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Writing

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

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Advent

Triune Advent

Our creeds, taking cues from Matthew 28:18-20 and other biblical texts, speak of the order of the Trinity as “Father, Son, Spirit.” This order is evident in the order of redemption as well: the Father sends the Son, who ascends to heaven to receive and send the Spirit. Luke 1,…

by Peter LeithartDecember 4, 2013
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Language

Relations, Uncreated and Created

The category of “relation” has long been central to Trinitarian theology, [1] but in recent theology it has become a transcendental, as many theologians have argued that relationality is the leading feature not only of divine life but of created life. [2] Human beings made in the image of the…

by Peter LeithartDecember 2, 2013
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Theopolis News

Reformational Catholicism

Listen to Trinity House President Peter Leithart discuss his article on the End of Protestantism with LCMS pastor Todd Wilken at Issues, Etc .

by Peter LeithartNovember 27, 2013
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Matthew

The Kingdom of the Parables

One of the keys to understanding the parable of the wheat and tares (Matthew 13) is to understand the time frame. Jesus is speaking in pictures and symbols about some period of history, but which? What’s the beginning, and what’s the end of the parable? Is Jesus talking about what…

by Peter LeithartNovember 25, 2013
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Literature

Machiavellian Politics and the Idol Ceremony

Shakespeare wrote two tetrologies of English history, patriotically celebrating the Tudor monarchy by recounting its chaotic prehistory. Read in chronological order, Shakespeare’s English histories trace the depressing collapse of medieval politics, from the ineffectual but dignified medieval kingdom of Richard II, through the usurpation of Henry Bolingbroke, later Henry IV,…

by Peter LeithartNovember 20, 2013
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Biblical Theology

Restoring the Office of Woman in the Church, (Part 3)

The Heart of Liturgy What we call sacrament, the food-aspect of worship, is essential here. Biblically, sanctuary worship, or worship in the heavenlies, is always a “marriage supper,” always sacramental. The Papal Church made the Eucharist into a private act largely separated from the community of the church. Protestant churches…

by James B. JordanNovember 18, 2013

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Jane Jacobs at 100

T o celebrate the centenary of Jane Jacobs's birth, Adam Gopnik devotes a New Yorker piece to the lyricist of the American city. Gopnik finds that her classic, Death and Life of Great American Cities “is still astonishing to read, a masterpiece not of prose—the writing is workmanlike, lucid—but of…

September 30, 2016
American Politics

Rooting out Burrowers

S everal weeks ago, I devoted my FT column to examining the Obama administration’s effort to consolidate its gender-equality gains by hiring attorneys to investigate and prosecute civil rights violations. Obama appointees will burrow in and continue the Obama agenda after he leaves office. Evan Osnos's attempt to imagine Trump’s…

September 30, 2016

Origins of Islam

O nce upon a time, everyone knew how Islam came into existence. As Tom Holland says ( In the Shadow of the Sword ), “Whole centuries’ worth of scholarship have been founded on the presumption that the sources for early Islam can be trusted. To this day, they continue to…

September 30, 2016

God With Us

E veryone who has sung a Christmas carol knows that “Immanuel” means “God with us,” but centuries of singing about Immanuel have domesticated and sentimentalized the word. The concept of “Immanuel” has a long history before Isaiah applied it to a child Messiah (Isaiah 7). It arises, in part, from…

September 30, 2016

It's the Theology, Stupid

T homas Small doesn’t think Hugh Kennedy’s Caliphate gives enough attention to the theological roots of the Caliphate. In his TLS review , he writes wryly: “ Reading Kennedy’s account of the Caliphate, you’d be forgiven for forgetting that there’s anything particularly religious about it. ” According to Small, the…

September 30, 2016

Get Ready to Rumble

Early in his To Change the World , James Davison Hunter counters simplistic Christian understanding of cultural change with a series of propositions about the character of culture and the dynamics of cultural change. Proposition Eleven is simultaneously reassuring and sobering: “Cultures change, but rarely if ever without a fight”…

September 30, 2016

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