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Writing

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

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Romans

Notes on Scary Stuff in Romans 9

What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on…

by Mark HorneFebruary 5, 2015
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American Politics

Covenants of Exclusion

A hundred years ago, William Warley signed a contract to buy a house in Louisville, Kentucky from Charles Buchanan, a white man. Before closing the sale, Warley, who was black, learned that the lot was subject to a city ordinance barring blacks from occupying the premises if most of the…

by Brendan O'DonnellFebruary 3, 2015
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Literature

The Bard and the Book

I concluded the first essay on this topic by saying that I would introduce three books about Shakespeare and the Bible, but I decided to introduce four instead. The three books become four are: Naseeb Shaheen, Biblical References in Shakespeare’s Plays (London: Associated University Presses, 1999) ; Hannibal Hamlin, The…

by Ralph Allan SmithJanuary 29, 2015
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Augustine

Augustine on Pagan Virtue

My children attend a classical Christian school, situated in the independent “free church” evangelical tradition. Over the past few years they have been growing in their acquaintance with the world of Homer, Plato, Virgil, and Livy. They enjoy it, and I envy it. The school is a great school. My…

by Gerald HiestandJanuary 27, 2015
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Atonement

The Prodigal and the Cross

The Prodigal Son parable (Luke 15) has been a favorite of liberal theologians for a couple of centuries. It seems to be a parable designed for liberal sensibilities: An indulgent, accepting Father; forgiveness extended without a cross; a surly older brother who might represent the "conservative" face of religion who…

by Peter LeithartJanuary 22, 2015
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Ascension

Underground Man, Ascended Man

“I want now to tell you, gentlemen, whether you care to hear it or not, why I could not even become an insect. I tell you solemnly, that I have many times tried to become an insect. But I was not equal even to that. I swear, gentlemen, that to…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 20, 2015

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Evangelical Alternative Medicine

C andy Gunther Brown's The Healing Gods is an effort to explain how Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) “entered the American cultural mainstream,” and especially how it achieved “a niche among evangelical and other theologically conservative Christians, although much of CAM is religious but not distinctively Christian and lacks scientific…

March 3, 2017

Spiritual Healing

I n her editor's introduction to Global Pentecostal and Charismatic Healing , Candy Gunther Brown observes: “According to the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life’s Spirit and Power: A 10-Country Survey of Pentecostals (2006), more than a quarter—and in many countries two-thirds—of the world’s 2 billion Christians identify themselves…

March 3, 2017

Tolerant Calvinism

I n an essay on the Brandenburg Calvinist pastor John Bergius, Bodo Nischan observes that “ Unlike most Protestants and Catholics at the time, Bergius did not think that a ruler should impose his religion on his subjects. True faith, he argued, could never be forced on people,” and he…

March 3, 2017

What Might Have Been

R obert Carle suggests that “sensible refugee policy will balance two competing realities: first, it is a moral duty for a wealthy country like the United States to help displaced and suffering people; and second, not everyone who wants to immigrate to the United States can come to live here.”…

March 3, 2017

Sub Species Aeternitatis

J ohn Milbank writes, “ Since life passes and is only mediated through memory and desire, every concrete instance of life is always also something other than itself, part of a larger, dimly-imagined reality, disclosed only partially.” Thus, “a ceaseless passing and a ceaseless dying is the very condition of…

March 3, 2017

Universal v. Universal

“W estern history is not, John Milbank argues, an evolutionary progress away from religion and toward human freedom and control.” It should instead be seen as “the history of a tremendous revolt against either particularism or the cult of universalizable power, in the name of the transcendent Good.” This revolt…

March 3, 2017

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