Sightings Articles
The Blinding Idol
Daniel Owings discusses the shortcomings of idolatry imagery for understanding Donald Trump...
October 17, 2019
Sharpiegate, or the Origins and Ends of Democracy
What does #Sharpiegate teach us about the place of religion in the future, or the end, of democracy? ...
September 23, 2019
Tangled in Apocalyptic Thought
President Donald Trump had a historic day on August 21, 2019. In less than twenty-four hours, he was declared “like the King of Israel” by conservative commentator (and Jewish convert to Christianity) Wayne Allen Root, and declared himself, in an ent...
September 2, 2019
Michael Cohen, Never Again
As I stood at my computer at 6 a.m. last Thursday morning reading Michael Cohen’s prepared statement to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, one passage in particular jumped out at me: “I have always tried to live a life of loyalty, f...
March 7, 2019
Male, Female, and Transgender: Notes from Theological Anthropology
Scripture, tradition, reason, and experience do not speak univocally. ...
November 8, 2018
What Trump's "Lies" Have to Do with (Political) Religion
president-as-crime-boss analogy...
April 19, 2018
Trump and the Inward Light
The U.S. president’s unilateral decision in December 2017 to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel understandably precipitated a storm of protest in the world of Realpolitik, and was immediately condemned almost unanimously by the United Natio...
January 18, 2018
Civil Religion and Civil Battles
In the time that’s elapsed since Sightings published my essay “Redefining the American Civil Religion” (October 6, 2017), it seems that positions of those on both ends of the political spectrum have hardened, while those in the center have become eve...
January 18, 2018
Trumpism Redux
Editor’s Introduction In the summer and fall of 2016, during the run-up to the U.S. presidential election, Sightings published a series of essays on the Trump phenomenon, or “Trumpism” (if such a thing can in fact be defined), and what it revealed...
January 18, 2018
Intense Religion and Donald Trump
Many people were surprised when Donald Trump became U.S. president, considering him a long-shot candidate with a message more suited to the past than the present. But despite, and in some ways because of, social change, intensely religious Americans ...