What are Christians celebrating on Easter? Not, surely, colored eggs and furry rabbits, appealing though each may be to the lush, sunny season of fertility and renewal. Nor are Christians celebrating the rebirth of human goodness (one is reminded of the aphorism that original sin is the only Christian doctrine that can be verified by [...]
Month: March 2013
Called to Be Holy (Part 1)
One of the most theologically riveting — and convicting — books I’ve read in a long time is Old Testament scholar John N. Oswalt’s Called to be Holy: A Biblical Perspective. The book is non-technical but thorough in its treatment of the Biblical conception of holiness. Oswalt is Wesleyan, but every Bible-believing Christian must account [...]
Easter is About Bodily Resurrection, Not Soul Immortality
But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness (1 Corinthians 1:23) And when they [the Greeks] heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked (Acts 17:32a) In late November 2001, the Arts and Entertainment Television Network carried a special by popular rock singer Billy Joel. Among other inane [...]
Sectarian Culture Warriors Trump Ecumenical Culture Wimps
In electing the Argentinean Jorge Mario Bergoglio (Pope Francis), the Roman cardinals signaled that they were not one whit impressed or cowed by modern (read: American and northern European) Catholics. Francis, a philosophical theologian anchored in the conservative wing of the church, is pro-life, anti-homosexual, anti-liberation (i.e., Marxist) theology and reliably conservative on every other [...]
On Giving the 60’s a Break
Thomas Frank’s best-selling revisionist retelling The Conquest of Cool counters the prevailing sociological interpretation of the 60’s, according to which the fresh, revolutionary “young culture” broke free of the hierarchical conformities of the 50’s — the business, political, artistic, educational, and moral conformities of their parents and grandparents — and established a fresh new egalitarian [...]
