Joshua Ryan Farris, Rev, Ph.D, is Humboldt Experienced Researcher Fellow at the University of Bochum, Germany, 2022-2023; Mundelein Seminary Chester and Margaret Paluch Professor, 2020-2021, March 2020 Center of Theological Inquiry; Director of Trinity School of Theology; International Advisor, Perichoresis, The Theological Journal of Emanuel University; Associate Editor, Philosophical and Theological Studies for the Journal of Biblical and Theological Studies; Associate Editor, European Journal of Philosophy of Religion.
Dante, the Soul, and Learning to See Again ~ Midway upon the journey of our life I found myself within a forest dark, For the straightforward pathway had been lost. — Dante Alighieri, Inferno I.1–3 In Part I, I argued that many Christians find themselves in something like Dante’s dark wood. We continue to…
The Church, the Soul, and the Return of the Unseen Walk into almost any bookstore today, and you will find shelves devoted to witchcraft, angels, ghosts, ancient spiritual practices, and various forms of mysticism. Podcasts discussing near-death experiences routinely receive millions of views. AI researchers now speak openly about consciousness, personal identity, and the possibility…
Why Christians Should Be Leftists. By Phil Christman. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2025. 229 pp. $23.99 (hardcover). With some books, if you’re in the right state of mind—receptive and able to get outside your conditioning—you might just find yourself coming around to the author’s perspective, or at least become a more sympathetic reader. With this book,…
Feasts for the Kingdom: Sermons for the Liturgical Year. By Khaled Anatolios. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2023. 318 pp. $19.99 (paper). In Feasts for the Kingdom, Khaled Anatolios offers the Church a gift that is increasingly rare: sustained, theologically rich, and genuinely liturgical preaching. Across forty-one homilies ordered to the feasts of the church year, Anatolios…
When Masculinity Disappears and the Church Becomes Silent Let’s be honest. A growing number of Christian men have stopped going to church—and not because they’ve lost the faith. It’s because the church has lost them. Why? Some blame secular culture, others point to boredom, but beneath the surface is a festering wound: the feminization of…
Eternal in Love: A Little Book about a Big God. By R. T. Mullins. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2024. 178 pp. $40 (hardcover), $25 (paper). Ryan Mullins’s Eternal in Love may be described as a “little book,” but it is anything but small in substance. It is short, yes. It is concise in its prose, certainly….
Atonement, Justice, and Divine Hospitality We’ve been arguing about who’s in the lifeboat, when the atonement was about calming the whole storm. In other words, Christ’s atonement is about more than who gets in and out of heaven; it’s about the whole cosmos. These reflections came to me over the last few months as I…
A Critical Review Matthew Bates declares victory over historical understandings of baptism, but it feels like trading steak dinner for porridge. His attempt to reframe baptism and salvation through ‘allegiance’ to Christ’s kingship oversimplifies the sacramental theology that has long been foundational to Christian tradition. While innovative, Bates’s view diminishes the richness and depth of…
The Toxic War on Masculinity: How Christianity Reconciles the Sexes. By Nancy R. Pearcey. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2023. 352 pp. $26.99 (hardcover). In Nancy Pearcey’s latest offering, The Toxic War on Masculinity, she takes on a subject ripe for cultural commentary: the attack on men in contemporary society. With her characteristic wit and rhetorical…
The question of whether holy orders should be restricted to males arises from deeper theological principles, grounded in both creation and redemption. To understand the issue fully, we must examine the archetypal union of Christ and His Bride, the Church, and the corresponding reflection of this union in creation. As Scripture reveals, creation is not…