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The first moment of the Quentin Tarantino film highlighted by the vice president during a recent interview occurs just seconds after the Samuel L. Jackson monologue used by Pete Hegseth as a prayer during a worship service at the Pentagon in April.

For this issue of A Public Witness, we virtually trek deep in the heart of Texas to see how “God and country” too often looks more like country as god at Prestonwood Baptist Church.

The Israel-U.S.-Iran conflict has seen an appeal to scripture from many of the involved leaders. But the moment God is invoked as argument rather than moral motivation, the willingness to be wrong is surrendered.

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Videos

Church

After President Trump took office, a Presbyterian church retreated underground — abandoning their sanctuary for the basement in response to the administration’s decision to allow ICE officers to enter places of worship.

‘What might have been an abstract policy decision that's taking place in Washington now is actually impacting communities,’ said Walter Kim, head of the National Association of Evangelicals.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court, Wes Campbell, a music promoter and co-founder of the popular Christian band, said rival promoters created false accusations of misconduct for anticompetitive reasons.

Nation

The fast-evolving list was met with blowback from critics who suggested its changes were an attempt to impose Christian Nationalism on the military.

Unitarian Universalists and Deists, who were reportedly excluded from the latest list, are among two categories represented among signers of the Declaration of Independence.

This issue of A Public Witness takes you inside a recent gathering to hear from leading scholars as they offer constructive ways to push back against a dangerous and heretical ideology.

World

Historic Christian churches representing the predominantly Arab Christian community and mostly U.S. evangelicals who support Israel are at odds with each other.

The unusual statement marked the second time in recent months that members of the Catholic hierarchy have asserted their voice against a Trump administration many believe isn’t upholding the basic tenets of human dignity.

This issue of A Public Witness looks at criticism of the Trump administration’s actions in Venezuela by various Christian denominations and organizations, as well as pleas for peace by Venezuelan Christian leaders.

Editorials

Editor-in-Chief Brian Kaylor reflects on Russian pro-war propaganda dressed up like a Christmas decoration, which he calls a sacrilegious assault on celebrations of the birth of the Prince of Peace.

Brian Kaylor writes that ten years ago today an armed man walked into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and opened fire. This massacre at Christmastime evokes memories of part of the biblical story we tend to leave out of our nativities and pageants.

As Brian Kaylor thinks about modern-day refugees fleeing a genocidal foreign dictator, he also wonders where Joseph, Mary, and Jesus spent the night on their journey from Bethlehem to Egypt. Where was their safe place to sleep and to enjoy a nice meal from strangers? And how were those people

Word&Way Voices

Despite the tough-on-crime adage that prisoners enjoy 'three hots and a cot' during their time behind bars, this paints far too rosy a picture of the meager portions of low-quality and ultra-processed foods available.

When we have created — and allowed — a world where the fearmongering of scarcity is rewarded far and above the possibility of abundance, we are indeed facing Advent in a time of starvation.

The good news of Advent is this: Christ entered the violence of human life, the very violence that says some folks are more valuable than others, and took on these abstractions.

E-Newsletter

Rev. Caleb Morell, a Southern Baptist, offered an evangelistic message about the resurrection of Jesus that stopped just short of a formal altar call as he urged government workers to follow Jesus.

This issue of A Public Witness considers how the military chaplain who authored a war prayer and the secretary of defense who appropriated it for himself performed violence against Scripture to justify violence against people.

In this edition of A Public Witness, we dig around between the couch cushions to explore the relationship between religion and politics as American Christians are confronted with what belongs to God when Caesar becomes more demanding.

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Recent Episodes

Books

Scholar Matthew Boedy exposes a dangerous plan driven by prosperity preachers, extremist politicians, and right-wing power brokers to destroy democracy and turn America into a Christian Nationalist state.

Beth Felker Jones offers a theologically grounded reflection on the beauty and complexity of the Protestant tradition, inviting a deeper understanding of Protestantism and its place in the broader Christian community.

In this book, Baptist theologian Myles Werntz explores the landscape of twentieth-century ecclesiology and shows how the four marks of the church were remade, contested, and reaffirmed in surprising ways.

Beau Underwood reviews The Seven Mountains Mandate: Exposing the Dangerous Plan to Christianize America and Destroy Democracy, which Matthew Boedy wrote to alert those who were ignorant or complacent about what was going on and what was at stake.