Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Stranger: Do you have to use so many cuss words? The Dude: What the f*ck you talking about? - The Big Lebowski There was a man I knew, an elder at his church, who, whenever he was called upon to announce a pregnancy, preferred the euphemism “with child” because…
I know what you’re thinking. Organ: funeral, ball game, grand dusty cathedral. Why should modern Christians of such a technological age revisit a thousand year-old instrument? Don’t worry, I will not be trying to punch another hole in my Weird Music Preferences and Opinions card here. The truth is, our…
Do things have natures? As I am posing the question, it is not simply a question of whether there are particular kinds of things in the world that have characteristic features, patterns of behavior, trajectories of growth and development. If that is what the word means, then the answer is…
We are excited to announce our 2016 Nevin Lectures featuring Father John Behr. Fr. John is the Dean of St. Vladimir's Seminary and Professor of Patristics, as well as the author of multiple works. He will be delivering three lectures over the course of two days dealing with "What Protestants…
New Year's Day makes one reflective, at least about the past year, perhaps about life, perhaps, more broadly, about time itself. Many view time as a curse. Some see it as a curse because of missed chances. As one day or year moves on to the next, all we can…
It seems a truism to say that we live in the world: that the world is outside of us. In reality the world is very much inside of us too. In fact the world passes through us as much as we pass through it. We breathe in its air, using…
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“How can a man be born again when he is old?  Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb?” Nicodemus’ way of putting the question sounds childish; but it’s a common question.  My life is a mess, and what’s done cannot be undone.  Then along comes Jesus mocking…
Carroll again: He explains that much recent film criticism takes its cues from the effort to maximize aesthetic satisfaction.  This is evident in the respect given to “transgressive” films that overturn “what are called the codes of Hollywood filmmaking”: “Within the context of recent film criticism, it is appropriate to…
Noel Carroll argues that anti-intentionalist structuralist criticism aims to maximize aesthetic enjoyment, at the expense of all other purposes of art and literature.  This, he argues, “has a very ‘consumerist’ ring to it.  In Buberesque lingo, it reduces our relation to the text to an I/it relationship.”  By contrast, Carroll…
In case you got bogged down and missed the plot, Thornton Wilder helpfully summarizes what he describes as Joyce’s “Night Book”: “We overhear and oversee [the hero] in bed above his tavern at the edge of Dublin.  His conscience is trying him for some obscure misdemeanors committed - or perhaps…
In his treatise Contra Gentiles , Athanasius reproduces an argument from the Phaedrus that provides the immortality of the soul.  Anything that has to be moved by something else is mortal and finite; whatever moves of itself is immortal, and immortally mobile.  What is most fully mobile is what is…
Adorno sees disinterestedness as a necessary stage in the development of aesthetic experience, but says that it has to be transcended by a recognition of the “interest inherent in disinterestedness.” Disinterestedness applies only to certain kinds of works, he says.  Try reading Kafka and remaining in disinterested contemplation: Kafka’s novels…
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