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Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Culture

Consumerism, Oikos, and the Role of Women in the Church

Part 1 We do not understand the role of women in ministry because we do not understand the role of men in ministry. We do not understand the role of men in ministry because we do not understand the church. We do not understand the church because the consumer culture…

by John CarpenterJuly 11, 2023
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Biblical Theology

Genesis’ Beginning Story

1. One structure The Creation account (G1:1-2:4) conspicuously conveys meaning using the literary shape of the text. The narrative is told with formulaic patterns, repetitions, and parallelism. The Garden account is different. It is viewed as a separate text, with its own author, employing its own structure. This second account’s…

by Scott FairbanksJune 28, 2023
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Baptism

Crystalline Baptism

I was reading James Jordan’s Creation in Six Days while also preparing for Trinity Sunday in which the gospel reading is John 3:1-15. As providence would have it Jordan dropped an easter egg for me along the lines of baptism. In chapter 5 he points out, “ On the second…

by Matthew CoreyJune 20, 2023
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Baptism

Christians Should Baptize Their Children, but Not Because of Circumcision

It's true. There is no verse in the New Testament that commands or records an infant baptism. This poses a problem for some Christians. Those who only look for explicit commands, or those whose theology is limited to the New Testament, will conclude that infant baptism is not biblical and…

by Adam McIntoshJune 13, 2023
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Biblical Studies

Polarities

1. Goal This paper’s goal is to identify and describe a literary strategy employed by scripture, namely using two episodes that cover similar territory or themes using details drawn from opposite ends of a number of spectrums. Once described the reader may recognize numerous other instances of this strategy in…

by Scott FairbanksJune 7, 2023
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Deuteronomy

Kind Capital Punishment

Numbers 14 records the tragic story of Israel’s decision to rebel against Yahweh and Moses. Twelve spies had been sent into the land to bring back a report to Israel. All twelve spies agreed: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey”…

by Ralph Allan SmithMay 31, 2023

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Technology

Talking Like Grownups

Jonathan Franzen begins his NYTBR review of Sherry Turkle’s Reclaiming Conversation by describing Turkle’s unique place among commentators on technical culture: “She’s a skeptic who was once a believer, a clinical psychologist among the industry shills and the literary hand-wringers, an empiricist among the cherry-picking anecdotalists, a moderate among the…

October 9, 2015
Sexuality

Sex and Peace

Sex is supposed to keep everyone so busy that they don’t have time to fight. Make love not war has been the implicit slogan of nearly every utopian project in the modern age. Augusto del Noce ( Crisis of Modernity , 182-4) shows why this is not the case: “One…

October 9, 2015
Immigration

Assimilated To What?

Leave aside the question of illegal immigrants for a moment. Legal immigration is itself a political and cultural challenge. And one of the central questions is whether or not the newest immigrants - coming from Latin America, Africa, and Asia rather than from Europe - can assimilate to American life.…

October 8, 2015

Battle of Har-Magedon

Kings gather at a place called “Har-Magedon” for the war of the great day of God pantokrator (Revelation 16:12-16). If we put aside our assumptions about this scene and follow the threads indicated by the text, what can we say about this battle? One clue lies in the identification of…

October 8, 2015

New Old Christendom

According to John Allen Jr., writing in Crux , the next Christendom in Africa bears some resemblance to the last one – particularly with regard to the role of the Catholic church. African Catholicism has exploded, growing over 6700% during the twentieth century. The largest Catholic seminary in the world…

October 8, 2015

Learning from Catholicism

“The differences between these two major types of Christianity, at the present time, involve contradictions,” wrote Avery Dulles in The Catholicity of the Church . “Full unity cannot be achieved by convergence alone but only by conversion.” Dulles believed that the necessary conversion could only take place if each church…

October 7, 2015

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