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) She was 19. I was 22. We said “I do” in a little church east of Oklahoma City exactly 33 years ago today.

Happy anniversary to my wife, Tamie!

While you do the math on the above numbers, it’s time for another edition of Weekend Plug-in.

As always, I appreciate you reading this newsletter.

Pope Francis arrived in Hungary this morning, “walking, rather than using a wheelchair as he has on the last four foreign trips,” the National Catholic Reporter’s Christopher White notes.

Check out White’s advance coverage of the pope’s trip.

Meanwhile, let’s jump right into the rest of the week’s top headlines and best reads in the world of faith.

What To Know: The Big Story

Is this heaven?: No, it’s Iowa. But not the one with Kevin Costner.

“The Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Spring Kick-off event on Saturday represented the first cattle call of the year, a forum for GOP candidates to court an indispensable voting bloc,” Christianity Today’s Kelsey Kramer McGinnis explains.

The key takeaway of McGinnis’ interviews with voters: “The world feels out of control. They want someone who will fix it.”

Trump vs. Pence: At New York Magazine, political columnist Ed Kilgore writes about former President Donald Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence and the “struggle for the souls of Iowa evangelicals.”

In (somewhat) related news, Pence testified Thursday before a federal grand jury investigating efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 election, The Associated Press’ Eric Tucker reports.

Among Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition attendees, “Trump remained a hero to many in the crowd though interviews with nearly two dozen attendees demonstrated the opportunity — and obstacles — for those seeking to challenge him,” according to AP’s Michelle L. Price.

Eat mor chikin: The Des Moines Register’s Katie Akin and Galen Bacharier summed up the Iowa event this way:

A bevy of Republican presidential hopefuls courted Iowa's religious conservatives Saturday night, pledging their opposition to abortion and transgender medical care for minors.

About 1,000 Iowa Republicans attended the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition spring kickoff event in Clive. The smell of Chick-fil-A boxed dinners filled the crowded venue as attendees waited to hear speeches from declared and potential 2024 candidates, including former Vice President Mike Pence and, over a live video call, former President Donald Trump.

The Republicans’ first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses in Iowa are set for Feb. 5, 2024 — about nine months away. In case you missed it, the Democrats have “nixed Iowa from the premier spot on the party’s nominating calendar.”

Power Up: The Week’s Best Reads

1. Faith lifts Pittsburgh Jews: “Three Jewish congregations, resolute in their defiance of the hatred that tried to destroy them, are still waiting for justice,” The Associated Press’ Peter Smith writes.

“But united in their horror and grief, they haven’t been standing still as the criminal case for the massacre that changed everything has crawled through the federal court system.”

Jury selection started this week in the 2018 attack that claimed the lives of 11 worshippers at the Tree of Life synagogue, Smith and his AP colleague Mark Scolforo report.

2. Surprising surge: “A greater share of young adults say they believe in a higher power or God,” the Wall Street Journal’s Clare Ansberry reports.

“About one-third of 18-to-25-year-olds say they believe — more than doubt — the existence of a higher power, up from about one-quarter in 2021, according to a recent survey of young adults. The findings, based on December polling, are part of an annual report on the state of religion and youth from the Springtide Research Institute, a nonpartisan nonprofit.”

The increase is a response to the pandemic, say young people, theologians and faith leaders interviewed about the trend.

3. Right and far right: Southern Baptist Convention President Bart Barber’s reelection bid just got more interesting.

Challenging Barber “is Georgia pastor Mike Stone, a leader in the convention’s further right flank and former SBC presidential candidate,” the Tennessean’s Liam Adams reports.

Stone’s candidacy, announced Wednesday, “all but guarantees a political divide in the nation’s largest Protestant denomination along similar lines as previous years over approaches to clergy sexual abuse reform, and other political and cultural issues.”

Read more on the challenge, set to be decided at the SBC’s annual meeting in New Orleans in June, from Religion News Service’s Bob Smietana.

More Top Reads

A deeply divided Israel limped toward its 75th birthday on Wednesday, The Associated Press’ Josef Federman notes. … In a time of division, two United Methodist churches became one in Memphis, Tennessee, the Commercial Appeal’s Katherine Burgess details. … A North Carolina pastor was his town’s Hero of the Year for two years in a row, but then he filed a lawsuit, the Raleigh News & Observer’s Josh Shaffer writes. … A church is canceling people’s medical debt for pennies on the dollar and wants others to join in, CNN’s AJ Willingham reports. … Muslim rideshare drivers improvise prayer spaces amid a lack of relief stations in New York City, Religion News Service’s Tori Luecking explains. … For her piece “Plant time: Inside a psychedelic church,” Interfaith Radio’s Kimberly Winston spent six weeks attending Sacred Garden Community Church in Berkeley, California. … The “Duck Dynasty”-backed Gen Z Jesus musical “His Story” is set to debut in Texas, according to RNS’ Kathryn Post. … The pope gave women the right to vote in an upcoming influential meeting of bishops, the New York Times’ Jason Horowitz and Elisabetta Povoledo report. … And finally, Oklahoma’s largest United Methodist church survived efforts to thwart its plans to exit the denomination, The Oklahoman’s Carla Hinton writes.

Inside The Godbeat

Jon Ward, chief national correspondent for Yahoo! News, is promoting his new book, “Testimony: Inside the Evangelical Movement that Failed a Generation," in high-profile venues such as MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

At Christianity Today, Samuel D. James gives Ward’s book a less than glowing review, rating it at two out of five stars and criticizing it as “marked by the absence of self-critique and a tendency toward assumption.” (Back in February, Ward talked about the book in a podcast interview with CT editor-in-chief Russell Moore.)

Read an excerpt of “Testimony” here.

Charging Station: ICYMI

Here is where you can catch up on recent news and opinions from ReligionUnplugged.com.

“The Dalai Lama ‘incident’: how not to respond to a troubling sexual situation with a child” is the focus of an op-ed by David Clohessy.

For more than 30 years, Clohessy was the national director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. He was sexually abused as a boy by his parish priest.

The Final Plug

Back in 2017, I did a Religion News Service story on faith inspiring Houston’s Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale to help victims of Hurricane Harvey.

Those who read that story might enjoy Houston Chronicle journalist Sarah Smith’s in-depth piece this week on “The untold story of Jim McIngvale, the complex man behind Houston’s famous Mattress Mack.”

Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.

Bobby Ross Jr. writes the Weekend Plug-in column for ReligionUnplugged.com and serves as 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 18 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.