On Monday I received my copy of Tiffany’s Swedenborgian Angels by Mary Lou Bertucci and Joanna Hill, currently featured on the Patheos Book Club. I’ve been reading it in bits and pieces over the last few days. It’s not a long book, but it’s one that invites pausing and reflecting. First and foremost: this is a beautiful book. Its tall, narrow dimensions make the perfect frame for the angel windows, a set of seven stained-glass windows commissioned in 1902 by the... Read more
There’s a scene in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe that I imagine most Swedenborgians can relate to. It’s where Lucy is trying to convince her siblings that she really did visit Narnia, and they respond with various degrees of derision and condescending disbelief. And of course they go into the wardrobe to try it out, and of course it’s just a wardrobe. Of course this describes a universal human experience, and especially one believers in any religion go... Read more
This past Sunday, I preached on the story of Jacob’s Ladder. One thing I’d add to the end, because I think it’s the primary point of John 1:51 (“And He says to him, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, Henceforth you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.'”): the Lord Himself is the stairway. I mention the passage from Arcana Coelestia that describes the human race as the link... Read more
In the comments on my previous post, Kendall pointed out that it’s important to be careful with the way we talk about “profanation.” Without a doubt, I think the teachings on profanation are some of the most frightening in the Writings, and I think it’s important to look at them more closely. I’m going to go into a fair amount of detail and use some fairly extensive quoting, because I think it’s an area that can’t very well be dealt... Read more
This week I preached on the topic of lesser and greater evils. I touched on the question of how we know whether we’re choosing the lesser of two evils out of necessity, or if there are really more options. As I mention in the sermon, I don’t think there’s an easy answer. And I’m curious what people think: are the circumstances where it’s a good idea to make a conscious decision and say, “I’m going to regularly choose to do... Read more
There’s a discussion currently going on over at New Church Perspective on the issue of women in the ministry. Something that has come up a few times is the question of a “call” – if someone feels a call to serve as a New Church minister, does that mean the General Church ought to ordain them? I’m interested in the specific question, but I’m more interested in what I see as a larger trend, which is not just a... Read more
There has been a fair amount of discussion lately in the Christian blogosphere of the story of Adam and Eve, discussing a.) whether it is scientifically viable to read the story literally, and b.) whether a literal reading is necessary to maintain orthodox Christian theology on the Fall of Man and Original Sin. (The most recent bout of blog posts seem to have been kicked off by this article by John Farrell in Forbes magazine; Mark Shea has a good... Read more
The teachings of the New Church are based on the Old and New Testaments, along with the divinely-inspired theological works of Emanuel Swedenborg (usually referred to as the Writings or the Heavenly Doctrine). Swedenborg was an 18th-century scientist who, at the age of 56, began to have visions of heaven and hell. Shortly afterwards, he writes, he was commissioned by God to write the books that we now refer to as the Writings. In total he wrote 25 volumes on... Read more
On Sunday, September 11 I preached on the topic of prayer at the Church of the New Jerusalem in Dawson Creek, BC. I spoke from notes and I didn’t have a manuscript; the following is a rough draft of some of the things we talked about. So, it may be a little rough around the edges, but hopefully it gets across the main ideas. (Note for those unfamiliar with New Church terminology: “the Writings” refers to the divinely-inspired theological works... Read more
Crime and Punishment is my favourite novel. And yet somehow I’ve managed to never read any of Dostoevsky’s other novels. So, I’ve started reading Brothers Karamazov, in the 2002 translation by Richard Peaver and Larissa Volokhonsky. I’m not far into it but already I’m starting to love it. Last week as I was preparing my sermon on Naaman the Leper, there was a scene in the novel that resonated with everything I’d been researching and thinking about in terms of Naaman’s... Read more
Good and Truth
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In