Last week, Union Theological Seminary—perhaps the epicenter of liberal Protestantism—tweeted out a photo that was roundly mocked across the internet: students “confessing to plants” in a chapel service, offering their “grief, joy, regret, hope, guilt and sorrow” to “the beings who sustain us but whose gift we too often fail to honor.” In follow-up tweets, Union explained that the rite was a response to a recent visit by Robin Wall Kimmerer, a Native American botanist

“We always give thanks to God for all of you and mention you in our prayers, constantly remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 1:2-3 NRSV). Paul’s second missionary journey began as an excursion to revisit churches planted throughout Asia Minor on his first missionary journey (Acts 15:36). Along the way, the Spirit of God gave Paul

Tradition has told us that God is impassable, but is this really true? Historical Theologians remind us that impassibility has more to do with Greek philosophy than Scriptures himself. Is it necessary modern Christians believe God to be impassable, or is there room for a passable God? How does a passable God cause us to newly understand intra-Trinitarian relations? In The Crucified God, Jurgen Moltmann rejects the traditional Platonic belief that God is apatheia, or impassable.

What is the artistic spirit within us that arises, unannounced, to haunt our homes? Today I saw my daughter pounding furiously with pencils upon paper. Brow furrowed, she inordinately assembled a haphazard diaspora of points by means of pummeling. Unsatisfied with one color, she expanded the oeuvre to encompass black, green and grey. The shimmering graphite reflects blindingly into my eyes as I gaze now upon the paper, turning it in my hands and observing

The emergence of the academic discipline of “biblical studies” is a post-Reformation, post-Enlightenment phenomenon that developed in opposition to dogmatic theology.  Within that discipline, emphasis on the historical-critical method has caused preoccupation with either proving the historical accuracy of the text, as seen in the biblical archaeology movement, or getting “behind” the text, as seen in the quests for the Historical Jesus or Paul within Judaism. While each approach does offer some valuable insights into

This article is a working edition of an explanatory position paper for a church plant. The question of who leads in the Church—when it comes to offices and gender roles—remains an oft debated topic with which all churches must wrestle. This is especially true of new churches, which have less working tradition to fall back on. The purpose of this position paper is to outline some of the considerations and boundaries for leadership in a

My last article presented several of Jesus’ teachings from the Wisdom of Sirach and noted the fact that Matthew’s gospel paid particular attention to those teachings. While Wisdom of Sirach had only a limited impact on the New Testament, the history of the Maccabees affected first century Judaism so strongly that our Protestant avoidance of 1st and 2nd Maccabees has enabled serious errors in some of our most central doctrines. Like Sirach, 1st and 2nd

The Scriptures are somewhat ambiguous about how fully God can be known by human beings. On the one hand, the Son has revealed God to be our Father and has pioneered the path of faith—offering unprecedented access through grace. Jesus teaches that the pure in heart “will see God” (Matt 5:8). Likewise in the first Johannine epistle: “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do

The Bible is, among other things, a collection of ancient stories possessing continued relevance to the current human experience, which is to say, “the Bible acts as a mirror.” Jacques Lacan once proclaimed (rightly, I think), “All sorts of things in this world behave like mirrors.” When you look at a mirror, you see “you,” but the reflection isn’t you; only you are you. As we gaze upon our reflection, we often see what we