Among secularists, Christianity is associated with intolerance, largely because its attitudes toward sex do not square with the progressive status quo. But Christianity’s reputation for intolerance can be traced back to the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century, and to public intellectuals such . . . . Continue Reading »
Lay Leadership Citing mass disenfranchisement in a “papal-episcopal oligarchy,” Bronwen McShea (“Bishops Unbound,” January) argues for institutional representation of “entire classes of lay and clerical members of the Church” currently “at the mercy of episcopal authority.” She . . . . Continue Reading »
To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism by ross douthat simon and schuster, 256 pages, $26 It is beyond question that the Roman Catholic Church is currently in the throes of one of the greatest crises in its two-millennium history. In human terms, its future might be . . . . Continue Reading »
St. Charles Borromeo endures as a model of true Catholic reformation for the contemporary Church. Continue Reading »
When Kenneth Clark devoted an episode to the Middle Ages in his magisterial BBC series, Civilisation, he celebrated the chivalry, courtesy, and romance of the French and Burgundian courts—the Gothic world of “imaginative fancy” that coexisted with a “sharp sense of reality.” Clark no doubt . . . . Continue Reading »
Two years after a study found most Evangelicals hold views condemned as heretical—especially on the Holy Spirit—an update has been released. And the numbers are in some ways even worse. So who—or what—is to blame? Continue Reading »
The Book of Acts opens with two events of great salvation-historical importance: the going up of Jesus from earth into heaven (the Ascension), and the coming down of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples (Pentecost). Both events are commemorated by Christians in this season of the year. Jesus’s resurrection from the dead inaugurated God’s new beginning, which the New Testament calls “the last days.” . . . . Continue Reading »
David Curtis Steinmetz, one of the leading church historians of our time, died this past November at age 79 on Thanksgiving evening. He spent most of his distinguished academic career at Duke Divinity School, where he was the Ragan Kerns Distinguished Professor Emeritus of the History of . . . . Continue Reading »
In 1971 the University of Chicago Press published The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600), the first volume in a projected five-volume work entitled The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine. In his preface to volume 1, Jaroslav Pelikan (a . . . . Continue Reading »
Robert Markus investigates the shifting spheres of sacred and . . . . Continue Reading »
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