Free Republic

CNN)Both cite the same Bible. Both follow the same Jesus. And both talk about the sanctity of life. And yet both stand on opposite sides of the contentious debate over abortion. Trent Horn, an author, speaker and podcaster, is a Roman Catholic and an opponent of abortion rights. Laura Ellis supports legal abortion rights and is project manager at Baptist Women in Ministry, a Baptist group that advocates for women in ministry. Both personify the divisions over abortion in the church — and show how complex the issue can be when two smart and well-informed people cite scripture to support...

The Brute. The Buck. And, of course, the Thug. Those are just some of the names for a racial stereotype that has haunted the collective imagination of White America since the nation's inception. The specter of the angry Black man has been evoked in politics and popular culture to convince White folks that a big, bad Black man is coming to get them and their daughters. I've seen viral videos of innocent Black men losing their lives because of this stereotype. I've watched White people lock their car doors or clutch their purses when men who look like me approach....

...Historians may remember Obama as the nation’s first black president, but he’s also a religious pioneer. He’s not only changed people’s perception of who can be president, some scholars and pastors say, but he’s also expanding the definition of who can be a Christian by challenging the religious right’s domination of the national stage. Obama is a progressive Christian who blends the emotional fire of the African-American church, the ecumenical outlook of contemporary Protestantism, and the activism of the Social Gospel, a late 19th-century movement whose leaders faulted American churches for focusing too much on personal salvation while ignoring the...