Denise Rector

[1] About twenty years ago, Joseph Carens, in a seminal article on the ethics of immigration, pointedly drew attention to the essential dilemma that it poses: “Borders have guards and the guards have guns,” he wrote. To the needy, desperate, and oppressed of the world, seeking access to a free and wealthy nation like the […]

[1]The early years of the Reformation were marked by sharp disagreement between Protestant proponents of the Lutheran notion of justification and Catholic reactionaries who, in their response to the threat of the reformers, accused their opponents of antinomianism and retreated to a casuistic notion of natural law that had dominated theology since the rise of […]

[1] First of all, a word of appreciation to the members of the Task Force who have generated this draft. Having been a part of the development of the last sexuality documents, I do understand the time and energy entailed. Much insight is available in this draft and certainly the final social statement should stand […]

Introduction [1] Since the time of David Hume (1711-76), philosophers have been struggling with the question of whether “ought” can be inferred from “is.” Famously, Hume held that it “seems altogether inconceivable how this new relation [ought] can be a deduction of others [is] which are entirely different from it.[1] For Hume, propositions of how […]

[1] My assignment is to evaluate how Scripture is used in the “Draft Social Statement on Human Sexuality” published in March of 2008. I will for the most part limit my focus to that single topic. All references to the document are by line number. Use of the Bible [2] By design, I start with […]

[1] Each year at Augustana College, a faculty committee selects a book which all first-year students are encouraged to read over the summer prior to beginning their college careers. The book chosen for the 2007-2008 academic year was The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness, an extended essay written by Simon Wiesenthal with […]

[1] The topic of self-disclosure in the pulpit is certainly worth critical exploration for the sake of honest ministry and ethical preaching. The sober reality, however, is that self-disclosure is a given in the act of preaching and cannot be helped. It just is. To say that there can be preaching without self-disclosure might be […]

[1] After spending the better part of two days reading and re-reading the new Draft Social Statement on Human Sexuality, I would like to first thank the Task Force for ELCA Studies on Sexuality for their careful and thoughtful consideration of the topic. Chapters 1 and 2 are rich theological texts that provide an excellent […]

[1] A few years ago, I walked into confirmation class and asked with great enthusiasm, “Guess what we’re going to talk about tonight, kids?” “What?” they replied, in their normal eye-rolling manner. “SEX!” I proclaimed. One boy looked at me in horror as the rest of the class tried to look anyplace else but in […]

[1] People who do not realize that their choices reveal their character think they have a choice as to whether or not to be self-disclosing. They don’t. Character is revealed by choice; as Aristotle says in his Poetics, we reveal ourselves in every choice we make from what we say, what we choose to wear, […]