Month: April 2012

April 30, 2012

What Christian Education Is Not

“Each generation needs to re-own the rationale for Christian education,” says philosopher James K.A. Smith, “to ask ourselves ‘Why did we do this?’ and ‘Should we keep doing this?’” In answering such questions, Smith notes, “it might be helpful to point out what Christian education is not”: First, Christian education is not meant to be merely “safe” education. Continue Reading...
April 30, 2012

Fair Trade or Free Trade?

Is ‘fair trade’ more fair or more just than free trade? While free trade has been increasingly maligned, The Fair Trade movement has become increasingly popular over the last several years. Continue Reading...
April 27, 2012

The Next Civil Rights Movement

During last year’s Acton University—have you signed up for this year yet?—Nelson Kloosterman gave a lecture on the subject of school choice and private education. In the latest issue of Comment magazine, Kloosterman expands on his claim that parental choice is “the next civil rights movement“: Let me begin with some contextualizing comments designed to set up the discussion that follows. Continue Reading...
April 27, 2012

Jacoby, D’Souza debate Religion in the Public Square

Susan Jacoby and Dinesh D’Souza met here in Grand Rapids at Fountain Street Church on Thursday, April 26, to debate the merits of religion in public discourse. The debate, co-sponsored by The Intercollegiate Studies Institute and the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, was titled, “Is Christianity Good for American Politics?” Continue Reading...
April 27, 2012

Was Thomas More a proto-communist?

In Utopia, many modern intellectuals say Sir Thomas More advocates an ideal political and social order without private property, competition, citizens quarreling over worldly possessions, poverty and other “evils” supposedly brought on by a market-based society. Continue Reading...
April 27, 2012

Are Young Millennials Less Religious or Simply Young?

Joe Carter recently posted a summary of a new study conducted jointly by Public Religion Research Institute and Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs that shows that college-aged Millennials (18-24 year olds) “report significant levels of movement from the religious affiliation of their childhood, mostly toward identifying as religiously unaffiliated.” Continue Reading...