Interstellar: Provoking Questions, Love, and Awe-Inspiring Beauty

November 10, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

The scope and scale of achievement in Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar is dizzying, mind-boggling, baffling, and–ultimately–awe-inspiring. As Interstellar begins, we see a ruined earth. We aren’t told if this ruination is caused by humans or by something outside their control, but we are told that life is fast becoming unlivable on this planet. Nolan makes lets elderly folks who lived through the worst days of Planet Earth narrate the history of its demise. They tell us there was dust everywhere. They... Read more

Why Christians Should Stand Up for Atheists

November 5, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

I have just spent several hours talking with atheists on one of the blogs here at Patheos. This wasn’t my first time talking with atheists, but this conversation was particularly illuminating and, for the most part, respectful. Several members of this community welcomed me, despite the fact that they disagree profoundly with me. I am grateful for this. This community shared experiences and raised some very thought-provoking questions. I came away from this conversation challenged that I need to do... Read more

How Should a Christian Vote? (Voting Day Thoughts on Political Party Idolatry)

November 4, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

When I step inside the voting booth today, I will be struggling with my conscience, juggling one set of moral priorities on one hand and another set of moral priorities on the other. I will be studying names of the candidates in both political parties, wishing that there was someone who took responsibility for all of “the least of these.” And I will be making my compromises as best I can, knowing that allegiance to Jesus as my Lord means... Read more

Happy Valley and the Loneliness of Self-Justification

November 3, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

Are good, normal people capable of justifying terrible evil? A recent BBC series (available on Netflix streaming) answers this question in the affirmative. Happy Valley (2014) stars Sarah Lancashire as Catherine Cawood, a police officer whose daughter was raped (or was she?) years ago by a man who has now just been released from prison (Tommy Lee Royce, played by James Norton). The rape resulted in a pregnancy and then in her daughter’s suicide after the baby’s birth. Catherine has... Read more

“A Mighty Fortress”: Hope from the Midst of an Infectious Disease Epidemic

October 30, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

As I prepared to write about how that good old Reformation hymn “A Mighty Fortress is Our God” speaks hope to a fearful, tumultuous world, a fact about its history that I didn’t know leapt off the page at me. Not only was “A Mighty Fortress” written during great turmoil and conflict (what I already knew), but it also was written during the time of an infectious disease epidemic. Seriously. I kid you not. Let me fill you in... Read more

How Luther’s Two Kingdoms Challenges Fundamentalism’s “Christian Nation”

October 28, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

There is perhaps no misunderstanding of theology that has more greatly damaged Christian witness in the United States than the conflation of Christ and nation. A generation of in-crowd religious conservatives have sold this self-pleasing agenda in our churches and public squares, and broad swaths of young people (and others) turned off by the confusion of spiritual and temporal power have stumbled and lost their faith. Into this contrived mess, Martin Luther’s 500-year-old teaching on the Two Kingdoms brings a... Read more

Madam Secretary: How Do We Do Good in a Broken World?

October 27, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

Note: This post contains spoilers for Episode 6. Madam Secretary, CBS’s answer to The West Wing, is a refreshing bit of noble idealism for a jaded world. As episode 6, “The Call,” opens, newly-appointed Secretary of State Elizabeth McCord (Tea Leoni) is agonizing over her speech to the World Affairs Committee. Every word has been carefully crafted in order to avoid offense to the world leaders to whom she will speak. Consequently, her speech says a whole lot of nothing.... Read more

Martin Luther and Me: A Tortured Soul Finds Grace

October 27, 2014 By Rebecca Florence Miller

When I was a teenager, I suffered from anxiety, depression, and what appears to have been obsessive-compulsive disorder (disorders with which I have learned to cope, but still battle from time to time even now). I hit the age of 16, and suddenly a massive load of pressure and stress collapsed on me. There was long-enduring family dysfunction and brokenness. There was my own sense of deep sinfulness and a longing to “get it together” spiritually, even as my efforts... Read more