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Playing Straight into God’s Hands: A Comparative Study of the Hindu and Christian Understandings of Play

Comparatively studying the Hindu theologies of lila and the Christian theologies of play can provide a common ground for interreligious dialogue on divine delight, divine presence, and human flourishing. In doing so, Christians can aim to build a robust and embodied theology of play that affirms similarities and identifies differences with other faith traditions while…
August 22, 2021
Article

Shame, Guilt, and the Practice of Repentance: An Intersection of Modern Psychology with the Wisdom of Calvin

Shame and guilt are important concepts within Christian theology. In much of the literature, however, these two concepts are lumped together, offering little if any distinction between them. By contrast, evidence-based psychological research on the topics of shame and guilt has flourished over the past 30 years, offering a careful and important distinction between shame…
June 1, 2021
Article

Transformative Learning Theory as a Hermeneutic for Understanding Tensions within Scripture

This article proposes that Transformative Learning Theory (TLT), particularly in light of recent advances in cognitive linguistics, is a fruitful means of teaching and interpreting tensions within Scripture. One of the key distinctions of TLT is that deep learning involves a crucial change in the learner, often induced by a crisis or a “disorienting dilemma”…
May 31, 2021
Reviews

Heaven on Earth: The Rise, Fall, and Afterlife of Socialism

Reviewed by James R. Vanderwoerd, Applied Social Sciences, Redeemer University “If you build it, they will leave” (xvi). What could be more ominous, obvious, and even humorous than this pithy observation at the end of Joshua Muravchik’s preface? Muravchik grew up as a card-carrying socialist who was thoroughly imbued with the doctrines of socialism from…
May 11, 2021
Reviews

Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents

Reviewed by John A. Bernbaum, former President of the Russian-American Christian University (RACU) in Moscow, Russia; currently CEO of BEAM (Business and Education as Mission), Inc. Rod Dreher is a courageous Christian author. He is willing to address controversial issues, which most Christians carefully avoid, and his criticism of the “moralistic therapeutic deism” that characterizes…
May 11, 2021
Reviews

Mathematics for Human Flourishing

Reviewed by Dave Klanderman, Mathematics and Statistics, Calvin University “For such as time as this.” This phrase serves as part of a final justification offered by Mordecai in his plea to Esther to use her role as Queen to help to save the Hebrews from Haman’s plot to destroy them (Esther 4:12-14ff). In a similar…
May 11, 2021