The Lead – Page 1603 – Episcopal Cafe

N.T. Wright’s new book

May 4, 2008 No Comments

As with his other works, Wright has encouraged his many fans on both sides of the Atlantic even as he has provoked some critics. He wants to hold out the gospel for a largely post-Christian United Kingdom, in part by refuting the faulty scholarship of biblical critics. But he also wants to challenge Christians to see the gospel in a new way. Thus, he takes issue with Luther’s view on justification by faith alone. He also worries that many Christians have unbiblically privatized the gospel, stripping the Good News of its public imperative.

Faith on the Carrier

May 4, 2008 1 Comment

Episode 8 of the PBS series Carrier this week focused on faith. The major religious groups on board are Catholic and Protestant, but there also is a coven of Wiccans, as well as a Pentecostal group whose newest member is challenged by the duality of his beliefs and the temptations of liberty as the ship drops anchor in Perth, Australia.

Black liberation theology

May 4, 2008 3 Comments

Dr. Cone, a founding father of black liberation theology, allowed himself a chuckle. “You might say we took our Christianity from Martin and our emphasis on blackness from Malcolm,” he said.

Catholic fiction

May 4, 2008 5 Comments

Over at the Catholic group blog Vox Nova, M.Z. Forrest is trying to compile a list of great Catholic fictional literature, which he defines to include “Catholic, Orthodox, and high Anglican authors.” To get the discussion going, his initial list includes four authorss, one of whom was an Anglican.

Evangelicals and liturgy

May 4, 2008 1 Comment

It is precisely the point of the liturgy to take people out of their worlds and usher them into a strange, new world—to show them that, despite appearances, the last thing in the world they need is more of the world out of which they’ve come. The world the liturgy reveals does not seem relevant at first glance, but it turns out that the world it reveals is more real than the one we inhabit day by day.

New Maine bishop begins “adventure”

May 3, 2008 No Comments

There’s a nice piece on the newly Right Reverend Stephen Taylor Lane, who was consecrated the ninth bishop of Maine today, in this morning’s Bangor Daily News, who caught up with him at a press conference yesterday. He will be bishop coadjutor of the diocese until Bishop Knudsen retires.

Evangelicals rethinking relationship with politics

May 3, 2008 No Comments

Signs are pointing to increasing dissent among conservative Christian leaders with regard to their involvement in politics. Recently we’ve seen acknowledgment of climate change from Southern Baptist leaders, and the growing influence of Sojourners within the faith-meets-politics landscape. Now, the Associated Press tells us, a group of conservative christian leaders are working on a “starkly self-critical document saying the movement has become too political and has diminished the Gospel through its approach to the culture wars.”

Professing one’s faith

May 3, 2008 1 Comment

It’s common enough that Christian universities hire Christian faculty, according to a front page article in this week’s Chronicle of Higher Education. Some places even require that one sign off on a “statement of faith” that includes doctrinal declarations about such things as Original Sin or the inerrancy of Scripture. But one Presbyterian university, Whitworth, in Spokane, Wash., tries to find a balance between the extremes of being a nominally Christian institution and dictating faith to its faculty, and requires that applicants write their own statement of faith as part of the application process.

What the church gets right

May 3, 2008 No Comments

Two things that the church gets right, says Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins over at Comment Is Free, are architecture and unofficial welfare. Describing the apparently magnificent restoration of St. Martin-in-the-Fields at Trafalgar Square, Jenkins provides a singular portrait of the architectural anomaly of steeple-upon-portico that became, in the 18th century, the template for many an Anglican church to come. But more than that, he adds, are the features that are at once just as permanent and, as individuals, totally transient.

Rehm on the “Art of Listening”

May 3, 2008 No Comments

Renowned radio host Diane Rehm found herself on the other side of the interviewing mike last week at the National Cathedral’s Sunday Forum. Rehm, an Episcopalian, related that her faith grew stronger and deeper while she was undergoing treatment for spasmodic dysphonia, the condition which makes it difficult for her to speak. In spite of her condition, Rehm has hosted a call-in radio show at Washington’s talk-oriented public radio station, WAMU, for more than a quarter century.

The Archive

Category: The Lead

N.T. Wright’s new book

Faith on the Carrier

Black liberation theology

Catholic fiction

Evangelicals and liturgy

New Maine bishop begins “adventure”

Evangelicals rethinking relationship with politics

Professing one’s faith

What the church gets right

Rehm on the “Art of Listening”

Archives

Categories