general

How long, O Lord, must I call for help?
But you do not listen!
"Violence is everywhere!" I cry,
but you do not come to save.
Must I forever see these evil deeds?
Why must I watch all this misery?
Wherever I look,
I see destruction and violence.
I am surrounded by people
who love to argue and fight.
The law has become paralyzed,
and there is no justice in the courts.

--Habakkuk 1:2-4a

Habakkuk's lament reflects [...]

Forty years ago, Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination. I was 16 years old, had just become aware of politics, and his death (only two months after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.) was shocking. But rather than leading to disillusionment, both of their lives inspired me these past 40 years in the movement for peace and [...]

I'm in the U.K. this week on a speaking and book tour.  It's always good to be here. My wife, Joy Carroll, is a Brit, and we frequently get across the pond.  Both of my children are "bilingual," speaking both the English of the English and the English of the Americans, and we love both countries.

The U.K. edition of The Great Awakening is titled Seven Ways to Change the World, [...]

They call him a lion. John McCain, on Tuesday, called him the "last lion in the Senate … because he remains the single most effective member of the Senate." I've always liked lions. I have a beautiful painting of a South African lion on the wall of our living room at home. My boys think it is Aslan, the lion of Narnia, of whom Mr. Beaver said, "'Course he isn't safe. But he's good."

The nation got a shock this week. Edward Kennedy, the lion who has been in [...]

President Bush's remarks, made last week in Israel, suggesting that anyone who wishes to talk with a violent enemy is the contemporary equivalent of a Hitler appeaser, are so wide of the mark, patronizing, and simply untrue that they must be challenged.

The fact that he used the emotive context of Israel's 60th anniversary celebrations as the background for these comments is an abuse of an already misused people. And implying that Sen. Obama wishes to appease terrorism is not [...]

I've remarked to a number of friends lately that there seem to be three main kinds of religious people in the world.

First, there are the fearsome -- those who like to make others afraid.
Second, there are the fearless -- those who refuse to be intimidated by the fearsome.
Then in the middle are the fearful -- those who are afraid to associate with the fearless because they might incur the ire of the fearsome.

I've [...]

At the Associated Church Press conference two weeks ago in Ft. Worth, Texas, I heard Phyllis Tickle, founding editor of the religion department at Publishers Weekly, speak about Christianity's every-500-years growth spurts. In her talk (and forthcoming book