“Are we a global church, or are we a federation of local bodies?” At the close of last week’s meeting of the Anglican primates in Egypt, the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams thus set forth the great looming question that Anglicanism has been asking itself for the last . . . . Continue Reading »
This essay by Richard John Neuhaus, who passed away January 8, 2009 , was originally printed in the February 2003 issue of First Things .In 1987, while I was still a Lutheran, I published a book titled The Catholic Moment: The Paradox of the Church in the Postmodern World . There I argued that the . . . . Continue Reading »
Over coffee this morning, I found that Razib Khan and Ross Douthat have started a lively little debate about the use and abuse of the term "Judeo-Christian". Khan argues that it’s little more than political correctness. In fact, the dominant form of Judaism between . . . . Continue Reading »
I brought up Adam Kirsch vs. Slavoj Zizek once before , wisely dropping the matter after one post, but now they’re back, and anyone interested should check out their (surely final) exchange at The New Republic . I don’t know if it’s worth the time to make heads or tails of . . . . Continue Reading »
For much of the last century, "experience" has been a central category in the philosophy of religion. Rather than treating religious beliefs as attitudes toward propositions ("God created the world in seven days, yes of no"), experientialist approaches understand religion as an . . . . Continue Reading »
Especially in his classic 1984 work The Naked Public Square , Neuhaus tackled important and still timely issues regarding the religious underpinnings of American life, the proper division between church and state, and the real meaning of American secularism. Insofar as these studies forced him to . . . . Continue Reading »
In reference to Will’s particularity-and-truth thread, Helen offers some reflections on Burke that lend themselves so well to speaking theologically that, well, here we go. My familiarity with Burke nowadays is a lot narrower, if deeper, than it was a decade ago, but I can’t really . . . . Continue Reading »
"At the time and in the country in which the present study was written, it was granted by everyone except backward people that the Jewish faith had not been refuted by science or by history . . . . [O]ne could grant to science and history everything they seem to teach . . . . Continue Reading »
I finally read THE PROBLEM OF GOD—a neglected classic by the great Jesuit theologian and political thinker John Courtney Murray (1904-67). Here’s the contribution Murray makes to our understanding of postmodern conservatism or postmodernism rightly understood. Distinctively modern . . . . Continue Reading »
It’s impossible to ignore all the characteristic signposts of the Christmas season—wherever you go the familiar sights and sounds are unmistakably evocative of the winter holiday. Our malls, shops, houses, television stations and radio airwaves are all transformed into vehicles of . . . . Continue Reading »
Subscribe
Latest Issue
Support First Things
