as enemies of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. One of the first steps toward changing was setting up a confidential hotline.

Agape Boarding School announced it will shut down Jan. 20. The closure is long-awaited for dozens of former students who have gone public with their allegations of physical, mental, and sexual abuse at Agape, which opened in Missouri in 1996.

An 800-year-old puzzle about a set of 13th-century floor tiles has added to historians’ thinking about the relationship of Europeans and Arabs at the time of the Crusades. It is telling visual evidence that Christian Europe was more porous than historians have believed.

In this issue of A Public Witness, we look at the role of Christianity in Brazilian politics and consider what the violence on Jan. 8 means for churches. While many reporters and commentators draw comparisons between Jan. 6 and Jan. 8, religion is too often left out of the conversation.

Robert D. Cornwall reviews "Becoming Human: The Holy Spirit and the Rhetoric of Race" by Luke A. Powery. This book draws upon theology, especially the theology of the Holy Spirit, to provide a theological foundation for responding to the racialization present in society.

At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, nearly every congregation in the United States shut down, at least for a while. For some Americans, that was the push they needed to never come back to church.