This past year we saw big changes under the second Trump administration as well as violence in the US and abroad. The news team looked back on what we covered to rank what we saw as the most significant developments for the church. (Christianity Today)
Read MoreNew Year's resolutions are a key part of how many people observe the holiday, as much of an annual tradition as the Times Square ball drop or a midnight champagne toast. The concept of taking stock and vowing to do better in the new year actually dates back centuries, though there wasn't always a pithy name for it. (Treisman, NPR)
Read MoreReaders bought about 184 million print adult fiction books this year. That’s roughly as many as they bought last year and 66 million more than in 2019, the last year before the pandemic gave book sales a jolt. (Harris & Alter, The New York Times)
Read MoreI’ve spent a lot of time over the past year talking to frustrated conservative Christians. They complain about their fellow believers’ tendency to make idols out of political power. But they also criticize the media’s simplistic depictions, especially in stories about Christian nationalism and a movement known as the New Apostolic Reformation. (Worthen, The New York Times)
Read MoreIt is one of the most surprising music stories of the year. While streams of new music — releases from the last 18 months — were down from last year, one genre is on the rise: Christian and gospel music, according to industry data and analytics company Luminate’s 2025 Midyear Report. (Sherman, AP News)
Read MoreFive families [have filed] wrongful-death lawsuits against OpenAI in recent months, alleging that the world’s most popular chatbot had encouraged their loved ones to kill themselves. A sixth suit filed this month alleges that ChatGPT led a man to kill his mother before taking his own life. (Tiku & Schaul,The Washington Post)
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