Business defines itself increasingly as the pursuit of money, but this move into the “iron cage” signals a process of abstraction away from goods internal to business. Scott Waalkes argues that virtues implicit in the Incarnation counter problems in this move by encouraging virtuous Christian business people to work toward the Kingdom of God through…
Everything is compromised. Nothing is worthy. Strip it down, strip it down. Take off the sugar-coating, the veneer, the gilding, the velour, and what is left? Nothing. Emptiness. Posing, pretending, preening, delusion. Those of us who love – truly love – sometimes feel like the prey of shadowy hunters. We are huddled together for safety…
In this essay, Annalee R. Ward explores Gran Torino’s moral order by engaging standpoint theory with Robert Wuthnow’s symbolic boundaries of moral order. In a journey of moral enlightenment, learning to communicate across boundaries anchors the story in hope. Along the way, Walt Kowalski encounters challenges to his moral structures which may affirm a redemptive…
Perry L. Glanzer notes that over the past two decades institutional growth in Christian higher education has slowed to a trickle in the West, but in Eastern Europe, Asia, and Africa it has taken off. The remarkable vigor and growth of Christianity in the global South and East is an obvious driver behind the rise…
Sociologists Michael Emerson and Christian Smith asked in their book Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America: will the evangelical church remove the color line? Phillip Luke Sinitiere offers a “history” of Divided by Faith since its publication in 2000. This article traces out the book’s impact on scholars, accounting…
Virtue ethics has made impressive inroads into the business academy. However, the prospects of the development of virtues in the actual practice of business remain in doubt. Among the most influential skeptics is Alasdair MacIntyre, who argues that business institutions must focus on “external goods” (material rewards and prestige) which threaten the development of “internal…
The 20th-century fundamentalist questions, pre-dating Carl F. H. Henry and the later rise of the Moral Majority, of whether Christians should participate in the political sphere are long gone. The fact that “evangelical” is now often understood within and without the Church as a political rather than theological marker has led to no little handwringing…
In the previous post, I compared the arguments of overwhelmed NYU students to those of their organic chemistry professor. NYU professor Stephanie Lee’s tweet sums it up: “I could write compelling defenses for each party – students, Prof. Jones, my department, NYU admin – bc everyone is operating under different pressures.” In this post, I…
‘My teacher, what are these cries I hear?Who are all these people conquered by their pain?’And he to me: ‘This state of miseryIs clutched by those sad souls whose works in lifeMerited neither praise nor infamy.’ The Divine Comedy is among the greatest literary works of all time. Written by the Florentine scholar and poet…
“Build to-day, then, strong and sure, With a firm and ample base; And ascending and secure Shall to-morrow find its place.” -H.W. Longfellow- Since the ostensible end of the COVID pandemic, and with the return of students to in-person classes, America has seen an interesting shift on law school campuses. Observers note a rising wave of activist students that the National Jurist called “the protest generation.” Examples abound, including the infamous cancelation…
Two weeks ago, a meme circulated with two pictures, labeled “My Fall Plans” and “The Delta Variant.” Usually the former image was cheerful and the latter considerably more dark. I saw most of these posted by my professor friends, asking a very good question: How can professors be expected to write a syllabus in this…
Many Christian films released in the last two decades often pitch themselves as a means of evangelizing unbelievers and reassuring the faith of believers. This article uses the film God’s Not Dead as an example of the recent trend in Christian films and argues, using historical parallels, that these films undermine their stated purposes and…
What we choose to eat impacts not only our health, but also contributes positively or negatively towards sustainability and justice. How food is produced determines its impact on environmental sustainability through pollution, soil erosion, ground water depletion, and biodiversity conservation. A food systems lens looks beyond production to consider the complex social issues linking food…
We illuminate conspiracy rumormongering by viewing it through the lens of Christian psychology. We propose that at the core of the anxiety and anger characteristic of much conspiracist discourse is a fundamentally unbiblical existential understanding of God leading to unbelieving responses to uncertainty and vulnerability stemming from human finitude. One fallen response to uncertainty is…
An infusion of vocational exploration within the undergraduate science curriculum could provide a path toward more effective healthcare and more significant scientific discoveries. students who pursue these careers often do so because they have a strong desire to help others; yet undergraduate science programs do not typically provide extensive training in communicating with others and…
Almost forty years ago Alvin Plantinga’s memorable “Advice to Christian Philosophers” set out a three-fold challenge to encourage members of his own academic tribe, but also “Christian intellectuals generally.” First, “to display . . . more independence of the rest of the philosophical world”; second, to “display more integrity in the sense of integral wholeness”;…
With today’s blog, I’m pleased to introduce the spring issue of Christian Scholar’s Review. We open the issue with a symposium addressing the issue of Christian political engagement. The twentieth-century fundamentalist questions, pre-dating Carl F. H. Henry and the later rise of the Moral Majority, of whether Christians should participate in the political sphere are…
Almost forty years ago Alvin Plantinga’s memorable “Advice to Christian Philosophers” set out a three-fold challenge to encourage members of his own academic tribe, but also “Christian intellectuals generally.” First, “to display . . . more independence of the rest of the philosophical world”; second, to “display more integrity in the sense of integral wholeness”;…
Nicholas Wolterstorff’s perceptive commentary on neo-Calvinist contributions to political activity is a welcome addition to discussions of Christian political engagement. Christian foundations of political thought are important and worthy of discussion, but in the current moment when fear and anger animate so much of American politics, Wolterstorff’s particular emphasis on political activity is especially prescient….
Among business disciplines, David J. Hagenbuch notes that marketing may be the field that is perceived least often as compatible with Christian vocation. However, when one considers that the central purpose of Christian vocation is reconciliation, that reconciliation is linked inextricably to exchange, and that marketing is the science that facilitates mutually beneficial exchange, it…
