I write to you from the exibitor hall at the 2024 meetings of AAR/SBL (the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature) in sunny San Diego. One of the highlights of trips like this is the chance to see some of our writers. Here is a picture of a few CC editors with scholar Mac Loftin (second from right).
A picture with Mac Loftin is timely because he is the author of one of our two new pieces on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, both of which are sort of going viral right now. Loftin’s piece is specifically about the new movie Bonhoeffer and the ways it dangerously misinterprets the German pastor. The other essay is from renowned Bonhoeffer scholar Victoria Barnett, who explores the lessons we can glean from the real Bonhoeffer (as opposed to the version of him we find in books and movies).
“In the movie’s political and moral universe, the only dilemma is whether the good guys can set aside their squeamishness and start killing the bad guys. For the real Bonhoeffer, this was exactly the fantasy of moral purity that led so many into complicity with fascism’s escalating spiral of violence.”
“That, I believe, is Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s real significance for us today: here was a man who over a period of 12 terrible years reflected with remarkable honesty and poignancy on the nature of the Christian faith and witness in evil times.”
“In the hours and days following her transition to the ancestral realm, social media flooded with stories from her colleagues, students, and friends. Everyone who knew her has a Barbara story.”
