Giles Fraser tried to find God when a helicopter crashed in London last week: It is often said critically of religion that it seeks to impose meaning on meaninglessness, that it is a sort of anxiety reduction strategy in the face of the general randomness of things. This is not the religion I know. What I see in church is a place that is remarkably accommodating to confusion and doubt. A place where people bring their not knowing what to... Read more
Big Daddy Bo takes Radical Orthodoxy — a theological movement of which I am not fond — down to size: It does not take long, when listening to John Milbank, to discover the fatal flaw. Milbank says “The only choice in our time is between religion and nihilism”. Into a plural, multiple, diverse 21st century, RO comes marching in with a old-school binary! From sentence one, as a listener, you start thinking “yeah, that thing you said might be true... Read more
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Elizabeth Drescher has a list of five books that we should read if we want to understand the (non-)religion of the nones. Here’s one: Courtney Bender, The New Metaphysicals: Spirituality and the American Religious Imagination (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010). Bender extends the work of Albanese, offering an ethnographic exploration of self-identified metaphysical practitioners as their apparently eclectic, unique, and personal spiritualities resist, engage, resource, and in many ways re-present the historical, scientific, philosophical, and theological narratives that have... Read more
Andrew Marin was disinvited from the United Nations this morning: I genuinely believe the UN just freaked out, not wanting the firestorm that happened against the White House to happen to them. Because if it did, their important message against the criminalization of homosexuality would be overshadowed by unnecessary drama. I get that, and even agree with it. I wish, however, they would have handled the invitation repeal in a more personal fashion. But such is life… This morning I... Read more
Believe it or not, I’ve never taught undergrads before. Sure, I’ve given the occasional lecture in someone else’s class, and I’ve spoken at many a college chapel service, but I’ve never taught a semester-long course at the college level. Until today. This afternoon I begin teaching “Introduction to the Christian Scripture” at a state university. I know that many of you, dear readers, have taught college courses, and I’m looking for advice. So far, I’ve been told to “own the... Read more
On Saturday, I’m flying to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malasyia. I’ll be speaking at a few venues, including the conference shown below. I’m wondering what you think I should see and do while I’m there. Have you been to Kuala Lumpur? If so, what tips have you got for me? Read more
Fred makes the salient point that Gigliogate and the Chik-fil-A fustercluck are basically the same. Evangelicals wade into the public square, air our their opinion on a social issue, take a beating in said public square, and then crawl back into their holes, wailing that they’ve been discriminated against. Well, Christian Smith predicted all of this. Smith did all of us who follow American evangelicalism a great service with his 1998 book, American Evangelicalism: Embattled and Thriving. Therein, he described how evangelicals... Read more
Wendell Berry is one of the most beloved authors in America today. He also happens to be a Christian author. Thus, he particularly loved by the hipster evangelical set (think Q, Catalyst, and the like). We’ll see how long that last, now that he has followed Brian McLaren and clarified his views on gay marriage: If it can be argued that homosexual marriage is not reproductive and is therefore unnatural and should be forbidden on that account, must we not argue that... Read more
This week, Aaron Berkowitz asks a question that, I think, will tax all of us who hope to maintain a fairly traditional Christology: I don’t know if this counts as a Question That Haunts, but I think it might. It seems that modern psychology doesn’t leave much active role for the human “soul” in cognition (unless I’m greatly mistaken). Instead of imagining the soul as a little homunculus in our heads that makes decisions for us, it appears that thought... Read more
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