Counting the Cost of Paying Ransoms for Missionaries
A Haiti kidnapping raises questions about no-payment practices.
International Christian organizations and missions experts agree it’s not best practice to pay kidnapping ransoms.
But ransoms do get paid. And the impacts are hard to quantify. The …
Australia Had a Pentecostal Prime Minister. Did It Matter?
As Scott Morrison steps down, evangelicals assess the way he brought religion into politics.
Scott Morrison went to church. And he invited the journalists along too.
One month before Australia’s federal election in 2019, the prime minister traveled to Horizon Church, a Pentecostal congregation in New South Wales. He closed his eyes, raised his hands, and let the cameras click away.
The images drew a sharp reaction from a public uncomfortable with charismatic worship—and from Christians who saw it as a publicity stunt.
But then Morrison won. His Liberal-National Coalition (LNC)—a center-right party—overcame the predictions of pollsters and secured 77 seats.
“I have always believed in miracles,” he said. “And tonight we’ve been delivered another one.”
Three years later, Morrison returned to the same church. Again the journalists followed. But this time the election didn’t go his way. The LNC lost to the Labor Party on May 21, and the next day Morrison stood up at Horizon Church and read a few passages from the Bible.
“At the last election, we really understood it was for such a time as this,” he said in an emotional three-minute talk. “And now we understand it was for such a time as that.”
As Morrison leaves office, evangelicals are assessing the way his faith interacted with his politics: how that was covered by the media, how it was viewed by the public, and how they would want Christians to act, as Christians, in the public sphere.
“Morrison’s faith has become a story because he is prominently and publicly Christian, as opposed to many past Christian prime ministers whose faith has been a more private affair,” said Chris Mulherin, an Anglican priest and the executive director of ISCAST (formally, the Institute for the Study …
Katy Perry’s ‘Dark Horse’ Prevails Over Christian Rapper’s Lawsuit
UPDATE: The pop star and her team no longer have to pay $2.8 million in damages in the copyright case.
Update (March 21, 2022): After a years-long legal battle between Christian rapper Flame and Katy Perry, “Joyful Noise” did not overtake &…
Announcing the Winners of Christianity Today’s First International Essay Contest
Wisdom, perspective, and theological understanding from Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Indonesian writers.
In 2021, we published more than 800 translations of Christianity Today articles into Spanish, Portuguese, French, Chinese (simplified and tradi…
Died: Labib Madanat, Who Showed the Bible to Palestinians and Israelis in Word and Deed
Son of Jordanian missionaries organized the Holy Land’s Bible societies and demonstrated the gospel’s love and forgiveness amid war and terror.
During his decades of ministry, Labib Madanat repeatedly passed through Israel’s main international ai…
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