Here…
• Reviews of The Pietist Option continued to come in: one predictably positive; one less so (also predictably).
• I loved how Mark Safstrom linked the Protestant ideal of “always reforming” with a more agricultural metaphor.
…There and Everywhere
• Well, at least we Covenanters can no longer complain that no one knows who we are. (Here’s a response from the denomination to recent media coverage.)
• One local Covenant church is closing its downtown Minneapolis homeless shelter while the Super Bowl is across the street.
• Just when I think I’ve read everything I need to read about evangelicalism, a fellow Covenanter comes along with a new perspective.
• Two of the best evangelical responses to President Trump’s profane denigration of countries in the Global South came from Thabiti Anyabwile and Ed Stetzer.
• Big news in the world of Christian NGOs: Richard Stearns is leaving World Vision.
• Chinese authorities demolished a megachurch that was home to 50,000 worshippers.
• Aren’t you dying to know when the children’s sermon became a regular part of Christian worship services? Of course you are.
• American exceptionalism isn’t the same thing as “America First.”
• A pro-choice, feminist law professor visits a crisis pregnancy center… and finds nuance in the debate over abortion.
• The dream of a competitive third party dies hard…
• Back to the classroom: why the benefits of “experiential” learning may be overstated.
• Tough as times are for most private colleges and universities, one expert thinks that a wave of closures is still unlikely.
• But as enrollment pressure mounts, George Yancey suggests that conservative Protestant colleges ought to “must maintain their traditional stances in key areas but also become modernized in other areas.”
• One such institution would rather its students avoid one particular off-campus job.
• What’s going on at Moody Bible Institute?
• How can Christian scholars use new media and public scholarship to address their “distribution” problem?
• Despite his best efforts, even my dad can’t singlehandedly keep Diet Coke from a sales tailspin.
The Pietist Schoolman 