06 Sep 2017
Posted by E.J. Hutchinson 
Previously, we remarked that Samuel Willard first subdivides "political" relation into "public" and "private" (="oeconomical," i.e., pertaining to the household), and then divides the latter into the relations of husband and wife and master and servant. He then discusses the marriage relation, as was discussed...
Read more → 23 Aug 2017
Posted by E.J. Hutchinson
In the last post, we saw that Samuel Willard recognizes only one natural "order of superiority," that of parents over children. All other relations of superior and inferior are what he calls "political." We further saw that he divides the "political" into the two spheres of public and private, the former...
Read more → 04 Aug 2017
Posted by E.J. Hutchinson
In Politics 1259a-b, Aristotle distinguishes between the type of authority fathers have over children and that possessed by husbands over wives as follows: "Of household management we have seen that there are three parts—one is the rule of a master over slaves, which has been discussed already,...
Read more → 28 Jul 2017
Posted by E.J. Hutchinson 
A bit later in the sermon to which I've referred a couple of times previously, John Cotton details what he thinks the phrase "help meet" in Genesis 2 means. I suspect that the simple act of copying and pasting this is enough to make most contemporary Christians, including not a few who classify themselves...
Read more → 15 Sep 2016
Posted by Alastair Roberts 
Since our founding, TCI has been committed to affirming the natural family and varieties of "household economics" as essential components to any sort of Christian political vision. Given the confusions of our day, this has required us to interact with both the push for modern egalitarianism and the reactionary...
Read more → 13 Sep 2016
Posted by Alastair Roberts 
A striking feature of modern Christian gender debates is how extensively the tenets of social constructivism have unwittingly been imbibed, by the very people who might claim to be its staunch opponents. Even in arguments from the most conservative quarters, there is a remarkable forgetfulness or neglect...
Read more → 30 May 2016
Posted by Simon Kennedy 
Over at the New York Times Ross Douthat has penned a tongue-in-cheek column about what could be if Donald Trump was a domestic policy wonk. The point he makes about family policy, one he has been making for some time now, is a good one. There is a family policy vacuum at the top end of town. The questions...
Read more → 24 Feb 2016
Posted by Simon Kennedy 
TCI has had its differences with Peter Leithart, some of them quite recent, but there is little doubt that his thought is provocative in general, and in some specifics very helpful. His piece some days ago on his First Things blog about the family (or household), productivity and fruitfulness was especially...
Read more → 20 Nov 2015
Posted by Andrew Fulford 
He writes at Quadrant: The link between Obergefell and the Planned Parenthood controversy is the family—in particular, the death of the traditional Western conception of family. Marriages no longer necessarily produce children. Children are no longer necessary products of sex, but only an optional...
Read more → 21 Oct 2015
Posted by Steven Wedgeworth 
I wanted to say a few things about Paul Tournier's thoughts on sublimation and the relationship between sexual energy and divine creativity. If you haven't read his essay, then refer to it first. I hope to explain his perspective and then expand it to a more basic understanding of desire and dominion. The...
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