The Holy Water Flowers

One Sunday morning in the middle of last January, I was busily preparing my church for the coming liturgy as part of my sub-deacon duties. My friend Mark greeted me, pointed to flowers in vases on each side of the altar, and asked, “Can you tell the difference between the two bouquets?” Continue Reading »

On Not Being “Prophetic”

Frequently I am invited to add my name as an endorser of a position paper on some topic of public concern. And when I decide not to sign it, it often has to do with my impression that the group making the declaration is trying too hard to be “prophetic.”. . .  Continue Reading »

Protestants March for Life

A Religion News Service (RNS) story several days ago highlighted how the usually Catholic-dominated annual March for Life, which occurred yesterday, is more deliberately reaching out to evangelicals. One prominent evangelical speaker yesterday was former Focus on the Family chief James Dobson, age seventy-seven but still fiery. . . .  Continue Reading »

From Contempt to Solidarity

The period from 2009–2012 saw a bizarre change within the culture of the Republican party. Party elites found it a good idea to express resentment and contempt for workers who were just on the other side of the earnings median. Republicans paid the price of this contempt in 2012, and recent signs indicate that Republican politicians have learned their lesson. . . . Continue Reading »

Accelerating Catholic Reform

Two recent books suggest that, amidst challenges and problems, the pace of authentic Catholic renewal is accelerating in these United States. Anne Hendershott and Christopher White’s Renewal (Encounter Books) was nicely timed to coincide with Pope Francis’s recently published comments on seminary reform. There, the pope stressed the imperative of integral formation, in which human development, spiritual growth, intellectual formation, and the development of pastoral skills mesh together in preparing the priests of the future. As Hendershott and White demonstrate, American seminaries, once deeply troubled by the confusions of the immediate post-Vatican II decades, are at the forefront of that renewal, in ways that might well be imitated by other countries in the West. Continue Reading »

Theological Stakes of Sexual Difference

One of the most neglected recent books on sexual difference is also one of the most important. Christopher C. Roberts’ 2007 book, Creation and Covenant, is a remarkably comprehensive and detailed theological investigation of the topic. By giving us a narrative arc that stretches from the earliest Church Fathers to Pope John Paul II and beyond, Roberts considers not only the ways in which these figures disagree with one another but how they provide resources for understanding sexual difference today. Continue Reading »

Lutheran Evangelicals

Why is Calvinism so influential among American Evangelicals while Lutheranism is not? We might describe the statistically modal convert to Calvinism—that is, the most frequently observed kind of convert—as a person like this: A young adult, usually male. Raised in a broad though indistinct Evangelical (and sometimes nominally Catholic) home. Bright. A reader. Searching for better intellectual answers to questions about God, Jesus and the Bible. Is open to becoming a pastor. Why does this young man so much more often become a Calvinist instead a Lutheran? Continue Reading »