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

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John

What did Jonah Know?

When a certain Samaritan village refused Jesus’ attempt to visit, James and John asked Jesus if they should call down fire from heaven upon it. The allusion to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah is evident, but, as the story shows, James’ and John’s thinking was entirely warped. Jesus rebuked…

by Ralph Allan SmithOctober 25, 2018
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Aristotle

The Relevance of Aristotle and the Role of Christ (Part 2)

In the first part of this essay, I considered paideia (formation)and mimesis (imitation) in the context of Aristotle’s virtue ethics and that of the New Testament. The overall concern is to realize how relevant is Aristotle’s ethics both to diagnosing our current malaise and to enculturing our children, though we…

by Bret SaundersOctober 23, 2018
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Epistemology

Seeking Integration in a Fragmented World: D.C. Schindler: The Integrative Ministrations of Delight

In these posts I am inviting you into my philosophical reflection about integration , the absence of which we feel palpably in our fragmented world. My hope is for us to understand it more deeply, and to be ourselves reintegrated in the process. At this point in this extended inquiry…

by Esther Lightcap MeekOctober 18, 2018
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Aristotle

The Relevance of Aristotle and the Role of Christ (Part 1)

It’s hard to imagine someone, centuries from now, mistaking our culture for a moral highpoint in the history of the West. Increasingly the news is dominated by school shootings, abusive policing, sexploitation of women, and increasing rates of suicide, addiction, and divorce. In response, the Left calls for regulations, surveillance,…

by Bret SaundersOctober 16, 2018
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Prayer

God’s Promise to Hear Us

“The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears, and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit.” (Ps. 34:17-18) God is listening. He is listening when we ask Him for financial provision,…

by Lindsey TollefsonOctober 11, 2018
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Baptism

Transfiguration and Jesus’ Baptism

The allusions to Mt. Sinai in the transfiguration story point to Jesus as a new Moses and even more as Yahweh, the God who met Moses and Elijah on the mountain. The fact that Jesus, Moses, and Elijah spoke of Jesus’ “exodus” suggests that the mountain of transfiguration was intended…

by Ralph Allan SmithOctober 9, 2018

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Sentimental cruelty

Virgil is not a critic of empire, but he’s not quite an unqualified celebrant either. He knows the costs, and mourns them. But neither he nor his hero wishes the conquests away. Sunt lacrimae rerum , indeed, but neither the tears nor the things are going to cease. This is…

November 13, 2006
Philosophy

Postmodern truth

In a review of Harry Frankfurt’s On Truth (a sequel to Frankfurt’s widely read On Bulls*** ), Oxford’s Simon Blackburn offers a neat summary of postmodern notions of truth. He questions the tendency to use postmodernism as a “whipping boy” against whom “many readers may feel that no insult is…

November 13, 2006
Theology

Isidore of Seville

For anyone with $150 of spare change, Cambridge University Press has just published what it’s calling the first-ever complete English translation of Isidore’s Etymologies , one of the most widely studied books in Christendom between 600 and 1600.

November 13, 2006

Eucharistic meditation

Thanks to Chris Morris for suggesting this line of thinking about 1 John 2:28-29. 1 John 2:28: Little children, abide in Him, so that when He appears, we may have confidence and not shrink away from Him in shame at His coming. As I’ve emphasized a couple of times this…

November 12, 2006

Baptismal meditation

1 John 3:1: See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are. Throughout this passage, John speaks about two different genealogies, two different families, two different kinds of people. On the one hand are those who…

November 12, 2006

Exhortation

We live out the Christian life, John says, between appearances of Christ. He appeared first to remove sin and to loose us from the works of the devil, and He appears again as judge and to transform us into His likeness. But Jesus comes again and again, not just twice.…

November 12, 2006

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