Today is Trinity Sunday, so I want to post this about the Trinity: How have theologians understood — or explained — the Trinity? Ron Highfield’s new book, Great Is the Lord: Theology for the Praise of God , sketches the “Trinity” as well as I’ve seen for an introductory text and the 3d section of chp 4 is about the theological understanding of the Trinity. He sees three levels of understanding Trinity: 1. The evangelical and doxological — this is how we experience... Read more

We welcome the reviews of books by readers of this blog, and ask that you survey the book so that our readers know the contents and then weigh in with your evaluations — both positive and negative. Do send me your reviews. We’ve got two excellent reviews coming the next two weeks, too. Christian Buckley and Ryan Dobson, Humanitarian Jesus: Social Justice and the Cross . In Humanitarian Jesus, Christian Buckley and Ryan Dobson investigate Jesus’ role as a humanitarian... Read more

We welcome the reviews of books by readers of this blog, and ask that you survey the book so that our readers know the contents and then weigh in with your evaluations — both positive and negative. Do send me your reviews. We’ve got two excellent reviews coming the next two weeks, too. Christian Buckley and Ryan Dobson, Humanitarian Jesus: Social Justice and the Cross . In Humanitarian Jesus, Christian Buckley and Ryan Dobson investigate Jesus’ role as a humanitarian... Read more

Lutherans don’t appear here all that much, but it’s mostly because they have their own networks and I don’t seem to be a part of them. From First Things, by Robert Benne, emeritus at Roanoke College. The decisions in the ELCA have had a serious fallout, and Benne sketches the reorganizations from within. However, the most interesting fall-out is the organizational changes.The two organizations formed to resist the direction of the ELCA–the Word Alone Network and Lutheran CORE–have redefined themselves. Neither... Read more

From Foreign Policy by Mohammad Qayoumi: On a recent trip to Afghanistan, British Defense Secretary Liam Fox drew fire for calling it “a broken 13th-century country.” The most common objection was not that he was wrong, but that he was overly blunt. He’s hardly the first Westerner to label Afghanistan as medieval. Former Blackwater CEO Erik Prince recently described the country as inhabited by “barbarians” with “a 1200 A.D. mentality.” Many assume that’s all Afghanistan has ever been — an... Read more

The Baylor Survey of Religion confirmed a long held claim: women are more religious (see Rodney Stark, What Americans Really Believe. Here’s a big picture set of numbers: 69% vs. 57% believe in God Men are twice as likely to be atheists. 77% vs. 68% believe Jesus is the Son of God. Weekly church attendance: 40% vs. 31% Prays at least once a day: 57% vs. 40%. Reads the Bible weekly: 32% vs. 24%. HIgh on religious experience index: 31% vs. 22%... Read more

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California will vote this November on decriminalizing marijuana. (The link in that previous sentence is to the Reuters report a little while back.)  What are the positives and what are the negatives? Do you think it’s the Federal or State government’s responsibility to tell citizens what to do in matters like this? Is marijuana’s impact any more significant than alcohol’s? I’ll weigh in if I need to, but I’m interested to hear what folks think about this. From Wikipedia: “Aside... Read more

Anthony R. Cashmore, Robert I. Williams Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania wrote his inaugural article following election to the National Academy of Science on The Lucretian swerve: The biological basis of human behavior and the criminal justice system. Scot mentioned this article a couple of weeks ago in Meanderings (HT JT) but it is worth some more thought and conversation. Professor Cashmore asserts that belief in free will is nothing more than “vitalism” rearing its ugly head.... Read more

This one actually emerges from one’s theological orientation, but there’s a very good set of questions and observations at CNN.com, and in our sports-shaped world today, a good conversation awaits us: Baseball players point to the heavens after hitting home runs; NFL players pray in the end zone after scoring. Competitors routinely thank Jesus, along with their sponsors, in post-game interviews. Thanking God from the winner’s circle has become so common that one British newspaper published a letter to the... Read more