Mechanical Medicine

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 2:50 pm By Peter Leithart

“Modern medicine works very well,” says Rupert Sheldrake ( The Science Delusion , 260-1), especially “with mechanical aspects of the body, like defective joints, decayed teeth, faulty heart valves and blocked arteries, or infections curable with antibiotics.” But it has “tunnel vision” since it focuses all its attention to physical and chemical processes and ignores what doesn’t fit. As a result of its “failure to recognize the power of minds” it is weakest “when dealing with the healing effects of... Read more

Signs of Wrath

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 2:36 pm By Peter Leithart

Jesus’ cry of dereliction (Calvin, Institutes , 2.16.11) expressed His feeling that he was “forsaken and estranged from God” and that all His cries were unheard. It was “as if God himself had plotted [His] ruin.” Calvin adds, though, that God was not in fact angry with Jesus: “we do not suggest that God was ever inimical or angry toward Him” ( Neque tamen innuimus, Deum fuisse unquam illi vel adversarium vel iratum ). This would be impossible: Jesus is... Read more

Loving sinners

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 2:09 pm By Peter Leithart

Calvin ( Institutes 2.16.2-4) works to reconcile the Bible’s double testimony about God’s attitude toward sinners. On the one hand, God redeems His enemies; on the other hand, this redemption comes out of God. He resolves by saying that while we all “have in ourselves something deserving of God’s hatred,” yet “out of his own kindness he finds something to love.” Like Thomas and many medieval theologians, he concludes that He loves us because “we nevertheless remain his creatures.” He... Read more

Salvation and Redemption

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 1:34 pm By Peter Leithart

In explaining the name “Jesus,” Calvin ( Institutes 2.16.1) makes this curious statement: “The office of Redeemer was laid upon him that he might be our Savior. Still, our redemption would be imperfect if he did not lead us ever onward to the final goal of salvation.” That distinction of “redemption” ( redemptio ) and “salvation” ( salutis ) is odd in itself. Redemption refers to the payment that Jesus made for our sins, while salvation refers to something that... Read more

The Purpose of Sex

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 8:14 am By Peter Leithart

Sex expresses love, but John Paul II argues that more needs to be said ( Love and Responsibility ). After all, “There may be affection between people who are not sexually attracted to each other.” That suggests that “it is not love of man and woman that determines the proper purpose of the sexual urge” (51). Rather, the end of sex per se “is something supra-personal, the existence of the species Homo , the constant prolongation of its existence.” This... Read more

Mapping Time

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 6:04 am By Peter Leithart

“Typology is the map of time.” Pastor Rich Bledsoe discusses typology and time at the Trinity House web site. Read more

Law and History

Last updated on: April 1, 2013 at 3:51 am By Peter Leithart

The latest in Pastor Ralph Smith’s essays on Deuteronomy is available at the Trinity House web site. Read more

Easter Homily, Isaiah 55

Last updated on: March 31, 2013 at 7:03 am By Peter Leithart

Let us pray. Father, You raised Your Son from the dead and installed Him as Lord and Christ. Fill us with the Spirit of His resurrection, that we present ourselves to You as those alive from the dead and our members as instruments of righteousness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Woe to the sinful nation. Woe to those who enlarge their estates and build their portfolios. Woe to the drunks. Woe to those who call evil good and... Read more

Holy Saturday Homily, Isaiah 54

Last updated on: March 30, 2013 at 6:00 pm By Peter Leithart

Let us pray. Father, we gather this night in hope that You will dispel our every darkness by the glorious resurrection of Jesus Your Son. Raise us and make us shine with the brightness of Your glory. Through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and with the Holy Spirit, age after age. Amen. Yahweh’s plan succeeds. He plans to restore His exiled people so that through them He can pour out His blessing... Read more

Carnival and cruelty

Last updated on: March 30, 2013 at 4:00 pm By Peter Leithart

Bauman ( Life in Fragments: Essays in Postmodern Morality , 148-50 ) notes that in the past public executions and blood sports “were rare, festive and party-like occasions,” within the realm of Bakhtin’s “carnival culture – the periodical spectacular reversals of the daily norms” that underscored “the binding routine of quotidianity.” Putting public violence in a carnival setting was”an emphatic statement about the unusuality and exceptionality of whatever happened during the ‘breaks’ in normal life.” The institution of carnival itself... Read more