Made in Vietnam: My World. (Yours Too?) Just got a new blood pressure monitor. But this post is not about my blood pressure. The old monitor gave out after several years: nothing but error messages. Amazon was ready with a new one, delivered the next day. Dropped from a drone? I was running errands when … Continue reading Made In Vietnam: My World. (Yours Too?)
Lighting the Fuse of Revolution? There’s a grimly fascinating update from “Rightwing Watch” (RW) detailing how the harder core of the religious right is throwing down the gauntlet to the U.S. Supreme Court, to wit:Legalize same sex marriage nationwide, and you’ll face an armed insurrection. A new Civil War. A Boom-Boom-Bonhoeffer Moment.Your Honors, You Have … Continue reading The Supreme Court: Lighting the Fuse of Revolution?
Baltimore Friends School Blows It The educational “Philosophy” stated on the website of the Baltimore Friends School [BFS] sounds great. The high points: [Baltimore] Friends School seeks to live the conviction that there is that of God in each person. At Friends, we work together to build and sustain a community that is inclusive, respectful, … Continue reading Baltimore Friends School Blows It
Besides, the book soon became an absorbing read – and how often can one honestly say that about an “institutional history”?
Except Gwyn has not set out to write an institutional history. “My training,” he says (vii) “is in biblical theology.” Hence, his slant is both different and more ambitious: the book is “probably best described as historical theology [his italics]. It examines how religious ideas, ideals, and practices have evolved over time through a particular institution, interacting with changes in the wider culture.”
Hence the subtitle, the “Life & Times” of Pendle Hill. Beyond the comings and goings, the highs and the lows, the book “ventures a theology of history.” [His italics again.] And in its eighty-plus years, Pendle Hill has been favored (and cursed) to have been through very interesting times, historically and theologically: not only wars and rumors of war, boom and bust, but also vast cultural changes in its Quaker constituency, with a theological evolution hardly less sweeping.
And yes, Doug Gwyn sets out to comprehend and grapple with it all.
Does he bring it off?
O.M.G. —Wal-Freaking-Mart?? In Arkansas?? The Arkansas legislature has passed a religious-based antigay law, HB 1228, that is a near-clone of the controversial Indiana law. It now goes to the governor. But Attention Wal-Mart shoppers! Let me repeat that, after picking my jaw up off the floor: << “Every day in our stores, we see firsthand the … Continue reading O.M.G. –Wal-Freaking-Mart??