It says "an era when it has become increasingly popular to insist that Jesus is already depicted as a pre-existent figure in the Synoptic Gospels." This means it is popular right now among bible scholars to argue that Jesus was depicted as a pre existent divine being in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. This is the trend that Kirk is arguing against.
Okay, glad we got that straight. And I think he's wrong. It is not popular at all.
He's thinking of people like Richard Bauckham et al.
Never heard of him. Not that it means anything that I haven't. But I do know of the "popular" guys, like Rick Warren, Lee Strobel, Greg Boyd. As Garrison Keillor pointed out, these days you can be really famous and no one has heard of you. With 7 Billion people on the planet and hundreds of channels to choose from, you can have a following of a few million, but outside that circle, be unknown.
I watch the major trends, like secular governments, changes in seminaries, the difference between the last two Popes, splits in major denominations. Some guy selling books doesn't impress me.