Pale Horse, Pale Rider

Last updated on: March 5, 2020 at 7:26 pm By Philip Jenkins

With all the unavoidable news right now about disease and epidemics, it’s an obvious temptation to look back to past eras to see how they coped with such things, culturally as well as medically. One consistent impression is how thoroughly our imagery of such events draws on very traditional apocalyptic. As David Wallace-Wells notes in his recent book on climate-driven catastrophes, “the vision is a bleak one, often pieced together from perennial eschatological imagery inherited from existing apocalyptic texts like... Read more

Why I’m Giving Up Political Hobbyism for Lent

Last updated on: March 5, 2020 at 6:20 pm By Melissa Borja

I must begin this post with a confession. The first thing I often do when I wake up is read the politics section of the New York Times. I should begin each morning by smiling gratefully at the dawn sky and thanking the heavens for another blessed day to live. Instead, I’m usually hidden under my down comforter, the only light in the room emanating from my smartphone screen, which I anxiously scroll to find new election forecasts and political... Read more

The Gender Difference Argument for Women’s Theological Education

Last updated on: March 4, 2020 at 11:37 am By Andrea L. Turpin

Last week I finally got around to listening to a podcast episode I had saved sometime in the past year. Obviously, I’m not a huge podcast devotee. But it was totally worth the wait. This podcast interviewed married evangelical Anglican co-priests Jonathan and Tish Harrison Warren on how and why they had come to support women’s ordination. They had earlier opposed it, having both grown up in the Southern Baptist Church and later joined the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA),... Read more

Reimagining a History PhD–Doing Academia outside of Academia

Last updated on: March 1, 2020 at 4:35 pm By Beth Allison Barr

Today we welcome Paul Gutacker (M.A. and Th.M. Regent College; Ph.D. Baylor University) to the Anxious Bench. Paul’s research focuses on religion and historical memory, particularly nineteenth-century American Protestants’ memory of the Christian past. In addition to teaching at Baylor, Paul and his wife Paige direct Brazos Fellows, a post-college fellowship centered on theological study, spiritual disciplines, and vocational discernment. They enjoy life in East Waco with their son James, daughter Marianne, and spaniel Lila. A few months ago, I sat in... Read more

The Mound-Builder Myth and the American Bible

Last updated on: February 29, 2020 at 8:56 am By Philip Jenkins

Jason Colavito spends his time demolishing pseudo-science and bogus archaeology (ancient aliens, giants, Nephilim, lost Atlantis, etc). He has a very readable blog, and also publishes entertaining books that are of special interest for anyone interested in the sizable overlap between esoteric movements, fringe religion, and pseudo-science. His latest is The Mound Builder Myth: Fake History and the Hunt for a “Lost White Race” (University of Oklahoma Press, 2020). To cut a very long story short, white settlers in the... Read more

Of Tech Startups and Megachurches

Last updated on: February 28, 2020 at 8:05 am By Philip Jenkins

Normally what I post here includes some kind of original research or (ideally) fresh insight from me. This one doesn’t. I am just drawing attention to a really interesting essay that might well escape the attention of ANXIOUS BENCH readers because of the source, namely Wired magazine, which would freely admit that it is as secular as the high tech industries and cultures on which it reports. It should resonate with the interests of many readers here, especially for its... Read more

Tom Holland, Dominion

Last updated on: February 27, 2020 at 1:10 am By johnturner

There are many ways to assess works of history. Does a book make a strong argument? Is the information accurate? Is the book coherent? And then, more basically, is it a pleasure to read? In that vein, is it characterized by eloquent prose, character portraits, quirkiness, and a dash of humor? Tom Holland’s Dominion is a remarkable book. There are many histories of Christianity. Diarmaid MacCulloch’s terribly titled Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years is among the best in its... Read more

Burning Corsets at a Free Methodist Revival

Last updated on: February 26, 2020 at 10:15 am By David Swartz

When a moment of women’s empowerment reasserts sexual norms in the end Read more

Will Your (Christian) College Close?

Last updated on: February 24, 2020 at 8:58 pm By Chris Gehrz

College closures have long been part of the story of American higher education. But recent announcements about several Christian institutions of higher learning have Chris wondering if religious colleges are at increased risk of closing. Read more

Tradition, Tradition, Tradition

Last updated on: February 19, 2020 at 5:55 pm By Thomas Albert Howard

To think well and wisely about tradition, there are, to be sure, many sources. One might begin with T. S. Eliot’s famous essay, “Tradition and Individual Talent,” and then take on Jaroslav Pelikan’s book, The Vindication of Tradition, in which he makes the crucial distinction between traditionalism (the dead faith of the living) and tradition (the living faith of the dead). After Eliot and Pelikan, one might head toward Yves Congar’s The Meaning of Tradition before dipping into Josef Pieper’s... Read more