It’s been almost four years since I first considered the idea of writing a spiritual biography of Charles A. Lindbergh, and three years since I signed the contract for that book with Eerdmans. And the calendar will have turned to 2021 before anyone can actually pick up a copy of that book. But yesterday I … More My Lindbergh Biography Is One Step Closer to Publication…
Tonight HBO premieres the first episode of a six-part adaptation of Philip Roth’s 2004 novel, The Plot Against America. Since its alternate history premise centers on the subject of my current writing project, I thought some of my readers might be interested in my response to Roth’s book — originally published at The Anxious Bench after … More Charles Lindbergh and The Plot Against America
I marked the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 by considering how people at the time made religious meaning of the Space Race, then shared my newest piece for Christianity Today and a map previewing the sites we’re considering for future Pietist Schoolman Travel tours. Elsewhere… • L.D. Burnett on the moon landing as an epochal moment: “After thousands of … More That Was The Week That Was
As we come to the end of Bethel’s summer break, I’m pretty happy with the research I’ve been able to do for my new Charles Lindbergh biography. As I told historian Jared Burkholder today for his new Historians on the Hot Seat series, The very idea of writing a spiritual biography of a someone as non-religious as Lindbergh is a bit … More A Good Summer of Lindbergh Research
I know that, no matter how many times I get a chance to preach, I’ll always sound like a professor in the pulpit. But I’ve learned enough about sermon-writing to leave out several academic references in this past Sunday’s message on “Freedom in Christ.” To contrast Christian freedom with the American civil variety, I instead … More What Is the Freedom That Americans Celebrate Today?
“We are not here to-day to mourn their deaths. Nothing would so shock the devoted and exultant spirit of their service.” So said former Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson in November 1920, as Yale University dedicated tablets in Memorial Hall with the names of 227 Yalies who had fallen in the recent World War. “We … More The Birth of America First
How should we rank America’s presidents? C-SPAN asked ninety-one “professional observers of the presidency,” including historians Douglas Brinkley, Edward Crapol, Robert Dallek, Annette Gordon-Reed, Allen Guelzo, David Kennedy, and Walter McDougall. Each participant ranked our previous chief executives in ten equally weighted categories. You can find the full results here, but a few highlights: • The top four remained … More Ranking America’s Presidents
Seventy-five years ago today, Japanese forces attacked the American military base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, leading to U.S. involvement in World War II. That evening Pres. Franklin Roosevelt issued an emergency proclamation authorizing the arrest of “Alien enemies deemed dangerous to the public peace or safety of the United States.” Within three months, FDR had authorized the War Department … More When a Christian College Sheltered Japanese Americans During WWII
On Monday I shared a few things that I’m enjoying right now. I left one off the list in order to come back to it today: Yes, among the many other blessings of this sabbatical — time with my wife and kids, time with my parents, time to write and read — I get to visit the … More The Blue Ridge Parkway
I don’t pretend that historical coincidences like this mean anything. But perhaps because I’ve just finished teaching a course on the history of World War II for the first time, I couldn’t help but notice a convergence of WWII-related anniversaries on my Twitter feed this morning: I’m sure there’s something profound to note about this … More This Day in History: A WWII Convergence
