It’s been a while since I’ve (a) posted here as opposed to Substack or (b) recorded a new podcast. So today I’m happy to announce the premiere of a three-episode run of The 252, the podcast about the history and politics of sports that I co-host with my Bethel colleagues Chris Moore and Sam Mulberry. … More Tuesday’s Podcast: The Political History of the World Cup
We’re planning to record one more special episode this summer to conclude our first season of the College for Christians podcast, but this week we paused to answer a couple of questions from listeners — plus one that we had ourselves but had never fully addressed. Stream or download that episode from Podbean, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, … More College for Christians: Some Listener Q&A
Any reasonable, empathetic person can find any number of reasons to find troubling Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The suffering, dislocation, and grief that any war inflicts on anyone in its path. The odiousness of Vladimir Putin, who had the gall to say that one goal of his “special military operation” was the “denazification” of Ukraine: … More Thoughts on Ukraine
This June will mark the tenth anniversary of The Pietist Schoolman, a blog that was inspired and influenced by John Fea’s The Way of Improvement Leads Home. (John also helped found The Anxious Bench, which I joined five years ago this June.) Though we blog very differently, our interests continue to overlap in many areas. … More New from John Fea & Co. – Current
It’s been a few months since the last time we shared an episode of our sports podcast, The 252. So I was glad when Chris Moore stuck his head in my office earlier this week and asked if we could record a “micropod” about the latest iterations in the debate over sports, protest, and the … More Wednesday’s Podcast: The National Anthem
I’ll never forget February 1, 2016. I had just got back from the first meeting of a spring course and barely sat down in my office when the phone rang: G.W. Carlson had had a stroke. I was stunned. Not just because GW was my friend and mentor, or because he had seemed so hale … More Five Years Later… The Legacy of GW Carlson
Yesterday Vice President Mike Pence declined to invoke the section of the 25th Amendment that would allow him temporarily to assume presidential powers from Donald Trump, setting up a historic impeachment vote today in the House of Representatives, with Democrats and even some Republicans likely to vote to send Donald Trump to a second Senate … More “A Time to Heal”
I’ve been blogging long enough to hesitate before responding too quickly to current events. But today is going to be an exception. To be honest, I’d paid no attention to events in Washington, DC for most of the day. I knew that the process of Congress formally certifying Joe Biden’s election as president would be … More “This Is Who We’ve Become”
In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” Matt 2:1-2 At this time of the church … More Twelve Days: King of Kings
I groaned a little when I saw James 2 show up on the daily lectionary yesterday and today. As a historian who teaches about the Reformation and a Protestant who still (mostly) celebrates its legacy, I’ve wrestled dozens of times with Martin Luther’s disdain for this “right strawy epistle,” which insists that “a person is … More The With-God Life: Faith without (Political) Works
The Pietist Schoolman 