Hi John,

Just read your blog posts on homosexuality -- very insightful. I am a homosexual man myself. However, I am extremely effeminate (not to the point of transgenderism), and I was wondering: What are your thoughts on males who behave like females (wearing make-up, into fashion, etc.) Sometimes, I...

Dear John,

First, I want to thank you for doing what you do. I've been reading your books, blogs, facebook, etc. for a while now. I've had friends who just don't think God wants them the way they are, and I've pointed them to your writings many, many times. I...

The Christian who believes homosexuality to be an abominable sin against God invariably points to the Bible as justification for this belief. What else can they do? Such a person isn't about to blame themselves for their bigotry. The Bible is all they have: There exists virtually no other "proof"...

We're all awfully busy these days. But we're all also of course deeply interested in what's happening around our current national conversation about guns.

If you missed the NRA's response to the Sandy Hook tragedy -- being the speech read last Friday by the...

So here we now have on us this unthinkable Newtown tragedy. And we know the cycle of our response to such events: first shock, then grief, then anger, then a slow fade until whatever news next rivets our attention. That's how it's done. That's how we all do it.

Except...

Today is Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR), which every Nov. 20 memorializes those killed by hatred or fear of transgender and gender non-conforming people. TDOR was founded in 1998 in response to the murder of Rita Hester, a transgender African American woman who was murdered in Allston, Mass., on Nov....

Dear John,

As a progressive Christian in the red state of Kentucky, I struggle with separating my belief in Jesus from the conservative, hellfire Christians I am surrounded by everywhere I look. My religious neighbors have so nicely informed me that yoga is spiritually dangerous and that Obama is a...

Dear John,
A good friend of mine suggested I contact you.

I am now at the end of a five-year relationship and I am feeling lost as to what happened. We have had no fights, no disagreements and no infidelity. All of a sudden, it is just over. I...

I recently received the letter below, which is followed by my answer. Please share this with anyone you know who is struggling with this same sort of issue.

I was raised in a Christian family, and have professed my faith since I was a young child. I was also...

Right off the bat let me confess that what I find irresistibly appealing about Kevin Miller's new documentary Hellbound? is that I was supposed to be in it. At the time Miller was planning his movie my blog posts on hell were hotter than Satan's sauna. (Those pieces have since...

I was recently asked to write a few words of support and love for the members of two Facebook groups, Independent Fundamental Baptist (IFB) Cult Survivors and Do Right Hyles-Anderson.

If you're unfamiliar with the beliefs and practices of the Independent Fundamental Baptists, some of them are:
...

Professor Malachi tapped a file resting in the middle of his desk. "Let's consider this candidate right here. The man's a homosexual."

Arthur shifted in his chair. "I think he goes to hell," he said.

"Are you certain of that?"

Arthur paused, in case he wasn't. He wanted to impress...

Dear John Shore,

It's taken me forever to write this, because it will reveal me to be a whiny, privileged, guilt-ridden wimp. But I'm writing it anyway. I guess because I'm such a wimp I can't even stand up to my desire to not be revealed as a wimp. Go...

Yesterday Chad Holtz left a comment on a post of mine from May 2011, "What Jesus Really Meant by the Story of Lazarus," in which I suggest that the parable is not, as it's traditionally accepted to be, intended as a lesson about the reality of a literal hell,...

Hi John:

What's your take on the legitimacy of pagan practices and rituals: devil worship, praying to pagan gods, etc.? Do those have real effects, or has that been exaggerated by fundamental Christians? I recently stumbled upon a few pagan blogs via a friend of mine, and the stuff there...

In response to my post "'It's no sin to be gay.' See how easy that is, Andrew Marin?" folks have made the point that Andrew's work is valuable, because he is "building bridges" -- because he is, as one reader put it, "creating stepping stones from one...

Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, has written a letter to Lois G. Lerner, director of the IRS's Exempt Organizations Division, in which he requests that Ms. Lerner consider that in this sermon Pastor...

You almost feel sorry for Pastor Worley. At the moment I published NC pastor: "Let's put all the queers and lesbians behind electric fences and let them die," the video of Worley preaching that all gay people should be sequestered behind electrical fences and left to die had been...