Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
First, I love my Christmas songs. This is how I think of it: the season of Advent gets in the way of singing what I want to sing. How can you not listen to Nat King Cole in December? Or Bing Crosby, Harry Connick Jr., and Amy Grant? Even though…
Introduction Imagine the stereotypical American grandparents. Once you have the outline, start filling in the details. What picture emerges? Maybe something like what Ogden Nash said, “When grandparents enter the door, discipline flies out the window.” Or maybe the oft-repeated assertion that it’s the grandparent’s job description “to spoil the…
Hundreds of generations of ancient Israelites grew up as children of Abraham, inheritors of the covenant—the promises of God. These promises were more than nice bumper stickers or framed photos to cover empty space in their homes–these promises were at the heart of their very identity–individually and collectively. Genesis “I…
Aliens and Sojourners When the question “Is there life on other planets?” is asked, even the best theologians can only reply, “The Bible doesn’t tell us.” Well, in truth, the Bible does tell us, but only if we are paying attention. …and there was not a man to till the…
John runs a theme throughout his gospel that bubbles under the surface—Jesus is searching for, and finding, a wife. John launches into the narrative proper with a statement of where he’s going. “On the third day there was a wedding” (John 2.1) is about as good an example of flash…
I have come to believe that a great many people are almost too weak to repent in any very open way. There must first be some level of healing. In some cases, including biblical ones, there is not even any evidence of faith on the part of the recipients of…
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What might democracy mean in Africa? What, in particular, “might it mean in cultural contexts, like those in Africa, in which freedom is not reducible to the exercise of choice, the equivalent to homo politicus of shopping to homo economicus ? In which the political subject . . . is…
Jean and John Comaroff offer what they recognize is “a rather stark inventory” of the symptoms of what they call “policulturalism” ( Theory from the South ), which they describe as “politicization of diversity that expresses itself in demands not merely for recognition, but also for a measure of sovereignty…
I dentity politics has weakened national identity, but it hasn't destroyed it. As Jean and John Comaroff put it ( Theory from the South ), “the fractal nature of contemporary political personhood, the fact that it is overlaid and undercut by a politics of difference and identity, does not necessarily…
I n a 1991 essay in the American Political Science Review , Timothy Mitchell assesses various theories of the state, concluding that they all attempt to draw a line between state and society, and fail. He proposes to take the very difficulty of drawing that boundary as the starting point…
A nthony Marx's Faith in Nation tells the story of the “exclusionary” basis for modern nationalism. Nations were unified not by inclusive policies but by exclusions within and without. Behind these exclusions were the religious divisions of the Reformation, which posed a challenge to rulers. In England and France, “one…
R obert Cardinal Sarah ( Power of Silence ) notes that “For some years there has been a constant onslaught of images, lights, and colors that blind man. His interior dwelling is violated by the unhealthy, provocative images of pornography, bestial violence, and all sorts of worldly obscenities that assault…
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