“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.
“The Story Behind Handel’s ‘Messiah’” – Clarissa Moll interviews Charles King in Christianity Today: “Handel’s Messiah is one of the most popular classical compositions played at the holidays. Filled with biblical passages and soaring vocal and orchestral arrangements, Messiah takes listeners through the story of Scripture with an eye for the timeless theme of hope. Clarissa Moll of The Bulletin sat down with Charles King, author of Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times That Made Handel’s Messiah,to learn more about who formed this important work and why, almost 300 years later, it resonates with those holding on to faith when life seems darkest. Listen to the entire conversation with special musical selections from Calvin University in episode 130. Here are edited excerpts.”
“Six Ways to Resist the Machine: The technological mindset is corrupting our souls. It’s time to fight” – Paul Kingsnorth in Plough: “It is the year 2025. We are 213 years out from the invention of the first commercial steam engine. It is 155 years since the construction of the first modern factory, 140 years since the invention of the commercial motor car, 122 years since the first manned flight, and 115 years since the invention of the neon light. We are sixty-seven years on from the coming of the microchip. It is eighty years since the first atomic bomb exploded, sixty-five years since the first contraceptive pill went on sale, fifty-six years since man walked on the moon, and a mere eighteen years since the invention of the iPhone. It’s been an eventful two centuries. In this same time period, the earth’s human population has grown from one billion to over eight billion, the earth’s climate has begun to shift, half of the planet’s forests have been destroyed, and the sixth mass extinction in history has begun. The lifestyle of the whole of humanity has been transformed, for better or for worse, by the vast technological and commercial forces that these developments, and many more, have unleashed. Now we stand on the brink of another development: one which has received endless hype and not a little hysteria, whether positive or negative. This is the development of artificial intelligence. If it lives up to even half of the hype that is currently swirling around it, it may be more transformative than anything else.”
“Make Anxiety Great Again” – Charles Marsh at Theology Now!: “‘I would say that he who has learned rightly to be anxious has learned the most important thing.’ – Søren Kierkegaard. Every age invents its own vocabulary for fear. In Don DeLillo’s novel White Noise, a black cloud drifts toward a Midwestern town in what DeLillo calls the Airborne Toxic Event. It moves with the wind, swollen and restless, a shape beyond naming—as if dread had itself become a quality of the weather. More recently, climate psychologist Brit Wray gave the title Generation Dread to her study of the uneasy emotional signature of our time. Those born into a warming planet enter a world freighted with fear, sadness, anger, and guilt. Few have exploited the national psyche more skillfully than the current president. His political life is a constant staging of dread. Immigrants, globalists, leftists. These are the toxins that must be expelled from the body politic, the billowing clouds polluting the nation. And so the inward work that anxiety demands is left undone. Nearly two centuries ago, a melancholy Dane named Søren Kierkegaard pondered the question of what it means to be anxious. Born in 1813 and dead by the age of forty-two, Kierkegaard wrote with the ferocity of a man racing against time.”
“Anatolia’s only known ‘Good Shepherd’ Jesus fresco uncovered in Iznik, crafted in Roman style” – Koray Erdogan in Türkiye Today: “A rare depiction of Prophet Jesus (pbuh) as the “Good Shepherd” has come to light in a chamber tomb at Hisardere Necropolis in ancient Nicaea (today’s Iznik) in Bursa province. The scene is considered the only known example of this type identified to date in Anatolia, and researchers regard it as a highly significant discovery for archaeology in Türkiye and worldwide. Arkeolojihaber, a Turkish social media news channel, first shared the find. The excavations at Hisardere Necropolis are being carried out with permission from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism under the direction of Iznik Museum Director Tolga Koparal. Scientific coordination rests with Professor Aygun Ekin Meric from the Department of Archaeology at Dokuz Eylul University, while Gulsen Kutbay also takes part in the expert team.”
“Men and Orthodoxy, Revisited: Eighteen years later, what’s changed?” – Frederica Mathewes-Green in Frederica’s World: “Inside the OrthoSphere, everyone’s talking about Ruth Graham’s New York Times article about the influx of converts—particularly men—into American Orthodoxy. Funnily enough, I wrote an article about this very thing eighteen years ago. It was a surprising phenomenon, back then, that the majority of converts were young men. These guys were just showing up at the doors of Orthodox churches, usually after a lot of independent study. (There’s a saying: “Why did he become Orthodox?” “He read too much.”) Back then the predominance of male inquirers really stood out, because Western Christian churches had long excelled in attracting women. (In a piece I wrote for Christianity Today in 1999, I cite a female-to-male ratio in American churches ranging from 2:1 to 7:1.) …When I was trying, eighteen years ago, to figure out what made Orthodoxy so attractive to men, I took a seat-of-the-pants approach: I asked ‘em. I emailed a hundred Orthodox men, most of whom joined the Church as adults, and asked what they thought made the Church particularly attractive.”
“Meet the Catholic priest who helped make the new ‘Knives Out’ Netflix movie” – Katie Yoder in Catholic Review: “When Rian Johnson was still writing the script for his new “Knives Out” movie, he turned to his aunt and uncle for help. They are Catholic, and his latest murder mystery would take place in a Catholic church. His relatives responded by inviting him to dinner — along with Father Scott Bailey, their pastor at Risen Christ Catholic Parish in Denver, and other local Catholic priests. ‘It was wonderful, because we had a great dinner, and it was kind of an Ask-Me-Anything session,’ Johnson, who is not a Catholic, said about the priests’ impact on the script. ‘I got to just kind of talk to them about what their lives are like.’ Afterward, Father Bailey ended up serving as a consultant for the film, ‘Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery,’ available to stream on Netflix Dec. 12.”
Music: Paul Zach, “Create in Me (Psalm 51),” from Lent Hymns
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Matthew Erickson 