Category: Theology and Practice
The Church’s One Foundation and the Fire at Notre Dame Cathedral
By Joshua Heavin Upon initially hearing there was a fire at Cathédrale Notre-Dame, I assumed that perhaps some light smoke damage would be incurred; such a titanic vessel must be unsinkable, and our sophisticated modern technology will undoubtedly prevent any...
The End of Christendom: Notes on the Burning of Notre Dame
Rod Dreher is fond of quoting a line from Benedict XVI who—forgive my paraphrasing—has said that the church’s two most powerful evangelistic tools are her art and her saints. Though I have never been fully outside the church, even during...
Natural Law and the Prospects of Persuasion
By James Clark When American evangelicals began to earnestly engage in conventional politics in the 1950s, a problem emerged. As David L. Weeks put it in a 2001 article, “Evangelicals have never developed a coherent and compelling political philosophy. Instead,...
Desire, Duty, and Dynamite
As it becomes clearer and clearer that global climate change is dangerous and will require enormous efforts to protect human lives from its effects, the debate about how our individual choices and corporate efforts affect us has only gotten sharper....
Pragmatism and the Practice of Theology
By Joshua Heavin Several decades ago, missiologist Lesslie Newbigin wrote about our impulse towards pragmatism in the post-Christendom West: In discussions about the contemporary mission of the Church it is often said that the Church ought to address itself to...
The Surprising Humanity of the Westminster Confession
Though there is no shortage of disagreement over the sources of our current malaise, that we live in a decadent society is, perhaps, one of the few ideas that actually can unite many conservative and progressive Americans. What’s more, in...
Will Complementarianism Die with the Baby Boomers?
In the latest edition of his newsletter “The Masculinist,” Aaron Renn dismissed complementarianism as a baby boomer phenomenon that will inevitably die with that generation. Much of the analysis is both interesting and correct, but it also misses a few key points...
In Defense of Localism
By Sean O’Hare In a recent piece for Arc Digital, Nicholas Grossman examined the viability of an alliance between left-wing identity politics and right-wing localism. Grossman ultimately concludes that common ground between localism and left-wing identity politics is an impossibility...
What Kuyper Gets Wrong: On the Problem with Denominationalism
By Ruben Alvarado Once upon a time, the state shared the public square with the church. The central location of the church building in every European town is mute testimony to this state of affairs. But those days are long...
The Real Place for Conflict: On Keeping Controversy Close to Home
By Justin Frank Social media gives unprecedented opportunities to know about and engage in controversy. Many of these controversies are rooted in places far from us; involve people we’ve never met (and will likely never know); and grow out of...