Two Theological Magazines
Theological magazines are quickly becoming an endangered species, with video channels, nefarious bloggers like myself, and even memes becoming the norm for Christian content. Much of it can be humorous, but in recent years I have found a lot of content relying on occupying a position rather than sparking any genuine thought. For a lot of this content, it seems that their success depends on bypassing the need to think at all.
In this kind of environment, theological magazines occupy a precious place. They are not quite formal scholarly journals, yet their reason for being is premised upon the need for genuine deep thought, even as they try to reach an audience beyond the academy. At the same time, they have to establish a foothold without pandering to the growing factionalism that is becoming the norm in our discursive spaces. In this kind of environment, the way forward appears to lie in sinking deep roots in a particular tradition, yet inviting multiple voices, including those from outside one’s ecclesial borders, that can nonetheless express (sometimes better) that tradition.
In this regard, two publications have really stood out.
The first is Macrina Magazine, who this week celebrated their first birthday. Macrina focus on mining the Christian philosophical tradition to, in their words “offer a respite for overstimulated yet undernourished minds that are hungry for more substantial reflection than the twenty-four-hour news cycle can provide regarding our world and how we ought to live in it”. Names like John Milbank feature among its lists of essays. On a less illustrious note, I too had the pleasure of writing for them on the eschatology of dance music, and they have just issued a call for papers for their next edition.
The second magazine is Plough, which is the publication run by the Bruderhof, a German Anabaptist community that has affiliates around the world, including here in Australia. Though an Anabaptist magazine, I have also found Catholic authors heavily featured in its pages (in our neck of the woods, our Archdiocese has a good working relationship with the Bruderhof and they often have a stall presence at a number of Archdiocesan events). The content of the magazine touches upon deeply human matters such as the meaning of solidarity, the blessing of grief and the prayers of Chinese artists, among many others. The print editions of the magazine are veritable works of art and well worth the modest subscription fee.
I commend both of these as channels for greater solidarity and fraternity, as well as a means to nourish the mind and soul.
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