What the church will look like after the COVID pandemic has run its course is hard to say.  Will modern society’s confrontation with its own mortality lead to genuine pursuit of deeper truth or will it lead to a doubling down on the human project of getting out of life alive?  Will social distancing cultivate a hunger for more meaningful forms of community and authentic relationships or will the move that many congregations have made to online platforms further reinforce our worst consumerist proclivities?  It is perhaps too early to tell.

However, in the meantime the pandemic has created the space for many to engage in important conversations they might not normally have the time for and stimulus for other people and ministries to reach out in new and intriguing ways.

One such opportunity is an upcoming series of Zoom sessions on Tuesdays in May that will be hosted by Stanley Hauerwas and Will Willimon.  Each week Hauerwas and Willimon will introduce and discuss sections of the great Reformed theologian Karl Barth’s theological classic Dogmatics in Outline.  Dogmatics in Outline provides a succinct and accessible introduction to Barth’s theology as a whole and by itself merits reading.  When you add in the opportunity to read it with Hauerwas and Willimon and ask them questions, it seems like too rich of an opportunity to pass up.

More information about the series is available on Will Willimon’s blog.