Northwoods Seelsorger

 I was privileged to hear the author, Dr. Ordway, offer a lecture on Tolkien at Nashotah House Seminary, in April of this year. At the lecture I purchased her book, Tolkien's Faith, and have been working on it off and on now for at least four months.  It took a while, in part, because I have a tendency to read more than one book at a time.    I have been interested in J.R.R. Tolkien for a number of years and was already working my way through his magnum opus, the Lord of the Rings for the second time twenty years later. Thus, I was was pleased to learn more about his faith, something not readily covered in summaries of his life and work and not always obvious in his popular writing.  Although baptized within the Anglican Church in South America, he was subsequently raised in the Roman Catholic Church in England following his father's death.  His mother also passed away relatively early, and so his upbringing fell to Fr. Francis Morgan of the Birmingham Ora...

   Recently, due to the influx of conservative Mennonites and Amish into my rural community, I have begun to reflect on the conflict between traditional culture and what I call "the ever-evolving culture."  I am reading extensively now on Amish history and practice, trying to better understand my new neighbors.  Yet as I do I realize parallels to my own struggle within the Lutheran church and its divergent 'cultures.'  My traditional, rural parish still reflects the worship and practices of previous generations. We use hymnals. We follow the established liturgies. We sing the 'old' hymns. But the lure to newer and more progressive parishes looms large.  Some churches cater to this increasingly casual culture, offering a 'style' of worship that has easy access and little demand.  It is well suited to a generation that eschews anything formal, preferring to dress down and enjoy church much like one might enjoy an outdoor music festival on a ...