Earlier this year, as COVID forced Bethel online and Minnesotans sheltered in place, I spent about four weeks writing daily Lenten devotionals. Spurred by a midweek sermon from my brother-in-law, the series was meant to help me focus on spending time each day encountering God in Scripture. I called the series “The With-God Life,” the … More The With-God Life: Part Two
This week I reflected on the state of American democracy under Donald Trump and considered the importance of history and memory to Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Elsewhere: • I don’t think it’s appropriate for the GOP to rush through Ginsburg’s successor mere weeks before Election Day, four years after refusing to vote on Barack Obama’s nominee … More That Was The Week That Was
Even if 2020 weren’t a presidential election year in the United States, I’d still spend this fall celebrating democracy. Not only is this the 100th anniversary of American women getting the vote, but I’m teaching a class on the Cold War, a conflict that began with the defeat of one authoritarian regime and ended with … More A Democracy, If You Can Keep It
This week: • Michael Gerson’s argument for not voting on the basis of abortion alone was compelling when he wrote it on Thursday… but all the more so after the Supreme Court abruptly reentered the presidential campaign on Friday night. • I’ll write more about the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg in a couple of days, … More That Was The Week That Was
This week I looked back at two weeks of teaching in the middle of a pandemic and looked back four years to a series of posts that anticipated my Lindbergh biography. Elsewhere: • Going back on campus has restored a sense of the weekday/weekend divide, but that’s certainly not true for everyone. • Molly Worthen … More That Was The Week That Was
We’ve now finished the first two weeks of the fall semester at Bethel University, where there’s no football opener tomorrow, only a handful of people could be in the Great Hall for a chapel service saying farewell to our president emeritus, and I still forget my face mask half the time I head to work. … More Two Weeks In and…
I’ve taken some time off from blogging here at Pietist Schoolman in order to get my fall courses launched under unusual circumstances and to finish revisions to my Lindbergh manuscript. Before I share some of what else I’ve been reading, here’s good news on the latter count, courtesy of my editor at Eerdmans: Thrilled that @cgehrz's terrific … More That Was The Week That Was
This week I studied African American responses to Charles Lindbergh’s historic flight to Paris and celebrated the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment by looking at the role of religion in the suffrage debate. Elsewhere: • I didn’t watch a lot of the online Democratic National Convention, but I thought that Michelle Obama (in making … More That Was The Week That Was
Before classes start at the end of the month, I hope to finish revisions to the manuscript for my spiritual biography of Charles Lindbergh. It’s not going to be drastically different from what I submitted in July, but I do think it will be improved, thanks to some insightful suggestions from my editor, Heath Carter. … More African American Responses to Lindbergh’s Flight
This week I wrote a letter to my students about the coming fall, recorded a podcast about sports under COVID, and introduced readers to a Lindbergh biographer who never got to finish her book. Elsewhere: • I’m worried that masks are going to make it harder for my students and me to get to know … More That Was The Week That Was
The Pietist Schoolman 