The Atheist Game of Telephone

Last updated on: January 9, 2016 at 6:02 am By James F. McGrath

A friend shared this meme, together with the comment, “Showing that whatever else atheists are, they are not students of history and historical criticism.” The irony is that the claims in the image above themselves circulate and circulate in the manner of the telephone game, among atheists and other self-proclaimed “skeptics” who are nothing of the sort, as they clearly fail to fact-check memes that come their way. Almost everything that is claimed in the image is wrong, or at least uncertain... Read more

Welcome to the Blogosphere, Josh!

Last updated on: January 8, 2016 at 2:00 pm By James F. McGrath

My former student Josh Boeke has started a blog, and his first post tells a bit about his own personal faith journey away from fundamentalism. I get a brief mention on it, and on the one hand, it makes me really wish that he and I had had more of a chance to continue the conversation he mentions, but on the other hand, it reinforces to me that sometimes the most important thing we do is not to provide helpful answers... Read more

Happy Birthday, Roy!

Last updated on: January 8, 2016 at 10:21 am By James F. McGrath

It is a striking coincidence that I just a few days ago watched Blade Runner again, together with my son who was seeing it for the first time. Its future is too close in time to ours to seem plausible now, but other than the dates being off, the possibility of genetically engineering something better than robots to do things that we cannot is not at all implausible. And that word “something” is the heart of the issue the film explores. Just... Read more

Loving the Common Enemy

Last updated on: January 8, 2016 at 6:10 am By James F. McGrath

The quote comes from Ben Corey’s recent blog post “The Real Reason Wheaton College is Terminating Larycia Hawkins: Loving the Common ‘Enemy’.” I thought it deserved to be highlighted and shared. Do you agree that fundamentalism, far from being purely dogma-focused, has this strong sociological aspect to it? Read more

Christology around the Blogosphere

Last updated on: January 7, 2016 at 6:20 am By James F. McGrath

There have been quite a few blog posts of interest, related to Christology, which are worth sharing and, where possible, commenting on. Matthew Malcolm listed the “threeness of God” as one of the things the Corinthians got right. I must object. Paul is emphatic about the oneness of God. He cannot then be subtly introducing divine threeness. Mentioning Christ and the Spirit does not mean that he is using those terms the way later Trinitarian theology would. The threeness of... Read more

Epiphany and History

Last updated on: January 6, 2016 at 2:10 pm By James F. McGrath

Having attempted to do away with contradictions between Matthew and Luke for Christmas, Ian Paul has now offered a blog post claiming that Matthew’s story of the arrival of the magi can be treated as historical. I am not persuaded. Infancy stories featuring miracles are a common feature in ancient literature, and are consistently devoid of reliable historical information. To try to pretend that the Gospels are an exception is not going to be persuasive without some very strong arguments. Splitting... Read more

#CFP: The Synagogue in Ancient Palestine

Last updated on: January 6, 2016 at 10:45 am By James F. McGrath

There is an interesting call for papers for a conference in Helsinki, Finland next September, on the synagogue in ancient Palestine. Sounds fascinating! Click through for more information. Of related interest, here is a photo of Butler students at the synagogue in Capernaum: Read more

An Epiphany Present

Last updated on: January 6, 2016 at 5:44 am By James F. McGrath

From Cartoon Movement. That’s the trouble with the magi delivering their gifts, according to Matthew, when Jesus would have been old enough to talk… For those who want something more serious on the occasion of Epiphany, I will point out that not only is Jesus a toddler in the story in Matthew, but the family lives in a house. Indeed, there is no indication in the story that the family has ever lived anywhere else than Bethlehem. Hopefully you know... Read more

Cities that Built the Bible

Last updated on: January 5, 2016 at 1:58 pm By James F. McGrath

Bob Cargill’s latest book, The Cities That Built the Bible, is now available for pre-order. There is a website about the book, and you can pre-order it on Amazon.com. Since it is now available, I thought I would share the full version of the blurb I provided to Harper Collins about the book: In The Cities that Built the Bible, Bob Cargill looks not just at cities that are the focus within the Bible, but the cities that provided the context for the... Read more

Losing Weight (Our Daily Salad)

Last updated on: January 5, 2016 at 11:49 am By James F. McGrath

I will do a retrospective post about my sabbatical soon – I’m not considering it to be over just yet, since I am still finishing off one project, and classes don’t start until next week. But I thought I would share a separate post about one of my sabbatical goals, which was to exercise regularly, and not merely lose some weight, but actually get within the recommended range for someone my height and age. That goal was successful, and although... Read more