“The Weekend Wanderer” is a weekly curated selection of news, stories, resources, and media on the intersection of faith and culture for you to explore through your weekend. Wander through these links however you like and in any order you like. Disclaimer: I do not necessarily agree with all the views expressed within these articles but have found them thought-provoking.
“Statement on the Holy Land War” – Fares Abraham of Levant Ministries: “I am a Palestinian-American Christian, born and raised in the Holy Land. And I am pro peace. My wife is a Gazan-American Christian, also born and raised in the Holy Land. And she is pro peace. Our loving families, still dwelling in the West Bank and Gaza, are pro peace. And millions of Palestinians living beside them are pro peace. Words cannot describe the pain that has filled my soul in recent days. It has been heart-wrenching to see so much death and destruction sweeping across my beloved homeland. I can hardly endure my grief, while watching the never-ending cycle of violence, hate, and savagery that continues unabated against so many innocent people on all sides. The back-and-forth attacks, followed by retaliations, which in turn incite more attacks, that lead to additional assaults, prompting more violence, and now war… must stop. Precious lives are being obliterated on a scale so vast, and in ways so heinous, that it is too much to fully comprehend. I am, to say the least, broken of spirit. The question we must ask ourselves in such dark times is this: where do we stand as followers of Jesus in the midst of such chaos? How do we align our emotions, attitudes, and actions with God’s perspective to view this turmoil through a Gospel-centered lens and to respond biblically to the horrors that are taking place. Hypothetically speaking, what would Jesus do today? Where would he go? Who would he visit right now?”
“Is religion good for you? The answer is complicated, new global Gallup report finds.” – Bob Smietana at Religion News Service: “A new report from Gallup finds that religious people around the world report being more positive, have more social support, and are more involved in their communities than those who are not religious. The study, based on 10 years of data, also finds the well-being of religious people varies from country to country and is often hard to measure. Even if researchers find that religion is good for you, people who are not religious may not care about its benefits or want anything to do with it. ‘Gallup World Poll data from 2012-2022 find, on a number of wellbeing measures, that people who are religious have better wellbeing than people who are not,’ according to the report, which was published Tuesday (Oct. 10). The study included data about nine aspects of people’s lives, from their positive interactions with others and their social life to their civic engagement and physical health. Each of the nine indexes included a score of 0 to 100, based on answers to a series of questions.”
“How to Engage Theology from the Majority World” – Stephen T. Pardue at The Gospel Coalition: “For at least two decades, a standard narrative about worldwide Christianity has been affirmed: the church’s center of gravity has shifted southward and eastward as churches in the West contract and their counterparts in Asia, Africa, and Latin America expand. Though this story is becoming old news, we’re still trying to figure out what it means—especially in the realm of evangelical theology and biblical studies. Today, most theological books and commentaries are written primarily by and for North American Christians, who represent a little more than 10 percent of the global Christian population. Much of this work is excellent and blesses the whole church. Even so, evangelical writers from the Majority World—where evangelical Christianity was almost nonexistent only decades ago—are increasingly producing theological resources that offer original and important perspectives on Scripture, theology, and Christian living. In the West, some Christians might wonder, Why does this matter? After all, theology is always local in the sense that we’re all tasked with living faithfully in our families, local churches, and communities. So while demographers and historians might have fascinating things to say about the global shift in the church’s composition, Christian leaders in Omaha (or Quito or Jos or Penang) must still primarily concern themselves with feeding and shepherding the flocks in front of them, not with the theology of far-flung Christian counterparts. Thus the ‘So what?’ question is entirely natural. Yet I’d suggest the rise of evangelical theologies from Asia, Africa, and Latin America is good news for the whole body of Christ. Here are three suggestions for how readers in the West could best respond.”
“Leisure and Liberality” – Elizabeth C. Corey reviews Kevin Hood Gary’s book Why Boredom Matters: Education, Leisure, and the Quest for a Meaningful Life in First Things: “Conservative commentators have long bemoaned the proliferation of ‘studies’ fields in the university. Women’s and gender studies are well known, but now students can take courses in topics as unusual as ‘surf studies’ and ‘fat studies.’ Given all the boring lectures that undergraduates have endured throughout the ages, it’s amusing to note that this list now includes ‘boredom studies,’ for which there is even a journal—the Journal of Boredom Studies. Anyone who has ever attended an academic conference will find some humor in its call for papers: ‘Submit a proposal for the 5th boredom conference.’ Much of this literature runs to the mundane or quantitative, but Kevin Hood Gary’s insightful book reflects his immersion in theology, philosophy, and literature. This is really a book about liberal education, as indicated by its subtitle: ‘Education, Leisure, and the Quest for a Meaningful Life.’ If boredom is the problem, Gary argues, then the solution is learning how to be leisurely, in the classical sense. It might be slightly misleading to say that the book is about a problem and its solution. In the tradition that runs from Aristotle through Aquinas to Josef Pieper, leisure is not a solution to anything, but an alternative way of being in the world. In Pieper’s formulation, leisure ‘runs at right angles’ to the practical pursuits of work and achievement.”
“Hopkins’ Haecceity” – W. David O. Taylor at his blog: “I’ve decided to make the nineteenth-century Jesuit poet-priest, Gerard Manley Hopkins, my primary conversation partner in the introduction to my book on the vocation of artists. Everything that I’m trying to say about what makes the work of artists unique is beautifully exemplified, it seems, in Hopkins’ sacramental theology and visceral, musical poetry. Catherine Randall summarizes Hopkins’ theology this way: ‘Gerard saw nature as one exceedingly privileged venue for the revelation of God.’ The world of the senses, for Hopkins, served as a primary vehicle for making positive sense of the spiritual world. ‘Trees were presences to him, stars no mere luminaries but celestial sign posts; birds, divine emissaries and figures of God.’ But it’s not simply that matter bore witness to the immaterial. It was that the aesthetically dense media of art could say things about God and the world that prose could not—or not as well, at least. The incoherent character of natural evil, for example, witnessed in the shipwreck of the SS Deutschland in 1875 and which Hopkins found deeply disturbing, could be given coherent shape through the ‘primal stew of sounds and rhythms that, when he later went to Wales, boiled over into an intoxicating broth of Celtic music and evocative wordplay.’ ‘Wiry and white-fiery and whirlwind-swivellèd snow / Spins to the widow-making unchilding unfathering deeps.‘”
“100 Hundred steps on the path towards caring for creation” – From The Evangelical Environmental Network: “1. Show yourself mercy and grace. It’s about progress not perfection. 2. Read “Green” faith books – Green like God, This is our Father’s World, Almost Amish, Go Green Save Green, Caring for Creation. 3. Before you recycle think reduce and reuse. 4. Limit of use of plastic straws – Americansuse 500 million a day. Carry a glass or stainless steel one instead if you need a straw. 5. Use cloth shopping bags. 6. Recycle electronics – gold and otherprecious metals are in each – don’tforget cell phones, tablets, tvs. 7. Recycle “curbside” – aluminum, glass, all types of plastics, tin, cardboard, paper – 80% percent of what we throw away can be recycled…”
Music: The Porter’s Gate, “God of Grace and Mystery (feat Audrey Assad),” from Climate Vigil Songs
Discover more from Matthew Erickson
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Matthew Erickson 