Welcome to the Pathways Blog

Welcome to the latest Pathways experiment, the Pathways blog. I want this blog to serve several purposes.

1. I want to share resources with people who may want to delve a little deeper into the material from class, so I'll post links to theological content (mostly online, but maybe a book or two here and there that is especially apropos) that is "Pathways approved"—at least in the broad sense that it will enable you to go deeper and to sharpen your theological critical-thinking skills, and not necessarily in the sense that I (or you) must agree with every sentence to everything I pass along in this category. (For instance, from the class on June 24, on the person of the Holy Spirit, here is Basil of Caesarea's treatise on the Holy Spirit—not light reading, mind you, and it's an old translation, but the fact that this is online is an indication of the riches that are available across the Internet.)

2. Often, there are dust-ups, discussions, digressions in the theological—and especially, the evangelical—world that pertain pretty directly to the issues we discuss in class (like this little tidbit that Darrel Voth just posted to the Facebook group). It's good to keep abreast somewhat of what's going on in the larger evangelical and theological world. And these will hopefully both demonstrate the usefulness of what we're doing in Pathways and set some of where I'm coming from in my teaching within the larger contexts of the theological discussions going on in North American Christianity.

3. Occasionally in my reading, I come across profound and/or edifying and/or otherwise-thought-provoking quotations or passages that fit the general thrust of what Pathways is all about, and I will share them here for your edification as well.

4. I am sure I will not be able to resist, on occasion, my own reflections/rants/pontifications/etc. Hopefully these will be rare.

So any one blog post could fit into two or more of these categories. How each post fits is for you, dear reader, to discern, though I will likely post disclaimers to stuff I find relevant but that I would not want to endorse (or imply that a GCC-endorsed Sunday school class would endorse it!).

Much of this may end up being redundant to the content that appears on the Pathways Facebook group page, but I want people who aren't on Facebook (cough-cough-Brandon Buerge) to be able to participate as well. I will try to synergize the two forums as much as possible so that if you see content in one forum, it's likely to show up at the other.

Last, I hope this blog and the Facebook group stimulate thinking and discussion. So pipe up in the comment box whenever you want to shower me with praise discuss things further.

We'll see if this all works. Here's to learning! Here's to discussion! Here's to furthering our participation in the divine life!