N. T. Wright
N. T. Wright
Nicholas Thomas Wrightis a leading British New Testament scholar and retired Anglican bishop. In academia, he is published as N. T. Wright, but is otherwise known as Tom Wright. Between 2003 and his retirement in 2010, he was the Bishop of Durham. He then became Research Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at St Mary’s College in the University of St Andrews in Scotland...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionClergyman
Date of Birth1 December 1948
real school thinking
Funny but, for me, the Bible was a hobby before it was a serious study. It was the thing I'd sneak off and do on the side, feeling rather guilty because I wasn't doing my real school homework or whatever... and never thinking I would make it a life's work.
children couple real
Such debates [about the nature of Scripture], in my view, distract attention from the real point of what the Bible is there for. Squabbling over particular definitions of the qualities of the Bible is like a married couple squabbling over which of them loves the children more, when they should be getting on with bringing them up and setting them a good example. The Bible is there to enable God's people to be equipped to do God's work in God's world, not to give them an excuse to sit back smugly, knowing they possess all God's truth.
christian easter reality
Christian holiness consists not of trying as hard as we can to be good but of learning to live in the new world created by Easter, the new world we publicly entered in our baptism. There are many parts of the world we can't do anything about except pray. But there is one part of the world, one part of physical reality, that we can do something about, and that is the creature each of us call "myself.
depressing real taken
One of the things I find depressing about some of the upper echelons of Anglicanism on both sides of the Atlantic is that it's sort of taken for granted that we all basically know what's in the Bible, and so we just glance at a few verses for devotional purposes and then get on to the real business.
reality done glimpse
When we begin to glimpse the reality of God, the natural reaction is to worship him. Not to have that reaction is a fairly sure sign that we haven't yet really understood who he is or what he's done.
across great hopelessly horribly issues kinds politics rest simply
From where many of us in the U.K. sit, American politics is hopelessly polarized. All kinds of issues get bundled up into two great heaps. The rest of the world, today and across the centuries, simply doesn't see things in this horribly oversimplified way.
equals faith level loves lowly matter plus require sorts sublime types
Most of the things that really matter require faith. 'How do I know that my wife loves me?' 'How do I know that Mozart's 'Jupiter Symphony' is sublime and beautiful?' There are all sorts of things which come at a more lowly level than that - 'How do I know that two plus two equals four?' There are different layers, different types of knowing.
bodies christians clouds earth future god heavens imagined playing present promised sitting throw ultimate western
Western Christians have imagined that, at the end of the day, God is going to throw the present space-time universe into a trashcan and we'll be sitting on clouds playing harps. The ultimate future that we're promised is much more interesting than that. It's new heavens and a new Earth with new bodies to live in.
teacher church bishops
Looking back to the earlier centuries of the church, most of the great teachers were also bishops and vice versa. It's only fairly recently that the church has had this great divide.
hymns important church
I'm fortunate in that I've grown up in a worshipping tradition which is quite rich musically (and music is very important to me) and has a wonderful resource of hymns from all sorts of different parts of the Church... and to go to church and be able to sing that stuff and listen to a Bach motet or indeed some charismatic choruses.
thinking stuff doctrine
There's a great deal about Roman Catholicism that I basically disagree with. For instance, the doctrine of Mary which... I have studied that stuff and I simply don't think that has any mileage at all biblically, theologically, and I've got some friends who are very disappointed that I say that.
results persons happens
The gospel is not itself about you are this sort of a person and this can happen to you. That's the result of the gospel rather than the gospel itself.
knowing hearing scripture
I'm very eclectic, musically as in other things! But also to frame the hearing and knowing of Scripture within a context of worship, which is what Anglican liturgy does, just seems to me such a very complete and compelling thing.
teacher people being-a-teacher
I'm a people person. I like being with people. So I like being a teacher, and so on.