Not sure what I expected "Kanye's pastor" to do after Kanye moved on from "Jesus is King," but showing an elder nude photos of the elder's daughter ... was not it.

Press release of the day

Charismatic leader Ché Ahn isn't going to be the next governor of California. Is it worth paying attention to his political aspirations anyway? Maybe:

Why are people still joining Mark Driscoll's church? “The whole thing is about men and masculinity,” a former member said. “They have an obsession with Mark and like being close to him. Mark is always going to have people he can attract. He could kill someone and still have people follow him.”

An ecclesiastic court in the UK ruled that chairs — 35 of them, upholstered — are not allowed in a church in Buckinghamshire. And the 25 already acquired by the churchwarden are not allowed either. They are "not appropriate."

If I'm reading this correctly, a Catholic priest was convicted of sexual assault in part for pressuring / manipulation a woman into having sex with her husband. The husband, incidentally, worked at Baylor.

We went and saw the synchronous fireflies again. Makes you just feel awe to be on this planet.

The curious contract at the heart of a new $1.75 million lawsuit against Liberty University: signed by Jerrys Falwell, and promising the younger of the two could continue collecting a salary through 2030, even if he was fired.

It's wild how varied access to public documents is in different courts across America. In Houston Texas, everything's available free online. Johnson City, Tennessee, I have to upload my license to prove I live in the state. Lynchburg, Virginia, "public" documents are only available in person.

An abuse case is back in court in Houston today. Survivors are fighting the Assemblies of God over disclosure of evidence, who has to give a deposition, and legal jurisdiction. As the case drags on into year three, is it worth it? I asked their lawyer:

Pentecost, He Qi

Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Drug manufacturer Eli Lilly is accusing a Pentecostal bishop, two pastors and an elder of $250 million fraud. roysreport.com/pentecostal-...

Hillsdale College has had a steady flow of Catholic converts over the years. But recently a surge, according to the student newspaper.

Interesting to see how James Robison skated through a scandal—sex with a woman reported to be in her late teens who worked for him and lived with him—when other televangelists of the era saw empires implode.

Chick-fil-A is famously closed on Sundays for religious reasons. According to the federal government, a franchise in Texas failed to extend that same religious freedom to an employee who observes sabbath on Saturday

Who would follow self-appointed apostle David E. Taylor with his wild claims about healing and prophecy and power? One answer: A woman in her 30s with serious mental health challenges who believed she was irreparably damaged from childhood abuse unless she could be supernaturally healed

Today in the life of my Appalachian church, baby in the pews looks like she’s conducting the choir.

The journalism ethics rule seems straightforward: “Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived.” But I haven’t found it simple. For one thing, I keep getting assigned stories that involve the place I work.

Greg Locke's son Evan posted about struggles with addiction last year. He died of an overdose yesterday. “I just want to thank every single one of y’all for praying for me.”

Fantastic poetry reading with Marie Howe and Bruce Beasley at @amypete.bsky.social’s church in Asheville last night.

Big day for non-human monk news

Sometimes the quaintest things are hiding such horror

Raised my eyebrows a bit to see @kkdumez.bsky.social pop up in transcripts of a Illinois Human Rights Commission hearing. This is an elder at Dane Ortlund's PCA church:

Struggles of local history

Paul Pressler is one of the most influential figures you may have never heard of. The onetime judge remade the Southern Baptist Convention, and helped forge the marriage between the GOP and white evangelical voters. As he did so he also committed decades of alleged abuses. A long look at his legacy:

The glories of the internet: TBN's old headquarters have been demolished but you can take a virtual tour of the monument to televangelism's successes and excesses

A disturbing story out of Serbia

Some strange (and strained) allegations in this lawsuit the Newsboys filed against The Roys Report and more than two dozen companies and individuals in the contemporary Christian music industry.

Credit where credit. But new true crime podcasters probably shouldn't expect this

Not paying one marketing firm is an issue. Not paying four over a dozen years is a pattern. Also a lot of marketing for a prosperity preacher? Here are the receipts: roysreport.com/judge-freeze...

A trail of lawsuits, with records in state and federal courts in New York, California, and Texas, show Benny Hinn Ministries has routinely failed to pay marketing firms.

Sometimes it's like people ready @kkdumez.bsky.social Jesus and John Wayne as a "how to"

Wonder what made it worth that much

Land of milk and honey they said.

Poem for Sunday

Sometimes writing journalism is like writing horror with the mounting dread, the urge to yell "don't go in there."

The Bill Hybels-started Global Leadership Network shut down in the UK and Ireland without explanation. But the tax records tell a story.

If nondisclosure agreements are good actually, I don't see why orgs would work so hard to hide them

ProPublica with a notable update to journalistic code of ethics

Things you see in East Tennessee

The story is nugget after nugget of quintessential megachurch culture, leadership, and governance. And that the bad joke is a decade old and they needed a third witness to finally get pastor to admit he had a problem is just the starting point.

The sixth-largest megachurch in America has suspended its senior pastor for one month, after an investigation confirmed he touched a man’s crotch with a riding crop as a joke.

The ongoing Methodist fight over property in the church split has maybe turned up an interesting legal question in Florida: religionclause.blogspot.com/2026/04/flor...

Christian software engineer Cameron Pak has developed criteria for faith-based AI. Like, it must be clearly IDed as AI and “must not fabricate or misrepresent Scripture.” One interesting idea: AI *can't* pray for you.

Today in the life of my Appalachian church, the building and grounds committee gave a report at the board meeting and a bunch of it was about changing lightbulbs. After it went on for a while, one of the ministers said, See it sounds like it took a lot of people.

How a big Baptist church in Texas decided to abandon democracy:

Secrecy always seems like a bad sign

Crescent earth, as seen from the Artemis II mission.

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