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Join Us for Our Fall Invitational Campus Visit!

wirgaus Join Us for Our Fall Invitational Campus Visit!Join us for the fall Invitational Campus Visit on September 25-27!

Have you thought about being a pastor or a deaconess? Then come. Meet your brothers and sisters in Christ who are also wrestling with how God would have them serve His Church and neighbor. Worship. Join with the seminary community and see how you will be formed in Jesus Christ as a servant of the Church.

Have you decided to take the plunge into seminary life? This visit is the perfect time to learn the details of financial aid, housing, schools, and jobs. You will soon call Fort Wayne home. Here is your chance to see your way around and make this community your own.

Have you wondered if or how all the details will come together? The Admission counselors, our Relocation Coordinator, and the whole seminary community are prepared to answer your questions.

If you would like to register or have further questions, please contact the Admission Department by phoning 800-481-2155 or e-mailing admission@ctsfw.edu or go here.

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You Never Know Where You’ll Find . . .

roland-ziegler-medium You Never Know Where Youll Find . . . a seminary professor eating. Chili in the Student Commons, anyone?

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You Never Know Where You’ll Find . . .

peter-scaer-small You Never Know Where Youll Find . . .

a Concordia Theological Seminary professor. Who guessed Cedar Point?

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New Wording of Roman Mass

I recommend you take a look at this piece from NPR regarding the changes to soon take effect in the Roman Mass.  According to the commentator, the reason for some of the changes was to make the language loftier, more reverent.  Some will object to the changes arguing that the former conversational way of speaking is more relatable.

Consider this quote from Fr. James Martin:

Language is important in the spiritual life: The way you relate to someone influences the way you speak to someone, and vice versa. It’s the same with God. The way you relate to God influences how you speak to God in prayer. And your language will influence your image of God.

What are your thoughts about liturgical expression?  Lofty or conversational?  Are they mutually exclusive?

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Follow up on Human Rights: Starting Point

Recently, I posted about Sen. Barack Obama’s answer, or non answer as it were, to Rick Warren’s question on when human rights begin, whether at conception or later? James Kushiner, at Mere Comments, the blog of Touchstone magazine, recently wrote about the state of children in Britain. What he reports is discouraging, especially since those same statistics are not all that different for the US.

What I found most helpful is his conclusion. He writes:

And when children are devalued in the womb, they are devalued after birth. Why is that? Because of something that mothers know (and fathers perhaps to a lesser extent?): There is no bright line separating the child in the womb 6 months or 6 days before birth and the child 6 days after birth, but it is one long continuity of being. You can’t isolate the disrespect for the small person at 3 months in utero from that at 6 months or the child at the time of his birth. The toxin of permission to kill must spread because there are no natural barriers to it. It bleeds into every thing else. Why else would a supposedly sane politician oppose something like the Born Alive Infant Protection Act? If it looks like infanticide, just maybe it is?

We have a duty as citizens in the Left-hand Kingdom, as citizens of the state, to ensure that the moral ethos codified in our laws and statutes uphold what we as citizens of the Right-hand Kingdom, as citizens of the church hold to be true and good because, as Kushiner alludes, what is codified in our laws and statutes is the best picture of what we as a people in this country, and any country for that matter, believe to be true and good. And this is true not only for issues on life, but also how we understand and define marriage, family, religion, liberty, and happiness (perhaps long ago rooted not in today’s rank individualism but rather in Aristotle’s eudaimonia).

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You Never Know Where You’ll Find . . .

your academic dean thinking deep thoughts.

larry-rast-medium You Never Know Where Youll Find . . .

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Is the Pastor Real?

Andrew Park begins his Aug. 15th article in Slate magazine with the following:
Most Sunday mornings at Buckhead Church in downtown Atlanta, one person is conspicuously absent: the senior pastor, Andy Stanley. A nationally known evangelist, Stanley is usually 20 minutes away at North Point Community Church, the suburban megachurch he has led for 13 years. To the 6,000 or so faithful at Buckhead, he appears only on video, his digital image projected in front of the congregation in life-sized 3-D. The preacher is a hologram. http://www.slate.com/id/2197166/?GT1=28001
How does such an approach redefine pastoral ministry? Shepherding of a congregation? Your thoughts.

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The Anne Rice Chronicles

anne_rice The Anne Rice ChroniclesHer books have sold over a hundred million copies, making her one of the most widely read authors in the modern era.  Until recently, Anne Rice’s name was synonymous with “popular vampire fiction.”  Her gorey gothic romances have been adapted into Hollywood films and television productions.

More recently, however, to the chagrin of many of her fans, Rice announced her conversion (or re-conversion) to the Roman Catholic faith of her childhood.  No longer a writer of baroque horror stories populated with blood-sucking fiends, she has dedicated the rest of her life to writing about her Lord, Jesus Christ.

Many Christians were skeptical when they learned that Rice plans to produce a series of novels on the life of Jesus.  The first two installments have already become best-sellers (Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt The Anne Rice Chronicles and Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana The Anne Rice Chronicles) and she’s only getting started.

You might be surprised, as I was, that she’s remarkably reverent and orthodox as she weaves plausible and deeply researched narratives about Jesus.  Rice has explained her path back to Christianity from atheism in numerous interviews.  She offers a taste of her upcoming memoir on her website.  It’s entitled “Called Out of Darkness” and I have high expectations.

Few, if any popular authors are as well informed about biblical studies as Anne Rice.  Certainly, she has read much more in the field than most LCMS pastors.  In First Things magazine online, Father Dwight Longenecker interviews Rice about her vampires, her Christian faith, and her books on Jesus.  I commend it to you.

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Obama on Human Rights

Perhaps you are all familiar by now with Obama’s answer to Rick Warren’s question to both Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama on when does life begin, or as Warren put it, when do human rights begin. Obama quipped that it was above his pay grade (see Dr. Veith’s blog for more on this).

This is what I want to know: Why didn’t Warren follow up with this standard legal response: “Objection your Honor, non response!” And then put the question a slightly different way: “Okay, Sen. Obama, when did your daughters’ human rights begin?” His answer there would be revealing and helpful for all. Perhaps to a lesser degree with fathers than mothers, but I would think that there is even in fathers a deep personal acknowledgment in conscience that life, human rights, and personhood begins at conception, despite the many claims to the contrary and the prevailing views that would have us believe that this is an old-fashioned and outdated mode of thinking. It is, after all, how God created us and this in some way remains even after the Fall, does it not?

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Meet the Counselors: Rev. Jason Braaten

img_0834-small-300x200 Meet the Counselors: Rev. Jason Braaten

Rev. Jason Braaten grew up in New Lenox, Illinois. He attended Concordia University Chicago, where he received his BA degree in theological languages and philosophy in 2000. During that time, he met his wife Lauren (neé Dorr) who was enrolled in the deaconess program. They were married in 2001 just before Jason matriculated to Concordia Theological Seminary. In 2003, Lauren and Jason moved to Cambridge, England, to study at Westfield House, a sister seminary in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of England. He graduated from Concordia Theological Seminary in 2006. In 2007, he began studies in the STM program and served as the graduate assistant to the Concordia Theological Quarterly. In April of 2007, Jason was placed at the seminary to serve as an admission counselor. Jason and Lauren have one son, Oliver, and another child due this winter. Because of his year spent studying in England, don’t be surprised if you see Rev. Braaten sporting a bowtie now and then.

Rev. Braaten’s recruiting territory includes Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Delaware, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, and a partridge in a pear tree. He can be reached at jason.braaten@ctsfw.edu.

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