Plain Speech with Philip Gulley

I have shed no tears for the death of Ali Hosseini Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, killed in a joint attack by US and Israeli forces. He was, from what I gather, a ruthless fundamentalist, silencing those whose beliefs differed from his own. Fundamentalists are a menace, contributing little to our betterment. Invariably, they are misogynistic, creating a world injurious to women. I feel no o...

Some time ago, I was invited to speak in Ashtabula, Ohio for the National Day of Prayer. I had identified as a religious progressive a dozen years before, so was surprised to be invited to speak at an evangelical event. The National Day of Prayer folks would have us believe they represent all Christians everywhere, but they’re mostly right-wing whackadoodles and have been since Billy Graham kicked...

In 1997, when my first book was published by an evangelical publisher in Oregon, I met another author published by the same company. His name was Josh Harris, whose book, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, helped kick start the purity movement within American Evangelicalism. The movement emphasized modest dress for women, imposed strict gender roles, and discouraged dating. Evangelical churches held purity...

The world collapsed on January 1, when Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as the new mayor of New York City while resting his hand on the Quran. At least that was the consensus of the Christian Nationalists, who donned their sackcloth, sat on their ashes, and wailed away, predicting the imminent return of Jesus on the clouds to carry the Christians to heaven and boot the Muslims down to hell. Donald Trum...

Dear Friends, My wife has fall break this week, so we will be traveling to visit our new grand twins. I will be holding them instead of writing, but I’ll be back in the saddle next Monday. In the meantime, enjoy this essay about participating in the No Kings Rally this past weekend. Please don’t hesitate to share it on your social media platforms, so we can generate support for our efforts to save...

I had this Sunday off and took advantage of my down time by catching up on current events. When reading the news, I learned the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseith. is summoning the generals and admirals to Quantico this Tuesday to lecture them on the warrior ethos. President Trump will also speak. There will be some who will joke about Pete Hegseth lecturing on the warrior ethos after allegedly a...

Since the shooting death of Charlie Kirk, I’ve read numerous editorials on the topic, all of them beginning with a denunciation of gun violence. I hate gun violence as much as the next Quaker. We haven’t yet figured out how to feed the world, but we know how to kill everyone in the world 130 times over, thanks to guns and bombs. I take this personally, not wanting the people I love to die even onc...

In 2003, Jim Mulholland and I, concerned about the toxic spread of evangelical Christianity, authored a book called If Grace Is True. It proposed, among other things, that the grace of God was not confined to Christians, that God equally cherished people in other religions, and that God was unswervingly committed to their temporal and eternal well-being. We also said the elevation of Jesus to divi...

In a recent conversation with my younger son, I criticized Donald Trump and was cautioned against becoming an angry old man. When I was growing up, an angry old man lived up the street from us. He yelled at us for walking on the public sidewalk in front of his house, which made us more determined to walk on the public sidewalk in front of his house. He was the only adult in our lives my parents sa...

My wife and I are on vacation this Labor Day weekend, visiting our son, his wife, and their son, who turned three on August 31st. I can never remember which months have 31 days, but now that my grandson was born on the 31st, I know August is one of them. I could not tell you the other six to save my soul. Our daughter-in-law is bursting at the seams, expecting twins by the end of September, a boy...

This past Thursday, the news feed on my iPhone informed me that James Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, had died at the age of 89, proving once again that only the good die young. If I were to have written a novel and gone in search of a demon, I would have created James Dobson, a man who had a knack of making evil seem kind, of making the profane seem holy, of making the absurd seem lik...

The closest store to our farmhouse is a Dollar General. As a rule, I avoid its crowded, unkempt aisles, but our well-water has a high sulfur content, so we buy drinking water at the Dollar General. On a recent trip, on my way to the water aisle, I passed through the home decorating section and noticed a gold medallion. I had seen that medallion before hanging on a wall. But where? Then I remembere...

It occurred to me that America these days is like the jock in high school all the girls wanted to date, but took up drink, put on 150 pounds, then showed up at the 25th class reunion with his fourth wife, thinking he was still a stud. Whatever appeal he once had is long gone, and everyone knows it but him. In his mind, he is still the greatest, still number one, still the object of envy, still wor...

I know a woman whose husband was so lazy she worked long hours to compensate for his lack of effort. He repaid her diligence by treating her with contempt. She came to me asking for advice and I suggested she stop subsidizing her mistreatment and divorce him, which she did, dramatically improving her life. Similarly, every year the state of California sends $83 billion more dollars to the federal...

Have you ever met someone who reminded you of someone else? When I first heard Pete Buttigieg, I was reminded of Richard Lugar, another well-spoken, intelligent Hoosier. When I met my wife, she reminded me of Katharine Hepburn, with whom she shared a classy, no-nonsense manner. I’m sure my rugged good looks reminded her of Spencer Tracy. When Donald Trump emerged on the political scene, I felt a s...

It is good to be with you all today. When I was invited to be here, I thought back to my earliest memory of Nashville, when I was 21 years-old and had just met my wife. I said, “Let’s go to Nashville,” and she agreed, so we drove down from Plainfield to spend the day and were in a little shop where I saw a stuffed rabbit made out of a white tube sock. I thought it was cute, so bought it for her, t...

I was scrolling through my news feed this past Saturday and saw the headline, “Quakers Condemn Police Raid as Six Arrested in Westminster Meeting House.” My initial reaction was one of anger and disbelief, fearing the police in question were members of ICE and the meetinghouse was in America. I was only slightly mollified to learn the Westminster Meeting House was in England and not the United Sta...