On Fridays I share articles/resources about broad cultural, societal and theological issues. Be sure to see the explanation and disclaimers at the bottom. I welcome your suggestions. If you read something fascinating please pass it my way.
Things Glen Found Interesting
- How Kindness Became Criminalized (Anastasia Boden, The Dispatch): “Three years ago, the city of Tempe, Arizona, was celebrating Austin Davis as a hero. It even gave him an award for his charitable work, which included driving the city’s homeless people to addiction or mental health services and putting on Sunday picnics, where he shared food with those who were hungry. Last summer, he was jailed for the same work.”
- This article is very much worth your time.
- The Mass Trauma of Porn (Freya India, Substack): “Imagine you meet a teenage girl who starts telling you about her childhood, when she mentions, somewhat casually, that she was shown porn by a strange man. He introduced her to it when she was nine, before she had even held hands with a boy, before she had gotten her first period, without her parents knowing. Week after week, he showed her more, each time something more extreme. By ten it seemed normal. By eleven, she was watching regularly on her own. She is calm about this, reassuring you that this has happened to most of her friends. Would anyone think this was normal? Part of coming-of-age, her healthy development? Exploring her sexuality? Or would we call this abuse? This is exactly what is happening to children today when we hand them a smartphone. But instead of one stranger introducing them to porn, it is a billion-dollar industry, profiting from their trauma.”
- Many of Dead Sea scrolls may be older than thought, experts say (Nicola Davis, The Guardian): “While some scrolls were radiocarbon dated in the 1990s, Popović said scholars did not tackle the problem of castor oil contamination – a substance applied in the 1950s to help experts read the manuscripts, but which could skew results.”
- The scholarly study is available at PLOS One: Dating ancient manuscripts using radiocarbon and AI-based writing style analysis
- Note that when the article says stuff like “Many of the Dead Sea scrolls could be older than previously thought, with some biblical texts dating from the time of their original authors” it means something different than I would mean. When I talk about the original author of Daniel, I mean Daniel. That’s not the assumption they’re working under. Setting that aside, the big takeaway is that some of the Dead Sea Scrolls seem to be significantly older than we thought, and that should encourage Christians because it shows that the textual evidence for the Old Testament is even stronger than previously realized.
- Some China-related news
- Why Taiwan Is the West Berlin of Our Time (Jay Sophalkalyan, The Dispatch): “At this juncture, Taiwan occupies that same fateful role West Berlin did. It stands unbowed along the fault line between tyranny and liberty—a free society that, by the cold arithmetic of authoritarianism, ought not to exist. But the stakes are even higher.… this small island nation is an irrefutable repudiation of the Chinese Communist Party’s ideological creed. It proves that prosperity does not necessitate repression, and that liberal democracy is neither a Western imposition nor a cultural anomaly—it is a universal aspiration springing from the shared yearnings of the human spirit.”
- Facing a Precarious Future in Hong Kong (Peter Maize, Christianity Today): “Chan believes that Hong Kong churches are within a 10-year grace period before the government imposes any significant changes. He says Flow is willing to cooperate to a certain degree. For example, he would put a Chinese flag on their stage if the government requires it. Yet for requirements that go against the Bible, ‘we will follow Jesus,’ Chan said. ‘We will not compromise our faith. We’re mentally prepared for the future.’ That preparation includes a deliberate decision not to keep a database of members and an expectation that the Flow Church might disappear soon.”
- Come to Me, All You Networking Techies (Natalie Mead, Christianity Today): “It’s not easy to be a Christian in the Bay Area. I’ve lived in San Francisco for 12 years. But it’s often impractical, even impossible, for Christians to put down roots here.… I know many techies whose faith didn’t survive the pressure to succeed, the money, and the cultural indoctrination. Mine did only by God’s grace. So when a friend on the East Coast shared a recent New York Times story about a Christian ‘revival’ occurring in Silicon Valley, I groaned—not because I’m against revival in the Bay Area! I was just skeptical of its supposed locus: the tech industry.”
- Fellowship in the Fiery Furnace: Do Christian Persecution Narratives Transcend Racial Divides? (Brooklyn Walker & Paul A. Djupe, Religion in Public): “In this article, we show that religious threat, or beliefs that your religious group is the target of persecution, can actually bring together people across America’s deep and persistent racial divide. As political scientists continue to wrestle with the meaning of racial difference in American politics, our work suggests that other types of identities, like religious identities, and the threat that makes those identities salient, should be an important part of the conversation.”
- How Certain Are Clergy of their Faith? (Ryan Burge, Substack): “There’s a statement in this survey, ‘My religion would be the best one for all people no matter their background or current religion’ that really gets to the heart of the matter. This is a great example of how the evangelical understanding of religion differs from other faith groups. In this sample, 93% of the evangelical pastors said that their religion was the best one for all people. That was 22 points higher than Black Protestants. It was also significantly higher than Catholic priests and mainline Protestant pastors. For the Catholics, 58% thought that they had a superior perspective and it was a bare majority of the mainline at 51%. I do want to note that the non-Christian clergy had a much different approach here — a majority disagreed that they had a superior worldview.”
- Lots of fascinating stats in this brief article.
Less Serious Things Which Also Interested/Amused Glen
Why Do You Send This Email?
In the time of King David, the tribe of Issachar produced shrewd warriors “who understood the times and knew what Israel should do” (1 Chron 12:32). In a similar way, we need to become wise people whose faith interacts with the world. I pray this email gives you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar.
Disclaimer
Chi Alpha is not a partisan organization. To paraphrase another minister: we are not about the donkey’s agenda and we are not about the elephant’s agenda — we are about the Lamb’s agenda. Having said that, I read widely (in part because I believe we should aspire to pass the ideological Turing test and in part because I do not believe I can fairly say “I agree” or “I disagree” until I can say “I understand”) and may at times share articles that have a strong partisan bias simply because I find the article stimulating. The upshot: you should not assume I agree with everything an author says in an article I mention, much less things the author has said in other articles (although if I strongly disagree with something in the article I’ll usually mention it). And to the extent you can discern my opinions, please understand that they are my own and not necessarily those of Chi Alpha or any other organization I may be perceived to represent.
Also, remember that I’m not reporting news — I’m giving you a selection of things I found interesting. There’s a lot happening in the world that’s not making an appearance here because I haven’t found stimulating articles written about it.
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