Two of the world’s best religious freedom researchers now have a Substack

Religious freedom is a central issue for virtually all global Christian leaders. If you care about this topic, you should subscribe to a new Substack page—even if you have to stop reading my Substack to make time for a new one.

Dennis Petri (whom I interviewed last February) and Ronald MacMillan have launched Five4Faith, promising posts on how faith shapes global affairs that will take 5 minutes or less to read.

MacMillan authored the first post, presenting a lucid, hard-hitting analysis of why bombing northwestern Nigeria will not solve the religious freedom problems there.

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In another post, Petri discussed the likely implications of the US invasion of Venezuela for religious freedom, based on his extensive research on the Maduro’s politically strategic treatment of Christian groups—rewarding loyalty and punishing his critics.

Petri is especially helpful in delineating things that should happen in the upcoming weeks if the US is really serious about advancing freedom in Venezuela and not just putting on a nice show while its main interest is in oil revenues.

Not only are Petri and MacMillan experienced, sophisticated researchers, but their independence makes them credible voices.

They have no political agenda or obligations to patrons. As a result, they can unreservedly pursue the truth and report it honestly.

All of us can fall pray to making biased judgments. For instance, those who strongly oppose the Trump administration can forget that just as a broken clock is right twice a day, even a madman can stumble into a good policy decision occasionally.

The best way to avoid bias is to develop a rigorous research methodology and follow it faithfully and transparently. That’s what Petri and MacMillan do.

I too aspire to avoid bias in my analysis and journalistic work. I welcome your feedback when I’m doing a good job or especially when you think I’m not.

I’ll stop here and leave you some time to sign up for Five4Faith and read a post or two.

Bruce Barron, author or coauthor of seven books on religion and politics and a former US congressional aide, was editor of the World Evangelical Alliance’s theology journal from 2018 to 2024. Subscribe to his blog at brucebarron.substack.com.