Robley Anne

“At present, Dickson said, the American Church is suffering from “bully syndrome.” Too many Christians are swaggering around and picking on marginalized people and generally acting like jerks because they’re angry and apprehensive. “Every teacher will tell you, the bully on the playground is usually the most insecure boy. It’s a compensation mechanism. If the boy were truly confident, he wouldn’t need to throw his weight around,” Dickson said. “It’s the same with the Church. The bully Church is the insecure Church.”
― Tim Alberta, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism

“What’s wrong with American evangelicals?” Winans thought a moment. “America,” he replied. “Too many of them worship America.”
― Tim Alberta, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism

“We in the United States have such an inadequate view of what a Christian is called to be,” Newell told me. “The Bible tells us that we are broken beyond repair—all of us—and that Christ came to heal us. Churches are supposed to be hospitals for the sick. And once we’re healed, we’re supposed to be helping others get healthy, too.”
― Tim Alberta, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism

“In a modern evangelical culture that punishes uncertainty—where weakness is wokeness, where indecision is the wrong decision—asking pastors to provide all the other answers is a recipe for institutional ruin. Because what their congregants crave, more and more, is not so much objective religious instruction but subjective religious justification, a clergy-endorsed rationale for living their lives in a manner that might otherwise feel unbecoming for a Christian.”
― Tim Alberta, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism