If you ask almost any student or professor what the purpose of the liberal arts is, they will likely not give you an explicitly theologically informed answer. Instead, they will likely discuss how “it fosters critical thinking,” or helps one “adopt different approaches to understanding,” or “trains one’s mind to be agile.” Christians are usually…
The Spirit of the Game is an admirable achievement. The history Paul Putz illuminates furthers our understanding of how a particular brand of Protestant Christianity came to dominate religious outreach and ministry in elite American intercollegiate and professional sports in the twentieth century. Putz argues that the emergence of sport ministry organizations such as the…
Montana is part of “Big Sky Country.” During a sabbatical last semester (thank you, Calvin University!), my wife and I spent time under the big sky and worked on writing projects. Unobstructed views and dramatic land features yield a sense of perspective that the sky’s not just big, it’s enormous. In parts of Montana, plains…
One of the oddest and most interesting educational developments during the past few decades is Protestants’ embrace of classical education at both the K-12 and higher education levels. What makes it odd is that certain Protestant Reformers thought key elements of classical education were suspect. After all, they attributed the too-friendly embrace of some of…
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”—a guide…
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”—a guide…
Cave paintings and rusty ochre brushstrokes appear on the cover of Darrel R. Falk’s recently published book, On the (Divine) Origin of Our Species. These earliest examples of art call out to us today. Falk describes the European cave paintings in the Chauvet caves, of horses, rhinos, and lions, which were discovered in the twentieth…
One of the exercises that I often have both classroom students and survey respondents do is to prioritize their identities. I first ask them to consider the range of identities they might apply to themselves, and then I ask them to rank their top three. I find the answers produce significant clarity about my audience,…
Matthew Barrett’s The Reformation as Renewal: Retrieving the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church seeks to retell the story of the Protestant Reformation by focusing on the connection between the Reformation and the theological heritage of the medieval West. Drawing on the historiographical interventions of a previous generation, Barrett sets out to reveal that the…
Why does the Bible exist? Whereas many introductory textbooks explore the “Four W’s” of inquiry (who, what, when, and where), Jacob L. Wright seeks to answer why a tiny nation over the course of several centuries produced a prolific and enduring corpus of texts. Setting aside answers one might expect from a confessional setting (“because…
Matthew Barrett’s The Reformation as Renewal: Retrieving the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church seeks to retell the story of the Protestant Reformation by focusing on the connection between the Reformation and the theological heritage of the medieval West. Drawing on the historiographical interventions of a previous generation, Barrett sets out to reveal that the…
Why does the Bible exist? Whereas many introductory textbooks explore the “Four W’s” of inquiry (who, what, when, and where), Jacob L. Wright seeks to answer why a tiny nation over the course of several centuries produced a prolific and enduring corpus of texts. Setting aside answers one might expect from a confessional setting (“because…
Russell Moore and Karen Swallow Prior may not fit the stereotype of an “exvangelical.” Unlike the angry twenty-something who takes to social media to announce that they’re resigning from church, Moore and Prior both devoted several decades of their adult lives to serving the church through teaching, writing, and (in Moore’s case) denominational administration. Both…
Every business is a social structure. Critical realist sociology tells us that social structures influence the decisions that persons within them make by presenting restrictions (penalties for violating norms) and opportunities (rewards for taking up advantages offered), that frequently alter those nonetheless free decisions. Thus, a business can encourage or discourage virtuous decisions, and over…
Since it is an election year, I wondered if I could find evidence that Christian universities help their students contemplate excellent Christian citizenship. As mentioned in an earlier post, my research team examined the general education requirements at 231 Protestant colleges requiring at least one Bible or theology course. We chose these institutions because they showed…
“My song is love unknown, my Saviour’s love to me; love to the loveless shown, That they might lovely be.” It is common practice in many Christian denominations to reflect on the Passion during Lent. For instance, in the Catholic Church, there are the Stations of the Cross. Another widespread practice, across Christian denominations, is…
As I sat down to begin writing this review essay of these recently published books, the sun was rising on the first day of the forty-eighth year of my life. I did not plan to be writing a review essay on my birthday, but it seems fitting given the topics addressed in these books. Like…
Debates rage over the best direction for American conservatism, particularly in the wake of Donald Trump’s disruptive presidency. The three books reviewed here provide distinct diagnoses and prescriptions for American politics. Only one book, Yoram Hazony’s Conservatism: A Rediscovery, is primarily intended as a blueprint for American conservatism. Francis Fukuyama’s Liberalism and Its Discontents assesses…
Regardless of how one defines it, American evangelicalism is at a crossroads. The last quarter of the twentieth century was replete with signs of prosperity. Many churches, parachurch organizations, universities, and seminaries grew at unprecedented rates. Some analysts argued that the individuals populating those institutions were contributing to an intellectual renaissance. For example, in the…
I can remember the first time Sabbath became real to me. Sure, I had learned about it in Sunday School as a child or even heard professors emphasize its importance in my transition to graduate school. But certainly, I didn’t really need it. I was able to get things done and maintain both a positive…
