That Was The Year That Was

My most popular posts from 2024

Except in the very important way it wasn’t, 2024 was a good year.

Among other personal and professional highlights… our kids got off to a great start in high school, I got to lead a tour of Scandinavia, and I spent part of my fall sabbatical helping to direct a successful conference. I launched a sabbatical blog where I could share updates on my research into the women’s history of my university, started publishing a serial version of my long-gestating college guide for Christian families (which will resume publication next week), reviewed books for Christianity Today and Current, and wrote a series on college for Church Leaders.

But for the second time in eight years, my sabbatical coincided with the election of Donald Trump to the White House. Which means that in a year when I had even more time than usual to write, politics took up far more of my attention than I wanted — e.g., inspiring three posts that were more popular than almost any of the other 189 published at The Pietist Schoolman in 2024.

Still, I also had time to “think in public” about history, teaching, the liberal arts, and various aspects of my faith as a follower of Jesus — my favorite subjects to contemplate and communicate. So before we start what’s sure to be an eventful, thought-provoking 2025, let me look back once more at what seemed to connect best with you all in 2024.

Pixabay

My Ten Most-Read Substack Posts of 2024…

1. I Hope I’m Wrong (November 7)

2. “There Is No Real Choice This November” (July 9)

3. Prophet Without Honor (May 21)

4. What’s a “Minnesota Lutheran”? (August 13)

5. Beyond Denominations (October 31)

6. Who’s an Evangelical? (September 12)

7. A Liberal Arts College, If You Can Keep It (December 12)

8. Why Is It So Hard to Make Good College Choices? (October 22)

9. What’s the Future of the Historian? (October 17)

10. The Best History Books of 2024? (December 4)

I didn’t count them for that list, since they weren’t really “my” posts, but also very popular were my interview about homeschooling with

Dixie Dillon Lane

and the time I shared a Confession of Evangelical Conviction that’s as relevant after the 2024 election as before.

…Five You May Have Missed…

Most of this year’s top 10 came from the last months of 2024, both because they were tied in some way to the presidential election and because my list of subscribers got a lot longer this fall.

So especially for those of you who are newer to The Pietist Schoolman, let me recommend a few posts from earlier in the year that are more typical of my writing:

• Four Questions about History (February 13)

• Easter Sunday Devotions: Life Wins (March 31)

• Is the Future of Christian Colleges “Post-Evangelical”? (April 4)

• A Christian Tribute to a Public School (June 6)

• The Irenic Spirit (June 27)

…and the Year’s Ten Most-Clicked Links

Finally, I always end this post by looking back through my Saturday posts (“That Was The Week That Was”), to see which of the links I shared got the most clicks. As so often in the past decade, news stories and opinion pieces related in some way to Christian debates over sexuality were especially popular.

1. Jonathan Merritt, “Conservative Christians just lost their scholarly trump card on same-sex relationships,” RNS (April 8)

2. Peter Wehner and Richard Hays, “‘A God Who Continually Surprises Us’: A Q&A With a Theologian Who Changed His Mind About Gay Marriage,” New York Times (November 24)

3. Reid Forgrave, “How Minnesota’s biggest church grows as others shrink,” The Minnesota Star Tribune (October 4)

4. Ethan Meyers, “Calvin University board charged with examining faculty dissent,” RNS (June 27)

5. John Fea, “Big changes at Trinity International University, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and the Evangelical Free Church,” Current (March 5)

6. Rondall Reynoso, “What Do People See? Exploring the Last Supper Vs. Bacchanalia Debate,” Faith on View (July 29)

7. Walter Brueggemann, “Out-Interpreting the Ten Commandments,” Church Anew (July 17)

8. Dennis Sanders
   , “We Don’t Live in the Nineties Anymore,” Church and Main (May 1)

9. Bob Smietana, “Feud with ex-president leads to lawsuit, alleged threats of violence at Calvin University,” RNS (April 15)

10. Nadya Williams
    , “The Holy Family and Mine,” Christianity Today (December 11)

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Thanks for subscribing, reading, and sharing, and may you have a very happy New Year!