Featured Essay / Blog
A concerned student recently asked me to use my authority over a friend of theirs (also a student and mentee of mine) to help get them on the right track, for this friend was involved in quite destructive behavior. As we were talking, I was growing increasingly uncomfortable, but when…
Essay / Education
In his 1961 book An Experiment in Criticism, C.S. Lewis describes the difference between reading a book to encounter what is in it, and using a book for other reasons. There are lots of other reasons to use a book, some petty and some profound,
Essay / Education
Every July, about forty students and three professors from the Torrey Honors Institute take a trip to Cambridge for an intensive four-unit class. It’s Torrey Cambridge, and it’s a blast. The curriculum each summer is anchored in a short book of the New Testament, and
Essay / Culture
A virtue, in order to live up to its lofty title, must contain within itself its own proper resources for opposing the vice unique to it. As Aristotle taught us, virtues rarely travel alone; typically they wander the streets accompanied by distorted versions of themselves;
Essay / Culture
A few weeks ago Biola had the delight of installing our new Provost and Senior Vice President, Dr. Deborah Taylor. Part of the installation involved a series of charges from faculty who had been invited to articulate some of the key challenges ahead of Dr.
Essay / Blog
This week, I submitted the manuscript for the T&T Clark Companion to the Atonement, an edited work with 18 major chapters and 85 shorter essays from scholars around the world, exploring the doctrine of the atonement from a variety of angles. The various essays explore
Essay / Blog
A concerned student recently asked me to use my authority over a friend of theirs (also a student and mentee of mine) to help get them on the right track, for this friend was involved in quite destructive behavior. As we were talking, I was
Essay / Culture
Late in the Spring semester, life at Biola was disrupted by a shocking event: On the whiteboard wallspace over a dorm room door, somebody converted a cross to a swastika. One of the roommates in that dorm room was an African-American student. The best reporting
Essay / Education
Here’s an episode of The Common Room, the periodic vidcast of the Torrey Honors Institute, made possible by OpenBiola. What we try to capture and share in Common Room conversations is a little bit of the ongoing dialogue that makes up the daily life of
Essay / Culture
A recent documentary, The Hunting Ground, explores the tragedy of sexual assault on university and college campuses across the nation. Directed by Oscar-nominated Kirby Dick, maker of The Invisible War, which discusses the epidemic of rape within the military, The Hunting Ground serves as Dick’s
Essay / Education
See Part 1 here. In my first post, I sought to paint a constructive vision of academic conferences, but that is far from all there is to say—for a conference is a vice-saturated affair, and it’s worth knowing that ahead of time. One of the
Essay / Education
See Part 2 here. If you are interested in an academic career, welcome to the world of conferences. For all their weaknesses, these are one of the main heartbeats of the academy. Over two posts, I will do my best to pass along what I
Essay / Culture
This speech was originally given on March 3, 2016, by Professor Eva Brann of St. John’s College (Annapolis), as part of the Distinguished Lecture Series at the Torrey Honors Institute. The following is an excerpt. A link to her full speech is available on Open