Here are some God-talk links to nibble on with your bed-time snack—and oddly (or not) most of them are blog posts, heh:Over at Jesus Creed, NT scholar Scot McKnight just started a series looking into the theology of the immaculate conception of Mary (you can read the second post here), which he says “may have a theological logic much more in tune with Protestant theological thinking” than the theology behind Mary’s perpetual virginity (another series he just finished). I know I’ve said this before, but going to that blog really, really reminds me of the times I snuck into panels and seminars at poly sci conventions during my husband’s graduate school days: like injesting a feast of knowledge that you’d never have time to read about or research on your own. Also, check out his ongoing summer series on Romans as well.
The Heresy points to a George Barna survey that indicates House churches are exploding in America—and yes, the survey differentiated between small groups meeting in homes connected to a conventional church and house churches meetings.
It was Mir’s Mirathon that gave me the heads up on the new Dallas Willard book, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus’s Essential Teachings on Discipleship. Ack, how could I have missed that? Where have I been?! Sigh.
Over at GetReligion, Terry Mattingly posts All eyes on Canterbury (again) regarding what faces the Archbishop after the election of Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori of Nevada as the Episcopal Church’s new presiding bishop, which plays into two big issues: women in church leadership and homosexuality (for which Jefferts Schori is an advocate). If you aren’t familiar with GetReligion, Mattingly flies their colors again in Reading the God-blog tea leaves.
When you’re done reading that, hop over to Mattingly’s webpage and read his latest weekly Scripps-Howard-syndicated column, A vote for the resurrection, where he mulls over N.T. Wright’s quiet but significant proclamation that Jesus did indeed physically rise from the dead—and why that matters.
Then head back to GetReligion, and read Mollie’s post All-American Islam, which points to a NY Times piece that looks at American Islamic clerics and gets into a bit of the difference between various Islamic sects.
For another look at the-sun-standing-still incident in Joshua, Claw of Conciliator points us to the blog of Dr. Claude Mariottini of Northern Baptist Seminary in Illinois. You seminary-graduated folk probably already heard this one, but it was new to me. (Honestly, it’s stuff like this that makes me want to learn Hebrew and Greek.)
And if you just want to read some beautiful writing, head over to Questing Parson, who's got some new posts up.
(Image: by Mike D on flikr.com)