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RESISTING INTERPRETATION
For my on-again, off-again, series of posts on renewing theology, I have been thinking lately about salvation. Salvation is at the heart of Christian theology, but what does it mean? How should it be understood? There’s much to consider in those questions. But sitting in church this morning past, the lectionary and the sermon turned…
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THE RELEVANCE OF THEOLOGY
Reflections on Martin Luther King Day Sometimes theology—thinking carefully about God—seems utterly irrelevant. Today, Martin Luther King Day, as I write this, is such a day. On this day, we think again of the dream that has been at the heart of who we are as Americans, a dream forever outside our grasp and yet…
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INSIGHT AND IDOLATRY
For the last long while in this blogspace, I have mostly had my nose to the proverbial grindstone, sharpening my responses to decisions made by recent Christian Reformed synods—synods which adopted for human sexuality a punitively rightwing version of church teaching. In doing so, these synods have purposely excluded churches and church leaders who differ…
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TRADITION
“Tradition!” Tevye, the milkman sings at the beginning of Fiddler on the Roof. It’s a great beginning, as Tevye walks us through his village and points out how things are done and why. Well, not why. Tevye mostly doesn’t know why they do things the way they do. It’s just what they have always done. Despite the song,…