In modern times, many people consider themselves blessed to not have children. Europeans—and I would include Americans—believe now more than ever that the traditional family-unit is not worth striving for. Steven Ozment, a renowned 
Reformation and modern European scholar, considers this trend in an article published in The Weekly Standard called Diminishing Europe. He specifically focuses on Germany as it is witnessing historically low birth rates. In light of the upsurge of Islamic peoples in Germany, Matthias Platzeck, chairman of the Social Democratic Party, sadly notes the differences of German families and their Islamic counterparts. Unlike the Germans, Muslims are extremely devoted to their families, tradition, and work. Platzeck worries that the reason for this is that most Germans want “a fun-filled life in the moment” (Spass im Tag) instead of the struggles that come with having children.
At times even I find myself feeling cursed to have children. I wonder what a life without children would be like. After all I am an aspiring scholar, longing to pursue the rigorous and taxing life of an academic. I catch myself thinking, “Life is so complicated with children. They are getting in the way of my dreams, hopes, and expectations. They are very expensive, and I could accomplish so much more without them. Indeed, I think I would be so much happier if I had much-needed freedom.”
I recently came across on old book by the Rev. Samuel Reed Fisher (1810-1881) with the promising title, Excercises on the Heidelberg Catechism: Adapted to the Use of Families, Sabbath-Schools, and Catechetical Classes, the revised edition published by the German Reformed Church in 1854. The full book is available from Google (click on the title if you haven’t already). I recommend it heartily as a resource for catechizing young and not-so-young children.
There are a lot of good things about this book (besides the fact that really old books are cool, of course). It’s very readable, even at 155 years old cool, and it includes:
- A brief history of the Catechism
- Explanation of all difficult or technical words and phrases
- Doctrines set out and explained separately as they come up in the course of the Catechism
- Cross-referencing througout, both to the Catechism and to the various Exercises
- Extensive biblical references in addition to the proof-texts included in the Catechism itself
One thing I really like about this book is that it is thorough enough to be a helpful resource, but it’s still just a resource — its purpose is to facilitate the discussion and explanation provided by parents or teachers, rather than to replace parents and teachers. What it’s good at is getting you to really chew on the questions and answers. The book doesn’t aim to become its own monologue, but to foster dialogue between catechist and catechumen (although I don’t recommend using these titles in normal conversation).
For another very good — but much more in-depth, technical, philosophical and theological — discussion, unfortunately not freely available, check out the Commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism by Zacharias Ursinus. Or one of the newer commentaries, I guess, if you’re into new books….
If you are like me, you probably struggle to pray every day. I must confess that most of the reason why I do not pray more frequently is that I hate my own prayers, especially when I pray out loud with my family. When I do pray, my prayers are often unfocused, redundant, shallow, way too long, and littered with too many “uhs” and “ums.” One of the things that I enjoyed about my time at Westminster Seminary California was some exposure to reading powerful and thoughtful prayers, but my se
nse is that most people find the practice of reading prayers to be unwholesome, impious, formulaic, and cold-hearted. Without spontaneity people often argue that the Spirit is inhibited. read more…
A great little article from Scott Clark of WSC (and the Heidelblog), available in full here.
The hit TV show Seinfeld has been called a show about nothing. One of the most pernicious falsehoods about the Bible is that it, too, is a book about nothing, that it is a random collection of ancient myths and moral aphorisms. Strangely, some Christians seem to regard Scripture this way. Others find unity in Scripture around God’s plan for national Israel and/or a time of millennial glory. Still others treat the Bible as if it is about the reader, as if there is no such thing as a “text” or authorial intent but only the reader’s experience of the text. Even more crassly, the Bible is read as if the reader (and his or her prosperity and happiness) is at the center of the story….
One of my favorite modern-day thinkers is Carl Trueman. His penetrating analysis of theology and contemporary issues causes me to pause for self-reflection. In his essay, “The Theater of the Absurd” found in his book Minority Report: Unpopular Thoughts on Everything from Ancient Christianity and Zen-Calvinism, Trueman 
discusses what he sees as a deficit in the blog-world. In the wake of the second amendment and the democratization of knowledge, the web has proliferated our sense that we have a right to speak whatever we want. The result is that many people believe that they have expertise on stuff that even scholars with actual PhDs struggle to grasp. In some ways, this is nothing new under an American sun. Americans usually become deeply religious and zealous when their right to speak is threatened, even if blatant ignorance gets in the way of it. Rights are genetically hardwired into our DNA.
