2/12/12 – Last night marked the first time since their playoff run in 2004 that I actually wanted to go to a Minnesota Timberwolves game. The New York Knicks were in town, which meant that Rubio-mania ran headlong into Lin-sanity. (Final score: Lin-sanity 100, Rubio-mania 98, alas.) For more on Knicks’ point guard Jeremy Lin, … More “J Lin”
A rare Saturday afternoon post here at The Pietist Schoolman, occasioned mostly by my forgetting to include something in this morning’s links round-up. But I’m glad my memory failed me because this essay by Fred Sanders deserves some special attention… Up until the fateful day at Covenant Pines Bible Camp when my brother decided to … More The Best-Selling Artist of All Time
Here • Hi, my name’s Chris, and I’m an eclectic. • I managed to get in one more post about museums (two good ones in London)… • …but instead of finishing that series (as I keep promising), I got curious about the history of presidential memorials in Washington, DC — and the controversies attending them. … More That Was The Week That Was
Key moments on my agenda for this particular workday: 7:45am – Drop off our twins (each suffering from an advanced case of being “terrible” two years old) at day care. Say quick prayer for their teachers. 9:00am – Deliver lecture in 100-level Western Civ course on post-exilic Judaism and its interactions with Hellenistic culture and … More The Dabbler
There are few things I understand as little and love as much as the sacrament of Communion. That’s something I’ve realized more in the past few years, since, as a lay leader in our church, I’m regularly asked to serve Communion. (A genuinely important example of that terribly overused cliche, “servant-leadership,” I think.) Depending on … More The Mystery of Communion
Commemoration has been much on my mind since my trip to the battlefields and cemeteries of World War I, but I have to admit that I hadn’t given much thought to the nature of commemoration in this country, the center of which (sorry, Mount Rushmore) is Washington, D.C. Of course, like many Americans I’ve seen … More Presidential Memorials
The last surviving veteran of the First World War died last Saturday, just shy of her 111th birthday. Her name was Florence Green. She joined the Women’s Royal Air Force (WRAF) as a mess steward in September 1918, nine months after she turned 17 and two months before the end of the war. Mrs. Green’s … More The Last Veteran of WWI
Calling museums “cathedrals of the modern world” (as I quoted cultural historian Jay Winter last week) might seem like setting the bar awfully high. Probably too high for something like the National Army Museum in London, which seeks simply to document the evolution of the British way of war in a way that’s neither intimidating … More “Cathedrals of the Modern World”: London
It’s not quite the most wonderful day of the year, but the day after the Super Bowl is one of my favorites. The moment when football finally cedes the sporting spotlight and makes room for the true National Pastime to return from hibernation. Back in 1987 Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post famously rattled off … More Super Monday
Are the liberal arts (e.g., history) irrelevant or out of date? Not according to Nannerl Keohane, former president of Duke University and Wellesley College: The very broad, capacious form of education that we call the liberal arts is rooted in a specific curriculum in classical and medieval times. But it would be wrong to … More A Defense of the Liberal Arts
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