Okay, face it – you clicked on this post because of its title…or maybe the picture. Either way, indulge me while I set it up. Radio Lab is one of my favorite radio programs that I almost never listen to. Not, I swear, because I don’t love it – it’s just that I rarely find the time to sit and listen – to anything! – for an hour, so even when I download episode after episode most of them sit in my iTunes queue waiting for my next road trip. But this Saturday I happened to be running some errands. A lot of errands. And since most of them involved lots of driving and only minimal in-and-out of the car, I got to listen to most of an...

I think it’s easy for a lot of folks to get intimidated by prayer. We come to it thinking that there’s a certain way to pray, a right way to pray (and therefore wrong ways to pray as well). Do you know what I mean? Certain phrases and ways of speaking that make a good prayer. If you’re from a more formal religious background, that probably means a certain number of “thees” and “thous,” as in, “Oh Lord, we beseech thee that that thou wouldst grant thy servant…” and so forth. If you’re from a more informal tradition, on the other hand, then the word “just” pops up with some regularity: “We just pray to you, Lord,...

Three weeks from today voters all over the country will take to the polls to elect a new President and a host of other public officials. In Minnesota, along with close to another dozen states, we will also have the opportunity to vote in a public referendum to change the constitution of our state so that it defines marriage as an estate solely between one man and one woman. Not surprisingly, this has occasioned impassioned rhetoric on both sides. This debate echoes, emulates, and informs similar conversations occurring in the church. I understand the passion in these conversations, knowing they stem from deep convictions about the Bible,...