Yesterday afternoon we visited the Rodeo Drive of the area — Portofino. All we could afford was a cup of Cafe Latte, which to be honest was about as good as they can be made. Dinner last night in Camogli at a place called Primula and we had a nice, long, leisurely dinner on the water. |inline Read more
You can’t find one final judgment scene in the Bible that is not a judgment by works. Salvation, we are told often, is not by works, but final judgment sure is. Here are Paul’s words, and we could back them up with others from Paul and yet others from Jesus (try Matthew 16:27 or 25:31-46): |inline Read more
3.0 The Orthodoxy of Orthodoxy 3.1 Defining “Orthodoxy” Perhaps the best place to begin is with a two-line, inelegant poem I wrote some time ago when I was reading Dante: He who fashions the story, assigns to each a glory. |inline Read more
We’ve never seen vacation plans that weren’t capable of adjustment. Our walking yesterday wore us out, so we got up a little later and decided to visit a historic (aren’t all villages in Italy that?) village called Santa Margherita just one train stop away. It is connected to Portofino. |inline Read more
God’s judgment, Paul says in Romans 2:2, is based on truth, and that truth is God’s standard for judgment. Those who do not respond to that truth, Paul says, are storing up for themselves wrath. But, these two points sandwich the gracious generosity of God: do you realize that God’s patience and kindness in the present life “should lead you to repentance”? |inline Read more
2.0 The Orthodoxy of Heresy Ehrman, who relentlessly tries to unveil the truth about earliest Christianity in order to demonstrate that it was a suppressive machine of power-mongers, commits the very sin he castigates. If the “sin” of the proto-orthodoxy is suppression and intolerance, he aligns himself with their method for he never engages the traditional or even an alternative view of the general thesis in his entire book. |inline Read more
Yesterday we messed up on the trains. Today we found out that one of our mess-ups was to our advantage. We bought yesterday what we thought was a “transfer” ticket; we discovered today, in fact, it was an “upgrade” ticket. So, today we bought a 2d class ticket and got to ride First Class. Quiet. Then we were suddenly invaded, at one stop, by a bundle of Canadians and Americans. We got the last laugh when NONE of them had... Read more
I will be participating at a local seminary, St. Mary of the Lake, in a conference on postmodernism and evangelization. I will be speaking on Thursday evening. There are some very good scholars at this event, and it might be worth thinking about attending if you are so inclined. Read more
I gave this paper sometime ago, but it pertains to The DaVinci Code movie. What I do is deal witih the proposals of heresy and orthodoxy behind the book, and the two major proponents of these theories today: Elaine Pagels and Bart Ehrman. It is a bit hard-hitting at times, but I think it is warranted. I’ll do this over three days. I thought I had posted this before, but didn’t find it. |inline Read more
I don’t know how many of you felt fairly comfortable reading Romans 1 last week, but at times I confess I did. I’d like to think I don’t suppress the truth and worship idols; I’d like to think that nasty list of vices and sins is not my own biography. Well, if we felt good we were missing the point: finger pointing at sinners stops at Romans 2:1: |inline Read more
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