Featured: The gallery below provides current examples and cases for a two-kingdoms analysis and other theological intersections with instructional content. Inclusion does not imply endorsement. Use the Sort: tool to select among new subject additions in the gallery. Be sure to check the specific Subject Area menu above and the Archives page for a longer selection of examples.
Welcome: This website is dedicated to better understanding the Lutheran distinctions and how they inform higher education, our practices, and our instruction. The site provides practical examples, ideas, and background for content and instruction in the classroom and congregation. For five hundred years, the Lutheran tradition has fostered a powerful and positive set of insights about Jesus and the Gospel. These Gospel insights have been lived out in faithful communities and congregations around the world, refreshing hope and promise for Christians of all sorts while also gaining the attention of others who encounter God's presence in these communities.
Across the years, the agent for sustaining this heritage and sharing its study has been Lutheran higher education. By teaching, examining, and exploring these distinct and sometimes peculiar expressions of the Gospel, we share a living tradition that enriches the entire church and engages the world.
Recommended:
christianity as an historical yet Weird event-
Trinity Lutheran: The Church-State Case Looms at the Supreme Court — The Supreme Court is expected to rule in June, 2017, on a case brought by Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Missouri, against the state. The ruling could have powerful implications for the separation of church and state and the funding of religious schools in […]
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Religiously affiliated hospitals win Supreme Court pension case: This case study can introduce students to the establishment clause, 7th commandment issues for pension and retirement funds, religious liberty issues, and who says what the church is and is not. The 8-0 ruling reverses lower court decisions that sided with hospital workers who argued that the exemption from […]
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Christians and Lawsuits: The usual starter text for law suits is 1 Cor. 6:1-8. ADF is among the better known Christian legal services and presents four factors to explain when and why the church may use a culture’s legal system to engage in litigation (citing Calvin here, though Luther addressed this concern also as he […]
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When the financial market is god, who pays? — Among other reviews available, this brief article provides an overview of Harvey Cox’ book, The Market as God (Harvard University Press, 2016), 320 pages. Cox argues that our now-sacralized market endows corporations with personhood, grants them immunity from double jeopardy, gives them the right to a trial by […]
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Keep Christianity Weird: This review of Destroyer of the Gods by Larry Hurtado (Baylor, 2016), 304 pages, notes that book reminds us how weird Christianity was to the Roman world. Christianity’s sheer familiarity has desensitized us to its radical claims. Hurtado aims to show how the “odd” became “commonplace,” by surveying the first three centuries of the Jesus […]
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Why the US Military Wants Fewer Generic Christians: The general categories of “Protestant, no denominational preference” and “Protestant, other churches” have been removed from the Department of Defense (DoD) list of recognized religions as the US military seeks out more detailed designations for its 1.3 million service members. The Armed Forces Chaplains Board made these changes to […]
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Christian Human Rights: A Debate — The annunciation of human rights in the 1940s is now viewed by the general public and professional scholars as the uncomplicated triumph of liberal democracy. But it is equally if not more viable to regard human rights as a project of the Christian right, not the secular left. Their […]
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Hebrew Teacher’s ADA Suit Barred By Ministerial Exception Doctrine: The Supreme Court’s doctrine of ministerial exception continues to be worked out in the lower courts, including this case in religious education. In rejecting the plaintiff’s argument that her teaching of Hebrew was cultural, not religious, the court nevertheless commented that “a religious organization could abuse […]
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From Myth To Science: Can We Make Sense Of The Origin Of All Things? Marcelo Gleiser offers a thoughtful essay that students can evaluate for insight and/or subtle fallacy. “Contrary to what some scientists say in hyped-up statements in books and social media, we can’t build a scientific model out of nothing — science needs […]
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Meg Meeker, MD, on Teenagers and the STD nobody is talking about: Most people are aware of the physical repercussions of sex–we e now have 35 known STDs (in 1960, we only had two); teenagers make up one-third of the U.S. population, but they carry 50 percent of STDs; one in four teens has an STD. […]
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In US, Belief in Creationist View of Humans at New Low: The conventional creationist view (down from 46% in 2012) and the God-guided developmental view (up from 32% since 2012) on human origins are currently at parity with 38% each. The evolution-without-divine-involvement view is at 19% (up from 15% since 2012). Gallup has been keeping count […]
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Wholly Citizens: God’s Two Realms and Christian Engagement With the World — Luther’s framework of the two realms is often misunderstood and misrepresented. Bierman wisely begins his work not with Rom. 13 but with Luther’s provocative treatment of Ps. 82. He examines Luther’s later interpreters–some accurate, others not so much–and how the two kingdoms doctrine has […]
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The student loan system is so complicated even the experts have trouble figuring it out: Christian schools can consider the challenges faced by the 44 million student loan borrowers across the country as they navigate the repayment process. The complexity of the student loan system, which includes both federal and private loans, a myriad of repayment […]
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A Renaissance of Clicks: The Case for More Religion Reporters — This 3o min. audio program is an interview with Emma Green and McKay Coppins, both reporters for The Atlantic, about the state of religion reporting in mainstream media and how The Atlantic approaches the Godbeat.
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The Reformation 500 Years Later, with Dr. Timothy Wengert: This 6 min. video from a Reformation scholar is a quick summary of the 95 Theses, the centrality of the Gospel, why these mattered then, and why they matter now.
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The War on Tenure: Universities are supposed to be institutions dedicated to the pursuit of truth as a common good, and faculty, given their training, ought to be accorded a certain deference as leaders in that pursuit. Administrators only exist to facilitate the necessary work to secure this common good as the basis of university […]
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Comment, Summer 2017: This issue explores expressions of civil religion that deserve serious consideration because, as implausible as it might seem, civil religion is an irreplaceable moral source of civil society. In fact, reconsidering civil religion is necessary precisely because civil religion is inevitable. It’s not a question of whether we have a civil religion, but […]
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Moral Outrage in America Is Now for Everybody: In a recent poll, Gallup found a widening embrace for more than a dozen moral issues, including record-high acceptance for gay relationships, divorce, pornography, polygamy, and physician-assisted suicide. The church today finds itself in a precarious position, as an ethical shift pushes public opinion in favor of stances that […]
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Here He Stood: Talking with the Creators of ‘Luther’ — This interview on the production of the documentary, Luther: The Life and Legacy of the German Reformer, discusses selection rationales for presenting complex content. Students can consider the decisions needed for communicating theology, history, and biography as well as some key themes from the Reformation. The […]
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San Diego schools sued over anti-Islamophobia campaign: Public schools now often find themselves in untenable situations regarding religious diversity in a society that no longer adheres to a shared narrative of life. Students can use this case to examine conflicting norms, values, and aims in education and the viability of public education in 21st century […]
Three from Robert Kolb
"Luther on Peasants and Princes" by Robert Kolb (Lutheran Quarterly, Volume XXIII, 2009, 23 pages). Kolb provides a thorough two-kingdoms analysis of the Peasants War and the ruling classes. A careful look at the peasant protests in their several forms and at the larger context of his comments on both the peasantry (essentially, the middle class, not a serfdom) and governmental officials reveals that Luther's concern focused neither on peasants as peasants nor princes as princes but on public order and justice as well as the need for princes and peasants alike to repent of their sins and trust in Jesus Christ. This article includes helpful background on the history and several insights about our practices in both God's left-hand and right-hand kingdoms.
Luther's Truths: Then and Now by Robert Kolb (Journal of Lutheran Mission, Col. 2, No. 4, Sept. 2015, 12 pages). Luther’s insights into God's word can be translated into our times and our places, as different as they are in our several corners of God’s world. When we recognize how Luther took what was familiar to his contemporaries and reworked the way key medieval terms were defined, we can appreciate how radically Luther recast the framework for reading Scripture and proclaiming its message as he worked within the old system of thinking to come to significantly new foundations for thinking and living in biblical fashion. We can learn and engage that same strategy today.
"Called to Milk Cows and Govern Kingdoms: Martin Luther's Teaching on the Christian's Vocations" by Robert Kolb (Concordia Journal, Spring 2013, 10 pages). Among the many helpful readings on vocation now available, Kolb's article connects the doctrine of vocation to the the larger narrative of Scripture and its other themes and teachings including a Trinitarian theology of creation, sanctification and ethics, and the versatility of the Gospel in addressing all human situations. "The callings of the believer arise out of the structure which God built into the essence of humanity in creation.... Evangelistically, this framework for human behavior can appeal to those with a utilitarian view of life and who are on the prowl for 'what really works'--although we must also refashion the larger conception of reality of most contemporary Western utilitarians."
Table talk on the Lutheran tradition at CUNE
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