Pressing Pause

Small steps toward thriving families, schools, and communities

The Church Is Up Against It

Posted on January 3, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

Post pandemic congregants not returning to the pews. Evangelicals under Orange Jesus’s spell. Secularism running amok.

As if that’s not enough Oregon spanked Liberty 45-6 in the Fiesta Bowl. Add to that, today’s ESPN headline, “Grambling women beat College of Biblical Studies 159-18”.*

Don’t be surprised if historians point to the College of Biblical Studies loss as the church’s low point.

*Reminds me of one of the youngest’s middle school basketball games, which her team lost 49-7. “Dad,” she said afterwards, “we lost by the square root!”

Sentence To Make Grown Men and Women Cry

Posted on April 4, 2023 by Ron Byrnes

The last one in this short/live update from Jonathon Swan in the NYT on Trump’s Tuesday night speech at Mar-a-Lago.

“One theme to watch in the speech is how Trump portrays the nature of his victimhood. His advisers and allies have explicitly referenced scripture and the fate of Jesus Christ — a play to rally evangelical voters. Trump’s campaign spokesman, Steven Cheung, on Monday tweeted out a picture of a Trump supporter by the roadside in Florida holding a large wooden cross. Mr. Cheung quoted Ephesians 5:2, implying that Trump was imitating Christ’s sacrificial love through his handling of his criminal indictment in the porn star hush money case.“

Someone PLEASE tell me we’ve bottomed out.

Letter To Ponder

Posted on August 16, 2022 by Ron Byrnes

I appreciated Tim Alberta’s clarity about what is really at stake with the rise of far-right evangelicals. The unholy alliance between radically conservative Christianity and radically conservative politics doesn’t seek the kingdom of God; instead, it wants to impose a theocracy on the United States of America. Such a theocracy would cheapen the foremost requirement of the Christian faith: humbly carrying one’s cross daily.

Early Christians believed that following Jesus Christ transforms a person into a well of compassion, humility, kindness, and generosity. They put the needs of others before their own.

Theocracy does not require such an inner transformation; the evangelical-right base and its prophets are quick to condemn cherry-picked sins. Jesus, by contrast, said that the important matters of God’s commands are “justice, mercy, and faith.” I don’t think Jesus himself would fit with today’s evangelical base.

Reverend Vanessa J. Falgoust
Natchitoches, La.