I have structured this page in such a way that it is available "at a glance" to others, who might share some of my interests. I am tired of having all of my favourite and interesting website URLs scattered across the "Favourites" lists on every browser I've ever had access to. As a result, I'm on a mission to put them somewhere that I can actually access them. Just because I list a URL does not mean I agree with the page in question. I find a great number of things interesting even though I profoundly disagree with them.
Due to somebody's sensible suggstion, it is now linked from AngelaRayner. I have also chopped large bits of discussion that have ensued about the links themselves. Since it is a Wiki, people can just put them back again if they desire, but I'd really rather they set up separate pages to discuss the pages' contents.
ARGH. This page is spiralling out of control. Ideally I want the whole Theology section categorised into sub-sections of what kind of theology it discusses...
I have started putting icons next to the links that are out of order. A lot of them have become out dated recently, and I may well put links from the Way Back machine in their place. In looking up the out of date ones, I've got as far as the section on Mary, but have not completed that section.
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/ The Summa. Obviously. A lifetime's worth of reading, so in the immortal words of a lecturer of mine, "don't bother reading the secondary literature" :) :)
http://www.cqod.net/ Christian Quotation of the Day - Evangelical leaning, but one of my favourite sources for quotes
http://www.firstthings.com/ An American conservative, but scholarly political/theological journal with articles free after the month they're published. One of my favourites.
http://dictionary.oed.com/ (It probably helps to be looking at this from a domain that has a subscription).
http://www.bigbrother.net/~mugwump/Hauerwas/ Quite possibly the definitive Stanley Hauerwas site on the Internet. It does not contain every Hauerwas resource, but it's a good place to start.
http://www.waybackmachine.org/ It's a magical mystery machine for tracking webpages that once existed, but now don't. I use it for items that Google caches, but will probably expire.
http://www.etymonline.com/ An online dictionary of etymology. I've used this on a number of occasions and have found it both useful and full of good insight.
http://milkbadger.2y.net/library/ An interesting collection of links from Bill Cavanaugh, Stanley Fish, Stanley Hauerwas, Richard Hays, Ivan Illich, Christopher Lasch, Stephen Long, Alasdair MacIntyre?, JH Yoder etc. Some of them are already on this list.
http://crc.sa.utoronto.ca/articles/ Bookmarked for a rainy day. Looks like interesting articles on "home" - homecoming, homelessness and home-making. Seems to be from a sensible Evangelical perspective, and addresses issues relating to term post-modernism.
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/patron00.htm This is a great site that enables you to find obscure topics associated with the saints. If you have problems with procrastinating, enlist the help of St Expeditus. You'll have to ignore the fact that he's possibly legendary! What about computer technicians? Their patron saint is Isidore of Seville.
http://www.rosary-center.org/howto.htm A good description of how to pray the rosary with a picture to aid you. I find this useful because I'm still not very good at getting the order right.
http://www.interchurchfamilies.org/journal/2002jul10.shtm The substance of a talk by Ruth Reardon on the life of Fr John Coventry SJ and his activities with inter-Church families. I found this article while doing a search for something else, but the description of John Coventry impressed me greatly.
http://www.xenos.org/essays/litthry4.htm "A BRIEF HISTORY OF LITERARY THEORY III" By Chris Lang. I found this a good critical summary of Stanley Fish's reader-response theory, but I've not dug deeper. I suspect the author and I would eventually disagree.
http://www.stnina.org/journal/art/1.2.11 "The Significance of the Maleness of Jesus Christ" by Valerie Karras. The author writes for a newish Orthodox organisation.
http://www.deepsight.org/articles/bible1.htm "Letting the Bible speak" by Graham Redding. This is written in line with "Unleashing the Scriptures". I'm starting to read about more narrative approaches to Scripture.
http://extras.denverpost.com/books/chborder0318.htm A piece by Rodney Clapp on "can evangelicals be nonfoundationalists?" I want every evangelical in the world to read this and to stop being captured by a certain kind of "scientific" hegemony.
http://haus-von-nomos.com/kp2.html A generally good introduction to non-foundationalism, especially to its bearing on Evangelicalism. I consider this a very well-written piece.
http://www.jesusradicals.com/index.php Articles by Hauerwas, Milbank, Cavanaugh etc. The library section is the good bit. This is Christian "lefty" site by the look of it.
http://astro.temple.edu/~arcc/burns.htm A very well written email by Peter Burns S.J. re. the status of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. I think he's spot on. Also contains info. re. how the RCC understands infallibility.
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/407001.htm An article, re. circumcision as a sacrament that may one day link with my long-time-in-coming article, "Practice Matters".
http://www.crosscurrents.org/whelan.htm The Responsible Body: Eucharistic Community by Matthew Whelan. This will eventually go into a political theology section... here is a quote from the article: "In [The Lord's Prayer], those who pray find themselves enfolded into a narrative in which concern for others' bread, or lack of it, is their obligation; they find themselves responsible for the hunger of others at the roots of their selves."
http://livedtheology.org/biblio.htm Index of papers from a group at Virginia University called "Lived Theology". Milbank article & one by Amy Laura Hall.
http://www.cofe.anglican.org/info/socialpublic/ People often ask, "what do Anglicans believe about abortion or euthanasia or whatever?". The answer is usually "They think lots of things". This page is a pointer towards documents that seek to answer that sort of question.
http://www.cofe.anglican.org/info/papers/placeofrefuge.pdf An Anglican article which I highly commend on refugees called "a place of refuge: a positive approach to asylum seekers and refugees in the UK". Sometimes it surprises me what good theological work goes on behind the scenes.
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~mikef/church.html An interesting and balanced take on the BCP ceremony of "The Churching of Women" or "Thanksgiving of Women After Childbirth"
http://www.btinternet.com/~glynhughes/squashed/index.htm I've no idea if it's done well, but this site provides squashed versions of the texts of various philosophers (Augustine's Confessions are included). Also, it provides cute icons to show how long it will take to read each text!
Possible resources for thinking about catechesis with adults and children
http://www.kencollins.com/pray-21.htm Does it matter whether we sit, stand or kneel in Church? I think this article combined with speaking about customs and manners would make a great slot on prayer and bodies. The way we greet, eat and meet our friends matters, and so does the way we greet, meet and eat our Lord in the sacrament. The author uses the Jesus prayer in 4 different positions to show how context matters.
http://www.kencollins.com/pray-20.htm "Should we sit, stand or kneel to pray?" Shows 5 traditional postures for prayer... This is great. One could ask children to assume the positions and then ask whether they could guess what kind of prayer would be offered from each one. Eg. kneeling = petitionary, standing with hands lifted = praise.
http://mariannedorman.homestead.com/Contents.html Marianne Dorman's catholic website. This looks to be an excellent catechetical resource for adults with a good devotional slant. It has introductory articles on the creed, the Bible and saints and seasons. Also has good resources on female abbesses and monasticism.
http://www.elca.org/dcm/worship/faq/ This is the Evangelical Lutherans FAQ on worship. It could go here or under liturgy, but it contains some fantastic questions and answers.
Beginnings of articles by and about Hans Urs von Balthasar
http://www.ratzingerfanclub.com/Balthasar/ More Balthasar links than even the most Balthasarian Balthasar fan could possibly need. The more I read, the more I'm sceptical of his account of gender, but I want to write theology like him.
http://www.secondspring.co.uk/bulletin/highlights33.htm Details of some random conference and a few mildly worded critiques of Balthasar on gender under the heading "The Catholic Theological Association of Great Britain".
Beginnings of articles by and about Amy Laura Hall
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/7/hall.htm "In what sense equal?" An article on 3 construals of human beings as equal through: imago dei, redemption and adoption. Hall criticises the asking of the question "who counts as human being?" and writes from concern for people often regarded as extraneous.
http://www.faithandvalues.com/tx/JLE-8/2/ An article from the Journal of Lutheran Ethics named "The Irreproducible Gift: Musings on Christ and biotechnological reproduction.". I consider it one of the most timely and well written articles that I've listed here. I return to it often.
http://www.theotherjournal.net/article.php?id=28 An interview with Amy Laura Hall by Chris Keller on Evangelicals having heartily embraced reproductive technology. I'm looking out for anything published or printed by ALH as I'm quite excited by some of what she to say about Christian practices.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/011/22.70.html "A Hard Pill to Swallow" - This article is connected to the one below and is by the editor of Christianity Today, Agnieszka Tennant, who had a change of heart with regard to the birth control pill after hearing Amy Hall.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2004/007/9.30.html "Unwanted Interruptions". An interview with Hall about the "interruption" of children into our lives. It has to be said that my favourite line in the article runs like this: 'It is not unusual for Hall to check her blouse for toddler goop as she begins a lecture.' What a celebration of embodiment!
http://www.religion-online.org (This website does not keep static links. Use search terms: Politics, Difference.) When the Politics of Jesus Makes a Difference - by Stanley Hauerwas
http://www.nd.edu/~theo/jhy/ Not everything by Yoder is in print. This is a site providing some of his unpublished articles. I think he has written the most interesting piece I've read for a while on homosexuality, called "History and Hermeneutics".
A few articles surrounding research into the "Historical Jesus" phenomenon.
http://www.worldvieweyes.org/resources/Strauss/QuestforHistoricalJesus.htm All you could ever want to know about the supposed "historical" Jesus quests. This page has a good summary of all 5 quests (what more could one want?). And yes, I'm sceptical of this stuff, even when it comes from writers I agree with. Who is the unhistorical Jesus anyway?
http://energion.com/rpp/hjbib.shtml A good page on the historical Jesus literature, giving guidelines on how conservative and how scholarly certain books are.
http://godsfriends.org/Vol16/No1/james-alison-interview.html An interview with James Alison - from which the most interesting quote is: "It seems to me to that the capacity of gay males to start to consider ourselves normal is the direct result of women having started to become equals or comparative equals within previously all-male groups."
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=1816 An article by Dr Peter A. Bertocci on "Keeping Quality in Sexual Experience". It's really interesting and moves from criticism of "better technology" to naming the courage required to marry.
http://www.litim-oi.org/menu.html The Li Tim-Oi Foundation exists to carry on the ministry of the first Anglican Woman Priest by enabling women in the Two Thirds World to train for Christian work in their own countries. (Why have I not heard of this before?)
Female priesthood? and a few articles on priesthood generally.
http://www.womanpriest.org/contemp1.htm Lots of pro-priest articles. I'm getting kind of sceptical of the general 'approach' from this site, but I like some of the stuff from Tina Beattie.
http://pontifications.classicalanglican.net/index.php?p=108 Entitled "Catholicity or female priests? Must the choice be made?" It is a (still ongoing and massively sprawling) debate on preciely this question. It has a slightly American bias.
http://www.peacetheology.org/papers/huebner.html An article that questions the epistemology of peace in a way that I think will take years to practice. This is a very well written piece about peace.
http://www.kingdomnow.org/essaytheo.html In re-searching for "When the politics of Jesus makes a difference", I found this page. It seems to contain peace resources. Looks fascinating.
http://www.bluffton.edu/~mastg/pacifism.htm Writings on Christian Nonresistance and Pacifism from Anabaptist-Mennonite Sources. Last time I checked, some of the links didn't work.
http://www.cpt.org/ Christian Peacemaker Teams. This is what I'm doing next ;-)
http://www.scit.wlv.ac.uk/ukinfo/alpha.html When there's little to do of an evening, some people watch Big Brother. I, however, seem to look for information Dionysius the Aeropagite's angelology.
Education
http://www.bethelks.edu/mennonitelife/2003Mar/huebner.php "Christian Education: The Question of Engagement" by Harry Huebner. There's a whole series of these articles, all critiquing one another on the Mennonite Life website, but I really like this one. Check out the introduction.
http://www.bethelks.edu/mennonitelife/2003Mar/schrag.php "Beautiful Minds, Crucified Minds, and Hospitable Hearts" by Dale R. Schrag. Whether you teach, learn or both in an academic institution, you should read this. It's about academic hospitality.
http://www.farmington.ac.uk/documents/old_docs/Wood.htm "UNLEASHING THE LION: TEACHING THE BIBLE IN THE POST-MODERN CLASSROOM" by Cavan Wood. It's a long and sprawling text. I can't remember why I read it (or if I read the whole lot), but it's got some interesting Stanley Fish excerpts.
http://www.romanrite.com/j070302.html John Lilburne's journal about articles by Bishop Ryan of Monterey on postures for the people. (This is all rather foreign to my ears, and my former self would have raged about excessive legalism, but I find the thinking on posture fascinating, even if I don't care for too much of this kind of sentiment.)
http://www.ourladyswarriors.org/articles/badliturgy.htm "Is Your Mass Valid? Liturgical Abuse" Bruce Sabalaskey. It's from a Roman point of view, and I don't subscribe, but it's useful for thinking about why ritual matters.
http://www.oremus.org/liturgy/lhwe/passion.html Here are the Passion Narratives in both continuous and dramatic form. Most people would have little use for them, but Google can't find "Passion Narratives Dramatic Form" so I thought I'd help out Parish Administrators!
http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgi-bin/register.cgi/tablet-00980 Eamon Duffy on the Mass, including his classic lament: "The once abundant repertoire of para-liturgical rituals, devotions and sacramentals, by which Catholics mark, bless or dedicate key events, has dwindled, and the Mass has become for most of us the one-fit focus of the sacred."
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/pope0264ih.htm "Women: Teacher's of Peace." from 1995 World Day of Peace. Even though I worry about the implied essentialism (and like he's really going to care what I think), I /still/ re-read and enjoy this document. Go women!
General Christianity:
http://www.catholicculture.org/ Catholic Culture Home Page. I think it has lots of conservative Catholic articles of interest.
http://www.economist.com/research/backgrounders/ A really handy page with links to the background of many world-conflict and other situations. Probably need a decent access service to get further into the page.
http://www.sogang.ac.kr/~anthony/Religion.htm This might be useful to A-Level or undergrad English Lit. students who are looking for links pertaining to Geoffrey Chaucer, religion and The Canterbury Tales.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/ This is a great resource for youth work/children's work that not enough people know about. The Bible (slowly emerging) in lego caricatures.
http://www.trainupachild.com/ Dubious Evangelical site for bringing up Christian children who play Christianly... However, it has some great action man/woman figures. I am a particular fan of Goliath. Also, it looks to me as though Mary has muscles. If you order one of these, you get an Angel free!!
http://www.kitchengifts.com/religious.html Tonnes more religious biscuit cutters. This one features an Ark, a harp, a Hebrew scroll, a Christian fish, obscurely a tea cup and pot, and also a camel with a large hump. For all of those occasions when you need to make biscuits!
http://www.bakingshop.com/cakes/religious/ Religious cake decorating and party supplies - nothing much useful to me here, but has some edible "First Communion" decorations if you so require.
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/edibles/edibles.htm#org Edible images for cakes. This site has the dubious prvilege of containing the only edible Virgin Mary that I've found on the entire world wide web. However, it doesn't say how large Our Lady of Guadeloupe actually is, which is a drawback. I am /still/ looking for small (fairy-cake sized), edible BVMs for Marian feast days!
http://www.tastyfotoart.com/ These people let you send them images which they will turn into edible objects. Could be useful if the Mary search proves fruitless.
Misc:
http://www.sfs.org.uk/ This is the website for the Society for Storytelling. Since I think story telling is a forgotten art, maybe I'll get in touch with them to see if it's possible to learn to practice some time...
http://www.countryloversstore.com/ If you want to look as cool as I do, buy your Drizabone coat from this site. They shipped me mine within two days of ordering and they are very weatherproof coats. Also, they have leg straps, meant for riding, but good for cycling too. [Discussion snipped. People have pointed out that the coding on this page is not secure for ordering. I've not faced repercussions, but watch this space.]