Christianity Today interim president Thomas Addington officially announced today the appointment of Marvin Olasky as editor in chief. The media company with its magazine flagship is moving into its 70th-year celebration.
Olasky was editor in chief at World magazine from 1994 to 2021. He served as a professor at The University of Texas at Austin from 1983 to 2008. Olasky is the author of 30 books on journalism, American history, abortion, and public policy, including The Tragedy of American Compassion, Prodigal Press, and Compassionate Conservatism. He has served the past 18 months at CT, first as a consultant and then as an executive editor.
Olasky’s move to editor in chief was first referenced publicly in Russell Moore’s “Moore to the Point” newsletter two weeks ago. Moore, who served in the editor in chief role from 2022 to 2025, requested a change to editor at-large and columnist because of the expansion of The Russell Moore Show in audience and time commitment, in addition to his weekly essays, column in each issue, and role as a cohost on The Bulletin, CT’s weekly news and analysis podcast, which has also grown in scope and reach over the last year.
Moore praised Olasky’s experience as “the titanic editor of World” and said, “I would quite often open up an issue with a low whistle and comment, ‘I can’t believe he is courageous enough to take on that.’… I finally convinced Marvin to take the editor in chief parts of this role so I can expand all this writing and speaking without collapsing. I was able to sell it to the powers that be at CTby noting that they could get the best of both of us if they let me have it this way.”
“I have been praying for a year and a half for God to send us a ‘Marvin Olasky type’ to serve with us so that I could focus my attention fully on writing, audio and video content, and speaking,” Moore said. “I remember the moment when I realized it might just be that the ‘Marvin Olasky type’ God was sending us was, well, Marvin Olasky. That seemed almost too perfect to be real.”
“Marvin is respected all over the world not only as one of the most accomplished Christian journalists in American history but also for the way he identifies and cultivates the gifts and callings of others,” Moore said. “Many of the most skilled and recognizable Christian journalists right now, on countless platforms all over the country, were trained by Marvin Olasky.”
“I am thankful to work with Russell Moore and my other colleagues and to follow in the footsteps of Carl F. H. Henry, CT’s first editor in chief when he and Billy Graham started the magazine in 1956,” Olasky said. “We’re celebrating next year its 70th anniversary of attempting to apply biblical thinking to every area of life. We’re now a big tent with global outreach but still faithful to God and not to any political party or movement.”
Addington called Moore and Olasky “evangelical statesmen” and said he was “thrilled” to have both of them, along with the rest of the CTteam, working together “to lift up the stories and ideas of the kingdom of God.”
“They communicate the message of Jesus with clarity and continue Christianity Today’s legacy as a strong voice for conservative orthodoxy and the heart transformation of the gospel,” Addington said.
