More straight talk about Bell's Love Wins

“Rumors of Rob Bell’s Heretical Universalism
Have Been Greatly Exaggerated”

A review of

Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell,
and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.
By Rob Bell.

Review by Adam Ellis.

Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.
Rob Bell.
Hardback: HarperOne, 2011.
Buy now: [ Amazon - Hardback ]
[ Amazon - Kindle ]

The fact that Rob Bell’s new book is considered controversial is as much a testimony to the marketing prowess of HarperOne (not to mention the unintentional marketing prowess of some critics), as it is to any theology contained in the book.  The first lesson that can be derived from all of this is that if you want to publish a successful book, HarperOne isn’t a bad way to go.

To begin with, let’s look at two things that shouldn’t be surprises, but (based on the more angry reviews I’ve read) apparently are:

1. Rob Bell is not a Calvinist (“New”, “Neo”, or otherwise).  He doesn’t write like one.  He doesn’t adhere to exclusively Calvinist doctrine.  He doesn’t see the terms “non-Calvinist” and “Christian” as mutually exclusive.
2. Rob Bell writes almost exactly like he talks.  That means that there will be

words

      and half-sentences

            laid-out unconventionally

                  throughout

                        the

                              book.

With that being said, there is much about this book that is worth discussing.  I’ll go ahead and go on record as saying that the vitriol-fueled rumors of Rob Bell’s heretical universalism have been greatly exaggerated.  Bell’s critics claim that the arguments in his book fall outside of historical Christian orthodoxy, while Bell himself claims to be saying nothing new, and that everything he argues for can be found within the stream of historic Christian orthodoxy.  So, who is right?  Well, that all depends on who you are asking, doesn’t it?  In contemporary use, the term “orthodox” is quite subjective, though almost no-one attempting to employ the term as a theological trump card will admit this subjectivity.  (Additionally, it should be noted that all reformers were technically heretics when they initially proposed their reforms, and that the way that the term “orthodox” is normally employed today seems more like a power game than anything else…but I digress)    Frankly, there isn’t much theological content in this book that you wouldn’t find in the work of N.T. Wright, Dallas Willard, and anyone who advocates a “restoration of all things” eschatology.  Even on the particular subject of Hell and eternal punishment, Bell doesn’t say anything that isn’t in the same spirit of what N.T. Wright argues in his chapter on Hell in Following Jesus:

“First, it must be said as clearly as possible that as soon as we find ourselves wanting to believe in hell we find ourselves in great danger.  The desire to see others punished–including the desire to do the punishing ourselves–has no place in a Christian scheme of things.  There is, of course, a right and proper desire for justice, for the victory of right over might; the desire to punish, however, must be sharply distinguished from this.”

And later, Wright goes on to state:

“[M]ost of the passages in the New Testament which have been thought by the Church to refer to people going into eternal punishment after they die don’t in fact refer to any such thing.  The great majority of them have to do with the way God acts within the world and history.”

If you’d like to see those ideas teased out and backed up, I’d recommend that you read Bell’s book and Wright’s work on the subject.  I don’t offer these quotes from Wright as a sort of “trump card” here (Indeed, for some, Wright’s name won’t carry any weight at all).  I’m merely attempting to show that Bell isn’t alone in his arguments and that it isn’t accurate to claim that only someone who doesn’t take the Bible or history seriously would make such an argument.  It is simply not the case that in Love Wins, Bell is ignoring scripture and making an unbiblical argument.  In his chapter on Hell, he actually lists and discusses every passage in the Bible that directly or indirectly discusses Hell.  One may disagree with Bell’s interpretation of the Bible, but (particularly on this point) an accusation that he’s ignoring scripture is laughable.

It’s not that I don’t have any criticisms of the book.  In his chapter on Heaven,  Bell states:

“Jesus often referred to the ‘kingdom of heaven,’ and he tells stories about people ‘sinning against heaven.’  ‘Heaven’ in these cases is simply another way of saying ‘God’.”(82)

There is a sense in which this is sort of true, but, at the same time, it is so oversimplified that it is utterly unconvincing as it is stated.   The fact is that the Gospel of Matthew records Jesus as using the term “Heaven” in this way, which is made all the more obvious when these texts are compared to the parallel texts in the other Gospels where the same term is rendered “Kingdom of God.”  This comparison would make Bell’s case much more convincing than simply claiming that Jesus often used the word “Heaven” as a euphemism for the word “God” (while offering no more detail or supporting information).

Additionally, in his chapter on Hell, Rob cites Jesus warning to Capernaum in Matthew 10, and says:

“[Jesus] tells highly committed, pious religious people that it will be better for Sodom and Gomorra than them on judgment day?

There’s still hope?

And if there’s still hope for Sodom and Gomorrah, what does that say about all of the other Sodoms and Gomorrahs?” (84)

My problem here is that it’s just a weak supporting argument.  The fact is that Jesus’s message here is directed at Capernaum, and Sodom and Gomorrah are brought in to the discussion for comparison’s sake.  Jesus is also well known to use hyperbole as a rhetorical device in precisely this kind of scenario.  Again, I’m not necessarily disagreeing with the point Bell is making here, I just don’t think he does himself any favors by using this particular text in this particular way.

This is not an academic book, and it doesn’t claim to be one.  Rob Bell is more pastor than professor, more artist than engineer, and more conversation partner than debate opponent.  He asks questions, not to undermine the Bible and/or faith, but rather because he thinks the Bible and/or Faith are so important…and because he thinks the people that God loves (read that as “everyone”) are so important.  If you think that theology is best done by engineers and that “Christian books” should always and only reinforce what you already believe, then this isn’t the book for you.  If you think theology is more art than science; if you believe that neither God nor truth are threatened by questions; and if you suspect that there may be more reason to hope than you’ve dared to hope for, you’ll really enjoy Rob Bell’s exploration of how “Love Wins”.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 27th, 2011 at 5:12 pm and is filed under *Featured Reviews*, VOLUME 4. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

via erb.kingdomnow.org

This is a helpful review with respect to the controversy, but I think the big shame in all the hubbub about the book is that, while I'm learning what it's _not_ about, I'm still not sure what it _is_ about.

Wonk Room » 73 Percent Of Republicans Oppose Cuts To Medicare

via wonkroom.thinkprogress.org

Huzzah to 73% of Republicans and 70% of Tea Party-ers. There's still some sense of social responsibility among conservatives.

PHD Comics: Dark Matters Video - "We [scientists] have no clue!"

via phdcomics.com

This is a fun video by PHD Comics looking ahead at some crazy new directions for physics and cosmology. What I'm hoping is that dark matter will be an excuse for why I'm often running out of time.

Relief | Christian writing unbound. Confessions of a Bible Virgin

Bear Witness as I Experience My First Time…

April 27, 2011 in Faith and Culture, General, Staff Posts with 6 Comments

Travis Griffith

It seems we’re born into a world where everyone is blind.

We don’t know who we are; so we search, arms outstretched, wandering, hoping we run into some form of ourselves that might know the answers.

It’s during that journey through the darkness that many people turn to religion.

Religion provides millions of people with the answers they seek, but for countless others it only raises more questions that outweigh the faith required to believe.

My journey is about to take a turn that every fiber of my being tells me not to follow. And I’m going to need your help.

First, though, a little history.

Continue reading >>>

via reliefjournal.com

We as a staff are both excited and a little trepidatious about Travis's new project. Let's face it, there's stuff in the Bible we still don't like ourselves. Blessings on you, Travis. As Walter might warn you, "You're about to enter a world of pain," though I say that in the best way possible.

Faith and Theology: Rowan Williams: a letter to a six-year-old

via faith-theology.blogspot.com

I suppose it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world if this is what they were teaching our kids in Sunday school, too.

“O thinke mee worth thine anger” | Relief: A Christian Literary Expression

“O thinke mee worth thine anger”

April 22, 2011 in Faith and Culture, General, Staff Posts with 0 Comments

Brad Fruhauff

Brad Fruhauff invites you to connect with the darkness of Good Friday.

In college, we used to complain that we didn’t get Good Friday off. I went to Calvin College, a Christian school, and wasn’t Easter really the most important Christian holiday? Instead, they gave us like half a day and had something they called a “Tenebræ Service.”

Truth be told, I had never seen Good Friday as anything other than  a day to get off of school. Thus, had I not had to stay on campus, I may never have gone to Tenebræ, and that would have been a shame.

“Tenebræ” means something like “shadows” or “darknesses,” and it seems to have ancient origins as a kind of funeral service sung during the last three days of Holy Week, and as it usually came at the end of the mass it was accompanied by extinguishing candles, leaving everyone in darkness.

It’s a dark service full of meditations on the death of God, a kind of attempt to inhabit the disciples’ despair on Golgotha. It was the first time I had really thought about how strange it is to “celebrate” the crucifixion of Jesus as a “good” Friday.

John Donne

Attending Tenebræ helped me understand one of the few Good Friday poems I’m aware of: John Donne’s “Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward.” The poem begins with some metaphysical musings about devotion’s effect on the body, and thus on how, though his body faces West, his soul faces East (to Jerusalem). Then Donne expresses relief that he did not witness the crucifixion himself, feeling it would be much more dramatic than the already painful death of self in the encounter with God. But then the poem becomes almost masochistic:

I turne my backe to thee, but to receive
Corrections, till thy mercies bid thee leave.
O thinke mee worth thine anger, punish mee,
Burne off my rusts, and my deformity,

If you’ve ever read “Batter my heart,” you know there’s this strain in Donne of imagining God as a violent lover – a metaphor we use less nowadays than that of “friend” or “father.” But the poem is written in context of God’s act of saving grace, the Atonement and Reconciliation, achieved through violence. How can reflection on such an act produce anything but contrition and a desire for purification? Donne feels small and unworthy of God’s sacrifice, so it is not, in fact, masochism, but deep spiritual humility and longing that cries, “O thinke mee worth thine anger, punish mee.”

His cry is to be made right, to be thought worthy to be made worthy of the sacrifice itself. Of course, the whole point is that we weren’t and aren’t worthy, but Donne doesn’t write as a theologian, here, but simply as a disciple feeling the tragedy of the Cross before the triumph of the Resurrection.

The goal of this purification, for Donne, is the restoration of the image of God within him, which becomes synonymous with his very self, for it is this restored self that God will recognize or know and enable Donne to turn toward Him:

Restore thine Image, so much, by thy grace,
That thou may’st know mee, and I’ll turne my face.

There is a time for laughing and a time for mourning. On Sunday we’ll celebrate the triumph of laughter over our tears, but today is a good day to remember the cost, paid once and for all but extorted from our brothers and sisters across the globe every day, of that joy.

Brad Fruhauff is Interim Editor-in-Chief of Relief. He holds a PhD in English from Loyola University Chicago and is currently an adjunct instructor in the Chicago area where he lives with his wife and 2-year old son. He has published fiction in The Ankeny Briefcase, poetry in Relief, Salt, and *catapult, and reviews in Burnside Writers’ Collective and The Englewood Review of Books.

via reliefjournal.com

Is there a greeting for Good Friday? "Sympathies," perhaps? Anyhow, I don't think we think about it enough.

Beyond Bunnies: The Real Meaning Of Easter Season : NPR

April 18, 2011

This is the season of holy days: Passover, Pascua, Holy Friday and Easter Sunday. For many Christians, the ritual of this Easter weekend will be punctuated by bursting pink and yellow dresses on little girls, and magnificent hats on their mothers and grandmothers. There will be Easter baskets filled with chocolate eggs and plush bunnies.

As joyous as the day is, Easter and the season of Lent are also a period of great introspection. Speaking with NPR's Michele Norris about her reflections of Easter this year is writer Anne Lamott. Many know Lamott from her seminal book on writing called Bird by Bird; parents might fondly remember Operating Instructions, her tome on motherhood. Lamott also writes novels and has published three essay collections on her Christian faith.

So what does the season — so much about rebirth and redemption, but also sacrifice — mean to Lamott?

"Well, it's the most profound holiday in the Christian tradition," Lamott says. "And I think two things really come to mind. One is something that the great writer Barbara Johnson said, which is that we are Easter people living in a Good Friday world. And I think that every year the world seems more of a Good Friday world. And it's excruciating, whether it's Japan, or Libya, or whether its your own best friends and their children who are sick, which is something that makes no sense when you think about a loving God. But it's a time when we get to remember that all the stuff that we think makes us of such value, all the time we spend burnishing our surfaces, is really not what God sees. God, he or she, loves us absolutely unconditionally, as is. It's a come as you are party."

In the essay "Ashes," Lamott wrote about her son, Sam, when he was much younger — in it, she attempts to explain Ash Wednesday to the child, but he just wants to watch television.

"I remember that Ash Wednesday he happened to have Alvin and the Chipmunks on," muses Lamott. "And they were singing 'Achy Breaky Heart,' and I felt like I might have a complete nervous breakdown. But Ash Wednesday, to me, is about as plain as it gets — we come from ashes and return to ashes, and yet there is something, as the poets have often said, that remains standing when we're gone. So in Easter — and Passover too — something that happens is that we stop. This is the 'dark night of the soul' stuff that John the Divine writes about; that in that stopping we may fall into an abyss that we have been trying to outrun since we were little children ... and the American way, I think, is to trick out the abyss so it's a little bit nicer. Maybe go to Ikea and get a more festive throw rug. But in Lent, if you are a person of committed spiritual growth, you do stop."

When asked how the meaning of Easter has changed for her over time, Lamott describes an experience that changed the meaning of the holiday for her:

"When I was 38, my best friend, Pammy, died, and we went shopping about two weeks before she died, and she was in a wig and a wheelchair. I was buying a dress for this boyfriend I was trying to impress, and I bought a tighter, shorter dress than I was used to. And I said to her, 'Do you think this makes my hips look big?' and she said to me, so calmly, 'Anne, you don't have that kind of time.' And I think Easter has been about the resonance of that simple statement; and that when I stop, when I go into contemplation and meditation, when I breathe again and do the sacred action of plopping and hanging my head and being done with my own agenda, I hear that, 'You don't have that kind of time,' you have time only to cultivate presence and authenticity and service, praying against all odds to get your sense of humor back."

"That's how it has changed for me," Lamott continues. "That was the day my life changed, when she said that to me."

Lamott explains that she will spend this Sunday following through with her usual Easter traditions:

"I'm going to go to my little church, and we will have a huge crowd of about 60 people. And I will cry a little bit ... out of joy, and then I will go home, and I will have 25 people — 15 relatives and about 10 riffraff, i.e., my closest friends — and we will sit down and we will eat, the most sacred thing we do."

via npr.org

This is why we love Anne Lamott, because she can get on a national radio broadcast to talk about Easter.

What Our Kids Can Teach Us About Technology

I'm only halfway into this On Being podcast of Krista Tippet's interview with Sherry Turkle, but one thing that's gotten me really thinking about my own tech habits is Turkle's recent research on digital communications in the home. While we adults often like to complain about how much those crazy kids are on their phones, it turns out that the people who are most upset about this subject are the kids themselves.

That's right, kids, especially teenagers, are complaining that their parents text too much at dinner, or when they pick them up from school. Turkle's findings are that kids want and need to feel connected to their parents, but that parents are complicit in obstructing that connection with the very devices they blame their kids for abusing.

Turkle has done what, I think, more and more families are doing, that is, defining and protecting what she calls sacred spaces in which phones and computers are not allowed. Her primary example is the dinner table, but she also includes moments of meeting (such as picking up your child from school) or simple things like walks together. One of the greatest gifts we can give our children, she argues, is to sometimes leave our phones at home when we go out with them, thus allowing ourselves to really be with them wherever we go.

We already limit TV/movie watching in our home, and we try to have family dinners sans technology (except maybe Pandora playing softly in the background). Putting the phone down altogether would be difficult even for someone like myself who fancies himself relatively independent of such things.

There's more at stake than a traditional way of life, Turkle claims. Technology runs 24/7, but humans do not. Survival itself -- survival in some way recognizably human -- seems to require that we unplug occasionally and just be present in the moment and the world around us.

Good Christians Make Bad Bar Flies

My friend Chris invited me to see John Mark McMillan at Schuba's last night. The show started at nine (kinda early as these things go), on time, with the opening act, All the Bright Lights, self-described as "an ambient, mostly-instrumental" group. The cozy hall was probably a little more than 3/4 full of hipster-type Christians in skinny pants, Keds, and thin cardigans. I wasn't really familiar with the headliner but overall enjoyed the show. All the Bright Lights is basically also McMillan's band, and their guitarist and drummer were quite impressive throughout the evening.

McMillan has written a few songs that have made their way into evangelical worship services, so he had some devoted fans who could sing for him when he got tired of doing so. I'm not really a big "group activities" person, so I always find it somehow self-indulgent to have the mic turned in my direction as if I can somehow share the glory of being a rocker by singing poorly with a hundred other people. Maybe there's another way to interpret that, I don't know...

The main thing that got me thinking about writing something was that, from Schuba's perspective, the evening was probably a bust. Chris turned to me after one song and said, "That's probably the first time I sang a worship song with a beer in my hand." Me, too. But when I looked around I realized that Chris and I were pretty much the only people drinking. When I closed my tab I saw like three other people with an open tab, and I only ever saw one other person with a beer. In other words, most people paid their nominal $10 cover and then kept their wallets closed the rest of the night. What's the point of having a concert in a bar when you don't enjoy their beverage selection? At least, I'm guessing Schuba's is asking that question.

People, look: ya gotta be a little more savvy. You know Schuba's took a bit of a risk even having this guy, with all his songs about blood, lambs, and some "he" who loves him, so do him and them a favor and have a beer or an iced tea or something.

That's all I have to say about that.

Why We're Fasting

Mark Bittman on food and all things related.

Tags:

congressional budget office, Food Stamps

I stopped eating on Monday and joined around 4,000 other people in a fast to call attention to Congressional budget proposals that would make huge cuts in programs for the poor and hungry.

By doing so, I surprised myself; after all, I eat for a living. But the decision was easy after I spoke last week with David Beckmann, a reverend who is this year’s World Food Prize laureate. Our conversation turned, as so many about food do these days, to the poor.

Who are — once again — under attack, this time in the House budget bill, H.R. 1. The budget proposes cuts in the WIC program (which supports women, infants and children), in international food and health aid (18 million people would be immediately cut off from a much-needed food stream, and 4 million would lose access to malaria medicine) and in programs that aid farmers in underdeveloped countries. Food stamps are also being attacked, in the twisted “Welfare Reform 2011” bill. (There are other egregious maneuvers in H.R. 1, but I’m sticking to those related to food.)

These supposedly deficit-reducing cuts — they’d barely make a dent — will quite literally cause more people to starve to death, go to bed hungry or live more miserably than are doing so now. And: The bill would increase defense spending.

Beckmann, who is president of Bread for the World, made me want to join in just by talking about his commitment. For me, the fast is a way to demonstrate my interest in this fight, as well as a way to remind myself and others that there are bigger things in life than dinner. (Shocking, I know.) I expect I’ll learn something about patience and fortitude while I’m at it. Thirty-six hours into the fast, my senses are heightened and everything feels a bit strange. Odors from the cafeteria a floor away drift down to my desk. In the elevator, I can smell a muffin; on the street, I can smell everything — good and bad. But as hungry as I may get, we know I’ll eat well soon. (Please check my blog for a progress report.)

Many poor people don’t have that option, and Beckmann and his co-organizers are calling for God to create a “circle of protection” around them. Some are fasting for a day, many for longer. (I’m fasting until Friday, and Beckmann until Monday. And, no, it’s not too late to join us.)

When I reminded Beckmann that poor people’s hunger was hardly a new phenomenon, and that God hasn’t made a confirmed appearance recently — at least that I know of — he suggested I read Isaiah 58, in which God says that if we were more generous while we fasted he’d treat us better. Maybe. But a billion people are just as hungry, human, and as deserving now as the Israelites were when they were fleeing Egypt, and I don’t see any manna.

This isn’t about skepticism, however; it’s about ironies and outrages. In 2010, corporate profits grew at their fastest rate since 1950, and we set records in the number of Americans on food stamps. The richest 400 Americans have more wealth than half of all American households combined, the effective tax rate on the nation’s richest people has fallen by about half in the last 20 years, and General Electric paid zero dollars in U.S. taxes on profits of more than $14 billion. Meanwhile, roughly 45 million Americans spend a third of their posttax income on food — and still run out monthly — and one in four kids goes to bed hungry at least some of the time.

It’s those people whom Beckmann and his allies (more than 30 organizations are on board) are trying to protect. The coalition may be a bit too quick to support deficit reduction, essentially saying, “We understand the need for fiscal responsibility, but we don’t want to sacrifice the powerless, nearly voiceless poor in its name. As Beckmann knows, however, deficit reduction isn’t as important as keeping people from starving: “We shouldn’t be reducing our meager efforts for poor people in order to reduce the deficit,” he told me by phone. “They didn’t get us into this, and starving them isn’t going to get us out of it.”

This is a moral issue; the budget is a moral document. We can take care of the deficit and rebuild our infrastructure and strengthen our safety net by reducing military spending and eliminating corporate subsidies and tax loopholes for the rich. Or we can sink further into debt and amoral individualism by demonizing and starving the poor. Which side are you on?

If faith increases your motivation, that’s great, but I doubt God will intervene here. Instead, we need to gather and insist that our collective resources be used for our collective welfare, not for the wealthiest thousand or even million Americans but for a vast majority of us in the United States and, indeed, for citizens of the world who have difficulty making ends meet. Or feeding their kids.

Though Beckmann is too kind to say it, he and many other religious leaders believe that true worship can’t take place without joining this struggle: “You can’t have real religion,” he told me, “unless you work for justice for hungry and poor people.”

I don’t think you can have much humanity, either.

Visit my blog, where you can find out more about my columns, or what I just cooked. You can also join me on Facebook or Twitter.

A version of this column appeared in print on March 30, 2011.

via opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com

I often tell my students that food is the social justice issue they should get interested in because it is central to just about everything else and the solutions ought to be nonpartisan inasmuch as they are good for the little guys - meaning they will reveal our government's hypocritical support for a few big interests.

Jim Wallis and Sojourners have been calling for fasting in protest of certain conservative-proposed budget cuts, but I've been reading messages from MoveOn.org and this article here in which progressives and even skeptics are using language similar to Wallis: that this is a moral issue, that a budget is a moral document, that fasting can be a meaningful form of discipline and solidarity.

According to G.E., Shirking Taxes is Good for America

Allegedly, cutting taxes on corporations is good for America because it creates jobs and tax revenue. Not so for G.E., according to this New York Times report by David Kocieniewski. Over the last couple decades, G.E. has lobbied successfully to create a tax code nearly custom-fitted to itself so that it can, in effect, receive a tax benefit in the billions of dollars while posting incredible profits. As Kocieniewski puts it, G.E. has basically turned its tax department into a profit center. 


It's all legit, of course, but it's hard to see how it's "good for America." Jobs, you say. Okay, but the largest job growth in G.E. has been overseas while there has been a 1/5th reduction of workforce at home (p.4). By the nature of the tax breaks, most of the profits have been earned overseas, too. The only real growth within the U.S.? Their tax department, meaning G.E. is mostly adding American jobs designed to keep money out of circulation in the American economy. Brilliant.

One of the striking ironies of this situation is that liberals are actually appealing to Reagan - yes, Reagan - to make their case against this kind of thing:

"Cracking down on offshore profit-shifting by financial companies like G.E. was one of the important achievements of President Reagan’s 1986 Tax Reform Act,” said Robert S. McIntyre, director of the liberal group Citizens for Tax Justice.

This shows how stupid it is to say this country is leaning too far left, since we're still to the right of Ronald Reagan.

Even Mother Jones is looking to Reagan as a model for getting us back on track, such as a recent interview with former Reagan budget director David Stockman, who laments that we have forgotten how Reagan actually had to raise taxes shortly after cutting them. Granted, Stockman's point was about cutting spending at the same time, but it remains distressing that the conservative right has managed to wrench our public discourse in a direction so far from the former political center that, as John Stewart was at pains to point out, we are simultaneously lamenting "high" teacher pay (upwards of $60,000) and protesting that people earning $250,000 are really struggling and so we should both cut collective bargaining rights and renew the Bush tax cuts (the ones that gave my family a "boost" of $600).

Aiee. Aiee.

I don't claim to have all the answers to the real deficit problems we have, but I do know that we can't hope to solve them if we're not willing to talk about them intelligently and to take stock of our values, here.

Sidling Up to Difference with Kwame Anthony Appiah [onBeing.org]

Sidling Up to Difference with Kwame Anthony Appiah

March 24, 2011

• » Download (mp3, 51:09)
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Our Civil Conversations Project continues with the Ghanaian-British-American philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah. His parents' marriage helped inspire the movie Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. He's studied ethics in a world of strangers and how unimaginable social change happens. We explore his erudite yet down-to-earth take on disarming moral hostilities in America now.

via being.publicradio.org

I'm nearly done listening to this podcast and respect Appiah's wisdom but also have some real questions, too.

A Perfect Storm in Undergraduate Education, Part 2 - Advice - The Chronicle of Higher Education

April 3, 2011

A Perfect Storm in Undergraduate Education, Part 2

Brian Taylor

By Thomas H. Benton

What is keeping undergraduates from learning? Last month, I speculated from my perspective as a college teacher about a set of interlocking factors that have contributed to the problem.

In that column (The Chronicle, February 25), I referred to the alarming data presented by Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa in Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses (University of Chicago Press, 2011) in the context of President Obama's call for more students to attend college in order to prepare for the economy of the future. Why, I asked, should we send more students to college—at an ever greater cost—when more than a third of them, according to Arum and Roksa, demonstrate "no improvement in critical thinking, complex reasoning, and writing skills" after four years of education?

Institutions are inherently conservative; they do not change easily. Many leaps of faith are necessary, and the people involved—teachers, students, parents, administrators, lawmakers, and others—have so many fundamental disagreements about the purposes of higher education that it is hard to know where to begin the conversation. It's far easier to make cuts to an inherently broken system than to begin building something new.

One hopes for an emerging consensus—another Sputnik moment—that will affirm Arum and Roksa's position that we need to make "rigorous and high-quality educational experiences a moral imperative." Whether that means college in a traditional sense is a different question. But that's a topic for another column.

Thomas H. Benton is the pen name of William Pannapacker, an associate professor of English at Hope College, in Holland, Mich.

via chronicle.com

If you can access this, it's a pessimistic but pretty close pic of what I've seen, too.