End of Year Takes & Hot New Year Takes on Religion in American Politics & Culture: Evangelicals White & Black, Exvangelicals, & King Cyrus in the White House

Lisa Sharon Harper via Eliza Griswold, "Evangelicals of Color Fight Back Against the Religious Right""

They're more white than Christian.

Valuable Commentary on National Prayer Breakfast and Treasonous Behavior of GOP Leaders: "#Nationalprayerbreakfast Is All Over the Affidavit for Russian Spy Maria Butina"

If you want to understand the Russian connection to U.S. right-wing white evangelicals — who are absolutely on board with treason to achieve their goals — you owe it to yourself to read @C_Stroop and @JeffSharlet. No one knows more about this than these two scholars.

— 𝚆𝚒𝚕𝚕𝚒𝚊𝚖 𝙳. 𝙻𝚒𝚗𝚍𝚜𝚎𝚢 (@wdlindsy) July 17, 2018

I'm pleased to see that the important thread I identified three days ago in the unfolding story of the treasonous activities of top Republican leaders — the centrality of the National "Prayer" Breakfast to the story — is receiving a lot of media attention. Here's commentary I'd like to share with you:

Hell of a Week: "Americans Who Mandate a Close, Symbiotic Relationship btw Christianity & Civil Society Are Deeply Opposed to Federal Gun Control Legislation"

With yet another tragic mass shooting, the #GunControl debate will yet again take center stage.

One reason for the intractable nature of this debate? Deeply held moral & religious schemas like Christian nationalism. 1/8@LandonSchnabel @PaulHRosenberg @jackmjenkins @JackSmithIV

— Andrew Whitehead (@ndrewwhitehead) May 18, 2018

Our working paper shows that Americans who mandate a close, symbiotic relationship btw Christianity & civil society are deeply opposed to federal gun control legislation. 2/8

Find the working paper here: https://t.co/1FzmpjZlxr@socarxiv pic.twitter.com/gFlHvYnHw3

— Andrew Whitehead (@ndrewwhitehead) May 18, 2018

It has been a hell of a week, and center-stage in each fresh hell are U.S. white Christians, notably white evangelicals. Here's some commentary:

"Excluding Women from the Gospel — in Jesus' Name": Twitter Hosts a Necessary Conversation Many Churches Don't Intend to Have

#T4G18 Excluding women from the Gospel - in Jesus’ name. pic.twitter.com/GIX8doKrPl

— Kate WallaceNunneley (@KateWallace1313) February 1, 2018

A set of tweets today (with a link to an article by Sarah MacDonald) that, in my view, all belong together. . . .They point to a necessary conversation that many Christian churches simply do not intend to have — no matter how many younger members walk away, no matter how many people are harmed by the exclusionary, clubby injustice, no matter how much the public witness of the churches is undermined by the lack of authentic catholicity at a moment in history at which this witness is desperately needed:

Russian Propaganda, Critical-Thinking Skills, and How the Christian Right Broke America: Valuable Recent Contributions to the Discussion

Without the education necessary to think critically, challenge what you’re told by ppl you respect, & vet info, you can fall for anything

— Mandy Nicole (@TenaciousMandy) November 1, 2017

Joel Osteen Story and Nashville Statement Raise the Question, What Good Do Churches Do? — #EmptyThePews More Important Than Ever

Victoria & I are praying for everyone affected by Hurricane Harvey. Please join us as we pray for the safety of our Texas friends & family.

— Joel Osteen (@JoelOsteen) August 26, 2017

How about you open the doors to your 16,000 person, $100 million church instead? https://t.co/7Qyuo0rtFJ

— jordan 🌹🌹 (@JordanUhl) August 28, 2017

As hurricane Harvey has devastated southeastern Texas and is now moving to Louisiana, there has been lively discussion, especially on social media, about the initial refusal of prosperity-gospel preacher Joel Osteen to open his Houston megachurch to those displaced by flooding. Osteen eventually responded to the negative publicity he and his church were earning by saying that he will admit people in need of shelter after other shelters are at maximum capacity. 

Christopher Douglas and Kurt Anderson on How America Lost Its Mind (or How the Christian Right Broke America)

Christian extremists took over @GOP and broke America with their #ChristianAltFacts.https://t.co/uD2dhuyI7K#YouDontKnowEvangelicals https://t.co/AUexPHAyEQ

— Christopher Stroop (@C_Stroop) June 6, 2017

Christopher Douglas responds to Kurt Anderson on how America lost its mind, with a statment entitled "How America Really Lost Its Mind: Hint, It Wasn't Entirely the Fault of Hippie New Agers and Postmodern Academics":

Sunday Morning Soul-Enriching Resources: Ex-Evangelicals, Catholic Sexual Abuse and Fr. Tom Doyle, Rev. William J. Barber and Healthcare

Some Sunday morning soul-enriching resources I'd like to share, dealing with disparate topics:

With Help from Conservative Catholics, White Evangelicals Broke America: Religion, Authoritarianism, and Creation of Post-Truth Culture of Trump

Another look at the white vote in 2016 by education and age

(data via CCES and @A_agadjanian) pic.twitter.com/MPiIuzBpoR

— Will Jordan (@williamjordann) March 5, 2017

An interesting conversation on Twitter today after Chris Stroop published his essay "Educated Evangelicals, Academic Achievement, and Trumpism: On the Tensions in Valuing Education in an Anti-Intellectual Subculture" at his blog site this morning. Drawing on his experiences growing up in the conservative subculture of white evangelical America — the people who, more than anyone else, inflicted Donald Trump on all the rest of us (with ample help from white Catholics and Mormons) — Chris has been doing yeoman's work to help unpack why white evangelicals could support a morally bankrupt authoritarian of the ilk of Trump.