How important is St. Augustine, bishop of Hippo? Let’s put it this way… I don’t write and perform parody rap videos for just any theologian-philosopher: Six years later, that lyric and video don’t seem quite as awesome as they did in the moment. But I stand by this couplet as containing some of my finest … More Happy Birthday, Augustine of Hippo!
I missed Carlos Eire’s address last night, so today was my first taste of the 2012 meeting of the Conference on Faith and History. I missed the 2010 version, but my sense is that this gathering is larger than the one in 2008 at Bluffton University. Some highlights from some of the papers I heard … More Thoughts from CFH 2012: Friday
Here • My post on the 150th anniversary of the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862 became my first to be featured by WordPress on its “Freshly Pressed” page! • Academic historians just need to stop whining about “popular” historians. Now. • The second part of my series on the commemoration of World War I in Minnesota … More That Was The Week That Was
In the current issue of my denomination’s magazine, The Covenant Companion, Jay Phelan reviews the newest book from historian Diana Butler Bass, Christianity after Religion: The End of Church and the Birth of a New Spiritual Awakening. (Alas, the review isn’t available for download at the Companion site.) As summarized by Phelan, Bass stresses that … More Is “Christianity after Religion” a Kind of “Neo-Pietism”?
Last Friday Bethel hosted its inaugural Colloquium on Pietism Studies. I’ve earlier posted summaries of Scot McKnight’s keynote address (on Anabaptism, Pietism, and evangelicalism) and Jon Sensbach’s post-lunch talk (on Afro-Moravian Christianity in the mid-18th century). This afternoon: a few highlights from the roundtable discussion that I moderated. In 2009, we hosted a research conference … More Pietism Colloquium Recap: Roundtable on Pietism’s “Usable Past”
Last Friday Bethel hosted its inaugural Colloquium on Pietism Studies, a one-day gathering that I hope to see become a biennial or triennial event. (It came three years after we hosted an international research conference on “The Pietist Impulse in Christianity.”) Thanks to our generous and supportive deans (Deb Harless and Barrett Fisher, in particular) … More Pietism Colloquium Recap: Scot McKnight
4/13/12 – Hot off the press from Wipf & Stock, publisher of our The Pietist Impulse in Christianity, is another book about an “impulse” in Christianity. Edited by Jared S. Burkholder and David C. Cramer, The Activist Impulse: Essays on the Intersection of Evangelicalism and Anabaptism brings together chapters by John Roth, Steven Nolt, John … More The Activist Impulse
Here • Eight of my students took a shot at defining what historians do. • Do political churches risk decline? Are apolitical churches drawing new members? Is there such a thing as an “apolitical” church? (For another critique of political partisanship in churches, see this from Chuck Gutenson.) • Another year, another Oscar ceremony. Perhaps … More That Was The Week That Was
Earlier this week I got a nice comment from Jeff Hochstetler, a student at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, who asked a great question: Do you think that for a Pietistic vision to be successful, it must be rooted in institutional expressions, as the Anabaptist vision was/is? Jeff had been reading my summer 2011 series on … More Where Would a Pietist Vision Come From?
Regular readers of The Pietist Schoolman might have noticed a new “widget” along the right-hand side of each page: a countdown to April 20, when Bethel University will host a colloquium on Pietism. I’ve already shared some initial details and, last week, a follow-up about our afternoon roundtable discussion on Pietism and contemporary churches and … More Update: Scot McKnight’s Talk at Our Pietism Colloquium
The Pietist Schoolman 