American Evangelicals and Politics

I discuss a number of recent books by American evangelicals on politics in Christianity Today magazine here. I also take some time to reflect on more general questions of how Christian faith properly interacts with political engagement

Caption Contest

This is a Very Serious Blog—at least, it is most of the time. But every once in a while, we take a walk outside and have a little fun.

While I was lecturing recently in New Brunswick, I had a photograph taken of me just outside the room in which I was speaking. Many people in the audience didn’t understand why I was delighted to have that picture taken, since the Bay of Fundy, home of world-famous tides, was all around the peninsula on which the hotel stood.

But many of you know why I wanted such a photo. And now I am asking you to amplify my joy by suggesting captions to the following pic. Behave yourselves now . . . but not scrupulously, okay? Here goes:

PROVIDE A CAPTION FOR THIS PHOTO:

The Implications of a Hotel

I’m working this week in St. Andrews by-the-Sea, a gorgeous little town on the shores of the Bay of Fundy in New Brunswick. The Conference of Atlantic Baptist Churches is hosting an evangelism conference, and your servant is their main speaker.

We’re enjoying the Fairmont Algonquin Hotel, a grand old resort built a century ago. I’ve had the privilege of staying in most of the Canadian Fairmonts, some of which are “railroad hotels” built as destinations for the rich by the Canadian Pacific Railway. The Château Frontenac in Quebec City, the Banff Springs Hotel, Château Lake Louise, and the Empress in Victoria are particularly famous examples.

As I looked into the history of this hotel (hey, I’m a historian by preference, as well as profession!), I found that this hotel originally catered mostly to influential Canadians and also Americans from Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and elsewhere. And these well-heeled folk, called the “Summer People” by the residents of St. Andrews, came for two things:

Should You Write a Master’s Thesis?

Here is what writing a master’s thesis won’t get you: a gasp of admiration from a PhD admissions committee. It doesn’t matter how long a thesis you write or how brilliant you think it is. It frankly won’t even be seen by (busy) admissions committees, who certainly don’t want applicants mailing a hundred-plus pages of text as part of their applications. No, writing a thesis doesn’t give you an immediate leg up on other applicants.

Furthermore, many programs, including those at elite schools, don’t expect theses from their own master’s students or even have a thesis track for their master’s degrees. Check out the Big Names: Many offer only MAs by coursework and, perhaps, examination.

So why go to the considerable trouble of a master’s thesis? Here’s why.

Ph.D. Applicants: Don’t Apply Unless You Mean It

As I’ve mentioned here earlier, we’re in the throes of moving houses–just as the world’s financial markets decided to jump into the toilet undergo an overdue correction. So my beloved and I have been more than usually busy these days.

Still, one does one’s duty, and cheerfully. So here is some intelligence I gathered recently for our own prospective doctoral students that may well be useful to many of you, too:

Don’t apply for a Ph.D. program and hope to defer an acceptance you receive. It’s not like undergraduate acceptance. If you don’t take the offer, you’ll have to reapply–in all but the most extraordinary circumstances. (One of my correspondents, at a major school in the eastern United States, says he has seen that once in seventeen years. Another friend, at another major school who previously taught at a midwestern American powerhouse, says he’s never seen it at all.)

CBC “Hockey Night in Canada” Theme Contest

Thanks to the many of you who visited my son Joshua’s entry in the contest to write a new theme song for CBC’s broadcast of “Hockey Night in Canada.” Josh’s entry was not selected as one of five semi-finalists. You can hear the ones that were selected here. Family modesty forbids me from saying more than than this: de gustibus non disputandum (which, carefully translated, means “I have no idea what prescription medication the CBC judges were on when they decided as they did”).

Vancouver House for Sale

As indicated in the previous post, we’re moving, and just a little north of where we live now–across a bridge and up a ravine–to North Vancouver.

Should you, or someone you know, be looking for a family home in Vancouver, please check out our house here and set up a visit with our realtor.

(Yes, this is just the time one wants to be trying to sell a house…. So we’ve priced it as attractively as we can and we hope prospective buyers want to get in before interest rates do whatever they might do in the months ahead…)