God-talk and the Suffering of the Guilty

They have committed crimes most would see as purely evil and are responsible for the most severe moments of suffering in many people’s lives. Yet I hold that they, too, are sufferers.

Noah Black | Vanderbilt Synesis | Fall 2018

Reading a Liturgy of Confession: Liturgy as Forma Formans

The form worship takes reveals has certain assumptions about how people learn built into it. Reading liturgy from a formalist perspective, one that pays attention to form, reveals much about what those assumptions are.

Caleb Molstad | University of Minnesota Between Cities | Spring 2019

How Much Is a Little Girl Worth? Justice, Forgiveness, and Sexual Assault

For all the attention paid to Denhollander’s faith and forgiveness, some forget why she was actually in the courtroom: to support “the maximum possible sentence” possible for Dr. Nassar.

Aldis Petriceks | Stanford Vox Clara | Winter 2019

Aching Desires

The more compelling idea is how closely together Augustine links a horrible act with good desires – desires for love, comfort, security, and justice.

David Bussell | UNC To the Well | Fall 2018

White as Snow: A Comparison of Two Prayers of Repentance

By examining two famous prayers of repentance, that of the fictional King Claudius in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and that of the historical King David in Psalm 51, I hope to shed light on what repentance is and what it is not.

Paul Jeon | The Dartmouth Apologia | Spring 2018

Let us Love and Sing and Wonder

How did hymns come about and how have they changed through history? Why were they significant and how are they relevant today?

Richard Ibekwe | MIT et Spiritus | Spring 2018

DAMN: Kendrick Lamar’s Radical Lament

Kendrick Lamar is currently one of the world’s most talented lyricists, a generational storyteller, and a Christian grappling with eternal condemnation.

Kion You | The Brown & RISD Cornerstone | Spring 2018

Friend of Sinners

Jesus was known to be a friend of sinners, and his life has encouraged me to do the same in my work within the criminal justice system–to befriend them, encourage them, and find them worthy of healing, rehabilitation, and forgiveness.

Brittany Krippner | CalPoly Aletheia | Spring 2018

Searching for the Ear of God

I myself reckoned with the reality I faced: I also thought prayer was sort of stupid. It certainly felt stupid, primarily for two reasons.

Jesse Rines | The Hopkins Dialectic | Spring 2017

What Killed Robert Peace?

Robert Peace’s short and tragic life comes as a shock because many of us assume that poverty can be eradicated with more money, more intellect, more opportunities, and so on

Esther Jiang | Cornell Claritas | Spring 2016

Prophecy, Progress, and Repentance: The Role of the Individual in Human History

Therefore, prophecy is primarily concerned with what may occur if the errant currents of the present are allowed to flow unaltered into the local or temporally proximal future.

Jake Casale | The Dartmouth Apologia | Spring 2016

God’s Justice: A Shifting Standard?

If Noah and Abraham were just before God because they were sinless, it would theoretically be possible for any human being at any point in history to be just in the same way.

Dinnie Ee | The Yale Logos | Spring 2016

Revisiting the Life of Martin Luther King Jr.: Perspectives for Today’s Challenges

Dr. King recognized that the question of racism and civil rights was tearing America apart, and he knew that only love as illustrated by the gospel could provide a viable solution.

Andrew Shuffer | The Dartmouth Apologia | Spring 2016

The Christian Faith

One way God manifests His nature in us is through our rationality.

Irving Nestor | The Hopkins Dialectic | Spring 2016

Genetically Modified Crops and a Christian Worldview

Modern food production has come a long way since the times recorded in Genesis, but the issues farmers face today are the same.

Megan Stevens | University of Minnesota Between Cities | Spring 2016

What God Expects: The Paradox of the Standards of the Christian Community

Therefore, the standard to be Christian and to become part of the Christian community is to understand this paradox: we cannot achieve God’s standards.

Cindy Wu | The Cornell Claritas | Fall 2015

The Sin of Adam: Two Allegorical Accounts of the Fall

Recovering the literal sense of the Greek hamartia—translated in our Bibles as "sin"—we have "missed the mark."

Erin Kast | Swarthmore Peripateo | Spring 2015

The Good News

One of the primary tenets of Christianity is that we are obligated to spread the “good news”—in other words, the Gospel. But what is this good news?

Elizabeth Jean-Marie | The Brown & RISD Cornerstone | Spring 2015

A Christian View of History

The strength of the metanarrative of progress and the triumph of the will falls short under examination.

Nathaniel Schmucker | The Dartmouth Apologia | Fall 2014

The Alternative Lens of Revelation

As responsible thinkers in this society, then, it is important to endeavor to read [the book of Revelation] responsibly, keeping to the message as truly as we can.

Shaun Lim | The Harvard Ichthus | Spring 2013

Affliction Furthers the Flight in Me

Inspired by the story of the resurrection, 17th century English poet George Herbert wrote his short poem “Easter Wings.” The poem beautifully recreates the restorative power of Christ’s resurrection.

Chih McDermott | The Williams Telos | Fall 2013

Abundant Life, Abundant Love, and the Empty Tomb

At the empty tomb, I want to ask the same two questions as at the Cross - why is it necessary, and why is it possible?

Nathan Scalise | Swarthmore Peripateo | Fall 2013

A Religious Animal?

How to understand the story of the Fall while accepting that death, too, was there from the beginning of life on earth?

Stephen Mackereth | The Harvard Ichthus | Fall 2013

Why Jesus?

J.R.R. Tolkien has undoubtedly captivated the heart of many in his Middle Earth saga, The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien’s ability to resonate with his audience lies in his tale’s appeal to human nature itself.

Mako Nagasawa | The Harvard Ichthus | Fall 2012

How Can the Gods Meet Us Face to Face?

The writer and Christian apologist G.K. Chesterson wrote, “Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity,” and Till We Have Faces is this sort of necessary fiction that doesn’t only alter our perspective but has the power to call into question who we are and what we live for.

Micaela Walker | UC Berkeley To An Unknown God | Volume 6, Issue 1, Spring 2013

Christianity and Feminism: A Look into the Work of Mary Astell

The foundation of Mary Astell's argument was the concept that it was men, not God, nor women themselves, who made women inferior. In a world that was constantly arguing for the natural inferiority of women, this was a radical idea.

Steffi Ostrowski | The Dartmouth Apologia | Spring 2013, Volume 7, Issue 2

Why Is There Winter In Narnia?

Why is there winter? And second, what needs to happen for the life-giving thaw of spring to return? In other words, what is the origin of what is wrong with the world, and what is the solution to it?

Nick Nowalk | The Harvard Ichthus | Fall 2012, Volume 8, Number 3.

On Reason in Milton’s Paradise Lost and John Donne’s “Holy Sonnet XIV” – Theologies on Agency in Christian Faith

Milton states, “reason is but choosing”; reason depends on a person’s free will to be utilized for either man’s pleasure, or God’s glory.

Trina Hyun | The UPenn Lamp Post | Issue 1, Spring 2012

The Incarnation

Christianity doesn’t preach a distant God who turned a blind eye to mankind, but rather tells of a God who became a man himself. God didn’t simply send a message; He became the messenger. We recall this momentous occasion – the divine incarnation – each year at Christmas.

Jordan Monge | The Harvard Ichthus | Volume 7, Number 4, Winter 2011

The Marriage of Justice and Mercy

Christianity has seeming contradictions like a dog has fleas. This one consistently arises: how can a God of justice be, at the same time, a God of mercy? George MacDonald brings this contradiction to a point: “Those who say justice means the punishing of sin, and mercy the not punishing of sin, and attribute both to God, would make a schism in the very idea of God.”

Andrew Kim | Brown Cornerstone | Volume 1, Issue 1, Spring 2012

September 2019