Our Poverty of Purity

I have recently been reflecting on the spiritual formation I experienced in my high school youth group. I want to share how our views on purity may have set us up to fail in dealing with sexual brokenness. Simply put: The thoughts and attitudes of contemporary church culture toward purity are inadequate. There are two primary viewpoints: flippancy and hyper-purity, both of which cause harm in our community.

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Give Christian Entertainment a Chance

In a community where we believe “In All Things Christ Pre-eminent,” Christian entertainment gets a bad rap. We believe in common grace as one of the reasons The Silence of the Lambs is an artful movie, and I have seen more “not church-approved” movies in Covenant classes than I have all my life. We know doing art and entertainment for the glory of God doesn’t always mean painting a Thomas Kinkade picture of perfect houses glowing with perfect lighting in front of a perfect sunrise.

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An Open Apology to Covenant Administration

As I opened up The Bagpipe last week, I was slightly horrified by what I read in Carrie Woodward's article entitled "Mandatory Meal Plan." When I read my own name and the comments about the meal plan that were associated with it, I was shocked by what I read. The comments attributed to my name were highly critical and accusatory. I couldn't believe I had actually written them on the change.org petition, so I went and checked to make sure I hadn't been misquoted or taken out of context. To my embarrassment, those were my words.

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Response to Global Warming

Before spring break, I noticed an article in the Bagpipe that showed how the changing weather we’ve all experienced does not disprove global warming, citing NASA’s data on the issue. I decided to write a response, not to show how wrong someone is if they believe in climate change, but to show that there is another side that ought to be taken into consideration.

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Chatty

Jane Tjahjono’s article from a couple of weeks ago, “Praying and Looking Off the Mountain,”  reminded me that I’ve been wanting to write a Bagpipe article for a while now. If you recall, Jane’s excellent article challenged students to look beyond the confines of Lookout Mountain and be dedicated to praying for those suffering in our world. Similarly, I want to suggest that we can do a better job engaging the wider Chattanooga community; we can play a small part in the efforts to alleviate the pains of those suffering locally.

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