That Was The Week That Was

Posted on by Chris Gehrz

Here…

• Five of my Bethel colleagues joined dozens of other Christian theologians to issue a modern-day version of the Barmen Declaration.

• How prayer sustained two of the most famous Christians to resist Nazism.

• If you’d like to buy a Kindle version of The Pietist Option, you’ve still got a few hours to save 65%.

Sales rank for Pietist Option Kindle

…There and Everywhere

• One of the few silver linings of the Trump era: the columns of Michael Gerson.

• A few more bright spots from evangelicalism today…

• Everything has a history, including a seemingly anodyne Thanksgiving song.

• The best piece I read on Thanksgiving came from a professor who remembered experiencing the holiday as a lonely first-generation college student.

• Guess what’s the “fastest-growing small-minority language in the United States.” (Hint: I overheard it while doing some anti-Black Friday shopping near Hazleton, Iowa.)

Country store in the Amish settlement near Hazleton, Iowa
From another country store in the Amish colony

• I always think of philosophy as one of the humanities… but do philosophers think of themselves as humanists?

• He’s probably as well known for his tweets as his books, but historian Kevin Kruse’s tips are relevant for writing of all kinds.

• It doesn’t help when you’re tempted to measure yourself against someone as accomplished as Kruse, but I’m glad to hear that it’s possible for academics to overcome impostor syndrome.

• Last word to Peter Marty, on how we talk about death: “One thing I will never pass, however, is away. I expect to die, and you’d be smart to expect the same.”