The Aesthetic Sphere

The aesthetic sphere bears within itself the germ of its own destruction: the frustrated attempts of the spirit to affirmt itself cause a strange anxiety, eventually leading to despair…Only a free decision can break through the aesthetic attitude.  At this point it does not matter to what one commits onself, since the dilemma here is [...]

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Essentially Religious

The essentially religious author is always polemical, and hence he suffers under or suffers from the opposition which corresponds to whatever in his age must be regarded as the specific evil.  If it be kings and emperors, popes and bishops…and powers that constitute Evil, the religious author must be recognizable by the fact that he [...]

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Stringfellow on Technocratic Totalitarianism and the Primacy of Human Life

“The ethical origins of the nation can be seen as ambiguous because they contain so much that renders property, as a social ethic, more basic than the concern for human life.  It may be argued that technology and the technocracy that it supports are an implementation, in extremely elaborate and sophisticated terms, of the primitive [...]

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How to Read Jacques Ellul

Anyone who has tried to read Jacques Ellul will have had a few moments of despair.  Just when you think you’ve got him figured out, he goes and makes a statement that completely contradicts something he said earlier.  This is not an uncommon experience, and probably one of the main reasons that people have trouble [...]

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The Good Kind of Church Leadership

I’m a leadership skeptic.  In 2004, I attended the Willow Creek Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C…sort of.  I mean, I was there, but none of the speakers were.  I was at one of the satellite campuses that ‘participated’ in the event through an enormous screen at the front of the church (In fact, I think [...]

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