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This issue of A Public Witness heads to the city that never sleeps to combat a zombie version of a famous biblical story.

‘We are actively exploring other venues where we can continue to share our witness of the birth of Jesus Christ in the excellence and prophetic tradition of the Black Church,’ said Alfred Street Baptist Church.

The proposed database has been derailed by denominational apathy, legal worries, and a desire to protect donations to the Southern Baptist Convention’s mission programs.

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Church

And Clint Pressley, who is senior pastor of Hickory Grove Baptist Church in Charlotte, will be the next Southern Baptist Convention president after winning 56% of votes in the final run-off race.

‘I honestly think we haven't come to the end of the debate over life: We've come to the end of the beginning,’ Pence said.

The Rev. Matthew L. Watley says it’s not happenstance his congregation, part of the historically Black African Methodist Episcopal denomination, is one of the fastest-growing churches in America.

Nation

This issue of A Public Witness recommends some recent documentary films on issues of faith in the public square, Christian Nationalism, and patriarchy.

Director D.J. Caruso hopes to tell Mary’s story through her own eyes and appeal to new generations.

‘As a trans person myself, I know that I’m just as much an image of God as a cisgender, heterosexual person of whatever color, race and creed,’ said the Rev. M.E. Eccles, a trans Episcopal priest.

World

Archbishop Welby spent several days in Jerusalem last week following the attack on Israelis by Hamas on Oct. 7 and the ensuing assaults on Gaza by Israeli forces.

Draft law 8371, which requires another vote before moving to the president’s desk, would give Ukrainian authorities power to examine the connection of religious groups in Ukraine to the Russian Federation and to ban those whose leadership is outside of Ukraine.

As the Israel-Hamas war continues, multiple Christian church buildings and facilities have been damaged. Rev. Hanna Massad shared an update about the war’s impact on the small Christian community on the day after the “devastating explosion” at the only Christian hospital in the besieged territory.

Editorials

Finding the moral courage to be first can be difficult. We need more Deborahs, Jaels, and Jackies.

In the book The Last Week, Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan suggest that on that Palm Sunday there were actually two processions entering Jerusalem. "The two processions, they state, "embody the central conflict of the week that led to Jesus’s crucifixion.”

Last week, a majority of justices on the U.S. Supreme Court decided to flip to a calendar in their quest to discover truth. Well, they didn’t admit that, but that’s essentially what they did in the case of the 94-year-old cross in Bladensburg, Md.

Word&Way Voices

Contributing writer Sarah Blackwell believes we are teaching our young people a version of reading the Bible that resembles the game Operation. They often have little concept of “connective tissue” and can only pluck out quotations like the stylized versions of body parts in the board game.

Professor Greg Carey writes that hope is an essential strategy for Christians. As the apostle Paul said, three things abide: faith, hope, and love. Love may be the “greatest,” says Paul, but hope stands in the top three.

Terrell Carter writes that unfortunately, mass shootings and other acts of violence have become an ordinary experience in our world. Some might say that this upward trend in violence epitomizes the “ordinariness of suffering,” the fact that violent things regularly occur in the world.

E-Newsletter

In the midst of this Holy Week, Lutheran minister and journalist Angela Denker had the chance to interview two authors of seemingly divergent books on White Christian Nationalism in America.

This issue of A Public Witness looks at recent and dangerous efforts from Donald Trump, Michael Flynn, Charlie Kirk, and others to define religious adherence by partisanship.

This issue of A Public Witness digs into the hotly debated 'render therefore unto Caesar' Bible verse to consider its usage in a recent notable legal opinion.

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Recent Episodes

Books

Perfect for Father’s Day, a review of Dear Son: Raising Faithful, Just, and Compassionate Men by Jonathan Hall and Beau Underwood. And learn how to win the autographed copy we will give away.

Robert D. Cornwall reviews Stepmother: Redeeming a Disdained Vocation by Dorothy C. Bass. The book delivers a deeper understanding of complex family relationships and seeks to redeem a “disdained vocation” through exploring life experiences and offering a word of grace

Robert D. Cornwall reviews Holy Communion in Contagious Times: Celebrating the Eucharist in the Everyday and Online Worlds by Richard A. Burridge. The book is both a scholarly response and a personal reflection since Burridge draws on his own experiences

Robert D. Cornwall reviews The New Adam: What the Early Church Can Teach Evangelicals (and Liberals) about the Atonement by Ron Highfield. The book explores how we should understand the death and resurrection of Jesus and what this means for