Ralph Waldo Emerson's Harvard Divinity Address

The average temperature in Boston during the summer of 1838 was a stifling 90 degrees Fahrenheit - hot enough to cause the six graduates and a select group of esteemed guests to loosen their starched collars as they crowded into the tiny side chapel at Harvard Divinity School for the graduation address. Neither diminutive numbers nor heat would dampen the refreshing gust of thought and inspiration that Ralph Waldo Emerson brought that day. No matter how claustrophobic the physical space or the minds of his listeners, Emerson's reflections opened onto vistas of spirit that

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Eyes Are the Lamp of the Body

I ONCE SAID that we can always know whether or not we are on the path of discipleship or when we are about to make a drastic misstep. However, I learned from the author of Matthew that I was too quick to speak. I still stand by my conviction but found it's not exactly that simple; my truism definitely needs fine-tuning. I'll state it again with Matthew's proviso: We can discern whether we are obedient disciples when we view our lives through the sound eye of God's revelation accessible to us in Scripture and in

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Journey into Modern Culture: The Spiritual Theology of Richard Niebuhr

I selected Richard Niebuhr as an exemplar and trailblazer into modern culture because he combined the cataphatic (with image) and apophatic (without image) modes of spiritual life and thought. These technical terms from spiritual theology were not used by Niebuhr nor are they normally used by moral theologians, especially those practicing fifty years ago. Nonetheless, applying these terms from spiritual theology may revitalize Niebuhr's thought and position it in the context of spiritual theology.

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Letter to a Young Man

This letter addresses a young man's anxiety about life. A recent Christian, he is wondering about the difference between the promise of life in the Spirit and the apparent mundanity of the everyday. First, the first symptom of the spiritual flu involves a sense of boredom. You will recall that the Ephesians in our Revelation studies had a bad bout with this. So much so that they had lost their first love, just as you have lately been lacking your regular enthusiasm. The Desert Fathers and Mothers of the early church, those who roamed around deserts 

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