Category: Theology
conservative Christian single payer health care: critiques & responses
First Things was gracious enough to publish my brief argument for single-payer health care from a conservative, Christian perspective. There was a lot that had to be cut due to space and a lot that I didn’t write simply because...
“Look at this ear I cut off, Lord!”
“Look at this ear I cut off, Lord! Isn’t it so bloody and ragged?” “Did you cut that off of… Philip’s head?” “Well, yeah, but did you hear what he said about…” I’m trying to stop sneering. My own tendencies...
Christian Moral Pedagogy and Penumbrae of Power
I think most Christians these days who are thinking about culture, society, and politics agree with Leslie Newbigin that Christians in the West today face the challenge of being missionaries in their own culture, and that the post-Christian pluralist West...
things that can be true at the same time
I’ve made these points at greater length in other essays, but I can’t seem to get people who disagree to push back in a meaningful way. So I’m trying a different strategy, for the skeptics who seem to think that...
an alternative ethic
In the current context, where everyone is talking about the world as a global village, it is important to undertake an exploration into the particularities of the indigenous world view of Africa. We wish to sample them because they have...
what if there’s nothing to assimilate to?
Shadi Hamid continues to be indispensable in thinking through issues of identity, belief, and assimilation in America: In short, Muslims are becoming more integrated, but they are becoming more integrated within only one half of the country, the Democratic one....
a letter from a Chinese pastor
This is a moving letter from a Chinese pastor arrested for preaching the Gospel: Those who lock me up will one day be locked up by angels. Those who interrogate me will finally be questioned and judged by Christ. When I...
“Shallow songs last for three years, and breed shallow believers that last for three years.”
Church Times has a fascinating (if somewhat meandering) report on the history and future of contemporary worship music: In fact, almost from the start, much of the critique of contemporary worship music has emerged from within the movement. Wimber was...
there may have been a manger, but it wasn’t a stable
Stop your nativity pageants! What, then, does it mean for the kataluma to have ‘no space’? It means that many, like Joseph and Mary, have travelled to Bethlehem, and the family guest room is already full, probably with other relatives who arrived earlier....
john the baptist and the advent calendar
Fleming Rutledge digs into the curious omission of John the Baptist from our advent calendar: It would be hard to say which is more alien to our contemporary ideas of getting ready for Christmas, the season of Advent or the...