Skip to main content
Blog

Teaching Amid A Community of Teachers

Part-way through teaching a new course on faith and pedagogy last year I noticed an emerging pattern that had not been a fully conscious part of my plan. An unanticipated trend slowly turned into a conscious strategy that threaded its way through several major topics. It started a few weeks into the semester as we…
September 9, 2024
Blog

Religious Service Attendance: An Important Predictor of Student, Faculty, and Human Flourishing

Throughout our scholarly careers, we have consistently been struck by an empirical finding we often encounter. The most important religious variable predictor in studies is usually not how people identify (e.g., Christian) or what they believe (e.g., certain views of the Bible). Instead, it is simply a weekly action. How often do they go to…
September 4, 2024
Blog

Through-lines of a Life and Career: An Editor’s Reflection

For my own part, I know I must keep alive in myself what I have once known and grown into. —Thomas MertonThomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (New York: Doubleday, Image, 1968), 187.  My wide-ranging but low-built apartment complex, constructed before I was born, values its old maples and oaks, though time has reduced…
August 30, 2024
Blog

Introducing The Christian Scholar’s Review Summer Issue

When we receive a manuscript that looks promising for publication, I often ask its authors to keep two things in mind as they work on revisions. First, I ask them to make it clear why people should care about their topic, reminding them that most of their readers will likely be outside their field. However,…
August 28, 2024

Subscribe

for new content notifications, access to video and audio conversations with our writers, and invitations to our events.

Blog

Humble Worldviewing

One of my courses in seminary—a half-century ago!—had a lasting impact on my thinking. It was about world religions, and especially helpful for me was an assigned text, Christian Faith and Other Faiths, by Stephen Neill,Stephen Neill, Christian Faith and Other Faiths: The Christian Dialogue with Other Religions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961). then a…
August 7, 2024
Blog

Where the Beauty Came From

“The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing—to reach the Mountain, to find the place where all the beauty came from.” —C. S. Lewis At age eleven classical music started it all for me. My parents, wanting to divert me from what they viewed as the corrupting rock ‘n’ roll of the…
August 6, 2024
Blog

Sorry Not Sorry*: The Apologetics of an Olympic Non-Apology

I love the Olympics. I have been transfixed by them for over fifty years, starting with the 1972 Munich games, where Olga Korbut catapulted women’s gymnastics to a demanding athletic sport, and a very photogenic Mark Spitz shattered seven world records to go along with the seven gold medals he won in his seven swimming events. My…
August 5, 2024
Blog

A Biblical Precedent for Dissent

Late in the spring 2024 semester, several college campuses were rocked by student (and faculty) protests over the conflict in Gaza. More recently, the Chronicle of Higher Education broke a story about an instructor whose contract was not renewed after he had publicly opposed an increase in parking fees. On the surface, these events could…
August 2, 2024
Blog

The Song of the Law — Lessons from John Witte, Jr’s Table Talk

“For we live not only under the rule of law. We live also under the rhythm of law—the ebb and flow, the different paces and places for legal practice” (John Witte, Jr.) Introduction On June 18, 2024, a group of 100 deans of American law schools issued a simple and succinct letter outlining the responsibilities…
July 16, 2024
Blog

Fully Seen, Fully Known

Recently I walked with students among the self-portrait collection at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. Most of these portraits were glamorous and proud, but a few were melancholy, desperate, even brutal. Some were fanciful, others despairing. Almost all faced outward as if to catch the eyes of passers-by and elicit recognition, acknowledgment, and sympathy.…
July 15, 2024
Blog

Review of Teaching for Spiritual Formation: A Patristic Approach to Christian Education in a Convulsed Age

Many valuable resources exist for Christian professors eager to integrate faith and learning in the classroom; however, I have found some of the best theological insight and practical guidance in a recent book directed toward classical Christian high school teachers. The book bears the intriguing title Teaching for Spiritual Formation: A Patristic Approach to Christian…
July 12, 2024
Blog

The University and Community Engagement: Recent Approaches

If we’re going to do this,” DeAmon Harges told me, “we’re going to have to become friends.” The condition set me back on my heels. Of course, I wasn’t opposed to getting to know this Indianapolis-based nonprofit leader, rapidly becoming a national figure in community development conversations. But though I was far from reluctant to…
July 11, 2024
BlogBook Review

All the Kingdoms of the World: On Radical Religious Alternatives to Liberalism

Kevin Vallier has written a valuable exposition and critique of what he describes as radical religious alternatives to liberalism. Vallier is an Eastern Orthodox political philosopher at Bowling Green State University and a strong defender of the liberal tradition in politics. Liberalism in this sense refers broadly to such things as constitutional government, respect for…
July 10, 2024