This article describes some potential uses of Bayesian estimation for time-series and panel data models by incorporating information from prior probabilities in addition to observed data. Drawing on econometrics and other literatures we illustrate the use of informative “shrinkage” or “small variance” priors while extending prior work on the general cross-lagged panel model. Using a panel dataset of national income and subjective well-being we describe three key benefits of these priors. First, they shrink parameter estimates toward zero or toward each (...) other for time-varying parameters, which lends additional support for an income → SWB effect that is not supported with maximum likelihood. This is useful because, second, these priors increase model parsimony and the stability of estimates and thus improve out-of-sample predictions and interpretability, which means estimated effect should also be more trustworthy than under ML. Third, these priors allow estimating otherwise under-identified models under ML, allowing higher-order lagged effects and time-varying parameters that are otherwise impossible to estimate using observed data alone. In conclusion we note some of the responsibilities that come with the use of priors which, departing from typical commentaries on their scientific applications, we describe as involving reflection on how best to apply modeling tools to address matters of worldly concern. (shrink)

Are there clergy who don’t believe in God? Certainly there are former clergy who fall in this category. Before making their life-wrenching decisions, they were secret nonbelievers. Who knows how many like-minded pastors discover that they simply cannot take this mortal leap from the pulpit and then go on to live out their ministries in secret disbelief? What is it like to be a pastor who doesn’t believe in God? John Updike gave us a moving account in his brilliant novel, (...) In the Beauty of the Lilies, which begins with the story of Reverend Wilmot, a Lutheran minister whose life is shattered by his decision to renounce the pulpit in the face of his mounting disbelief. But that is fiction and Wilmot’s period of concealment is short-lived. What is it like to be a pastor who stays the course, in spite of sharing Wilmot’s disbelief? (shrink)

This article reviews the cultural agenda of the celebrated Dominican preacher Giovanni Dominici in fifteenth-century Florence. Central issues discussed include Dominici’s educational programme, his cultural propaganda, his interest in the visual arts and his opposition to the study of the classics, as expressed in his public popular preaching. The close examination of his cultural agenda discloses Dominici as the most extreme opponent of humanist studies.

A most excruciating handicap for the understanding and appraisal of medieval poetry, especially lyric poetry, is our limited knowledge of its context. In many cases we know nothing at all about the author, about his or her character and the situation in and for which a poem was written, about the intended audience, or about the way in which a text, say the Corpus Christi plays, was presented. Now and then the manuscript environment may furnish a hint, or another text (...) may provide a clue , but by and large the available information is minimal, to the point that an ingenious critic has been forced to reconstruct the context of “poems without context” from the texts themselves. (shrink)

The claims of Daniel upon our world will be kept freshest if we see in the text paradigms of a consistently renewed experience of the triumph of God's redeeming power over death and corruption.

South African homiletics is in a crisis and it has – contrary to our expectation – nothing to do with either the presence or the influence of the great 19th-century theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher. In fact, this article shows that his absence stretches even deeper and wider than is often assumed. What makes this state in scholarship even more strange and remarkable is that the practice of preaching played an immense and crucial role in Schleiermacher’s own life and theology. By coming (...) to know how this famous theologian as a preacher embodied the blending of different voices – preacher, church, Scripture and the Triune God – into the mystery of the one living voice of the gospel that speaks to us in the preaching event, this article tries to show why it is necessary and relevant to engage with Schleiermacher as a preacher who primarily thought about himself as a servant of the Word. Reading one of his sermons on sermons may stimulate theological thought beyond the borders and confinements of discipline and context. (shrink)

The author tries to present "a clearer view of God's revealed ideal for the preacher, what he is and how he is to do his work." For that purpose he considers "his message and his authority, the character of the proclamation he is called to make, the vital necessity of his own experience of the Gospel, the nature of his motive, the source of his power, and the moral qualities which should characterize him, notably humility, gentleness and love." This preacher's (...) portrait, a portrait painted by the hand of God himself on the broad canvas of the New Testament is arrived at by the author by analyzing the different words used in the New Testament for the Christian preacher, such as Steward, Herald, Witness, Father, and Servant. This book, I believe, would be a very useful guide for every Christian preacher.—J. K. (shrink)

Este artículo analiza los aspectos retóricos y rituales de la exhortación piadosa (wa,z) practicada en al-Andalus y el Magreb, tomando como base documental dos fuentes homiléticas. Los textos se analizan a la luz de noticias hagiográficas y jurídicas con el fin de determinar el papel social de los wu,,az y el impacto de sus sermones. El poder seductor del sermón se halla en función del carisma del predicador, sus dotes de oratoria y su afán en involucrar activamente a su auditorio (...) en su propia experiencia carismática. Los textos hagiográficos examinados presentan al wa,iz como testigo de la omnipotencia divina, propiciando la conversión religiosa, incluso de individuos situados al margen de la sociedad. (shrink)

The claims of Mt. 5:17—20 are often taken to provide the interpretive key to the ethical claims of the Sermon on the Mount as a whole. The theological issue at stake here is the determinative relation between Christ's person and work and his teaching. This article explores the vital role played by the identity of Christ as the `fulfiller of the law' and `bringer of the Kingdom' in the exegesis of the Sermon offered by Eduard Thurneysen and Dietrich Bonhoeffer in (...) their respective works Die Bergpredigt (1936) and Nachfolge (1937). Both readings assert that the force and nature of the claims of the Sermon cannot be understood aright apart from constant attention to the difference made by the fact that Christ is the preacher. Out of this shared conviction, both theologians advance a reading of the Sermon as `the gospel itself' in the light of the eschatological identity of Jesus. Such readings of the Sermon, arising amidst the German Kirchenkampf of the 1930s, represent substantial contributions to the `responsible interpretation' of the Barmen Declaration (1934) whose second article states that, `As Jesus Christ is God's assurance of the forgiveness of all our sins, so in the same way and with the same seriousness is he also God's mighty claim upon our whole life.'. (shrink)

The claims of Mt. 5:17—20 are often taken to provide the interpretive key to the ethical claims of the Sermon on the Mount as a whole. The theological issue at stake here is the determinative relation between Christ's person and work and his teaching. This article explores the vital role played by the identity of Christ as the `fulfiller of the law' and `bringer of the Kingdom' in the exegesis of the Sermon offered by Eduard Thurneysen and Dietrich Bonhoeffer in (...) their respective works Die Bergpredigt (1936) and Nachfolge (1937). Both readings assert that the force and nature of the claims of the Sermon cannot be understood aright apart from constant attention to the difference made by the fact that Christ is the preacher. Out of this shared conviction, both theologians advance a reading of the Sermon as `the gospel itself' in the light of the eschatological identity of Jesus. Such readings of the Sermon, arising amidst the German Kirchenkampf of the 1930s, represent substantial contributions to the `responsible interpretation' of the Barmen Declaration (1934) whose second article states that, `As Jesus Christ is God's assurance of the forgiveness of all our sins, so in the same way and with the same seriousness is he also God's mighty claim upon our whole life.'. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Exhortation, Refutation, and Examination Inquiry – Not Teaching The “What is x?” Question.

The readers/hearers of the Fourth Gospel are not meant simply to learn from its scenes; they must encounter Jesus and be challenged by him, so they are led to perceive God's ways rather than fitting Jesus into their own preconceived needs.

Columbanus, not to be confused with his near-contemporary Columba of Iona, was a towering figure in the religious and political life of Europe in the Dark Ages. In this lively biography of the saint, Carol Richards evokes the violent and unstable age that laid the foundations for the achievements of the Middle Ages.

Hearing the words of Deuteronomy, the preacher is called to make clear what it means to be God's covenant community and to live according to his will rather than the dictates of the surrounding culture.

Welsh rock band the Manic Street Preachers have travelled a great distance in the years since the release of their first album Generation Terrorists in 1991. They’ve had a myriad of musical styles, huge mid-to-late-90s popularity, the still-unsolved disappearance of songwriter Richey Edwards, acclaim, and some derision, along the way. A band committed to their vision, the Manics’ work has always had an overt political and philosophical focus which has set them apart from contemporaries both in Welsh music and (...) the wider British popular scene. The band’s third album, The Holy Bible, now widely regarded as one of the best British albums of the 1990s, is an education in nihilism and alienation. (shrink)

Elaine J. Lawless. Handmaidens of the Lord: Pentecostal Women Preachers and Traditional Religion. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988. ISBN 0812212657. Paper, $18.95. ISBN 0812281004. Hardcover, $41.95. Pp. xx+272.

This essay wants to provide a preliminary introduction to, and initial contextualization of the sermons of the seventeenth-century Capuchin preacher Geminianus von Mainz. To my knowledge, his literary production has never been a subject of exhaustive scholarship, even though it has been portrayed by some as a typical example of Bavarian baroque preaching from the later seventeenth century.1 More recently, his metaphorical approach to marriage has been commented upon in passing by Ulrike Strasser and Merry Wiesner-Hanks,2 whereas several culinary remarks (...) in his sermons drew the attention of the late German gastrosopher Christoph Wagner, as can be read in the chapter on 'Barocke... (shrink)

Questions of ethics and politics have a long tradition in the classroom as well as the political world. Those who act in the political realm¿including the media, political strategists and consultants, educators, and religious leaders¿are in professions for which a clear code of conduct or an accepted set of ethical norms exists. By contrast, Donald J. Trump, as candidate and as President, has upended the political and ethical context in which he and others operate. This book explores emerging ethical questions (...) that face professionals interacting with a new executive order. Some say the age of Trump is unique and that the norms of ethical professional behavior must be bent to meet this challenge. Others maintain that responding to someone like Trump is precisely why their profession has ethical norms, and that they must put their judgments on hold and respond in what has always been deemed the appropriate professional manner. Each chapter opens with an introduction setting the framework of ethical analysis for a particular profession, is followed by original contributions by notable practitioners, and concludes with a set of questions for students and other readers to ponder and discuss. (shrink)

In Let's Talk about Truth, Ann Garrido shares practical ways that preachers and others charged with moral and spiritual leadership in the Church can stop backing away from the topic and instead help Catholics recover the practice of truth as a way of life to which we are all called.

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the Franciscan regular Observance and its milieu produced a series of hagiographical portraits of its greatest and most renowned preachers:1 Bernardino da Siena, Giovanni da Capestrano, Giacomo della Marca, and Bernardino da Feltre.2 This biographical material has been long disregarded by scholars or used only partially, and has rarely been compared in its entirety.3 The majority of these texts are virtually unknown, written by anonymous or little-known authors, and the goals and audiences of (...) these biographies remain equally shadowy.All of these vitae stand in a tradition that began during the fifteenth century, but.. (shrink)