As a history professor I often find myself in conversations with students and fellow faculty members about whether or not it is appropriate for historians to cast judgment on people and events from another era. Since I teach at a Christian college, these conversations usually focus on applying the moral teachings of the Bible to past events. I am often accused by my non-historian friends of being too “evenhanded” on a particular subject when I should have used my role... Read more
What political legacy did the Puritans leave to America? There was a time when historians commonly portrayed the Puritans as America’s founding democrats. No one better articulated this view than Alexis de Tocqueville, who wrote in Democracy in America that Puritanism was not merely a religious doctrine, but it corresponded in many points with the most absolute democratic and republican theories. It was this tendency which had aroused its most dangerous adversaries. Persecuted by the government of the mother country, and disgusted... Read more
The US State Department just released its Report on International Religious Freedom. Much of the media reporting on this study focuses on those countries identified as arousing “particular concern”, including such obvious usual suspects as China, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Some of those CPC’s (“Countries of Particular Concern”) have fired back at the US accusations, not least on the grounds that they don’t accept the Americans’ right to proclaim themselves the self-appointed judges of truth and justice around the globe.... Read more
I recently described the 1888 novel Robert Elsmere, which in its day was a global best-seller, and in itself a major contributor to contemporary debates over faith and skepticism. For modern readers, the book is a terrific resource as a snapshot of religious thought and debate at that era. The main lesson you learn is how thoroughly standard in 1888 were so many debates and insights that we think of as boldly modern. Remember the old Jesus Seminar? Authors like... Read more
The north visitor’s center at Salt Lake City’s Temple Squarehouses an eleven-foot statue of the resurrected Jesus. Known as Christus, the statue is a replica of an 1821 sculptor by Danish artist Bertel Thorvaldsen. Now beloved by many Mormons, replicas of Christus adorn a large number of Latter-day Saint visitor centers around the world. In a recent Newsweek / Daily Beast interview, my friend Ed Blum termed the Mormon Christus an “icon of white supremacy.” I’ve been reading Ed and... Read more
James Banner’s Being a Historian: An Introduction to the Professional World of History should be required reading for every first-year student enrolled in a history graduate program. There is no other book like it. Banner is a history veteran. He taught at Princeton from 1966 to 1980 and then left to start the American Association for the Advancement of the Humanities. He co-founded the History News Service (where he shepherded some of my first attempts to write op-eds) and the... Read more
The National Parks may well be “America’s best idea” (goodness knows the government has had many worse ideas), and one of their best programs is the Junior Rangers. As homeschooling parents of young children, we have gone to many national parks and found that doing the Junior Ranger activities is just the trick for maintaining our kids’ interest. On our recent family trip, we did the programs at Jamestown and Yorktown in Virginia, and will be submitting the Chattanooga &... Read more
Last week, I had the great pleasure of attending the International meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature at the University of Amsterdam. Given the city’s pivotal history in Biblical scholarship, there really could have been no better choice of venue. I have through the years attended many such events, but I was thinking what a first time visitor might make of something like this. Imagine a literate believer with a deep interest in the Bible, but no first-hand knowledge... Read more
I recently posted about The Damnation Of Theron Ware, a classic example of a book that was hugely popular and influential for some decades, but is now largely forgotten. Actually, literary history is littered with such cases, and their oblivion is often unfortunate, as some of these texts – like Theron Ware itself – are really excellent pieces in their own right, beyond their value for historians. Probably the greatest example of this type of book is an English work... Read more
Since he hasn’t drawn attention to it here, I wanted to point our readers to Philip Jenkins’s recent essay at Real Clear Religion about the long-term effects of the sexual abuse scandals within the American Catholic Church. (It is a pleasant indulgence to catch up on good writing at RCR every few days). Jenkins argues that the scandals eviscerated both the church’s finances and its moral and political authority. The first point is especially convincing: In Southern California alone, the... Read more
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