Recommended Reading (Dan's Take)

Recently we at KBT (mostly me, but not without any input) have revamped the links. They're now categorized as recommended reading and fun links. Austin and I both read Buttersafe and play DF, so both of those are in fun links. Recommended reading is an amalgamation of our old links. I must confess I didn't feel comfortable as a Catholic linking to CARM or Monergism.com, which is why those were removed. I suppose I could also have linked to Catholic Answers, but that would have struck me as obnoxious on my part to do, perhaps more-so than the removal of the other two. However we did reach mutual agreement on linking to specific thinkers within sub-traditions rather than websites that more explicitly promote some sub-tradition or another. The new recommendations list is pretty balanced in terms of where exactly in Christendom the thinkers hail from, and after some conversation with Austin I've added John Piper's 'Desiring God' blog. I haven't actually bugged Mike yet to see if he's got stuff to add.

My linking to these sites doesn't constitute any necessary endorsement of the specific ideas contained or preached therein. It definitely doesn't mean that I endorse as Catholic everything said on any of these websites, even the ones labeled "Catholic." What it does constitute is my general endorsement of those who do the main writing on those sites, as thinkers, and my good faith that they all endeavor to seek the Truth.

If anyone who runs these sites happens to see this list, and I've got their tradition wrong, they should tell me so I can correct it.

So here's the list, as I've currently got it composed (Austin or Mike might add stuff later):

* A Minor Friar (Catholic) - Fransiscan Brother Charles reflects on lots of things.
* Alexander Pruss (Catholic) - Thomistic philosopher who writes about just about everything, it seems.
* Amateur Theological Musings (Catholic, really Theological Musings from an Amateur) - Interesting musings on theology and philosophy; this kid could be huge in the future.
* Catholic and Enjoying it (Catholic) - Mark Shea, an interesting fellow.
* Dangerous Idea (Arminian Evangelical) - Victor Reppert, who asks lots of interesting questions about everything and is a big proponent of Lewis's Argument from Reason.
* Desiring God (Reformed Evangelical) - Headed by John Piper, a bigger reformed blog. I must admit I didn't pay much attention to Piper, but having read a little of his blog and watched some videos, I'm pretty impressed.
* John Meunier (United Methodist) - If you read only one UMC small minister's blog a day, make it this one. John waxes awesome on everything from whether Wesleyans are Wesleyan, to the internal politics of the church, to Rob Bell.
* Mere Orthodoxy (??? Evangelical) - How can you not love a blog that takes its name from a combination of Lewis's Mere Christianity and Chesterton's Orthodoxy? Theologizing on everything over here.
* Mouw's Musings (Reformed Evangelical) - Richard Mouw of Fuller Theological Seminary doesn't update ultra-often, but I find he is almost always worth the read.
* Parableman (Reformed Evangelical) - Jeremy Pierce is a philosophical grad student who asks interesting questions about lots and lots of things, from how we read texts (including Biblical texts) to philosophy of race.
* Sola Nobilitas Virtus (Catholic) - Kev Johnston often posts videos of Milton Friedman or people falling hilariously, but when he gets thinking, he gets thinking. He and I certainly disagree as to whether he gets it right from a Catholic or Christian standpoint, but he gets a lot of it right.

One last thing. I do not make this promise for Austin or Mike, but everything in the recommended reading list also goes in my RSS Feed Reader, with the intent that I read all of it, pretty much post-for-post.

Christian Carnival is Up

Over at Thinking in Christ. Enjoy!

Christian Carnival CCCXXVIII

Up over at parableman. Peruse/enjoy.

A Response to this Gulley Fellow

I got a tip on this from John Meunier. It's rewarding reading, because it's so wrong that the words I want to use are words a theology blog shouldn't use. It's forcing me to try and articulate why it's so wrong.

Readings of Scripture aside, I don't think I can square all the false implications he's made about the doctrine of original sin.

For starters, any Churches--the RCC I know for sure but I'd be willing to bet more than a few Protestant denominations--teach a kind of co-creation and co-operation of God and man that they see as being in perfect harmony with the notion of original sin. They might be wrong (I guess the Monergists might be right), but even if that be the case, they're still more biblically and historically Christian than this guy.

Apparently Gulley's never heard of all those joyous saints and philosophers whose belief in original sin combined with beautiful views of creation and God and humanity. Gulley's never read John or me, in our honest struggles to work out salvation in fear and trembling. If so, he should know better than this. But he doesn't know better. Most of this piece was crap, and most of the good advice can and has been acted on by persons who vehemently disagree with him. Maybe we're just too trapped in the unreasonable dogma of yesteryear to be enlightened like Gulley is. Maybe we're not the only dogmatists.

Looking at Grad Schools

This is a serious question for anyone reading this post:

Any ideas about places I might go to grad school?

I'm looking to study historical theology at least for the master's level. I'm pretty sure if I ever break into academia my research interests will include theology of sexuality and the Christian concept of human dignity (I'm particularly interested in the ways in which 20th century authors, especially but probably not only Catholics, have used the world's concept of dignity as a negative definition of the Christian concept.)

So if anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. I kind of already know what Catholic places I sort of want to apply to (for instance, CUA and Notre Dame are on my list, still thinking on the Catholic GTU schools in Berkeley because I think I might choke on the little-l liberalism down there.)

If anyone knows of good Protestant schools especially for historical theology I'd like to know. I know a couple of other Carnival people either are or have been grad students in the past, so if you'd have anything about those to offer, let me know.