Is there a religious history of America's state fairs? Chris reports from one of the largest such events. Read more
Is there a religious history of America's state fairs? Chris reports from one of the largest such events. Read more
Some monuments should be put into storage. Others should be taken out. Read more
Dozens of Christian historians and other scholars have signed an open letter condemning racism, co-written by Anxious Bench founder Thomas Kidd Read more
For many years, I taught an introductory Religious Studies course on World Religions. On several occasions, I taught this in an Honors class format, which allowed me to get into some major themes in some detail. In the next few posts, I have some comments and questions about the whole enterprise of teaching Religious Studies at college level. I begin with a simple request for information, which actually does raise some serious issues. Can anyone point me to good books... Read more
Let me introduce you to seven women in the great cloud of witnesses. Read more
I worry that evangelicals have become too comfortable with hiding our inaction behind the guise of prayer. Read more
The 1957 film version of Charles Lindbergh's memoir, Spirit of St. Louis, dispenses with much of the book's spirituality - and add other religious themes. Read more
My new book will be out shortly. This is Crucible of Faith: The Ancient Revolution That Made Our Modern Religious World (Basic Books, 2017). It will be available on September 19. That “Crucible” refers to an era of revolutionary transformation that occurred in the Jewish and Jewish-derived world in the couple of centuries before the time of Jesus – roughly from 250 BC through the late first century BC. Or to adapt the publisher’s description: The New Testament proclaims a... Read more
I have been posting about the early chapters of John’s Gospel, and how an author/editor incorporated older materials that worked for his argument. (For convenience, let us call him John). One incident – the Marriage at Cana – shows clearly how John drew widely on earlier sources about Jesus and fitted them into his narrative, paying next to no attention to the chronology or sequence of those sources. The Marriage story originated as a miracle story in an older free... Read more
As I alluded to in my first post in this series on the Mayflower separatists, it is a bit strange to term them “the pilgrims.” They considered themselves “strangers and pilgrims,” who as the saints of old looked forward to what came beyond their time on earth. I felt this disconnect most keenly when rooting around in the Canterbury Cathedral Archives for information on Robert Cushman, whom the folks there happily refer to as a “Pilgrim Father.” Very nice of... Read more
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