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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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Dante's Journey

In the course of a review of Vittorio Montemaggi's Reading Dante's Commedia as Theology , Rowan Williams offers these observations on Inferno and Purgatorio : "There is still a tendency among not very attentive readers – not to mention people who have read almost nothing of the work but have…

September 29, 2017
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Liturgy

The World Needs the Liturgy

"God's work in history," writes Mark Searle ( Liturgy Made Simple ), "is to gather into one the scattered children of God, to overcome divisions, to provide a place for the homeless and the lonely, to give support to those whose burdens are heavy, and to create an oasis of…

September 29, 2017

Christian Historicism

John Milbank argues in his Beyond Secular Order that " historicism cannot straightforwardly be considered as something specifically modern" (8). In fact, it originates from a Christian insight: "the sense of estranged distance from the past is initially the fruit of the Christian contrast between old and new covenants and…

September 29, 2017

No Thucydides Trap

Last week, I wrote a Firstthings.com column summarizing the argument of Graham Allison's Destined for War , a study of Sino-American relations organized around the concept of the "Thucydides Trap." Allison says that the ancient Greek historian claimed that Athens and Sparta went to war because Sparta was fearful of…

September 29, 2017
Eucharist

Bodies Renewed by Christ's Body

Christine Chaillot has a fascinating summary of the liturgical traditions of the "Ancient Oriental Churches" (Egyptian, Ethiopian, Syrian, Assyrian, Indian) in The Oxford History of Christian Worship . She quotes this Eucharistic hymn from the fifth-century Saint Yazdin (p. 164): "Strengthen, O our Lord, the hands which reach out and…

September 29, 2017

Do Human Beings Create?

In ST I, 45, 5, Thomas Aquinas asks whether God alone creates. His sed contra cites Augustine’s de Trinitate (3.8), where Augustine says that angels cannot create anything. If angels cannot, Thomas reasons, neither can any other creature. He presents several arguments in favor of this conclusion. Creation is, Thomas…

September 28, 2017

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