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

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Biblical Horizons

Pansexual to Mature Marriage

There is a young man (under 35) who sometimes stops and speaks to me at my “office” (the coffee bar at the Wild Oats Grocery Store). He is very articulate and highly intelligent, and I always enjoy my conversations with him. In our last few conversations it has become apparent…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 14, 2009
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Biblical Horizons

Jesus and Confusion

What began at the Tower of Babel has increasingly become a global affair. All of world history is a project to become a “tower to the heavens” as a self contained and self sufficient world, but this is increasingly judged everywhere, and more and more, crisis is introduced and interjected…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 13, 2009
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Biblical Horizons

Outside the Box

At the always marvellous Auburn Avenue Pastor’s Conference this past week the inimitable Douglas Wilson complained that he is tired of hearing of the need to get out of the box. He said that some people need to stay in the box. Indeed. Who can disagree? The so-called “Federal Vision”…

by James B. JordanJanuary 9, 2009
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Advent

Virgin-Born Son of God | Pagan Myth or New Creation?

It is popular in some circles to claim that the story of the virgin birth was a pagan insertion into the teaching of the early Church. In various books one can easily find by scanning the shelves of the “religion” section in any decent bookstore this claim functions as a…

by Mark HorneDecember 15, 2008
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Biblical Horizons

Ritual Versus Christianity

This article was originally published at the Biblical Horizons blog. Some of the comments and responses on the original article have been shared at the end. Peter Leithart in Against Christianity points out that “Christianity” tends to be an ideology, and that Jesus did not come to set up an…

by James B. JordanOctober 29, 2008
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Ecclesiology

10 Things a Church can do to Change the World

The principle to keep in mind is that we have to change ourselves first. 1. Participate In The Lord’s Supper Every Sunday In Worship The Kingdom is again and again a feast. The Church is the beachhead of the Kingdom. Does Jesus ever tell a parable comparing the Kingdom to…

by Mark HorneJune 5, 2008

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Modern Sphinx

Modernity, Sergei Bulgakov once said, is a sphinx. It poses a riddle, and those who cannot or will not answer the riddle are devoured. The editors of Political Theology in Orthodox Christianity cite this at the beginning of their study to highlight the ambivalence of modernity. It has both constructive…

September 22, 2017

Bach the Modern?

"One of the factors that has rendered [Bach's] Matthew Passion so successful over the course of its reception," writes John Butt ( Bach's Dialogue with Modernity , 36), "lies in its evocation of subjectivities that somehow resonate with those of the broader modern condition." Bach's Passions target "the individual believer,…

September 22, 2017

Liturgy In Secular Imagination

Alastair Roberts's contribution to Our Secular Age , a collection of essays on Charles Taylor's A Secular Age , focuses on the effect of secularism on liturgical piety. Taylor identifies "authenticity" as one of the features of our secular age, and Roberts observes that this can take the form of…

September 22, 2017

US By TR

Graham Allison's Destined for War is a study of contemporary politics, Sino-American relations in particular. Along the way, he asks what we would think if China started acting like the U.S. did as we rose to global prominence. The career of Teddy Roosevelt makes the point: “ In the decade…

September 22, 2017

Late Bloomer

William Golding, writes Allan Massie in a review of John Carey's biography in the TLS , was "a late starter, one oppressed in youth by doubts and feelings of social, and perhaps intellectual, inferiority. Until his middle forties he was a poor, reluctant and unsatisfied provincial schoolmaster." He more than…

September 22, 2017

Fire Makes the Man

John Lanchester reviews James Scott's latest ( Against the Grain ) in the New Yorker . Scott contends that human civilization is the product of our mastery of fire. Fire enabled humans to cook food, and that gave us, Scott argues, and evolutionary advantage. Chimps put a lot of (unconscious)…

September 22, 2017

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