Chi Alpha @ Stanford

I just finished a fascinating collection of essays compiled by Os Guiness called The Great Experiment: Faith and Freedom in America. The “Great Experiment” of the title is America itself: a nation without precedent in its treatment of faith.

It made me think deeply. It avoids either of the extreme positions often taken by contemporary authors (that the founding fathers barely tolerated religion or that they were all Bible-thumping fundamentalists) in favor of a more intelligent view.

The thesis throughout the book is that faith and freedom in America are codependent: individual faith requires freedom, freedom requires public morality, public morality requires widespread individual faith.

The founding fathers (the majority of whom were thoughtful Christians) seemed to think that separating the church from the state was a profoundly biblical idea: I have to say that the message I’ve always taken from 1 Timothy 2.1-2 is that we need to pray for our rulers to leave us alone (faith-wise). In other words, it seems that separation of church and state was God’s idea.

Interestingly, I was finishing this book I came across an article in Books & Culture about recent scholarship on this very theme (scholarship which I referenced in an earlier posting)! The article is titled Why Separation of Church and State Is Still A Good Idea: Even If It May Not Be What the Founders Had In Mind. I found the article middling-to-fair, but that’s probably because I’d just come from reading Guiness.

If you’re curious about the role of religion in America’s public life, I encourage you to pick up this book and read through it. You might also want to check out the earlier posting on an interview with Charles Taylor about What It Means To Be Secular.

I ran across this at Tolle, Blogge: you can get some free stuff to read!

The blogger who mentioned this site especially recommends The Intercollegiate Review.

I just ran across Antithesis, a site that purports to be “a voice from the emerging Christian counterculture.”

That’s overstating the case a bit: there is a real (evangelical) Christian counterculture and these guys ain’t it.

Still, their site is worthwhile. Their basic premise is that North American Christianity has so identified with our society that we cannot stand against it, for that would be to destroy ourselves. Therefore, they have decided to be a voice for true reformation and a call to thoughtful reflection on what it means to be a devoted apprentice of Jesus.

This site is coming from a Reformed tradition (definition: that sort of means they perceive themselves to be following in the footsteps of John Calvin). The reason I mention that is that I don’t agree with all their theology (and actually have some serious points of contention with them), but I still think their family of sites is worth checking out.

There are zillions of Christian books out there, and many of them are worthwhile reads. There are few, however, that are truly outstanding. Here are some that really need to appear on your reading list!

Growing Spiritually:
1) The Spirit of the Disciplines, by Dallas Willard (author, Amazon)
2) Prayer, by Richard Foster (Amazon)
3) Life Together, by Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Amazon)

Understanding the Bible:
1) The Challenge of Jesus, by N.T. Wright (publisher, Amazon)
2) Slaves, Women, and Homosexuals, by William Webb (publisher, Amazon)
3) Surprised By The Power of the Spirit, by Jack Deere (author, Amazon)

Reasonable Answers to Honest Questions
1) Mere Christianity, by C. S. Lewis (author, Amazon)
2) Long Journey Home, by Os Guinness (Amazon)