I was telling a colleague about the fact that there are Mandaean baptisms on YouTube, and she did a search and found this really nice video I had not seen before, which includes Mandaeans talking about the meaning of baptism for them. Read more
I was telling a colleague about the fact that there are Mandaean baptisms on YouTube, and she did a search and found this really nice video I had not seen before, which includes Mandaeans talking about the meaning of baptism for them. Read more
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David Meadows offered some more nails for the ossuary in which many are confident that the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife will be buried, and Sightings has an article entitled “The Swift Rise and Apparent Demise of ‘Jesus’ Wife’.” As we await the test results on the ink on the papyrus fragment that made news headlines recently, blogging about the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife has seen an unsurprising lull. But there has been some interesting discussion of what the online discussion... Read more
At long last I got around to watching the movie Prometheus – aka Intelligent Design: The Motion Picture. It is a great film for those interested in the intersection of religion and science fiction. And I am therefore delighted to learn that there are plans for a sequel, Prometheus begins with the discovery on the Isle of Skye the latest of a series of cave drawings depicting a giant being pointing to the sky and a particular configuration of stars.... Read more
I recorded my class on Amos and Hosea. There were no separate slides prepared, and so you can simply listen to the lecture as a podcast. I hope to try recording some things in a smart classroom at some point, so that I can even capture writing on the smartboard, much like one sees in some TED talks. Read more
There is some debate about whether there will be a 5th Indiana Jones movie, but IO9 recently shared a neglected sacred item that would be worth of the adventurer’s next quest – especially if by that stage he is so elderly that he himself needs a walker! I love this part of the piece at IO9: “But can you combine the sacred baby walker Voltron style with the Spear of Destiny and the Holy Grail to build a prayer-powered F-15?... Read more
If you are among those who have been waiting for the big reveal that Donald Trump promised he would offer about Barack Obama at noon today, he’s done it. What he revealed is that he (i.e. Trump) still wants to see Obama’s birth certificate and other records. Seriously. That’s his “big news.” In my opinion, the news that Nicholas Cage might be in a reboot of Left Behind was more exciting. See his video and press release below – but don’t expect them... Read more
David Hayward has a cartoon today that gets at the heart of an issue many of us have with the depiction of God in some Biblical stories as well as elsewhere: We would be horrified if human parents did these things, and yet few seem to reflect on the sort of impression they give of God when they depict God along these lines – the allusions of course being to the story of Noah and the concept of hell. This... Read more
If you don’t think so, you’ve clearly never looked at them carefully: No human being should have the power to obliterate anything from the beginning of time… Read more
Richard Mourdock, a Republican candidate running to represent Indiana in the Senate, has caused a great deal of controversy with a remark he made in the context of a discussion of whether abortion should be allowed for rape victims. His reply included the following: I know that there are some who disagree and I respect their point of view but I believe that life begins at conception. The only exception I have to have an abortion is in that case of the... Read more
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