Today’s guest post comes from Raully Donahue. Donahue took a PhD in European history from Notre Dame into upper Michigan to raise three boys. Now that the boys are grown, he is trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life. Here he shares his observations on Christian scholarship and the Christian public. One of my standard conversation openers at parties is to ask this question: “Why is C. S. Lewis one of the most revered... Read more
This is from my Anxious Bench archives. It is still one of my favorites, even though I wrote it two years ago. Stay tuned for my next post on more Xmas traditions. I literally stumbled across St. Bride’s church in London this summer. Walking down Fleet Street toward St. Paul’s Cathedral, I was considering eating at Ye Olde Chesire Cheese when I looked up and saw the wedding cake spire designed by Christopher Wren. It wasn’t until I saw the sign... Read more
Is evangelical identity based on a shared story, a religious version of a national narrative? Read more
At the recent meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in Boston, I spoke on a panel that reviewed the major new collection edited by Tony Burke and Brent Landau, New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans, 2016). These were my remarks. I make two statements that might sound contradictory. First, the praise. This book is a wonderful treasure house. Despite all the difficulties of coordinating and marshaling so many different contributions, it maintains... Read more
Last time, I talked about the collapse of the old Roman order in Britain in the fifth century, and what we can reliably say about such an obscure period with so few written sources. (Although it is not a fashionable term, I do use the concept of the Dark Age, properly defined). For historians of Christianity, this is a matter of some moment because out of this world comes the whole world of the Celtic church of Britain and Ireland,... Read more
In 1676, the residents of Plymouth feasted not on turkey and cranberries, but on the severed head of their enemy. The government of New Plymouth asked the colony’s churches to keep August 17 as a day of thanksgiving. The day followed on the heels of many days of “humiliation,” on which colonists had fasted and prayed that God would forgive them for their sins that had provoked God to punish them with war and sickness. For much of the prior... Read more
In “Take an Indian to Lunch,” Freberg sings about an early Puritan politician who strategically takes an Indian out to eat in order to secure the Native American vote. Read more
Thanksgiving started in 1863 with Abraham Lincoln, who urged not just gratitude but humility and empathy on a nation in the midst of civil war. Read more
There is enough fixity to the Thanksgiving menu to require a certain order in order to make it turn out right. Read more
I have posted often at this site on the subject of the “Dark Ages,” or post-Roman era, and specifically as it affected the British Isles following the Fall of Rome. (And yes, I do accept and use the concept of Dark Ages, and have justified my use of the term at some length). The era has multiple appeal for historians, not least because of the whole Arthurian myth, and the relation between history and legend; but also the fate of... Read more
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