“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.
“Deep-Rooted in Christ: A Conversation Between Richard Foster and Chris Webb” – Richard Foster and Chris Webb at Renovaré discussing Deep-Rooted in Christ: The Way of Transformation: “Richard: One thing that impresses me about Deep-Rooted is its quiet confidence. I find this quality also in Pastor Kang as a person, and it certainly spills over into the book. This is such an unusual quality in our day. So many people are either tentative and fearful or they are bombastic and overly self-assured. It is a rare joy to find a writing that is clear and concise from a person who is meek and humble of heart.
Chris: I agree. And it’s noticeable that the book overflows with a sense of grace, which I’m sure is the wellspring of this confidence. It’s clear that the life Pastor Kang describes flows out of a response to God’s gracious invitation; it’s unforced, not a self-willed initiative. As he says in Chapter 16: ’Spiritual discipline is all about practicing the will that God has put into our hearts.’ He’s gently teaching us to allow God to take the lead rather than trying to pummel ourselves into holiness.”
“Charlie Dates counters John MacArthur’s declaration that MLK ‘was not a Christian'” – Adelle M. Banks and Bob Smietana in Religion News Service: “The Rev. Charlie Dates, the pastor of two historically Black churches in Chicago, is defending the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. after California pastor John MacArthur declared in February that the civil rights leader ‘was not a Christian at all.’ ‘We, the undersigned, regret that we have to write you this way, but we sense that this is the only way to address the egregious wrong that you — and those like you — have yet again inflicted on Black Christians in America,’ Dates wrote in an open letter that appears on the website of his Progressive Baptist Church in Chicago. ‘Undoubtedly, you, Mr. MacArthur, have made significant and helpful contributions to the reading and understanding of scripture for our present age. How ironic it now feels to write to you, a teacher, a word of correction. We hope that you will find within this missive a patient and reasonable rebuttal for your unwise and ill-timed slander of the Rev. Dr. Martin L. King, Jr.’ The controversy reflects the lines that have been drawn in disputes among Reformed Christians and other Christian groups over issues related to race or social justice.”
“Days of wanting: My family didn’t want to go to America at all; we left Vietnam on pain of death” – Jonathan Tran in The Christian Century: “Shortly after arriving in America as a war refugee in 1975, my brother David was hit and killed by a car. I was five and he was six. It was my oldest brother Thierry’s birthday, and the rest of the family was busy making preparations for the party. David and I decided to pick some flowers across the street. He was in front of me, just barely ahead. I don’t know if the driver who hit him never saw him or just couldn’t stop in time, but my next memories are David’s body on the street and people screaming and running around. Emergency services arrived, and I recall being excited by the sirens and the big, interesting vehicles, the sounds and the thrill of it all processed through the mind of a five-year-old lacking a working concept of death. I guess I am grateful that I don’t remember much more. This is my first memory. It’s not that nothing else happened before that point; this was just my mind’s way of marking a beginning. The beginning of an American life.”
“An ‘exvangelical’ on loving, leaving and reporting on the culture of Christianity” – Tonya Mosley at NPR: “NPR political correspondent Sarah McCammon grew up in Kansas City, Mo., in the 1980s and ’90s in an evangelical Christian community that taught her to fear God and never question her faith. She was ‘saved’ at age 2, baptized at 8 and raised watching Christian movies and reading Christian books. ‘The sense was just that the secular world was full of sin and was lost,’ she says. ‘I knew very few people who were not evangelical Christians.’ Then, in high school, McCammon participated in the Senate Page Program, which meant moving away from home and living in Washington, D.C., for half a year. One day Sina, a Muslim friend and fellow page, asked her something that shook her belief: Did she believe he was going to hell because he wasn’t Christian? According to McCammon’s faith, the answer was yes, but she couldn’t bring herself to say that to her friend. Instead, she remembers, ‘I just said, “I don’t know. I think that’s between you and God.” And I think in that moment, when I said that, I realized something about what I actually believed.’ In the decades that followed, McCammon found herself quietly moving away from the evangelical church. But her personal and professional lives converged during the 2016 presidential campaign.”
“Why We Cancel: Understanding the logic behind today’s social capital punishment” – April Lawson in Comment: “One of the most troubling developments in American life in the last fifteen years is the rise of a new, virulent mutation of a very old practice: cancelling. Countless individuals have lost jobs, reputations, friends, loved ones, communities, and a sense of safe belonging in their world. Many people, especially those on the young left, have defended cancelling as a punishment befitting a range of social crimes. ‘Cancel culture is the best weapon the powerless possess,’ roared a headline in the Daily Beast, arguing that cancellation is a way for the marginalized to strike back against the powerful. ‘Cancel culture is the only option left when institutions fail and powerful individuals run amuck,’ wrote the article’s author, Ernest Owens. ‘The court of public opinion can outweigh everyone else when utilized effectively.’ Justified or not, from the cancelling of J.K. Rowling for objecting to the shifting of our understanding of women to ‘people who menstruate’ to the growing blacklist of people who have lost their jobs for saying politically incorrect things on social media, cancellation leaves a wide swath of social destruction in its wake.
“American Bible Society to shutter $60 million Faith and Liberty Discovery Center” – Bob Smietana in Religion News Service: “A $60 million museum that showcased the Bible’s role in American history will shut down less than three years after it opened. The American Bible Society announced Wednesday (March 13) it will close the Faith and Liberty Discovery Center in Philadelphia on April 1. The 40,000-square-foot museum, which cost a reported $60 million to build, opened in May 2021 in the Wells Fargo building on Independence Mall. Leaders at the ABS had hoped the center, which was designed for ‘sharing the importance of the impact of Scripture on the development of the United States,’ would draw a quarter million visitors a year, the Philly Voice reported in 2018, when the project was first made public. ‘We want the Faith and Liberty Discovery Center to be a place that unites people, shows how faith has always played a role in our nation, and helps visitors consider what difference faith can make in our lives today,’ Roy Peterson, then ABS president, said in 2018. The ABS cited the COVID-19 pandemic and ‘other factors impacting sustainability’ in announcing the decision to close the center. The nonprofit did not immediately respond to questions about the costs of running the center or the number of staffers being laid off.”
Music: Greg LaFollette – “Hosanna in the Highest” from Songs of Common Prayer
Discover more from Matthew Erickson
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Matthew Erickson 