American evangelicals and serious theology are not terms that just naturally snuggle up to one another with easy equipoise. That, despite the fact that Jonathan Edwards, the greatest theologian America has yet to produce, stands at the headwaters of the evangelical tradition. The diminution of the evangelical mind since Edwards”and not only in theology”has been often rehearsed… . Continue Reading »
Thomas Jefferson’s religion has been controversial for over 200 years, since at least the 1800 presidential race. The latest flare-up was over popular conservative Christian writer David Barton’s recently published Jefferson Lies, which the publisher withdrew last year after the exposure of numerous distortions in Barton’s attempt to baptize Jefferson as a virtual evangelical fellow traveller. Secular historians have typically painted Jefferson as a religious freethinker… . Continue Reading »
Whenever I criticize the Wild West ethics of the in vitro fertilization industry, I hear from heartbroken people who tell me they would do “anything” to have a baby. I sympathize with the heartache of childlessness. But the willingness of many to do”and of the IVF industrial complex to sell”anything leads to a “me first” sense of reproductive entitlement… . Continue Reading »
I thank John Leslie and Robert Lawrence Kuhn for their gracious and substantive response to my recent comments on their fine anthology The Mystery of Existence: Why Is There Anything At All? In the course of my earlier remarks, I put forward a “friendly criticism” to the effect that John and Robert had paid insufficient attention in their book to the tradition of classical theism … Continue Reading »
Breaking Bad’s creator Vince Gilligan has said that while he wants to believe that there is a heaven, he cannot believe there is no hell. The characters in Breaking Bad surely sin and suffer, and God is not silent. But there is more to the God of Breaking Bad than judgment. He also offers grace to characters who, like those in Flannery O’Connor’s stories, ignore or misinterpret it time and again… . Continue Reading »
Our thanks to Edward Feser for his review of The Mystery of Existence: Why Is There Anything At All? (“Fifty Shades of Nothing,” First Things, July 24, 2013). Our book’s limited mission is to build appreciation for the most baffling of all enigmas: Why is there something rather than nothing? In its shadow, all the big questions”Does God exist? Why the universe? Life after death?”are eclipsed… . Continue Reading »
In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus speaks the first words of his adult ministry not to his family or to his friends”but to his adversary, Satan, in the desert. He says,“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” And in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus begins his public ministry with these first words: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel” … Continue Reading »
“The most serious of the evils that afflict the world these days are youth unemployment and the loneliness of the old.” So begins the most recent papal interview, this one with Eugenio Scalfari, founder of the Italian paper La Repubblica, with whom Francis had already had an exchange of letters. If you look at that sentence as it stands, it sounds a bit incongruous… . Continue Reading »
The humanitarian and strategic disaster of Syria should focus Catholic minds on the hard fact that there is no easy or quick path to peace in the Middle East, a very dangerous part of the world where Christians of all persuasions are at daily risk of their lives. Two recently published books will help those eager to get beyond media sound-bites, wishful thinking, and vague pieties in order to think seriously about the realities that must be faced in a region with too little geography and too much history, where religiously-inspired passion too often leads to murder… . Continue Reading »
Throughout reactions and deliberations to the Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons, the question of punishment has arisen on multiple occasions. Yet the importance of punishment”even its meaning and goals”has become contested and miserably confused. At some level, we still think that punishment matters in international politics. But we don’t understand why… . Continue Reading »
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