Dr. Hunter Baker observes, “All universities, and certainly Christian ones, face a landscape in which students have been largely replaced by consumers.” He says in his latest book, if Christian colleges try to be like their secular counterparts, they will fail on almost every level, particularly in their stated mission. On the other hand, if they integrate the worship of the Most High with every academic discipline, they will distinguish themselves and accomplish their mission. “Christian colleges can successfully argue that the best education connects with the mind, the body, and the soul.”
This Is Abusive
“All abuse, whether laser-tipped irony or bare-knuckle fisticuffs, is best delivered coolly, without huffing and puffing. The best abuse looks effortless, the work of a ninja not a WWF wrestler.” Patrick Kurp talks about An Anthology of Invective and Abuse from 1929.
Update: Still alive
I’m half way through.
I’ve finished the fall semester in my graduate studies at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee. I’ve completed 18 of the 36 credits I’ll need for graduation, and should have them all this time next year, the Lord willing. It’s all as time-consuming as I expected (no, more – I didn’t anticipate how intensive the work would be), but if I want to qualify for World Domination, sacrifices must be made.
I’ll try to post more often in the free time I’m about to have – the rest of December and most of January. But there are a lot of projects I’ve been putting off, and I find them clamoring for my evening time.
Anyway, thanks for your faithful readership.
Personally, I’m making physical progress. My new, android hip is working fine. The Original Manufacturer Equipment hip (the left one) still gives me some pain, but I’ve joined a health club and exercise it on a stationary bike three times a week. The improvement has been palpable, so I hope that with time I’ll be all better again.
And now, in keeping with the season, a Swedish Christmas song by Sissel:
Starbucks Opens the Coffee Temple
“These days, Starbucks stores function more like gas stations: They’re everywhere, and frequented for fuel,” writes Margaret Rhodes for WIRED. But to compete with third wave coffee roasters for high-end coffee, Starbucks has restored a one-hundred-year-old building to host its Reserve Roastery and Tasting Room in Seattle. See the article for lots of pictures.
I’m thinking they keep the golden bulls in the back.
How (Not) to Be Secular by J.K.A. Smith Wins CT’s 2015 Book Awards
Many titles are recommended in today’s list of Christianity Today’s 2015 Book Awards, among them is James K.A. Smith’s work on Charles Taylor’s How to Be Secular. Smith makes Taylor’s work accessible to a broader audience and adds a good bit of commentary himself.
In the fiction category, CT picks Lila by Marilynne Robinson and The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd.
“Robinson slowly unfolds the story of Lila, a woman not quite defeated by a brutal, hardscrabble life, who discovers hope and security as the wife of an elderly pastor. Together, they wrestle with questions of the meaning of existence and the ultimate fate of humanity. Readers who loved Robinson’s earlier novel, Gilead, will discover the same breathtaking writing, beautifully painted scenes, and strong working knowledge of theology.” —Cindy Crosby, author of By Willoway Brook
And on The Invention of Wings:
“Based on the life of abolitionist Sarah Grimke and a fictional slave girl, Handful, the novel skillfully joins fiction and history, African American resilience and Southern white hypocrisy, Charlestonian exuberance and Quaker idealism. Kidd reminds us that the foundation of social injustice is ordinary human selfishness.” —Betty Smartt Carter, author of Home Is Always the Place You Just Left
‘Manual of Mockery,’ by Ori Pomerantz
Our friend Ori Pomerantz has published another little e-book (I got mine free, for the record). This one is called Manual of Mockery, and its ostensible purpose is to instruct people in how to create good Internet memes.
In fact, it’s an accessible short course in basic logical argument.
Recommended.
VIDEO: “Our Stories of Faith and Film”
Here’s a video of the panel discussion held October 24 during the 2014 Baylor Symposium on Faith and Culture, Faith and Film. It was called “The Lives of (Three) Others: Our Stories of Faith and Film.”
Participants:
• John Wilson, Editor of Books and Culture and Editor-at-Large for Christianity Today
• William Romanowski, Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences, Calvin College
• Alissa Wilkinson, Assistant Professor of English and Humanities, The King’s College and Film Critic for Christianity Today Movies
Are We Witnessing a Writing Resurgence in Evangelicalism?
Owen Strachan thinks so. “Be of good cheer, evangelical-arts-aficionados. Good things are afoot.”
“You’ll have to find somewhere else to sleep”
Chicken coop, Coupeville, Island County, WA. Photo by Anne E. Kidd. Library of Congress
Today I was reminded of a man I wrote about here some years back. He’s gone now, and one of his relatives came to the library today to donate several cartons of books from his personal collection.
I think it’s all right to give his full name now. It was Marvin Rodvik, and he lived in Franklin, Minnesota. I met him a couple times in my life. The last time he gave us another gift of books. He also told me a story, which I passed along in this blog. I’ll tell it again now, because it is, in my opinion, one of the best stories I ever heard for the Christmas season.
Marvin was a pastor’s kid. The story happened when he was a teenager, probably (by my calculations) around the time of World War II.
An entertainment event of some kind (he didn’t say what) was planned in their small town. Marvin announced at supper that he was going.
“You’re not going,” said his father. They belonged to a strict church, a congregation of the forerunner to my own church body.
“Yes I am,” said Marvin. “You can’t stop me.”
His father paused a moment. Then he said, “You’re right. I can’t stop you. But know this. If you go to that event, you’ll be locked out of this house when you come home tonight. You’ll have to find somewhere else to sleep.”
Continue reading “You’ll have to find somewhere else to sleep”
Remaking TNR in Their Own Image
Chris Hughes, the owner of The New Republic, and new CEO Guy Vidra apparently don’t care nothing for the history and style of their magazine or the people who have worked for it most recently. Both men are relatively new to the organization. Last Friday, the two arrived at the Washington office, having previously announced its closure and moving to New York, and were greeted by the mice and a few orphans.
I’m joking only a little. Ten contributing editors resigned over the firing of leading editors Franklin Foer and Leon Wieseltier. Foer had been given repeated assurance that his job was secure until the day he read in Gawker.com that he had been replaced.
According to multiple sources, Hughes came to think of his writers and editors as “spoiled brats,” and especially disliked the flamboyant, feud-prone, white-maned Wieseltier, who was more than twice his age. Much of Hughes’s distaste was telegraphed in his body language; he strikes many TNR staffers as passive-aggressive and averse to confrontation.
The friction escalated with the arrival of Vidra, who is said to have complained to Foer that the magazine was boring and that he couldn’t bring himself to read past the first 500 words of an article. According to witnesses, Vidra did little to hide his disrespect for TNR’s tradition of long-form storytelling and rigorous, if occasionally dense, intellectual and political analysis—to say nothing of his lack of interest in the magazine’s distinguished history—at an all-hands meeting in early October.
Vidra said to someone in the room, “Your brain is as dry as the remainder biscuit after voyage.” To which that someone replied, “There’s no more faith in thee than in a stewed prune.” They saw the writing on the wall at that point but did not leave until last week.
Hughes has been described as “a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise breaker, the owner of no one good quality.” I didn’t get any sources for these quotations. In fact, you could say I made them up, but let’s keep it nice, thou cream-faced loon.