They've come for another one: Comments to the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville about the legacy of former U.S. Sen. J. William Fulbright included a few threats to halt donations if his statue is taken down and his name is removed from UA’s arts and sciences college. But many wrote in to say that UA should …
What We Were Really Trying to Accomplish in Men’s Ministries
As sort of a follow-up to my last post, I'd like to defend something else that's under attack these days: men's ministries. I actually worked in this field during my time with Church of God Lay Ministries, from when I started in 1996 until the department was abolished in 2010. So I can speak with …
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The Episcopal Snobs and the John Wayne Evangelicals
There's never a dull moment these days, and to shut off the possibility of one occurring we now have the food fight around Kristin Kobes du Mez' Jesus and John Wayne. The most recent volley has been around the illustrious Anglican Anne Carlson Kennedy's review of same, with the usual suspects saying the usual things. …
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Those Infernal Internal Passports
At the left is a passport cover, one of those things designed to protect your passport, especially if your home is really a pied à terre and you travel a great deal. But look carefully: it's from the old Soviet Union, complete with their national seal embossed on the cover, and "Pasport" at the bottom. …
The Catholic Church and the Dung Beetles
One of my Twitter followers referred me to this series of posts (Part I, Part II and Part III, and now he's added a piece about the Trads) by one Larry Chapp, one time seminarian and academic. (He uses the dung beetle analogy in the first post.) A thorough response would be as long as …
I’m Featured in the New Humanist About Working in Heaven
It's the topic that never seems to go away (sorry!) My first post on this topic was in 2012, but just a few weeks ago I wrote this in response--and amplification--to an article which featured my first post in, of all places, MEL Magazine (a secular publication for men.) Now Ralph Jones has written a …
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Things Going Your Way? A Holy Week Reflection
Many of you know that I used to work for the Church of God Department of Lay Ministries. One of my colleagues, who did most of the graphic design work, was a good friend in addition to being a coworker. Sometimes he'd greet me with the phrase, "Things going your way?" It's an easy way …
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Why Did They Cancel Charles and Mary Beard?
I recently completed reading Charles and Mary Beard's The Rise of American Civilization, which at one time was one of the most influential texts on the subject. The Beards, as is typical with textbooks in general, frequently revised the text, mostly adding to the end to keep that up to date. The version I read …
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The Problem With Social Justice is That It Always Involves Changing Someone Else
Anne Kennedy makes an interesting observation in her piece "What is Really the Problem?": Second, human people are wicked. All people. ALL have sinned and fallen well and catastrophically short of the glory of God. All of the cries about white supremacy, white evangelicalism, patriarchy, and racism all illumine the very false and foolish idea …
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Casting the Seven Mountains Into the Sea
David French's piece on the "Seven Mountain Movement" is in intriguing look into something that I've heard discussed over the years but never really spelled out. He describes the basics of the movement as follows: In its distilled essence, the Seven Mountain concept describes seven key cultural/religious institutions that should be influenced and transformed by …
Positive Infinity 