Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Bible and Theology

September 21, 2006

Proportionalism Critique

The debate has not been confined to Catholic circles, but it has been concentrated there. Many (most?) American Catholic moral theologians of the post-Vatican II era have been enamored with one form or another of “proportionalism,” a theory of morality that eschews the traditional Catholic focus on the “intrinsic” goodness or badness of human acts. Continue Reading...
September 13, 2006

Death and Despair, Life and Hope

Two pieces on Christianity Today’s website this week are worthy of comment. The first, “Despair Not,” reminds us that “there is something worse than misery and death.” The author Stephen L. Continue Reading...
September 06, 2006

Agape and Eros

This article by Mary D. Gaebler, visiting assistant professor of theological ethics at Gustavus Adolphus College, “Eros in Benedict and Luther,” from the Journal of Lutheran Ethics argues, “Lutherans, insofar as they derive their theology from Luther, should welcome Pope Benedict’s Encyclical, Deus Caritas Est. Continue Reading...
September 04, 2006

Prayer for Vocation in Daily Work

Almighty God our heavenly Father, you declare your glory and show forth your handiwork in the heavens and in the earth: Deliver us in our various occupations from the service of self alone, that we may do the work you give us to do in truth and beauty and for the common good; for the sake of him who came among us as one who serves, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Continue Reading...
August 31, 2006

Wealth, Envy, and Happiness

In the modern classic Tombstone, Wyatt Earp, played by Kurt Russell, asks Val Kilmer’s Doc Holliday why the sinister Johnny Ringo is so evil: “What makes a man like Ringo, Doc? Continue Reading...
August 15, 2006

‘The poor people’s God, the sinner’s God’

I’m reading John W. de Gruchy’s Confessions of a Christian Humanist, and despite some rather disagreeable elements to his theology, he does have quite a few valuable insights. Here’s what he says in the context of Nietzsche’s derision of Jesus Christ contained in The Anti-Christ: Christians should not disparage the body, human strength and bravery, or the aesthetic dimensions of life. Continue Reading...
August 08, 2006

Vitalism Leads to Nihilism

I saw a post on the Web somewhere in the last few days (I can’t recall where), about the trend toward worshiping human life itself as the highest principle…detached from recognition of any higher theological realities. Continue Reading...