The letter to the Ephesians devotes much of its content to establishing the unity of both Jew and Greek in the body of Christ the dividing wall has been torn down between us familial identity we are all children of God adopted through Christ into this one family and the new heavenly citizensh
John W. Martens
John W. Martens is an associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn,where he teaches early Christianity and Judaism. He also directs the Master of Arts in Theology program at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity. He was born in Vancouver, B.C. into a Mennonite family that had decided to confront modernity in an urban setting. His post-secondary education began at Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kansas, came to an abrupt stop, then started again at Vancouver Community College, where his interest in Judaism and Christianity in the earliest centuries emerged. He then studied at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, and McMaster University, with stops at University of Haifa and University of Tubingen. His writing often explores the intersection of Jewish, Christian and Greco-Roman culture and belief, such as in "let the little children come to me: Children and Childhood in Early Christianity" (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2009), but he is not beyond jumping into the intersection of modernity and ancient religion, as in "The End of the World: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Film and Television" (Winnipeg: J. Gordon Shillingford Press, 2003). He blogs at www.biblejunkies.com and at www.americamagazine.org for "The Good Word." You can follow him on Twitter @biblejunkies, where he would be excited to welcome you to his random and obscure interests, which range from the Vancouver Canucks and Minnesota Timberwolves, to his dog, and 70s punk, pop and rock. When he can, he brings students to Greece, Turkey and Rome to explore the artifacts and landscape of the ancient world. He lives in St. Paul with his wife and has two sons. He is certain that the world will not end until the Vancouver Canucks have won the Stanley Cup, as evidence has emerged from the Revelation of John, 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, and 4 Ezra which all point in this direction.
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Memorial of Saint Mary Magdalene
When The Da Vinci Code exploded onto the literary sic scene it created a secondary cottage industry Catholic and other Christian scholars who responded to it either in Parish halls or in short book-length refutations See a nice online refutation from my colleague David Landry I was a part of
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Reading the Bible
How do you receive the word of God when you do not read This is a strange question to ask in an age of unprecedented literacy at a time when access to data texts and knowledge is constant No longer need one rely on books taken from the library you can carry Kindle and have over a thousand book
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Dividing Walls
The second reading for the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time continues with the reflections of Paul or a superb facsimile of Paul on human unity in and through Christ The reading for this Sunday is Ephesians 2 13-18 but I think it is worth drawing in the two verses just prior to this passage S
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George Weigel, Source Criticism and Biblical Scholars
In the criticism of George Weigel s intemperate and churlish source criticism of Pope Benedict XVI s new encyclical criticism which is warranted it has not been much noted that biblical scholars engage in source criticism on a regular basis The same criticisms raised of Weigel s gold pen and r
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The Family of God
Many scholars evaluate Ephesians as a pseudonymous letter of Paul s attributing it to a period some twenty years approximately after Paul s martyrdom and composed by disciples of Paul sometimes styled as a Pauline school Others note that the earliest manuscript traditions lack to the Ephesi
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The Year of St. Paul: Answers and Questions
The year of St Paul ends with the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul on June 29th 2009 I think this year has been a tremendous gift for the Church if only to draw considered attention to the man Paul and the many facets of his ministry Certainly in my diocese that of St Paul and Minneapolis
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Reality Show
Brothers and sisters As you excel in every respect in faith discourse knowledge all earnestness and in the love we have for you may you excel in this gracious act also 2 Cor 8 7 What is this gracious act of which Paul speaks I am having a difficult time concentrating as I hope to be a
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“What then will this child become?”
There is a common theme running through the readings for the Solemnity of the Nativity of John the Baptist Mass during the day and that is your purpose and mine I know that Isaiah 49 1-6 pertains directly to God s servant Isaiah technically I suppose this is Deutero-Isaiah but who names their
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A Prairie Home Companion
nbsp The readings for the Twelfth Sunday of Ordinary Time both the Old Testament reading from Job 38 1 8-11 and the Gospel reading from Mark 4 35-41 place us in the presence of God who is sovereign over nature It is on my mind not only because of the readings for the week but due to our prese