Culture

I celebrate Christmas. Growing up as an atheist, December 25th was about a lot of things, but not the birth of Jesus. For many centuries before the birth of Christ, December 25th was similarly non-Christian. The present date for Christmas traces back to the 4th Century. When Constantine declared Christianity …

The older I get, the more aware I am of my own mortality. While I still think of myself as the same person I was twenty-five years ago, my mirror seems to tell another story. I’ve discovered that my unchanging sense of “self” (despite what I see in the mirror) …

While I was in Tempe a few years ago for a Campus Crusade event as ASU, I carved some time from a very busy schedule to hang out with Matthew Mittelberg, the young son of Christian Case Maker, Mark Mittelberg. Matthew was leading an apologetics club on the campus of …

Fewer people celebrated Father’s Day than ever before, a fact that may have less to do with the nature of the holiday than it does with the nature of American families. A recent U.S. census found that the percentage of children living in single parent households increased from 12% in …

The Journal of Social Psychological and Personality Science (SPPS) recently released a study demonstrating that religious people live longer. The study observed that “self-reported religious service attendance has been linked with longevity,” and confirmed this by examining obituaries from 43 U.S. cities. Researchers found that religiously affiliated people lived between 5.64 …

Recently, the Association for Library Service to Children renamed the award it gives authors or illustrators whose books “have made, over a period of years, a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children.” This award used to be called the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, but the association’s board decided …

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to train 80 high school students at Crossline Church here in southern California.  These students were capable and willing to engage the tough issues at a high level, and their churches and Christian high schools have embraced the mission. Students have a …

The number of self-proclaimed Christians is shrinking in America. I’ve been collecting data on this trend for over ten years, and the surveys reveal an important truth: Fewer people claim a Christian affiliation than ever before, and those who claim no religious affiliation are the fastest growing group in America. …

The recent suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain have renewed a national conversation about suicide and it’s causes. As a homicide detective, I saw an increase in our local suicide rate first-hand over a fifteen year period, and a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention …

In the days following a recent school shooting (this one in Santa Fe, Texas), family members, friends and investigators found themselves searching for illusive answers. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott summarized the effort: “Unlike Parkland, unlike Sutherland Springs, there were not those types of warning signs. The red-flag warnings were either nonexistent …