Denise Rector

[1] “Beginning the Journey” was the title given by the students at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg this spring as a request to the faculty for gathering information. The information they wanted to know specifically dealt with topics that concerned homosexuality and human sexuality. They believed they needed to know this information to prepare […]

[1] My first encounter with Islam was much more sensory than theological. In Fall 1981 our family of four arrived in Damascus, Syria, to begin a year of teaching and research. Immediately we were immersed in the sights and sounds and smells of the Arab East, if not always of Islam itself. Outside the bedroom […]

[1] On June 27, 2002 the Supreme Court of the United States issued its ruling in Zelman, et. al. v. Simmons-Harris et. al. whereby a sharply divided Court upheld as constitutional a school voucher program that allowed thousands of Cleveland, Ohio students to attend religious schools. Some commentators have called this one of the most […]

[1] We outlined and began writing this article in August 2002. In the ensuing weeks, a number of ethical and moral issues emerged in the United States in general and in the African American context in particular. These issues have implications for both church and society. These issues caused us to pause and reflect as […]

[1] Many Lutherans, perhaps a majority, feel uncomfortable with all the talk about preemptive war with Iraq, but find it hard to see beyond the two options of diplomacy and military action that dominate both official and media commentary. As Christians, our deep discomfort with violence is rooted in the repeated, explicit teachings of our […]

[1] The analysis of most public policies is a two stage affair. First we ask: Should we adopt this policy (unemployment insurance, minimum wage legislation, regulations on abortion, etc)? The second, if the answer to the first question is yes, is: How should the policy be structured? Taxes are different. All governments have always had […]

[1] The “war on terrorism” designates a fundamentally new framework for U.S. foreign policy. The new foreign policy framework is shaped by two countervailing political impulses. On the one hand, responding to terrorism is an act of self-defense. On the other hand, responding to terrorism requires military interventions and even overturning governments. These two impulses, […]

Authority in General [1] The term “authority” has many possible meanings.1 In regard to our topic here, however, the list of possibilities is relatively short. When a person speaks of the authority of the church in the world (as distinct from the church’s authority among its own members), he or she is likely to be […]

[1] It is fitting, if frustrating, to find myself working on this article while my pre-adolescent child is throwing a prolonged fit over her mother’s inability to accommodate one more companion animal in the household. I am a divorced single parent, currently getting a snootful about my maternal shortcomings. It comes with the territory of […]

[1] One of the fruits of the 1997 North American Lutheran-Reformed Formula of Agreement was its development of the concept “mutual affirmation and mutual admonition.” Given a common core of shared belief, each brings to the other a fresh charism and a corrective of reductionist tendencies. The Journal’s request for a Reformed perspective on Lutheran […]