Theology

I’m going to be honest with you. I find prayer really hard. If I had to give reasons for all my tears over the past few years, most of them have come during conversations with God.

As we know all too well, life can be hard. Even in the best of times, life can be hard. But now this, a pandemic? How are we to cope?

I don’t remember much about the moment. I remember its warmth, and the way it glowed with purpose and spirit. But the stage is blurry. The song which pulsed out from it is uncertain. I know it came from a good friend of mine, one whose spot-lit glory provoked in me no jealousy, no feeling of being left out.

I talked to Pastor Nicu Butoi about the role that religion could play in treating depression and hopelessness, at the end of a series of evangelistic presentations he gave to a full-house before the pandemic.

No scene depicting the birth of Jesus is complete without angels.

The veneration of saints is a very old tradition in Christianity. Many Christians cannot imagine their religion without appealing to saints for guidance, protection, healing and intercession. Less concerned with theological correctness, people seek the company of saints out of loneliness, hardship, sickness, fear, guilt, or disappointment.

An ordinary wooden chair is a metaphor that’s often used to talk about the key dynamics of faith. But it’s worth exploring further. Perhaps we could describe this as a process of developing the theory of a chair.

At the appointed time in the plan of salvation, Christ was sent to us: "When the set time had fully come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law..." (Galatians 4:4).

God gave Christians a message to spread. The whole Bible talks about creation, about the fall of the world into sin, but also about the existence of a Saviour, in the person of Jesus Christ.

In a conversation with Dr. Shelly-Ann Bowen, we discussed her research on what determines whether someone will be active or passive in the face of catastrophic events—fires, floods, or a cancer diagnosis. Social injustice, a lack of self-awareness, and even an immature understanding of faith paralyse action. But there are ways to make positive changes.

By the year 2022, I had not lost anyone close to me, but I had the feeling, as never before, that death was approaching with unexpected speed. The war that was taking place to the east of Romania, and the news that we were in second place in the world in terms of the number of deaths per thousand inhabitants, made me think...

As the crisis caused by the new coronavirus deepened and spread, it was to be expected that the phenomenon would be framed in apocalyptic terms. It is something that tends to occur in such contexts.

In Europe, one in twenty people suffer from depression, and one in four will experience depression during their lifetime. In the United States, major depressive disorder affects about five percent of the population.

Much of the Bible was written by prophets, so it is full of prophetic revelation. Most of these revelations are about mysteries of the past and present that we would not otherwise have access to.

When a visitor walks into your church, what will they see? What will they hear? How will they feel?