John Murdock

Let’s keep Christianity weird.” So said the Southern Baptists’ official face to the nation, Russell Moore, as he closed an address on “prophetic minorities” before a thousand pastors, artists, social entrepreneurs, and assorted others at latest edition of Q. “What is Q?” you might ask like a local woman did to me as I snapped a picture of the ten-foot-tall reclaimed wood logo that stood outside a historic hall in the shadow of the Tennessee capitol building. Telling her dryly that it was a gathering of hipster Christians only seemed to add to her confusion. (I overheard someone else try to explain it as a bit like TED for evangelicals, which apparently left his native inquisitor as perplexed as mine.) Even the basics can be cloudy—every participant I asked assumed the “Q” stood for “question” but no one really knew for sure, and Q’s website holds no direct answer. Continue Reading »

A few weeks back, I highlighted the friction between ascendant libertarians and ignored social conservatives at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). After some time to mentally digest that red meat laden all-you-can-eat political buffet, one nutritious morsel still stands out: the . . . . Continue Reading »

Pot was in and social conservatism was out. That is the best single sentence summary I can give after three exhausting and sometimes mind-numbing days at last week’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).The gathering is a media favorite partly for its colorful characters. One tall . . . . Continue Reading »

I am no stranger to incendiary language. Organizations on the left and the right alike use loaded language: words designed, not to foster thoughtful discourse, but simply to whip the like-minded into a lather. Still, this was one of the more incendiary paragraphs that I had read in a while: In . . . . Continue Reading »

In A Charlie Brown Christmas, Charlie Brown’s quest to escape a melancholy brought on by the materialism and artificiality climaxes with Linus’ powerful recitation of St. Luke’s nativity. Remembered now as a classic, the success of the special was by no means assured … Continue Reading »

“Do you have something by Muir to read?” asked a friend as I made last-minute preparations to embark for Yosemite National Park. The thought had previously crossed my mind, but his encouragement spurred me to action. Like Muir in 1869, I was off for My First Summer in the Sierra. I am so glad… Continue Reading »

The Independence Day fireworks over the National Mall are impressive to behold. Yet, watching from a hillside between Arlington National Cemetery and the Iwo Jima Marine War Memorial”both of which speak eloquently to the past sacrifices made for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”I could not shake my friend Os Guinness’s observations about “sunset societies.” … Continue Reading »

A crowd of about 35,000 had gathered near the Washington Monument during a cold blustery Presidents Day weekend in the midst of an unusually mild winter to prod the Obama administration to take actions against climate change. The largest climate action rally in American history had been scheduled for noon on a Sunday, not exactly a time chosen with regular church-goers in mind”though, undoubtedly, for some present the environmental cause would be the closest thing to a religion in their lives… . Continue Reading »

Abraham Lincoln, born on this day in 1809, is enjoying a banner year. Before January had passed, President Obama would place his own hand over the same Bible used by the sixteenth president and invoke Lincoln’s legacy to hundreds of thousands on the National Mall. In the wake of the inauguration, Lincoln’s name rolled just as effortlessly off the lips of pro-lifers gathered on the same ground to commemorate the fortieth sad anniversary of Roe v. Wade… . Continue Reading »

I am unable to forget the “March for Women’s Lives” held on a beautiful D.C. Sunday in April 2004. Its Orwellian event title referring to aborting mothers not unborn females: As the Indigo Girls sang and Whoopi Goldberg held up her coat-hanger, one of the largest banners in the crowd of thousands read “Pro-Life is to Christianity as al-Qaeda is to Islam.” … Continue Reading »