January (Web-only) 2001

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Christianity Today: "Not the work of grim, humorless, self-important, easily offended Bible thumpers"
Evangelicals, says Mark I. Pinsky, author of this month's Christianity Todaycover story, want to understand their image. "There has always been interest in seeing themselves as others see them," he tells Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg. "To see how they are viewed by the culture at large, particularly that they are viewed favorably or neutrally. The idea is: 'Here's a view from Hollywood—the Belly of the Beast—and they think we're decent people. How surprising.'" Pinsky was commenting particularly on his article on The Simpsons' television character Ned Flanders. But he could also have been talking about some of the buzz Christianity Today has been getting lately. Notable is Steinberg's column (Weblog readers will remember Steinberg as the subject of a Weblog "How offensive is this article?" contest). After reading Pinsky's article, he writes, "Wow. … This isn't the work of the grim, humorless, self-important, easily offended Bible thumpers who populate the cliche bigotries of my secret heart. This is new, at least to me." Somehow, Steinberg still manages to again bring the whole conversation back to sex, suggesting that evangelicals have only recently discovered that copulation can be fun. That's a little off, but we'll take the compliment.

Our cover story also received notice from Chicago's Fox affiliate, but there's nothing online about the segment to link to. Nor can we link to a New York Newsday piece that noted our Trent Dilfer profile. We can, however, note praise from another source: Contentville.com's "religious and spiritual magazines expert" Winifred Gallagher. "If you want to start ...