“In summary, this volume is a unique and worthwhile resource for both Christian and non-Christians in the fields of applied linguistics an second language pedagogy, as it can no only broaden the reader’s understanding of the relationship between Christian faith and second language learning but also as a springboard for future research in this area.”

1.  Volume 16 Spring 2015

One of the most powerful ways to move toward intercultural understanding and solidarity is through the direct interpersonal exchage of words in an intercultural setting.

• Volume 15 Spring 2014

All of these articles evoke the unique situation i wich a Christian world language teacher is privileged to work: shaped by oour deepest beliefs, engaged in intercultural dialogue and learning walking aloside our students, discerning and serving the Kindom.

• Volume 14 Spring 2013

Excerpt from Editorial:  Christian theology, Stephen Webb argues, teaches that “freedom begins in the ear before it reaches the mouth.”1 Hearing (not here to be equated with a certain physical means of receiving auditory stimuli) has a basic place in the process of spiritual growth – Webb goes as far as to claim that “all of biblical religion can be summarized in the Shema of Deuteronomy which begins, ‘Hear, O Israel.’”

1. Editorial Egocentricity and Learning to Hear a Foreign Language, David I. Smith.
2. Teaching World Languages for Social Justice, Terry A. Osborn, Fordham University.
3. Amazin Space: Portrayal of Grace in Corneille´s Polyeucte, Leonard Marsh, Le Moyne College.
4. Mysticism and Politics in Pierre Corneille´s Polyeucte, Matthew Motyka, Santa Clara University.
5. Spirituality and Feminism in George Sand´s Indiana, Kelsey Haskett, Trinity Western University.
6. FORUM: When “evangelisch” is not “Evangelical”: Preparing Students for a Diferent Religious Culture, MAry Buteyn, Calvin College.
7. Assessment that Teaches: An Experiment in Just Evaluation, James D. Wilins, Lee University.
8. Christians, Foreign Languages, and the Inmigration Debate, Lindy Scott, Wheaton College.
9. Reviews, James D. Wilkins, Lee University.

Most readers of this journal are probably familiar with the volume The Gift of the Stranger: Faith, Hospitality and Foreign Language Learning  that I coauthored with Barbara Carvill. This is no great boast; the literature on faith and language learning is small enough that anyone interested in the topic is likely to have picked it up it regardless of its merits or weaknesses. Even so, the response to the book, recently published in Russian translation, has been gratifying. It has also at certain moments been troubling. In what follows I would like to voice a caution and a corrective concerning the way in which some of the book’s central themes appear to have been received

1. Editorial: The Gift of the Stranger Revisited, David Smith.
2. Shalom, Not Bigotry: Orthopraxis as Response to Karl Gutzkow’s Wally, die Zwelflerin.
3. Visions as Illness and Inspiration: Young Estelle L’Hardy and Sister Anne- Catherine Emmerich in works of Doctor Antoine Despine And Poet Clemens Brentano, Joanne M. McKeown, Moravian College.
4. The Personal Narrative Journal in the Christian Foreign Language Classroom, Galen Yorba- Gray, Point Loma Nazarene University.
5. World War II Meets French  331: Using Au revour les enfoants to Discuss Religion, Ethics, and Values, Laura Dennis – Bay, University of the Cumberlands.
6. Bulgaria’s Response to the Holocaust as Portrayed in T. Todorov´s La Fragilite du bien, Sarah Nova, Azusa PAcific University.
7. Coral Gardens and Classroom Ecology, David I Smith, Calvin College.
8. Reviews, James D. Wilkins, Lee University.

Study of the interface between Christian belief and education in foreign languages and literatures requires attention to relevant developments not only in disciplines such as literary studies or applied linguistics, but also in theology. Theological reflection on cultural difference and relationships between cultures, while far from being the only relevant theological discussion, is particularly pertinent. A recent work that deserves the attention of scholars concerned with Christianity and education in foreign languages and literatures is the recent collection of essays by prominent missiologist Andrew Walls published under the title The Cross-Cultural Process in Christian History (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis/Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2002).

1. Editorial, Crose- Cultural Learning and Christian History, David I. Smith
2. Preparing Students to Encounter the Other: Mario Vargas Llosas’s Lituma en los Andes, Phyllis Mitchell, Wheaton College.
3. God, Art, and Suffering in Dios no nos quiere contentos, Dianne Zandstra, Calvin College.
4. Teaching French Film in a christian Context Cedric Klapisch´s Un Air de famille, Jolene Vos- Camy, Calvin College.
5. Argentina is Delty and Juan domingo Peron its High Priest: THE POLITICS IS RELIGION Metaphor.
6. Text- based vs. Thematic/ Theological Activities for the FL Classroom: Finding the Right Fit, Jennifer Beatson, Gordon College.
7. Scripture, Speech Acts and Language Classes, DAvid I. Smith, Calvin College.
8. Singing into the Wind: Uses and Abuses of “Christian” Songs in oy Foerign Language Classes, Lindy Scott Wheaton College.
9. Scripture in the Foreign Language Classroom, Colonial Spanish American Literature, Dwight Ten Huisen, Calvin College.
10. Attentiveness, Hernan J. De Vries Jr, Calvin College.
11. Falth and Pedagogy in the Literature Classroom: Points of Departure, Cynthia Slagter & Dianne Zandstra, Calvin College.
12. Reviews, Marilyn Berlin Calvin College.
13. Reviews Marilyn Berlin Calvin College.
14. Reviews Marilyn Berlin Calvin College.

Excerpt from editorial: It is the day of Pentecost. An assorted group of followers of a recently executed Messiah – one of a series of such figures to emerge in recent times in turbulent Judea, but this time rumored to have risen from the dead – are assembled in a house in Jerusalem. They have never read the New Testament, for not a word of it is yet written. They don’t yet know one of the most familiar stories of the Christian Scriptures, or how they will become part of it. They have been given no detailed expectations as to what will happen next. When they asked Jesus, immediately before he was taken from them, about whether the kingdom was about to be restored to Israel, his response was: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority.”

1. Letter From the Editor, Pentecost, Perplexity and Language learning, David Smith.
2. Language as a Liberal Art, David L. Weeks, Azisa Pacific University.
3. The Future as Eschatological Presence in Juan de Mena’s Laberinto de Fortuna, Galen B. Yorba- Gray, Vanguard University.
4. Reading Signs of Mystery in Flaubert´s “Herodias”, Leonard Marsh, Le Moyne College.
5. Gertrudis Gomez de Avellaneda and the Politics of Religion: Gender Construction and the Nineteenth – Century Devotional Manual, Sandi Wightman, Bethel College.
6. FORUM: engaging Culture: Guiding Students to Reflect on Cross- Cultural Experience, Cynthia Slagter, Calvin College.
7. Defining the Purpose and Mission Behind Core Language Courses, Jennifer BEatson, Gordon College.
8. Teaching Students with Learning Disabilities: A Christian Imperative, Irene Brouwer Konyndyk, Calvin College.
9. Reviews, Herman J. De Vries, Jr., Calvin College.

Excerpt from Editorial:  It was 6:30 in the evening on New Year’s Eve. I had landed in Germany with a group of students earlier that day and traveled by train to Köln. After months of anticipation and a night of largely sleepless travel it felt surreal to suddenly find ourselves in Germany. Now, after catching a few hours of rest at the youth hostel, we were braving the cold and the jetlag to wander across the Rhine for a New Year’s Eve service.

1. Letter from the Editor, David Smith, Tourists, Guests and Why We Learn Other Languages.
2. Borges and Chesterton: Theologians of the Detective Story, Julia Van Loan Aguilar, Eastern University.
3. Glossing Scripture Calderon’s Sonnet Artistry in Sueños hay qye verdad son, Michael Sullivan, Cornerstone University.
4. Three Films of Maria Luisa Bemberg: A Female Gaze, Christine Goring Kepner, Wheaton College.
5. FORUM: To Know the Other, Mary Docter, Westmont College.
6. An encounter with Italy: A Note on An Italian Education by Tim Parks, Kevin Williams Dublin City University.
7. Reviews, Michael Pasquale, Cornerstone University.
8. Reviews, Alexandra Sterling- Hellenbrand, Goshen College.
9. Reviews, James D. Wilkins, Lee University.

Excerpt from Editorial: The ideal of authenticity has informed the development of foreign language pedagogy over at least the past three decades. Through its influential role in the rhetoric of communicative language teaching, it has helped to motivate far-reaching curricular change, despite being assigned meanings that are not only diverse, but potentially in tension with one another.

1. Letter From the Editor, David Smith, Reflections on Authenticity
2. Classroom Devotion in the Foreign Language Course Possibilities for Effecting Change in Student Motivation an Attitude, Herman J. De Vries, Calvin College.
3. Scriptural Aurthority in the Quixote: Target for Subversion, Galen B. Yorba-Gray, Vanguard University.
4. North American Christians and the Latin American Church: Lessons from South of the Border, Lindy Scott, Wheaton College.
5. NACFLA Presidential Address 2001, Barbara Carvill, Calving College.
6. Language Play, Personal Intimacy, and Imaging God, William J. Vande Kopple, Calvin College.
7. What Hath Jerusalem to do with Athens – Again ?, Douglas Penney, Wheaton College.
8. Reviews, Wallace Bratt Calvin College.
9. Reviews, Morris Vos, Western Illinois University.
10. Reviews, Teri McCarthy, International Institute for Christian Studies.

“As NACFLA celebrates its 10th annual conference this year by returning to Wheaton College where the first annual conference took place (the previous year an organizational meeting was held at Palm Beach Atlantic College, West Palm Beach, FL), it is almost inevitable that we look back at our past in order to get a clearer view of our future…”

1. Letter from the Editor, Phyllis Mitchell, Wheaton College.
2. Babel, Pentecost, Glossalia and Philoxenia: No language is Foreign to God, Calvin Seerveld, Institute for Christian Studies.
3. The Spiritual Quest in the Novels of Marguerite Duras, Kelsey L. Haskett, Trinity Western University.
4. The Desconstruction of the Traditional Macho Image in Allende, Silvia Garzia Edwards, Malone College.
5. Chac and Maximon: Perspectives on Religious Syncretism, Marilyn Bierling, Calvin College.

Excerpt from the Letter from the Editor: “It is with great joy, a deep sense of blessing, and immense gratitude that I welcome the first volume of the Journal of Christianity and Foreign Languages (JCFL). I have great joy, because this is, to my knowledge, the first refereed journal dedicated to publishing research written from …

1.  Letter from the President, Barbara Carville, Calvin College.
2. Letter from the Editor, Phyllis Mitchell, Wheaton College.
3. Faith and Method in Foreign Language Pedagogy, David I. Smith The Stapleford Center.
4. Creation an Incarnation in Borges, Dianne Zandstra, Calvin College.
5. La verdadera religion de Ruben Dario: el vaiven ritmico del cosmos Jacoba Koene, Anderson University.
6. Death and Resurrection in Cesar Vallejo’s Late Poetry, Mary Docter, Westmont College.
7. “Language de Canaan”, Alan D. Savage, Wheaton College.
8. Mitchel Foucault and Christian Scholarship, Hadley Wood, Point Loma Nazarene University.