Philip Mitchell, Director of the University Honors Program at Dallas Baptist. 

He is deeply interested in the intersection of theology, literature, history, philosophy, and culture and is currently writing a book on Baptists and honors education. Dr. Mitchell is also an amateur poet, enjoys modern classical music and classic modern jazz, and teaches a young adult Bible study at his church. He has been twice nominated for Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers. He lives with his wife, Kristin, and two daughters, Noelle and Grace.

-- John Calvin

"Writing is a sacrament insofar as it provides graced occasions of encounter between humanity and God."

--Ron Hansen

"It is not only prayer that gives God glory but work. Smitting on an anvil, sawing a beam, whitewashing a wall, driving horses, sweeping, scouring, everything gives God some glory if being in his grace you do it as your duty. To go to communion worthily gives God great glory, but a man with a dungfork in his hand, a woman with a sloppail, give him glory too. He is so great that all things give him glory if you mean they should."

--Gerard Manley Hopkins

"Can you be Holy without accomplishing the end for which you are created? Can you be Divine unless you be Holy? Can you accomplish the end for which you were created, unless you be Righteous, unless you be just in rendering to Things their due esteem? All things were made to be yours, and you were made to prize them according to their value: which is your office and duty, the end for which you were created, and the means whereby you enjoy. The end for which you were created, is that by prizing all that God hath done, you may enjoy yourself and Him in Blessedness."

--Thomas Traherne

He is the Truth.
Seek Him in the Kingdom of Anxiety;
You will come to a great city that has expected your return for years.

He is the Life.
Love Him in the World of the Flesh;
And at your marriage all its occasions shall dance for joy.

--W. H. Auden, from For the Time Being

On the Mystery of the Incarnation

It's when we face for a moment
the worst our kind can do, and shudder to know
the taint in our own selves, that awe
cracks the mind's shell and enters the heart:
not to a flower, not to a dolphin,
to no innocent form
but to this creature vainly sure
it and no other is god-like,God
(out of compassion for our ugly
failure to evolve) entrusts,
as guest, as brother,
the Word.

--Denise Levertov

"We shall say much, and yet shall want words: but the sum of our words is, He is all." (Sirach 43:29)