It’s about as unlikely as a question as you’re going to see over an article in The Atlantic: “Is it possible to judge a school’s ability to encourage deeper religious faith?” But that’s what appeared this morning above a piece by freelance writer Ruth Graham, who started by confessing that she sometimes wonders whether my … More The Challenge of Ranking Christian Colleges
Welcome again Jared Burkholder of Grace College and Seminary, who will be blogging in this space every other Friday. Jared’s first post jumps off from a new book on the martyrdom of eight Jesuit missionaries martyred in mid-17th century Canada. The Cushwa Center at the University of Notre Dame held its fall Seminar in American Religion … More Historian Emma Anderson and the “Afterlife” of Martyrdom
You generally see the birthdate for the great Christian humanist Desiderius Erasmus given as October 27, 1466, but both the day and year are a bit uncertain. So since I don’t blog on Sundays, I’ll take advantage of the confusion and celebrate the second date suggested, October 28th. To be honest, I’d need a lot … More Erasmus: The Christian Scholar’s Scholar
There’s been plenty of criticism of massive open online courses (MOOCs) in recent months, a small fraction of it linked in my Saturday wrap-up posts. But I haven’t seen much that consciously takes on the problems of MOOCs from a faith-based perspective. So Jonathan Malesic’s piece a couple of weeks ago in the Chronicle of … More A Christian Case Against MOOCs
A couple more posts you might have missed during the quiet summer months, both having to do with 20th century war poetry that’s less familiar to most of us. Just over 6000 American soldiers are buried outside the French village of Fère-en-Tardenois, at Oise-Aisne Cemetery. The most famous was killed by a German sniper ninety-five … More Best of The Pietist Schoolman: Forgotten War Poetry
Here… • Announcements: Books & Culture is alive and kicking; Efrem Smith took a new job; the U.S. News Best Colleges report came out and it’s still ridiculous. That is all. • Not exactly the finest hour for either Britain or France: the Phoney War of 1939-1940. And WWII would get worse for both countries … More That Was The Week That Was
I’m about to head up to the second and final day of Bethel‘s annual faculty retreat, a venerable tradition meant to help us reconnect after a summer away, engage in some professional development (e.g., yesterday I sat in on a session about open access publishing and digital humanities), hear from our leaders, and worship together. … More The Christian Liberal Arts as Spiritual Retreat
Just over 6000 American soldiers are buried outside the French village of Fère-en-Tardenois, at Oise-Aisne Cemetery. The most famous was killed by a German sniper ninety-five years ago today: a sergeant in the New York National Guard named Joyce Kilmer. So we were informed by the cemetery superintendent when our group visited Oise-Aisne last January … More “I think that I shall never see…”: Joyce Kilmer as War Poet
When I blogged earlier this year about the election of Jorge Bergoglio as a “pope of firsts,” the first such groundbreaking I explored was Pope Francis as the “First Latin American Pope.” I noted that some observers speculated that the election was meant, in part, to address the decline of Catholicism in regions like Francis’ … More Shifting Religion in South America
“Martin Luther must be turning over in his grave,” tweeted a former student of mine last night, re: the following announcement from the Vatican (via The Guardian passing on news from an Italian newspaper) about a certain practice that both prompted and survived the Protestant Reformation: Indulgences these days are granted to those who carry … More e-Indulgences?
The Pietist Schoolman 