How the Body of Christ Talks by C. Christopher Smith is an invitation to deeper conversation for Christian congregations, although organizations of all sorts will likely find value in Smith’s observations and advice.Read more…
Science Book Review: The Revolutionary Genius of Plants Ch 7-9
We’re on our final week discussing the English translation of Stefano Mancuso’s The Revolutionary Genius of Plants, a colorful and wide-ranging survey of recent developments in our understanding of plant biology. Mancuso is particularly interested in what sets plants apartRead more…
Science Book Review: The Revolutionary Genius of Plants Ch 4-6
In chapter 4, [Mancuso] brings up what I thought was the most intriguing difference: plants stay put. OK, maybe that’s obvious, but what’s intriguing are the implications Mancuso teases out from it.Read more…
Science Book Review: The Revolutionary Genius of Plants Ch 1-3
Mancuso has a lot to say about the uniqueness of plants, how they can expand our understanding of life, and how the features of plants can be harnessed to address challenges faced by humans.Read more…
Science Book Review: Programming the Universe
Although Lloyd was not overtly concerned with any religious intersections, I found the discussion of the universe as a quantum computer relevant to a couple of issues that come up in science & faith conversations.Read more…
Science Corner: Nectar of the Plant Overlords
While we don’t have evidence of plant intelligence here on Earth, we may still have underestimated our local flora and overlooked their capacity to communicate.Read more…
Living in relationships with immigrants, refugees, and other low-income people . . .
What is my main takeaway for those of us in the context of higher ed? Royce’s conclusion summarizes the book’s call to prayer, knowing and learning from immigrant neighbors, serving, giving, educating our churches and communities/advocacy, and addressing the root issues. Read more…
Restless is our heart . . .
Inspired by lengthy conversations at Urbana Student Missions Conference (12/27-31) regarding resources on/practices in faithful witness and my family returning with a suitcase full of books, I am launching Read…Quote…Reflect.Read more…
Science Corner: Christmas Reading
If you have some extra time for a holiday or winter break and are looking for something to read, allow me to remind you of the books we’ve discussed over the past year.Read more…
Science Book Review: Can a Scientist Believe in Miracles?
The result is a wide-ranging exploration of questions, some specific to the present science-faith conversation and some raised perennially by skeptics and curious seekers.Read more…
Book Review: Frankenstein
Frankenstein is the one who steals from the gods (God?) the ability to create life from that which is lifeless.Read more…
Science Book Review: Scientism and Secularism
[Scientism and Secularism] is clearly aimed at fellow Christians who agree with Moreland that science is taking influence away from the church and who need help articulating why theology and religion are still relevant.Read more…
We Are Ahab – Both Hunter and Hunted. A Book Review of Moby Dick
If you can survive through the minutia, what makes Moby Dick such an iconic book, and further, why should anyone bother taking up the massive tome (assuming they haven’t been guilted into it!) and read 500+ pages when anyone knows how the book will end?Read more…
Book Review: Introverts in the Church
Adam’s admission of his own construction of a one-dimensional image of leadership—the most effective leader being a high-paced, always outward-oriented extrovert—is something I personally resonate with as an introvert, and I believe all leaders and leaders-in-training should reckon with and seek to correct.Read more…
Faith and Reason, Part 1
The work of the Holy Spirit and a reasoned case often go hand in hand in Scripture. Read more…
Science Corner: Lightning in a Novel
In essence, modern biology has grown up alongside Frankenstein and the science fiction genre.Read more…
Summer Book Suggestion: Strange Survivors by Oné Pagán
You are all but guaranteed to learn something new about God’s creativity as expressed through nature’s endless forms and to enjoy a chuckle in the process.Read more…
Science Book Club: When Science & Christianity Meet Ch 12
Are there laws that prescribe how the world behaves, or are what we call the laws of nature simply our descriptions of the behavior we observe?Read more…
Science Book Club: When Science & Christianity Meet Ch 11
If politics applies truth to arrive at policies, and if science is a way of discovering truth, then the two will inevitably be intertwined.Read more…
Reflection: Congregations, Neighborhoods, Places
Congregations, Neighborhoods, Places is “an attempt to think with congregations, particularly congregations in cities, about how social science can both help churches become more aware of themselves and of those who live around them” (19).Read more…
Science Book Club: When Science & Christianity Meet Ch 10
It makes sense to me that the mind is not fully reducible to the brain and its activity, and that mental states are causally meaningful. At the same time, it makes sense that the mind is mediated by the brain, arising from the numerous interactions of nerve cells and other biological entities, possibly as an outgrowth of sensory perception turned inward.Read more…
Science Book Club: When Science & Christianity Meet Ch 9
The Easter season is a natural time for Christians to reflect on miracles, as the resurrection of Jesus is the central miracle of our tradition.Read more…
Winsome Persuasion. A Teaser
The uniqueness of Winsome Persuasion is that it helps readers prepare to engage by laying the theoretical foundation for understanding what constitutes a counterpublic (section 1), discovering the rhetorical and philosophical tools necessary for engagement (section 2), and wrestling with issues specific to Christian counterpublics (section 3).Read more…
Science Book Club: When Science & Christianity Meet Ch 8
Evolutionary biology is a challenging topic; the history of the Christian church’s reaction to it, doubly so. Continuing a theme running throughout When Science and Christianity Meet, David Livingston identifies the human element as a major complicating factor. Read more…