I wrote an article about seven years ago on what the bible teaches about homosexuality. That essay begins with a discussion of Brian McLaren’s then recent affirmation of committed homosexual relationships. It is strange to read that essay now and to consider in retrospect how quickly McLaren faded from evangelical view. At the time, the “emerging church” still had some purchase within the evangelical movement. Now that entire project is defunct and so are its major proponents. They pushed the very edges of the leftwing of the evangelical movement until they pushed themselves right out of the movement. Many of them did so by adopting unorthodox positions on sexuality. The…

N. T. Wright penned a letter to the editor of The Times of London this morning expressing his thoughts about “gender-fluid” children. Responding to articles about gender identity confusion–and even trans-speciesism–in children, he writes: The confusion about gender identity is a modern, and now internet-fuelled, form of the ancient philosophy of Gnosticism. The Gnostic, one who “knows”, has discovered the secret of “who I really am”, behind the deceptive outward appearance (in Rifkind’s apt phrase, the “ungainly, boring, fleshy one”). This involves denying the goodness, or even the ultimate reality, of the natural world. Nature, however, tends to strike back, with the likely victims in this case being vulnerable and impressionable…

Sexual perversion is firmly entrenched in our cultural mainstream, so it takes a lot these days to astonish me. But I am astonished today. In the span of twenty-four hours, I have come across not one but two separate unrelated articles about teenage girls who agree to be brutalized during sexual encounters with teenage boys. Both articles indicate that this is a growing trend among adolescent children who becoming sexualized at younger and younger ages. Last week, Teen Vogue published an article instructing teenage girls how to enjoy being sodomized by their boyfriends. The article is so vile that I am not even going to link to it. But among…

If you are unfamiliar with this story, see my previous post on the topic. Just a few thoughts about this appearance on “The View”: 1. The ladies from “The View” were respectful in this exchange. That cannot always be said in left-leaning pop-culture venues that are typically dismissive of religious liberty claims. That they gave a platform to Jack and Kristen is a win for religious liberty. 2. The baker Jack Phillips and attorney Kristen Waggoner acquitted themselves quite well in this exchange. And this is not exceptional among Christians in the wedding industry who are behind the eight ball right now with religious liberty claims. Most of these people…

Over the weekend, I came across one of the saddest interviews I have ever seen (see above). It’s an interview on The New York Times Magazine website that features five “non-monogamous” men and women. All five of the persons are involved in sexual relationships with others in the group and with many others outside the group. There are two married couples in the group, and one woman who has no legal tie to either of the couples. The interview describes what their non-monogamous marriages are like, and how they make their marriages work. What is really sad about this interview is that the dysfunctionality of these relationships is apparent even…

It’s hard to believe that I have been listening to U2 for over 30 years. It’s also hard to believe that I’ve never made it to one of their showstopping live performances until just last night. My wife and I bought our tickets months ago, just after they went on sale. So we have been anticipating this for quite some time. I know Bono did not want this tour to be about nostalgia, but for us it certainly was. We wanted to hear them play the old stuff, and that’s exactly what they did. It was lump-in-your-throat spectacular. In fact, I got a little verklempt when “Where the Streets Have…