Woke Inferno

Note: this is a parody piece that explores the question, what if Dante were woke? Introduction Midway upon the journey of our life,I found myself in a system of oppressionreinforced through hegemonic discourse.  My eyes were just beginning to opento the deep-rooted structural inequitiesagainst women, BIPOCs, and LGBT. But there came upon me a great […]

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Defending Perspicuity: A Response to The Obscurity of Scripture by Casey Chalk

Note: the following is a modified transcript of an adult Sunday school lecture that I taught at Riveroaks Reformed Presbyterian Church (PCA) in October 2023, as part of a series defending the Protestant doctrine of Scripture. In this lecture, I address some common Roman Catholic objections to the perspicuity of Scripture. I do this primarily […]

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Review: God Reforms Hearts by Thaddeus Williams

These words, written by C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, reflect one of the most common Christian responses to the problem of evil and suffering in the world. At first glance, the so-called “free will defense” has considerable appeal. It seems to absolve God of responsibility for the existence of evil, by shifting that responsibility to […]

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Review: Conservatism: A Rediscovery by Yoram Hazony

There was a time when liberalism ruled the West. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, the divide between conservatives and progressives mostly amounted to a contest between competing versions of liberalism. However, in recent years, liberalism’s grip has begun to weaken. In its place, we have witnessed the rise of an updated Marxism […]

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Review: Outsiders on the Inside by Billy Boyce

William E. Boyce. Outsiders on the Inside: Understanding Racial Fatigue, Racial Resilience, and Racial Hospitality in Our Churches. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock, 2022. 146 pages. Since its founding in 1973, the Presbyterian Church in America has professed a commitment to welcoming all races. However, putting this commitment into practice has proven more difficult. Despite […]

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Review: The Myth of Colorblind Christians by Jesse Curtis

There has been a lot of discussion recently on the topic of American evangelical deconstruction (see also here and here). Such deconstruction generally involves subjecting the evangelical church to historical and sociological analysis, in order to demonstrate that evangelicalism is actually rooted in efforts to uphold—and to provide religious justification for—the social dominance of privileged […]

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White fragility, white guilt, and the ring of Gyges

I think these books were meant to be read together. They are coming from very different perspectives—one a white progressive and the other a black conservative—but they are both attempting to make sense of white psychology in post-Civil Rights America. Even the book covers look similar, with the black and white appropriately inverted. Let me […]

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‘Splainshaming: when “centering other voices” becomes a tool to silence dissent

Straightsplainshaming: rebuking, ridiculing, or dismissing a straight person for speaking on issues of sexuality, just because they are straight. Whitesplainshaming: rebuking, ridiculing, or dismissing a white person for speaking on issues of race, just because they are white. Mansplainshaming: rebuking, ridiculing, or dismissing a man for speaking on issues of gender, just because he is […]

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Review: Beyond Racial Gridlock by George Yancey

“Gridlock” is a good word to describe the state of evangelical discussions on race today. The past couple years especially have witnessed a meteoric rise in the use (and misuse) of terms like “critical race theory” and “systemic racism.” If evangelicals are going to break through the current ideological impasse, then they need a reliable […]

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Review: The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James Cone

This summer I’ve been trying to read as much as I can on the topic of racial justice, covering a range of perspectives—both secular and Christian, and both progressive and conservative. One title that I just finished is The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James H. Cone, who is considered to be the father […]

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Some random thoughts on Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility

Having recently finished reading Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility, I thought it might be helpful to offer a few thoughts on it. I don’t intend to give a full review here. If you want to read a more substantial review, then I would recommend Coleman Hughes or John McWhorter. What I want to do here is […]

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Review: Them Before Us by Katy Faust and Stacy Manning

Them Before Us: Why We Need a Global Children’s Rights Movement, by Katy Faust and Stacy Manning. Post Hill Press, 2021. 235 pages. I first heard about this book from a recommendation by John Stonestreet on the Colson Center’s Breakpoint Podcast. When I learned that Robert George (see my reviews here and here) wrote the […]

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Four Christian Responses to Gay Marriage

This blog post is probably at least twenty years too late, if not much more so. Christians in America lost the gay marriage debate long before the Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges decision. When the best response we can give to why the government shouldn’t legally recognize same-sex marriage is “because the Bible says it’s […]

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Discussing abortion, Scholastic-style

In the spirit of Thomas Aquinas’s Summa Theologica, what follows is an attempt to tackle the topic of abortion according to a medieval-scholastic disputation. The topic is divided into four key questions (philosophical, biblical, circumstantial, and legal) that follow the format of Aquinas’s Summa, first setting forth the objections, then stating the opposing traditional view […]

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