Author Archives: Arlan
Sickness
I am always surprised by how it feels to be sick. I remember sickness as a pain in a specific body part. More and more, I think, I experience sickness as a pervasive sense of ill health. Last Saturday I started the weekend with an exam at 8 a.m. I finished the test about an hour later. By noon I Read More
Intellectualism and sentimentalism
Liturgy makes the most sense to me when it is described as no more or less spiritual than self discipline: Good liturgy and ritual guides and shapes our emotions into fitting responses to God’s self-revelation. An approach to worship focused on undisciplined spontaneity and individual self-expression can be problematic on this front, as the emotions can become feral. One of Read More
Disability Theology
Interesting discussion over at Alistair’s on disability in theology. Doesn’t the Christian religion hold out hope of ultimate healing? Doesn’t God promise physical restoration to those who have faith in his righteousness? Don’t we, as people of God, long for the day “when there will be no mourning, nor death, nor crying, nor pain?” Insofar as this vision seeks to Read More
Surfeit
My complaint (for everything from me must be either a complaint or a critique) is simple: a surplus of luxury. I have been feeling mopey for, oh, months anyway, and can’t seem to shake it. I thought if I enrolled in an MBA program I would be challenged and burdened enough to keep my preoccupied, but no; I fit that Read More