Issue: January 2003

We have lost our moral compass… The ethical consensus of our society has been steadily eroding… The church urgently needs to speak clearly and forthrightly to this situation of growing moral anarchy…. [1] Such concerns and convictions are common today. Moreover they have been a perennial complaint in virtually all societies. Within the church, however, […]

[1] The so-called “Two Kingdoms Doctrine” is the label under which a particular framing of the relationship between God’s grace and everyday life in the midst of its institutional realities has been presented in 20th century Lutheranism. For over half a century it has been the way Lutherans framed the relationship between justification and justice. […]

The following paper was presented at an International Symposium on “Religions, Morality and Social Concerns” at Fudan University, Shanghai, China in April 2003. The university’s newly established Institute of Religious Studies brought together Christians (Protestant and Catholic), Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Marxists and others from China, other Asian countries, Europe and the United States. According to […]

In the wake of the January 10, 2003 Society of Christian Ethics plenary session on Iraq, I’d like to follow up some disturbingly fruitful comments made from the floor by Charles Matthews of the University of Virginia. If I heard Matthews correctly, the Bush administration may be bluffing its way towards resolving the crisis without […]

Abstract: In this paper I outline what is essential for Luther’s understanding of a pure doctrine of faith as articulated primarily in his treatise titled The Bondage of the Will (1525). Luther’s response to Erasmus’ text titled An Examination of Free Will (1524) makes it clear that in their relationship to God, human beings have […]

[1] This good occasion brings together two groups that divide the magisterial responsibilities that belonged to the Wittenberg faculty in the early decades of Lutheranism. Luther functioned well because he was surrounded by a gifted group of theologians who worked together, sharing the task and compensating for each other’s weak points. Many in that circle […]

[1] The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has been mired in debates about ordained service by non-celibate gay and lesbian persons since 1976. [2] In 1976, two presbyteries (local districts) overtured General Assembly, the denomination’s highest governing body, for “definitive guidance” whether persons who openly acknowledge a homosexual orientation and practice may be ordained. The 1978 General […]

(Author’s note: This article extends some earlier work that Shannon Jung has done in formulating a Biblical–theological foundation for understanding eating as a spiritual and moral practice. Food for Life: The Spirituality and Ethics of Eating (Fortress 2004) claims that God had two purposes in creating food: to contribute to delight, and for sharing. In […]

“The so-called ‘Two Kingdoms Doctrine’ is the label under which a particular framing of the relationship between God’s grace and everyday life in the midst of its institutional realities has been presented in 20th century Lutheranism. For over half a century it has been the way Lutherans framed the relationship between justification and justice. How did this “doctrine” come to be regarded as a central piece in Lutheran theology when it has such a remarkably short history as a doctrine and has for the last decades even faded into oblivion? The reasons for this phenomenon are closely connected to a particular modern (Western) agenda fraught with the crisis of legitimacy of modern institutions.”