“It is time to take the full measure of certain arguments widely cherished by churchmen to excuse Soviet practice and minimize the Soviet threat” – Henry P. Van Dusen in 1946, responding to Christians who thought the West’s actions caused tensions with the USSR.

Toward the end of World War II, Americans contemplated the possibility of “world government” to prevent another catastrophe, especially after the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japan.

In 1946, Reinhold Niebuhr visited an evangelical church for an Easter worship service in a movie theater. He did not entirely enjoy the experience. Here are his reflections.

In this article originally published by Christianity and Crisis on March 18, 1946, Charles W. Gilkey warns Americans not to worry that helping people abroad will make them “suckers.”

“A Christian knows, or ought to know, that an adequate Christian political ethic is not established merely by conceiving the most ideal possible solution for a political problem. He must, in all humility, deal with the realities of human nature, as well as the ideal possibilities.”

Christian Realism is our theme at Providence, and Christian Realism was the theme of George Washington’s life that America celebrates with today’s federal holiday.

Quoting Romans 12:20, the message to feed and help the enemy is simple, but oftentimes the simplest command can be the hardest to fulfill. So the reminder is always timely in every age.

America remains the world leader. This fact is naïve to reject and realistic to accept. It is the American Century still.

It’s been a sad day for American democracy. Our republic will survive but it has been uniquely wounded by the nation’s elected chief magistrate, as none of his predecessors across 230 years would have ever considered.