Terry Gross of NPR’s Fresh Air interviewed John Dominic Crossan a few years back to explore the historicity of the crucifixion. Originally airing in 2004, the conversation winds around the notion of, as guest host David Bianculli explains in the intro, crucifixion as state-sanctioned terrorism that “existed for centuries, before it became infamous under the Romans.”
Washington National Cathedral is compiling an excellect collection of videotaped Lenten reflections. The Cathedral’s Sunday Forum collection is also worth a listen if you’ve got
Abraham’s story has never been ours more than it is now. Naming the compulsion to take innocent life in the belief that sacrifice is noble goes beyond the incidents of any single crime, and takes us into the foundations of human culture and of how people understand the divine. The impulse to praise martyrdom, and therefore to encourage susceptible adolescents to become martyrs, is embedded in our cultural DNA.
England’s Bible Society has released an edition of the Bible that highlights the more than 2,000 passages that reveal God’s sorrow over poverty and injustice,
In the back of a collection of letters of Ignatius of Antioch, handwritten pages from a letter of Clement of Alexandria (150-215 CE) to Theodore identify three versions of Mark known in antiquity: a gospel written in Rome; an expansion of the gospel written in Alexandria by Mark for those “being perfected in the faith;” a further expansion of Secret Mark by Carpocrates that Clement rejected as false.
At times, God seems to be silent and withdrawn. Whatever intimacy and friendship with God we have known disappears, and there is only a void. It is a time when we may face severe temptation, when we may have to cling to God in faith and love, even when there seems to be no sound basis for either.
… or is it hermeneutics? A preacher who sounds remarkably like the character Jack on Lost explores Biblical mandates regarding the male urinary posture. Elizabeth Kaeton, bless her heart, unearthed this gem on You Tube.
Robert Alter has published a new translation of the Book of Psalms that attempts to offer a translation that is truer to the original Hebrew. Why do we need a new translation? As Adam Kirch argues in a New Republic book review, most English translations of the Psalms take a distinctively Christian point of view that distorts the original meaning of the Psalms.
John the Baptist was a major figure – and yet, we really don’t know most of the details of his life – because he gave it away to point to Jesus. John was big, but he made himself small, as he pointed toward Christ and showed that disciples of God must live lives of giving it all away. It’s the central paradox of the Gospel – to live, we must die.
We don’t know who the magi really were, but we know who they represent: you and me. We are seekers after God too – right? And I believe that like them, you and I have been made to know by Grace where the King of Love is – and he’s in our midst. Christ is born by all who bear him – and Christ is within us as we are within him.