Falwell Jr. says his former employer owes him over $8.5 million. Here is Jacob Hunziker at ABC 13 News in Lynchburg, Virginia: Liberty University is facing a new lawsuit — this one coming from its former president, Jerry Falwell Jr., […]
Archives for 2023
Commonplace Book #249
So people whose views have been religiously formed have to learn, and many have learned, to express them in ways that make sense to irreligious or differently religious fellow citizens. Talk of God’s will and appeals to revealed truth are […]
Doug Mastriano’s comeback
The Pennsylvania Christian nationalist was defeated soundly in the November 2020 gubernatorial election. He is now staging a comeback. Here is WKOK News with a piece from Penn Live’s Charles Thompson: Doug Mastriano was back on the political stage in […]
The Author’s Corner with Christian Goodwillie
Christian Goodwillie is Director and Curator of Special Collections at Hamilton College, Burke Library and Associate Editor of the Richard W. Couper Press. This interview is based on his new book, Richard McNemar: Frontier Heretic and Shaker Apostle (Indiana University […]
Evangelical roundup for March 13, 2023
What is happening in Evangelical Land?: A veteran religion writer tackles women in the ministry. Baptists and Pentecostals lead the way in the promotion of God-fueled American exceptionalism. Ten books about Billy Graham. Ed Stetzer’s nameplate: How Rick Warren changed […]
BOOK MARKS: A Sacred Obligation at Top Speed
āIām thinking of calling a general strike of all writers until mankind finally comes to its senses. Would you support it?ā
Different worldviews or different vantage points?
It can be incredible what a difference vantage points can make in our views of certain subjects. Consider differing opinions on the extent and significance of structural inequity versus the impact of individual choices. Some people believe that we generally […]
Sunday night odds and ends
A few things online that caught my attention this week: The 1850s Black Convention movement Kevin McCarthy joins the insurrection Elizabeth Bruenig on Lent Francis: the first Jesuit Pope Rod Dreher’s last American Conservative blog post Bob Smietana reviews Lerone […]
Commonplace Book #248
The White workers who voted in large numbers for Donald Trump in 2020 are often described as nationalists–or, better, as men and women who have bought into a nationalist politics. But they don’t have anything like a national history. They […]
Commonplace Book #247
It is no affront to liberal socialist egalitarianism, as I understand it, if the entrepreneur who sells portable ventilators makes more money than I do and is more widely known than I am. The socialist state should not interfere with […]
Rod Dreher’s funder pulls the plug
Howard Ahmanson Jr,. the sole benefactor of Rod Dreher’s blog at The American Conservative, just pulled the plug on the conservative commentator. Here is Caleb Ecarma at Vanity Fair: …But one particular reader, upon reading the last of said posts, […]
Inside Tucker’s head
I ran across this video today: And then I read David French’s recent column at The New York Times. A taste: On Tuesday evening, two news reports caught my attention. The first was anĀ Emerson College pollĀ of Republican primary voters in […]
Commonplace Book #246
I don’t think that the adjective ‘liberal’ necessarily pushes the nouns that it modifies in the direction of complacency and compromise. In the cases relevant here, it is indeed the noun that carries the radicalism and requires those it describes […]
What is popular this week at Current?
Here are the most popular features of the week atĀ Current: Here are the most popular posts of the last week atĀ The Way of Improvement Leads HomeĀ blog: Here are the most popular posts of the last week atĀ The ArenaĀ blog:
Historical thinking is often paradoxical thinking
WHYY in Philadelphia recently hosted an interesting conversation between Dolly Chuch, a psychologist, and Hasan Kwame Jeffries, a historian. Chuch argues that it is difficult to get people to accept the fact that two seemingly contradictory ideas can exist at […]
The Author’s Corner with Alison Bell
Alison Bell is Professor of Anthropology at Washington and Lee University. This interview is based on her new book, The Vital Dead: Making Meaning, Identity, and Community through Cemeteries (University of Tennessee Press, 2023). JF: What led you to write The Vital Dead? […]
Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man
In The Banshees of Inisherin, Hollywood and serious film make their acquaintance once more
What I am reading: reflections on Vodolazkin and the joys of communal reading
Perhaps the first sensation you experience as you walk in is the smell. One way to describe it is musty, but that is not entirely it. It is not entirely unpleasant. The wooden walls of the old cabin have absorbed […]
Patrick Spero is the new Executive Director of the George Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon
Big news in the world of presidential and revolutionary-era American history: TheĀ Mount Vernon Ladies’ AssociationĀ is proud to announce the appointment of Patrick Spero, Ph.D., as the Executive Director of theĀ George Washington Presidential LibraryĀ housed within the Fred W. Smith National Library […]
Commonplace Book #245
The existence of millions of fellow citizens who believe in “alternative facts” and conspiracy theories strongly suggests that our schools aren’t producing enough science-savvy and tough minded realists. What seems most necessary right now is an enhanced education in what […]