Colleagues, This coming Sunday is the Festival of The Holy Trinity. Herewith some random reflections. There is a LCMS congregation here in St. Louis whose offical name is “Saint Trinity Lutheran Church.” Usually saints are human beings. This time it’s the deity. The current pastor explains the curiosity this way: in the late 1800s a Concordia Seminarian, wanting …
Earthquake in Yogyakarta
Colleagues, Marie and I have dear friends in earthquake-devasted Yogyakarta, Java, friends from our earlier Mission Volunteer days in Indonesia. The folks we know there are with the ACAA, the Asian Christian Art Association–Judo Poerwowidagdo (ACAA president), his wife Timur, and Marthen Tahun, prime-mover for producing IMAGE, the association’s quarterly journal. We’ve been members almost from the …
The Ascension of our Lord
Colleagues,Today is probably the most uncelebrated “Feast of our Lord” in the whole church year–at least among Christians in the USA. Lutherans included. Signal of it insignificance may be the glitch in the Thrivent “Lutheran Pastor’s Desk Diary–2006” that puts Ascension–mirabile dictu!–on Friday this year! Not so. It’s always a Thursday–40 days after Easter and 10 days before …
Theologian Giants out of Missouri
Colleagues,With the death of Jaroslav J. Pelikan [b. 17 Dec. 1923] on May 13, 2006 one of the super-nova theologians who grew up in the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod has arrived at rest in peace. The Pelikan family were Slovaks, JJP’s father also a pastor in the “Slovak district” of the LCMS, into whose ministry JJP was also ordained …
ELCA Launches Project on How to Read the Bible
Colleagues, Pastor Robin Morgan supplies this week’s ThTh posting, some reflections on “literalist” Bible-reading in connection with the ELCA’s current project to find a better way to “read and understand the Bible.” Apparently such literalist Bible reading still afflicts the membership of the “liberal” ELCA. I know that’s true. But it may surprise some folks, especially those …
In the Afterglow of Easter 2006
Colleagues: ForewordAlthough the ThTh number above is “only” 412, there came 88 Sabbath Theology postings beforehand from the computer on this desk. Add them up and it’s 500. Five hundred postings choreographed around law-promise theology. As Luther might ask: What does this 500 mean? It’s you readers who can best answer that question, of course. But you’re …
I’ve Got my Doubts about “Praising Doubt”
Colleagues,Not till this past Sunday afternoon did I get around to reading the March 2006 issue of THE LUTHERAN, the monthly journal of “my” church, the ELCA. The cover page hyped the 4 lead articles: “In Praise of Doubt . . . Plus Study Guide.” Because it was “last Sunday afternoon,” the Sunday after Easter, I’d just heard …
“Lutheran Theology and Global Capitalism” [Or “Empire-building and Me”]
Colleagues, Pastor Robin Morgan, occasional co-conspirator in these postings, links in this book review the grisly underside of today’s global capitalism with the results of her just-completed doctoral dissertation. In that dissertation she takes case studies of Lutheran ministry here in St. Louis and “crosses” them with Luther’s axiom of God’s ambidextrous work in the world. Although …
Easter Epistle from Indonesia
Colleagues, The ThTh postings for the past two weeks have looked at Christianity “moving south.” Here’s a case study. Today’s ThTh is an interview that appeared in the current issue of THE LUTHERAN, the national magazine of the Lutheran Church of Australia [LCA]. Marie and I have been reading the magazine ever since 1994. That was our …
Luther and World Christianity. Part Two
Colleagues, Here is the second half of the essay “Philip Jenkins’ Global Christianity Viewed through Luther’s Lenses”Peace & Joy! Ed Schroeder PART III: THE SOUTH IS COMING NORTH JENKINS’ THESIS #3. By that time [sc. within a few decades] Christianity in Europe and North America will to a large extent consist of Southern-derived immigrant communities. LUTHER: If …