By: Harry Edwards on April 3, 2019
Save for the author’s ardent commitment to Darwinian evolution, there is much to learn and appreciate from Jonathan Haidt’s book The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion. I also wished he addressed an important corollary of his project, namely, the grounding of morality. But that may be exclusively in the…
By: Mike on April 3, 2019
James Beck’s Two Views on Women in Ministry offers the egalitarian and complementarian sides of an evolving inside-outside church debate over whether women should have equal access as men to all church leadership positions. In short, the book says the debate needs more time to solve issues, become more irenic, and review new ideas.[1] I…
By: Karen Rouggly on April 2, 2019
It was February 2015 and overnight, everyone and their mother became concerned with the latest fashion statement. Everyone had an opinion on it and people were camped out solidly on their side. The internet was roaring. It’s almost as if you could hear the virtual chanting in the streets, “Gold, Gold, Gold!” and “Blue, Blue,…
By: John Muhanji on March 29, 2019
We have many indigenous churches which are now calling themselves as Africa Independent Churches (AIC) which broke away from the mainstream churches which were established by missionaries. Some of these churches are led with people who have never gone through theological training nor any other church leadership, but they claim to have been trained by…
By: Karen Rouggly on March 27, 2019
This last week, I’ve been at a conference that centers around the idea of vocation. Most of the conference attendees are folks from institutions of higher education, some religious and some not. As my colleague and I wandered the breakout sessions and sat through the workshops, we both remarked a few times on the terminology…
By: Tammy Dunahoo on March 23, 2019
Ross Douthat, an Op-Ed columnist for the New York Times took an interesting faith journey through various streams of Christianity including infant baptism in the Episcopal church, attending evangelical and Pentecostal churches as a child, and converting to Catholicism after turning seventeen and becoming quite traditional in his Christian faith, has developed a passionate argument…
By: Mary Mims on March 23, 2019
I started reading Ross Douthat’s book, Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, with great interest because, in the introduction, he promised to talk about the Black Church and its role in the American Church. As I read on, I found Douthat’s first characterization of the Black Church ill-informed at best. Douthat states…
By: Wallace Kamau on March 23, 2019
Martha Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed-or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her. Jesus was categorical about the best place and posture for a believer to be safe on matters of God. Humility at the…
By: Nancy VanderRoest on March 23, 2019
Today, I chose to take the opportunity to visit a Muslim church service that was honoring the victims of the horrible New Zealand tragedy. It was a ‘community service’ open to the public. I wanted to write this blog after attending the service, as I had just devoured Douthat’s book and felt a little ‘boxed…
By: Greg on March 23, 2019
Crawling out of bed in the morning, I reach over and grab my phone to read the Bible from an app on my phone. There are times after reading a little I turn on some worship music to begin the day with. Turning on my secure tunnel (VPN) I begin to scroll through the four…
By: Trisha Welstad on March 23, 2019
I did not know what a good choice I was making when I announced to my church a few weeks ago that I would be practicing presence for Lent. After having a few conversations prior to Ash Wednesday and thinking about how I would approach the season leading to Easter, I thought about how distracted…
By: Digby Wilkinson on March 22, 2019
Ok, Bad Religion is a book of rhetoric.[1] Moreover, I love it, but not for the right reasons; it is pessimistic and cynical – my favourite words. However, and it’s a big, however, those words do not always twin with wisdom and insight. Inasmuch as Ross Douthat comes across as somewhat prophetic, he draws a…
By: Shawn Hart on March 22, 2019
For your reading discomfort: https://babbletop.com/15-most-dangerous-internet-challenges/ As I worked through our reading this week, I could not help but ask the question; “Did we go full circle?” I mean how did we get from Sarah Pink writing, “Pre-field work surveys of literature, digital and other visual texts and examples of how other ethnographers have successfully worked with…
By: Kyle Chalko on March 22, 2019
Cal Newport’s first book we read, Deep Work, was a MAJOR game changer for me. I mean like a serious life change. Because of this, I wanted to take this book very seriously. And so I did. I committed to taking this book as seriously as I could and incorporating as much of it into…
By: Sean Dean on March 22, 2019
One of my favorite moments of the show M.A.S.H. is this time when a patient is brought before Hawkeye Pierce and for some reason they have run out of anesthesia. Hawkeye has to improvise and fast so he can do the work that needs to be done, so he distracts the patient by asking him…
By: Jean Ollis on March 22, 2019
It was refreshing to read another Cal Newport text this week – Digital Minimalism. His premise of ‘technology as distraction” resonates with me. In fact, I want to shout out PREACH IT CAL! I agree with almost every technology concern he raises in his writing. I have been/still am concerned about the role our phones,…
By: Jennifer Williamson on March 22, 2019
A century ago, when missionaries left for the field, they said goodbye to friends and family, expecting never to see them again. Today, with the ease of global travel and the accessibility of global communication, missionaries find it easy to stay connected with people “back home” while serving in even the remotest parts of the…
By: Harry Fritzenschaft on March 21, 2019
In Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat examines some of the most significant changes that have occurred in U.S. religious life since the 1950s. Douthat argues that the problem with contemporary American religion is not growing secularism or unrelenting religious fanaticism. Instead, Douthat contends that religious…
By: Jay Forseth on March 21, 2019
[1] While reading this week’s book, my mind (yes, evangelicals do occasionally use their mind, Mr. Mark Noll) kept going back to Dr. Henry Cloud and John Townsend in Boundaries: When to Say Yes, How to Say No to Take Control of Your Life. I used to hand that book out like candy when I was…
By: Dan Kreiss on March 21, 2019
It came on quickly. No one anticipated the outcome and there is still significant uncertainty when considering future implications. Even Steve Jobs had very little idea how the smartphone would transform society. To him the iPhone was an mp3 player that could also be used to make cellular calls and texts.[1](5) Since that time (only…
