A Perennial Digression

My attempt to outline Christianity as I understand it—Faith, Hope, & Love: A Trivial Catechism—is now finished. I link all the parts here for convenience, and am allowing this summary post to take the place of a normal Sunday. Next week: different stuff.

What I have posited as the “rhetoric of Christian love” is founded on piety and justice, like the two pillars Boaz and Jachin of the Jerusalem Temple. Christian piety—monolatry, aniconism, sanctification of the Divine Name, sanctification of the Sabbath, honor for parents—expresses the substance of love for God; Christian justice—honor for the sanctity of life, ma...

There’s an increasingly popular argument in biblical studies that the author of Mark’s Gospel—for convenience, Mark—knows Paul’s letters and what I’m going to call “phase one” Pauline theology (on which see more below). It’s not yet a consensus: for those interested, see Eve Marie Becker, Troels Engberg-Pedersen, and Mogens Müller, eds., Mark and Paul: Comparative Essays ...

Faith, I have contended, is the grammar of Christianity: Christians entrust themselves to the kerygma of Christ and the apostles, which has over time developed into the classic expression of belief we find in the Apostles’ Creed. The Creed proclaims faith in certain truths; I have organized those truths under three headings, concerning what the Creed says...

I am breaking my normal Thursday / Sunday posting cycle due to the magnitude of Christopher Nolan’s Th...