Support First Things by turning your adblocker off or by making a  donation. Thanks!

Life Without the Opposite Sex: Why Not?

Women should never “settle” with a man in order to have a child. Granted, women are created by God to have longings for procreating and nurturing, and I believe this is evidenced in the fact that women will go to all kinds of technological extremes to have their own biological children. . . . . Continue Reading »

A Richer Bible

The true Church of Christ teaches the gospel. The Bible is the sacred and canonical witness to the gospel. Therefore, the teachings of the Church accord with the teachings of the Bible. This simple syllogism provides the rationale for theological exegesis. And not just the rationale, but also the . . . . Continue Reading »

An Ecumenical Question

Throughout Church history, theological controversy has been one of the enduring features. Name any communion or denomination and you will find one which has struggled with this matter. St. Maximus the Confessor was imprisoned, exiled, and lost his tongue and compared to many he got off easy. For . . . . Continue Reading »

Bleg: Some N.T. References Sought

One week from Saturday, I’m giving an oral final/homily to a (late vocations) N.T. class that I’m taking. I had a suggestion to do my homily concentrating on the topic of tolerance. Right now I’m thinking of starting (and wrapping up?) with a look at the section in John in which . . . . Continue Reading »

Dispensationalism, Jews, and Israel

A notable characteristic of dispensationalism, one which distinguishes it from both amillennial eschatology and even from historic premillennialism, is how the dispensationalist views the Jewish people and the nation Israel. The following are some quite brief notes on the subject, followed by a . . . . Continue Reading »

CS Lewis on the Cross

I have been reading the final book in CS Lewis’s space trilogy That Hideous Strength, and I came across an excerpt worth sharing. For those unfamiliar with the book a man named Mark (who is an unbeliever) is being programmed under the threat of violence to think . . . . Continue Reading »

The Many Worlds Adiaphora or Heresy?

Two well known strands of Protestant theology are the Calvinist and Arminian. There are a number of differences between these two schools but one of them keys on soteriology (salvation). Calvinists would hold that once a person is saved, he is always saved. Arminians dispute this idea. Consider the . . . . Continue Reading »

On Knowing Your Interpretive Methods

We begin with the axiom that all things are interpreted. We interpret the world around us according to our personal framework — our world view and our presumed method(s) for arriving at an accurate conclusion. We may learn these frameworks from others and subsequently tailor them as needed to . . . . Continue Reading »

Filter Tag Articles