Table of Contents
The book series Political Devotions: A Year in Public Spaces consists of an introduction, 52 essays, and a bibliography.1
The five devotions that make up the sample essay “What is politics?” are free and available now. The ten devotions that make up the series’s introduction is free. The first of those devotions is available now, and the other nine will be available on consecutive weekdays during the first two weeks of January. The bibliography also is free. Paid subscribers can access the rest of the book.
Sample Essay: What is politics?
PD 1: Public happiness
PD 2: Two conceptions of politics
PD 3: Outbreaks of political life
PD 4: “A strange and unknowable vision of ourselves”
PD 5: Discussion questions
Front Matter
Copyright
Dedication
Introduction
PD 1: Political science and political citizens — Monday, January 1, 2024 (available now)
PD 2: Devotional entries, pamphlets, and crosses — Tuesday, January 2, 2024
PD 3: The political nature of all devotional practice — Wednesday, January 3, 2024
PD 4: Hannah Arendt and N. T. Wright — Thursday, January 4, 2024
PD 5: Dualism versus triadic semiology — Friday, January 5, 2024
PD 6: Public space and God’s now-and-not-yet kingdom — Monday, January 8, 2024
PD 7: Courage and identity — Tuesday, January 9, 2024
PD 8: Public space and politics — Wednesday, January 10, 2024
PD 9: The book’s features and organization — Thursday, January 11, 2024
PD 10: Citizens as aliens and amateurs — Friday, January 12, 2024
Topic 1: Thresholds
Essay 1: Bricks and Stones
PD 1: Two ways of building communities — Monday, January 15, 2024
PD 2: Israel vs. Babylon, Pentecost vs. Rome — Tuesday, January 16, 2024
PD 3: Two cities moving in opposite directions — Wednesday, January 17, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Thursday, January 18, 2024
Essay 2: The Lord of Hosts
PD 1: God and Israel as political actors — Friday, January 19, 2024
PD 2: Federalism and covenant — Monday, January 22, 2024
PD 3: Israel’s history of federalism — Tuesday, January 23, 2024
PD 4: The Bible’s federal messianic vision — Wednesday, January 24, 2024
PD 5: The federalism of New England, the Cherokee, and the Iroquois — Thursday, January 25, 2024
PD 6: Federalism vs. mass society — Friday, January 26, 2024
PD 7: The purpose of our vice-regency — Monday, January 29, 2024
PD 7: Discussion questions — Tuesday, January 30, 2024
Essay 3: Toleration and Hospitality
PD 1: Hospitality precedes covenant — Wednesday, January 31, 2024
PD 2: Toleration’s stasis vs. hospitality’s dynamism — Thursday, February 1, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Friday, February 2, 2024
Essay 4: The Hidden Miracle
PD 1: Why people doubt the wine miracle — Monday, February 5, 2024
PD 2: Jesus’s “self-control and indirection” — Tuesday, February 6, 2024
PD 3: Jesus: straightforward or subversive? — Wednesday, February 7, 2024
PD 4: Jesus as trickster — Thursday, February 8, 2024
PD 5: The wine and the resurrection — Friday, February 9, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Monday, February 12, 2024
Essay 5: Space and Place
PD 1: Two New-World tempests in 1609 — Tuesday, February 13, 2024
PD 2: Shakespeare’s The Tempest on sovereignty — Wednesday, February 14, 2024
PD 3: From place to space and back again — Thursday, February 15, 2024
PD 4: Politics: Plato’s essence or God’s appearance? — Friday, February 16, 2024
PD 5: Public space and political place — Monday, February 19, 2024
PD 6: Re-enactment vs. recognition — Tuesday, February 20, 2024
PD 7: Discussion questions — Wednesday, February 21, 2024
Topic 2: Friends
Essay 6: Trinity and Covenant
PD 1: The Trinity in dots and and the line between them — Thursday, February 22, 2024
PD 2: Covenant as love in action — Friday, February 23, 2024
PD 3: Is “one” an individual or a unity? — Monday, February 26, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Tuesday, February 27, 2024
Essay 7: Friends and Neighbors
PD 1: Nickled and dimed — Wednesday, February 28, 2024
PD 2: Intimacy and action — Thursday, February 29, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Friday, March 1, 2024
Essay 8: Unity and Opinion
PD 1: The necessity of opinions — Monday, March 4, 2024
PD 2: Opinions and the U.S. Senate — Tuesday, March 5, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Wednesday, March 6, 2024
Essay 9: Our Medieval Constitution
PD 1: Medieval, trinitarian politics — Thursday, March 7, 2024
PD 2: Nominalism and tyranny — Friday, March 8, 2024
PD 3: America as a Medieval survivor — Monday, March 11, 2024
PD 4: America and political participation — Tuesday, March 12, 2024
PD 5: Politics and our conception of God — Wednesday, March 13, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Thursday, March 14, 2024
Topic 3: Covenants
Essay 10: Hobbes and Locke
PD 1: History vs. states of nature — Friday, March 15, 2024
PD 2: An appeal to heaven: natural and positive law — Monday, March 18, 2024
PD 3: Locke’s incompatible social contracts — Tuesday, March 19, 2024
PD 4: Locke’s compacts and the colonists’ incompatible experience — Wednesday, March 20, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Thursday, March 21, 2024
Essay 11: Perfection and Public Space
PD 1: How to be perfect — Friday, March 22, 2024
PD 2: Perfection under the Declaration of Independence — Monday, March 25, 2024
PD 3: God’s perfection — and ours — Tuesday, March 26, 2024
PD 4: Devotion to others in the new covenant — Wednesday, March 27, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Thursday, March 28, 2024
Essay 12: Creation and Objectivity
PD 1: Creation from nothing or from chaos? — Friday, March 29, 2024
PD 2: Objectivity through covenant — Monday, April 1, 2024
PD 3: Covenant and the earth’s wellbeing — Tuesday, April 2, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Wednesday, April 3, 2024
Essay 13: Three American Covenants
PD 1: Patterns of covenanting in the Bible and in the United States — Thursday, April 4, 2024
PD 2: Matching grant and treaty covenants — Friday, April 5, 2024
PD 3: Matching relationships among covenants — Monday, April 8, 2024
PD 4: The superiority of the second grant covenants — Tuesday, April 9, 2024
PD 5: Paul and Lincoln on relationships among covenants — Wednesday, April 10, 2024
PD 6: The Civil War Amendments as a second founding — Thursday, April 11, 2024
PD 7: Discussion questions — Friday, April 12, 2024
Topic 4: Community
Essay 14: Salvation and the Beloved Community
PD 1: Success is not enough — Monday, April 15, 2024
PD 2: Lawson, Royce, and Paul on the Beloved Community — Tuesday, April 16, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Wednesday, April 17, 2024
Essay 15: Church and Polis
PD 1: Ancient religion’s civic side — Thursday, April 18, 2024
PD 2: The church as a threat — Friday, April 19, 2024
PD 3: The church as Greek poleis and Roman assemblies — Monday, April 22, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Tuesday, April 23, 2024
Essay 16: Benefaction and Blessing
PD 1: Distance and privilege breed beneficence — Wednesday, April 24, 2024
PD 2: Communion and blessing — Thursday, April 25, 2024
PD 3: Common life overcomes distance — Friday, April 26, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Monday, April 29, 2024
Essay 17: Death and Banishment
PD 1: Individual punishment or social harmony — Tuesday, April 30, 2024
PD 2: Death or banishment as oblivion — Wednesday, May 1, 2024
PD 3: Romeo vs. Friar Lawrence — Thursday, May 2, 2024
PD 4: The individualized distortion of hope — Friday, May 3, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Monday, May 6, 2024
Essay 18: What is Politics?
PD 1: Public happiness — Tuesday, May 7, 2024
PD 2: Two conceptions of politics — Wednesday, May 8, 2024
PD 3: Outbreaks of true politics — Thursday, May 9, 2024
PD 4: “A strange and unknowable vision of ourselves” — Friday, May 10, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Monday, May 13, 2024
Topic 5: Freedom
Essay 19: Let My People Go
PD 1: The Declaration of Independence and the petition process — Tuesday, May 14, 2024
PD 2: The right of revolution — Wednesday, May 15, 2024
PD 3: Relationships fuel petitions — Thursday, May 16, 2024
PD 4: A pattern of oppression, salvation, and covenant — Friday, May 17, 2024
PD 5: Universality and racism — Monday, May 20, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Tuesday, May 21, 2024
Essay 20: Tyranny’s Freedoms
PD 1: Portable autonomous freedom — Wednesday, May 22, 2024
PD 2: Philosophic liberty — Thursday, May 23, 2024
PD 3: Safety from whom? — Friday, May 24, 2024
PD 4: Apathy and despotism — Monday, May 27, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Tuesday, May 28, 2024
Essay 21: Adams and Baldwin
PD 1: The slaves’ petitions — Wednesday, May 29, 2024
PD 2: Encountering the Other — Thursday, May 30, 2024
PD 3: The journey to public freedom — Friday, May 31, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Monday, June 3, 2024
Essay 22: Barns and Nobles
PD 1: God as a covenant-making king — Tuesday, June 4, 2024
PD 2: God’s multinational covenant — Wednesday, June 5, 2024
PD 3: No appropriation, no monopoly, no barns — Thursday, June 6, 2024
PD 4: Barns or community — Friday, June 7, 2024
PD 5: Small public spaces precede deliverance — Monday, June 10, 2024
PD 6: Middle Eastern reforms before Israel — Tuesday, June 11, 2024
PD 7: The reforms of Turtle Island’s First Nations — Wednesday, June 12, 2024
PD 8: Jesus’s backdrop: the Roman destruction of villages — Thursday, June 13, 2024
PD 9: Civilization and covenant life — Friday, June 14, 2024
PD 10: Discussion questions — Monday, June 17, 2024
Topic 6: Natality
Essay 23: Justice and Irony
PD 1: Repentance and public life — Tuesday, June 18, 2024
PD 2: Childbirth and the irony of justice — Wednesday, June 19, 2024
PD 3: Justice isn’t private — Thursday, June 20, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Friday, June 21, 2024
Essay 24: Anticipatory Democracy
PD 1: Paul’s eschatological and political moxie — Monday, June 24, 2024
PD 2: Jesus’s victory over violence — Tuesday, June 25, 2024
PD 3: Solidarity’s anticipatory democracy — Wednesday, June 26, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Thursday, June 27, 2024
Essay 25: Binding and Loosing
PD 1: Covenant and forgiveness as interruptors — Friday, June 28, 2024
PD 2: Romeo and Juliet: Shakespeare’s study of binding and loosing — Monday, July 1, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Tuesday, July 2, 2024
Essay 26: Entitlement and Entailment
PD 1: The source of our rights — Wednesday, July 3, 2024
PD 2: The Declaration’s own constitution — Thursday, July 4, 2024
PD 3: Eternal rights in the covenant heritage — Friday, July 5, 2024
PD 4: Our rights and the Spirit of adoption — Monday, July 8, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Tuesday, July 9, 2024
Topic 7: Democracy
Essay 27: Jefferson’s Little Republics
PD 1: Jefferson: ballots over bullets — Wednesday, July 10, 2024
PD 2: Jefferson: ward republics over ballots — Thursday, July 11, 2024
PD 3: Ward republics and federalism — Friday, July 12, 2024
PD 4: Jefferson vs. Madison on republics’ size — Monday, July 15, 2024
PD 5: Jefferson and Tocqueville on daily, corporeal politics — Tuesday, July 16, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Wednesday, July 17, 2024
Essay 28: Functional Republics
PD 1: Tocqueville on civil and political associations — Thursday, July 18, 2024
PD 2: English Pluralism’s consociational critique of sovereignty — Friday, July 19, 2024
PD 3: When “legislating from the bench” is good — Monday, July 22, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Tuesday, July 23, 2024
Essay 29: Elections and Sortition
PD 1: The changing purposes of elections — Wednesday, July 24, 2024
PD 2: Citizens new role: “the source of political legitimacy” — Thursday, July 25, 2024
PD 3: Elections are aristocratic; sortition is democratic — Friday, July 26, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Monday, July 29, 2024
Essay 30: Theocracy and Authority
PD 1: Theocracy and republican exclusivity — Tuesday, July 30, 2024
PD 2: Theocracy vs. sovereignty — Wednesday, July 31, 2024
PD 3: Deuteronomy: the world’s first mixed constitution — Thursday, August 1, 2024
PD 4: Theocracy and the mixed constitution — Friday, August 2, 2024
PD 5: The courts as mediators between the people and their constitution — Monday, August 5, 2024
PD 6: The theocratic nature of republicanism — Tuesday, August 6, 2024
PD 7: Discussion questions — Wednesday, August 7, 2024
Topic 8: The Other
Essay 31: Chaos and Racism
PD 1: The theology of imperialism — Thursday, August 8, 2024
PD 2: People as raw material — Friday, August 9, 2024
PD 3: The indigenous need for pre-contact covenants — Monday, August 12, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Tuesday, August 13, 2024
Essay 32: The Viewpoint
PD 1: Paul, a prisoner among conquered peoples — Wednesday, August 14, 2024
PD 2: Paul’s critique of empire through Jesus — Thursday, August 15, 2024
PD 3: The rich symbolism of the oppressed — Friday, August 16, 2024
PD 4: Hermeneutics in dominant cultures — Monday, August 19, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Tuesday, August 20, 2024
Essay 33: Weights and Measures
PD 1: We affect whom we judge — Wednesday, August 21, 2024
PD 2: Seeing our own faults in others — Thursday, August 22, 2024
PD 3: The community of interpretation — Friday, August 23, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Monday, August 26, 2024
Essay 34: My Father and Your Father
PD 1: What to the non-Jew is Pentecost? — Tuesday, August 27, 2024
PD 2: Frederick Douglass’s conversion to “political abolitionism” — Wednesday, August 28, 2024
PD 3: Douglass’s July Fourth speeches compared — Thursday, August 29, 2024
PD 4: Collapsing a people’s struggle into doctrine — Friday, August 30, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Monday, September 2, 2024
Essay 35: Tribalism and Kinship
PD 1: 70 warriors and life in covenant renewal — Tuesday, September 3, 2024
PD 2: Genesis’s political blessing through Noah on 70 nations — Wednesday, September 4, 2024
PD 3: Seventy kinship nations vs. empire — Thursday, September 5, 2024
PD 4: Israel to be gathered from 70 nations in 70 years — Friday, September 6, 2024
PD 5: Plato’s tribalistic response to the victory of 70 Athenian democrats — Monday, September 9, 2024
PD 6: Israel’s 70-strong progeny as the 70 nations’ surrogates — Tuesday, September 10, 2024
PD 7: Gabriel’s and Jesus’s “70 times seven”: the eschatological role of God’s forgiveness — Wednesday, September 11, 2024
PD 8: Discussion questions — Thursday, September 12, 2024
Topic 9: Witnesses
Essay 36: Pilgrims and Exiles
PD 1: Our removes as witnesses — Friday, September 13, 2024
PD 2: Creation and exile — Monday, September 16, 2024
PD 3: Chaucer’s exilic model for a mixed commonwealth — Tuesday, September 17, 2024
PD 4: Witnessing in the portable public space of pilgrimage — Wednesday, September 18, 2024.
PD 5: A deterritorialized citizenship — Thursday, September 19, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Friday, September 20, 2024
Essay 37: A Candid World
PD 1: “Witness”: John’s juridical world — Monday, September 23, 2024
PD 2: How courtrooms threaten authoritarian regimes — Tuesday, September 24, 2024
PD 3: The vital, changing roles of spectators — Wednesday, September 25, 2024
PD 4: The irreconcilable Greek and Roman notions of political spectators — Thursday, September 26, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Friday, September 27, 2024
Essay 38: Guilt and Shame
PD 1: Involuntary vs. cultivated shame — Monday, September 30, 2024
PD 2: How we confuse guilt and shame — Tuesday, October 1, 2024
PD 3: Just and unjust shame — Wednesday, October 2, 2024
PD 4: Why Jesus and even God can experience shame — Thursday, October 3, 2024
PD 5: A change agent: biblical shame for our ancestors’ sins — Friday, October 4, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Monday, October 7, 2024
Essay 39: Public Epistemology
PD 1: The encounter: apprehension and naming — Tuesday, October 8, 2024
PD 2: Naming and mediation in Eden — and in public — Wednesday, October 9, 2024
PD 3: Faith as public epistemology — Thursday, October 10, 2024
PD 4: The public life of being known by God — Friday, October 11, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Monday, October 14, 2024
Topic 10: Mediation
Essay 40: Time and Citizenship
PD 1: The personal cost of civic life — Tuesday, October 15, 2024
PD 2: Mediated and immediate government — Wednesday, October 16, 2024
PD 3: Friction between public space and the marketplace — Thursday, October 17, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Friday, October 18, 2024
Essay 41: Divide and Expand Power
PD 1: The difference between force and power — Monday, October 21, 2024
PD 2: Dividing power expands power — Tuesday, October 22, 2024
PD 3: A balance of powers or of functions? — Wednesday, October 23, 2024
PD 4: The Trinity as a generative balance of powers — Thursday, October 24, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Friday, October 25, 2024
Essay 42: Grids
PD 1: Governments, grids, and spacial irregularities — Monday, October 28, 2024
PD 2: The swallow’s nest in the altar: simple space vs. Gothic space — Tuesday, October 29, 2024
PD 3: Illegibility and political autonomy — Wednesday, October 30, 2024
PD 4: The reductive nature of both grids and greed — Thursday, October 31, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Friday, November 1, 2024
Essay 43: Ideology and Mediation
PD 1: Ideology vs. common sense — Monday, November 4, 2024
PD 2: Ideology vs. politics — Tuesday, November 5, 2024
PD 3: Medieval and modern political mindsets — Wednesday, November 6, 2024
PD 4: On public demands — Thursday, November 7, 2024
PD 5: The counter-totalizing effect of the particular and the provisional — Friday, November 8, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Monday, November 11, 2024
Topic 11: Materialism
Week 44: The Sermon on the Mount
PD 1: Second cheek, second garment, second mile — Tuesday, November 12, 2024
PD 2: The Lord’s Prayer: Jesus’s nonviolent strategies in context — Wednesday, November 13, 2024
PD 3: “Teachers of a mercenary age” — Thursday, November 14, 2024
PD 4: Materialism and the wall of separation — Friday, November 15, 2024
PD 5: Doke’s memorial service — Monday, November 18, 2024
PD 6: Discussion questions — Tuesday, November 19, 2024
Essay 45: Society and Marketplace
PD 1: Jesus’s insistence on public life — Wednesday, November 20, 2024
PD 2: “The world is at stake” — Thursday, November 21, 2024
PD 3: The as-yet-liberated Proverbs 31 woman — Friday, November 22, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Monday, November 25, 2024
Essay 46: Invisibility and Redistribution
PD 1: Poverty and invisibility — Tuesday, November 26, 2024
PD 2: Aristotle on leisure time for the poor — Wednesday, November 27, 2024
PD 3: Economic disparity and political freedom — Thursday, November 28, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Friday, November 29, 2024
Essay 47: Liberalism and Capitalism
PD 1: Different conceptions of waste — Monday, December 2, 2024
PD 2: Money and expropriation — Tuesday, December 3, 2024
PD 3: How liberalism helped capitalism — Wednesday, December 4, 2024
PD 4: How capitalism helped liberalism — Thursday, December 5, 2024
PD 5: Discussion questions — Friday, December 6, 2024
Topic 12: Alternatives
Essay 48: Rulers and Romans 13
PD 1: Resisting rulers and the dark forces behind them — Monday, December 9, 2024
PD 2: Paul’s and Eggy’s apocalyptic critiques — Tuesday, December 10, 2024
PD 3: Romans 13 and Paul’s long rap sheet — Wednesday, December 11, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Thursday, December 12, 2024
Essay 49: Intentional Communities
PD 1: The church as an intentional community — Friday, December 13, 2024
PD 2: The new creation as a “resistance archetype” — Monday, December 16, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Tuesday, December 17, 2024
Essay 50: Carnivals and Disasters
PD 1: Carnivals as public space — Wednesday, December 18, 2024
PD 2: Disasters and public space — Thursday, December 19, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Friday, December 20, 2024
Essay 51: Revolutions and Institutions
PD 1: Jerusalem, Poland, and Kiev: Revolutions that change people — Monday, December 23, 2024
PD 2: The revolutionary purpose of institutions — Tuesday, December 24, 2024
PD 3: Discussion questions — Wednesday, December 25, 2024
Essay 52: The Final Question
PD 1: Nature’s violence vs. society’s violence — Thursday, December 26, 2024
PD 2: How much nonviolence can we take? — Friday, December 27, 2024
PD 3: Public life after society — Monday, December 30, 2024
PD 4: Discussion questions — Tuesday, December 31, 2024
Back Matter
Bibliography
1
In print form, Political Devotions will amount to a series of four books, each with 13 essays.