In my previous post I wrote about the common practice these days of moving from conservative to progressive on a variety of theological and social issues. A list of such issues might include gender and sexuality, Jesus as a historical figure, the resurrection, religious pluralism – and the doctrines of universal sin, salvation through Christ, and hell. A sampling of …
Slippage Part 1 of 5: Progressing Out of Traditional Christianity
It’s fairly common these days to hear the noble declaration, “I can no longer hold to [the Bible, Christianity, traditional stance on social issues, miracles, etc.] in good conscience. “I used to be so certain of these matters. But I can’t keep up appearances any longer. I need to be true to myself and to the oppressed. The truth of …
Explicitly Jesus
Not long ago I was about to hop an Uber cab in Detroit when I got a prompting from the Lord. He seemed to be saying, “I want you to talk about Jesus in the first ten seconds of this ride.” Ten seconds isn’t a lot of time. The driver greeted me outside his car and stowed my bags in …
Riseaboveability: Do You Have It?
I don’t often write devotional blogs. But the topic of elevating ourselves above the fray of life’s troubles seems important enough to make an exception. I call it riseaboveability. College students don’t have it, much. And I’m afraid I don’t model it for them very well. They rise and fall according to the latest fortunes of class assignments, GPA volatility, …
The Decline of Mental Health on Campus: One Small Antidote
Counseling centers on college campuses are packed out these days. Students are waiting in long lines to visit a counselor to talk about anxiety, depression, suicide, sexual trauma, substance abuse, and more.* I’m not a counselor but I do offer a listening ear. I hear a lot about medical issues, family conflicts, broken friendships, and academic pressure. And more than …
The 90-10 Rule (part 4 of 4)
In my prior post I suggested two main causes for students’ diminished participation in the church: ecclesiology, and caricatures from campus (the focus of this post). On campus, the dominant portrayal of the church is that it’s guilty of being a historic oppressor and, in modern times, of excluding persons of alternative lifestyles. My response is to propose a 90-10 …
How Students Got This Way (part 3 of 4)
In my last post I shared my observations about Christian students’ lack of commitment to the church. How did they come to this position? I offer the following thoughts with a bit of caution. See what you think: 1. We forgot our ecclesiology (theology of the church). A strong ecclesiology says, in effect, there is no true Christian spirituality outside …
Understanding College Students: Church Attendance (part 2 of 4)
In my prior post I did a flyover of the collegiate landscape, mainly in terms of atheism and agnosticism. What I meant to suggest is that, overall, campus culture is quite secular. As for religion, it’s allowed to exist as an exception to the prevailing rule of secularism, and especially as a concession forced by higher education’s stated commitment to …
College Students: What Makes them Tick (part 1 of 4)
Church people often ask me, “What’s happening on college campuses these days? What are students like?” I usually start my reply at the macro level, and talk about atheism, because along with its softer cousin, agnosticism, it’s the most dominant view on campus. Actually, there are two kinds of atheism in the university world: modern and postmodern. Generally speaking, moderns …
Exclusivism Part 4: Principled Pluralism
In my prior post I made the point that in terms of ultimate truth claims, the pluralist is just as exclusive as anyone else. But there’s another kind of pluralism available to us: social pluralism, or what’s often called “principled pluralism.” In 2013 the American Inclusivist Project published a paper called “Principled Pluralism” that called for Americans to “move beyond mere …