Today things are still a little quiet on campus, as most students seem to be walking around with syllabus shock and that dazed look that comes from realizing Christmas break is over. But it’s good to be back on campus, and I’m looking forward to what this semester has in store.  It almost feels like I’m starting over in a lot of ways, especially in my work at UW. Most of the students I got to know there last semester have left campus for a co-op term, and won’t be back until the end of April.

I’ve come to learn that the campus parish is in constant flux: people are always coming or going. I suppose “normal” churches have their own ebb and flow, too, but it’s probably rare that half the community takes off for the semester. If seasons have their rhythms, then campus life must be polyrhythmic – the meter of the academic year moves alongside that of the church year. That can be a little jarring, especially for those of us who want to keep time with both.

Still, the time off over Christmas was great. A lot of it was spent reading:

Young, Restless, Reformed by Collin Hansen. I saw an ad for this book in Books and Culture and was intrigued by the title. I suppose I’m still young, and I’m Reformed, and I’ve had my bouts with restlessness, so I thought I might find some commiseration in the book. As it turns out, the book is an extended treatment of what is ostensibly a new subculture in protestant churches in America: the young Calvinist. The book grew out of a 2006 article Hansen wrote for Christianity Today about the growing interest in Reformed theology among folks in their early twenties.  The article was infamous in my West Michigan circles, because it contained a dismissive quote from John Piper about Grand Rapids (and presumably about the CRC and Calvin College). There’s a lot to like about this new Reformed subculture, but I think there’s even  more to be wary of. Expect a more extended treatment of the book on this blog soon.

Pagan Christianity, by Frank Viola and George Barna. Normally I reserve my dismissive criticism for John Shelby Spong, but this is a dreadful book. Barna and Viola seek to show that most of what we consider to be “Christian” practice is, in fact, a contamination of the New Testament ideal by pagan ideas. Things like church buildings, clergy, seminaries, and infant baptism are not properly Christian, and they have less than noble roots. I’m not sure how prevalent these ideas are among Christians, but I’ve heard at least a couple of students articulate something similar to me this fall. I suppose there’s something seductive about such thinking, seeing how it’s transgressive and all, and I’m sure some of these ideas are to be expected in light of some of the excesses of the institutional church. But to articulate them in a book like this – one that makes a mockery of logic and is historically naieve – doesn’t really help the case of the authors. If you do end up reading the book, make sure you check out Ben Witherington’s review (it’s in four parts, and almost as long as the book itself).

The Beauty of the Infinite by David Bentley Hart. I understand about half of this book, but the parts I can grasp leave me in a swoon. Hart is amazing; a man of peerless erudition, wonderful prose, and theological acuity. He gives a hard time to all the right people (Tillich, Bultmann, Gore Vidal, even dear old Calvin), and has helped me understand more about Gregory of Nyssa and Friedrich Nietzche. I’m about a quarter of the way in, and I get the sense that he’s still just revving his engine. I haven’t encountered his main argument yet, but I’ve enjoyed the detours along the way: great discussions of aesthetics, ethics, and the juxtaposition of Nietzche’s “will to power” with Christianity’s “ontology of peace.” Hart has two books coming out in the new year, with more appeal to casual readers, I’m sure. The first, “In the Aftermath: Provocations and Laments” is a collection of reviews and essays, including a devastating takedown of Daniel Dennett. His next book “The Christian Revolution,” is coming in March. It was originally to be an historical overview of how Christianity was a liberating force in a world suffused with fatalism and haunted by animism, but I hear he’s appended a criticism of the “new atheists.” Oh, to be able to hear a debate between Hart and Hitchens.

A and I have also been reading aloud The Brothers Karamazov. It’s great to hear it out loud; I can really hear the “polyphony” that Rowan Williams is always talking about. I’ve also been wondering what would happen if John Piper and those young Calvinists with their mechanistic understanding of predestination got into a tussle with Ivan Karamazov…

Ok. That’s it for now.