The Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown in Minnesota — which has led to confrontations with protesters and two high-profile shooting deaths of U.S. citizens — has dominated national headlines for days and even weeks. Here are key faith angles to follow.
Read MoreDuring this tense moment in journalism, will Southern Baptist leaders return telephone calls from elite newsrooms or will they choose to speak to “conservative” and “religious” publications, alone?
Read MoreFederal authorities announced arrests after activists disrupted a Minneapolis Southern Baptist church service to protest ICE activities. Civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong and two others were charged under an 1871 conspiracy statute. Church leaders have condemned the protest, while activists called it a peaceful demonstration.
Read MoreLeaders of Cities Church condemned protestors who disrupted a St. Paul worship service, calling the conduct unlawful and intimidating. Pastor Jonathan Parnell addressed the incident biblically, urging perseverance. The Department of Justice began investigating, while church leaders affirmed their mission and called on authorities to protect religious freedom rights broadly.
Read MoreU.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi says she has spoken to a Minnesota pastor following a disruption by protestors during Cities Church’s morning worship service on Sunday. “Attacks against law enforcement and the intimidation of Christians are being met with the full force of federal law,” Bondi wrote on X late Sunday night.
Read MoreAn anti-ICE protest disrupted Sunday worship at Cities Church in St. Paul, Minn., with demonstrators chanting inside the sanctuary. Former CNN anchor Don Lemon streamed the incident live. Southern Baptist leaders condemned the disruption, calling it a violation of religious freedom and urging authorities to protect churches.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Where are there lots of evangelical Christians in the United States, and where is it hard to find one? That’s actually a really difficult question to answer from a methodological perspective. Very few surveys offer enough granularity to provide rigorous state-level estimates, let alone data at the county level. But because of the rapid acceleration of Artificial Intelligence, I can actually provide you all with a really good answer now.
Read MoreChristians are bringing light amid the evil, with many treating the wounded at homes to avoid certain arrest at hospitals. Christians are also taking food and water into crowds of protesters amid Iran’s humanitarian crisis. One Christian couple prepared 50 sandwiches, put them in their backpacks along with bottles of water and distributed the food to protesters.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Iran’s leaders warned the United States and Israel of retaliation as nationwide protests challenged the Islamic Republic’s theocracy. Facing mounting deaths and unrest, Iranian officials framed dissent as foreign-backed chaos, tightened repression and escalated external threats, revealing a regime prioritizing clerical survival over popular consent.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Pope Leo XIV used an annual address to Vatican diplomats to warn that global politics had shifted toward militarism and force. Without naming any political leaders, he criticized war, erosion of international law and weakened human rights, positioning the Holy See as a moral counterweight to rising geopolitical tensions in many places around the world.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Nothing can provoke anger quicker than mercy, when it’s directed to the wrong kind of people.
Read MoreMany Venezuelans, including Christians at home and abroad, expressed cautious hope after U.S. forces captured President Nicolás Maduro. While rejecting violence, they welcome the possibility of justice after years of repression. Church leaders now see the moment as a difficult beginning toward rebuilding peace.
Read MoreThe First Circuit Court of Appeals has sided with the Trump Administration in allowing the defunding of abortion providers to continue while lawsuits are ongoing. Multiple states and abortion providers filed lawsuits in the wake of Congress’ “Big Beautiful Bill,” which President Trump signed last July 4.
Read More(ANALYSIS) For members of the Religion News Association, this was the kind of dramatic appeal that made the Chicago native the top Religion Newsmaker of 2025. The runner-up was Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani, who was elected as New York City's first Muslim mayor. The assassinated evangelical activist Charlie Kirk placed third.
Read More(ANALYSIS) A widespread populist rebellion against the well-educated and well-paid “elite” that has ruled culture provides the framework for actions that would have been inconceivable not long ago. Religious elites, too, face resistance and a weakened ability to overcome such disillusionment across society, and also within their own ranks.
Read MoreThe question is not whether Trump is relevant in many of these stories. This is, after all, an age in which faith, culture and religious doctrines are frequently linked to debates about hot-button political issues. The question is whether Trump is placed front and center in every story, warping discussions of issues that were important long before he entered American politics.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I keep a little list in the notes app on my phone — just a running log of potential ideas for the newsletter. Most of them are only a few words, just enough to remind me to poke around in the data when I get back to my computer. If I’m being honest, about 75% of those ideas go nowhere. Either the data doesn’t tell a compelling story, or that “great dataset” someone mentioned turns out to be nothing like they described.
Read More(ANALYSIS) “News as we have hitherto known it has died and been laid to rest.” So wrote illustrious former BBC war correspondent Martin Bell, ending his autobiography, “War and the Death of News.” He was not writing the BBC’s obituary, but he could have been. No, he was arguing the BBC no longer knew the difference between fairness and neutrality.
Read MoreThe U.S. designation of Nigeria as an egregious violator of religious freedoms has not gone far enough to stem violence there, top persecution watchdogs said amid an intense uptick in attacks on Christians in the African nation.
Read More(ANALYSIS) A majority of mainline Protestant Christians voted for Donald Trump in 2024. They also supported him in 2020 and 2016. In fact, even during Barack Obama’s landslide election in 2008, the mainline was evenly divided at the ballot box.
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