Jesus and the Compassionate Capitalist: A Reflection for Labor Day

September 1, 2019 By vancemorgan

There are a couple of sayings attributed to Jesus that Christians often use when attempting to show that following Jesus and a commitment to capitalism are compatible with each other–I’ve encountered each of them over the past few days. In a Facebook thread, a person noted that since Jesus said that “God helps those who helps themselves,” clearly he would endorse the capitalist work ethic of competition and self-promotion. Then yesterday on Twitter someone quoted Jesus as saying that “If... Read more

The Life of a College Professor: Nice Work if You Can Get It

August 29, 2019 By vancemorgan

It’s the first week of the new academic year, which is always a good time to reflect on what I am privileged to do for a living. A few years ago, I read a Huffington Post article summarizing the results of what a bunch of anthropologists found out concerning the daily work habits of university faculty. What Do Professors Do All Day? After spending two weeks with a non-random sample of sixteen faculty of different ranks at Boise State University, the researchers found... Read more

What is the Best Evidence that God is Real?

August 27, 2019 By vancemorgan

In her wonderful memoir Take This Bread, Sara Miles tells us of a conversation she had with a fellow volunteer as they distributed food at their church’s food pantry one Friday morning. Both Sara and Steve were lay eucharistic ministers who brought the chalice to parishioners on Sunday morning; they noted the similarities between handing out food on Fridays and their activities at the altar on Sunday, including the importance of looking past the ritual and making eye contact with each... Read more

Remembering One of my Best Friends (and celebrating seven years of blogging)

August 25, 2019 By vancemorgan

This week marks seven years since I, with trepidation, misgivings and a certain amount of reluctance, started this blog (I’ve been blogging on Patheos for the past two-and-a-half of those years). It’s been a ride, one that has been on a serious upswing during this calendar year. This month is already by far the best single month in the blog’s history, the latest in a series of consecutive record breaking months. My second book rooted in this blog will be... Read more

Is Donald Trump “The Chosen One”?

August 21, 2019 By vancemorgan

So that just happened. In a wide-ranging “conversation” with reporters on the White House lawn yesterday, Donald Trump looked toward the sky and said “I am the chosen one.” Really. Context is important, of course. Trump was talking about trade wars with China, something that he claimed previous Presidents dropped the ball on. Since he believes he is not dropping the ball, he is apparently the “chosen one” to get this done. But this is not the first time President... Read more

Will All Things Be Well?

August 20, 2019 By vancemorgan

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well. I don’t know when I first heard or read this well-known saying; it regularly pops up in various places. A teaching colleague commented on it in her lecture a few semesters ago on Julian of Norwich, the medieval Christian mystic to whom the saying is attributed. T. S. Eliot includes it in “Little Gidding,” the last poem in Four Quartets. My friend Marsue says... Read more

Finding the Light

August 18, 2019 By vancemorgan

We are not simply made by God—we are made of God Julian of Norwich Toward the end of a transformative four-month sabbatical in the spring of 2009, I heard a homily given by a Benedictine monk at the abbey where I had been spending a couple of hours a day reading psalms and praying with the monks for weeks. I don’t remember anything about the homily except this quotation from Saint Catherine of Genoa: My deepest me is God. Without exaggeration, any evidence of positive internal... Read more

Does Faith Need a Creed?

August 15, 2019 By vancemorgan

One Sunday, I decided to pay close attention to the words of the Nicene Creed when it showed up as it does every Sunday morning in the Episcopal liturgy right after the homily. People usually pay about as much attention to the text of the Creed as they do to the words of the Lord’s Prayer—but try it sometime. “Wow,” I thought as I said the words, “there’s some pretty crazy stuff in here. I’m not sure that I believe... Read more

Maybe It’s Time For A Revolution

August 13, 2019 By vancemorgan

There is a saying, particularly popular among conservatives, that “A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.” I am a liberal, but cannot challenge the alleged truth of this saying since I have never (thankfully) been mugged. In six decades of experience, however, I have had plenty of opportunity to wonder about an important question that this saying raises for everyone, regardless of political or social commitments—What happens when ideology runs headlong into real life? I got to thinking... Read more

This is Just Too Weird: Dealing with Inconvenient Truths from the Gospels

August 11, 2019 By vancemorgan

During the three years that I lived in Milwaukee while completing my Ph.D. studies at Marquette University, I made some additional money beyond the pittance I earned as a teaching fellow by serving as the organist for Grace Presbyterian Church. I studied piano from age four, thought until my senior year in high school that I would be a concert pianist, realized that I would not be (I was good, but was not that good), then taught myself the organ... Read more