Author Archives: mhick255

The News at Regent College: September 11 & 18, 2001

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The second issue of the 2001-02 Regent College Et Cetera, dated September 18, 2001.

Ten years ago today, I began my year-long run as editor of the Et Cetera, the official student “newspaper” of Regent College. I put “newspaper” in quotes because it’s not like most student newspapers around the country. Regent College is a fairly small, fairly tight-knit community of theology students, and our newspaper (when I was there) consisted mostly of run-of-the-mill announcements and anything-but-run-of-the-mill theological essays.

The first issue under my tenure was dated September 11, 2001. Obviously, I had no idea what would happen on that day, as you can see for yourself:

Regent College Et Cetera – Sept 11 2001 (PDF, 1.2 MB)

As I wrote a few years ago, I learned about the terrorist attacks just as I arrived on campus. A week of reflection, prayer, and mourning led to our second issue, which included liturgical readings, poetry of mourning, a cover essay by Mark Filiatreau, and a column by my assistant editor Leland Ferguson, but also a surprising number of “ordinary” items: an invitation to discuss the movie Contact, a warning about theft on campus, logistical announcements for the annual retreat:

Regent College Et Cetera – Sept 18 2001 (PDF, 888 KB)

Over the rest of that semester, our community debated the meaning of 9/11, the appropriate responses to violence, anger, and mourning, and any number of political and theological issues related to the attacks. In these first two issues of that year, you can get a sense for how the Regent community operates.

P.S. I’m fairly certain that I don’t have permission to post the contents of these two issues online, but I hope no one minds. If you’re one of the writers and you’d like me to take your article offline, just let me know.

Was the Norway shooter a Christian?

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In today’s Wall Street Journal, Feisal Abdul Rauf (of Cordoba Initiative fame) begins his column “A Call to All Religion Moderates” by writing:

Fox News host Bill O’Reilly was right when he insisted that Abders Behring Breivik [sic], who committed mass murders in Norway in July, is not a Christian. Even though Breivik referred to himself often as a Christian, Mr. O’Reilly noted, no one who slaughters innocents can be a follower of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace. (emphasis added)

First of all, you should never get theological opinions from Bill O’Reilly.

Second, I agree that Breivik was not a Christian, but it has nothing to do with the murders he committed. It has everything to do with how he defined his own identity. Here’s how Breivik himself described his “Christianity”:

A majority of so called agnostics and atheists in Europe are cultural conservative Christians without even knowing it. So what is the difference between cultural Christians and religious Christians? If you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God then you are a religious Christian. Myself and many more like me do not necessarily have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God. We do however believe in Christianity as a cultural, social, identity and moral platform. This makes us Christian. (emphases added; via GetReligion)

Christianity as a “cultural, social, identity and moral platform” is meaningless without a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. In fact, I would argue that “Christianity” as a “cultural, social, identity and moral platform” – without the accompanying relationship with Jesus – is responsible for many of the greatest crimes against humanity of the past two thousand years. Christianity is, first and foremost, about the person of Jesus Christ. If you exclude him, then all you have left is one more godless ideology.

Rauf goes on to say that no murderer can be a “true Christian” (or a “true Muslim,” for that matter). I disagree strongly with this idea. As I wrote above, Christianity is, first and foremost, about the person of Jesus Christ. It’s not about how righteous, holy, or moral we can be, or whether we can simply avoid (through care or luck) making terrible decisions.

Could someone have a personal relationship with Jesus and still commit horrific crimes? Tragically, I believe the answer is yes.

I see two important implications of this sobering idea:

1) We should not be quick to reject someone as a brother or sister in Christ. Whether a historical figure or one of our contemporaries, we shouldn’t base our opinion of them or their faith on their misdeeds.

2) We should never assume that our own actions are right, simply because we’re Christians. Perhaps our descendants will judge us as harshly as we judge our misguided ancestors, for some blind spot or crime that never even occurred to us to be wrong.

Link

Why You and I Could Not Write the Book of Revelation

The book of revelation has about 400 verses, and scholars say those verses contain around 550 allusions to Old Testament passages.

But here’s the thing, John doesn’t include a single quotation of the Old Testament. He only uses allusions. This means that his writing, his thoughts, his spirituality literally bleeds with an deep, abiding knowledge of the Scriptures.

via John Dyer