Yearly Archives: 2015

Justine Toh–Great Sexpectations: Augustine, Ashley Madison and the Problem of Disordered Love

The Ashley Madison hack may have faded from the headlines but one of its key revelations lingers on in our cultural conversations about sex.

It’s present in more recent offerings like Rachel Hills’s book The Sex Myth: The Gap Between Our Fantasies and Reality and the romantic comedy Sleeping with Other People, currently showing in cinemas.

That this theme should crop up so repeatedly suggests that we need to be constantly reminded of it – no great surprise, really, since sex is often something that can (if you pardon the phrase) screw with our thinking, feeling, and desiring.

What each of these sex stories reinforces, again and again, is that all of us have great sexpectations that remain, frequently, unfulfilled.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, --Social Networking, Anthropology, Blogging & the Internet, Books, Ethics / Moral Theology, Health & Medicine, Marriage & Family, Media, Men, Pastoral Theology, Psychology, Religion & Culture, Sexuality, Theology, Women

A NYT Article on the Sexting Scandal at a Colorado High School

At least 100 students at a high school in Cañon City traded naked pictures of themselves, the authorities said Friday, part of a large sexting ring.
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The revelation has left parents outraged, administrators searching for missed clues, and the police and the district attorney’s office debating whether to file child pornography charges ”” including felony charges ”” against some of the participants.

George Welsh, the superintendent of the Cañon City school system, said students at Cañon City High School had been circulating 300 to 400 nude photographs, including images of “certainly over 100 different kids,” on their cellphones. “This is a lot of kids involved,” he said, adding that the children in the pictures were believed to be students at the high school as well as eighth graders from the middle school.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * General Interest, --Social Networking, Anthropology, Blogging & the Internet, Children, Education, Ethics / Moral Theology, Law & Legal Issues, Marriage & Family, Pastoral Theology, Photos/Photography, Sexuality, Teens / Youth, Theology

A Prayer to Begin the Day from L. E. H. Stephens-Hodge

O God, who in thy fatherly love hast called us that we should inherit a blessing: Give to us also, we pray thee, the blessing of wholesome speech and loving deed; that following always that which is good, we may do and suffer all that thou willest; in the name and strength of Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord.

Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, Spirituality/Prayer

From the Morning Scripture Readings

Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, thou who leadest Joseph like a flock! Thou who art enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth before E’phraim and Benjamin and Manas’seh! Stir up thy might, and come to save us!

–Psalm 80:1-2

Posted in Theology, Theology: Scripture

First Presbyterian Church in San Antonio votes to Depart from PCUSA

First Presbyterian Church of San Antonio overwhelmingly voted Sunday to leave its denomination, the Presbyterian Church (USA), citing what supporters of the outcome called an increasingly progressive social justice agenda and a drift from the authority of Scripture.

Read it all and you can find the links to all the key documentation there.

Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, * Culture-Watch, * Religion News & Commentary, Christology, Ethics / Moral Theology, Other Churches, Parish Ministry, Presbyterian, Religion & Culture, Sexuality Debate (Other denominations and faiths), Theology

Pew looks at the Religious Landscape in South Carolina

Check it out.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * South Carolina, Religion & Culture, Sociology

(CT) Gabriel Salguero–Why Settle for the 'Wilberforce Option' When We Have Dr. King?

Losing cultural influence is a necessary corrective to conflating Christian witness with political and cultural dominance. Christian witness is never a guarantee of success.

But there is something missing in many descriptions of this “from below” moment. Evangelical Christians are not, and have never been, a monolith. Sweeping statements about past dominance and present dislocation show that, for many, evangelicals of color remain Ralph Ellison’s “invisible man.”

Many Hispanic, Asian, and African American evangelicals are not having a “Chicken Little” moment. Our sky is not falling, because we have lived under fallen skies for years. Conservative Christians have been disproportionately affected by racism, immigration, poverty, and denial of voting rights (to name a few issues) for decades and centuries. Why did lack of progress on these issues not arouse similar concerns long ago?

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Religion News & Commentary, Ethics / Moral Theology, Evangelicals, Other Churches, Religion & Culture, Theology

Ross Douthat on the Angus Deaton+ Anne Case paper–The Dying of the Whites

Amid the stresses of the dot-com bust and the Great Recession, it was only white Americans who turned increasingly to drugs, liquor and quietus.

Why only them? One possible solution is suggested by a paper from 2012, whose co-authors include Andrew Cherlin and Brad Wilcox, leading left and right-leaning scholars, respectively, of marriage and family.

Noting that religious practice has fallen faster recently among less-educated whites than among less-educated blacks and Hispanics, their paper argues that white social institutions, blue-collar as well as white-collar, have long reflected a “bourgeois moral logic” that binds employment, churchgoing, the nuclear family and upward mobility.

But in an era of stagnating wages, family breakdown, and social dislocation, this logic no longer seems to make as much sense.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, America/U.S.A., Anthropology, Consumer/consumer spending, Corporations/Corporate Life, Economy, Ethics / Moral Theology, History, Housing/Real Estate Market, Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market, Marriage & Family, Personal Finance, Politics in General, Psychology, Religion & Culture, Theology, Theology: Scripture

Heroin overdose deaths casting dark shadow on Lowcountry South Carolina

Heroin is no longer only an inner-city problem.

Users are young, educated and often fighting an uphill battle to stay clean while deep in the clutches of a disease that is far from free of stigma.

And the highly addictive drug’s increased use and potency have led to overdose deaths rising dramatically in the nation, state and Lowcountry.

Reported opioid deaths across the state jumped 118 percent from 237 in 2013 to 516 in 2014, a trend mirrored in the tri-county area, according to data from the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control.

Read it all from the local paper.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * International News & Commentary, * South Carolina, America/U.S.A., Anthropology, Children, Drugs/Drug Addiction, Ethics / Moral Theology, Marriage & Family, Pastoral Theology, Theology

A Prayer to Begin the Day from the Pastor's Prayerbook

O good Jesus, who alone orderest my life and my days; worthless and unworthy, I cast myself upon thine infinite love. I trust thee with my all: with my present and my future; with my joys and my sorrows; with my time and my eternity. Deal with me as thou willest and knowest best, only bind me fast with the bonds of thine everlasting love.

Posted in Uncategorized

From the Morning Scripture Readings

Mightier than the thunders of many waters, mightier than the waves of the sea, the LORD on high is mighty! Thy decrees are very sure; holiness befits thy house, O LORD, for evermore.

–Psalm 93:4-5

Posted in Uncategorized

Al Mohler–Why can’t Christians just join the revolution into the new sexual ethics?

The current American landscape includes more liberal churches that are doing their best to join the sexual revolution and conservative churches that cannot follow. Simple honesty requires acknowledgment that it is the conservative churches that are teaching what Christianity has taught for two millennia.

We are told that holding to biblical authority and the historic Christian faith will lead to our marginalization.

Perhaps so, but it is the more liberal churches that have been hemorrhaging members by the millions for the last four decades and, even in a secularizing age, it is the most secularized denominations that have suffered the greatest membership losses.

We do understand what is at stake in terms of the human judgment of history, but we are far more concerned about the divine verdict of eternity.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, --Civil Unions & Partnerships, America/U.S.A., Anthropology, Ethics / Moral Theology, Marriage & Family, Politics in General, Religion & Culture, Sexuality, Theology, Theology: Scripture

How one Georgia Trooper Went above and Beyond to Help 4 Children in a Tragedy

He was there to tell them their parents were killed in a car crash, but when he found the kids in costume ready to go trick-or-treating, he did something else first.

Watch it all.

Posted in Uncategorized

(1st Things) Peter Leithart–Enlightenment Bible, Church Bible

…the Church’s fundamental response to the Enlightenment Bible must be refusal: The Enlightenment Bible is not our Bible. Scripture has many authors, it makes use of many sources, and it is written””if we may be excused an unhelpful anachronism””in various genres. Academic scholarship has pointed all of this out, sometimes with insight, often to the point of tedium, and at times quite erroneously.

Yet Christians believe that the Bible is a unified book of books with theological and literary coherence. We believe that the Bible is such because the same God who spoke the world into existence spoke again and again through angels and prophets to Israel, and spoke again in the last days through his Son who is his eternal Word. This divine author did not grope from beginning to end, or vice versa, but knew the end at the beginning because he is the Lord who is, who was, and who comes.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, Books, Religion & Culture, Theology, Theology: Scripture

A Prayer for the Feast Day of Saint Willibrord

O Lord our God, who dost call whom thou willest and send them whither thou choosest: We thank thee for sending thy servant Willibrord to be an apostle to the Low Countries, to turn them from the worship of idols to serve thee, the living God; and we entreat thee to preserve us from the temptation to exchange the perfect freedom of thy service for servitude to false gods and to idols of our own devising; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, Church History, Spirituality/Prayer

John Donne's Batter My Heart to Begin the Day

Batter my heart, three-person’d God, for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp’d town to’another due,
Labor to’admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captiv’d, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly’I love you, and would be lov’d fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me,’untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you’enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, * Culture-Watch, Poetry & Literature, Spirituality/Prayer

From the Morning Scripture Readings

At the set time which I appoint I will judge with equity. When the earth totters, and all its inhabitants, it is I who keep steady its pillars….

For not from the east or from the west and not from the wilderness comes lifting up; but it is God who executes judgment, putting down one and lifting up another.

–Psalm 75: 2-3; 6-7

Posted in Theology, Theology: Scripture

(WSJ) The Challenge of Homesickness Among Elderly People

Q:Your article on homesickness was very thought-provoking. Many of my peers and I relocated in our sixties. Although we volunteer, attend houses of worship, have friends and travel, many of us are still lonely for home and sometimes depressed because of it. Has anyone studied this?

”” E.M.

A:People of all ages can feel homesick, and longing for the security and comfort of a past home can increase with age, according to a few studies that have included healthy elderly participants.

People often look for new sources of identity as their relationship with career and past colleagues fade. A 2004 study by Norwegian researchers found that elderly Danes and Pakistanis who had settled in Norway decades earlier identified more strongly with their native countries as they grew older, bringing a feeling of homesickness. Connecting to their cultural heritage by decorating their homes with related artwork or talking about their memories supported self-esteem and helped make up for age-related losses in other areas, researchers found.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, Aging / the Elderly, Anthropology, Children, Ethics / Moral Theology, Health & Medicine, Marriage & Family, Pastoral Theology, Psychology, Theology

(CT) Francis Beckwith–The Joys and Burdens of Being Both Evangelical and Catholic

In less than two weeks I will be delivering a paper in Atlanta at the annual meeting of the Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS). It is a group in which I have held membership since 1988. It meets every year with the much larger academic alliance, the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS). I was the 57th President of ETS before I resigned both my presidency and membership in May 2007, a week after I had been received back into the Catholic Church of my youth.

Since November 2007 I have participated in five EPS/ETS meetings. Some Catholic friends have expressed amazement (and dismay) that I still identify (with the appropriate caveats) as an Evangelical of a sort, even though I have, in many venues, offered critical assessments of aspects of the dominant streams of Evangelical theology that part ways with what the Catholic Church teaches.

So, for example, I have argued against the Reformers’ understanding of justification, for apostolic succession, the sacrament of penance, and transubstantiation, and for the permissibility of accepting theistic evolution (though, of course, rejecting philosophical naturalism). I explained in 2010 and 2011 how my own internal deliberations on the nature of the Reformation were instrumental in my return to the Catholic Church. And yet, I find myself back again at EPS/ETS among scholars, writers, and teachers who, with few exceptions, disagree with me on these matters. Why do I do it? There are two reasons.

Read it all.

Posted in * Religion News & Commentary, Evangelicals, Other Churches, Roman Catholic, Theology

(CSM Cover Story) So how’s the American middle class, really?

The old image of the “middle class” as an aspirational state of being ”“ upward mobility coupled with a measure of financial stability ”“ hasn’t disappeared. But it’s under stress as much as at any time in the postwar era. Fewer Americans these days call themselves middle class, and many who do use that label see it as a badge of struggle as much as a badge of opportunity.

The middle class is being redefined partly by demographics. In 1970, fully 40 percent of US households were married couples with at least one child under 18 years old. By 2012 that share had declined to 20 percent of US households ”“ a shift that includes more single-parent breadwinners. It’s also being redefined by a changing job market ”“ notably by the rising importance of education on résumés, as well as the disappearance of punch-the-timecard jobs in offices and factories that once produced comfortable lifestyles but were vulnerable to automation.

All this doesn’t mean that living standards for average middle-income families are languishing in a state of permanent deterioration. A good deal of evidence suggests that’s not the case. And while some deride the insecurity of the Gig Economy ”“ the growing legions of people doing freelance, contract, temporary, or other independent work ”“ the changing job market has a bright side for many Americans: greater flexibility, creativity, and self-determination for one’s career.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, America/U.S.A., Anthropology, Consumer/consumer spending, Corporations/Corporate Life, Economy, Ethics / Moral Theology, History, Housing/Real Estate Market, Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market, Marriage & Family, Pastoral Theology, Personal Finance, Politics in General, Psychology, Science & Technology, Theology

The Bp of Chester leads a debate on impact of pornography on society

Children and adults are being harmed by the widespread availability and use of pornography in society, the Bishop of Chester has warned.

The Rt Revd Peter Forster, leading a debate in the House of Lords on the impact of pornography on society, called for action in the face of evidence showing the damaging impact of pornograhy on adults as well as children and young people.

Speaking to peers, Bishop Peter highlighted the exposure of children to harmful sexualised content online.

Read it all.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, Anglican Provinces, Blogging & the Internet, Children, Church of England (CoE), CoE Bishops, England / UK, Ethics / Moral Theology, Marriage & Family, Politics in General, Pornography, Religion & Culture, Science & Technology, Theology

Friday Morning Mental Health Break–Psalm 91 sung by [Australia's] Sons of Korah

Listen to it all (Hat tip:LW).

Posted in Uncategorized

(Church Times) African commission on South Sudan describes mass atrocities

Women who were raped in churches are among the victims of mass atrocities perpetrated during South Sudan’s 22-month civil conflict, the long-awaited report of the African Union’s Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan, published last week, shows.

The Commission documents acts of “extreme cruelty”, including brutal killings, the mutilation of bodies, and forced cannibalism.

The abuses were conducted “in a systematic manner and in most cases with extreme brutality”, it says. Witnesses in Juba reported sexual violence against women committed by both parties to the conflict, and “extreme cruelty exercised through mutilation of bodies, burning of bodies, draining human blood from people who had just been killed and forcing others from one ethnic community to drink the blood or eat burnt human flesh”.

Read it all.

Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, --South Sudan, Africa, Defense, National Security, Military, Ethics / Moral Theology, Foreign Relations, Politics in General, Religion & Culture, Sexuality, Sudan, Theology, Violence, Women

A Prayer for the Feast Day of William Temple

O God of light and love, who illumined thy Church through the witness of thy servant William Temple: Inspire us, we pray, by his teaching and example, that we may rejoice with courage, confidence and faith in the Word made flesh, and may be led to establish that city which has justice for its foundation and love for its law; through Jesus Christ, the light of the world, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Christian Life / Church Life, Anglican Provinces, Archbishop of Canterbury, Church History, Church of England (CoE), Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer of William Temple to Start the Day

Lord Jesus Christ, who didst for me endure the horror of deep darkness, teach me by the depth of thine agony the vileness of my sin, and so bind me to thyself in bonds of gratitude and love that I may be united with thee in thy perfect sacrifice, my Saviour, my Lord, and my God.

Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, Spirituality/Prayer

From the Morning Bible Readings

Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a lonely place apart. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. As he went ashore he saw a great throng; and he had compassion on them, and healed their sick. When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a lonely place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” Jesus said, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” They said to him, “We have only five loaves here and two fish.” And he said, “Bring them here to me.” Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass; and taking the five loaves and the two fish he looked up to heaven, and blessed, and broke and gave the loaves to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

–Matthew 14:13-21

Posted in Theology, Theology: Scripture

Queensland civil unions: Anglicans, Baptists at odds with other Christians

Queensland’s proposal to reinstate civil partnerships for straight and same-sex couples has received support from Anglicans and Baptists, while other Christians continue to oppose the move.

Of the 30 submissions to the parliamentary committee, most were in support of the return to civil partnerships which were established in the dying days of the Bligh government, but changed into registered relationships in one of the first acts of the Newman government.

The Palaszczuk government legislation would alter the name and once again allow state-sanctioned ceremonies for same-sex and straight couples.

Read it all from the Brisbane Times.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, * International News & Commentary, * Religion News & Commentary, --Civil Unions & Partnerships, Anglican Church of Australia, Anglican Provinces, Anthropology, Australia / NZ, Baptists, Ethics / Moral Theology, Other Churches, Pastoral Theology, Politics in General, Religion & Culture, Sexuality, Theology

TEC Diocese of Pittsburgh–Nov 7th to be the end for St Martin's Monroeville before it is sold

For more than a half-century, St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Monroeville has played an important, if not unique, role in the life of our diocese as a whole, as I know it has for many of you individually. Its visibility along the Parkway provided the means to proclaim to thousands of drivers every day that Jesus is alive. It was a Spirit-charged community, and members of our clergy and lay leaders alike have been fostered by that charism. And, it was the final resting place for some of our departed sisters and brothers.

As I am sure you are aware, there has not been an active Episcopal Church congregation worshiping at St. Martin’s for several years and the diocese now intends to sell the property.

Read it all.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Economics, Politics, Economy, Episcopal Church (TEC), Housing/Real Estate Market, TEC Bishops, TEC Conflicts, TEC Departing Parishes

(CSM) Can The Episcopal Church's first black leader heal racial divides?

The Episcopal Church is hardly alone in seeking what Christin Taylor, writing for the liberal Christian magazine “Sojourners,” called “The White Church’s Second Chance.” In the sudden intensification of racial social justice efforts following tragedies in Ferguson, Mo., Baltimore, Md., and many others, some traditionally white congregations see an opportunity to right wrongs that they say they have failed to address in the past.

Christianity has a decidedly mixed past, and possibly present, when it comes to racial justice: throughout the abolitionist movement, Civil War, and Reconstruction, for instance, pro- and anti-slavery Christians alike used Bible verses to support their positions.

Ms. Taylor shares her surprise, and pain, to realize that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” describing the urgency of change for African Americans, was written from the Baptist minister to fellow men of faith.

Read it all.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Culture-Watch, Episcopal Church (TEC), Race/Race Relations, Religion & Culture, TEC Bishops, Theology

Archbishop Justin Welby on being filled with the Holy Spirit

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, speaks of his experience of being filled with the Holy Spirit as a 19-year-old new Christian.

In this video message, which was filmed for the centenary celebrations of the Elim Pentecostal family of churches, and shown during their 100th anniversary event in London on Saturday 31 October, Justin Welby says that he was “overwhelmed by the love of God” as he read John 3:16 two weeks after becoming a Christian.

Read it all and enjoy the video.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, * Religion News & Commentary, --Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, Ecumenical Relations, Other Churches, Pentecostal, Theology, Theology: Holy Spirit (Pneumatology)