Last week’s Southern Baptist Convention annual summer gathering produced more than just the widely-discussed decision to codify a ban on female pastors. Delegates — known as messengers — also passed a resolution condemning political violence and hateful speech. A separate resolution called for the humane treatment of people in the country illegally, while at the same time affirming that immigration enforcement is legitimate and rejecting rhetoric that dehumanizes or promotes nativism. The delegates additionally backed a resolution speaking out against anti-Semitic violence and conspiracy theories, with particular attention to those that emerged following the Hamas attack on Israel in 2023.
The United Nations is once more raising the alarm over violence targeting Christians in Nigeria. The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights reports being overwhelmed with accounts of Muslim terrorist attacks on believers in that country, with women bearing the heaviest burden. According to the U.N., there has been a sharp rise in kidnappings, sexual violence, forced marriages, and enforced disappearances — particularly in Nigeria’s northern and Middle Belt regions. At least two Muslim extremist organizations, Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province, are known to be operating in Nigeria. Critics have accused the Nigerian government of responding too weakly to the ongoing crisis.
Evangelical Christians continue to stand as one of President Trump’s most reliable voting blocs. A new AP-NORC poll shows that roughly two out of three white born-again Protestants gave Mr. Trump a thumbs-up on his overall job performance in April. That tracks with his electoral history — Mr. Trump earned the backing of about eight in ten White Evangelical Christian voters in both 2020 and 2024. A number of high-profile religious leaders have been among his most vocal supporters. Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, said he has been particularly appreciative of Mr. Trump’s creation of the Religious Liberty Commission. Jeffress himself testified before that commission about what he described as unfair scrutiny of his church by the IRS.
