Jesus Creed
The lead singer in Dexys Midnight Runners, in Come On Eileen, gets an award for a catchy tune by a guy who can’t dance for didley. Read more
The lead singer in Dexys Midnight Runners, in Come On Eileen, gets an award for a catchy tune by a guy who can’t dance for didley. Read more
This song doesn’t get the credit it deserves. So, I aim to restore its glory. What do you think? Read more
Our third word for Advent is “light.” Here is John 1:4-5: “In him was life, and that life was the light of men.The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.” How is the Word also “light”? Christmas is the time of Bright Light, the time when God makes his message bright and clear. Light is connected to the presence and being of God.Light is connected to truth and to revelation and knowledge by revelation.Light is... Read more
Notre Dame professor Gary Anderson, in his splendidly written new book Sin: A History , tackles a subject that has gained renewed attention among scholars while it has lost its nerve among many preachers and lay folks and culture at large. In a word, that topic is sin. People have just gotten nervous about the word and aren’t sure when and when not to use it, so they don’t use it at all. It’s like the word “me” as in “she sent... Read more
If you have three minutes, I’d appreciate your watching this video and recording your response to this liturgical framing of what it means to say “I’m saved.” Do you agree or disagree? Read more
Darrel Falk posted an excellent column on Science and the Sacred yesterday. In this post he comments on three conversations with highly educated people who hold a young earth view of creation. The reasons are not scientific, all three will admit that the science points in another direction. Hope and purpose is tied together with a theology and view of the bible which seems incompatible with the view of creation portrayed by science. These are intelligent committed Christians. The path... Read more
“In him,” John says of Jesus Christ, the Word, “was life” (1:4). The second Christmas word in our series is “life.” What does this mean? I begin with this: John does not say only that the Word “gives” life but that “in him” — in who he was by nature — was life. The Word that became flesh is Life Itself, the very life of God in living flesh. Second, by connecting Word to Life, John emphasizes again the New... Read more
Here is a letter from a reader with some very specific questions: How do you respond when you discover your mother is now a lesbian? The traditionalist says such is contrary to God’s will, so the question emerges for this letter-writer on whether one should apply the disciplinary instructions of Paul to churches within one’s family. Assuming we can be civil here, and that means entering into the world of this letter writer and not just contending with him with... Read more
I heard about The Manhattan Declaration through Twitter and FB and then on Christianity Today, so I read it to see what was being said and I read through the list of those who were invited to sign it to see who was officially on board. Here’s the opening set of claims: A CALL OF CHRISTIAN CONSCIENCE Christians, when they have lived up to the highest ideals of their faith, have defended the weak and vulnerable and worked tirelessly to... Read more
I don’t consider Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter “fiction” because I’d prefer to maintain my impish, indefensible line: I don’t read fiction. So, having read the book lately, my line needs commentary: “I don’t consider classic fiction to be fiction; it’s a classic.” Perhaps you are unconvinced. The book is brilliant, classic or fiction, because Nathaniel Hawthorne (statue at left) can get to the heart of darkness. Any comments about the novel? or the descriptions of Puritans in the book? What do... Read more
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