by Randall Balmer | Jul 22, 2026 | Opinion
In 1874, Lewis Miller and John Heyl Vincent, both Methodists, inaugurated the Chautauqua Lake Sunday School Association on the shores of Lake Chautauqua in western New York. The idea was to provide instruction for Sunday school teachers and out-of-school vacation...
by Randall Balmer | Jun 3, 2026 | Opinion
You really have to feel sorry for Robert Jeffress. The faithful are looking to the pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, which once claimed to be the world’s largest Baptist congregation, for political advice. He’s under some pressure to deliver. Over the past...
by Randall Balmer | May 14, 2026 | Opinion
Robert Downen’s superb article about Paul Pressler in the May issue of Texas Monthly may not have covered new ground. We are well aware of the tawdry beginnings of the conservative takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention as well as the moral failings of the...
by Randall Balmer | Apr 9, 2026 | Opinion
It’s a good rule of thumb that if Tony Perkins lines up on one side of an issue, it’s better to be on the other side. This is not merely because of Perkins’s history of entanglements with the Ku Klux Klan and the Council of Conservative Citizens, also known as the...
by Randall Balmer | Mar 3, 2026 | Opinion
Editor’s Note: The Baylor Line is the publication of the Baylor Line Foundation, which is an independent organization for alumni of Baylor University. An earlier version of this post described it as the student newspaper of Baylor, which is The Baylor Lariat. It...
