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A Review of Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age.

Given its title, Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age is unexpectedly narrow in its target audience and goals. Yet even more surprising is the power, richness, and far-­reaching value of the vision at its heart. This book is a guide for “Christian practices for teaching reading”Julie Ooms,…
November 7, 2024
Reviews

A Review of Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age.

Given its title, Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age is unexpectedly narrow in its target audience and goals. Yet even more surprising is the power, richness, and far-­reaching value of the vision at its heart. This book is a guide for “Christian practices for teaching reading”Julie Ooms,…
November 6, 2024
Review Essays

Theological Foundations for Creation Care: Replacing Apathy and Despair with Hope and Christian Virtues — A Review Essay

Andrew J. Spencer’s and Steven Bouma-­Prediger’s recent releases applying Christian theology to contemporary environmental problems share similar goals and face common constraints. As trade paperbacks, both books are intended to motivate an indifferent or skeptical Christian readership and theologically equip students to address hot-­button political topics. The authors self-­identify as Evangelical, utilize the language of…
November 6, 2024
Review and Response

“Apostle to the Disillusioned” — A Review of Tomáš Halík’s The Afternoon of Christianity

When an influential priest (the Czech, Templeton-­award winning author, teacher, and theologian Tomáš Halík) criticizes “ecclesiastical authorities” while seeking to advance the agenda of another ecclesiastical authority (in-deed, the highest of them all: Pope Francis, to whom the book is dedicated), one can’t help but be hopeful for or at least curious about the future…
November 6, 2024
Article

Telling New Stories

Last year a group of provosts convened to engage in conversations about Emerson’s essay, “The American Scholar.” Over the period of a year, we looked for insights into the role of the Christian scholar by reflecting on Emerson’s description of the ideal American scholar. He admonished the American scholar to break free from the European…
November 6, 2024
Article

The Christian Scholar as a Poet

A Tale of Two Emersons In the little New England town where I grew up, two roads were named after Ralph Waldo Emerson—different roads sharing one name. Our split-­level home sat on a half-­acre plot by a meadow; while I lived on this quiet Emerson Road, there was another Emerson Road less than a mile…
November 6, 2024
Article

Christian Higher Education: Partnering the Chapel and Laboratory

In 2011 Pepperdine University hosted a conference in which Francis S. Collins offered the keynote address. His credentials are extraordinary: Collins is an accomplished research scientist, physician, director of the Human Genome Project, and subsequently director of the National Institutes of Health for three consecutive United States presidents. A devout Christian believer, he authored The…
November 6, 2024