Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
We've all heard it, too often to count. The Apostle Paul was a misgynistic homophobic pro-slavery authoritarian, probably a repressed homosexual himself, the first Puritan - Puritan here defined as "someone who cannot sleep if someone in the world is having fun." To call this a caricature is too generous.…
Some of our forefathers believed in reading/singing the psalms in order. Today, when the psalms are even used at all, they tend to be used randomly, though sometimes tied to a church calendar or to the pastor’s sermon. The Bible does not bind us to any particular practice, but there…
". . . and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:4). Paul’s passing comment about the rock that followed the Israelites in the wilderness has often been treated as a bit of…
The story of Hezekiah’s illness and recovery is familiar to every child who has attended Sunday School. Informed that he would die, faithful King Hezekiah pleaded in tears for a longer life. God heard his prayers and saw his tears, and promised fifteen more years. As a sign that He…
When viewed as an allegory of biblical history, the controversial third act of Danny Boyle’s gripping sci-fi adventure is transformed from an illogical divergence into a blinding revelation. The following analysis contains spoilers for the movie “Sunshine.” The Creation Week is the elementary type that orders everything God has said…
In my last post , I told you the story of my current desire to understand philosopher D.C. Schindler’s metaphysical work. With this post, I start in to the venture. I begin by reflecting on what it is to be a thing. This matter always makes me laugh, and makes…
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Saba Mahmood and Peter G. Danchin examine religious liberty cases from Egypt (publicly an Islamic state whose laws are based in sharia), the European Union, and the U.S. Despite differences, they highlight the remarkable similar dilemmas that arise in these very different legal systems. The common antinomies emerge because of…
In 1969, Carlo Lancellotti writes in Commonweal , the journal " Esprit published an exchange between two of the best-known Catholic intellectuals of the time. One was Jean-Marie Domenach, who in 1957 had succeeded Emmanuel Mounier as editor of Esprit and de facto flag-bearer of 'progressive' French Catholicism. The other…
In a scathing TLS piece , John Gray describes the "un-liberty" of "hyperliberalism," today most clearly evident on university campuses. Under the older liberal regime, "Academic disciplines cherished their orthodoxies, and dissenters could face difficulties in being heard. But visiting lecturers were rarely disinvited because their views were deemed unspeakable,…
JN Figgis isn't a household name these days, but he was an important Christian political thinker of the early twentieth century. Raised in a Calvinist home, he abandoned his childhood faith for some years, before returning to Christianity while at Cambridge. But his real "conversion," according to David Nicholls (…
Johannes Zachhuber argues, against Richard Cross, that Gregory of Nyssa holds to a "collection theory" of universals. That is, universals are collections of individuals, but genuine wholes, not merely a summation of individuals. For Gregory, this is not nominalism; universals are real. And the universal is indivisibly immanent in each…
In a 2016 article , Rogers Brubaker describes a trend in European politics. Having defined the enemy of European civilization as "Islam," rightists in Europe have come to define themselves in religio-civilizational terms as well. They are posing as defenders of "Christianity." Problem is, many of their beliefs are distinctly…
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