What does it mean to exercise hope while reading the Bible? Esau McCaulley approaches this question through the perspectives and questions Black readers bring to the interpretation of scripture. Reading While Black is a much-needed addition to the shelves of hermeneutic resources available to preachers, students, and teachers. Its insights, although designed for Black readers, should be read by others as well.

As a military spouse who attended many events meant for the wives of soldiers, McCaulley learned that there are advantages to being the one man listening to the conversations in a room full of women. In this book, he offers a similar advantage to White readers: the chance to visit a majority Black space and see how Black people talk differently than they would if they were the minority in the room. For both insiders and outsiders to its conversations, Reading While Black opens up fresh ways of seeing ancient truth.

Read it all.

'Reading While Black' received The Beautiful Orthodoxy Book of the Year award from @CTmagazine. A big congratulations to @esaumccaulley!

Don't miss out on this important read. Order your copy at https://t.co/UCytkdvTta. #ReadingWhileBlackBook #AuthorsOfColor pic.twitter.com/yKwfr8V2BZ

— Every Voice Now (@EveryVoiceNow) December 15, 2020

Overall, I want to say this: Ultimately, there is absolutely nothing in LLF which warrants a change in the Church’s doctrine or practice. It simply fails to present a sufficient case to justify revision, if that’s what some were hoping it would do. The clearer our feedback to the process of discernment on the back of this, the better.

At a meeting I was at with various contributors to the LLF material, a bishop said that we need to keep looking at God’s word on this subject, because “obviously we have not done a good enough job yet.” We need to climb down from our positions and listen to each other, she said, hold our convictions provisionally, and keep learning. This sounds nice, and it is obviously a good thing to look at God’s word. But I was reminded of Paul telling Timothy that some people will be always learning but never able to come to a knowledge of the truth (2 Timothy 3:7). It is a characteristic of false teachers to always give us chewing gum in place of food.

I don’t know what that bishop teaches on this subject specifically, so that’s not directed at her in particular. But the thing is, we’ve had quite a number of reports and statements from the Church on these subjects over the last 40 years or so: Homosexual Relationships in 1979, to Issues in Human Sexuality, and Some Issues in Human Sexuality, the Pilling Report just a few years ago (2013), Synod motions, Lambeth Conferences, Pastoral Statements by the Bishops. I’ve got a shelf full of this stuff and books from various perspectives published in between. I don’t think we can be accused of not having considered the issues recently, or of having adopted positions without some thought.

The LLF book does make a reasonable effort to present different opinions on these subjects in a way that is respectful and clear. It rehearses differences quite well, and helps unpack why some conversations on all this go the way they do. So I do think it can succeed in helping us have an informed discussion on issues of sexuality, if we don’t know much about it already or haven’t heard the other side of an argument articulated well.

It’s not very good at assessing the validity of different arguments though, or analysing them to see if they are true or not….

Read it all.

But then came the interesting part. “Since the beginning of this year, I have said on many occasions that we must promote the formation of a new development pattern, in which domestic and international cycles are the mainstay, and the domestic and international dual cycles promote each other,” Xi said. To an outsider, this might seem unremarkable, cloaked as it is in the elliptical phraseology that often marks Chinese economic ideas. But the “dual circulation” strategy Xi outlined actually represents a radical new understanding of globalization and of China’s place within it.

More than just a buzzword, dual circulation describes the deeply pessimistic worldview that has settled over Beijing. Once China’s leaders saw opportunity in globalization. Now, they expect the U.S. and its allies to deny China the technology it needs to build “a modern socialist country” by mid-century, meaning a wealthy superpower fit to rival the U.S. Although likely to be less pugilistic, Beijing rightly believes an incoming Biden administration will also press forward with policies designed to stop advanced technologies finding their way into Beijing’s hands. Chinese thinking has long valorized self-reliance, dating back to ideas developed by former Chinese leader Mao Zedong during the country’s civil war, which ended with the foundation of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. Now, Trump’s tariffs, as well as his campaigns against companies like Huawei and TikTok, have given new impetus to the modern form of self-reliance Xi dubs “internal” development.

Many experts have noted a changing Western consensus on China, as leaders in Washington abandoned the idea that economic modernization would inevitably lead to political liberalization in Beijing. But there has been a comparable shift in China’s internal conversation on the West too. Beginning with semiconductors but potentially expanding to all manner of other areas, China now expects it will have to develop technologically on its own. Xi’s new theory now sits at the heart of the country’s 14th five-year plan, which covers development from 2021 to 2025, and was unveiled in draft form in October. The result will accelerate China’s decoupling from the West, while also increasing the importance of trading links forged with other parts of the world — for instance, via Xi’s signature Belt and Road Initiative. Put more bluntly, while the world was distracted by the drama of the U.S. presidential election, Xi quietly unveiled an economic strategy fit for a new Cold War. Both for China and for globalization itself, the results are likely to be profound.

Read it all (my emphasis).

"Chinese President Xi has quietly unveiled an economic strategy fit for a new Cold War" | @jamescrabtree in @NoemaMag https://t.co/23vLmm7nv5

— Branko Milanovic (@BrankoMilan) December 12, 2020

Tucked away in a conference room on the second floor of the Conway Medical Center, Dr. Stephen T. Brady initially joked that he wasn’t going to look as Jennifer VanAernem stuck a needle in his left arm — representing the first FDA-authorized Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine doled out in Horry County and across South Carolina on Monday afternoon.

But Dr. Brady didn’t take his eyes off his arm — that needle represented history and, more importantly, hope.

“People have pandemic fatigue, isolation fatigue, plus it is incredibly emotional for families to make the decision not to be together during the holidays,” Dr. Brady said. “The only problem is that you have to realize that not being together for this holiday may mean that you have many more in the future with those relatives to be with.

Read it all.

JUST IN: The first doses of the FDA-authorized Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in South Carolina, at Conway Medical Center.https://t.co/KB7vW9jekV

— The Post and Courier (@postandcourier) December 14, 2020

As Dr. Rishi Seth rolled up his left sleeve on Monday to receive one of the United States’ first Covid-19 vaccines, he thought of his patients back in the Special Care Unit.

There was the Uber driver who had walked out of the hospital after being on a ventilator. The dying father who said goodbye to his two college-age daughters on a video chat. The four coronavirus patients Dr. Seth had treated just on Monday morning, checking their oxygen levels and reviewing treatment plans before he stripped off his protective gear and joined a first wave of health care workers to get vaccinated in hospitals across the country.

“That’s why today is so emotional,” said Dr. Seth, an internal-medicine physician with Sanford Health in North Dakota, a state that has been ravaged by the virus. “You’re still fighting a battle, but you’re starting to see the horizon.”

Read it all.

“That’s why today is so emotional,” said Dr. Rishi Seth, a physician in North Dakota, a state that has been ravaged by the coronavirus. “You’re still fighting a battle, but you’re starting to see the horizon.” https://t.co/uWM5VMHsds

— The New York Times (@nytimes) December 15, 2020

Boko Haram asserted responsibility on Tuesday for laying siege to a secondary school in northwest Nigeria and abducting more than 300 boys, marking a striking leap from the extremist group’s usual area of operation.

Hundreds of gunmen on motorbikes surrounded the boarding school in Katsina state Friday night and opened fire on police, witnesses said, before rounding up students and dragging them into the woods.

Abubakar Shekau, the group’s leader, said in an audio message released in the early hours of the morning that fighters stormed the school to discourage “Western education,” according to Nigerian media outlets and researchers who reviewed the recording.

Read it all.

Horrifying news out of Nigeria: Boko Haram has asserted responsibility for kidnapping 300+ schoolboys — far from where fighters normally strike.

“This is a huge announcement — an audacious demonstration of capacity.”https://t.co/FtJYbSlj0c

— Danielle Paquette (@DPAQreport) December 15, 2020

O God, who didst send thy messengers and prophets to prepare the way of thy Son before him: Grant that our Lord when he cometh may find in us a dwelling prepared for himself; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who came to take our nature upon him that he might bring many sons unto glory, and now with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, ever one God, world without end.

–A New Prayer Book (London: Oxford University Press 1923)

Ladybird Artists Advent Calendar, window 15.
‘The North Wind Doth Blow’#FrankHampson pic.twitter.com/AY4nmeETrB

— Helen Day (@LBFlyawayhome) December 15, 2020

But there will be no gloom for her that was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.

The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shined.
Thou hast multiplied the nation,
thou hast increased its joy;
they rejoice before thee
as with joy at the harvest,
as men rejoice when they divide the spoil.
For the yoke of his burden,
and the staff for his shoulder,
the rod of his oppressor,
thou hast broken as on the day of Mid”²ian.
For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult
and every garment rolled in blood
will be burned as fuel for the fire.
For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government will be upon his shoulder,
and his name will be called
“Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
Of the increase of his government and of peace
there will be no end,
upon the throne of David, and over his kingdom,
to establish it, and to uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
from this time forth and for evermore.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

–Isaiah 9:1-7

Good morning dear friends#photos #photography #morning #sunrise pic.twitter.com/Q88QzGMyi8

— Hugo (Alessandro) ⚓️ (@KatanaHugo) December 15, 2020