Sarah Mullally as the Archbishop of Canterbury

On January 28, 2026, Sarah Mullally became the first woman to occupy the seat of the archbishop of Canterbury, which is the spiritual leader of the Church of England under its governor, the British King (or Queen) and of the worldwide Anglican Communion, which includes the Episcopal Church. The King (or Queen) being above the archbishop in the Church of England is in line with Thomas Hobbes’ seventeenth-century theory that the sovereign should be in charge of church and state lest civil war break out (again). Just as a British king is a man and a queen is a woman, so too, as of 2026, the Archbishop of Canterbury could be a man or a woman. This of course set the Anglicans even further off from the Roman Catholic Church, where only men can be priests and bishops, including that of Rome (i.e., the Pope). I contend that the intransigence on this point is due to a logical error involving a category mistake just for added fun.

The Confirmation of Election service out of which Mullaly became the Archbishop of Canterbury “marks a milestone for the Church of England, which ordained its first female priests in 1994 and its first female bishop in 2015.”[1] That was not long before 2026, so progressives in that Church had reason to be astounded as the swiftness of the change. In no small measure, the relative progressive stance of King Charles after his conservative mother, Queen Elizabeth, enabled the first woman to occupy the position in just a decade after the first woman was made a bishop in the Church of England. The tremendous change in the societal role of woman in the West since the early 1970s and the effect of this change on how all of Jesus’s disciples being men in the Gospels has been perceived differently can also be said to be factors in Mulally’s confirmation as the archbishop. Seeing in the contemporary world that women are perfectly capable of leading large organizations and even governments, Christians would be more likely to view the all-male discipleship in the Gospels as reflecting the societal context of Jesus or the writers of the Gospels and thus as not bearing for the contemporary world. Additionally, the point that just because Jesus selects only men in the Gospels doesn’t in itself mean that only men could be disciples could back up the historical-context argument.

Nowhere in the Gospels does Jesus say that only men can be disciples; were that line in the stories, then adjusting to the modern context would be more difficult from a theological standpoint. One of the problems with the notion of scripture is that everything in it must be taken as truth, so distinguishing, for example, between Paul’s personal opinion on women as leaders and a theological point that women should not be leaders in the Church is unfortunately difficult to do, if not utterly forbidden. That Paul’s stance on female leaders is so obviously his opinion, likely reflective of the world in which he lived, raises the thornier problem of including letters written to churches as part of scripture. Once a document has been declared to be scriptural, separating the wheat from the chaff becomes very difficult if not impossible from a theological standpoint. This is reflected in the opposition to Mullally’s appointment.

“Gafcon, a global organization of conservative Anglicans, says Mullally’s appointment is divisive because a majority of the Anglican Communion still believes only men should be bishops.”[2] In the Gospels, however, Jesus does not say, “Only men should be bishops,” and that he chooses only men is descriptive rather than normative. Hume’s naturalist fallacy holds that you can’t get normativity from a statement that is only descriptive. In other words, you can’t get “ought” out of “is”; something more is needed to say that what is, should be. If, for example, Jesus is to say, “only men should be my disciples” in the Gospels, the readers would expect a justification to also be stated as to why only men should be in the religious role. If there is a theological justification, readers would naturally expect Jesus to state it.

These problems aside, that the Roman Catholic Church had come to recognize Mary Magdalene as the Apostle to the Apostles may undercut that sect’s insistence that only men can (and should) be priests and bishops, especially since the discovery of the Gospel of Mary Magdalene in which she occupies a significant place in Jesus’s ministry. So perhaps more stunning than the swift change in the Church of England in the appointment of Mullally is the utter stubbornness of social-religious conservatives in that Church as well as in the Church of Rome.

Moreover, that matters given scant if any attention in the Gospels (hence excluding Paul’s personal letters to his congregations) have been so easily blown out of proportion many centuries after the Gospels were written, such as homosexuality, gender and the priesthood, and even abortion, demonstrates the vulnerability of the human mind’s self-check mechanism in the domain of religion (and politics). Religion loses its core element of transcendence and is instead so easily filled with personal ideology, in which is none other than self-love as self-idolatry. Rather than having compassion for “thy enemies,” ideological worship of oneself belies Jesus’s message in the Gospels on how to enter the Kingdom of God. Ironically, compassion even to the marginalized is in line with Paul’s dictum not to cause one’s brother (or sister) to stumble.

Lest this be viewed as an unabashedly progressive stance, it should be observed that feminist interpretations of the Gospels’ contents can easily replace theology with (feminist) ideology, such that the religion that results is in the very image of the feminists themselves. The same can be said of remaking Christianity according to queer theory. Such extravagances are just as damaging as reducing Christianity to opposition to abortion and homosexuality even though those two topics are not mentioned scarcely at all directly in the Gospels, and blowing one’s inferences out of proportion such that the religious text is distended beyond recognition is itself a manifestation of self-idolatrous ideology. 

I contend that were Christian sects to actually follow Jesus’s principles, conservative clergy would be oriented to serving the groups despised rather than fighting against them, and feminist and gay laity would serve conservative men in the clergy in respect to their humane needs. The last are first, and many of the first are actually last unless they put themselves after those whom they loath. Therefore, the conservative Anglican clergymen who opposed Mullally’s appointment were actually obliged as Christians to become servants of the female Archbishop of Canterbury, essentially washing her feet rather than castigating her as if being a female bishop rendered her as the Anti-Christ. Compassion for one’s detractors and those whom one dislikes does not imply agreement; rather, it is to begin the chore of expanding human nature to become a bridge of sorts to the Kingdom of God already in this world.

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1. Danica Kirka, “Sarah Mullally Confirmed as Archbishop of Canterbury, First Woman to Lead the Church of England,” APnews.com, January 28, 2026.
2. Ibid.

Devil’s Advocate

In the film, Devil’s Advocate (1997), human free-will plays a very important role. It has implications not only for whether humans tend to be good or evil, but also on how culpable God is for the evil that committed by humans. One of the devil’s sons by a mortal woman, Kevin Lomax, must choose whether or not to impregnate his half-sister, Christabella Andreoli, to produce the Anti-Christ, which John Milton, who is the devil, wants so much. In Christian theology, both the extent of free-will and how tainted it is from the Fall have been debated. Even within Augustine’s works, his thought changes. The one thing that cannot be asserted is that free-will both does and does not exist. Also, that so many greedy people have been so destructive of democracies and even the planet does not necessarily mean that God is responsible or that humans are not capable of choosing to do good over evil.

The full essay is at "Devil's Advocate."

The Vatican Tapes

After The Omen (1976), which was released just two years after the sardonic U.S. President, Richard Nixon, had resigned in utter disgrace from the presidency amid much economic and political pessimism in the 1970s generally, moviemakers got busy on stories involving demon-possession. The 2015 film, The Vatican Tapes, begins as an apparent demon-possession case and thus seems not to stand out among other such films, but towards the end of the film, when the demon-possessed young woman suddenly breaches the bounds of the sort of supernatural feats of which demons are capable, the true significance of her case emerges with stunning clarity. For that which possesses and kills the young woman is none other than the Anti-Christ, and that figure is in a wholly different league than demons.

The full essay is at "The Vatican Tapes."

Religious Liturgy and the Wholly Other

In the Zhuangzi, how can Zhuangzi possibly know that the fish are happy? To know what it is like to be a bat, a person must be a bat. This is not to say that we disagree with bats. Sonar represents the “sheer otherness” of a bat. In Christianity, how does eternal joy and bliss differ from happiness? Happiness is not a theological concept. There are different kinds of experience, and it follows that they have different kinds of truth-claims. To treat every such claim as the same kind of thing is premised on conflating domains of human experience that are qualitatively different. I contend that the domain of religion is both distinct and unique. Our ordinary ways of describing the world and even ourselves are not well-suited to our endeavors in the domain of religion.

The full essay is at "Religious Liturgy and the Wholly Other."

Iran’s Theocracy: An Uneasy Fusion of Religion and Political Economy

As mass protests erupted in Iran during the second week of January, 2026, Iran’s theocracy was on edge. That the protests stemmed from the dire economic conditions facing the people amid staggering inflation, including on basic food staples, rather than from foreign affairs, raises the question of whether religious clergy, including the “supreme leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, are competent in making economic policy. Without the ongoing political pressure that can come from constituents in a representative democracy, or republic, it is no surprise that the protests in Iran quickly became mass riots. In other words, bad economic policy by religious clerics in power in an autocracy can easily result in popular protests abruptly erupting into rioting. The overreaching of functionaries based in the domain of religion into politics (including economic policy), such that the distinctiveness of the two domains is ignored or obfuscated, can be distinguished from the problems that go with autocracy.

The full essay is at "Iran's Theocracy."

An American Proto-Fascist Presbyterian Church

Mixing religion and politics can be a dangerous business, especially if done from the pulpit and backed up by fully-weaponized police poised in a worship space at the laity in the pews, and from the front so the congregants know they are being intensely watched even as the words, “Peace on earth” are shown on the big screen directly above one of the uniformed police employees. To my utter astonishment, I encountered just this scenario when I visited a large Presbyterian church in the U.S. early in 2026. A Christian who has read the Gospels might look askance at the weaponized, uniformed police in the sanctuary who were facing the people from near the front, and the television cameramen who were standing on the stage even very close to the altar, and think of Jesus castigating the money-changers and sacrifice-animal sellers operating inside the temple.

During the piano prelude, a cameraman hangs out near the altar.

A uniformed, fully-weaponized local police employee at the front-left of the altar faced and stared at the people in the pews throughout the service, except, interestingly, during the sermon. 

The full essay is at "An American Proto-Fascist Presbyterian Church."

Skepticism within Religion: A Prescription for Epistemological Humility

We tend to separate religion from skepticism, and we associate science with evidence even though of religion and science, only science is open to revision. Kierkegaard remarked that there is something absurd about religious belief, and yet a religionist should believe, and even without any evidence to back up the absurd. In fact, in the early-modern period in the West, religious belief was often assumed to have a higher epistemological status than philosophy and science even though the latter two are supported by the strictures of reason and the support of empirical evidence, respectively. I submit that it is precisely to the extent that religious beliefs are held to be certain that we should be modest about them in terms of what we can know. According to Peter Adamson, religions were once very open to skepticism, whereas the Aristotelian philosophers were certain of their epistemological certainty. Considering that varied assumptions have been applied by philosophers to their craft, they should be weary of their own claims of having achieved epistemological certainty. I contend that religionists should get back to being more tolerant of, and even invite skepticism, even within their own minds. Being humbly aware of falling short, both as an individual and as a species, of grasping true religious knowledge as it is, undeluded by our own limitations (e.g., opinions), is rarely the case as religionists make declarations as if with epistemological certainty.

In a talk, Peter Adamson asked, why does God allow us to be so ignorant? Why does God make us subject to error? It must be for some reason, Descartes thought. The problem of ignorance is akin to the problem of evil. Is the former just a sub-case of the latter? They may be the same problem. I submit that even if the two problems are related or relatable as being similar, the hatred that is endemic to evil is absent from ignorance. Stated on a more secular basis, ignorance does not necessarily come with, or spring from a bad attitude.

Nevertheless, Adamson viewed ignorance in religious terms. To Augustine, ignorance is due to free-will amid original sin. Also, the limited nature of creation is why knowledge is limited, hence ignorance exists. A religious basis exists for ignorance in terms of people tending to latch on to just some knowledge. Augustine’s Free Choice of the Will does not insist on grace because Augustine had not yet encountered Palagianism. In the text, Augustine is in dialogue with Evodius, a convert to Christianity. Adam and Eve were created in a state “between wisdom and foolishness.” In our fallen state, we are “born into ignorance, difficulty, and mortality.” “Evil is turning away eternal things, . . . and instead pursuing temporal things, which are perceived by means of the body.” Also, when desires rule over the mind, “the mind is dragged by inordinate desire into ruin and poverty . . .” This characterizes infants, according to Augustine. In short, ignorance, which is synonymous with foolishness, exists due to free-will in the state of original sin. But why then are Adam and Eve ignorant? To Augustine, this is like complaining about the world because it is not as good as heaven. Descartes wrote, “it is in the nature of a finite intellect to lack understanding of many things, and it is in the nature of a created intellect to be finite.” God certainly is not obligated to do more, and we are able to obtain knowledge. According to Adamson, Stoics and neo-Platonists, including Plotinus, have contended that individual evils are part of a good whole. According to Leibniz, the best of all possible worlds reflects this philosophy. The upshot is that human ignorance is just part of the best of all possible worlds that God could create, so we should not blame God for our own ignorance. I contend that it is important even when looking at scripture in a revealed religion to keep in mind that human ignorance is not exempted on our end. Therefore, humility in making religious claims, as if declarations, could greatly reduce the typical impious air of infallibility on our end. Even if revelation does in fact come from an intelligent being that transcends the limits of human cognition, perception, and emotion, such news must travel through our fallible atmosphere before we can make sense of the distinctively religious truth.

It follows that religious accounting for human ignorance is not exhausted by one religion, or at least that in humility human epistemology should be open to alternative accounts. Even if one religion holds a monopoly on truth, the truth of this truth is not contained within our purview. Accordingly, in his talk, Peter Adamson discussed the religious account of Jainism, which is native to South Asia, with respect to ignorance. Umasvati (4^th to 5^th century), for example, author of the Tattvartha Sutra, was a Jain, so he was not a Brahmanic thinker. On the topic of the human self, Jain thought is that the Brahmanic and Buddhist philosophies are in part right and in part wrong. The Jains claim that there is an eternal, changing self. Liberation means freedom from the cycle of samsara and comes through “enlightened worldview, knowledge, and conduct,” so one is not trapped in a one-sided view. Being non-violent, Jains didn’t want to disagree too strenuously with others, but this explanation doesn’t fit with the polemics in some Jain texts. Also, the Jains criticize a person having one-sided knowledge. In addition to assertability, there is the notion of unassertability. Omniscience refers to knowledge of all substances in all their modes, past present, and future.” The path to knowledge is about elimination of karmic bondage. Growth in knowledge involves the steady falling away of one-sided thinking. Seeing the world from every perspective rather than from only one is thus to be sought.  Delusion is at the root of ignorance, and is associated with having a one-sided view; both are associated with karmic bondage, which keeps a person from liberation.

So rather than original sin from a Fall, which itself is premised on Creation, Adamson’s account of Jainism is that delusion is part of the unenlightened human condition, wherein we may tend to have one-sided views. Our knowledge and perspectives tend to be one-sided, and we are susceptible to being in bondage to them—even to being deluded that they are wholistic rather than partial. Both Augustine and Umasvati were skeptical concerning the pretensions of human knowledge. In his talk, Adamson added in Francis Bacon’s view, which is that Adam has perfectly functional cognitive faculties, whereas we, the fallen, do not. True knowledge is the province of divinity. I submit that religionists would greatly enhance their own credibility as purveyors of truth that is inherently sourced beyond our reach by humbly keeping in mind their own fallibility even and especially with regard to what is actually religious belief rather than knowledge, for if the content of religion were known, what place would faith have when the human mind enters into the religious domain?