Debating Reformed Eucharistic Theology

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Debating Reformed Eucharistic Theology

I'm pleased to announce that volume 2 of The Mercersburg Theology Study Series​, edited by Linden J. DeBie and entitled Coena Mystica: Debating Reformed Eucharistic Theology​, has just been published by Wipf and Stock Publishers.  You can read more about the Study Series​, of which I am serving as General Editor, and which aims to print at least 13 volumes of the writings of Nevin, Schaff, and their colleagues over the next few years, at our website.  ​

This is one of the most exciting volumes in the whole series, bringing to light material that has never been seen before by most scholars, let alone the general public, in an easily accessible form that enables comparison of two rival models of Reformed sacramentology.  But you don't have to take my word for it.  Here's what some leading scholars and historians had to say:

“These are essential documents pertaining to one of the most important theological debates in American history.
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A Living, Busy, Mighty Thing

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A Living, Busy, Mighty Thing

​Luther, Preface to The Epistle to the Romans:

"Faith is not that human notion and dream that some hold for faith. Because they see that no betterment of life and no good works follow it, and yet they can hear and say much about faith, they fall into error and say, "Faith is not enough; one must do works in order to be righteous and be saved." This is one reason that when they hear the gospel they fall-to and make for themselves, by their own powers, an idea in their hearts which says, "I believe." This they hold for true faith. But it is a human imagination and idea that never reaches the depths of the heart, and so nothing comes of it and no betterment follows it.
Faith, however, is a divine work in us. It changes us and makes us to be born anew of God; it kills the old Adam and makes altogether different men, in heart and spirit and mind and powers, and brings with it the Holy Ghost. Oh, it is a living, busy, mighty thing, this faith; and so it is impossible for it not to do good works incessantly. It does not ask whether there are any good works to do, but before the question rises; it has already done them, and is always at the doing of them.
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Where the Action's Happening

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As my blogging hiatus drags on into its third week, I thought I would come out of hibernation briefly to tell anyone who might still be listening where they can find some very exciting stuff going on in blogdom.  

First, one of my favorite sites, to which I've contributed on a number of occasions, The Calvinist International, has now built an all-new website, which is exceptionally cool-looking, and very much more navigable.  Prominently displayed on the homepage, you'll find articles of enduring interest and significance highlighted, along with a well-organized and invaluable index of other  resources and blogs on the sidebar.  Plus, they've now started, in addition to their occasional ponderous essays, posting a regular stream of short notes and quotes from a wider range of contributors, which you will see in the Nota Bene section.

Second, another of my favorite sites, to which I also occasionally contribute, Mere Orthodoxy has also just finished a nice redesign.  It's less sweeping, but it, like the Calvinist International, includes the addition of short snappy mini-posts, in a new section called "Mere-O Notes," alongside their more substantive material.  With all this great new material filling the blogosphere, maybe I needn't bother returning to blogging after all....

Third, the Junius Institute has recently been launched.  An outgrowth of the Post-Reformation Digital Library project, the Junius Institute represents a fantastic venture to bring the resources of the Reformation and early modern periods into the digital age.  I highly recommend that you check them out.

Hayek on Social Welfare

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Much more "liberal" than his present-day ideological followers:

"[T]here can be no doubt that some minimum of food, shelter, and clothing, sufficient to preserve health and the capacity to work, can be assured to everybody. ... Nor is there any reason why the state should not assist the individual in providing for those common hazards of life against which, because of their uncertainty, few individuals can make adequate provision. 
Where, as in the case of sickness and accident, neither the desire to avoid such calamities nor the efforts to overcome their consequences are as a rule weakened by the provision of assistance – where, in short, we deal with genuinely insurable risks – the case for the state’s helping to organize a comprehensive system of social insurance is very strong.
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A Seven-Week Sabbatical

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Having been informed by my supervisor that my Ph.D thesis is considerably closer to completion than I had deemed, I have resolved to throw caution, sanity, and blogging to the winds, and try to finish it by the 1st of June, the date at which I will be leaving these shores for good.  

Accordingly, I will be spending the next seven weeks in an ascetic regimen, refusing to to indulge the urge to comment on matters of current debate and interest, or to compose ponderous essays on political or historical theology, as I frequently do here and elsewhere.  I may, and probably still will, post occasional quotes from my reading, and links to important things other people are writing, but don't expect any substantial commentary again until June.  Indeed, if you do catch me blogging as before, you have my permission to chide me publicly for my irresponsibility.  

I trust this silence won't be too unbearable, and if you're looking for good things to read in the meantime, just consult my Blogroll (or, better, go read the entirety of Hooker's Lawes).  

Till June, farewell!

Announcing "The Bible: Culture, Community, and Society"

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I am pleased to be able to bring to your attention the publication of a new book by T&T Clark, entitled The Bible: Culture, Community, and Society.  Edited by Angus Paddison and Neil Messer, the volume offers perspectives from leading contemporary theologians on the how to understand Scriptural authority in modernity—in relation to community, to science, and to politics.  Contributors include such distinguished theologians as David Fergusson, Ellen Davis, Ben Quash, Gavin D'Costa, Andrew Bradstock, and last and almost certainly least, myself.  

This is, I confess, a rather striking example of the problems of modern academic publishing.  My paper that appears here, "Sola Scriptura and the Public Square: Richard Hooker and a Protestant Paradigm for Political Engagement," was written nearly two years ago, and comprised a sort of condensed prospectus of what I hoped to accomplish in my Ph.D research, on which I had just set out.  As such, it seems amusingly naïve and over simplistic now, largely on-track in substance, to be sure, but lacking a good deal in precision.  Nonetheless, I'd be an idiot not to tell you that you ought to buy the book (or at least encourage your librarian to buy it)—even if not for my contribution, then certainly for the other fine thoughts on offer here (particularly Andrew Bradstock's essay, "The Bible and Public Theology"), and for the lovely cover image.  

Late Great Natural Law Debate, Pt. 2

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So, the good news is I've finally completed the promised second installment.  The bad news is it's not here.  But the good news is that it is over at Mere Orthodoxy, where Matthew Anderson kindly proposed to offer it a roomier home.  But the other bad news is that it doesn't, actually, do everything I promised to do in this second installment (i.e., it offers no constructive or synthetic proposals of my own).  But the other good news is that a third installment will do that, hopefully next week, and probably also at Mere Orthodoxy.