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Saint Augustine

Saint Augustine by garry wills penguin books, 152 pages, $19.95 Augustinophobia, the fear and loathing of Augustine, is a long-standing malady. The condition has never been confined only to the secular despisers of Christianity. Indeed, in this century, symptoms have been observed among . . . . Continue Reading »

Impoverished Theology

Theologians move in two worlds, working not only with the abstract categories of philosophy but also with the highly concrete and often complex literary forms of the Bible. One of the central tasks of biblical theology is to provide a description of God that is compelling as well as truthful. If . . . . Continue Reading »

What a Woman Ought to Think

This is the “hiring season” for those of us in academia, the time of year when faculty search committees sift through piles of applications for teaching jobs for the coming academic year, and when PhD candidates like me wait nervously for the telephone to ring with invitations for job . . . . Continue Reading »

Derrida, Death, and Forgiveness

Barth, Derrida, and the Language of Theologyby graham ward cambridge university press, 258 pages, $54.95 The Gift of Deathby jacques derrida, translated by david wills university of chicago press, 115 pages, $18.95 Though Jacques Derrida is perhaps France’s best-known living philosopher, his . . . . Continue Reading »

Doing Christian Philosophy

Reasoned Faithedited by Eleanor Stumpecho point books & media, $34.95A decade ago, the well-respected Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga urged Christian thinkers to philosophize not only for skeptics but for their own faith communities. Christian philosophers, he argued, should do Christian . . . . Continue Reading »

Evangelical Theology in Crisis

No Place for Truth: Or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology by david f. wells eerdmans, 318 pages, $24.99  One of the common oddities of our time is the invocation of statistics to provide comfort and consolation to the religious believer. To be sure, numbers offer an almost irresistible . . . . Continue Reading »

God and Evolution: An Exchange

I Howard J. Van Till Although the rhetoric Phillip E. Johnson employs in his article “Creator or Blind Watchmaker?” (FT, January 1993) differs in some details from that of the “scientific creationists” of North American Christian fundamentalism, the effect of his pronouncements is the same. . . . . Continue Reading »

The Complexities of Natural Law

A few years ago I appeared on “Firing Line” with my Notre Dame colleagues Gerhardt Niemeyer and Ralph McInerny for a discussion of natural law. My memory of that occasion is vivid: our attempt to discuss the possibilities for the theory of natural law in the contemporary intellectual climate was . . . . Continue Reading »

Women, Ordination, and Angels

When Dr. George Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, visited Pope John Paul II in May 1992, the two church leaders discussed the probable future ordination of women priests in the Anglican Church. That, the Pope said, “touched on the very nature of the sacrament of holy orders.” A Vatican . . . . Continue Reading »

Briefly Noted 92

Covenant Of Love: Pope John Paul II on Sexuality, Marriage, and Family in the Modern World edited by Richard M. Hogan and John M. Levoir Ignatius Press, 328 pages, $14.95 For those who have had enough of the dull and deadly conformism of recent decades, a manifesto for a sexual revolution that . . . . Continue Reading »

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