It has been too long since my last post about the classic Doctor Who series. I finished my rewatch a while back and so just need to finish off blogging the Fourth Doctor era, having completed the first three as well as from the Fifth Doctor onwards, due to my having started my rewatch on two parallel tracks, with the First Doctor and some lost episodes in the form of audiobooks, but also watching the Peter Davison era, since that was my... Read more
Flat-Earthers have been getting more attention lately, for reasons that I cannot quite fathom. But I will not complain, and here’s why: Jonathan Robinson found a wonderful application for an analogy with those who insist that the Earth is flat. Even though flat-earthers say things about the Earth that are blatantly untrue and clearly wrong, we would nonetheless never deny that the planet we live on together, which they depict so erroneously, is still the same Earth. And so why do some Christians... Read more
Via Facebook I found out about an interesting upcoming lecture by Rabbi David Sandmel, the Director of Interfaith Affairs for the Anti-Defamation League. The title is “Can Christians Learn from Jews about the New Testament?” It will be held at Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis on Thursday, March 31st at 7pm. Read more
Conspiracy theories, a recent article emphasizes, are not harmless self-delusions: In an important sense every conspiracy theory comes at some moral cost. To offer a conspiracy theory is to make an accusation. The accusation may be amorphous (‘shadowy forces run the country!’) or highly specific (‘Prince Philip ordered MI6 to kill Princess Diana!’) but by necessity ultimately there is always another human being at the end of it. And given the defensive logic of conspiracy theories, in which anyone who... Read more
There was an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education recently about the disproportionate number of engineers among the ranks of terrorists. This is not a new observation – articles on this subject, I learned, have appeared over the years, in Slate, the Washington Post, and Foreign Policy. But as Greg Laden also pointed out, there is a new book out Engineers of Jihad which explores this topic. One one level, none of this surprised me. The ranks of young-earth creationists have always included a strikingly large... Read more
After I shared my last Sunday school class session about ideas of the afterlife in the Jewish Scripture/Christian Old Testament, several people expressed the desire that I record the next session, in which we’d be moving on to the New Testament and beyond. And so here it is, as per your request. The class is typically more discussion-oriented, and so I won’t record every meeting of my Sunday school class. But I may do so again from time to time, especially on... Read more
Bob Royalty shared on Facebook this set of new lyrics he wrote for a well-known Easter hymn, with words that reflect the profound divisions between the Eastern and Western churches over the date of Easter: Jesus Christ is risen today! A-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. Or is it the First of May? A-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. Hung up on 14 Nisan, A-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. Each Church thinks the other’s wrong. A-a-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. And if we could make it worse, A-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. There’s the Filioque curse. A-a-a-a-a-le-e-u-u-ia. From the Father or the... Read more
I should probably have looked into this question more than I have up until this point. What is the meaning of the riddle in Mark 12, in which Jesus asks how the Messiah can be David’s son, when he is called David’s lord in Psalm 110? The question came up in the comments on my blog post about “Palm Sunday and History.” The first question that needs to be asked is what makes the question a riddle. It is presented... Read more
Hemant Mehta pointed out the above Easter display, set up in the Wisconsin Capitol Building as a form of protest over the other religious displays. It is clearly based on the flyer that I shared here previously. The fact that it relates to religion and Star Wars would be enough justification for sharing it. But I also think it is worth discussing the act of setting up this display for other reasons. There are plenty of Christians who support the... Read more
Three cartoons on this theme by Tim “Spike” Davis. One of the things that Christians think about during this season is Jesus' teaching about loving our enemies, and how he put it into practice to the last. Can I not forgive my Facebook friends' posts that seem hateful to me, and do so not just 70 times, but 70×7 times? Read more
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