Politics & Culture

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Medium •

AI and the Post-Culture Moment

This week, First Lady Melania Trump unveiled a humanoid robot at the White House and asked the country to imagine a near future in which artificial intelligence does not simply assist learning, but increasingly mediates it. In her remarks, she described a hypothetical AI tutor named “Plato,” always patient, always available, able to adapt to a student’s pace, prior knowledge, and emotional state, with the promised result of “a more complete person.” The event was not presented as a novelty. It w...
Medium •

Separate is Never Equal: Bad Bunny, “Football Is Ours,” and the Conservative Retreat

For much of America’s history, we lived with two of everything: two schools, two entrances, two water fountains, two sections of town, two versions of “public” — one for “us” and one for “them.” The logic behind this division was rarely dignified with an argument strong enough to survive daylight, let alone constitutional scrutiny.That sad state of affairs did not emerge because separate institutions were better. It emerged because separation was comfortable for those who owned the center. And i...
Medium •

Let’s Talk About Masks, Again…

ICE, Justice, and the strange moral boomerang of “masking for safety.”Back during the pandemic, when masks emerged as an issue, I read C.S. Lewis’s Til We Have Faces — the psychological retelling of the ancient Cupid/Psyche Myth. The crux of Lewis’s retelling is simple yet profound: we are often haunted by our own history. What we cannot bear to face, we rewrite. We cover. We rename. And then we act surprised when the world we have created becomes unrecognizable.Now, once again, six years after...
Medium •

The Real Minneapolis Question: What is the point of the state?

Minnesota’s shootings — and Washington’s rhetoric — force an old question back into the open: what is government for, and who is it meant to serve?In Minneapolis this month, two American citizens were killed during federal immigration enforcement actions. In the same week, a federal judge in Minnesota ordered the acting director of ICE to appear in court to explain repeated failures to comply with orders in detainee cases — an extraordinary escalation that speaks to a system straining under the...
Medium •

The Truth We Tread

On Juneteenth, Memory Must Triumph Over NostalgiaJuneteenth and the Weight of MemoryIt’s often difficult for White Americans to understand critical or harsh assessments of American history. In some ways this difficulty is understandable, so much of American history has been framed around the White experience, and has lionized white achievements and white achievers and the expense of more diverse, realistic, or minority experiences. For too many Americans, to focus on or elevate America’s histori...
Medium •

In Whom Do We Trust?

The offhand comment came during the final moments of a White House press briefing, but it revealed a deep fault line in American civic life.Pressed about the economic fallout from a new round of tariffs that sent markets reeling, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt replied: “Trust in President Trump. He knows what he’s doing. This is a proven economic formula.”No data. No rationale. No explanation of risk or cost. Just a confident assertion of faith in the man at the helm.It’s a curious...
Medium •

The Garden and the Sword: Should Christians Rethink Power in the Era of Trump?

W e live in a moment thick with threats — some real, some exaggerated, all politicized. Immigration, national security, and foreign policy have become flashpoints for a public discourse increasingly shaped by aggression and militancy. Since 2016, the Trump administration has championed a style of politics defined by force — rhetorical and literal — and many Christians have followed eagerly behind.Evangelicals in particular have shown strong alignment with hardline policies. A recent Lifeway Rese...
Medium •

Testing the Limits: Do the Bible’s Ends Always Justify Our Means?

(The third article in the Lenten Series on Faith and Politics)In Luke’s account of Christ’s temptation, Satan takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple and dares Him to throw Himself down, citing Scripture to suggest that God would surely rescue Him. The enemy’s challenge is clear: prove your identity, force God’s hand, and put Him to the test. Jesus responds with a rebuke, quoting Deuteronomy: “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.” (Luke 4:12, Deuteronomy 6:16).Satan’s final taunt i...
Medium •

How the Mighty Have Fallen: The Republican Party and the Cult of Power

If the right no longer believes in the wisdom of the people, then what exactly is it conserving?William F. Buckley Jr. famously quipped that he would rather be governed by the first two thousand names in the Manhattan phone book than by the faculty of Harvard. His reasoning was simple: expertise alone does not confer wisdom, nor does it guarantee good governance. But how far have we fallen that today’s right-wing populists — who once championed the virtue of common sense over technocratic elitis...
Medium •

With Successes Like These, Who Needs Victories?

Trump and Musk’s attack on USAID is a victory for small government — but at what cost?In 280 BC, King Pyrrhus of Epirus, a highly regarded military commander and hired mercenary, led his forces into Italy at the behest of the Greek city of Tarentum. His campaign was meant to check Rome’s expansion, but it quickly became an exercise in self-destruction. At the Battle of Heraclea, Pyrrhus achieved a narrow victory against the Romans, inflicting heavy losses. However, his own forces — especially hi...
Medium •

Disordered Amoris: What JD Vance Gets Wrong About Love

J.D. Vance’s recent remarks on ordered love have set off a predictable furor. In a brief clip circulating online, Vance argues that there is a Christian hierarchy of obligations: “You love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens, and then after that, prioritize the rest of the world.” He then asserts that “a lot of the far left has completely inverted that.” The statement is simple, intuitive, and — to many conservativ...
Medium •

A Salute to Shame: Musk, Martin, and Germany’s Ghosts

In recent weeks, public debate has been ignited by a series of controversial gestures. The first, during President Trump’s inauguration, Elon Musk made a gesture that many interpreted as a Roman or Nazi salute. The second, Episcopal Priest Calvin Martin seemingly emulated Musk’s gesture at the March for Life rally. Concurrently, Germany has witnessed the rise of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, a far-right political movement gaining significant traction, with Musk’s suppport. These dispa...
Medium •

A Church Set Apart: The Barmen Declaration and the Perils of Christian Nationalism

On January 21, 2025, during the National Prayer Service at Washington National Cathedral, Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington stood at the pulpit and delivered a sermon that would soon ignite a firestorm. Directly addressing President Donald Trump, she called upon him to govern with mercy, to remember the vulnerable, and to show compassion to the marginalized — immigrants, the poor, LGBTQ+ individuals, and those who feared his administration’s policies. Her words we...
Medium •

When Inescapable Hate… meets Unavoidable Love

When one turns on the TV, goes online, or logs onto social media, there is little doubt about the presence of hate within our culture. Increasingly, our politics and our discourse are filled with invective and vitriol that used to be reserved for times of war, or maybe Thanksgiving dinners. We have blocked our neighbors and ostracized our families, all because of their politics. Ironically, what we often condemn in others we would be well-advised to avoid in ourselves. As Hermann Hesse, the Nob
ERLC •

Why evangelicals must speak up about anti-Semitism : 3 things to understand about the Jewish people

Recently, there have been a string of violent attacks against the Jewish community in America. 2019 saw an almost unprecedented increase in hostility toward American Jewry; from a vandalized synagogue in Beverly Hills and a desecrated cemetery in Nebraska, to a series of knife attacks and shootings in New York and New Jersey. In New York alone, in one week, there were nine acts of violence against Jewish people. Long known as one of the few places where it is OK to be a Jew, America is becoming
Providence •

Christian Missions: Divine Calling or Cause for Concern?

The theme of the latest print issue of Providence is the sometimes conflicted and often contentious relationship between Christian missions and US foreign policy. There are few arenas of public engagement where the precepts of Christian theology and the politics of American statecraft come in such proximity to one another. This interaction is unavoidable, and missionaries and international relations practitioners would do well to understand its origins and effects. The Gospel writers Luke and M
Providence •

The Burden of Leadership

A common myth in antiquity is that of Sisyphus. He makes an appearance in classic works by Homer, Ovid, and Plato and in modern poetry by Albert Camus. Sisyphus was the king of Corinth in ancient Greece and was known as much for his achievements as the avarice which followed. Like many who suffer the blessing of success, he attempted to prolong the same by cheating death. While he prevailed in eluding death, he was cursed with an eternal burden. It was the fate of Sisyphus to lift a great stone
Providence •

The Fault in Our Stars: Tyson, Trump, and the Search for Human Worth

America’s collective consciousness has been assaulted of late by the rapid-fire reports of mass shootings across the country. What was once an almost unthinkable rarity has become a commonplace crime. This has lead to the posting of travel warnings by foreign governments, looking after the safety of their own citizens traveling to the US. Scarcely a week passes between tragedies, and in the case of this past weekend mere hours. When these events occur we are caught between simultaneous impulses
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Podcasts and Interviews

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Providence •

ProvCast Ep. 37: Islamic Exceptionalism — A Defense of Religion in the Public Square

Drew Griffin was managing editor for Providence. He holds a BA in political science from the University of Arkansas and a MDiv in biblical and theological studies from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is a veteran of over a dozen political campaigns and is a featured writer and speaker on the intersection of faith and culture. For three years he served as director of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary extension center in NYC and was a professor of Theology at the New York Sch
Providence •

Ep. 42: The National Conservative Divide — A Conversation with David French

Drew Griffin was managing editor for Providence. He holds a BA in political science from the University of Arkansas and a MDiv in biblical and theological studies from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is a veteran of over a dozen political campaigns and is a featured writer and speaker on the intersection of faith and culture. For three years he served as director of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary extension center in NYC and was a professor of Theology at the New York Sch