A recent joint statement by a number of Italian evangelical groups indicts the Roman Catholic Church as an “imperial” church and its call for evangelicals to “unionist initiatives that are contrary to Scripture and instead renew their commitment to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to the whole world.” Continue Reading »
When you consider how thrilling and deeply moving the Bible really is, it is almost an accomplishment to make it as boring as modern editions do. Continue Reading »
The post-Vatican II Lectionary for Mass has many fine features, one of which is the continuous reading of the Acts of the Apostles during weekday Masses in the Easter season. As the Church celebrates the Resurrection for fifty days, the Church also ponders the first evangelization: the primitive Christian community, in the power of the Spirit, brings the surrounding Mediterranean world the history-shattering news that Jesus of Nazareth, having been Continue Reading »
Say goodbye to one of the most ancient Christian communities in the world. Last week, members of ISIS—the “Islamic State in Iraq and Syria,” a Sunni Islamist group that recently has captured parts of Iraq and declared a new caliphate—began going through the northern Iraqi city of Mosul and marking the homes of Christians with the Arabic letter “Nun.” “Nun” stands for “Nasara,” from “Nazarenes,” a word that refers to Christians. The implications were clear. Mosul’s Christians faced the same fate the Christians of Raqqa, Syria, had when ISIS captured their city last spring. “We offer them three choices,” ISIS announced: “Islam; the dhimma contract—involving payment of jizya; if they refuse this they will have nothing but the sword.” Continue Reading »
On 28 March, 1606, Fr. Henry Garnet, an English Jesuit, went on trial in London. He was accused of involvement in the famous “Gunpowder Plot” the previous year in which Guy Fawkes and his co-conspirators attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament and assassinate King James I. Continue Reading »
A popular argument against the existence of God is what some call divine hiddenness: “If God exists, why doesn’t he make his existence more obvious, such that it could not be doubted?” But what atheists take to be a strike against God may prove just the opposite, and in fact the very pattern of human flourishing. Continue Reading »
On July 14, 2014, the General Synod of the Church of England voted to permit women to be consecrated as bishops in their church. It followed a long, and sometimes bitter debate, and a vote in 2012 that barely fell short of the required two-thirds majority among lay representatives. Part of the decision—debated as to its enforceability—guarantees parochial opponents access to male priests and bishops. Continue Reading »
There are some things that should never be said to the dying. I’ve never bothered developing a comprehensive “no-no” list but years of parish ministry have attuned me to the particularly egregious. Continue Reading »
As the world marked the silver anniversary of the Polish elections of June 1989, which eventually brought to power the first non-communist Polish prime minister since the Second World War, a conference met at the Vatican to consider “The Church in the Moment of Change in 1980-1989 in East Central Europe.” Continue Reading »
Michael Lindsay, President of Gordon College, the Christian liberal arts college that I attend on Boston’s North Shore, co-signed a letter to President Obama, asking that he include a religious exemption in his imminent executive order barring federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Gordon President Michael Lindsay wrote his name alongside thirteen others, including Michael Wear and Stephen Schneck, both involved in faith outreach for the 2012 Obama campaign. But within hours of the letter’s reproduction in the Atlantic, Gordon was hit by a wave of controversy. Continue Reading »
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