This week I explained why more and more Christian colleges are likely to drop their “faith screen,” reflected on the importance of patience in the Christian life, put in one last plug for our June 2023 tour of Germany, and recommended some other Substack writers to follow. Elsewhere:
• Sadly, it’s again a good time to teach the Cold War. I’m doing it both this semester at Bethel and this weekend at a local church. Thanks, Putin.
(One of my Cold War students at Bethel is researching Billy Graham’s responses to that conflict. I wish I could send her to the new Graham archive opening soon in North Carolina!)
• Like many modern events, the Cold War’s origins go back at least as far as World War I — whose most iconic symbol will be pervasive this month everywhere in the English-speaking world besides the U.S. Turns out the poppy has an intriguing history.
• Meanwhile, a new book about WWI and its aftermath reminded one reviewer of an important historical lesson for these days: in many respects, things used to be worse.
• Tomorrow is the International Day of Persecution. Maybe don’t just pray for Christians, but lift up others who endure violence.
• “Politics and friendship are deeply connected,” argued political scientist David Corey. “As strange as it sounds, how we understand what politics is has an effect on the kinds of friendships we are likely to enjoy. And, conversely, how we understand friendship will affect our practice of politics.”
• Amid increasing political violence, what does it mean for Christians to be peacemakers?
• If Democrats struggle in the midterm elections this year, it will probably have something to do with their struggle to retain Hispanic voters.
• Of course, if Democrats win, Republicans might not accept that result.
• If things seem to be getting uncomfortably close to “new civil war” territory… Dan Williams suggested we learn from a period a bit later in the 19th century.
• Speaking of that century… here’s my latest reminder that I’m not really a U.S. historian: I’d never heard of this father-daughter pair of industrial age reformers.
• Saving this for the next time I teach our History and Politics of Sports class: researchers shared some initial findings into the effects of legalized sports gambling in the U.S.
• I often talk about Christian colleges educating “the whole person.” Can secular universities also engage in holistic formation?
• Finally, a big development one way or another in Christian higher ed: the board of trustees at Calvin University decided to permit faculty to dissent from their denomination’s stance on sexuality.