Worship can never replace reality. It can foreshadow or represent it, but it is not itself the reality it represents. Why is this an important distinction to keep in mind? Because Roman and Eastern approaches to worship, where this distinction sometimes seems to blur, may result in a too sharp a divide between the spiritual and …
One of the things that drew me to my current parish was its use of Rite 1. But, I wondered, how many knew why it’s used? For me, it’s not just the beauty of the Elizabethan prose and the continuity of hundreds of years, but the plain declaration of the gospel it makes. For instance, when the …
The finality of Christ’s atonement undermines the claims of any other mediator, be it temple, priesthood, and even church. Other mediators leave people conscious stricken. Christ leaves our consciences clean. So, why are the consciences of many Christians still guilt-ridden? First, because some may not yet be regenerated. Their religion is akin to “having a form of godliness but denying …
Here’s a quick English pop-quiz: what is the subject and what’s the verb in this very long sentence? In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias …
“Bind them… fix them,” Deuteronomy 6:8’s call to a veneration of the actual written word of God was consistent with other common religious practices in the ancient near east. Moreover, the pious act was voluntary. By contrast, the mark of the beast is a mandatory, state-decreed identifier. Both emblems are concrete, with real-world implications. Likewise, evangelical …
