The What and the Why of Religious Decline

One is relatively simple to map out. The other is much harder to capture.

Illustration by Micha Huigen

In social science, it’s relatively easy to explain what is happening. Ask a question with a straightforward answer—How has the cost of lettuce changed over time? Are people getting married later in life?—and the answer should be forthcoming. Just download the right data set, write a bit of computer code, and present the findings in an informative, visually appealing manner.

But once you describe the what, it’s natural to begin wondering about the why.

As I like to tell my graduate students, there’s nothing simple about the social world. The internet is full of clickbait articles promising three simple tricks to increase your income or one easy hack for a better night’s sleep. There are no such shortcuts, however, in academic social science.

Take American religion for instance. Over the past several decades, the most important trend is a pretty simple line graph indicating the share of adults who claim no religious affiliation. Five decades ago, that figure was 5 percent of the population. Today, it’s about 6 times higher. But why? How did the share of “nones” rise so dramatically in such a short time?

Smith tackles those questions, among others, in Why Religion Went Obsolete. The book analyzes responses gleaned from four focus groups, over 200 interviews, and a survey sent to more than 2,000 adults. Smith’s conclusion is clear and simple: For a growing number of younger Americans, religion simply lost its usefulness.

Those accustomed to ruminating about the decline of religion have long sensed that today’s young people don’t seem to care much about faith one way or another. However, that feeling has never been developed into a mature, testable theory. Smith harnesses a term—zeitgeist, often defined as “the spirit of the times”—that helps ground this pervasive sense that some big shift has occurred. It’s an idea many of us innately understand, even if we have a hard time wrapping our minds around it. Smith does a great service by laying an academically rigorous foundation for what he calls the “Millennial zeitgeist.”

Getting down to specifics, Smith argues that the millennial generation has embraced a new zeitgeist based around four key characteristics: cultural individualism, rapid technological change, “postmaterialist” values of autonomy and self-expression, and a deep skepticism of authority. As an older millennial, I can say that those four factors resonate with my own experience. Even so, I’m not entirely convinced, on an empirical basis, that millennial life rests atop a philosophical scaffolding fundamentally unlike that of prior generations of Americans.

Take, for instance, one statement Smith posed to survey respondents: “I am more concerned with a good life here and now than what comes after death.” If millennials came of age amid an entirely different zeitgeist, we would expect their answers to differ dramatically from, say, those of baby boomers. In fact, the breakdown is strikingly similar (51% of people born between 1946 and 1954 either “strongly agree” or “somewhat agree” with the statement, compared to 54% of millennials). Thus, people born three or four decades apart have nearly the same view about the value of living a good life.

Smith also reports survey results that might seem to suggest significant generational differences, when in reality the explanations are probably more mundane. His questionnaire included the statement “I spend a great deal of time thinking about myself.” Fifty-three percent of millennials agreed with this compared to just 33 percent of early boomers. Does this indicate a huge zeitgeist shift? Or simply confirm that people self-reflect less as they age? Without having surveyed baby boomers on these questions when they were younger, we can’t know for sure.

Social science models always contain lots of unexplained variance, no matter how sophisticated our conceptual starting points and statistical techniques. In graduate school, I remember one of my professors joking about the best way to wave away these mysteries: Just shrug your shoulders, say culture, and move on with life.

We understand readily enough that culture shifts all the time, following new fashion styles and intellectual trends, even if we find these shifts impossible to fully explain. In attempting to get a handle on an obvious cultural shift in how young Americans view religion, Smith’s book wields social science tools with incredible skill. It’s a methodological tour de force. However, I can’t help wondering whether a full accounting still lies outside his grasp.

It bears mentioning, for instance, that the ranks of nones appear to have stopped increasing. A number of independent surveys demonstrate that the share of Americans claiming no religious affiliation froze back in 2020. According to data I reviewed from the Cooperative Election Study, religion may actually be on the upswing among millennials and Generation Z.

Even so, I generally agree with Smith’s conclusions. Religion in the United States is declining for many reasons, including self-inflicted wounds from corrupt or abusive ministry leaders. (In one chapter, Smith devotes four and a half pages to a single table listing scandals among major conservative Protestant leaders.)

But churches are also emptying for reasons that can’t be blamed on ministry misbehavior. American culture was already heading in a direction that ensured headwinds for houses of worship. To take one example, Smith notes how the digital revolution ate away at communal gatherings by turbo-charging trends in atomization that began in the 1980s. More than ever, people could entertain themselves without leaving the comfort of home. While churches have occasionally responded with flashy worship bands, polished event production, and easily digestible sermons, this hasn’t always coaxed people away from scrolling news feeds on their couches.

In total, Smith’s book makes a laudable contribution to current discourse about the decline of religion. His concerted effort to describe, define, and measure the shifting cultural zeitgeist should motivate students of American religion to think outside the box when theorizing about the American religious landscape. However, I think all of us who share in this work would do well to remember Paul’s words in in 1 Corinthians 13:9–10: “For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears.”

Ryan P. Burge is associate professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University. He is the author of 20 Myths about Religion and Politics in America.

This article appeared in the May/June 2025 issue of Christianity Today as "Quantifying the Cultural Shift".

- More from Ryan P. Burge

Books

Review

Young Nones Might Not Hate Religion. But They Don’t Like the Vibes.

Michael Horton

How Christian Smith’s concept of a “Millennial Zeitgeist” helps explain their recent retreat from faith.

Illustration by Micha Huigen

I doubt I’m the only parent of Gen Zers who occasionally hears the protest “I’m not feelin’ it” on a Sunday morning.

As Christian Smith argues in Why Religion Went Obsolete, it is widely recognized that traditional religion in America is in “a spiral of decline.” What is less understood is why. The book, as Smith describes it, “moves beyond statistics and interviews to explore the larger cultural environment” that made traditional religion (and especially Christianity) feel irrelevant to younger generations of Americans.

Smith frames much of his cultural analysis around his notion of a millennial zeitgeist that gained momentum in the early 1990s and peaked just before 2010. The idea of a zeitgeist, or a “spirit of the age,” resembles what the philosopher Michael Polanyi called “subsidiary awareness.” It proposes that within a particular culture or time period, certain background assumptions become so pervasive that we aren’t even consciously aware of them. They simply “ring true.”

Following the work of London School of Economics professor Monika Krause, Smith rehabilitates this concept as something with real empirical force rather than a vague perception of something “in the air.” Various periods are distinguished by ideas and practices that extend across spheres of social life and geographical boundaries. As examples, Smith mentions the Wild West, the Roaring Twenties, and the 1960s.

The millennial zeitgeist isn’t defined by opposition to this or that doctrine. Rather, it flows from a network of ideas, practices, technologies, and habits that make Christianity feel out of date, like a horse and buggy in the automobile age.

Much of our apologetics aims at skeptics and atheists who can give coherent arguments for their stances. But the younger Americans Smith surveyed are not deliberately rejecting religion for clearly discernible reasons. According to one of several summary statements Smith uses to outline their consensus attitudes, “It is not necessary to be well-informed about religion to criticize and dismiss it.” One respondent confessed, “The Bible makes my eyes roll,” even though he’s never read it. Many others failed to articulate their beliefs in clear or consistent ways, beyond a hazy sense that “the vibes were off,” the idiom Smith uses to close one chapter.

After revealing the results of extensive empirical surveys, including his own, Smith sketches the “contours” of the millennial zeitgeist, accentuating this portrait with several dozen popular marketing slogans (“Obey your thirst,” “Drive your ambition”) and bits of youth lingo (“You do you,” “Don’t judge me”). His examples coalesce around a fundamental dogma: individual autonomy. Many respondents gesture toward an inner divinity that withdraws from external authorities like a snail into its shell.

Smith also shows how churches themselves have contributed to this environment, often by shifting their focus from a transcendent God to the earthly horizons of moral, political, and therapeutic benefits. They have downplayed norms of communal fellowship in favor of an individualistic “Jesus and me” piety. As one self-proclaimed churchgoer tells Smith, “You don’t have to physically go to a building to praise God, you can pray at home. I just go because I get satisfaction out of it.”

In a similar vein, many religious leaders encourage going deeper within yourself rather than trusting external authorities, institutions, and traditions. As an example of where this mindset leads, Smith cites Oprah Winfrey, who once remarked, “I have church with myself. I have church walking down the street. I believe in the God force that lives inside all of us, and once you tap into that, you can do anything.”

From Smith’s findings, I was struck by three paradoxes. The first is that respondents who dislike traditional notions of a personal God who exercises judgment often praise religious systems that ratchet up the consequences for sins.

One recalls discovering Wicca in college: “I learned they believe whatever they do comes back to them 10 times,” a cosmic pattern that sounded advantageous. “Because if [other people] do something bad to you, it’s gonna hurt them a lot worse. If I had to go to a religion, I would definitely go there.” The attraction, of course, is autonomy. This person can affirm punishments for wrong behavior, so long as those punishments can be controlled and manipulated without answering to a higher judge.

A second paradox is that younger Americans bet everything on the here and now even though they have fading hopes for this life. “Younger generations face diminished economic opportunities,” Smith writes. “Their chances of achieving the American dream are slim.” But instead of raising their eyes to God, they double down on the quest for sacred experiences in this world.

Smith writes of young people seeking transcendence “in concerts, nature, dance, drugs, sports, family, clubbing, unexplained coincidences, serendipitous moments of joy.” Amid pessimism about their overall life prospects, they preoccupy themselves with transitory reprieves, cultivating “a healthy ‘fear of missing out’ (FOMO), even if it is stressful and tiring.”

A third paradox is seen in the desire of Smith’s subjects to enjoy the blessings of community without sacrificing the comforts of autonomy. As Smith writes of their mindset, “Religion is a personal ‘opinion’ of individual choice—whether religion is true or false is not at issue. . . . The possibility of a historical tradition guiding one’s life is nearly inconceivable.”

But of course it’s impossible to enjoy meaningful community if each individual is the author of his or her own religion. Younger Americans might “crave strong relationships and community,” Smith writes, but in practice they tend to “maintain [their] autonomy, safety, and options, even at the cost of some loneliness.”

Notably, none of these paradoxes suggests a complete loss of interest in spiritual matters. As Smith concludes, younger Americans might be giving up on organized religion, but they haven’t “lost interest in things supernatural, enchanted, or quasi-religious.” Many who find traditional Christianity obsolete are attracted to Neopaganism and non-Western religions. By contrast, a dogmatic secularism strikes them as “too empty and dreary to be engaging.”

But the reality of the millennial zeitgeist guarantees intense headwinds for anyone who would evangelize young people today. Why Religion Went Obsolete offers a sobering road map of the challenges ahead. Every pastor, elder, and seminarian should digest its findings.

Michael Horton is professor of systematic theology and apologetics at Westminster Seminary California. He is the author of Shaman and Sage: The Roots of “Spiritual but Not Religious” in Antiquity.

This article appeared in the May/June 2025 issue of Christianity Today as "The Paradoxes of Religious Decline".

- More from Michael Horton

Books

Review

The Upside to Religious Obsolescence

Kara Powell

Why a post-Christian generation might be the ripest for revival.

Illustration by Micha Huigen

Among Gen Xers and millennials, “deconstructing” one’s faith has been a popular response to spiritual doubts and church dissatisfactions.

When we see this trend reach a close friend or family member, deconstruction often looks more like devastation. The results can resemble smoldering rubble after a building demolition, leaving behind a pile of fading childhood church memories and a sense of confusion and isolation.

Most Gen X and millennial spirituality has not been capable of withstanding the wrecking balls aimed in its direction. As Christian Smith argues convincingly in Why Religion Went Obsolete, religion has come to seem outdated in the US. Among younger generations especially, it functions like a CD player in a world of Spotify or a typewriter in a world of laptops.

But there could be an upside to obsolescence. Unlike their Gen X and millennial parents, who were often scarred by the church, today’s young people are more of a blank slate. As Josh Packard, cofounder of the organization Future of Faith, once told me in conversation, “Today’s young people don’t hate the church; they nothing the church.” Perhaps young people are so post-Christian that they’re almost pre-Christian. Or maybe even pre-revival.

In his book, Smith analyzes declining faith among teenagers, emerging adults, and young adults of the 1990s and 2000s. During those decades, a multitude of philosophical, cultural, sociological, and relational pressures pushed religion toward the periphery of their worldview, relationships, and everyday practices.

But that may (emphasis on may) be changing. At least a little. In a 2024 nationwide survey of 1,112 13-year-olds conducted by Springtide Research Institute, 74 percent identified as at least slightly religious, and 82 percent described themselves as at least slightly spiritual.

Even more encouragingly, this generation thinks highly of Jesus. After studying 25,000 teenagers globally, The Barna Group concluded, “It’s rare that teens think poorly of Jesus. Most teenagers around the world have a positive perception of him.” According to this research, young people appreciate Jesus for offering hope, caring about people, inspiring trust, showing generosity, and making a real difference in the world.

That openness to Jesus is translating into fresh movements in faith communities. Many parachurch campus ministries are expanding, including InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, which is experiencing its highest year-over-year growth since 1980. As InterVarsity president Tom Lin once told me in conversation, “Since many of today’s unchurched students are unscathed by church hurt, coupled with their humility and curiosity about faith, we see a generation uniquely open to spiritual transformation.”

Considering the past four decades of religious decline, Smith contends that we can’t reverse these trends through “theological idealism,” defined as promoting correct doctrine, or “program idealism,” meaning a shiny new program. He’s right, but he’s missed a way we can move forward: relational discipleship.

Young people’s deep need for relational discipleship is being confirmed through ethnically and ecumenically diverse efforts like the TENx10 collaboration, which seeks to help faith matter for 10 million teenagers in the next 10 years. Supported by evangelical, mainline, Catholic, and Orthodox youth leaders, this movement promotes a discipleship framework fueled by adult mentoring, spiritual formation practices, service, and partnership with families.

Evangelicals often speak more of having a “personal relationship with Jesus” than of cultivating relationships with fellow believers. As a product of 20th-century evangelicalism, I’ve used this language often. After seeing Smith’s account of how it contributed to religion’s obsolescence, I might never use it again.

In Smith’s interviews, those who reported leaving childhood faith as a teenager or adult gave two main reasons: because “religion is not about institutions but a personal matter,” and because “religion is a personal journey.” Such responses show how inviting people into purely personal relationships with Jesus can backfire. However well-intended, it can create a rationale for regarding church as optional or deciding for yourself who you think “God” is.

Of course, the idea of a personal relationship with Jesus isn’t so much wrong as incomplete. We should want to offer young people both a personal and a communal relationship. Unfortunately, one recent test shows faith leaders failing in this regard. According to a nationwide sample of 13-to-25-year-olds, only 10 percent had a religious leader (from any faith) reach out to them during the first year of the pandemic. For young people identifying as Christians, the figure was barely higher.

But in the same study, 70 percent of teenagers and young adults reported valuing relationships more than they had prior to the pandemic. This finding parallels one of Smith’s observations: “Many post-Boomers have friends and family ties. But many also long for something more: to belong to real communities.”

Our invitations into intentional, formational community will be more appealing if we practice listening instead of lecturing. In a recently released study of 1,138 teenagers by Future of Faith, 75 percent indicated that being listened to helps them process spiritual challenges like doubt, disillusionment, and grief; and 71 percent reported that it deepens their own faith. Perhaps most importantly, the study concluded that experiencing a listening ear without judgment is two times likelier to produce spiritual growth than hearing sermons.

In our new book, Future-Focused Church, Jake Mulder, Raymond Chang, and I affirm that “leadership begins with listening.” As we’ve seen in over 1,000 churches with whom we’ve journeyed, caring adults who empathetically relate to young people offer a lifeline as they navigate economic uncertainty, political instability, unprecedented mental health challenges, and other forms of adversity.

Fortunately, many young Americans still are open to and seek out transcendence. Reports from youth ministry observers regularly highlight how this generation is compelled by faith experiences. Teenagers and twentysomethings don’t just experiment with spiritual practices of prayer, Scripture reading, sabbath, baptism, and Communion—they invite their peers to join them. They share their experiences on social media. They stay open and curious.

Will we model that same posture toward young people? Will we provide spaces where they can find fresh faith—and will we let them lead us into fresh ways of being the church? If religion is nearly obsolete, that might signal a new world of opportunity for anyone willing to reimagine faith for—and with—a new generation.

Kara Powell is executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute and chief of leadership formation at Fuller Theological Seminary. Her books include 3 Big Questions That Change Every Teenager: Making the Most of Your Conversations and Connections.

This article appeared in the May/June 2025 issue of Christianity Today as "Opportunity from Obsolescence".

- More from Kara Powell

Books

The Key Lesson of My Book: Don’t Underestimate ‘Deep Culture’

Christian Smith

Christian Smith responds to CT’s reviews of Why Religion Went Obsolete.

Illustration by Micha Huigen

Of all the themes I stress in Why Religion Went Obsolete, the importance of “deep culture” is among the most fundamental. Whether we’re analyzing the sociological data of religious decline, examining the broader intellectual currents in play, or charting possible responses, we shouldn’t underestimate the sheer weight of the cultural forces pushing millennials and Gen Zers away from traditional forms of faith. In this spirit, I’ll offer a few clarifications, cautions, and agreements, all aimed at furthering this essential conversation.

First, Ryan Burge makes an important point that younger generations don’t always differ radically from older ones. This was a key theme in my prior work about the religious lives of teenagers and emerging adults. Where we see fewer generational differences, that is partly because post-boomers (all generational cohorts born after 1965) did not change much from their parents, partly because many boomer parents are also shaped by the millennial zeitgeist. Generational influences work in both directions.

But a more interesting point remains when we recognize that millennials and Gen Xers, as the children of baby boomers, were socialized into their parents’ underlying norms and values. Much of the deep culture shaping post-boomers emerged amid the cultural revolutions of their parents’ generation in the 1960s and ’70s. Those boomers, however, had been socialized in a prior era (1945–1965) that took certain religious, moral, and epistemological foundations largely for granted—which put some ballast in their boats, so to speak.

Their children absorbed some of the boomers’ revolutionary values. But they grew up in a sociocultural environment lacking most of the older foundations. Instead, they were inundated by the internet, postmodernism, economic pressures, politicized religion, and other trends I describe in the book. Having inherited their parents’ distrust of authorities, they proceeded to carry that distrust in more immoderate directions.

I would also contest Burge’s claim that I present a “clear and simple” argument that “religion simply lost its usefulness.” My book emphasizes massive complexity. I speak broadly about religion lacking cultural resonance, not “vibing” with young people’s perspectives, and conflicting with the millennial zeitgeist.

Burge seems inclined, along with his grad school professor, to dismiss “culture” as a cop-out explanation for social change. But culture was and is ultimately where the action is. Culture is indeed harder to measure than, say, numbers of votes or births. But we need to look for our lost keys where they probably are, not only under the sociological lampposts where the light shines brightest.

I won’t say as much about Michael Horton’s response, which seems to grasp the gravity of the cultural situation my book portrays. I can only echo his invitation for ministry leaders to carefully consider the implications.

Kara Powell addresses these leaders in her own response, which considers the path forward for churches in a climate of religious obsolescence. She takes an appropriately tentative tone throughout, leaning on language like “could be,” “perhaps,” “maybe,” and “almost.” Still, it’s worth probing a bit more into her reasons for guarded optimism.

I am not surprised, for example, that most American 13-year-olds claim on surveys to be at least slightly religious and spiritual. Few people that age—just past childhood, only beginning to form independent identities and commitments—are ready to identify as atheists or pagans. Check back 15 years later, and their mature sentiments will likely be more revealing.

I am also not surprised to hear that “teenagers globally” have a “positive perception of Jesus.” Yet “appreciating” Jesus for embodying ideals of hope, trust, and generosity is hardly the traditional Christian gospel.

Powell is understandably scanning the horizon for signs of hope. But questions remain. First, can admiring the virtues of Jesus open spiritual doors to something bigger and better? Or will it only validate more of the “niceness” commended by moralistic therapeutic deism? Second, do these teens view Jesus as one among a pantheon of moral and spiritual role models, along with Gandhi, the Buddha, and Mother Teresa? Or as the incarnate Son of the triune God?

Elsewhere, Powell floats an intriguing idea: Perhaps if some younger Americans are less “churched,” they are also less “scathed” by hurt from the church. Will this open them to spiritual change? Maybe. But even someone without scars (yet) from a church or parachurch organization isn’t necessarily a blank slate ready to be engaged with, converted, and discipled. That assumes an individualistic view of how people gain knowledge.

Every unchurched person lives and operates in the larger zeitgeist. When people lack firsthand experiences to shape what they know, they turn to common cultural sensibilities, memes, and ideas that everybody supposedly knows. I argue in my book that, regardless of individuals’ experiences, the cultural zeitgeist has left traditional religion polluted. This is why many Americans who are quite ignorant about religion nonetheless feel authorized to judge it negatively. Constructively engaging with such people requires addressing the cultural baggage they associate with religion, fairly or not.

Finally, I could not agree more with Powell about the importance of relationships and listening. Pastors, youth ministers, evangelists, seminary teachers, and denominational leaders are used to telling people things. They may be good listeners too, but telling is their job. In most cases, their schedules also leave little time to wander around, strike up conversations, and seriously listen for extended periods.

Yet devoting time to building relationships across social, ethnic, and demographic lines is exactly what dealing with the current zeitgeist demands. Opportunities for outreach exist because the millennial zeitgeist is not one of grand, happy satisfaction. Many post-boomers contend with disappointment, pressure, isolation, resentment, distrust, frustration, and cynicism. They carry many felt needs and unmet longings. But the accumulated evidence shows that standard church practices—new outreach programs with more pizzazz, even more carefully crafted sermons—won’t work for most, even if they work for some.

Seen this way, Powell’s plea to listen and build relationships is not simply a useful pastoral strategy. It’s also a sociologically necessary means of confronting hard realities. Even if my book is only partly correct, now is the time for chastened humility and serious, critical, creative self-reflection.

Christian Smith is the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Sociology and founding director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Society at the University of Notre Dame.

This article appeared in the May/June 2025 issue of Christianity Today as "Don't Underestimate 'Deep Culture'".

- More from Christian Smith

Interviews with CT’s Young Storytellers

Reflections from Christianity Today’s first Young Storytellers Fellowship

Hannah Glad

Illustrations by Mary Putrasahan

At the beginning of 2025, Christianity Today wrapped up its inaugural Young Storytellers Fellowship—formerly called the NextGen Accelerator—with a commissioning weekend in Chicagoland. On Sunday afternoon, the fellows lingered in the hotel lobby, waiting for Ubers and shuttles to the airport and reflecting on their experiences over the previous six months.

From August 2024 through January 2025, the 15 fellows had gathered together in person and virtually. They were young creatives—journalists, poets, pastors, illustrators, essayists, photographers, and artists—ranging in age from 19 to 27, from all across the United States.

Between bouts of laughter and farewell embraces, there was a consensus that something special had taken place—something that felt like a need had been answered with lavish generosity. Those six months had been filled with an energy, insight, and blessing that I don’t think we could have anticipated the year before, when we first decided to launch the fellows program.

Rather than explain too much on their behalf, we interviewed the fellows so they could share for themselves what the Young Storytellers Fellowship meant to them. — Hannah Glad

These interviews have been edited for clarity and concision. Illustrations of the Fellows were created by Mary Putrasahan.
Interested in applying for the 2025 cohort? Find out more here!

What were the unique aspects of this program?

Mary Putrasahan

Mary Putrasahan: With a lot of things—but especially in art—it’s very much “We’re pouring into you; we expect to get something out of it.” It feels unique that CT said, “We’re going to pour into you, and we’re going to pour into you very abundantly, and we’re not expecting anything in return.” Anything like that, in a world where it’s usually very give-and-take, is really unique.

Kate Millar: You cared about our spiritual formation. That’s invaluable and completely intrinsic to the program, because I guess the point was to view ourselves as integrated beings; we are Christians and artists at the same time. The health of our soul will affect the health of our art.

Tali Valentine

Anna Mares: By being undefined, the program allowed people to be really creative.

Tali Valentine: The fact that CT understood that relationship was probably the most valuable output—that’s a pretty cool thing. It was smart to emphasize the relational aspect.

How did being a part of this cohort shape your experience?

Steven Slappey

Steven Slappey: Especially in the creative world, there’s competition: I need to get above everyone else. I think maybe we felt that going into the program—a little bit of Who are these guys?—but once we saw the Lord in each other there was solidarity. The truest thing about me is the truest thing about them, too. We were just for each other. That’s more conducive to good art and good writing. It’s cool how Christianity can flip things on their head in these spaces; support and love is better than harsh competition.

Elijah Ramzy: This fellowship opened my eyes to what creativity can look like in different spheres and helped me to know that I’m not alone. Dallas has a good number of creatives, but not all of them are necessarily Christian, and so to know that I’m supported by other people that are like me, and that care about me and love me, who share the same faith, is really, really sweet.

Rebecca Ince

Rebecca Ince: There’s a quote that says something like, “I’m not just a cool girl. I’m the conglomerate of every woman I ever thought was interesting.” And that’s how I feel fellowship-wise. I’m a little bit of you, a little her, and I’m just better for it. I don’t know what y’all’s process was for picking—maybe fasting and praying for 40 days and 40 nights! But it feels like some kind of a kairos moment. God was just like, “I want these people to know these people at this time and there’s nothing you can do about it to foster this; I’m the one cultivating it.” I think that this can be replicated over and over so long as God is at the head.

What was the most meaningful experience or insight you gained?

Mary Putrasahan: I keep all of my finished paintings in a literal shoebox because I live in an apartment, so I didn’t realize it was going to be so meaningful to be able to display my work at the Inkwell Evening. But it really was. I had never seen so much of my art lined up in frames. It just felt nice. It was a healthy sense of accomplishment.

Jenna Mindel

Jenna Mindel: Being in proximity to creative people who are in my generation along with having insight from people who are older and wiser and have done more work in that area really reminded me of the importance of sharing our work and how our art should be made in the context of a community.

Steven Slappey: The world doesn’t need 10,000 of me. It doesn’t need a bunch of people that look just like me and are passionate about the exact same things within Christendom that I’m passionate about. The world needs Kate, the church needs Chris and Isaac. There’s so much comparison. But at the end of the day, the Lord isn’t going to ask us, “How did you compare to others?” but “Were you faithful with what I gave you?” If we were more focused on being faithful with the gifts God has given us, we would actually produce more beautiful things. A life lived unto Jesus is beautiful, but that looks different for each person. And so for me, going into pastoral ministry, I want to be the kind of pastor that instead of saying, “Hey, this is how you need to look on all these things,” I acknowledge that what you do vocationally and how you serve the church and how you glorify God is going to look different for each person.

Lily Price

Lily Price: I’d never had that kind of engagement around the art I was creating before. It definitely challenged and changed the way I viewed the things I create as an artist and as a writer. It gave me a lot of confidence I didn’t have before. And what a perfect environment to foster that, with people who were excited to get to learn about one another and to see the kinds of art we were all creating.

Did your future vocational plans change because of the program? If so, how?

Isaac Wood: The program solidified my vocational plans. I had tentative hopes of some sort of career in journalism. The thing is—at least where I grew up and in the schools I went to—I didn’t see what that path looks like. There weren’t a lot of roadmaps or scripts for how to go from “I’m pretty good in my grammar class” to “I’m making a salary writing.” Through this program—seeing a lot of other people who are making their living doing that sort of thing and meeting other young people looking to do that—I just felt an encouragement that it’s definitely on the table.

ChiChi Odo

ChiChi Odo: The program influenced me as a healthcare professional who works in substance abuse to ask for people’s stories. For example, I got on the phone with somebody who was concerned about the cost of her insurance and whether or not she’d get the medication she needed or be in withdrawal, and the effect of that on her work. She was obviously upset, but she wasn’t even mad at me. (She works in insurance and she understands the whole thing.) She was saying, “I need someone to hear what’s going on and recognize that I’m somebody who just wants to be okay.” Value for story has improved the way that I work and improved the way that I relate with my colleagues in general.

Hayoung Oh

Maddy Montoya: I think it was kind of a catalyst for what I knew I wanted to do.

Hayoung Oh: I feel like my calling has been reinforced. This program allowed me to go deeper into what I think God has called me to do and it has allowed me to ask better questions about the world around me, how God is involved, and how I’m involved in that, too.

What are some nuggets of wisdom you took away from our mentor calls throughout the program?

Lily Price: You guys inviting Karen Swallow Prior to speak to us was just—chef’s kiss— perfect. That experience really cemented a lot of the thoughts I’d been having about vocation. Prior described vocation as something that’s given or appointed and not something that changes based on what you’re doing. I think—now knowing that—I can say that I have the vocation of writing and creating and it doesn’t mean that I can’t have other jobs in my life. I think that was a huge confidence boost for me.

Jenna Mindel: Jon Tyson talked about how the opposite of burnout is wholeheartedness. I’ve been thinking a lot about that—how approaching work and projects with excitement and things that really do fill your cup, that’s the opposite of burnout. I’m trying to integrate that into my daily life and figure out ways to be wholehearted.

If you had to sum up what you gained from this program in one sentence, what would it be?

Anna Mares

Anna Mares: There is enough. I feel like I’m always worried there’s not enough time and I’m not doing enough. I just love the expression: “there is enough.” There’s no rushing true art.

Chris Kuo: I learned a lot from the program about the ways stories influence us on a day-to-day basis, and because of that, the importance of choosing which stories you tell and examining the stories that you’re living by.

ChiChi Odo: I received the gift of dreaming again.

Sonia Parail: Learning how to integrate all the different parts of me, all my different identities, with my identity as a follower of Christ being the guiding lens.

Kate Millar

Kate Millar: I gained a broadened imagination of what it means to follow Christ as an artist and friend, and learned that I can bring my full curiosity, the same curiosity that I have brought to secular spaces. Full curiosity is a gift from God.

What role do you think storytelling plays in today’s cultural or faith conversations?

Isaac Wood

Isaac Wood: I think our generation, or at least the people I know, are fairly wary of people trying to pitch or sell them something, and the cheapness of social-media-style marketing. But strong and compelling storytelling is something that everyone enjoys. It just has this natural ability to connect people, which is important on its own, and then from an evangelizing perspective, it has the potential to be a genuine and authentic way of communicating to people what the faith has to say to our lives and how it’s important to us rather than some sort of sales pitch or marketing scheme.

Tali Valentine: I think the storytellers are the namers. Good storytellers are people who name what to care about and what to look at.

Maddy Montoya

Maddy Montoya: I think people are made with stories, and a desire to hear stories and to tell stories. They are the framework that contextualizes everything. The Bible is the most important story, so I think it makes sense that we’re naturally inclined to this way of thinking. All throughout history, people have told stories…. That’s why I love that the Bible is a collection of peoples’ stories. You see God’s character through them. The Bible could just be a bullet list—God is this, this, this, and this. But are you going to believe that if you don’t see it played out in a story?

Hayoung Oh: I love James K. A. Smith, and he talks a lot about how every philosophy or every prevailing idea in the world is always ultimately a story; how in a post-secular world, it’s less about objectivity and it’s more about who can tell the better story. And he’s like, why not tell the Christian story then? Right? It’s the one about resurrection, it’s something that seems so unbelievable but now, in a postmodern world, it can be something that’s believable, it doesn’t need as much objective scientific truth holding it down. In some ways we can unleash it. This has made me rethink my posture toward postmodernity. I feel like storytelling will play such a vital role in the Christian faith in the 21st century, especially in the online space where you have three seconds to share your pitch or people are going to scroll past you. Crafting the best story is vital, I think, to preserving and spreading the faith.

Elijah Ramzy

Elijah Ramzy: One of my old pastors used to say the best story wins. I think it’s really easy to live in a certain narrative, and if all that you hear is that narrative then you’re prone to believe that way, think that way, and act that way. But if you hear a better and greater story, then you’re able to live in a more beautiful and Christlike way. So storytelling I think is of utmost importance even if it’s not going to get all the views.

Sonia Parail

Sonia Parail: People are starved for connection. Storytelling is a way to connect with others, a way for people to be seen, feel seen.

Rebecca Ince: There’s no way of evading story in life. Literally everything, even data, has a who, what, when, where, why, how. And it’s just how we move through life. Even before we had the written word, we had the orators to pass the stories down. People are also looking for relatability, to feel seen and understood, and I think Gen Z is just hacking it. We’re so raw that even if it’s just TikTok storytelling and somebody’s bawling their eyes out because they got broken up with on a live or something, we’re locked in. Somebody’s always telling something and people are always responding “I relate to this, I feel this…” I’m hopeful for the future of the church and for believers; I think the next however-many years will be marked by genuine storytelling and vulnerability.

Chris Kuo

Chris Kuo: More broadly, there’s a loss of narrative within our cultural context. In modernity there’s this loss of tradition, and with the loss of tradition, a loss of story. And because stories help give us meaning and give us context for our lives, there’s often a loss of purpose as well. And so I think storytelling can provide people with a sense of purpose because I think we all innately want to be part of some kind of story. We all unconsciously have stories that we abide by and stories that shape us and I think it’s helpful to be mindful of those and then also be mindful about the stories that we create.

We’re excited to announce that applications for the 2025 Young Storytellers Fellowship have now opened! Go ahead and learn more, apply, share with a friend, and see what happens.

Christianity Today Is Advancing A Global Movement of the Kingdom—And It Starts With Each of Us

How a career in public service and her family’s mission work in South Asia has made Mishal Montgomery more kingdom-minded.

Melissa Huff

Hung Tran

“Aslan is on the move, I always say,” remarks Mishal Montgomery, referencing C.S. Lewis’ classic The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe from the Chronicles of Narnia. “God is making it spring in Narnia again. He’s bringing about his kingdom, and we are to be obedient to his call. To me, Christianity Today is vital in helping Christians understand this very thing.”

For Mishal Montgomery, this biblical mandate to seek the kingdom has guided her vocation as a policy advisor and public servant. As someone who has dedicated over thirty years to local government affairs in Southern California, Mishal has seen it all when it comes to facing the issues that plague our cities and navigating the political upheavals of local government.

Rather than becoming cynical about political divisiveness and the slog of bureaucracy, her unwavering optimism is rooted in a deep-felt conviction that civic engagement is not only important, but that every citizen—Christians in particular—should roll up their sleeves to work toward solutions rather than complaining when problems inevitably arise.

As an undergraduate business major at Biola University, Mishal had a professor who was serving on the local city council. He told her about his work and encouraged her to pursue a master’s degree in public policy. Her interest was piqued, and she soon earned her degree and began working as a policy advisor for elected officials in Los Angeles County, the largest county in the country, followed by several years serving the city of Anaheim.

“You can get things done in local government that you can’t at the state and national levels because it’s non-partisan,” she says. “Most city council members are part-time and only earn a few hundred dollars a month, so they’re there to do good. It just really appealed to me.”

Mishal and her husband Len met as students at Biola University, becoming friends through a bible study, and later dating and marrying several years after graduation. After starting a family and becoming a mother to three sons, Mishal decided to move from LA county into the Mayor’s office, serving in multiple roles, including Chief of Staff. Her public-facing career, spanning five Presidential administrations, has taught Mishal how to navigate multiple challenges and cultural shifts.

Today, Mishal runs her own consulting firm as a government affairs expert, using her in-depth knowledge of policy and municipal operations to help businesses and nonprofits navigate complicated departments. While she admits that trying to fix problems can sometimes feel like a game of whack-o-mole, she’s also witnessed first-hand how the concerns of regular citizens can lead to significant positive changes for communities.

“I’ve had opportunities to work on behalf of a couple of companies that are trying to bring really smart solutions for both temporary and permanent housing to those who were impacted by the fires in LA County,” she explains. “Seeing how solutions manifest at the local level is very satisfying. But it can also be frustrating because the source of so many societal challenges are rooted in brokenness and the human condition. Government can’t and perhaps shouldn’t always be the solution to the problems we confront. What I love about Christianity Today is that I am reminded, in story after story, how the gospel transforms people and societies.”

Mishal and Len give to Christianity Today because of its trustworthiness and because they believe that “CT is helping the Church be reminded that we are a global movement, and that biblical orthodoxy matters.” Mishal explains, “While there are many perspectives from across the Christian community represented through CT, and I don’t always agree with every emphasis or opinion, I do believe that there is an earnestness and a sincerity that drives the writers at Christianity Today to be biblically faithful.”

“When I read Christianity Today, I learn about what God is doing around the world: about the church in Japan, in Albania, in tiny provinces in China, in urban Birmingham, Alabama. In all these different places, the Church is alive! It’s like an organ that’s moving. Or like an army that is marching. I’m picturing The Lord of the Rings,” she says with a laugh, reiterating how the allegories of J.R.R. Tolkein, C.S. Lewis, and others have deepened her understanding of the kingdom of God.

Mishal explains that just as we as citizens have a responsibility to take care of our communities through public engagement, we are accountable as Christians in how we see and respond to and love the people around us. “We are the Church, so we need to be kind, thoughtful, and generous in our spirits.” Even though some Christians may avoid civic engagement because politics can be distasteful, she says that by being passive or ambivalent we may actually be contributing to the problem; instead, Mishal encourages everyone to do their part. “When you get frustrated with potholes or broken sprinklers in the park, sometimes it’s as simple as calling your public works department and explaining the issue,” she says.

For Mishal, Christianity Today reminds her that we are “one body with many parts,” and she appreciates that CT offers a global perspective on how God is always moving around the world. Both Mishal and her husband Len were raised as “missionary kids.” Len’s parents had a missions ministry in the Philippines, and he grew up reading CT at home, while Mishal, who is Indian-American, grew up immersed in her parent’s ministry equipping pastors in South Asia.

While Mishal is devoted to local public policy work, in many ways her path has been influenced by the faithful example of her parents who founded their own ministry working to train Indian nationals to reach others in India with the gospel. Mishal and her siblings as well as Len and their young adult sons continue to carry on the work in India, which has grounded her faith and profoundly shaped her perspective as a follower of Christ. Although it’s easy for us as Americans to get caught up in the political and culture wars in our social media feeds, she says that CT helps her to be mindful that the global Church is alive and well, even amid persecution in places like India.

“We are all part of this great universal church of those who have gone before us, those who are present today like you and me, and then future generations. If the Lord tarries another 50 years, 100 years, or hundreds of years from now, there’s going to be other iterations of Christ-followers building the movement.”

Mishal shares that the Testimonies section of the magazine has been particularly meaningful to her over the years. The testimony written by CT’s South Asia Editor Surinder Kaur, which appeared in the September/October 2024 issue, struck a chord with her because of her family’s background and long-time ministry in India. “So often, when I think of sharing the gospel with unbelievers I think, ‘They’re not going to listen to me.’ But hearing about everyday men and women in an article, I realize, they’re just like me. They’re sharing their testimony so I can do it too.” Mishal regularly shares CT articles with family and friends both as an encouragement to fellow believers and as a way to share the gospel with nonbelievers who may be searching for truth.

“When I went through a lot of political drama and trauma in one city where I worked, the mayor’s wife would always say, ‘We gotta keep on keeping on.’ And that’s what Christianity Today does. It helps us keep on keeping on. CT helps me think, ‘I’m part of this bigger movement and I can do this.’ I can keep going because Aslan is on the move.”

Ideas

Supreme Court Seems to Side with Faith-Based Charter School

Charles J. Russo - The Conversation

Justices weighed First Amendment rights in the case of a publicly funded Catholic school in Oklahoma.

Shedrick Pelt for The Washington Post via Getty Images

As demonstrators gathered outside, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday about whether Oklahoma can operate the nation’s first faith-based charter school. St. Isidore of Seville would be a virtual, K–12 school run by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa.

Charters are typically public schools of choice, funded by taxpayer dollars. Unlike regular public schools, they are free from most state regulations on curriculum and teacher qualifications. Until now, however, charters, like other public schools, have been secular.

The litigation over St. Isidore reveals a built-in tension in the First Amendment religion clauses, under which “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” While the free exercise clause guarantees people the right to believe as they wish, controversy remains over what constitutes an “establishment” of religion.

Here, the specific question is the extent to which, if any, states can spend public funds to allow parents to enroll their children in a faith-based charter school. Supporters are appealing a 2024 ruling from the Supreme Court of Oklahoma, which held that a religious charter school violated state law, as well as the Oklahoma and federal constitutions.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican supporter of St. Isidore, has said the case “stands to be one of the most significant religious and education freedom decisions in our lifetime.”

On the other hand, the attorney for St. Isidore’s challengers—led by Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, who blocked the school’s opening—said that a victory for St. Isidore “would result in the astounding rule that states not only may but must fund and create public religious schools, an astounding reversal from this court’s time-honored precedents.”

It remains to be seen whether a ruling in favor of St. Isidore’s would prove to be a win for religious freedom, as Stitt claimed, or a threat. Even so, as a professor focused on education law, I believe an order to continue expanding taxpayer aid to faith-based institutions looks more likely after Wednesday’s arguments, where five of the eight participating justices seemed sympathetic to St. Isidore.

The Supreme Court faces two key questions.

First, do the teachings of “a privately owned and run school constitute state action simply because it contracts with the state to offer a free educational option for interested students?” In other words, is a charter school a state actor?

Second, the justices will weigh how the First Amendment religion clauses apply to a faith-based charter school. According to the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The question is whether Oklahoma violates the free exercise clause by excluding schools from the charter program “solely because the schools are religious.” If so, is the exclusion justified by concerns about the government “establishing” religion?

The dispute over St. Isidore comes at a time when the Supreme Court has been steadily expanding the limits of aid to faith-based schools. Starting in 2016, a trio of cases have held that states cannot deny institutions and believers generally available, taxpayer-funded aid based solely on their religions. These cases covered aid to enhance playground safety at a Missouri preschool, the right to participate in Montana’s educational tax credit program, and providing tuition assistance to Maine parents in districts lacking public secondary schools.

The other issue—the “state actor” question—essentially asks whether a state-funded school teaching Catholicism would constitute the government promoting a religion, in violation of the First Amendment’s prohibition against doing so.

Drummond, Oklahoma’s attorney general, is also a Republican. However, he reversed his predecessor’s action allowing St. Isidore’s creation, arguing that the school “misuses the concept of religious liberty by employing it as a means to justify state-funded religion.”

In a 2024 brief to the Supreme Court, Drummond noted that Oklahoma’s “charter schools bear all of the hallmarks of a public school,” such as being entirely state-funded. During April arguments, his attorney emphasized that charters are “required to be public schools by the Congress of the United States and the legislatures of 47 states.”

If this argument prevails, it means St. Isidore is a government actor, and therefore it cannot promote any one religion over another.

The state action claim may be difficult for St. Isidore’s supporters to overcome. However, the ace in the hole is the Supreme Court’s recent trend of expanding the boundaries of government aid to faith-based schools and their students.

In fact, Chief Justice John Roberts authored the majority opinion in all three of those cases. Excluding a religious preschool “from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely because it is a church, is odious to our Constitution all the same, and cannot stand,” he wrote in the 2016 decision.

Justice Amy Barrett, a supporter of increased aid to faith-based schools, recused herself from participating in the oral arguments, without explanation. This leaves five justices who support expanding public aid for faith-based schools: Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Roberts.

During questioning, Roberts commented that St. Isidore’s creation seems like “much more comprehensive [state] involvement” with a religious organization, compared with the previous cases that expanded taxpayer aid to religious schools—leaving the door open to speculation over how he might vote. Nevertheless, he and the other four proponents of aid appeared open to St. Isidore’s argument that to exclude faith-based schools from charter programs is unconstitutional discrimination on the basis of religion.

“All the religious school is saying is don’t exclude us on account of our religion,” Kavanaugh commented. He added, “You can’t treat religious people and religious institutions and religious speech as second class in the United States.”

The remaining justices—Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson—appeared skeptical of expanding state aid to faith-based schools.

Illustrating the tensions within the First Amendment, Sotomayor remarked to the attorney representing St. Isidore, “what you’re saying is the free exercise clause trumps the essence of the establishment clause.”

Jackson said to the same attorney that St. Isidore is “not being denied a benefit that everyone else gets. It’s being denied a benefit that no one else gets, which is the ability to establish a religious public school.”

If Roberts agrees with these three justices, resulting in a 4-4 tie, the judgment of the Supreme Court of Oklahoma would remain undisturbed.

In the words of the baseball sage Yogi Berra, “it ain’t over ‘till it’s over.” The court is expected to rule near the end of its term, likely in late June.

Charles J. Russo is the Joseph Panzer chair in education and research professor of law at the University of Dayton.

- More from Charles J. Russo - The Conversation

Church Life

Do Not Harm Yourself, for We Are All Here

Warren Kinghorn

Paul’s cry to the Philippian jailer is a model for the church to respond to suicide in an America plagued by deaths of despair.

Illustration by Abigail Erickson / Source Images: Wikimedia Commons, Getty Images

Paul, Silas, and their companions were dirty, wounded, and bleeding as they sat in a dark jail in the rough-and-tumble Macedonian city of Philippi. Unjustly beaten and imprisoned after freeing a young woman from spirit possession and human trafficking (Acts 16:16–24), they had every reason to be angry and discouraged.

Instead, they prayed and sang hymns late into the night—and then, miraculously, a violent earthquake shook the prison, opened the doors, and unfastened their chains. They were delivered, free to slip away into the darkness of the surrounding countryside, away from Philippi and its corrupt authorities (vv. 25–26).

But Paul and Silas didn’t leave. They noticed the Philippian jailer, the man who had kept them unjustly imprisoned. Desperate, the jailer had drawn his sword and was preparing to kill himself, lest he be blamed and punished for the escape of his prisoners. “Do not harm yourself,” Paul shouted, “for we are all here” (v. 28, NRSVue throughout).

And remarkably, the jailer did not kill himself. He fell at the feet of Paul and Silas and asked them how to be saved. He cleaned and washed the wounds from their public beating. He brought them to his own home, fed them, and introduced them to his family. Then, even more remarkably, he and his entire family were baptized (vv. 29–34). He did not die by suicide that night but found a life he had not known was possible.

The jailer became the host. The accomplice of the violent became the medic. The persecutor of the disciples of Jesus became a disciple himself. And in this story the Bible offers its clearest depiction of a prevented suicide.

Many suicides are not prevented. Over 49,000 people died by suicide in America in 2023, and suicide is a major cause of death in the United States, ranking as the second-leading cause of death among Americans ages 10–14 and 25–34. These numbers are not improving. The age-adjusted rate of death by suicide in the US rose by 35 percent between 2000 and 2018. It has remained at a high plateau since. For every person who dies by suicide each year, hundreds of others consider or attempt suicide.

But even such large numbers fail to convey suicide’s deeply personal pain. Suicide is a display of immense suffering, and every death by suicide leaves immense suffering in its wake. Many Christian families, churches, and communities know this all too well.

Though Christians feel the pain of suicide, it is hard to speak about it well. Suicide is often cloaked in shame and stigma, leaving people who are considering suicide or loved ones grieving suicide even more isolated and vulnerable. Though most churches—including the Catholic church, contrary to popular misconception—do not teach this, some Christians even wonder whether suicide is an unforgiveable sin.

I am a psychiatrist who regularly works with people who are considering suicide and encourages them to choose life. I am also a Christian theological ethicist who believes the rising rate of death by suicide in the United States demands Christians think and act differently about suicide than we tend to do now.

While suicide has spiritual dimensions, it is not solely a spiritual or religious problem that calls for prayer and pastoral counseling alone. And while suicide has medical dimensions, it is not solely a medical or mental health problem that should be left to the domain of health care practitioners like me. Rather, we must also understand suicide as a cultural problem linked to how we live together in the United States and the wider Western world—linked to how we belong to each other.

Paul’s cry to the Philippian jailer—“Do not harm yourself, for we are all here”—is exactly what people who are considering suicide need to hear. And for Christians wondering how to respond to suicide and how to support those who are considering suicide, Paul is an excellent model in three ways.

First, Paul’s response makes clear that the gospel is always on the side of life. This was as countercultural in Paul’s time as it is in ours. Much like advocates of “rational suicide” and euthanasia today, some influential first-century Greek and Roman philosophers like Seneca taught that suicide could be an appropriate response to loss of health and rational thought. The jailer faced real danger, enough that suicide may have been seemed rational. But like the vast majority of Christians throughout history, Paul clearly rejected that choice.

This “no” to suicide, however, should be understood primarily as a resounding “yes” to life, especially the lives of those who feel alone and vulnerable. The jailer was a Gentile functionary of the corrupt city authorities responsible for flogging and imprisoning Paul and Silas. He stood in the way of their freedom. Why should his life and his personal crisis matter? But the jailer’s life mattered to Paul because the jailer mattered to God.

Suicide is a complex problem that affects every kind of person and every community. As in Paul’s time, though, suicide risk today tends to be higher among those who perceive our culture as telling them that their lives do not matter: older white men who for years have been taught to be independent and strong but are now facing frailty and vulnerability, adolescents struggling with gender and sexual identity, military veterans who wonder if they belong in civilian culture anymore, people with disabilities, and survivors of childhood sexual and physical abuse, among others.

To those who wonder whether they belong and whether they matter to God, the answer of the gospel is always emphatically yes. The deepest truth of who we are as human beings is that God knows us and loves us. Our lives are held in trust by God, and nothing can ever change that.

Second, Paul’s response to the jailer shows that when people are in crisis, it is not enough simply to value human life. It is also necessary to take direct action to help people stay alive and to get the help they need.

For Christians, this action starts with willingness to talk about suicide, never in a way that valorizes or romanticizes it but in a way that acknowledges its reality and encourages people to seek the care of others when they are struggling. It means asking people directly when they are in crisis, “Are you having any thoughts of hurting or killing yourself?” and taking practical steps to help them if the answer is yes (including by calling the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 if necessary). Like Paul’s “Do not harm yourself,” it means directly encouraging people considering suicide to stay alive, not only because they matter to God and to others but also because, in most cases, people who survive suicidal crises are grateful to be alive after the crises have passed.

Beyond directing people to individual help, practical action also means encouraging entire communities to limit access to potential means of suicide. This especially includes firearms, given that in the United States guns are involved in over half of suicide deaths, and more than half of firearm-related deaths each year are suicides. When someone is in crisis, being willing to store that person’s gun for safekeeping or offering to help install a simple gun lock can make the difference between life and death.

Third, Paul’s response to the jailer reminds us that suicide is not simply an individual problem that requires an individual response. It is also a communal problem that requires a community response.

Many factors that increase the risk of death by suicide—including social isolation, unemployment, financial stress, housing insecurity, and a sense of purposelessness—are related to how we live together in community and how we think about our own lives and the lives of others. Economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton have evocatively described suicide (alongside deaths from drug overdose and alcohol-related illness) as modern American “deaths of despair.” People considering suicide often feel that they do not belong, are a burden to their communities, and have no hope for the future.

We can’t know exactly what the Philippian jailer was thinking when he drew his sword, but it’s not hard to imagine that he too wondered if he had a future. His one responsibility was to keep control of his prisoners, and he had failed. He would surely be punished by the Romans, perhaps even killed. His family would be ruined.

The jailer was imprisoned by despair, but Paul reminded him that he was not alone. Instead, his prisoners became his community of support. They became his brothers and sisters in the body of Christ, fellow members of the fragile, fledgling house church of Philippi.

People who are considering suicide or are at risk for suicide need good mental health care and good spiritual counsel. But they also need healthy and supportive communities. They need the church, which is called to exactly this kind of care. Churches can help meet many needs for people in crisis: prayer, friendship, meals, transportation, assistance with navigating financial and legal challenges, connection to medical care, and more.

But the church is not only called to direct care for those who are at risk for suicide. Constantly, in our rhythms of communal life and worship, we remind each other that we belong to one another as interdependent members of a common body (Rom. 12:4–5). We call each other into vocation and service according to our gifts and capacities (vv. 6–8). Put simply, when we wonder if our lives matter, the church gives us something to do and reminds us that our lives are “hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3), that we always matter and are never alone.

In the church, we carry one another in hope (Rom. 12:12). There are times in life when we may be unable to hope for ourselves, and this inability to hope may be accompanied by thoughts of suicide. But in these times, we are called to hope for one another—to do the work of hoping for those who presently cannot, looking forward to the day when their own hope returns.

When the voices of emptiness, self-loathing, pain, and isolation creep in, we all need to hear the loud and clear voice of the gospel, mediated through fellow Christians: You matter. You are loved. Your life has meaning and value. Don’t give up. We will walk with you. We will help you get the support that you need. There is hope for your future. Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.

Years after his brief and eventful stay in Philippi, Paul wrote a warm letter to the church there. “I thank my God for every remembrance of you,” he wrote, “always in every one of my prayers for all of you, praying with joy for your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. … It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because I hold you in my heart” (Phil. 1:3–5, 7).

When that letter was read to the gathered Philippians, I wonder who was there. I wonder, specifically, if there was a man in the crowd, now perhaps in middle age, who had previously been a jailer. I wonder if he remembered that fateful night when he almost died by his own hand but instead was invited into a life of deeper beauty and grace than he had ever known. If so, then surely he knew what it meant to hold Paul in his heart, just as he knew Paul held him in his own, and thanked God for him.

It is our task to offer the same life-saving and life-giving invitation.

Warren Kinghorn is a psychiatrist and theological ethicist at Duke University Medical Center and Duke Divinity School, the codirector of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative at Duke Divinity School, and a staff psychiatrist at the Durham VA Medical Center. He is the author most recently of Wayfaring: A Christian Approach to Mental Health Care.

If you are in crisis or thinking of suicide, we encourage you to reach out and talk to your local pastor or call, text or chat with the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988, or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741741.

- More from Warren Kinghorn

Theology

I Love the Ten Commandments—in Biblical Context

Carmen Joy Imes

I’m an Old Testament scholar who cares about God’s law. But posting it in public schools misunderstands who and what it’s for.

Illustration by Mallory Rentsch Tlapek / Source Images: Getty, Unsplash

Efforts to post the Ten Commandments in public schools are not new, but the United States is seeing an uptick in support for these measures. Last year, Louisiana state legislature passed bill HB71, which requires the display of the Ten Commandments in a “large, easily readable font” in public classrooms from kindergarten to university.

Though the bill is currently experiencing legal challenges, that has not deterred Texas, South Carolina, Arkansas, and other states from attempting their own versions of legislation that require the Ten Commandments in public schools. Texas Senate Bill 10 passed in March and awaits confirmation by the state House of Representatives. Arkansas Senate Bill 433 passed in early April and was signed into law April 14.

Supporters of these bills, appealing to the historical influence of the Ten Commandments on the US Constitution, argue they do not violate the separation of church and state. However, it is evident that those putting forward these bills have more than history in mind. Others may be motivated by a desire to rebuild the moral foundation of our nation or to gain the trust (and votes) of those who do.

Opposition from the American Civil Liberties Union and the Freedom from Religion Foundation is no surprise. These groups eschew any attempt to bring God into the classroom. But perhaps more surprising is the opposition to these bills from Christians themselves. Why wouldn’t every Christian want to return our nation to its Judeo-Christian roots? Why not relish the opportunity to provide a moral foundation for our young people?

Republican Steve Unger from the Arkansas House of Representatives is an evangelical Christian and military chaplain but said he could not support the bill. Although Unger agrees the Ten Commandments are part of our “American heritage,” he worries that posting them in the classroom trivializes them and focuses on the “outward trappings of holiness” rather than inward transformation, creating a brand of “cultural Christianity” that bears little resemblance to the Christianity espoused by the Bible.

I am not a politician, but I have built my academic career—and written an entire book—on the premise that “Sinai still matters.” A photo of Mount Sinai has been the home screen on my computer for at least five years. After writing my doctoral dissertation on Exodus 20:7, the command not to take the Lord’s name in vain, I’ve worked to help churches and individuals better understand the ongoing relevance of Old Testament law for the Christian life. Still, I wouldn’t advocate for a bill such as those currently under debate. Why not?

I agree that the moral foundation of our nation is in a serious state of deterioration. I would love nothing more than for a revival to sweep through. But I have concerns about the constitutionality of posting the commands in public school, which could violate the establishment clause. More importantly, I remain unconvinced that posting the Ten Commandments would either repair our nation’s moral foundation or prompt greater faith. To explain my perspective, I want us to consider more closely the purpose and audience of the Ten Commandments.

The Ten Commandments are one of the most familiar passages of the Old Testament, but such familiarity can often breed sloppy theology. We think we know what they mean, so we don’t engage in the careful reading and reflection required to understand them as they were intended to be understood. Two distortions, in particular, tend to plague evangelical approaches to the Ten Commandments.

At a popular level, many Christians are under the mistaken assumption that obedience to the law was how ancient Israel earned salvation under the old covenant—and since we now believe salvation is offered to us by grace through faith in Jesus under the new covenant, the law should be abandoned altogether.

In other words, if the law was how Israelites were saved, then our salvation in Jesus would now replace and supersede it. But if the purpose of the law was not salvation and instead offered a larger vision of how to live in Yahweh’s world, then it might still be valid for Christians today. Those in the former camp might affirm the ongoing value of the Ten Commandments only insofar as Jesus reaffirms them in the New Testament.

A second distortion of the Ten Commandments sees them as based on “natural law,” meaning that they are timeless and universally valid for all people of all time, regardless of the context. While it’s true that the commandments are worded more generically than some of the other Old Testament laws, they are neither timeless nor universal. For example, the command against coveting (in the context of adultery) is directed only at adult males. And the only people who are capable of taking the Lord’s name in vain (Ex. 20:7) are those who have become part of God’s covenant people so that they bear his name in the first place.

Both misconceptions about the Ten Commandments—seeing them as either salvific or timeless—ignore their biblical context and extract them for other purposes. If the commands were salvific, then wouldn’t the Lord have sent Moses directly to Egypt with two stone tablets listing prerequisites for getting rescued from Pharaoh? Instead, all that was expected of the Israelites to demonstrate faith in Yahweh’s promise was to participate in the Passover and pack their bags.

It wasn’t until the Israelites arrived at Mount Sinai and were invited into a covenant relationship with Yahweh that he specified its parameters. The laws were not a means of salvation but a matter of mission. To be the people who represented Yahweh among the nations—those who bore his name and functioned as a kingdom of priests (Ex. 19:6)—they needed to live in a way that was consistent with his character and rule.

The Israelites were not called to be missionaries in the sense of being sent out to teach God’s laws. They were simply supposed to live by them, which would result in the curiosity of others, who would be drawn in to find out more (Isa. 2:1–4). When Yahweh pronounced judgment on the nations through his prophets, they did not berate people for worshiping other gods or breaking the Sabbath. Instead, the nations warranted judgment simply because they were excessively violent toward their neighbors.

The Book of Amos offers a good example of this. Yahweh condemns the Arameans for cruelty against Gilead, the Philistines and Phoenicians for human trafficking, the Edomites for unchecked rage against Judah, the Ammonites for brutality fueled by greed, the Moabites for excessive dishonor of the Edomite king (1:1–2:3). But when the prophet turns to the southern kingdom of Judah, the basis for his condemnation takes a decisive shift:

For three sins of Judah,
even for four, I will not relent.
Because they have rejected the law of the Lord
and have not kept his decrees,
because they have been led astray by false gods,
the gods their ancestors followed. (2:4)

God judged Judah because of Torah violations, such as the worship of false gods. The Israelites knew better. The standard was different for those whom God had drawn into covenant with himself. As recipients of God’s law, they were held to a higher standard.

And what about us today? Obedience to the law helped Israel fulfill its mission to represent God to the nations, and New Testament believers are incorporated into that mission by faith in Jesus (1 Pet. 2:9–10). Therefore, Old Testament laws, including the Ten Commandments, are an important source of revelation for us about God and his purposes in the world. But they were never meant to be held up as a standard for the general public.

If we want a godly example of how to interact with a nation that has lost its moral compass, we might consider Daniel. What can we learn from Daniel about how to steward power in an ungodly empire? After all, as Marvin Olasky has argued for CT, we do not live in ancient Israel but in a modern-day Babylon.

The Babylonian army dragged Daniel from his home along with other Judeans who showed promise. Shockingly, King Nebuchadnezzar elevated him and his friends to government positions. When Daniel arrived in Babylon, we might have expected him to lobby for religious reform or at least to advocate for religious protections for Jews like himself. But while he refused to compromise personally on matters of worship, as far as we know, Daniel did not petition for the Decalogue to be posted in public institutions around the Babylonian empire.

Daniel warned the king of the folly of arrogance toward Yahweh, but he did so with kindness (4:27). Daniel did excellent work and demonstrated wisdom and discernment. Dedicated to the God of Israel, he maintained his personal convictions in the sight of others without trying to change anyone around him—or complaining about the persecution that came as a result.

Beyond Daniel’s example, pastor and professor Mark Glanville has made an excellent case for why posting the commands in public school classrooms may actually signal a failure to love our neighbors well. Pointing to ways the Old Testament law encourages generosity and care for the vulnerable among us, Glanville asks, “Will those Christians who cherish these laws enough to have them displayed in every public classroom also submit to their prophetic call?”

In addition, I worry that by divorcing the commandments from their literary and theological context, we send the message that the God of the Bible is someone who demands obedience without offering himself. Yahweh did not lead with the law; he began by hearing the cries of the oppressed and working to set them free. Shouldn’t we follow his example and do the same?

Instead of working to post our convictions on the walls of public school classrooms, what if we invested in the health of our public schools? What if Christians approached local principals to find out how we could serve? What if, instead of hanging posters, we offered to pick up trash? Instead of lobbying, what if we showed tangible expressions of love, such as sending backpacks with school supplies for impoverished students? What if we volunteered to be lunch buddies for lonely kids? What if we offered to tutor struggling students?

I wonder if many American Christians have lost sight of the heart of Christ’s gospel. After all, John 3:16 does not read, “For God so desired to correct the world that he gave his one and only law, that whosoever obeyed that law would not perish, but have everlasting life.” If we want the children of our communities to experience everlasting life, then our mission ought to be to demonstrate the love of Jesus, not whip them into shape outwardly.

The Bible makes it clear that only our transformation by God’s Spirit enables us to obey his law. Putting it the other way around results in either hypocrisy or a salvation based on our own works.

Carmen Joy Imes is associate professor of Old Testament at Biola University and author of Bearing God’s Name, Being God’s Image, and a forthcoming book, Becoming God’s Family: Why the Church Still Matters.

- More from Carmen Joy Imes

Ideas

A Battle That Shaped Black Evangelicals

Jessica Janvier

Preachers like John Marrant proclaimed the gospel across cultures. But the persistence—and defense—of slavery challenged their ministries.

Illustration by Sparkle Boea / Source Images: Pixabay and Pexels

In 1737, Jonathan Edwards published A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God, one of the earliest written evangelical accounts describing the Great Awakening. In it, Edwards mentions that the religious revivals that swept through the American colonies drew “several Negros.” Yet in his telling, they are voiceless and passive.

Books, essays, and articles written by evangelical historians since then have largely followed in Edwards’s footsteps. Typically, the story of early American evangelicalism focuses on white male revival leaders, with marginal glances toward Black people. As a result, many—if not most—people carry a skewed perception of early evangelicalism and the diversity present in its days.

While it’s true that figures like Edwards and evangelist George Whitefield are notable voices in American Christian history, the rise of evangelicalism was also aided by Black leaders such as John Marrant, George Liele, Phillis Wheatley, and others who helped shepherd and spread the nascent movement. The evangelical revivals of their day came amid chattel slavery and the stark racial divisions pervasive throughout early America. But by God’s grace, the revivals still managed to bleed through color lines, bringing together Africans, Europeans, and Native Americans in exuberant worship.

The story of Marrant, who first appeared on the evangelical scene as a disciple of Whitefield, offers a window into this remarkable period. In 1775, Marrant was born into a free Black family in New York, which allowed slavery at the time. Four years later, his father died, leaving his mother as the sole breadwinner. In search of work, she moved the family from Florida to Georgia before ultimately settling in Charleston, South Carolina.

Marrant found early success as a trained musician, excelling in horn and violin. His achievement, however, appears to have led him down a bad path. By age 13, he described himself as “devoted to pleasure and drinking in iniquity like water.”

Around that time, Marrant and a friend noticed a crowded gathering at a nearby church. His friend dared him to disturb the meeting by blowing his French horn while the preacher was speaking. As Marrant entered, the preacher, who happened to be Whitefield, disturbed Marrant by locking his eyes with the young man and pointing his finger at him. Then, Whitefield announced his text for the night: Amos 4:12 (“Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel,” KJV). Marrant fainted on the spot.

He later recounted the incident in his 1785 book, A Narrative of the Lord’s Wonderful Dealings with John Marrant, A Black. Of that eventful night he recalled, “The Lord accompanied the word with such power, that I was struck to the ground, and lay both speechless and senseless near half an hour.”

His book would go on to depict Whitefield, with tender pastoral love, grasping his hand to lead him in prayer. Detailing the moment of his conversion, Marrant relayed, “The Lord was pleased to set my soul at perfect liberty, and being filled with joy I began to praise the Lord immediately.” Whitefield would visit Marrant many more times while in Charleston, and the two strengthened their friendship as builders of a small Calvinistic branch of Methodism.

As with many evangelical converts of his day, Marrant’s faith had an immediate effect on his life. He engrossed himself in the Scriptures and began to share his faith. As a teenager, his passion led him to be a missionary to the Cherokee Nation in what is now northern Georgia. He became fluent in the Cherokee language and spent two years with the Native Americans before returning to Charleston, where he ministered to many slaves.

At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, Marrant enlisted and sided with the British as a Loyalist. Though his biography doesn’t say why, it’s likely that he, even as a free man, wanted a more secure future. And the British, who offered freedom to enslaved Africans who sided with them, were a better bet.

Afterwards, Marrant was transported to England, where he continued his ministry among white evangelical enthusiasts. By 1785, he was ordained by a society of churches called “Huntington’s Connexion” and sent to Nova Scotia to pastor a congregation of Black Loyalists who settled there after the war. His fire for revival continued as he entered Canadian shores. In 1790, he published A Journal of the Rev. John Marrant, in which he recounted his initial months in Nova Scotia preaching to large crowds of Black, white, and Indigenous groups alike.

While Marrant’s life was extraordinary in many ways, it is also emblematic of early Black evangelicalism.

From the first Great Awakening, Black Americans shared their faith evangelistically, becoming leaders and pastors who helped spread the evangelical tradition. Some who were enslaved, like Jupiter Hammon, ministered primarily to their own people. Others, such as Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, were emancipated by evangelical masters and shared the gospel beyond the confines of racial and national barriers.

The impact of Black Americans also extended beyond North America. Black evangelicals participated in the transnational network of evangelicalism, particularly in England, where their incipient conversion stories were published. Some preached the gospel and did ministry work in England. And their writings, such as those by Gronniosaw and poet Phillis Wheatley, showed them to be witnesses—and participants—of the Holy Spirit’s extraordinary activity in the American revivals.

In the late 18th century, as the Second Great Awakening emerged along with abolitionist fervor, the number of Black evangelicals—both slave and free—grew dramatically. Their rise coincided with a boom in Methodist and Baptist churches. During this time, Southern Black evangelical pastors, church planters, and missionaries, such as Liele and David George, ministered both cross-culturally and internationally.

In a racially stratified environment, early evangelicalism was especially attractive to enslaved people, as it offered hope that Christianity would overcome racial divides and the brutal institution of slavery. But in the years following the Revolutionary War, white Southern evangelicals largely severed the tie between evangelicalism and abolitionism in their region.

In his book Slave Religion, Albert Raboteau, a scholar of African American religious history, noted that among many white evangelicals at the time, slavery was increasingly “not only accepted as an economic fact of life, but defended as a positive good.” As they saw it, the institution was “sanctioned by Scripture and capable of producing a Christian social order based on the observance of mutual duty, slave to master and master to slave.”

Baptist and Methodist denominations, which held the largest number of Black people saved through revivals, split into proslavery and antislavery camps. Among white evangelicals, the fracture happened primarily along Northern and Southern lines. At the same time, Black evangelicals were increasingly uniting against the practice.

As Northern states moved toward abolition following the Revolutionary War, Black evangelical slaves openly petitioned for freedom based on their Christian convictions. Evangelical Biblicism had opened the way for enslaved people in the North to have limited access to education, helping them—for the first time—read the Bible for themselves. Using their education, they advocated for themselves in entreaties and petitions that argued slavery was against the “whole tenor of the Christian religion.”

In the South, runaway slaves who were part of evangelical denominations produced numerous autobiographies in the decades leading up to the Civil War. Among the most famous, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, showed that slaves were rejecting pro-slavery doctrines.

As time went on, ties between white and Black Christians become more strained by the persistence of slavery and the determination of Black evangelicals to challenge it.

Marrant’s own life displayed this tension. His close friend, Whitefield, had begun his ministry as a denouncer of slavery. But the economic instability of running an orphanage in Georgia—coupled with the desire for free labor—led Whitefield to change his view. He publicly advocated in favor of the peculiar institution, which he also saw as an instrument for Christianization. Whitefield’s orbit then followed suit.

Soon enough, Marrant’s small collective of Calvinistic Methodists became surrounded by slaveholding evangelicals who sought to steer him away from arguments against slavery.

The editor of Marrant’s first book—which detailed his conversion, early missionary journey, and ministry work—removed his criticisms of proslavery theology, including references to the racist violence he witnessed from white people in Charleston. Refusing to be silenced, Marrant republished the work with direct supervision and incorporated his antislavery theology. In doing so, his once widely cross-cultural ministry increasingly became situated among like-minded Black evangelicals.

In different regions, denominations, and hush harbors, Black evangelicals formed communities where they could freely express their convictions. Eventually, their collective organizing culminated in the rise of the Black church in America.

Because evangelicals largely separated by race into their own corners, their shared history also parted ways. In universities, the history of the early Black church found a home in Africana studies, which focused more on the growth of Christianity among Black people and less on the type of Christianity they practiced. In contrast, the written history of early evangelicalism predominantly followed the lives of its white leaders and subscribers.

But even though we’ve inherited segregated stories, history paints a picture of an integrated story in which Black evangelicals always existed.

Jessica Janvier is an academic whose focus crosses the intersections of African American religious history and church history. She teaches at Meachum School of Haymanot and works in the Intercultural Studies Department at Columbia International University.

- More from Jessica Janvier

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