September 2001 (Volume 1 Issue 1)
[1] As the United States considers various responses to the September 11 attacks, including bringing to justice the perpetrators of the attacks, we, as a nation, should be giving attention to the root causes of terrorism and the anger, fear, and sense of hopelessness that prompt a few to act desperately and violently. [2] All […]
This essay is slightly revised from a paper delivered at a meeting of the Faith and Order Commission, National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA, St. Louis, Missouri, October 11, 2002. [1] According to current statistics, there are over 65 million Lutherans in the world. Most of these (61.7 million) are members of […]
[1] Ronald F. Thiemann died of pancreatic cancer November 29, 2012, at the age of 66. The Humble Sublime, accepted for publication on the day of his funeral, was published November 30, 2013. It includes a brief but rich factual biography composed by four of his Harvard colleagues. In the Foreword, his daughter, Laura Theimann Scales, adds further […]
The works reviewed in this issue approach migration through three different lenses — academic, artistic and activist. Professor Laura Alexander reviews Tisha Rajendra’s Migrants and Citizens: Justice and Responsibility in the Ethics of Immigration (2019). Rajendra addresses questions of political philosophy, arguing that Christian ethical thought can enhance global dialogue on migration and prompt Christians to understand […]
Please consider submitting a paper proposal for the Journal of Lutheran Ethics. For our submission guidelines, click here. June, 2022 Summer Book Review Issue Please submit the title and a short description of a book you would like to review. Please send proposals for reviews to Jennifer.Hockenbery@elca.org. August, 2022 “Gender Identity, Gender Expression, and Sexuality” Please consider […]
[1] The Sacredness of the Person: A New Genealogy of Human Rights, a monumental study of human rights as a value commitment, serves as the testing ground of Hans Joas’ theory of the “genesis of value commitments” developed in his earlier works The Genesis of Values and War and Modernity (originally published in German in […]
In the midst of those threats of life in this not-yet world that give rise to anxiety, even debilitating or all-consuming anxiety, Jesus calls for his followers to make the promise of God’s kingdom their ultimate concern. We experience the threats of life as real and anxiety producing; they are often essentials that need to be tended to. Yet we are still called to make trust in God’s promises the paramount force in our lives. Wolfhart Pannenberg in his early and still very useful lectures on anthropology, contrasts security and trust. The drive for security is the drive to control one’s life and one’s world. When this striving for control becomes an end in itself then security and one’s own efforts becomes the ultimate concern, perversely, the object of trust. The opposite is the trust of faith in the promises of God, an openness to God’s future kingdom made present in the Christ.
[1] A mere decade ago the quickest form of online communication was an AOL Messenger or email. Chat rooms were generally for those who were more tech savvy, while emails were growing in popularity in the business world and in higher education. Now if personal news has not been communicated via Facebook, Twitter, other social […]
When assessing technology with a view to religion, one ought not simply adopt the claims of gadget lovers or dystopians, but should attend thoughtfully to the broader system of affordances, perils, advantages, and costs (and to the probability that we will not identify those considerations correctly when we first deploy a particular technology) (para. 39). […]
[1]The debate over what constitutes and how to live “family values” continues and revolves primarily around the meanings and practices of marriage. Receiving less attention is how Christian families, in whatever form, strive to live with justice and compassion in a culture that is increasingly characterized by individualism, unsustainable patterns of consumption, and competition.1 Rather […]
