Boo! Just in time for Halloween, frightening headlines about evangelicals

Weekend Plug-in 🔌

Editor’s note: Every Friday, “Weekend Plug-in” features analysis, fact checking and top headlines from the world of faith. Subscribe now to get this newsletter delivered straight to your inbox. Got feedback or ideas? Email Bobby Ross Jr. at therossnews@gmail.com.

(ANALYSIS) Here’s a scary thought: Who wants to dress up as an evangelical for Halloween?

Except, exactly what would that look like?

Would it involve wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat? Or does the term still have any religious and/or theological meaning left?

Those questions came to mind as I perused some of the week’s big religion stories — both news reports and major analytical takes.

Here are five such headlines that caught my attention:

1. Why ‘evangelical’ is becoming another word for Republican: “Instead of theological affinity for Jesus Christ, millions of Americans are being drawn to the evangelical label because of its association with the G.O.P.,” Ryan Burge, a frequent contributor to ReligionUnplugged.com, writes in an opinion piece for the New York Times.

2. In a post-Trump world, these pastors are ditching the evangelical label for something new: “They looked to each other to ask, What could it look like to organize as ‘post-evangelicals?’” religion writer Sarah Pulliam Bailey reports for the Washington Post. “They had at least one thing in common: They were all on some journey of deconstruction, the process of reexamining their long-held beliefs, and they wanted to participate in reconstruction and the building up of something new.”

3. The evangelical divide: “Political and social issues are splintering American Christians. Can the Church find unity?” asks part one of a three-part series by World magazine senior reporter Sophia Lee.

4. The evangelical church is breaking apart: “As a person of the Christian faith who has spent most of my adult life attending evangelical churches, I wanted to understand the splintering of churches, communities, and relationships,” contributing writer Peter Wehner explains in The Atlantic. “I reached out to dozens of pastors, theologians, academics, and historians, as well as a seminary president and people involved in campus ministry. All voiced concern.”

5. ‘The Liberty Way’: How Liberty University discourages and dismisses students’ reports of sexual assaults: “The school founded by evangelist Jerry Falwell ignored reports of rape and threatened to punish accusers for breaking its moral code,” former students allege in this in-depth investigative report by ProPublica’s Hannah Dreyfus. '"An official who says he was fired for raising concerns calls it a ‘conspiracy of silence.’”

Liberty is, as the report notes, “one of the largest private evangelical institutions in the world.” Along with the ProPublica story, I recommend Terry Mattingly’s analysis of it for GetReligion.

For more on Liberty and a whistleblower lawsuit filed its former spokesman, Scott Lamb, see coverage by the Post’s Bailey and Susan Svrluga, Politico’s Michael Stratford and Brandon Ambrosino, The Associated Press’ Sarah Rankin, Religion News Service’s Bob Smietana and the Washington Times’ Mark A. Kellner.

Power Up: The Week’s Best Reads

1. A 100-year-old priest was nudged from his parish. He has no plan to retire: As Catholic news goes, I probably should have started with today’s Vatican meeting between President Joe Biden and Pope Francis. (Check out the latest from ReligionUnplugged.com’s own Clemente Lisi.)

And there was some excellent advance coverage, including this insightful story by Washington Post national political reporter Matt Viser.

But really, New York Times national correspondent Rick Rojas’ superbly written front-page profile of the Rev. Luis Urriza in Beaumont, Texas, can’t be beat.

2. Prayer for kidnappers deeply rooted in mission group’s faith: Last week’s Plug-in highlighted coverage of a gang’s kidnapping of an Anabaptist mission group in Haiti.

This week, Associated Press religion writer Peter Smith explains why “when kidnappers in Haiti abducted 12 adult missionaries and five of their children, including an infant, it wasn’t surprising that those sharing that Christian tradition would draw on these values as they joined around-the-clock prayer vigils.”

In a busy week, Smith also wrote about the third anniversary of the Pittsburgh synagogue attack and the Orthodox Church’s top patriarch visiting the U.S. and meeting with President Joe Biden.

3. After almost a year on a ventilator, a Federal Way pastor stricken by COVID emerges: Seattle Times reporter Nina Shapiro tells the harrowing story of Hector Garcia, a 61-year-old pastor who — against the odds for someone as ill as he was— beat the coronavirus.

Still, his wife and two daughters decided not to get vaccinated.

• Forget angels in the outfield: Astros rally nuns 'a point of light in a world that's too often dark' (by Lindsay Peyton, Houston Chronicle)

• Why some faith-based child care centers may miss out on ‘Build Back Better’ funds (by Kelsey Dallas, Deseret News)

• Young people say disconnect keeps them from church (by Clare Ansberry, Wall Street Journal)

• Why 200 years later, Vine Street Christian Church's progressivism is still an 'ongoing process' (by Liam Adams, The Tennessean)

• That poll saying 30 percent of young Christians identify as LGBTQ has some real problems (by Tyler Huckabee, Relevant)

• First a Metro cop, then a preacher: Now, he says, he finally found his best way to help kids (by Brad Schmitt, The Tennessean) 

Inside The Godbeat: Behind The Bylines

The Associated Press has named a new global religion news director: David Crary. He succeeds Sally Stapleton, who left in July to join Magnum Photos as senior assignment manager.

As noted by his MuckRack.com bio, Crary has served as an AP reporter, editor and bureau chief since 1976. In 1999, he became an AP national writer based in New York. He has focused on social issues such as abortion, gay rights and prison conditions.

Before returning to the U.S., his AP postings included Nairobi, Kenya; Johannesburg, South Africa; Paris, France; Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina; and Toronto, Canada.

Back in May, Crary wrote a truly touching obituary for longtime AP religion writer Rachel Zoll, who died at 55 after a three-year bout with brain cancer. Crary called Zoll his “best friend at work.”

This week, he previewed the late Rachel Held Evans’ final book, “Wholehearted Faith,” which is set for release next week.

• Christian couple share Jesus through baseball and adoption (by Bobby Ross Jr.)

• I warned that doctors were experimenting with transgender children. Now a leading transgender doctor is sounding the alarm (by Dr. Michael Brown)

• People have been asking: Is the COVID vaccine the Bible's sinister 'mark of the beast'? (by Richard Ostling)

• What does it mean to be a 'true' believer? (by Terry Mattingly)

• Samaritans number less than 1,000. Here's how their tradition survives in Israel (by Gil Zohar)

• Catholicism grows in Africa and Asia, Plummets in Europe, report says (by Clemente Lisi)

The Final Plug

Here’s a shameless plug for one of my own stories: I first wrote about Anna Salton Eisen and her father, Holocaust survivor George Lucius Salton, when I worked for The Associated Press in Dallas in 2004.

Seventeen years later, I was excited when Eisen contacted me and shared an amazing follow-up story about an unlikely “reunion” of Holocaust survivors’ family members. I really appreciate AP’s new global religion news director, David Crary, and religion news editor Holly Meyer letting me write it.

Happy Friday, everybody! Have fun with the ghosts and goblins this weekend.

Bobby Ross Jr. is a columnist for Religion Unplugged and editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 15 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.

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