Could an ancient African bishop know you better than you know yourself? Philosopher James K.A. Smith thinks so. Though Augustine died in 430 CE, he is our contemporary, Smith insists, because the existentialist philosophers whose ideas molded and still permeate our cultural atmosphere were stirred by his search for an authentic self.

Smith’s new book On the Road with St. Augustine is “a travelogue of the heart”, mapping a handful of destinations where Augustine has stopped before us:

• Freedom — How to escape
• Ambition — How to aspire
• Sex — How to connect
• Mothers — How to be dependent
• Friendship — How to belong
• Story — How to be a character
• Enlightenment — How to protest
• Fathers — How to be broken
• Death — How to hope

It’s a beautiful read and a stirring presentation of the Christian faith. In fact, “Augustine might make Christianity believable for you even if you’ve heard it all, been there, done that, and left the stupid Christian T-shirt at home,” writes Smith. "Here’s a Christianity to consider before you stop believing.”

Pick up a copy of On the Road with St. Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts. You can read the first chapter online or listen to James K.A. Smith talk about “Reforming Our Ambition” in this stimulating lecture.

Faced with centuries of war and violence, modern theology has commonly presented the Holy Spirit as an embracive, comprehensive current that ushers the world into the fullness of the divine. Call it force or call it flow, the Spirit’s aim is to lift humanity beyond painful mortal limits until all becomes Spirit in an inclusive, limitless affirmation.

In this complex and moving lecture, theologian Ephraim Radner explains how this recent theology obscures central Christian claims about the divine grace of our limitations as creatures made by God. With his own family history of suicide in view, Radner is also concerned that the claims of modern pneumatology might encourage people to move beyond the pain of this life by choosing to die — to believe that "the world as it is as a creation of God, with all its intrinsic mortal limits, is without hope unless and until it is left behind.”

What, then, is the role of the Holy Spirit? To drive us and join us to the body of Jesus Christ. In Jesus, we find “the whole fullness of what it means to be a human person in God’s eyes.” We see “the order of our life as we are given it and called into it: that our lives be given over to the fullness of the grace of our creator for birth, for suffering, for labor, for joy, for death, and for resurrection.”

“Those who choose to live require first the choice that God has made to live this life that they were given."

Listen to "Spirit of Life and Death: Modern Pneumatology and the Struggle against Mortality” and this illuminating interview with Radner. For the brave among us, Radner's new book on the topic is also available.

French journalist Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry (known to his readers as PEG) was once skeptical about the “hyperbolic warnings about the perils of pornography” coming from his Evangelical and progressive feminist friends. A deep dive into the latest scientific research has changed his mind. “I have become deadly serious,” writes PEG in this important article. 

PEG marshals the most recent data for a truly science-based case showing the dangers of online pornography. "I wanted to be as precise as possible about what we can know scientifically about porn, with a high degree of certainty, versus things we can strongly suspect, albeit not prove."

PEG shows how porn has dramatically changed in the past fifteen years. Couple the advent of free YouTube-like porn sites since 2006 with the proliferation of smartphones since 2007 and you end up with an unprecedented public health issue. Forget about magazines under the bed. xThis ubiquitous new porn delivery system combines with hardwired features of the human brain to make it “uniquely addictive, on par with any drug you might name—and uniquely destructive."

Find out how in “A Science-Based Case for Ending the Porn Epidemic”. This might seem an odd choice for the final section of our newsletter, but it could be the most practically important thing you read as we enter this new decade, especially if you live and work with children or teenagers.