Category: Links

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 25

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

There’s a lot of heavy content in this one. Buckle your seatbelt. Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. Alcohol, Blackouts, and Campus Sexual Assault (Texas Monthly, Sarah Hepola): I think this is the most thoughtful secular piece I’ve read on the issue. “Consent and alcohol make tricky bedfellows. The reason I liked getting drunk was because it altered my consent: it changed what I would say yes to. Not just in the bedroom but in every room and corridor that led into the squinting light. Say yes to adventure, say yes to risk, say yes to karaoke and pool parties and arguments with men, say yes to a life without fear, even though such a life is never possible… We drink because it feels good. We drink because it makes us feel happy, safe, powerful. That it often makes us the opposite is one of alcohol’s dastardly tricks.” 
  2. Fatal Flaws In That Religion And Generosity Study (The Stream, George Yancey). Yancey is a sociology prof. Related: Are Religious Kids Really Meaner Than Their Counterparts? by a social psychologist.
  3. Now for a ton of links related to the racial incidents and responses at Yale and Mizzou (which seem different to me but which happened in such close proximity that they are linked in the national dialog).
  4. In global news: On The Brink: Christianity Facing Middle East Purge Within Decade, Group Says (Fox News). Stories like this have led one lawmaker to introduce a bill to Prioritize Refugee Status For Christians Fleeing ISIS (The Hill). See also Islam Is A Religion Of Violence by Joel Miller, wherein he argues that the lack of Trinitarian doctrine corrupts the Muslim conception of God. 
  5. Christian Belief Cost This Man His Job: (Wall Street Journal, Jason Riley): apparently the fire chief of Atlanta was fired because of something he said in a book he wrote. Note that this is an op-ed, not a news story.
  6. Hating Queerness Without Hating The Queer (The Atlantic, Emma Green): basically an article-length interaction with Albert Mohler’s book We Cannot Be Silent.
  7. Quick Links:

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 24

News News News 98/365In 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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. I heard a moving Radiolab episode: Gray’s Donation. If you’ve never listened to Radiolab before, I highly recommend the episodes Colors and Oops. If you’re into podcasts, check out a list of thoughtful Christian podcasts I compiled a while back.
  2. ’A Tour of Burned Churches’ Explores Race, Resilience, and Religion in America (Huffington Post, Christopher Mathias): an interview with a podcaster about a series he did on the burning of black churches in America. I have not listened to the series, but the interview was good.
  3. Data about Adults Who Do Not Believe In God (Pew Forum) — one of the charts makes me think of a funny clip about atheism as white privilege [the whole thing is worth watching, but you can jump to the sound bite at 5:45]. There is a good summary of some of the takeaways at GetReligion. On a related note, there is a study in Current Biology: The Negative Association Between Religiousness and Children’s Altruism Across The World. The comments on reddit are interesting (more interesting to me than the study itself).
  4. A somewhat contrarian piece: Liberals Are Losing The Culture War (Molly Ball, The Atlantic). A semi-response piece: This Isn’t A Culture War, It’s A War On Culture (The Federalist, David Harsanyi).
  5. File under sad: The State Department Turns Its Back on Syrian Christians and Other Non-Muslim Refugees (National Review, Nina Shea)
  6. The story I alluded to in my sermon: How Prop 47 Helped One Man Keep His Job (KQED,  Sara Hossaini). This is an illustration of what justification involves — a legal decree that exempts you from penalties the law would otherwise apply (when I quote stuff in my sermon I try to remember to share it here).
  7. Quick Links:

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 23

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. The Ultimate List of Birthday Freebies (Stanford Daily, Samantha Wong): This is, without a doubt, one of the most useful links I have ever shared with you. Not so much about broader societal issues — but you’ll want to read it nonetheless.
  2. The Anti-Free Speech Movement at UCLA (The Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf): I particularly liked this bit: “The college students fighting to limit free speech or to punish free expression are courting tremendous harms that would ultimately fall disproportionately on the least powerful, most marginalized groups of the present and future…. activists who say that they live in a system of white supremacy [should not] empower state administrators to police speech at their discretion!”  For much more, check out UCLA law prof Eugene Volokh’s comments on campus freedom of speech (some of which are quoted in the Friedersdorf article).
  3. Cash Strapped Missionaries Get A New Calling: Home (Wall Street Journal, Tamara Audi): this is sad. I encourage you to pray for and give to missionaries.
  4. Reframing The Debate About Payday Lending (the blog of the New York Fed): Fascinating. I’ve been critical of payday lenders in the past, but at least some of my misgivings appear to have been off the mark.
  5. A Black Legend Refuted (Catholic World Report): this is a review of Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War Against Hitler. The review is from a biased source, but is the most detailed of the reviews I’ve seen. Kirkus Reviews, a secular source, also has good things to say about it as does First Things, which is in between the two ideologically. The book’s endorsements are impressive.
  6. Quick links:

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 22

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.

To that end, on weekends (usually Fridays but last night we had alumni over for homecoming and it turned into a five hour party, so this time Saturday) I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. Muslim Migrants, Meet Christian Gypsies (Jillian Melchior, Wall Street Journal): this is pretty beautiful.
  2. Moral Responsibility and Emotional Rejection of God (William Lane Craig): Craig, who we hosted on campus years ago, answers a tough question. I think it’s amusing how often he directs the reader to another one of his books, but I don’t guess he had an alternative if he wanted to keep his answer short enough to be readable.
  3. Hooking Up Is Easy To Do (Katie Van Syckle, NY Mag):  “I’ve come back to my alma mater because it sits at the crossroads of two major themes of modern-day college sex: hookup culture, which seems as rampant as I remember it, and sexual assault… Lately, researchers have been making an obvious but controversial point: that these two trend lines are in fact related — that hooking up puts students at higher risk of having nonconsensual sex, and that there are elements of this culture… that are more complicated than ‘yes means yes.’” 
  4. How Friendships Change In Adulthood (Julie Beck, The Atlantic): there’s a lot in this article. I was struck by the idea that friendships are either active, dormant, or commemorative.
  5. Joel Osteen: Would Jesus Christ Be A Good President? (David Wallis, New York Observer): the title is super-click-bait. It’s a short, interesting interview with Joel Osteen, pastor of the largest church in America.
  6. Treasures On Earth: How Religion Is Redistributing The World’s Wealth (Morgan Lee, Christianity Today): misleading title, interesting data.
  7. Quick Links:

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 21

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. How big of a deal do you have to be for POTUS to interview you? President Obama & Marilynne Robinson: A Conversation In Iowa (NY Review of Books). You might recall that Robinson is speaking at Stanford soon and also that I mentioned her essay “Fear” a few emails back.
  2. Wondering why people are fleeing Syria? Check out Syria’s War: A Five Minute History (a Vox video). This is really well-done. 
  3. There is also violence erupting in Israel. Foreign Policy asks Can Anyone Prevent A Third Intifada?  Incidentally, if you wonder why people are skeptical of the way news concerning Israel is reported, take a look at Returning to the Copy Desk, Briefly (Kevin Williamson, National Review). It is a takedown of a NY Times article showing how much bias can creep into an apparently objective article (this is from the right critiquing the left — for counterexamples search for clips from the Daily Show). Bottom line: it’s really hard to find trustworthy news about Israel.
  4. Lying About Our Religion, and Other Problems With Polling (Religion Dispatches). There really is a problem developing with polling, which is bad news because we rely upon polling in our national life to tell us what the public thinks. Nate Silver is also worried about this — Polling Is Getting Harder, But It’s A Vital Check On Power (FiveThirtyEight).
    • An insightful observation from the “Lying About Our Religion” article: “In a democracy with hundreds of millions of people, how do you know what the public thinks and wants? How do you figure out what binds them together, besides an annual obligation to the IRS and a love of fireworks? In short: how do you know what the public is? Like many hard questions, these problems have been rendered largely invisible, in no small part because “The Public” and “The American People” are favorite fictional characters for politicians and journalists, who speak of them without a trace of precision. So let’s indulge in a quick reality check. The Super Bowl—that national spectacle that unites us around the flickering LCD hearth—had 115 million viewers in the United States last February; in other words, nearly two-thirds of us weren’t watching it. The most-viewed political spectacle of the year, the State of the Union address, draws around 10% of the population. Barack Obama won the 2012 presidential election with 62 million votes, meaning that fewer than 20% of us voted for him. The people have spoken…kind of.”
  5. Quick links:

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 20

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. From the Glen-alluded-to-this-in-his-sermon department:
  2. From the current events department
  3. From the all-things-sexual department:
  4. From the Stanford department: this Daily op-ed caught my eye: Petition To Student Activities and Leadership to End Open Membership. There was a swift nuh-uh from the administration. The petition itself is on change.org. For the record, Chi Alpha has no desire to exclude people from our ministry. I do, however, think that Stanford’s open membership policy needlessly abridges students’ constitutional right to freedom of association. As a private institution, Stanford is allowed to do that… but it is unwise to do so.

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 19

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. There was a shooting at a college in Oregon yesterday. There’s a religious angle to this story, but the details are still not clear.
  2. For completely different news, read Googling For God (NY Times, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz): file under “interesting but not that surprising” (although I am surprised at the relative positions of questions 1 and 2  — I assumed they were swapped)
  3. Pope Francis and the Not-Quite-Secular West (NY Times, Ross Douthat): Secularism’s grip on America is weaker than it appears.
  4. Stop The Robot Apocalypse (Amia Srinivasan, London Review of Books): the title is misleading — this is an insightful critique of the effective altruism movement from the left.
  5. Huh. The Correlations Between Arts and Crafts and a Nobel Prize (Rosie Cima, Priceonomics).

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 18

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

Without further ado, I give you the interesting things:

  1. Downwardly Mobile For Jesus (Lawrence Lanahan, Al Jazeera): this is a really well-written and engaging story that weaves together faith, race, poverty and justice.
  2. If you are in the social sciences, read this journal article from Behavioral and Brain Sciences: Political Diversity Will Improve Social Psychological Science (summary by one of the authors here). There is an article with related insights at The American Sociologist: How Ideology Has Hindered Sociological Insight. There are many implied religious issues at play besides the political ones which are the focus of these two pieces.
  3. Sad truths: The Decline and Fall Of American Political Debate (John Davidson, The Federalist). Davidson says “our fragmentation and insularity has reached a dangerous tipping point: we no longer agree on what’s real.” Read especially the section labeled “Take Two Recent Examples.”
  4. A surprisingly fascinating article: More Titillated Than Thou: How the Amish Conquered the Evangelical Romance Market (Ann Newumann, The Baffler). Really.
  5. An unexpected perspective: Why The Best Thing This Generation Can Do Is Put Down The Drink (Alexia LaFeta, Elite Daily): the comments section, unsurprisingly, is filled with vitriolic objections. Some of the language in the article, incidentally, is less than refined and genteel.
  6. This is Timi’s mom: Funke Opeke: Nigeria’s Cyber Revolutionary (Femke van Zeijl, Al Jazeera). I hope her name is pronounced the way I am pronouncing it in my head, because that would be awesome. Also, Timi’s mom is a boss.

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 17

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

  1. Fear (Marilynne Robinson, NY Review Of Books): I don’t often find overtly theological pieces in the New York Review of Books, much less ones whose opening lines are, “America is a Christian country. This is true in a number of senses.” She’s gonna get some hate mail.
  2. Some things that made me chuckle:
  3. Why Do Good Universities Tend To Be Good At Everything? (Quora question): Short but insightful.
  4. What Stanford Taught Me About Grace (Seth Villegas, personal blog): Seth is an alumnus of our ministry who is currently doing grad work at Fuller Theological Seminary.
  5. Religion and the Republic (David Forte, Witherspoon Institute): the author (a law professor) explains the importance of religious speech in the public square. This seems like a good place to mention one of my favorite academic papers: The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy.
  6. From the I‑know-I-shared-this-last-week-but-want-to-share-it-with-the-new-students department: How To Stay Christian On Campus (David Mathis, Desiring God): I expected something very different than what I got. Recommended.

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.

Things Glen Found Interesting, Volume 16

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.

To that end, on Fridays I’ve been sharing articles/resources I have found helpful recently in thinking about broader cultural and societal issues (be sure to see the disclaimer at the bottom). May these give you greater insight, so that you may continue the tradition of Issachar. Past emails are archived at http://glenandpaula.com/wordpress/category/links

  1. From the recommended-by-a-student department: How To Stay Christian On Campus (David Mathis, Desiring God): I expected something very different than what I got. Recommended.
  2. From the perilous times department: 
  3. From the unexpected-insights-from history-department: Morals Legislation, Revisited (Books and Culture, David Skeel): Books and Culture is an evangelical version of the NY Times Review of Books. This article is written by a law prof at Penn reviewing a Harvard University Press book about the evangelical origins of the living constitution approach to law.
  4. From the everybody-is-quoting-it department: Microaggression and Moral Cultures (Campbell and Manning, Comparative Sociology): I have seen so many people pumping this academic article I am astounded. Three to take a look at: Conor Friedersdorf in the Atlantic, Megan McArdle in Bloomberg View, and Jonathan Haidt on his personal blog. The original article is descriptive — the response pieces tend to be evaluative.
  5. From the principles-you-will-probably-need-to-know-one-day department: When Does Your Religion Legally Excuse You From Doing Part of Your Job? (Washington Post. Eugene Volokh): this one came out right after my last email update. Volokh is a law prof at UCLA.

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.