My guest blogger and American colleague Stan Wallace elaborates on C. S. Lewis’ concept of “Chronological Snobbery.” Lewis was a great 20 century British apologist of the Christian faith who had academic positions at both Oxford and Cambridge. He is also the famous fiction writer of the Narnia Chronicles. … More Guest Blog: The Temptation of Chronological Snobbery
Like the film The Red Violin (1998), the plot of People of the Book (2008) follows hundreds of years in the life of an object–but rather than a violin, the focus is the famous Sarajevo Haggadah (a rare illustrated Jewish devotion book). This history, too, is a series of dramatic episodes (from 1480 to 2002) that keep returning to a modern present that is full of intrigue. So this is a historical fiction page-turner by Brooks, a Pulitzer Prize winning author who can’t stop writing about religion. Remarkably, the story of a religious book turns out to read like a spy novel. … More Summer Reading: _People of the Book_ by Geraldine Brooks
Eccentric means literally off-centre, and more broadly, unconventional. This is key to the Christian faith. No ethnic group, city, or language lays claim as Christianity’s sacred centre. This is illustrated beautifully in a recent music video sent to me by Danny McCain in Nigeria. … More Christianity’s Eccentricity: A Religion without an Ethnic Centre
A review by Dr. Wendy Helleman of Jamie Smith’s latest book–on the life and journey of St. Augustine, which is also our journey. … More A “Travelogue of the Heart”: A Philosopher’s Journey with Ambition, Fathers, Justice, Sex, and More
I’ve written and preached on the bedrock of joy that animates faith, but its equally true that church should be the best place for a broken heart to find welcome. But few of our worship songs today want to go to the dark places, ask the hard questions, and complain to God. Here I examine a few lament songs possible for Christian worship. … More Songs of Lament as a form of Protest against COVID, Racism, Climate Change, and other Wounds
Why are there so few spiritual songs about life on our planet–about the things that most Christians do with most of their time–tend gardens, buy groceries, engage in business, build homes, create artworks, do scientific experiments? There is an inherent dualism in much of our singing that confines it to “spiritual” matters of prayer, praise, church, and loving and serving our neighbours in generic ways. But Christians are called to be culture makers first–this is the blessing that God gives right off in Genesis 1:28: “Prosper! Reproduce! Fill Earth! Take charge!” (MSG) … More Sing A New Song for Cultural Renewal: Hymns that Mention the Economy, Media, and Justice
Summer officially begins in two days. COVID notwithstanding, its time to make plans to get away from work, spend more time outdoors, getting exercise, exploring creation, and investigating new landscapes and communities. We just got a used trampoline for the backyard, and we are planning a family bicycle trip this month. These kind of activities, … More Everyone do Leisure Studies: Summer, Recreation, and Vocation
Zoom means fast. Zoom is so fast it connects two distant points almost instantly. In fact, Zoom assumes social distance, and to some extent the whole modern world is zooming away during COVID: families, friends, churches, businesses, governments, and even doctors. Zoom allows us to see and hear each other without getting infected by what the other person’s presence might bring with it. But I’m only giving two cheers for Zoom. … More Two Cheers for Zoom: Video Conferencing during COVID as a Gift without Presence
This is a letter I’ve written to my American colleagues and friends, hoping to clarify more sharply our different contexts–and how that might shape attitudes, values, priorities and ministry. … More A Letter to My American Friends and Partners: Canada is A Foreign Country
A shorter version of this article appeared in The Christian Courier June 8th 2020. It involves changing faculty requirements at Calvin University, but it has implications for all Christian institutions of higher education: how best to nurture a faithful Christian faculty with a common identity and purpose? How do you navigate between the polar extremes … More Belief and Belonging at Calvin University: How Does a Denominational University stay Vibrantly Christian?
Sensus Divinitatis 