Tristitia: The Christian Sin of Surrender

September 16, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

Tristitia is the Latin name for a sin, or a negative spiritual state, that is the subject of some degree of controversy. Usually, of course, sins are not very controversial — you won’t find many people defending theft, for example, or singing lauds to the glories of unadulterated envy. Murder is universally deplored, and adultery — if glanced at somewhat admiringly by the vanguard of degeneracy in our contemporary culture — retains its pejorative shading in most circles. But tristitia... Read more

Tragically, God Gives Us What We Want

August 25, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

We are all aware of the fact that God hardened the heart of Pharaoh when Moses demanded that the Jewish people be allowed to leave Egypt. Pharaoh said No, and he said it repeatedly. And we know from our studies of Hebrew that when the Old Testament text says that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, it means that God accelerated the man’s already-established predilection in the direction of refusal. Pharaoh had already determined on a course of stubbornness in regard to... Read more

How Prince Charming Saved Me From Hell

August 17, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

It’s a vexed question to be sure, but here’s how I have come to envision a possible solution to the problem of how individual sinners become saved through grace. I have employed the help of a classic fairy tale, because I find that fairy tales — being the imaginative products of a Christian civilization — embody profound Christian truths in vivid, colorful and memorable images. I have pointed out before, in my book Moral Majesty, Spiritual Splendor, how Rumpelstiltskin spinning... Read more

The Embittered Christian

July 29, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

On the one hand, Jesus tells us to pray that extreme trials and testings will swerve and avoid us in their providential careening round the world (Matthew 6:13). On the other hand, we’re told in various passages that afflictions are headed our way, and we should rejoice in them. Christ says: “In this world you will have troubles, but be of good cheer: I have overcome the world.” I believe that. But what about us? How does His overcoming the... Read more

The Case For Christian Agnosticism

July 3, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

Anyone who seriously studies the Bible for any length of time comes to a point, I suppose, where he or she must say: “I just don’t know concerning this point of doctrine.” Or this element of the Faith, or this particular tile in the mosaic of my theology. In fact, it may so happen that one’s field of “unknowing” grows over time, and actually increases with biblical study. It has happened in my own experience, and I’m beginning to suspect... Read more

I’m The Greatest Threat To My Own Faith

March 11, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

It’s the long slog through the desert that is the most depressing and debilitating for many believers – that interminable “race” (in Paul’s words) that seems to be much more like a crawl through parched and draining sand traps, spiritually speaking. It is when there appears to be no advancement in sanctification that one is most defeated – or at least that is when one is most tempted to see no hope in the Christian life of (apparently) overblown promises.... Read more

Necromancy & Idolatry: A Dialogue

February 21, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

Anson: You do know, my friend, that a defining feature of ancient Canaanite religion was a constant solicitation of the dead for help in everyday affairs. You are aware of the fact that communication with revered ancestors, who had gone on to the land of Mot, was an integral part of their daily devotions. Squire: And what, pray tell, does that have to do with the Roman Catholic veneration of saints? Or with the intercession of the saints in the... Read more

Holy Sonnets 14 through 20

January 30, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

XIV We have strong joy because His joy is stronger And more robust, fuller, heartier than all those Little firework-squibs and faint sparklers – those Sporadic spurts of celebration we manage to find in Our seas of steadfast gray. Out of the ennui endlessly Lulling comes on occasion the lighthouse-beam Needling a line of light through the night, the un- Ending night of the long march. Here we have joy Infused and fed to us unendingly, even in the waiting... Read more

Holy Sonnets 9 Through 13

January 19, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

IX If humanity is the renegade rag-girl in the tale Of all history, then the prescient Prince has always Loved her through all ages, as she picked through Bones and ash and assorted litter, looking for Gems or even just pennies in the trash. He had Always known and loved her, from the beginning Or before, convinced always of how he would Rescue her, not just giving up his diadem and wealth, But taking on agony and shame as... Read more

Holy Sonnets 4 through 8

January 9, 2024 By Clark Elder Morrow

The Hero is a fitting sobriquet: he does what he Would rather not, by a wide degree. Death is nothing Beside a suffering conjured into being Through hurting and hurtling into rage one you Love most, and most want to soften and assuage. To bear black obloquy and iniquity into The Throne Room, where once you played as Prince – Into the loved one’s sphere of personal private Intimacy – while wearing rags offal-befouled – This is the torment of... Read more