I’m re-reading William Placher’s The Domestication of Transcendence. His argument, in a nutshell, is that, starting in about the 17th century, thinking about God moved sharply away from an emphasis on mystery and the inadequacy of all human language and concepts when applied to God (as he finds in St. Thomas Aquinas, Luther, and Calvin)…

This interesting essay (via Kevin Carson) argues that Greens and Libertarians have enough in common, philosophically and politically, to forge an alliance.

Camassia on her Mennonite church and the Real Presence. Brandon on what it means to respect other people’s beliefs. Malcin Horton on the “Caelum & Terra” vision.

John Allen has a piece in the National Catholic Reporter on the Taizé community in the aftermath of the murder of its leader Brother Roger Schutz. (via Amy Welborn) There is still debate about Taizé, but Schutz and the community he founded are nevertheless seen by millions of Christians as prophets of the ecumenical dream,…

Americans often assume that European-style welfare states are inherently unworkable and unstable and that they must lead in the long run to high unemployment and low economic growth. This article disputes that view, saying that there are important differences between the generous welfare states of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland and their counterparts in…

“Fr. Jape” has a post on the need to inculcate habits of devotion and piety, not just an intellectual “world-view” (as seems to be popular now in some circles), in order to pass the faith on to the next generation. As an adult convert (or adult “re-lapsed” Christian depending on how you look at it)…

Here’s the Lutheran World Relief page for donations of aid for victims of the earthquake in South Asia. No doubt all of your more reputable charities are doing similar things.

Can this be true?? Bono, lead singer of U2 and poster boy for vaguely Christian global do-goodism, is going to appear with his bandmates at a fundraiser for … Sen. Rick Santorum, poster boy of Christian Rightist eeeevil! UPDATE: As I suspected, this isn’t true. See here.

Alexander Cockburn weighs in on the brouhaha in his usual iconoclastic fashion: Every year or so, some right-winger in America lets fly in public with a ripe salvo of racism, and the liberal watchdogs come tearing out of their kennels, and the neighborhood echoes with the barks and shouts. The right-winger says he didn’t mean…

Paul Cella has an article in the New Atlantis that tackles some of the issues that have been preoccupying us here over the past couple of days. (via The Japery)