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Matthew Schmitz is a former senior editor of First Things. 

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How I Evolved on Gay Marriage

From First Thoughts

After my Bloggingheads discussion on gay marriage and related matters with Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern, a student at a prominent Evangelical college wrote me asking for advice. She said her campus has been riven by the homosexuality debate and she’s found herself challenged to . . . . Continue Reading »

A Letter from the Inquisition

From First Thoughts

Whereas you, the Federalist, brainchild of one Ben Domenech, of Virginia, were denounced in 2014, to this Holy Office, for holding as true a false doctrine taught by a majority, namely, that marriage is possessed of an immovable definition, that it consists of two persons, and of opposite sex; also, . . . . Continue Reading »

On the Value of Reading Books

From First Thoughts

Isaac Chotiner hasn’t spent much time talking to religious folks, and he hasn’t read David Bentley Hart’s The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss, but he does think the book’s picture of God differs vastly from that of most believers:I cannot speak for . . . . Continue Reading »

In Praise of “Xmas”

From First Thoughts

One of the popular indicators of the supposed war on Christmas is the use of the abbreviation  Xmas . The well motivated, if grating, “Don’t take Christ out of Christmas” alludes not so subtly to the abbreviation. The former Anglican bishop of Blackburn, Alan Chesters,  . . . . Continue Reading »