Iowa Republicans set the date for the state’s first-in-the-nation caucus for January 15 as the race for the GOP 2024 presidential nomination heats up.

The date was chosen by the Iowa Republican’s State Central Committee and will fall on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a federal and state holiday. 

“We remain committed to maintaining Iowa’s cherished first-in-the-nation caucuses and look forward to holding a historic caucus in the coming months and defeating Joe Biden come November 2024,” Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Jeff Kaufmann said in a statement. 

The race for the GOP presidential nomination currently includes former President Donald Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, political commentator Larry Elder, and North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum. 

Most polling has shown Trump leading and DeSantis in second place. Both campaigns have made recent appearances in Iowa, with Trump speaking in Council Bluffs on Friday.

 “No president has ever been close to me for farmers,” the former president said at a rally, adding that he was “the most pro-farmer president in history” 

On Thursday, DeSantis’s wife, Casey, launched the national version of “Mamas for DeSantis” in Iowa alongside Governor Kim Reynolds, who has not made any formal endorsements in the race. 

The 2024 election schedule for the Democrats, in which President Joe Biden is being challenged by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Marianne Williamson, is turning out to be a bit more complicated.

Historically, both Iowa and New Hampshire have voted ahead of South Carolina. But after a chaotic 2020 caucus, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) moved to make South Carolina the party’s first voting state, part of a reshuffling that DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison said was made in part to prioritize non-white voters.

For 2024, Iowa Democrats have proposed also holding their nominating contest on January 15, which would come before the planned South Carolina primary on February 3, but with possible concessions such as withholding the results until other states have voted and including a mail-in option.

“No matter what, Iowa Democrats are committed to moving forward with the most inclusive caucus process in Iowa’s history,” Iowa Democratic Chairwoman Rita Hart said on Saturday, adding that the party “did not have a chance to have any input on the choice of this date.”

“We’re committed to doing what’s good for Democrats, what’s good for Iowa, and what’s good for democracy,” she added. 

Hart previously said that the decision demonstrated that Democrats had “turned their back on Iowa and rural America.”

New Hampshire Democrats may buck the DNC’s changes, as it is required by state law to hold the first primary, whereas Iowa holds a caucus. Primaries are run by state and local governments whereas caucuses are run by political parties.

An archbishop in the Church of England said the opening of the “Lord’s Prayer” is considered “problematic” to some people because the 2,000-year-old prayer starts by addressing God as “Our Father.”

Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell told the General Synod, the legislating and ruling body of the Church of England, that referring to God as “father” might be offensive to some people because of the negative connotations of patriarchy. 

“I know the word ‘father’ is problematic for those whose experience of earthly fathers has been destructive and abusive, and for all of us who have labored rather too much from an oppressively patriarchal grip on life,” Cottrell said, according to The Guardian.

Cottrell was referring to the prayer that Jesus Christ taught his disciples in Matthew 6:9–13 and Luke 11:2–4.

Conservatives within the church took issue with Cottrell’s words, while liberals supported the sentiments expressed by the archbishop. 

“Is the archbishop of York saying Jesus was wrong, or that Jesus was not pastorally aware? It seems to be emblematic of the approach of some church leaders to take their cues from culture rather than scripture,” said Dr. Chris Sugden, a church official and chair of Anglican Mainstream, a conservative organization within the church. 

Calvin Robinson, a conservative commentator and deacon in the Free Church of England, also critiqued Cottrell’s comments.

“We call it the ‘Lord’s Prayer’ because it is the prayer the Lord gave us. He taught us to pray it. We call God ‘Our Father’ because that is how he instructed us to address him. Is the Archbishop saying Christ was wrong? That God made a mistake?” Robinson said on Twitter. 

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Currently, the Church of England is looking at using “gender-neutral” pronouns for God, instead of the masculine pronouns used in the Bible. 

“Christians have recognized since ancient times that God is neither male nor female,” a spokesperson for the church said in February. “Yet the variety of ways of addressing and describing God found in scripture has not always been reflected in our worship.”

The Bible refers to God using masculine pronouns throughout both the Old and New Testaments. Jesus, who Christians believe to be fully human and fully God, came to Earth in bodily form as a man, and Christians believe that he still has a physical body.