A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

Lutheranism

  • Marty and Wright

    One noteworthy fact mentioned in this Nicholas Kristof column on the Obama/Jeremiah Wright brouhaha is that, apparently, noted religious historian and veritable dean of American mainline Lutheranism Martin Marty is a longtime associate of Wright’s: Many well-meaning Americans perceive Mr. Wright as fundamentally a hate-monger who preaches antagonism toward whites. But those who know his Read more

  • Ash Wednesday ruminations

    I managed to make it to church this afternoon for the service of Communion and the Imposition of Ashes. And it occurred to me that the cyclical nature of the liturgical year is a good way of driving home the Lutheran insight that we’re always beginning anew and always utterly dependent on God’s grace. In Read more

  • Lutherans and lay presidency

    The case for it. LutherPunk and Fr. Chris comment. I think there are good reasons to have only ordained persons presiding at the Lord’s Supper. However, in extreme cases I don’t see any insuperable theological objection to a lay person doing it. There’s a remark of Luther (perhaps apocryphal) that in emergencies “even” a woman Read more

  • Praying the Psalms with Luther

    Speaking of spiritual practices, I wanted to mention another little gem I picked up recently. Our Missouri-Synod brethren at Concordia Publishing have put together a little volume called Reading the Psalms with Luther. This consists of the entire Psalter (in the ESV translation) with each psalm prefaced by a short introduction from Luther’s work The Read more

  • Items of interest from the JLE

    From this month’s Journal of Lutheran Ethics: First, an article on the neglect of spiritual practices in the ELCA and how, if the church doesn’t offer pathways to intimacy with God, people will seek them elsewhere. I can definitely sympathize with this. As someone who (re)turned to Christian faith as a young(ish) adult I was Read more

  • Paul Zahl’s theology of grace

    Another newish book that I picked up almost on a whim is Paul Zahl’s Grace In Practice: A Theology of Everyday Life. Zahl was until recently dean of Trinity Episcopal Seminary, is a determined low-church evangelical and vocal opponent of revisionist moves on same-sex relationships. Despite some disagreement there, I’d read his Short Systematic Theology Read more

  • Jesus vs. marriage

    I had the same thought about the Gospel reading this Sunday that Derek did. I don’t know why it never struck me this way before – maybe it was the translation I was reading/hearing it in. But it sounds for all the world like Jesus is saying that his followers–“those who are considered worthy of Read more

  • Rev. Paul

    Turns out Ron Paul’s older brother David is an ELCA pastor in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And the Paul family originally hails from Pittsburgh. Who knew? David Paul is proud of Ron Paul, but he is enough of a realist to understand that his brother’s candidacy is a long shot. Some of his stands—for example, he Read more

  • The evangelical crack-up: not all it’s cracked up to be

    An honest-to-goodness evangelical pours some cold water on David Kirkpatrick’s NY Times Magazine piece on the splintering of political evangelicalism. (via Jeremy) I’ve seen a number of outlets assume that evangelical dissatisfaction with Bush and the GOP must be dissatisfaction from the Left. While younger evangelicals may indeed have a newfound concern for issues like Read more

  • Just in time for Reformation Day!

    My birthday’s coming up (it actually falls on the same day as a certain Reformer’s) and my parents sent me, a little on the early side, a box of goodies including Alister McGrath’s new book Christianity’s Dangerous Idea (thanks, Mom and Dad!). Despite the title, which seems to be a jab at Daniel Dennett’s Darwin’s Read more