Tag Archives: Freedom of the Self
What I learned on summer vacation – random thoughts at the end of the road
Each summer I have taken my family on a road trip through some of America’s national parks. Last summer we did the California redwoods, Yosemite National Park, and the Oregon Coast. This summer we worked our way through more of the Oregon Trail and down into Utah – Zion National Park, Arches National Park, Dead Horse Point, and some white water rafting on the Colorado River in Moab. These … There’s more to read here.
Can you love God without a political party? Freedom of the Self and ‘Republicanity’
In the introduction to my book Freedom of the Self, I open with a story regarding Rembrandt’s famous 1642 painting “the Nightwatch” I heard while viewing it a few years ago in Amsterdam that frames—both literally and figuratively—my concern with the church today and, in particular, a misguided loss of personhood for many faithful people.
Those who have seen many of the 17th century Dutch master Rembrandt Harmenszoon … There’s more to read here.
Lenten release: (just about) everything I learned about Lent I learned from U2
As I discuss in the opening chapter of my 2010 book Freedom of the Self, popular music since the late 1960’s has been replete with claims of what it means to have identity in the world. Whether our sense of identity is bound up in the longing for love, the loss of our past, or the social injustice that removes people from seeing their true beauty and worth, popular … There’s more to read here.
Lenten losses: Philippians 2, George Bailey, and finding the “Wonderful Life”
I have had a week of world-weariness and I suppose I am not alone in this. Our government can’t seem to balance the budget, wars continue to wage around the globe, poverty and sickness takes the body, soul and spirit of thousands upon thousands of people who are created in the Imago Dei.
It gets simply tiring, doesn’t it?
In Lent we find a season that acknowledges that to be weary … There’s more to read here.
True Myth – there is no faith without fantasy
Artist Dan Meth recently posted a map of the ‘fantasy world’ that pulls together over 30 different fictional/fantasy worlds into one glorious landscape – Narnia, Middlearth, Earthsea, Wonderland, Never Never Land, Oz, Whoville, Florian, the Land of the Lost, you name it. What I love about the map is how by glancing at it I am drawn back into the narratives, characters, plotlines and epic grandeur of these places that … There’s more to read here.
How (Not) to Speak of God – some latent reflections on Peter Rollins’ book
As I have begun to receive comments on my recent book Freedom of the Self, one of the questions I have had is for follow-up reading – people who are tilling the same soil I am seeking to work in bringing together continental philosophy, Christian mysticism, and a deep concern for the contemporary accelerated culture within which live in Western culture. One of the books I point people to … There’s more to read here.
Dragon Tattoo, Crazy Heart, Facebook and the End of Forgiveness
Like so many people this year, I have been swept up into the world of Lisbeth Salander and the Millennium Trilogy of the late Stieg Larsson that began with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Needless to say, the books follow a fairly predicable pot boiler thriller formula akin to a Scott Turow, Robert Ludlum or Tom Clancy novel: an innocence protagonist is thrust (whether by chance or fate – you … There’s more to read here.
Tom Oord lists “Freedom of the Self” in his summer reading list
Tom Oord at Northwest Nazarene University posted his summer reading list and included Freedom of the Self on the list:
http://thomasjayoord.com/index.php/blog/archives/books_im_reading/
Many thanks Tom for the kind thoughts!… There’s more to read here.
Freedom of the Self – a short description of my new book and web deal price available now!
Friends – my new book Freedom of the Self: Kenosis, Cultural Identity and Mission at the Crossroads is about to be published and I have a web deal for you. The book will be available July 1st but won’t be up on Amazon and other sites for a few more weeks. My publisher has a “web deal” price of $16.80 if you order directly from the URL I am providing. Feel … There’s more to read here.
10 resolutions for ‘twenty-ten’ from ‘Freedom of the Self’ – make this decade selfless and self-full rather than selfish
In my new book – Freedom of the Self: Kenosis, Cultural Identity and Mission at the Crossroads – I outline an argument to move away from the posture of consumerism and into what I call “the Kenotic Self” based on Philippians 2:5-11. In the book I track the forgotten path of the Kenotic self in philosophy dating back to Aristotle and Augustine through to Derrida, Levinas and Jean-Luc Marion and … There’s more to read here.
