Certainty and Its Costs: What Two Wyoming Books Say About the Future of American Faith

Two writers from Wyoming published books on American Christianity in the same month, and the pairing is more instructive than coincidence. According to Cincinnati Magazine, Jason Hentschel, pastor of Wyoming Baptist Church, brought out Desiring Certainty: The Making of Biblical Inerrancy (Eerdmans Publishing), while his neighbor Sarah Stankorb, a professional journalist, published Damned If She Does: Why Women Quit Church and What It Means for the Future of Religion (Broadleaf Press). Both appeared in September. They will discuss the books together at 7 p.m. November 10 at Wyoming Community Coffee. What the pairing means, read as one argument rather than two, is this: American Christianity's current turmoil is not primarily a fight over belief but a fight over authority — who gets to claim it, on what grounds, and what happens to the people on the receiving end.

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