Get the audiobook of my first novel, A-Tumblin' Down, direct from Thornbush Press , or from Audible , or pretty much any audiobook retailer of your choice! Not quite convinced yet? Then listen to these excerpts introducing you to the Abney family: Kitty , Donald , Carmichael , Saul and Asher . Prefer to read rather than listen to your novels? No problem! Jump here to find links to the book in paperback, hardcover, and ebook ....
Welcome to season 5 of the Queen of the Sciences podcast! Vocation is a topic near and dear to me and Dad, both as a central theological focus of the Lutheran Reformation and also because we just plain take a lot of pleasure in our work. But David Graeber's astonishing book Bullshit Jobs came as a serious wake-up call to us both. In this episode, we review Graeber's case for the precipitous shift from meaningful to meaningless and even actively harmful paid work in the world today, and what it m...
Dad's second talk for the NALC Atlantic Mission Region's theological conference, "Stand Fast and Be of Good Courage: The Lord Will Fight for You." Hey, have you ever noticed how awesome it is that we don't advertise? I mean, for anything other than ourselves. A major reason that's possible is our equally awesome, highly select band of Patrons . That kind of elitism is really OK, we promise. Join their ranks and support your favorite podcast in remaining stridently independent and advertising-fre...
Dad's first talk at the NALC Atlantic Mission Region's Theological Conference, "Stand Fast and Be of Good Courage: The Lord Will Fight for You." Hey, have you ever noticed how awesome it is that we don't advertise? I mean, for anything other than ourselves. A major reason that's possible is our equally awesome, highly select band of Patrons . That kind of elitism is really OK, we promise. Join their ranks and support your favorite podcast in remaining stridently independent and advertising-free!...
Sarah's lecture at Johannelund Theological School in Uppsala, Sweden, at a daylong conference on Sanctification in Lutheran Perspective. Hey, have you ever noticed how awesome it is that we don't advertise? I mean, for anything other than ourselves. A major reason that's possible is our equally awesome, highly select band of Patrons . That kind of elitism is really OK, we promise. Join their ranks and support your favorite podcast in remaining stridently independent and advertising-free!...
Dad's talk at Roanoke College reflecting on his 22 years of service there as a professor of theology. Hey, have you ever noticed how awesome it is that we don't advertise? I mean, for anything other than ourselves. A major reason that's possible is our equally awesome, highly select band of Patrons . That kind of elitism is really OK, we promise. Join their ranks and support your favorite podcast in remaining stridently independent and advertising-free!...
What's beyond the land, the earth, and outer space? Heaven and hell. Unless, that is, we don't exit the created cosmos to get to them, but they come to us (preferably the former and not the latter). In this episode, guided by a book from N. T. Wright, Dad and I explore the unexplored and unexplorable territory of the life to come, speculating mildly, not wildly. And that's a wrap for Season 4 of Queen of the Sciences. Thanks for being with us! Bonus episodes coming your way till we resume with S...
From the land, to the earth, to infinity and beyond! In this episode Dad and I contemplate the vastness of the universe and the itty-bittiness of subatomic particles, the astonishing rareness of life in any form and the likelihood of meeting aliens, what this cosmos-view does to our God-view, and what it means to be an Earthling, i.e., an "Adam," assisted along the way by science fiction novels, shows, and movies. But most importantly, I finally get to indulge my decades-long desire to crack a j...
The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof! We start off this episode with some appreciative words for the agrarian background of the Bible, though also some cautionary words against modern industrial people cheaply romanticizing the agrarian past. But most of this episode is Farmer Paul's personal testimony to his own hands-on care for a neglected and degraded patch of earth, now flourishing under his care. Sleeping flounder, Swiss bears, and runaway honeybees all make an appearance. Plu...
The meek shall inherit the earth... or maybe the land. And if the land, which land—the land of Israel, to be exact? In this episode Dad and I admit to lacking anything like a robust theology of the land of Israel for today, despite being rather more theologically robust on this topic when it comes to the biblical writings, as well as having some political convictions about the current state of secular affairs. But do we need to have an active theology of the land of Israel today? To guide us thr...
This episode started out as an experimental bonus: I asked Dad to think through with me what it can mean to bear witness in these days when a) everything sounds like propaganda, b) public and private are endlessly confused but I'm unwilling to expose to public scrutiny matters that are relevant to public discourse yet intrinisically private, and c) rebuttal and critique automatically vault the rebutted into martyr status. In other words, is it even possible to say truthful things in public anymo...
If everything's postmodern, then nothing's postmodern. In fact, according to Dad, postmodernism is actually just modernism continued by other means. Perplexed yet? No worries, that's part of the plan. If you can't conquer the body, then conquer the soul, and the rest will follow. In this episode we sort out postmodernism and its doppelgänger, then explore ways to keep sane and whole amidst the insanity. Surprisingly, I give words of hope, encouragement, and peace. So listen in just for that surp...
Miracles seem like straightforward things to define, if rare to experience, until you start to think about the topic more deeply. In this episode, Dad and I discuss C. S. Lewis's book Miracles, the danger of accepting the definition of miracle as "violation of natural processes," what the Creator has to do with the Redeemer, how prayer affects providence, and biblical ambivalence about miracles. Notes: 1. Lewis, Miracles 2. Related episodes: Illness and Healing , Revival and Renewal with the Blu...
Already in our first year of podcasting we expressed sympathy with Bonhoeffer's view that the time was coming when faith would need to come to the aid of reason. Three and a half years later, it seems even more acute than that: faith to the aid of science! In this episode we discuss scientific reasoning as an extremely valuable form of reason that nevertheless, like all human forms of reasoning, is subject to both limitations and distortions, not to mention exploitation in the service of authori...
Hegel was our first family dog, which probably tells you all you need to know about our family. Before that, Hegel was a German philosopher, famously one of the most impenetrable, and yet weirdly influential for all that. In this episode, Dad shines a light in the fog. Don't worry if you come to this topic with nothing but Thesis + Antithesis = Synthesis. I didn't either, but it all made sense in the end. Kind of. Notes: 1. Related Episodes: St. Paul Among the Philosophers , Critical Social Theo...
Yikes. You know the end is nigh when a couple of Lutheran theologians produce an episode on James longer than the one they did on Romans . In this episode, we first sort out what Luther did and didn't say about James, "epistle of straw," clearing up a lot of misapprehensions and faulty inferences, but either way we strongly suggest that the rest of the history of interpretation of James need not be controlled by a few remarks of the reformer early in his career. From there, we discuss at length ...
After three and a half years of dropping not-so-subtle hints, Dad finally persuaded me to read Reinhold Niebuhr's The Nature and Destiny of Man... though in this episode we cover only vol. 1, the "Nature" part. (Stick around with us in Season 5 and you might just get vol. 2!) In this episode we examine Niebuhr's sweeping summation of Western intellectual history and whether it holds up to scrutiny, how the divorce of Renaissance and Reformation gave us all the intractable problems of modernity, ...
Robots are not people, information does not want to be free, and the internet has no consciousness of its own. Meanwhile, human society trades on outrage and no one can tell what is true and what is false. Among the many enduring themes of human experience is how we create tools that in turn re-create us, and the past couple decades are only an accelerated and amplified version of that. With the help of tech critic Jaron Lanier, in this episode Dad and I explore the roots of how the whole world ...
Lincoln observed that both slaveholders and abolitionists appealed to the Bible to make their case—but who was right, and why? Slaves appear throughout the Old Testament, yet the core story is the Exodus from slavery in Egypt. The Pauline and Petrine letters exhort peace and fair treatment between masters and slaves, but do not openly advocate for manumission. In Paul's shortest letter, a personal address to Philemon, he sends home a (runaway?) slave, Onesimus, not making it clear what Philemon ...
In this episode we turn to the great emancipator—not that he started out with that intention. From the covenant between the States in one Union to the painful perception of necessary bloodshed for the North as well as the South on account of its collusion, Lincoln out-Jeffersoned Jefferson, invoking the equality of all human beings according to the Declaration over against the evasion of the slavery issue in the Constitution. And yet, young Lincoln has about as much regard for orthodox Christian...
One last bonus episode! Dad and I talk about his impressions so far of A-Tumblin' Down , six chapters in and just through the devastating tragedy that scared me off of writing the book for nearly 15 years. Also, what is it exactly that has caused the book of Joshua to haunt our lives for so long?! Subscribe now to the serialization of the novel—it starts next week!
Last chance to subscribe to the serialization of my novel A-Tumblin' Down about the lives, tragedies, and triumphs of a Lutheran pastor and his family in the late 1980s. The story begins on June 6, so don't delay! On today's bonus episode, meet Carmichael Abney, English professor, pastor's wife, and mother of three, content with her life--that is, until alternate versions of herself appear and demand her dissatisfaction...
Another installment for Queen of the Sciences listeners! Subscribe to the serialization of my novel A-Tumblin' Down about the lives, tragedies, and triumphs of a Lutheran pastor and his family in the late 1980s. On today's bonus episode, meet Saul and Asher Abney, brothers born within a year of each other but with diametrically opposed personalities...
Another sneak preview--or rather prehear--for Queen of the Sciences listeners! Subscribe to the serialization of my novel A-Tumblin' Down about the lives, tragedies, and triumphs of a Lutheran pastor and his family in the late 1980s. On today's bonus episode, meet Donald Abney, gentle grandson of a fiery revivalist, afflicted by the one and only appearance of the Book of Joshua in the Common Lectionary...
Being great afficionados of great thinkers who are impossible contradictions, we turn our attention to American founding father Thomas Jefferson: the man who penned the stirring words of the Declaration of Independence that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" ... and yet, in his lifetime, owned over 600 slaves including a (...
Sneak preview--or rather prehear--for Queen of the Sciences listeners! Subscribe to the serialization of my novel A-Tumblin' Down about the lives, tragedies, and triumphs of a Lutheran pastor and his family in the late 1980s. On today's bonus episode, meet Kitty Abney, an 11-year-old about to learn some shocking news concerning her grandparents. And there is more yet to come...
Experience of God is all very well and good... until your experience is being afflicted by an evil spirit from the Lord. Especially after first being called to be the first king of Israel, and then having that calling revoked. And yet still being king while a new king has been anointed, this new king respecting your former kingship more than the Lord God Almighty. Yikes! In this episode, we explore the saga of King Saul, ask whether his story is one of tragedy or just deserts or something else, ...
Continuing on in a loose sequence of explorations of our experience of church, this time we turn to Dietrich Bonhoeffer's record as well as recommendation for Christian life together as he experienced (and very much formed) it at the illegal seminary of Finkenwalde. Heartening words for hard times! Just one note: we worked from the edition in the collected Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, vol. 5: Life Together and Prayerbook of the Bible. Do you rejoice every other Tuesday to see a new Queen of the Sc...
After losing our way and tangling ourselves up last time, in this second episode on theology and experience we once again get off to an inauspicious start with a serious attack of the giggles (and if you've never heard Dad giggle, well, you're in for a treat). Having gotten that out of our systems, we sketch out some of the reasons in Western intellectual history for the problematic place of reason and then explore some rubrics for interpreting "incorrigible experience" (Cornell West) fruitfully...
Experience is everything, so talking about experience is impossible. Nevertheless in this episode Dad and I attempt to do so, with the result of tangling ourselves in knots and occasionally losing our composure. If you ever wondered why experience was the most contentious of sources, methods, and goals for theology, well, here it is, case in point. Notes: 1. Methodist Quadrilateral 2. Driver, Patterns of Grace 3. Theologia Germanica 4. Kolb, Bound Choice, Election, and Wittenberg Theological Met...
