All right. I suppose I should explain to you all what was up with my near-week-long involuntary hiatus from blogging. There were various factors in play, but the central one was my misguided belief that I was somehow included in all that free speech business that Madison wrote about in the First Amendment. You see, …
7 Theses on Historical Loyalties
Grounded loyalty is an inescapable part of historical studies, and attempts at academic detachment are simply attempts that reveal misplaced loyalty to a guild of historians (say) instead of to (say) your nation. What I want to do here is offer seven theses that might help us approach this most helpful truth from various angles. 1. …
Writing About Critters
If you go to this link, and scroll down to Departments, you will see that my brother Gordon Wilson and my friend Joe Francis have won a writing award from the Evangelical Press Association. They won this award for a three part series on critters. Warm congrats.
Well, Whew
Which Is How We Got Here
“In the Olympic games of our culture wars, it is possible to win a gold medal from God when a bunch of your fellow Christians are embarrassed even to look at you” (Rules, p. 111).
The Town Drunk on a Park Bench
Last night I watched Marco Rubio announce his candidacy for the presidency, and as far as such speeches go, I thought he did a very good job. I also observed that those who want him to go far thought he did a better job than he actually did, but still, I thought it was a …
Say You’re Sorry . . .
“Anyone who has not noticed that ‘demands for apologies’ have become one of the central political and culture tactics of our day has simply not been paying attention” (Rules, p. 105).
Doing the Sensitivity Sham
An extended discussion broke out in the comments of my “deny Him seventy times seven post,” and it had to do with whether or not my way of expressing myself leaves someone who struggles with same sex attraction feeling quite “safe” around people like me. One of the themes of my writing is that of …
With Stirrups Raised to Molech
The modern world has seen many revolutions, from the French revolution to the Russian, but the bloodiest of all of them has been the sexual revolution. And that provides the backdrop to our current uproar over the definition of marriage. We are now much occupied with the issues swirling around same sex mirage, but we …
Balanced Worship
A dedicated space for worship has a shaping and disciplinary effect. When we meet in an informal setting, as we have been doing for years, we have had to make a point of selecting music that helps us swim upstream. Because the informal surroundings make it easier for the worship to become breezy and casual, …