Articles

[1] Hearing the Cries: Faith and Criminal Justice (hereafter HtC) provides an important contribution to theological reflection on the current penal crisis. The ELCA Criminal Justice Task Force deserves considerable praise because their document is theologically robust, pastorally-driven, and instructive for Lutheran congregations as well as all persons concerned about the state of criminal justice […]

Where Did this Come From? [1] Anyone familiar with the United Nations Arab Human Development Reports published between 2002 and 2010 watched the events unfolding at Tahrir Square in the center of Cairo on January 25, 2011, and wondered, “What took them so long?” The AHDRs were major research projects undertaken by Arab social scientists […]

[1] “I don’t understand why you care about those people. They’re just trash, and we should throw them away. I don’t want anything to do with them.” I have become accustomed to hearing statements like these from people whom I love, who are Christian, but who do not see my work critiquing criminal justice systems […]

[1] Years ago when I was a graduate student at Union Theological Seminary in New York, my wife Ellen appeared breathlessly in our apartment doorway at noon; she regularly would walk home from work at the “Godbox” (the National Council of Churches headquarters) to join me for lunch. She had just been robbed at knife […]

[1] Hearing the Cries:Faith and Criminal Justice opens the door to a long overdue conversation about beliefs, values, experiences, practices, and policies that profoundly affect all of us. I approached my reading of Hearing the Cries with a deep sense of gratitude for the work of the task force and staff, and a feeling of […]

[1] Given the extensive biblical references to seeking justice, lifting the afflicted, and Jesus’ announcement of his ministry as “freeing the captive, and bringing good news to the poor,” we should all applaud Hearing the Cries, the thorough study developed by the ELCA Criminal Justice Task Force, chaired by the capable Cynthia Osborne. The diversity […]

[1] It is no secret that some members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) question the value of the social statements of this church. A proposed resolution from a congregation in our synod declares that “social statements have limited value to the ministry and mission of the ELCA, have been divisive, and are […]

See “Conscience-bound Beliefs” Rule and the “Conscience-bound-belief” Rule by John R. Stumme [1] John R. Stumme is right1: with “bound conscience” the ELCA has bought an unfocused concept with an undefined purpose and an unspecified scope of application, whose usefulness is uncertain and whose consequences are unknown, perhaps because its biblical origins are unstated. Stumme […]

[1] The great Louis Armstrong was reportedly asked once how he would define “jazz.” His famous reply was, “Man, if you’ve gotta ask… you’ll never know.” Some things seem intuitively clear to people who are familiar with them, and could never satisfactorily be described or defined by them. One wonders whether “conscience” might be just […]

[1] In July 2010, The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod Convention passed a resolution calling for a “thorough response” to the ELCA social statement Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust. In the justifying clauses of Resolution 3-05, the document asserts that the social statement “suggests a concept, namely the ‘bound conscience,’ as a ‘distinctly Lutheran’ principle of theology.” […]