Speaking Freely
- November/December 2017
- November 1, 2017
It has been said, cynically enough, that the twentieth century didn’t begin on January 1, 1900, but on July 28, 1914. That was when World War I officially started, the worst bloodbath in history up to that point, only to be exceeded a few decades later by World War II. But 1914 wasn’t merely the
READ MORETwo recent decisions by the United States Supreme Court relative to religious freedom and freedom of speech should give pause to those religiopolitical conservatives who insist that civil government is on a rampage against Christians and who believe the American secular state is determined to regulate speech in compliance with an agenda of coerced tolerance
READ MOREThe Eighth IRLA World Congress Now, more than ever, we need a holistic understanding of religious freedom.” These words from Ganoune Diop, Secretary General of the International Religious Liberty Association (IRLA), summed up one of the key objectives of a unique international gathering of religious freedom advocates held August 22 to 24 in Hollywood, Florida.
READ MOREAgape love is the central premise of Protestant Christian theology. According to The Oxford Handbook of Theological Ethics, “Luther’s rediscovery of the primacy of agape was the linchpin of the Reformation and the rediscovery of genuine Christian ethics.”1 Many confuse the concept of agape love with the concept of caritas, or charity, but these are two separate
READ MOREFriedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), the self-described antichrist and disciple of the Greek god Dionysus, is undeniably one of Christianity’s bitterest philosophical enemies. Yet ironically, in numbers 60 and 61 of The Antichrist (1888), he eulogized the Renaissance Papacy and bitterly condemned Martin Luther’s break with Rome.1 Inadvertently, however, the eulogy reveals the pagan essence of medieval
READ MOREThis year we celebrate 500 years of the Protestant Reformation. On October 31, 1517, the then Augustinian monk, priest, and teacher Martin Luther nailed, at the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany, a document with 95 theses on salvation, that is, basically, the way people are led by the Christian God to heaven. Luther
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