Latest Articles
Debating evolution: The God who would intervene: Religion meets science
In the days before the Kansas School Board's August decision to strip the teaching of evolution from state science standards, the presidents of the Kansas university system issued a statement...
At table with the saints: 1 John 3:1-3
Would going to church make any difference in how you live—or die?
The center and beyond
Re-forming the Center: American Protestantism, 1900 to the Present, edited by Doublas Jacobsen and William Vance Trollinger Jr. ...
Rendering Unto Caesar, by Anthony Gill, and Religious Politics in Latin America, by Brian H. Smith
Twenty years ago the churches in Latin America were viewed as playing a major role in resisting military dictatorships and in developing new revolutionary social models....
Sensational art: Shocked in Brooklyn
The exhibit at the Brooklyn Art Museum that has caused a furor in New York and generated reams of material for editorial pages is titled "Sensation." That title offers a good clue about the commerc...
Violence and illness: Treating the mentally ill
When violence breaks out and murder occurs, we want an explanation, a reason, and preferably someone to blame....
Whatever happened to liberation theology? God's "option for the poor": God's "option for the poor"
Not long ago, a retired pastor and theologian who had lived and taught in Buenos Aires in the early 1970s came back to visit....
Mainline faith, with passion: Cultural immersion of the good kind
Thirteen years ago I became the pastor of a downtown church that had once been a major force in the community. At one time, 2,000 people filled its huge sanctuary on Sunday mornings....
God’s holiness
The rabbi put the question to my friend directly: Do Christians believe that God is holy?" My friend was initially taken aback; she thought of the popularity of the hymn "Holy, Holy, Holy," and of ...
Refugees with dwindling rights
To reach the Israeli settlement of Ma'ale Adumim, you drive due east on a new highway built through the Israeli-occupied West Bank, ignoring, if you can, the occasional Palestinian refugee camp in ...
Why bother with Reformation? John 8:31-36
There was a time when Reformation Sunday provided the occasion for Protestants to get together and say bad things about Catholics. Reformation services were conclaves of smug pronouncements....
The Cambridge Companion to Christian Doctrine, edited by Colin E. Gunton
Academic theology can have a future only if theologians themselves are interested in it....
Presbyopia and other milestones: Relinquishment
Older people take us by surprise. All of a sudden one day, they are us. This happened to me recently....
Fearfully and wonderfully made: Reflections on cosmetic surgery
Making the Body Beautiful: A Cultural History of Aesthetic Surgery, by Sander Gilman...
Leaving a landmark
As we moved out of the Old Colony building a few days ago, I remembered having written about the place back in 1977 when it—along with the Fisher building to the north and the Manhattan building to...
Another look at Waco: Difficult lessons
Did federal agents start the conflagration in which 75 Branch Davidians died near Waco, Texas, on April 19, 1993?...
Divine violence?
In the New Testament, God's "violence" is a precondition of human nonviolence.