The Urantia Book Fellowship Daniel Love Glazer Blog

Religious Minorites Face Uncertain Fate in Syria and Iraq

Tue, 15 Aug 2017 23:40:46 GMT

In 2014, the crimes committed by Daesh (also referred to as Islamic State or ISIS) shook the world. Daesh hascommitted mass atrocities, including “murder, enslavement, deportation or forcible transfer of population, severe deprivation of physical liberty, torture, rape, sexual slavery, sexual violence and persecution.” These atrocities amount to crimes against humanity, and because they were perpetrated against the protected groups (here, religious group) with intent to annihilate them in whole or in part, the atrocities amount to genocide.

While the Daesh genocide perpetrated against Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities is an extreme example of religious persecution, it sheds light on the perils religious minorities have been encountering more generally in the Middle East. Even before the emergence of Daesh, religious minorities faced significant difficulties. Many Iraqi Christians named 2003, when Saddam Hussein fell, as the event that changed their position in Iraqi society. Under Hussein’s dictatorship, despite some challenges, many religious minorities had a decent life, I was informed. After the fall, discrimination and persecution became part of their lives. During my interviews with Iraqi Christians, I was told about single occurrences of killings, kidnappings for ransom, assaults, threats, and individual cases of forced displacement. Such cases of discrimination and persecution were not unusual for the post-Hussein Iraq. However, they were not systematic or conducted on a mass scale.

With the emergence of Daesh, portraying itself as a legitimate state, with its own courts, flag, and currency, the jihadists wanted to ultimately establish a purely Islamic states across North Africa and West Asia. The rewritten world map that Daesh released in 2014 will remain a warning of what it could have been without the military efforts of so many states that managed to (more of less) restrain Daesh to two countries (with some smaller presence in Egypt, Libya etc., however, not to the same extent as in Syria and Iraq).

In 2014, Daesh began taking over parts of Iraq and Syria and established a self-proclaimed caliphate. Around this time news started circulating about what life under the Daesh “caliphate” would look like. Most notable were videos and photographs of beheadings or burning people in metal cages. During my trip to Iraq and Jordan, I spoke to many Iraqi Christians about their situation before and after Daesh. They all were very clear that after Daesh began to take over their villages and towns and established the self-proclaimed caliphate, their lives as Christians ceased to exist. Daesh fighters destroyed churches and places of worship, burnt all Bibles and religious books, and broke crosses. Daesh wanted to destroy all signs of Christians ever living in the area.

As the brutality of the Daesh atrocities against religious minorities was unprecedented in the 21st century, the world finally became concerned about the fate of religious minorities in the Middle East. Over the last roughly three years, 68 states have engaged in military actions against Daesh in Syria and Iraq. The Council of Europe, European Parliament, the US Congress and Secretary of State, the UK House of Commons, and the Parliaments of Lithuania, Australia, Canada, France, and Austria, formally recognized the Daesh atrocities as genocide. Some states offered to resettle the persecuted groups, most notably, the Canadian government pledged to relocate 1,200 Yazidis. Other actions to address the Daesh atrocities in Syria and Iraq in general and against religious minorities specifically are still at very early stages.

While Daesh is losing territories in Syria and Iraq, there is some fallacy in speaking of post-Daesh. The same applies to the debates of “before Daesh”. The militia that ultimately became known as Daesh has been in the region for years. The origin of Daesh reaches back to 1999, when Abu Musab al-Zarqawi funded the Jama’at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad that later become what we know as Daesh. The two major events that shaped the group were also the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the 2011 Arab spring. However, the act of Daesh establishing so-called “caliphate” in many parts of Syria and Iraq marked a new era in the history of the region. A terror group of unprecedented size and unprecedented international support of foreign fighters took the Syrian and Iraqi lands piece by piece, unabated.

Also, soon Daesh in its current form may be defeated, but this does not mean that its narrative will be defeated. Their mentality may survive the military action and re-manifest itself the next time circumstances in the region allows, for example, during a civil war, because of fragility and instability in the area.

To prevent such re-manifestation of the Daesh narrative, states must ensure that they enable and accommodate interfaith dialogue among all religious groups, strengthen the interfaith cooperation, and actively overcome the Daesh narrative of countering religious pluralism or the “us against them” narrative. This is not an easy task as the communities are torn. However, to ensure that the threat to the existence of religious minorities is overcome, all communities must work together towards a sustainable solution. The need for reconciliation and interfaith dialogue has never been greater, as right now the fate of Christians and other religious minorities in the Middle East is uncertain.

—

Ewelina U. Ochab is a human rights advocate and author of the book Never Again: Legal Responses to a Broken Promise in the Middle East. Ochab works on the persecution of minorities around the world, with main projects including Daesh genocide in Syria and Iraq, Boko Haram atrocities in West Africa, and the situation of religious minorities in South Asia. Ochab has written over 30 UN topical reports (including Universal Periodic Review reports) and has made oral and written submissions at the Human Rights Council sessions and the UN Forum on Minority Issues. Ochab is currently working on her Ph.D. in international law, human rights and medical ethics.

Beyond Meaning, by Bernard N. Nussbaum

Sun, 30 Jul 2017 23:09:29 GMT

This essay, first published in the journal First Things in 1995, is a review of two books: Medicine Ethics, and the Third Reich and Defenders of the Race: Jewish Doctors and Race Science in Fin-De-Siecle Europe. Note that despite the criticism here of "the fatuous notion of using craniometry (measuring certain key diameters of the head) to differentiate racial types, there are indeed "race differences in brain size, when body size is fixed... with Asian brains larger on average than white brains, and white brains larger than black brains." Michael Levin, Why Race Matters, page 104.

Medicine Ethics, and the Third Reich: Historical and Contemporary Issues
Edited by John J. Michalczyk
Sheed & Ward 240 pages. $19.95

Arthur Cohen has characterized it as “beyond the deliberations of reason, beyond the discernments of moral judgments, beyond meaning itself,” and defined it as “the expression of ordinary secular corruption raised to immense powers of magnification and extremity.” As one who absorbed the hideous drama of the Holocaust from the hushed voices of my parents and the keening of relatives who had successfully fled, I am on this subject afflicted with an aporia bordering on rhetorical paralysis. Several years ago, I visited the Dachau camp in the suburbs of Munich, and the experience was so desolating as to be beyond tears, and yes, beyond meaning itself.

Nonetheless, the literature that attempts to understand the Holocaust is vast and growing, and has matured to the point of specialization. There is a body of work on the failures of the German clergy, another body of work on the origins of the Holocaust in race science, still another on the bankrupt Nazi judicial system-and now we add yet another work on the German medical profession. John Michalczyk has compiled and edited papers presented at a 1993 conference at the Jesuit Institute of Boston College, Medicine, Ethics and the Third Reich: Historical and Contemporary Issues. The participants hailed from markedly diverse disciplines, and included bioethicists Arthur Caplan, George Annas, and Lisa Sowle Cahill; theologians Donald Dietrich and Peter Haas; physician Michael Franzblau; historians Daniel Nadav and Robert Proctor; journalists Nat Hentoff and Peter Steinfels; and Holocaust victims Eva Kor and Vera Laska. There was even one surgeon, Robert L. Berger, who was himself a victim who survived the Holocaust. (Like Lawrence Langer, I abjure the term “survivor” in favor of the more honest word “victim” in describing those who lived through the horror; the word “survivor” strips the drama of its limitless evil and instead suggests a natural-not man-made-cataclysm: one Jewish physician liberated from Auschwitz observed, years later, “If you lick my heart, it will poison you.”)

Kierkegaard wrote that life is lived forward and understood backward. The papers presented at the conference pay the conventional attention to the historical roots of German National Socialism but regrettably do not explore adequately the race science that developed in Germany in the last half of the nineteenth century. John Efron has carried out that task, however, with remarkable thoroughness in his bookDefenders of the Race: Jewish Doctors and Race Science in Fin-De-Siecle Europe. Efron examines the “Jewish question” in Germany meticulously, beginning with the egregious tales (carried from the Middle Ages into nineteenth-century Germany) that Jewish males menstruated, that they were uniformly effeminate, that Jews were more subject to insanity than other races. He moves forward to describe the work of race scientists such as Georg Wachter, a Dutch anatomist who studied the skull of a thirty-year-old Jewish male and published his conclusions in 1812. Wachter remarked on the large nasal bones, the square chin, the typical bony impressions on the lateral sides of the orbits and concluded that “among Jews, the muscles primarily used for talking and laughing are of a kind entirely different from those of Christians.”

Efron recounts the work of other race scientists such as Andreas Retzius and Carl Vogt in the mid-nineteenth century who devised the fatuous notion of using craniometry (measuring certain key diameters of the head) to differentiate racial types, and by this mathematizing of racism triumphantly divided Jews into two taxonomic niches: the round brachycephalic and the long dolichocephalic. The Austrian physician (all race scientists in Europe in the nineteenth century were physicians) Augustin Weissbach published a paper in 1877 in a scientific journal confirming the stereotypes based on his study of nineteen Jewish males, and Bernhard Blechman in 1882 supported Weissbach’s conclusions with a study of his own.

Other race scientists built upon this scientifically grotesque edifice to divide Jews into the brachycephalic Ashkenazis (of Eastern European extraction) and dolichocephalic Sephardics (of Mediterranean extraction). Constantine Ikow in the 1880s reclassified Jews into three racial types on the basis of evidence derived from the craniometry method. Prominent German psychiatrists such as Emil Kraepelin and Richard Krafft-Ebbing stressed the emotional fragility and the putatively high rate of insanity among Jews; Krafft-Ebbing remarked that religious fervor in the Jewish community promoted deviant sexual practices such as consanguineous marriages.

By 1900, 16 percent of all physicians in Germany were Jewish (Jews comprised approximately 1 percent of the German population), and these physicians were subjected to intermittent but vicious attacks. In 1875 the world-famous surgeon Theodor Billroth unleashed a lengthy anti-Semitic harangue in the press, protesting the admission of Jewish students in what he termed disproportionately large numbers to the German medical schools. Only the great non-Jewish pathologist Rudolph Virchow battled the anti-Semites by ridiculing the entire racial typing project and defending the Jewish physicians fearlessly. Jewish physicians such as Joseph Jacobs in Great Britain and Samuel Weissenberg in Germany took on the race science question, conducting studies and publishing scientific papers confuting the virulent anti-Semitism of the German non-Jewish medical community-but by 1900 the damage was done. Jews had been thoroughly marginalized, and the ground had been prepared for Alfred Ploetz and Wilhelm Schallmeyer, the founders of the German racial hygiene movement in the first two decades of the twentieth century.

Daniel Nadav and other essayists inMedicine, Ethics, and the Third Reichdescribe with impressive force the progressive deterioration of medical ethics in the pre-Nazi and Nazi eras, as doctors stepped from forced sterilization of the physically and mentally imperfect through the various euthanasia programs devised first to care for the suffering and then to the more comprehensive programs designed to eliminate the “lives not worth living,” the lives that were a “drag” on the racial hygiene aspiration, and the lives of the “useless eaters.” In the introductory essay, Christian Pross observes that “a combination of pseudoscientific racism, socioeconomic crisis, and abandonment of the ideal of physician as healer produced doctors who sterilized or killed so-called inferiors and social deviants in the name of science.” Pross states that only 350 German physicians directly committed the medical crimes, but “many more were involved, directly or indirectly, among them the cream of German medicine, university professors, outstanding scientists and researchers.” In the Nazi era half of all physicians were members of the Nazi party, 26 percent of them were storm troopers, and 7 percent were in the SS-these were much higher rates than for any of the other professions. Regarding the fate of the German-Jewish physicians, Pross estimates that between 1932 and 1945 at least 5,000 Jewish physicians were expelled from Germany, several hundred committed suicide, and close to 2,000 perished in the death camps.

Lisa Sowle Cahill, in a moving valedictory to this dispiriting account of the systematic betrayal of normative medical ethics, does not tastefully avert her eyes; she calls the Holocaust exactly what it was-an unmitigated and unmitigatable evil. She marks the role of the Nazi physicians-the loyal traitors-as having caved in to “scientific bias, ideological banality, professional self-serving, and moral vacuity.” In bioethical terms, it was a pervasively squalid, unparalleled, and unimaginably destructive perversion of the utilitarian theory of medical ethics.

Unfortunately Cahill-like other participants in the conference-relies on that old saw of the “slippery slope,” as though it were a logical inevitability; she does however warn that “the ‘slippery slope’ argument is a valid one, but it calls for caution and precision in the application.” Mary Mahowald, in her consideration of the “slippery slope” argument, has acknowledged that the “slope” does exist but that one can control the rate of descent (and even arrest it) by driving what she terms “moral wedges” into the slope. This is not far from my own position on the subject: the slope is not a slope at all but a spiralling staircase descending into unfathomable depths of evil. At every step one has the opportunity to rest, to survey the moral landscape critically, to look back, to contemplate with great care the next step, and even to climb back up if the occasion warrants. Had German physicians (and for that matter, the German judiciary, philosophers, academicians, journalists, and even the military) taken this approach to National Socialism, it is a reasonable probability that that terrifying, dizzying descent into hell would not have occurred.

Medicine, Ethics, and the Third Reichis a powerful indictment of the abject collapse of the German biomedical ethical system during (and even preceding) the National Socialist regime. Others have written authoritatively on the subject, but none with the eloquence and force of the contributors to this volume.

Bernard N. Nathanson, M.D., is author ofAborting AmericaandThe Abortion Papers.

Who Is Your Best Friend? a Homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bella Terra

Fri, 23 Jun 2017 23:01:35 GMT

James 2:23 New International Version (NIV)

²³ And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend.

John 15:12 New International Version (NIV)

¹² My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.¹³ Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command.¹⁵ I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.

Hymns: "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" and "In the Garden"

Who Is Your Best Friend?

A Homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer

At Bella Terra Nursing Home

Sunday, June 11, 2017

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Do you have a best friend? Someone with whom you have a deep affinity? Someone with whom you can share your deepest thoughts and feelings, knowing that he will respond with understanding and affection? Or, perhaps, did you used to have such a friend, who has gone on to the life beyond our life here and whom you will greet with joy when you too have ascended on high?

I once heard a lecture a professor of psychology give a lecture on friendship. He said that he used to ask his students how many close friends they had—how many people they knew with whom they could share their deepest yearnings. Many students had no such friend; some had one dear friend; occasionally a student reported two close friends.

I don’t know whether you have been blessed with such a dear friend, but I am here to tell you this: every one of us has a phenomenally close friend who can appreciate all of our longings, fears, and hopes. This Friend is God!

Yes, God, the Father of all things and beings, longs to be in personal relationship with each and every one of us. And because this is so, we can know God as a constant partner and friend in our daily life.

As human beings, we are accustomed to experiencing friendship with other people on physical, emotional, and intellectual levels. But there is another, higher dimension to reality, namely the spiritual level. It is on the spiritual level that we can experience friendship with God himself.

To be God’s friend we must communicate with him. Communicating with God suggests prayer, of course. By prayer I do not mean anything formal or considered as a religious duty. I mean simply directing your thoughts and desires to the spiritual personality we know as God. Prayer can encompass a broad range. It can be an expression of spiritual attitude, a proclamation of soul loyalty, an expression of thanksgiving, a desire for meaning in life, deep consideration of the supreme values of truth, beauty, and goodness, a confession of ultimate devotion, a determined soul searching for self-discovery, an intense call for spiritual help, an earnest release of selfish desires, a visualization of God’s nectar pouring down on those in need, and, above all, a heartfelt chat with your dearest friend, the Creator and Controller of the universe.

Prayer is a two-way conversation with God. You tell God your concerns, your joys, your sorrows, and your needs. And he responds lovingly with comfort and guidance. You don’t pray to change God, but the act of sincere prayer certainly changes you. Of course, only rarely, if ever, will you receive God’s answer to your prayer as a crystal-clear response. More likely you will see indirect answers—increased understanding, enhanced ability to deal with the challenges of life, and , perhaps, apparent chance occurrences.

In prayer we must strike a balance between expecting too much and expecting too little. Prayer is not a form of magic, in which we can get anything we desire. But if we believe too little we sacrifice spiritual comfort, strength, and support, never to experience the joy of recognizing God’s answer to prayer.

In the material world, we perceive via our senses of sound, sight, taste, touch, and smell. But God is a spirit person and we communicate with him from the deepest recesses of our soul.

And doubt not—God can and will answer you!

Jesus taught us that the Kingdom of God is within us. Yes, there is a divine spirit within each of us, and this spirit is the source of our faith. The indwelling spirit inspires our faith, the faith that assures us that God is real and loves us with an infinite love. Every one of us is blessed with this gift of faith. In some of us this faith may be only a glimmer, but if we act on the faith we do have, however small, our faith will grow. Faith is a gift from God, and he yearns for us to cultivate it so that it increasingly dominates our thinking, our feeling, our prayers, and our interactions with each other.

The faith I am talking about is not the same as a mere belief. You may intellectually believe something, for example, the belief that God loves you, but to have faith implies that this truth securely holds you, that the truth has become so real to you that you accept it with every fiber of your being. When you experience faith in God, he becomes real to you and you become assured that your career in this life and eternity is wholly secure in the hands of the absolute spirit person who is the creator, controller and infinite upholder of the universe and who wants to be your friend.

But have not people had faith in things which are not real and can never be real? You may have faith that 2 plus 2 equals 5, but that does not make it so. Or you may have faith that you will win the lottery. Such faith, while not so impossible as adding two and two to get five, is not a desire that God will respond to. What can you reasonably have faith in? Here is a short list:

God listens to your prayers.
God knows everything about you: your history, your thoughts, your emotions, your desires.
God seeks your highest good.
God has an eternal plan that encompasses a glorious future for you, if only you will accept his guidance.
God forgives any errors or misdeeds you may have committed and is eager to embrace you as a loving father embraces a child who may have gone astray.

As we develop our friendship with God, we must remember, of course, to be sincere. This sincerity goes beyond the honesty we owe to our human friends. Though we are honest with them, we are also discreet and sensitive to them; we will not blurt out a truth that we know will hurt them. But with God, we need not be reserved. He knows our every thought; there is no reason not to be totally sincere with him; we can’t fool God! The better we know him, the more we realize we can trust him. Trust in God means letting go of our wishes and any desire to change him, and allowing God to change us.

To be good friend to God, we must trust him. We trust our human friends, but God is worthy of absolute trust. He will never betray us. He wants only the best for us. We can bring to him every concern, every difficulty, every desire, and he will always guide us toward our highest good.

Here’s an important point about praying to God: Our prayers must be unselfish. God will not welcome a prayer that asks for unfair advantage over someone else. In prayer, we ask to know God’s will, and God’s will must be the highest good for us. Also, we should pray for others, as Jesus often did. We can pray for our family, our friends, for strangers, and, yes, even for our enemies. All are children of God, created in his image and beloved by him.

Remember: God responds to your real needs. And he answers your prayers when you are ready. And you can increase your receptivity to God’s spiritual blessings. How? First, by asking for God’s help. Second, by confidently expecting him to answer. But realize that his answer comes from his infinite wisdom; he may not give you just what you ask for, but he will answer in terms of his superior knowledge. So we can abandon all petty desires and instead cultivate the supreme desire of knowing and doing God’s will. We can be confident that God will answer our prayers, but he will answer according to our highest needs; we must be patient and let God provide answers according to his timetable, not ours.

Let us rejoice that our God loves us so much that he is ever willing to respond lovingly to our faintest faith. Yes, God is our best friend!

Amen!

Joint Education Seminar Papers

Sat, 17 Jun 2017 22:56:47 GMT

From March 23-26 I participated in a Joint Education Seminar held at Urantia Foundation headquarters, 533 Diversey Parkway, Chicago IL 60014. The topic of the Seminar was "Giving of the Truth of Heaven: Using Our Talents." The papers from the Seminar have been posted on the Urantia Fellowship website. See

http://www.urantia.org/study/seminar-presentations

Homily: The Good News of the Kingdom

Wed, 01 Feb 2017 23:55:08 GMT

A Homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer

Bella Terra Nursing Center

January 22, 2017

[Scripture: Matthew 4:12-23]

Do you all remember the days before there was voice mail or answering machines? When I first moved to Chicago, 35 years ago, I worked for a company where a receptionist would write down telephone messages on a slip of paper.One day I picked up a message that I had been called by someone from the National Association of Reality. This surprised me, for I knew of no such organization, but thinking about it, I thought that The National Association of Reality was an organization I would like to join! How about you? When I returned the call, I learned that the caller was actually from the National Association of Realtors. Too bad! Still, the message got me to thinking, what is reality, anyhow?

We can think of various kinds of realities, at different levels. To us, living in the Chicago area in the wintertime, reality is bitter cold temperatures and snow. To a new-born child, reality is his mother’s loving care. In Chicago, one reality is that 700 people were murdered last year. Chicagoans also relished the reality that the Chicago Cubs won their first World Series in 108 years.

How would Jesus characterize reality? After all, Jesus mission was to reveal the truth. “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” [1] Moreover, he said, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”[2] Jesus would not deny the realities of bitter cold, of maternal nurturing, of an epidemic of murders, or the joy of a baseball team’s triumph, and he would have much to say about the evil realities we encounter in life, but he came to earth to testify to a more far-reaching truth, the truth of the reality of the kingdom of heaven.

In today’s scripture passage, we are told about the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry, when he started gathering disciples and first talked about the coming kingdom of heaven. Jesus’ mission was preceded by that of his cousin John, who became known as John the Baptist. John’s message was “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”[3]

After Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he “began to announce, ‘Change your hearts and lives! Here comes the kingdom of heaven!’”[4] And he started calling disciples. The first two named in the gospel of Matthew are fisherman brothers, Simon Peter and Andrew. “He said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” Then he calls two sons of Zebedee the boat builder, James and John.

I wonder whether Simon Peter, Andrew, and James and John Zebedee might have known Jesus before being called, as reported by Matthew. We know that Jesus’ father Joseph was a carpenter; It is likely that Jesus was also a carpenter; he may well have worked in Zebedee’s boat-building shop. If so, the Gospels don’t tell us. They simply relate Jesus’ calling these disciples, who immediately accept Jesus’ command, “Follow me.”

We Christians should ask ourselves, “What does it mean to follow Jesus?” The first disciples left their work and families, and accompanied Jesus on his various preaching tours in Palestine. And they were witnesses to his various sermons, to miracles of healing, and ultimately to his death and resurrection.

You and I do not have the blessing of being with Jesus of Nazareth in the flesh. But, as Christians, we are also called to follow Jesus. To do this, we must understand the meaning of Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom of heaven. In today’s scripture passage, we are told that “Jesus traveled throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues. He announced the good news of the kingdom.”

What is the good news of the kingdom of heaven that was a central part of Jesus’ teaching? The Hebrew prophets presented the kingdom of heaven or kingdom of God as both a present reality and a future hope—when the kingdom would be realized in fullness upon the appearance of the Messiah. This is the kingdom concept John the Baptist taught. And Jesus taught both these, as well. Most basically, he taught that the kingdom of heaven must begin with the dual concept of the fatherhood of God and the resulting fact of the brotherhood of man. Jesus said that “God is your heavenly Father.” Indeed, Jesus referred to God as “your Father” or “your heavenly Father 15 times in Matthew chapters 5 and 6 alone, as well as elsewhere. In chapter 20 of the gospel of John, the risen Jesus tells Mary Magdalene, “I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”[5] Moreover, he affirms, “You are all brothers.”[6]Jesus also told us, “The Father himself loves you.” [7] and “Fear not, little flock: for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”[8]

Since Jesus portrayed God as a Father, one may ask why Jesus used the image of “kingdom of God” rather than “family of God.” At the time of Jesus’ life in the flesh, kingdoms, in which a king ruled, were the dominant form of political organization. Moreover, “Kingdom of God” was the phrase used by John the Baptist, the last in the line of Hebrew prophets and who aroused Israel to fervent expectation of Jesus’ coming. By using the phrase “kingdom of God,” Jesus tapped into the religious fervor that John had developed among the people. But the kingdom which Jesus proclaimed is not a life of servitude to a monarch. It is a life of familial love. His teaching was that one enters this kingdom simply by acceptance of the relationship of being a son or daughter to God: “Whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”[9] Jesus also taught the profound truth that “The kingdom of heaven is within you.”[10] Jesus thereby exalted the individual. And realize that individuals who are so exalted will go on to engage in loving service to all God’s children.

By accepting Jesus’ teaching of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, we are endowed with a new life of spiritual liberty. We are emboldened with new courage and increased spiritual power. The gospel of the kingdom sets us free and inspires us to dare to hope for eternal life; it includes true consolation for all of us, even for the poor. Jesus taught that, by faith, the believer enters the kingdom now. He taught that two things are essential to entrance into the kingdom:

1.Sincere faith. To come as a little child, to receive as a gift that one is a son or daughter of God.
2.Hunger for truth. The thirst for righteousness, the acquirement of the motive to be like God and to find God.

Christians believe that Jesus was the Son of God and also the Son of Man, that is, he was both divine and human. We sometimes forget that the human Jesus needed to have faith, just as you and I do. He enjoyed a sublime and wholehearted faith in God which totally dominated his thinking, his praying, and his life of dedicated service.

Jesus does not require his disciples to believe in him, but rather to believe with him, believe in the reality of the love of God and in full confidence accept the assurance that we are all his beloved children. The Master desires that all his followers should fully share his transcendent faith. To “follow Jesus” means to personally share his religious faith and to enter into the spirit of the Master’s life of unselfish service for mankind. Jesus most touchingly challenged his followers, not only to believe what he believed, but also to believe as he believed. This is the full significance of his one supreme requirement, “Follow me.” If we follow him, we will know the reality of the kingdom, both in this life and the life to come.

Sermon: Miracles (preached January 29, 2017)

Wed, 01 Feb 2017 23:53:04 GMT

A sermon preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Northbrook United Methodist Church

January 29, 2017

[Scripture: Mark 1:21-28]

No one who knows my mother would consider her to be religious. She is a Jew and proud of her Jewish identity, but her Judaism does not encompass a conscious devotion to the Holy One of Israel. Even so, she describes the experience of giving birth to me, her first-born child as a “miracle.” Perhaps you women who have given birth feel similarly. For my part, I can simply say that birth is a wonder.

Our scripture passage for today relates an incident early in Jesus’ public ministry in which he is said to drive out an evil spirit from a possessed man. Does this represent a miracle? Skeptics have suggested that, rather than being delivered of an evil spirit, the man had epilepsy and was mimicking the behavior he understood that demon possession would require. Remember that in Jesus’ day, no one knew of or understood the disease of epilepsy. So, while in this event Jesus evidently healed the man, he may not have cast out an evil spirit. Even so, curing him of epilepsy could plausibly be termed a miracle.

And speaking of miracles, the Gospels relate many incidents when Jesus healed someone of disease.

Here are just a few examples:

Curing a man who had been blind since birth of his blindness[1]
Healing a man with a withered hand[2]
Healing the paralyzed man whose friends lowed him from an opening in the roof[3]

A Google search for “miracles of Jesus” yields a list of 35 miracles, including the casting out of demons, many healings, and, not to be forgotten, the spectacular miracles of feeding the 5000 with two fishes and five loaves, and the resurrection of Lazarus from the dead.

None of this should be surprising for us Christians who consider Jesus to be the Son of God. Jesus was a miraculous person. His incarnation as a babe, born of Mary can certainly be deemed a miracle—and I say this, quite apart from Mary’s alleged virginity.

When the Son of God was on earth, incarnated in the likeness of mortal flesh, and overflowing with compassion for the struggling mortals of the realm, it was inevitable that extraordinary things should happen. But we should not approach Jesus through miracles; rather we should approach the miracles through Jesus.

Jesus did not want to become known primarily as a miraculous healer. Such a reputation would attract unfavorable attention from the religious authorities and would detract from his true mission. Consider Mark 1:40:

A man with a skin disease [leprosy?] approached Jesus, fell to his knees, and begged, “if you want, you can make me clean. Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand, touched him, and said, “I do want to. Be clean.” Instantly, the skin disease left him, and he was clean. Sternly, Jesus sent him away, saying “Don’t say anything to anyone. Instead, go and show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifice for your cleansing that Moses commanded. This will be a testimony to them.” Instead, he went out and started talking freely and spreading the news so that Jesus wasn’t able to enter a town openly. He remained outside in deserted places, but people came to him from everywhere.

When I was in high school, I read Bertrand Russell’s book Why I Am Not a Christian. In this book Russell asks, “If Jesus was as powerful and as merciful as Christians believe him to be, why didn’t he banish illness from the face of the earth, instead of just healing a few random lepers?” When I read this, I thought, “That’s a knock-down argument.”

But Jesus’ mission on earth was not to perform miracles. It was to portray the Truth. He declared, ““For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” [4] Moreover, he said, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”[5]

What is the truth which Jesus came to portray? It was the truth of the Kingdom of God, which embodies the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Jesus taught that “God is your heavenly Father.”Indeed, Jesus referred to God as “your Father” or “your heavenly Father 15 times in Matthew chapters 5 and 6 alone, as well as elsewhere.

Toward the end of the gospel of John, Mary Magdalene cries at the tomb where Jesus was buried. And the resurrected Jesus appears to her. He says, “Go to my brothers and sisters and tell them, “I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God,”[6] Jesus here makes clear that God is not only the Father of Jesus’, but is also the Father of each one of us. He has also affirmed, “You are all brothers” [7] and “The Father himself loves you.”[8] And also, “Fear not, little flock: for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”[9]

We live in a disturbed world. Whether due to demonic influence or the faulty free-will decisions made in a finite, evolving world, we cannot open the newspaper or peruse the TV news without realizing that evil and tragedies abound. I’m sure you can all provide a list of horrors that are all too real. I will cite only one: in Chicago last year, 700 people were murdered. The victims included little children. My wife used to teach high school on the South Side of Chicago. She said that all of her students knew someone who had been shot.

For the most part, you and I live fairly comfortably here on the North Shore. It’s unlikely that we knew any of the 700 murder victims I just cited. But, in lesser ways, we are not immune from pain and suffering. We may struggle with one or more of a variety of problems: physical infirmity, broken relationships, a wayward child, dying parents, unemployment, not to mention internal demons such as addiction that may control our lives. Still, we can take heart in what Jesus taught us: that we are all the children of a Fatherly God, who loves each one of us with an infinite love, and who has provided for our welfare in this life and in eternity. If we realize this eternal truth, we will not only be comforted in our souls, but we will be inspired to bring comfort and hope to our fellow brothers and sisters.

In his book The Spiritual Life of Children, Robert Coles tells of a girl named Mary, not yet ten, from a region of the country often called backward. Mary told him, “I don’t want to waste my time here on earth. When you’re put here, it’s for a reason. The Lord wants you to do something. If you don’t know what, then you’ve got to try hard to find out what. It may take time. You may make mistakes. But if you pray, He’ll lead you to your direction. He won’t hand you a piece of paper with a map on it, no sir. He’ll whisper something, and at first you might not even hear, but if you have trust in Him and you keep turning to Him, it will be all right.”

Thanks be to God!

Books I have read in the past year

Wed, 26 Oct 2016 22:46:27 GMT

As a Lay Servant in the United Methodist Church, I submit a report each year to the UM Charge Conference. One part of the report is a list of "books read to help you develop your devotional life, improve your understanding of the Bible, improve your understanding of The United Methodist Church, and to improve your skills in caring leading, commnuicating, and speaking."

Here is the list I submitted for the past year:

Books I have read in the past year:

Friendship with God | Kaye and Bill Cooper

Origins: God, Evolution, and the Question of the Cosmos | Philip A. Rolnick

Living in Truth, Beauty, and Goodness: Values and Virtues | Jeffrey Wattles

The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Final Days in Jerusalem | Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan

Birdsong | Rumi

Sacrifice and Atonement: Psychological Motives and Biblical Patterns | Stephan Finlan

Bullying in the Churches | Stephan Finlan

Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner and Saint | Nadia Bolz-Weber

Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People | Nadia Bolz-Weber:

The Enduring Quest: A Search for a Philosophy of Life | Harry Overstreet

The Religion of Jesus | Walter E. Bundy

Our Recovery of Jesus | Walter E. Bundy

God in Idea and Experience | Rees Griffiths

God and Ourselves | Edwin Lewis

If the Oceans Were Ink | Carla Power

The Kotel Siddur: Prayer Book for Friday Night and Festivals | The Western Wall Heritage Foundation

Speaking of Faith | Krista Tippett

Note:

The two books by Bundy, as well as the books by Rees Griffiths, Edwin Lewis, and Harry Overstreet, are cited by Matthew Block as "source books" for paper 196, "The Faith of Jesus." See http://www.urantiabooksources.com/pdf/196.pdf

The Faith of Jesus | sermon by Daniel Love Glazer 7-17-2016

Tue, 19 Jul 2016 22:44:05 GMT

A sermon preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Northbrook United Methodist Church

July 17, 2016

[Note: the hymn preceding the sermon was Jesus Walked this Lonesome Valley]

I am retired from my career in the computer field. At one time I used to teach computer classes at corporate sites around the country. I would fly in to a city Sunday night, teach Monday through Friday, then fly back home. I liked the teaching, but did not like the travel, especially with a wife and two kids at home, so after a while I quit.

One week I taught a class to about 20 programmers, each one of whom had a computer for doing the class exercises. One of my students was in a motorized wheelchair. He wasn’t able to use his legs, which hung limply. He could hardly use his arms, except for the minimal effort required to move his wheelchair. And he couldn’t talk; he could only grunt. In order to use the keyboard to type in programming commands or to send me a message he had a prong attached to a headband. He would lean forward and use the prong to press the keys, one by one.

[I illustrated this story by putting on a headband, to which I attached a two-foot prong]

When I saw how this fellow, who was evidently a successful computer programmer, coped with his handicaps, I resolved that the next time I had a hangnail, I would not feel sorry for myself.

I know nothing of this student’s faith or his personal relationship with God, but it must have required great courage and a genuine faith of some sort for him to be a successful computer professional. Like Jesus, he had to walk that lonesome valley. Indeed, each one of us also has to walk the lonesome valley. We may not have the afflictions this programmer had or we may have even greater afflictions—of body, of mind, or mistreatment by the world. But whether we have been lucky or unlucky, every one of us, in the depths of our soul, has to walk the lonesome valley in which we find God for ourselves. Every one of us, rich or poor, strong or weak, healthy or unhealthy, must face the ultimate question: Is life, with all of its contradictions and cruelties, nothing more than a random combination of atoms, or does life conceal some higher purpose? Could it be true that this world, with all its horrors, was created by God who called it good, who created mankind in his own image and who sent us his divine Son, Jesus, to be the way, the truth, and the life and to guide us into a glorious destiny?

Some people have questioned whether Jesus really had to walk the lonesome valley. After all, wasn’t he the Son of God, who declared “I and the Father are one”[1]? If the only record we had of Jesus was the Gospel of John, this would be a plausible view. In John’s Gospel, Jesus knows who he is, all that he has ever been and is to be from the very beginning. He is presented as a divine being, an object of veneration, but not as a human being needing faith or religion himself. But the other three Gospels, those of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, present us with a different perspective on Jesus, one that emphasizes that he was not only the Son of God, but also the Son of Man.

Yes, Jesus walked the lonesome valley, as each one of us must do. He was a religious man—the most religious man ever—who by his fervent and undaunted faith achieved the knowing and doing of the divine will.

The human Jesus had a faith in God that was absolute and exultant. Like every mortal creature, he experienced the highs and lows of daily existence, but he never for one moment doubted the certainty of God’s protection and loving care. Jesus’ faith was the result of the activity of the divine spirit working within the ground of his being. His faith was not just an adherence to tradition or acceptance of a dogmatic belief; nor was it simple an intellectual exercise. His faith was completely personal and wholly spiritual.

Jesus saw God as holy, just, and great, as well as being true, beautiful and good. For Jesus, all these divine qualities comprised the “will of the Father in heaven.”

Faith for Jesus was not a means of escape from a world of troubles and conflicts. It was not an illusory consolation for the trials and problems of life, an avoidance of the harsh realities of life. In the face of all life’s tribulations, he enjoyed the thrill of living, by faith, in the very presence of the Heavenly Father. This faith was a triumphant source of personal power and security. As the theologian Wilhelm Bousset has put it, “Never in the life of any one man was God such a living reality as in the life of Jesus.”

Jesus’ faith was rooted in his personal experience with God.Theologians may intellectualize and dogmatize faith, but in the human life of Jesus, faith was personal, original, and spontaneous, like the attitude of a child toward his parents. Jesus’ faith in God was not something he held, but rather something that held him. His experience of God was so real and so deep that it dissolved all doubts or contrary desires. No disappointment, frustration or distress could shake his all-consuming faith. His trust in God was absolute, totally loyal. Not even a cruel death could dent his faith.

For Jesus, the kingdom of God encompassed all spirit values. He said, “Seek First the kingdom of God.”[2] The heart of the prayer he taught his disciples was, “Your kingdom come, your will be done.” He devoted himself to the realization of the will of God with utter self-forgetfulness and total enthusiasm. Yet he never succumbed to the fury of the fanatic or extremist. This spiritual attitude dominated all of his praying, his preaching, his teaching, his thinking, and feeling.

Even so, when someone came to him with the question, “Good teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” Jesus immediately replied, “Why do you call me good? None is good save one, even God.” When we behold this incredible self-forgetfulness, it becomes easier to see how God the Father was able so fully to manifest himself to Jesus and reveal himself through him to others. As the theologian Heiler has written, “The greatest of all offerings that the religious man brings to God is the surrender of his own will in complete obedience.” This is just what Jesus did: the dedication and consecration of his own will to the majestic service of doing the divine will.

Walter E. Bundy, in The Religion of Jesus, has commented that “[Jesus] interpreted religious living wholly in terms of the divine will.”He points out that Jesus never prayed as a religious duty, but rather as “an expression of need, a release of soul, a relief of inner pressure, an elevation and enrichment of mind, a reinforcement and refreshment of spirt, a clarifying of vision. Bundy goes on to say that “Not in visions and voices, but in prayer and communion with God…Jesus learned the divine will and found the personal power to perform it.”

Jesus proclaimed, “Except you become as a little child, you shall not enter the kingdom.”[3] Here Jesus is not recommending a childish immaturity, but rather the attitude of trust and confidence that a child has in his parental environment.The child has a sense of absolute security, free from skepticism and disturbing doubts. Like such a child, Jesus was assured of the watchcare and guidance of his heavenly Father. Bundy says, “His dependence of the divine yielded a sense of absolute security, a wholesome optimism.”

When Jesus was nailed to the cross, he said, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” He could not have so mercifully forgiven his executioners unless his entire life had been dominated by thoughts of love.

Jesus’ great demand is, “Follow me.” He urged his followers not so much to believe in him, but rather believe with him, to accept the reality of the love of God and confidently feel the assurance of sonship with the Father in heaven. He challenged his followers to believe not only what he believed, but as he believed.

Christians glorify the risen and divine Jesus, and it is right and proper that we do so. But he has ascended on high as a man, as well as God. He belongs to men; men belong to him. Let not the discussions of the humanity or divinity of the Christ obscure the saving truth that Jesus of Nazareth was a religious man who, by faith, achieved the knowing and the doing of the will of God.

Thanks be to God!

Brutal Realities: The only "shocking" thing about ISIS's attack on a gay establishment is that it took this long | Bruce Bower | City Journal

Tue, 14 Jun 2016 22:42:36 GMT

On CNN and Fox News, one politician after another professed to be “shocked” by the massacre in Orlando. “Who would have expected such a thing?” people kept asking. Actually, I’ve been expecting just such a thing for years. The only shock was that it took this long for some jihadist to go after a gay establishment.

Islamic law, after all, is crystal clear on homosexuality, though the various schools of sharia prescribe a range of penalties: one calls for death by stoning; another demands that the transgressor be thrown from a high place; a third says to drop a building on him. In Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Sudan, Yemen, Mauritania, Pakistan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, as well as in parts of Nigeria, Somalia, Syria and Iraq, homosexuality is indeed punishable by death.

Nor do Muslims magically change their views on the subject when they move to the West. As long ago as 2005, the head of the Netherlands’ leading gay rights group said that, owing to the growth of Islam in Amsterdam, tolerance of gay people was “slipping away like sand through the fingers”; over the last 10 or 15 years, Dutch gays have fled the cities in droves to escape Muslim gay-bashing. In Norway, several high-profile Muslims have refused publicly to oppose executing gays, and when challenged on their views have gone on the offensive, demanding respect for orthodox Muslim beliefs. This past April, a poll established that 52 percent of British Muslims want homosexuality banned.

Many on the left (and some on the right, too) refuse to face these facts. In 2004, when gay activist Peter Tatchell urged London’s then-mayor Ken Livingstone to rescind an invitation to Koranic scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi—who supports the death penalty for gays—Livingstone issued a report calling Qaradawi a liberal and Tatchell a racist.

Yes, there are self-identified Muslims who harbor no antigay prejudice; I suspect that more than a few of them are actually apostates who—aware that Islam considers apostasy, too, a capital crime—choose to keep quiet about their infidel status. Some gays who were born into Islam claim that they’ve worked out for themselves a version of their faith not inconsistent with their homosexuality; good luck to them, but they’re in a tiny minority. Whenever a Muslim commits some atrocity, we’re reminded that the world contains some 1.5 billion Muslims, the great majority of them tolerant, peace-loving, etc.; the fact is that the great majority of those 1.5 billion Muslims also belong to varieties of Islam that preach contempt for, and severe punishment of, homosexuals.

Incredibly, many gays still don’t get this—or refuse to get it. They cling—mindlessly, one wants to say—to leftist ideology, which tells them that Muslims, like gays, are an official victim group, and thus their natural allies. They see Christians as their enemies—though even the most aggressively antigay Christians in America, namely the “God hates fags” crowd at the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, don’t go around killing anybody. Perversely, some gays support the BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) movement, which demonizes the only gay-friendly country in the Middle East. Some even buy into the concept of “pinkwashing”—the inane assertion, promoted by radical lesbian playwright Sarah Schulman, that Israel advertises its own gay-positive values as a means of covering up its supposed oppression of Palestinians. On this day of horror, let’s hope that the jihadist massacre of 50 people in a gay club in Orlando finally awakens gay Americans to the brutal reality of Islam’s hatred for them.

Bruce Bawer is the author of The Victims’ Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Closing of the Liberal Mind.

The Great Question: On Islam and Islamism | Andrew Klavan | City Journal

Tue, 14 Jun 2016 22:40:18 GMT

Islamism is the great evil of our age, and the great question of our age is whether this foulness is the natural child of Islam itself or a cancer on its body. This is not a question that can be decided by comparing the number of “good” Muslims to the number of “bad” ones. A religion is a form of philosophy, and a philosophy shapes not just individuals but whole cultures and nations into its own image over time. Any individual may do right or wrong in the name of any given idea. You have to see a much bigger picture before you can judge the moral quality of the idea itself.

The West, over the centuries, has become increasingly tolerant and diversified. This did not happen in spite of our dominant religion but because of it. If you look at a map of the nations that accept the concept of gay rights, for example, you will find that they are almost without exception nations formed by Christianity. Indeed, when one Westerner argues for gay rights and another argues against them, they are both arguing on Christian principles—the Judge-Not versus the Shall-Not. Though it infuriates both sides to hear it, it is nonetheless true: this is an internecine quarrel, a family feud. Our very ability to disagree on such basic issues without murdering one another is what makes all of us, believers or not, helplessly Christian in the end.

When I look at the nations of Islam, I do not see the same sort of development toward tolerance and multiplicity. Almost everywhere Islam is dominant, there is oppression, ignorance, and violence at levels the West does not experience. Almost every act of terrorism worldwide is associated with Islam—so much so that those wishing to defend the creed have to seize on the occasional outlying act of non-Islamic terrorism, or descend into childish moral equivalencies or try to spin the issue as one of “guns” or “hate” or “religion” in order to distract us from the painfully obvious.

The fact is, when an Islamic man invades an Orlando gay bar and starts slaughtering the innocent on Koranic principles, it is not just right but necessary for us to ask: is he distorting the teaching of the Koran or living out its logic? Much depends on getting the answer right, possibly even our survival.

The best way to find the answer is, of course, to have well-informed people debate the question publicly without censorship and with at least a modicum of civility and goodwill. We seem to have decided against this. Instead, with the aid of our media and Internet, we greet each new act of Islamic murder with a show of lies and anger. The Left is in charge of the lies. They tell us, in Hillary Clinton’s absurd words, that “Muslims . . . have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism.” The Right takes care of the anger, spewing useless rhetoric about carpet-bombing Arabia until the sand glows in the dark.

A battle between lies and anger can never be resolved. Each feeds the other. The lies produce more frustrated anger; the anger seems to justify the pacifying lies. The best one can hope for is the brute victory of one form of stupidity over the other. That seems to be the idea behind the current ridiculous presidential election, in which the dishonest Left is about to nominate the avatar of its dishonesty, and the angry Right is about to nominate the avatar of its rage.

The Devil, says C.S. Lewis, “always sends errors into the world in pairs—pairs of opposites . . . He relies on your extra dislike of one to draw you gradually into the opposite one. But do not let us be fooled. We have to keep our eyes on the goal and go straight through between both errors.”

The path between lies and anger is the fearless search for truth, that truth which not only sets us free but which, in this case, may be the only thing that can save us. If we are in a fight with the angry fragment of a moderate creed, let our warriors and lawmen hunt them down and kill them and be done with it. If we are in a clash of civilizations, we may all of us need to oppose the enemy without fear at every level of our national life.

Andrew Klavan is a City Journal contributing editor. His podcast is featured Monday through Thursday at the DailyWire.com.

Challenging Radical Islam: An Explanation of Islam's Relation to Terrorism and Violence | John A. Azumah | First Things, January 2015

Tue, 17 May 2016 22:37:48 GMT

The world is being subjected to horrific images of religious violence. The Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria records its beheadings. Boko Haram in Nigeria parades hundreds of kidnapped schoolgirls. Al-Shabaab in Somalia attacks a shopping mall in Nairobi. These barbaric acts can make us feel helpless, fearful, angry, and even guilty, because there seems to be little we can do to stop them. Meanwhile, commentators traipse from one television channel to the other, presenting their analyses. Some condemn IS and Boko Haram but assure viewers that their acts have nothing to do with true Islam. Others opine that IS and Boko Haram do represent Islam’s true face. Neither perspective is helpful. Both distort the nature of Islam and its relation to terrorism and violence.

Evangelical views on Islam understandably hardened after 9/11. Ted Haggard, past president of the National Evangelical Association, said, “The Christian God encourages freedom, love, forgiveness, prosperity and health. The Muslim god appears to value the opposite. The personalities of each god are evident in the cultures, civilizations and dispositions of the peoples that serve them.” A leading British Evangelical activist, Patrick Sookhdeo, expresses a similar view: “The violence perpetrated by [jihadi] groups is rooted both in the ideology of large contemporary Islamist movements and in the traditional, orthodox and classical version of Islam, especially its doctrines of jihad, da’wa and dhimmitude, and also the law of apostasy, presented in the authoritative Islamic scriptures and commentaries.”

In other words, for most Evangelicals, Islam is the problem because it warrants the violence of jihadi groups. The claim is not without grounds. Contrary to repeated Muslim denials, key aspects of the ideology of radical violent Muslim groups are indeed rooted in Islamic texts and history. Al-Qaeda, IS, and Boko Haram have their origins mainly in Wahhabi and Salafi thought. These are traditions of fundamentalist Islamic interpretation that have widespread influence across the Muslim world. Founding leaders of jihadi groups have either been students of leading Wahhabi-Salafi scholars or were inspired by their works.

Islam is similar to Judaism in the importance it gives to legal interpretation. As one Muslim scholar put it, “Shari‘ah instructs man on how he should eat, receive visitors, buy and sell, slaughter animals, clean himself, sleep, go to the toilet, lead a government, practice justice, pray, and perform other acts of [worship].” Unlike Christianity in the West, where divisive debates often have focused on theological doctrines, in Islam the most important schools of thought reflect differences in jurisprudence. There are four main schools of law for Sunnis (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i, and Hanbali schools) and one for Shi’ites (Ja‘fari). The main distinctions between these schools lie in divergent opinions about authoritative sources or roots of law. All accept the Qur’an and the sunnah (Muhammad’s example) as foundational but differ on the importance of consensus in collective scholarly reasoning (ijma) and individual analogical reasoning (qiyas). The most conservative school, Hanbali, tends to emphasize the Qur’an and sunna and is suspicious of ijma and qiyas, while the most liberal, Hanafi, tends to emphasize qiyas and individual opinion.

Wahhabi and Salafi thought in their modern expression derive from Islamic jurist-theologians Ibn Taymiyyah (d. 1328) and Muhammad Abd al-Wahhab (d. 1792). They are both renowned students and teachers of the Hanbali school of law. Salafi teaching upholds the first three generations of Muslim history (salaf) as sacrosanct alongside the prophetic example. Not all Salafis are Wahhabis. The latter brand any practice or teaching later than the third century of Islam (salaf) as satanic innovation (bida‘). Wahhabism is the most literalist and iconoclastic branch of Hanbalism, which itself is the most conservative of the four main schools. For instance, while other Muslims might urge abstention from alcohol, Wahhabis also prohibit stimulants, including tobacco. Not only is modest dress prescribed but also the type of clothing that should be worn, especially by women (a black abaya, covering all but the eyes and hands). Religious education includes training in the use of weapons. Wahhabism emphasizes the importance of avoiding non-Islamic cultural practices and non-Muslim fraternity on the grounds that the sunna and the central importance of Muhammad as exemplar forbid imitating non-Muslims. Wahhabi scholars have warned against taking non-Muslims as friends and against smiling at or even wishing them well on their holidays.

Since the oil boom of the 1970s and ’80s, Saudi Arabia, whose official creed is Wahhabi Islam, has exported Wahhabism to parts of Africa, Asia, and the West through scholarships and the funding of radical mosques, preachers, and groups. Al-Qaeda is a direct spinoff of Wahhabi Islam, and IS an outgrowth from al-Qaeda, while the origins of Boko Haram lie in a network of Wahhabi-Salafi groups in Nigeria. This religious context provides the framework for justifying violence. Jihadists quote from Islamic scripture, prophetic traditions, and legal opinions to support their claims and activities. Jihad against non-Muslims and the ultimatum to convert to Islam, pay a special tax, or be killed are in fact based on Islamic law. The same is true of the tactic of capturing women and children as war booty and keeping or disposing of them as slaves. Islam also promises rewards and pleasures awaiting the martyr. It is therefore simplistic if not misleading to argue that groups like IS and Boko Haram have nothing to do with Islam.

Nevertheless, it is equally misleading to argue that the jihadi groups represent the true face of Islam. While the legal and doctrinal edicts that the jihadists cite are integral parts of Islamic law, the jihadists without question violate that law by taking it into their own hands. Their failure to consider the conditions necessary for the declaration of jihad, as well as for its proper conduct, provides an obvious example. Questions of which groups can be targeted, and of how and toward what end, are enormously complicated and sharply qualified in the authoritative legal texts. For instance, all four Sunni schools of law, including the Hanbali school, agree that the declaration of jihad can be justified for the sake of preserving or extending the government of an Islamic state. Therefore, as is the case in Christian just-war theory, in which the power to declare war is carefully limited to governments, in Islamic law only legitimate Islamic governments can declare a jihad, not individuals or nonstate actors. An exception is made when a Muslim land comes under attack or occupation by an enemy force, which renders jihad or resistance an individual responsibility. But even then, jihad has to have been formally declared by the legitimate authority properly representing the people of the occupied nation. By declaring and conducting jihad on their own, al-Qaeda, IS, Boko Haram, and other such groups act as heretical usurpers.

When it comes to the conduct of jihad, Islamic terrorist groups are also at odds with all the main traditions of Islam. All four orthodox schools of law, including the conservative Hanbali school, declare that women, children, the elderly, the disabled, priests, traders, farmers, and all noncombatant civilians should not be targeted and killed in a jihad. Places of economic value, such as farms, markets, and places of worship—mosques, of course, but also churches, monasteries, and convents—are not to be targeted for attack. Islamic law allows that places of worship may be taken as war booty, but they are not to be destroyed. The Hagia Sophia, for example, was a church that was converted to use as a mosque (it is now a museum) after Constantinople, now Istanbul, fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. Deliberate assaults on civilians, the murder of religious figures, indiscriminate bombings in markets and buildings, hijacking and ramming planes full of civilians into buildings occupied by civilians, attacks on and destruction of churches and mosques—all carried out by al-Qaeda, IS, and Boko Haram—violate the clear limits set in Islamic law for the conduct of a jihad.

Another key feature of the jihadists’ ideology is their rejection of and often rebellion against established governments of Islamic countries. Al-Qaeda, IS, and Boko Haram have declared Muslim governments around the world un-Islamic and illegitimate, vowing to replace them with an Islamic caliphate. To achieve their aim, the groups target and kill Muslim opponents, justifying their actions by invoking takfir, a doctrine, dating back to the seventh century, that specifies conditions under which fellow Muslims can be declared unbelievers who can be killed. A splinter group known as the Kharijites taught that it was acceptable to excommunicate and legitimize jihad against other Muslims, including Muslim rulers, if they were judged guilty of the commission of certain sins. This idea was repudiated by the rest of the Muslim community at the time, and all four orthodox schools of law, including the Hanbali school, continue to reject it. Indeed, the legal tradition of Islam includes explicit rulings against Kharijites, classifying them as unbelievers who should be fought and killed.

Islam’s own tradition, therefore, bears witness against Islamic terrorism today. The four schools of law have clear rulings that on no account should an individual or group of Muslims attempt to change the government of an Islamic state through the use of arms and violence, because to allow such a possibility invites civil strife, private wars, and the abuse of Islam by factions who use theology to justify their self-interested rebellions and usurpations. The schools are also unanimous in denouncing the killing of fellow Muslims in the name of jihad. The guiding principle has always been that anarchy and the killing of fellow Muslims are worse than living under an unjust system.

Given the clear consensus of the Islamic tradition, it is no surprise that Muslim leaders around the world have repeatedly and publicly denounced al-Qaeda, IS, and Boko Haram. These include the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, the Indonesian Ulema Council, Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi of Iran, the grand imam of Al-Azhar University in Cairo, and many others. Two leading Pakistani Muslim scholars, Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and Muhammad Tahir ul-Qadri, both with considerable followings and influence, have written a book and issued a comprehensive legal ruling (fatwa) on the meaning and conduct of jihad. Both the book and the fatwa proscribe terrorism and violent rebellion, citing extensively the Qur’an, prophetic traditions, and a chain of legal and theological luminaries over the centuries and across sectarian divides. They declare jihadi groups such as the Kharijites to be terrorists, rebels, and heretics. Recently, 126 leading Islamic figures around the world signed and published an open letter challenging the Islamic basis of the ideology of IS.

While these public renunciations and fatwas may have little impact on the leadership of jihadi groups, they play a significant role in delegitimizing jihadi ideology and thereby undermining its appeal to young Muslims. We should take them seriously and do what we can to amplify their influence. Unfortunately, Western critics of jihadi groups overlook these voices and sometimes even discredit Islam as a whole. Too often I’ve heard people say, “Islam reformed is no Islam!” Not only is that a patronizing claim about what Muslims can and cannot achieve within their own tradition, it is a dead-end position. As a colleague of mine once put it, “When the Muslim tells a Christian, ‘The Qur’an teaches me to love you,’ why should the Christian then tell the Muslim, ‘No, the Qur’an actually teaches you to kill me’?”

We need to strongly resist the view that Islam is the problem, that the Qur’an is the problem, that Muhammad is the problem. To denounce Islam as a death-loving religion—or the Qur’an and Muhammad as a constitution and example, respectively, for terrorists—provides excuses for twisted zealots. It reinforces their deluded belief that they and only they are the true Muslims. Moreover, it inspires fear and mistrust among the great majority of Muslims, who are not jihadists. If the Qur’an and Islam are the problems, what is the solution? Drop bombs on the Ka’bah in Mecca? Ban the use of the Qur’an?

Those who argue that jihadi groups represent the “essence” of Islam actually reflect a very Western way of thinking. Wittingly or unwittingly, they presume a scripturalist interpretation of Islam, imagining that we can explain Islamic terrorism by drawing a straight line between authoritative texts and the actions of jihadists. To prove their point, these Islam-is-the-problem critics tend to link specific acts of jihadi groups to a string of references from Islamic scripture, traditions, legal texts, and Muslim scholarly opinions. Perversely, this sola scriptura approach is no different from the jihadists’ own “Qur’an and sunna alone” approach.

The truth about religious lives is not so simple. The vast majority of Christians and Muslims don’t live by sola scriptura, or by Qur’an and sunna alone—and this is the case even when they claim to do so. A complex, shifting web of sociopolitical, geopolitical, racial, ethnic, cultural, economic, historical, and existential realities inform the way all of us live out our faith. My own view is that Islamic texts contain seeds of violence. In the corruption, illiteracy, poverty, and oppressive governments that plague many Muslim societies, those seeds find fertile ground in which they take root, sprout, and flourish—as well as in historical memories, foreign-policy missteps by Western governments, and alienation felt by Muslim youth in Western societies.

We cannot make sense of the jihadi mindset, let alone work out a credible and sustainable response, without taking such background conditions seriously. Undoubtedly the disorientation caused by modernity and postmodernity is key. Economic development and an increasingly global commerce in movies, TV, and other forms of popular culture weaken traditional Islamic institutions and disturb and disorient many Muslims. It is in this context that heretical groups such as Boko Haram and the Islamic State flourish. They’re part zealot, part thug, part political entrepreneur, in societies undergoing profound social transformations.

What, then, are we to say about Islam and terrorism? There is no question that the jihadists quote mainstream Islamic texts to justify their actions. But bear in mind that, in itself, quoting Islamic texts does not necessarily make one’s views and actions Islamic. The Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda quotes the Bible, as did the Branch Davidians of David Koresh, the People’s Temple of Jim Jones, and many other eccentric Christian cults. That does not make their views and actions Christian.

I have read and met Evangelical commentators who, regarding any efforts to distinguish jihadi abuses of Islamic traditions from Islam itself, dismiss them as no more than attempts to prevent us from holding Islam accountable for the actions of the jihadi groups. They insist that we would blunt their criticism of Islam and thereby prevent them from helping the victims of jihadism. But I can’t see how judging Islam on the basis of jihadi actions helps their victims. Quite the contrary, in fact. If it is right to judge Islam as a whole on the basis of the barbarism of jihadi groups, how should we explain—and encourage—the actions of Kurdish Muslims and many other Muslims who are standing up to the jihadists and paying with their lives to protect Christian and Yazidi minorities in Iraq? They read the same Qur’an, follow the same Muhammad, and perform the same daily prayers.

When I press this point, some lamely argue that the good deeds of the Kurds are motivated by nationalism whereas the evil deeds of IS are motivated by Islam. But this is little more than a conclusion latching onto a convenient argument. And the argument is unconvincing. It’s absurd to imagine a separation of religious and ethnic identity in the Middle East.

If there is a danger of being seduced into imagining that the horrors of jihadism can be explained simply by blaming Islam, there are also temptations of multicultural ideology and of the spirit of “inclusion,” which only too quickly make excuses for jihadist violence. Let’s treat Muslims as the mature and intelligent adults they are and engage them in hard conversations. Muslims are not captives of Islamic traditions with no escape or alternatives. There are competing schools and sects among the faithful. We should not be shy about expressing our judgments as to which are the better and which are the worse traditions. If we withhold those judgments, we fail to engage with Muslims as men and women capable of moral agency. They too have religious consciences. They too care about the truth, and not only about God but about their duties to their neighbors as well. The present generation of Muslims has the right to interpret its authoritative traditions in light of twenty-first-century realities. And we as non-Muslims have a right to interpret them as well, and to speak frankly with Muslims about our conclusions. Given the stakes today, I’d say we have a duty to do so.

As a Christian scholar of Islam, I offer a short list of questions that require frank discussion with Muslims. First, during the formative stages of nearly all jihadi groups, local Muslim religious and political leaders have either turned a blind eye to them or actively supported their activities, which have been funded by Islamic governments, organizations, and businessmen. How is it that groups so widely condemned as heretical by Islamic authorities receive so much tacit support from the mainstream Muslim world?

Second, Muslim leaders around the world have countenanced the largely negative and dehumanizing teaching about non-Muslims that we find in authoritative Islamic texts. The same goes for teaching on jihad, apostasy, blasphemy laws, and the place of non-Muslim citizens in an Islamic society. While jihadi groups are heretical in their claim that they have the authority to interpret and impose these laws, the existence of the teaching alone is an invitation to rebellion and extremism. In other words, while it is neither true nor fair to argue that Islam is the problem, there is no doubt that Islam has a problem. When Jesus said that we will be able to discern the faithfulness of his followers by their fruits, he was speaking a common truth. And so, is it not time for Islamic scholars and leaders to reexamine the doctrines that are so easily abused by extremists? Isn’t the orgy of blood we are witnessing today a clear sign of the need for important and thoroughgoing reforms?

These questions and others are not being ignored. A wind is blowing in the house of Islam, and a battle for the soul of Islam is earnestly underway. Disillusioned young Iranians are leaving Islam in droves and giving up on religion altogether. Other ordinary Muslims are turning away from Islam to other religions, including Christianity. We see also in Islam a growing progressive trend toward a critical rereading of Islamic texts and history. These are signs that a serious introspection is taking place across the Muslim world. After 9/11, progressive Muslim scholars openly declared their stance against “those whose God is a vengeful monster in the sky issuing death decrees against the Muslim and the non-Muslim alike . . . those whose God is too small, too mean, too tribal and too male.” To all of these, they declared, “Not in my name, not in the name of my God will you commit this hatred, this violence!”

As someone who grew up in the Muslim world, I want to conclude by saying that we too need to reform our ways. In recent decades, Evangelicals have contributed to the invisibility of Christian presence and witness in Muslim lands. We have caved in to real and imagined threats from radical groups. Instead of openly challenging the criminalization of Christian missions and evangelism in Muslim contexts, we have engaged in undercover and underhand missions. As Evangelicals, we must remain watchful and prayerful, lest radical Islam radicalize us into redefining our witness and values out of fear and hatred. The fight is not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers, and we cannot win by resorting to the same weapons the enemy wields. We are called to use superior arms, called to put on the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, and the helmet of salvation and to take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Eph. 6:14–17).

John A. Azumah is associate professor of World Christianity and Islam at Columbia Theological Seminary.

The Religion of Jesus | Charles Laurence Olivea

Mon, 21 Mar 2016 22:34:27 GMT

The "religion of Jesus" has hardly ever been lived on Urantia according to The Urantia Book. His was the greatest life ever lived, but many appropriate what they want from it or project onto it, rather than actually live it.

He told the Apostles that they called him, "Master," but he did not call them, "servants." Instead, he called them his, "friends." Remarkable. He also said that anyone wishing to be his, "friend," must love their fellow mortals the way he and the Father loved us. Theirs was a parent's love, divinely so. Following him -- living his religious life -- means to seek, find and act upon God-consciousness. To follow him religiously, we must go beyond brotherly or sisterly love. We must learn to assume the Father-perspective: that love that does not count the cost. A Father's love can result in a reciprocity of feeling and worth, but such a love is given with contingencies.

The broader, deeper significance of this point may be, in my opinion, characterized or illustrated in this way: the core meaning of the entire text of the first five papers in The Urantia Book may be summed up as a "Father's love."

I am most drawn to Jesus because of his kindness and decency. But I am amazed by the grace of his friendship. I am awed by the Creator Son wanting to be my friend, personally. I trust and believe him and in him. Our Master sought and followed the will of Universal Father in each of his significant or meaningful decisions in mortal living. (This is why he was never [rarely] in a hurry: he was following a perfect guide.) To really follow him we must do the same, forging a living spiritual tie between human mind and divine spirit. A connection that actually grows. We must be willing to commit freely and trustingly to the Father's invisible presence, adjusting mortal mind in time to realities in eternity.

Jesus (Michael) is a personality of majestic proportions. To follow him is to embrace a living spirit -- to exhibit in truth, in reality, the Fruits of the Spirit. Friendship with such a being means to be transformed by his Spirit of Truth and then in turn be led to the Father's indwelling spirit. The paradox of these ties -- these bonds -- is that such a mortal person is liberated by the connections themselves. Think about it: friendship with Jesus will lead (eventually) to a peace passing understanding. Combining comprehension and contentment. True insight into universe meanings and spiritual values. This experience transcends even knowledge and wisdom.

"Islam--Facts or Dreams?" by Andrew C. McCarthy

Mon, 21 Mar 2016 22:32:29 GMT

Islam—Facts or Dreams?

imprimis.hillsdale.edu/islam-facts-or-dreams/

Andrew C. McCarthy
National Review Institute

Andrew C. McCarthy is a senior fellow at the National Review Institute. A graduate of Columbia College, he received his J.D. at New York Law School. For 18 years, he was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York, and from 1993-95 he led the terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and 11 others in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. Following the 9/11 attacks, he supervised the Justice Department’s command post near Ground Zero. He has also served as a Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense and an adjunct professor at Fordham University’s School of Law and New York Law School. He writes widely for newspapers and journals including National Review, PJ Media, and The New Criterion, and is the author of several books, including Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad and Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotages America.

The following is adapted from a speech delivered on February 24, 2016, at Hillsdale College’s Allan P. Kirby, Jr. Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship in Washington, D.C., as part of the AWC Family Foundation Lecture Series.

In 1993 I was a seasoned federal prosecutor, but I only knew as much about Islam as the average American with a reasonably good education—which is to say, not much. Consequently, when I was assigned to lead the prosecution of a terrorist cell that had bombed the World Trade Center and was plotting an even more devastating strike—simultaneous attacks on the Lincoln and Holland Tunnels, the United Nations complex on the East River, and the FBI’s lower Manhattan headquarters—I had no trouble believing what our government was saying: that we should read nothing into the fact that all the men in this terrorist cell were Muslims; that their actions were not representative of any religion or belief system; and that to the extent they were explaining their atrocities by citing Islamic scripture, they were twisting and perverting one of the world’s great religions, a religion that encourages peace.

Unlike commentators and government press secretaries, I had to examine these claims. Prosecutors don’t get to base their cases on assertions. They have to prove things to commonsense Americans who must be satisfied about not only what happened but why it happened before they will convict people of serious crimes. And in examining the claims, I found them false.

One of the first things I learned concerned the leader of the terror cell, Omar Abdel Rahman, infamously known as the Blind Sheikh. Our government was portraying him as a wanton killer who was lying about Islam by preaching that it summoned Muslims to jihad or holy war. Far from a lunatic, however, he turned out to be a globally renowned scholar—a doctor of Islamic jurisprudence who graduated from al-Azhar University in Cairo, the seat of Sunni Islamic learning for over a millennium. His area of academic expertise was sharia—Islamic law.

I immediately began to wonder why American officials from President Bill Clinton and Attorney General Janet Reno on down, officials who had no background in Muslim doctrine and culture, believed they knew more about Islam than the Blind Sheikh. Then something else dawned on me: the Blind Sheikh was not only blind; he was beset by several other medical handicaps. That seemed relevant. After all, terrorism is hard work. Here was a man incapable of doing anything that would be useful to a terrorist organization—he couldn’t build a bomb, hijack a plane, or carry out an assassination. Yet he was the unquestioned leader of the terror cell. Was this because there was more to his interpretation of Islamic doctrine than our government was conceding?

Defendants do not have to testify at criminal trials, but they have a right to testify if they choose to—so I had to prepare for the possibility. Raised an Irish Catholic in the Bronx, I was not foolish enough to believe I could win an argument over Muslim theology with a doctor of Islamic jurisprudence. But I did think that if what we were saying as a government was true—that he was perverting Islam—then there must be two or three places where I could nail him by saying, “You told your followers X, but the doctrine clearly says Y.” So my colleagues and I pored over the Blind Sheikh’s many writings. And what we found was alarming: whenever he quoted the Koran or other sources of Islamic scripture, he quoted them accurately.

Now, you might be able to argue that he took scripture out of context or gave an incomplete account of it. In my subsequent years of studying Islam, I’ve learned that this is not a particularly persuasive argument. But even if one concedes for the purposes of discussion that it’s a colorable claim, the inconvenient fact remains: Abdel Rahman was not lying about Islam.

When he said the scriptures command that Muslims strike terror into the hearts of Islam’s enemies, the scriptures backed him up.

When he said Allah enjoined all Muslims to wage jihad until Islamic law was established throughout the world, the scriptures backed him up.

When he said Islam directed Muslims not to take Jews and Christians as their friends, the scriptures backed him up.

You could counter that there are other ways of construing the scriptures. You could contend that these exhortations to violence and hatred should be “contextualized”—i.e., that they were only meant for their time and place in the seventh century. Again, I would caution that there are compelling arguments against this manner of interpreting Islamic scripture. The point, however, is that what you’d be arguing is an interpretation.

The fact that there are multiple ways of construing Islam hardly makes the Blind Sheikh’s literal construction wrong. The blunt fact of the matter is that, in this contest of competing interpretations, it is the jihadists who seem to be making sense because they have the words of scripture on their side—it is the others who seem to be dancing on the head of a pin. For our present purposes, however, the fact is that the Blind Sheikh’s summons to jihad was rooted in a coherent interpretation of Islamic doctrine. He was not perverting Islam—he was, if anything, shining a light on the need to reform it.

Another point, obvious but inconvenient, is that Islam is not a religion of peace. There are ways of interpreting Islam that could make it something other than a call to war. But even these benign constructions do not make it a call to peace. Verses such as “Fight those who believe not in Allah,” and “Fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem of war,” are not peaceful injunctions, no matter how one contextualizes.

Another disturbing aspect of the trial against the Blind Sheikh and his fellow jihadists was the character witnesses who testified for the defense. Most of these people were moderate, peaceful Muslim Americans who would no more commit terrorist acts than the rest of us. But when questions about Islamic doctrine would come up—“What does jihad mean?” “What is sharia?” “How might sharia apply to a certain situation?”—these moderate, peaceful Muslims explained that they were not competent to say. In other words, for the answers, you’d have to turn to Islamic scholars like the Blind Sheikh.

Now, understand: there was no doubt what the Blind Sheikh was on trial for. And there was no doubt that he was a terrorist—after all, he bragged about it. But that did not disqualify him, in the minds of these moderate, peaceful Muslims, from rendering authoritative opinions on the meaning of the core tenets of their religion. No one was saying that they would follow the Blind Sheikh into terrorism—but no one was discrediting his status either.

Although this came as a revelation to me, it should not have. After all, it is not as if Western civilization had no experience dealing with Islamic supremacism—what today we call “Islamist” ideology, the belief that sharia must govern society. Winston Churchill, for one, had encountered it as a young man serving in the British army, both in the border region between modern-day Afghanistan and Pakistan and in the Sudan—places that are still cauldrons of Islamist terror. Ever the perceptive observer, Churchill wrote:

How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. . . . Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property—either as a child, a wife, or a concubine—must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Habitually, I distinguish between Islam and Muslims. It is objectively important to do so, but I also have a personal reason: when I began working on national security cases, the Muslims I first encountered were not terrorists. To the contrary, they were pro-American patriots who helped us infiltrate terror cells, disrupt mass-murder plots, and gather the evidence needed to convict jihadists. We have an obligation to our national security to understand our enemies; but we also have an obligation to our principles not to convict by association—not to confound our Islamist enemies with our Muslim allies and fellow citizens. Churchill appreciated this distinction. “Individual Moslems,” he stressed, “may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen.” The problem was not the people, he concluded. It was the doctrine.

What about Islamic law? On this topic, it is useful to turn to Robert Jackson, a giant figure in American law and politics—FDR’s attorney general, justice of the Supreme Court, and chief prosecutor of the war crimes trials at Nuremberg. In 1955, Justice Jackson penned the foreword to a book called Law in the Middle East. Unlike today’s government officials, Justice Jackson thought sharia was a subject worthy of close study. And here is what he concluded:

In any broad sense, Islamic law offers the American lawyer a study in dramatic contrasts. Even casual acquaintance and superficial knowledge—all that most of us at bench or bar will be able to acquire—reveal that its striking features relative to our law are not likenesses but inconsistencies, not similarities but contrarieties. In its source, its scope and its sanctions, the law of the Middle East is the antithesis of Western law.

Contrast this with the constitution that the U.S. government helped write for post-Taliban Afghanistan, which showed no awareness of the opposition of Islamic and Western law. That constitution contains soaring tropes about human rights, yet it makes Islam the state religion and sharia a principal source of law—and under it, Muslim converts to Christianity have been subjected to capital trials for apostasy.

Sharia rejects freedom of speech as much as freedom of religion. It rejects the idea of equal rights between men and women as much as between Muslim and non-Muslim. It brooks no separation between spiritual life and civil society. It is a comprehensive framework for human life, dictating matters of government, economy, and combat, along with personal behavior such as contact between the sexes and personal hygiene. Sharia aims to rule both believers and non-believers, and it affirmatively sanctions jihad in order to do so.

Even if this is not the only construction of Islam, it is absurd to claim—as President Obama did during his recent visit to a mosque in Baltimore—that it is not a mainstream interpretation. In fact, it is the mainstream interpretation in many parts of the world. Last year, Americans were horrified by the beheadings of three Western journalists by ISIS. American and European politicians could not get to microphones fast enough to insist that these decapitations had nothing to do with Islam. Yet within the same time frame, the government of Saudi Arabia beheaded eight people for various violations of sharia—the law that governs Saudi Arabia.

Three weeks before Christmas, a jihadist couple—an American citizen, the son of Pakistani immigrants, and his Pakistani wife who had been welcomed into our country on a fiancée visa—carried out a jihadist attack in San Bernardino, California, killing 14 people. Our government, as with the case in Fort Hood—where a jihadist who had infiltrated the Army killed 13 innocents, mostly fellow soldiers—resisted calling the atrocity a “terrorist attack.” Why? Our investigators are good at what they do, and our top officials may be ideological, but they are not stupid. Why is it that they can’t say two plus two equals four when Islam is involved?

The reason is simple: stubbornly unwilling to deal with the reality of Islam, our leaders have constructed an Islam of their very own. This triumph of willful blindness and political correctness over common sense was best illustrated by former British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith when she described terrorism as “anti-Islamic activity.” In other words, the savagery is not merely unrelated to Islam; it becomes, by dint of its being inconsistent with a “religion of peace,” contrary to Islam. This explains our government’s handwringing over “radicalization”: we are supposed to wonder why young Muslims spontaneously become violent radicals—as if there is no belief system involved.

This is political correctness on steroids, and it has dangerous policy implications. Consider the inability of government officials to call a mass-murder attack by Muslims a terrorist attack unless and until the police uncover evidence proving that the mass murderers have some tie to a designated terrorist group, such as ISIS or al Qaeda. It is rare for such evidence to be uncovered early in an investigation—and as a matter of fact, such evidence often does not exist. Terrorist recruits already share the same ideology as these groups: the goal of imposing sharia. All they need in order to execute terrorist attacks is paramilitary training, which is readily available in more places than just Syria.

The dangerous flipside to our government’s insistence on making up its own version of Islam is that anyone who is publicly associated with Islam must be deemed peaceful. This is how we fall into the trap of allowing the Muslim Brotherhood, the world’s most influential Islamic supremacist organization, to infiltrate policy-making organs of the U.S. government, not to mention our schools, our prisons, and other institutions. The federal government, particularly under the Obama administration, acknowledges the Brotherhood as an Islamic organization—notwithstanding the ham-handed attempt by the intelligence community a few years back to rebrand it as “largely secular”—thereby giving it a clean bill of health. This despite the fact that Hamas is the Brotherhood’s Palestinian branch, that the Brotherhood has a long history of terrorist violence, and that major Brotherhood figures have gone on to play leading roles in terrorist organizations such as al Qaeda.

To quote Churchill again: “Facts are better than dreams.” In the real world, we must deal with the facts of Islamic supremacism, because its jihadist legions have every intention of dealing with us. But we can only defeat them if we resolve to see them for what they are.

"I Dreamed of Martin Luther King"

Sat, 30 Jan 2016 23:29:18 GMT

On January 18, the day celebrated as the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.—why can’t it be celebrated on his actual birthday, January 15?--our church, in collaboration with six other churches, organized a Day of Service in Dr. King’s honor. There were about 10 projects that over 150 people participated in. Karen and I were in a group that went to a homeless shelter, where we cooked and served lunch to 60 residents, then played bingo (and, in my case, chess). A few other projects: organizing books at Bernie's Book Bank, which distributes used children's books to poor areas of Chicago, packing meals at Feed My Starving Children, which sends food to third world countries, and working on Project Linus, which provides hand-made blankets for critically ill children.

We started the day with a short worship service, during which I sang "I Dreamed of Martin Luther King," my father’s song that appears on his CD, “Songs of the American Dream.” You can hear his rendition of the song, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vLQH7wLteM

Homily preached 12-13-16 at Bella Terra Nursing Centre

Fri, 29 Jan 2016 23:24:06 GMT

A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bella Terra Nursing Centre

December 13, 2015

Welcome to the third Sunday in Advent! The word advent means arrival, and the season of Advent is the time in the church calendar when Christians anticipate the arrival of Jesus.

Who is this Jesus whom we anticipate? Christianity describes him as The Son of Man and the Son of God. We believe that he combines both human and divine natures in one unified personality. Today I want to focus on the human nature of Jesus.

Jesus saw God as holy, just, and great, as well as being true, beautiful and good. For Jesus, all these divine qualities comprised the “will of the Father in heaven.”

Jesus’ faith was rooted in his personal experience with God. Theologians may intellectualize and dogmatize faith, but in the human life of Jesus, faith was personal, original, and spontaneous, like the attitude of a child toward his father. Jesus’ faith in God was not something he held, but rather something that held him. His experience of God was so real and so deep that it dissolved all doubts or contrary desires. No disappointment, frustration or distress could shake his all-consuming faith. His faith in God was absolute, totally loyal. Not even a cruel death could dent his faith.

For Jesus, the kingdom of God encompassed all spirit values. He said, “Seek First the kingdom of God.”[1] The heart of the prayer he taught his disciples was, “Your kingdom come, your will be done.” He devoted himself to the realization of the will of God with utter self-forgetfulness and total enthusiasm. Yet he never succumbed to the fury of the fanatic or extremist. His spiritual attitude dominated all of his praying, his preaching, his teaching, his thinking, and feeling.

Walter E. Bundy, in The Religion of Jesus, has commented that “[Jesus] interpreted religious living wholly in terms of the divine will.” He points out that Jesus never prayed as a religious duty, but rather as “an expression of need, a release of soul, a relief of inner pressure, an elevation and enrichment of mind, a reinforcement and refreshment of spirt, a clarifying of vision. Bundy goes on to say that “Not in visions and voices, but in prayer and communion with God…Jesus learned the divine will and found the personal power to perform it.”

Jesus proclaimed, “Except you become as a little child, you shall not enter the kingdom.”[2] Here Jesus is not recommending a childish immaturity, but rather the attitude of trust and confidence that a child has in his parental environment. The child has a sense of absolute security, free from skepticism and disturbing doubts. Like such a child, Jesus was assured of the watchcare and guidance of his heavenly Father. Bundy says, “His dependence of the divine yielded a sense of absolute security, a wholesome optimism.”

Thanks be to God!

Homily preached 1-23-16 at Bella Terra Nursing Centre

Fri, 29 Jan 2016 23:17:23 GMT

A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bella Terra Nursing Centre

January 23, 2016

[Note: the scripture for this service was Luke 4: 14-21; the hymns were “Jesus Walked This Lonesome Valley” and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” both of which I allude to in my homily.]

[I illustrated this story by putting on a headband, to which I attached a two-foot prong]

When I saw how this fellow, who was evidently a successful computer programmer, coped with his handicaps, I resolved that the next time I had a hangnail, I would not feel sorry for myself.

I know nothing of this student’s faith or his personal relationship with God, but it must have required great courage and a faith of some sort for him to be a successful computer professional. Like Jesus, he had to walk that lonesome valley. Indeed, each one of us also has to walk the lonesome valley. We may not have the afflictions this programmer had or we may have even greater afflictions—of body, of mind, or mistreatment by the world. But whether we have been lucky or unlucky, every one of us, in the depths of our soul, has to walk the lonesome valley in which we find God for ourselves. Every one of us, rich or poor, strong or weak, healthy or unhealthy, must face the ultimate question: Is life, with all of its contradictions and cruelties, nothing more than a random combination of atoms, or does life conceal some higher purpose? Could it be true that this world, with all its horrors, was created by God who called it good, who created mankind in his own image and who sent us his divine Son, Jesus, to be the way, the truth, and the life and to guide us into a glorious destiny?

Some people have questioned whether Jesus really had to walk the lonesome valley. After all, wasn’t he the Son of God, who declared “I am the Father are one”[1]? If the only record we had of Jesus was the Gospel of John, this would be a plausible view. In John’s Gospel, Jesus knows who he is, all that he has ever been and is to be from the very beginning. He is presented as a divine being, an object of veneration, but not as a human being needing faith or religion himself. But the other three Gospels, those of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, present us with a different perspective on Jesus, one that emphasizes that he was not only the Son of God, but also the Son of Man. They show us a Jesus conscious of his mortal dependence such that, when addressed as “Good teacher,” instantly replied, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”[2]

In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we see a very human Jesus, a man in need of faith, a man whose supreme religious aspiration is the discovery and performance of the divine will. And he achieves this goal by a terrific struggle and stress of soul. In the Gospel of Luke, just before preaching the sermon in which he quotes Isaiah, saying “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,” he spent 40 days in the wilderness, where he was tempted by the devil. Yes, Jesus walked the lonesome valley, as each one of us must do. He was a religious man—the most religious man ever—who by his fervent and undaunted faith achieved the knowing and doing of the divine will.

Let us hear again these words from Jesus’ sermon in the Nazareth synagogue:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
    and recovering of sight to the blind,
    to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
¹⁹to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”

²⁰And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. ²¹And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

Jesus said," For this reason I came into the world, to testify to the truth"[3]

What truth did Jesus testify to? To begin with, the truth that God is the heavenly Father of each person. The concept of God as a Father was not wholly original with Jesus, but any reader of the Bible can see that God the Father in the experience of Jesus is something quite different from anything we find in the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus exalted and elevated the idea of God the Father into a sublime experience by achieving a new revelation of God and by proclaiming that every mortal creature is a child of this Father of love, a son of God.

When the resurrected Jesus emerged from the tomb and encountered Mary Magdalene, he said to her, “Go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”[4] Christianity has emphasized that God the Father is the Father of Jesus Christ, but as Jesus himself proclaimed the Father is also the Father of every person. He said, “The Father himself loves you”[5] and “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”[6]

Jesus taught that all we need to realize the infinite Fatherly love of God is faith. And as a consequence of God’s Fatherly love, we are all brothers and sisters. For example, in Mathew 23:8-9, he proclaimed, “You are all brethren. And…you have one Father.” He often said, “Your faith has made you well”[7] or “Your faith has saved you.”[8]

Perhaps the major theme of Jesus’ teaching was the Kingdom of Heaven. The Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus taught, consists of these essentials: the Fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and faith in the effectiveness of the supreme human desire to do the will of God, to be like God.

If, in walking the lonesome valley, we come to realize, by faith, God’s loving acceptance of us, his children, we are assured of spiritual peace in this life and of salvation, continuing life in the world to come. Yes, a band of angels will come in a chariot to take us to our heavenly home. Thanks be to God!

The Inequality Taboo / Charles Murray / Commentary Magazine / September 1, 2005

Thu, 03 Dec 2015 23:14:34 GMT

When Francis Came To Cuba

Sun, 27 Sep 2015 22:12:02 GMT

We should cheer any time a pope mingles with sinners. It’s what Jesus did, and what his vicar on earth is supposed to do, too. Sin and evil need to be confronted, not ignored, and those who are unjust should be urged to repent and mend their ways. Unfortunately, there is little to cheer about when it comes to the mingling Pope Francis did with the Castro brothers in Cuba, and with other heads of state in Latin America who praise and emulate their dictatorship. Pope Francis seems much too comfortable with Latin American dictators and with their symbols of repression.

A few months ago, when he visited Ecuador and Bolivia, Pope Francis mingled with presidents Rafael Correa and Evo Morales, avowed disciples of Fidel and Raul Castro with tyrannical tendencies, but he refrained from speaking about their human rights abuses. He also received a blasphemous hammer-and-sickle crucifix from Evo Morales and accepted this gift with a smile. What if that crucifix had been in the shape of a swastika rather than a hammer and sickle?

That incident was a portent of things to come in Cuba, where Pope Francis has smiled his way through meetings with blood-soaked tyrants and failed to speak out about human rights abuses on the island, or to challenge the cruelty of his hosts. Pope Francis also failed to meet with any of Cuba’s non-violent dissidents, despite their urgent pleas for an encounter. This is not so much the “preferential option for the poor” as the preferential option for oppressors.

Havana’s Cardinal Jaime Ortega y Alamino explained this approach by saying that the Catholic Church in Cuba had to avoid “partisan politics.” This is the same prince of the Church who has called for the arrest of asylum-seeking dissidents in his churches, and in April of 2012, at Harvard University, ridiculed these persecuted Cubans as “former delinquents” and “people with psychological disturbances” who lacked “any cultural level.” Despite his frequent calls for “reconciliation,” Ortega has referred to Cuban exiles as “gusanos” (worms or maggots), the unchristian epithet that the Castro regime has applied to all its opponents for over half a century.

The papal entourage eventually decided to give in to the dissidents’ pleas for a meeting at the last minute, as an afterthought, but the results were predictably disastrous. When some democracy advocates were suddenly and unexpectedly invited to meet with Pope Francis at the Apostolic Nunciature in Havana all of them were arrested as soon as they left their homes. In addition, many other non-violent dissidents were rounded up or placed under house arrest, to prevent them from attending the pope’s open-air Mass. Meanwhile, the Castro regime sent busloads of its own hand-picked supporters to the papal Mass, to ensure that Pope Francis would have a sufficiently large audience of politically-correct Cubans. Worst of all, the selection process for those who were crammed into those buses was vetted at the parish level by the Cuban Catholic Church, and approved by its bishops.

When four dissidents somehow managed to get close to Pope Francis, despite the efforts of church and state to keep all such Cubans away from him, they were quickly attacked by plain-clothed state security agents and whisked away to prison. Has Pope Francis denounced these injustices, which amount to religious persecution? Has he voiced concern over the compliance of his bishops in this persecution? No. Not a word. His silence is deafening.

The Holy Father’s homily on Sunday, in Havana, focused on the vulnerable members of society, and it could have been delivered anywhere on earth. His sermon was full of beautiful sentiments, but there was very little in it about Cuba, and nothing whatsoever about the oppression, vulnerability, and poverty of the Cuban people. This sermon displayed none of the sharp-edged subtlety favored by his own Jesuit order. It was far too subtle. So subtle, in fact, that only someone with a doctoral degree in theology, rhetoric, or political science might be able to detect any reference to injustice in it.

As Newsweek has observed, seventeen years ago in his homily in Havana, John Paul II mentioned “freedom” seventeen times and “justice” thirteen times. In his homily, Francis did not mention “freedom” or “justice” once. All that Francis said about Cubans was that they are “a people which has its wounds, like every other people.” In other words, Francis told Cubans that they are no worse off than any other people on earth after fifty-six years of economic and political repression, and that they really have nothing to complain about. The closest he came to upbraiding the Castro regime or to calling for an end to the enslavement of the Cuban people was to say: “service is never ideological, for we do not serve ideas, we serve people.”

Ironically, dictator Raúl Castro had just greeted Pope Francis at the airport with a long speech that had less to do with his visit than with praising the failed ideology that has made Cuba one of the poorest and most repressive nations on earth. “Preserving socialism is tantamount to securing independence, sovereignty, development and the well being of our nation,” said dictator Raúl.

In his long-winded speech, Raúl Castro strung together a series of lies that have yet to be challenged by the Pope or by anyone at the Vatican. Emboldened by the pope’s overt approval of his regime, made manifest in their meeting in Rome this past spring, the octogenarian dictator boasted: “We have founded an equitable society with social justice and extensive access to culture, attached to traditions and to the most advanced ideas of Cuba, Latin America, the Caribbean and the world.”

As if this were not cheeky enough, the unelected and unchallenged “president” Raúl Castro also claimed that he was committed to building “a prosperous and sustainable socialism focused on human beings and the family, and with the free, democratic, conscious and creative involvement of the entire society.”

Fine things to say, especially for someone who is responsible for driving out into exile twenty percent of his country’s population, breaking apart millions of families, and stifling all dissent and all access to outside sources of information. The Holy Father had nothing to say about these lies then or afterward.

Sadly, however, he did have something nice to say to the oppressors. According to Granma, the top official newspaper of that regime, in a private meeting Francis “thanked comrade Fidel Castro for his contributions to world peace in a world saturated with hate and aggression.” If this is indeed true, Francis has overlooked the history of a consistently violent government, one of the very few to have brought the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation, and the only one in Latin America to have sent troops to three continents and to have sponsored warfare and terrorism around the globe, and to have consistently called for the extermination of Israel.

What is any Catholic to make of this? Why has Pope Francis chosen to side with the oppressors rather than with the oppressed?

God only knows. Perhaps he wants to win favor with the Castro regime so that the Catholic Church in Cuba can avoid the persecution experienced by Protestant evangelical churches on that island? Perhaps he knows that most popes who have locked horns with secular rulers have ended up losing way too much? Perhaps he is taking a cautious Jesuit approach of the sort taken by his order in seventeenth-century China? Perhaps he knows that the Catholic Church has always thought of change in terms of decades, centuries, and millennia rather than days, weeks, months, or years? Or perhaps he likes what he sees in Cuba and genuinely admires its unelected rulers? His reasoning is immaterial. What matters most is that his smiling silence and his joviality in the company of ruthless oppressors is immensely dismaying.

Pope Francis is not exactly the silent type when it comes to social, political, or economic issues. When he thinks something is wrong, he lets the world know, as he has just done in his encyclical Laudato Si’, in which he champions environmentalism and excoriates materialist consumerism. A few months ago, in Bolivia, he spoke of “the unfettered pursuit of money” as nothing less than “the dung of the devil.”

So, why is it that he refrained from calling the Castro regime and other such failed experiments in materialist totalitarian communism “the dung of the devil”? Is communist materialism any less fiendish? Is communist political and economic repression any less reprehensible? Why didn’t he call Raúl and Fidel Castro to repentance? Why did he praise them instead?

We’d like to know why.

But who are “we,” and why are “we” so impertinent, you ask?

Here is who “we” are: we who have been unjustly abused by the Castro regime, who have seen our nation ruined, who have had our relatives tortured and killed, who have seen our families torn apart by imprisonments and exile, who have been denied the right to express ourselves freely, who have been subjected to atheist indoctrination and had our right to worship denied. In brief: we who know from first-hand experience that to live in Cuba is to be a slave.

We could provide a much longer list of injustices endured for the past fifty-six years, but what would be the use? For now, all we Cuban Catholics can do is acknowledge the fact that the first pope, Saint Peter, made many, many mistakes, and that none of his successors have been infallible when it comes to politics. And we can take comfort in praying along with an innumerable throng of Christians who stretch all the way back to first century: Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis

Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

Carlos Eire is the T. L. Riggs Professor of Catholic Studies at Yale University.

Homily preached by DLG 9-6-15: "Who Do You Say I Am?

Thu, 10 Sep 2015 22:07:58 GMT

Who Do You Say I Am?

A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bella Terra Nursing Centre

September 6, 2015

Scriptures: Matthew 16: 13-17; John 20:1-18 (printed at end of homily)

I have a riddle to ask you. It is a “Who Am I?” riddle.

I shave several times a day, yet I still have a beard.Who am I?
a barber.

I dig out tiny caves and store gold and silver in them. I also build bridges of silver and make crowns of gold. They are the smallest you could imagine. Sooner or later everybody needs my help yet many people are afraid to let me help them. Who am I?
a dentist

Now I have another riddle for us. The riddle is “Who is Jesus?”

To answer this question, it may help to consider the circumstances in which Jesus lived. A little over 2000 years ago, Jesus was born into a Jewish family in the village of Nazareth in Palestine. The Jews were very proud of their religion. At a time when almost all cultures believed in many gods, the Jews had become ardent monotheists, believers in one God, the creator of all things and beings in heaven and earth. The Jews had a highly developed religion, with sacred scriptures and worship rituals that were centered at the Temple in Jerusalem. However, the Jewish nation had become a colony of the Roman Empire, which the Jews bitterly resented.

For many years, Jews had been longing for the appearance of a deliverer, whom they called the “Messiah,” or anointed one, a deliverer who would free the Jews from Roman rule and inaugurate a new era, the kingdom of God. Over the years, this anticipated deliverer had been called “the servant of the Lord,” the Son of David,” the Son of Man,” and, more recently, “the Son of God.” He was to be “the anointed one,” the Messiah.

The Jews earnestly believed that, as Moses had delivered their fathers from bondage in Egypt by performing miracles, the new deliverer, the Messiah, would similarly perform supernatural feats to free the Jews from the oppression of Roman rule and inaugurate a new era, which they called the kingdom of God. The Jewish national glory would be restored. Unfortunately, in this vision, the fixation on Israel’s temporal exaltation caused them to lose sight of the possibility that the deliverer would have the mission of inaugurating a new age of mercy and salvation for all people, not just the Jews.

This was the context into which Jesus of Nazareth made his appearance. Prior to Jesus’ ministry, his cousin John, who became known as John the Baptist, preached a compelling message of repentance to the people. If the Jews would repent, John proclaimed, this would pave the way for the coming kingdom. John also proclaimed that Jesus of Nazareth, his cousin, would inaugurate the new kingdom. And John baptized those who accepted his message as a token “for the remission of sins.”

One day, while John was baptizing believers in the Jordan River, Jesus himself appeared to be baptized. When John baptized him, an apparition appeared over Jesus’ head and a voice was heard saying, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Subsequent to being baptized, Jesus, in the company of a dozen close disciples and others, travelled throughout Palestine, preaching about the Kingdom of God and healing the sick. When he referred to himself, he would use the title, “the Son of Man.”

Now, let us consider the following, as we heard from today’s reading from the book of Matthew:

¹³When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

¹⁴They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

¹⁵“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

¹⁶Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

¹⁷Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.

This amazing declaration became the core or the Christian faith, namely, the proclamation that Jesus of Nazareth was and is actually the divine Son of the living God.

Along with this faith in the divine identity of Jesus, there comes the faith in Jesus’ message of salvation, namely that each one of us is a child of God, whom God loves with an infinite love, and that by simple faith, we can realize this saving truth.

Another scripture reading we heard today is about the encounter of the resurrected Jesus with his disciple Mary Magdalene. Jesus had told his disciples many times that he would be killed by his enemies, but that he would be resurrected on the third day. Almost none of his disciples believed him; they were convinced that Jesus could not die. But, in fact, Jesus was crucified and died a painful death. This could not have happened if Jesus were the kind of Messiah most Jews were hoping for: a deliverer who by miraculous means would overthrow the Romans and restore the material rule of King David. When Jesus was arrested, he said, “Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?” [Mt 26:53] He repeatedly said, “My Kingdom is not of this world.” And also, “For this reason I came into the world, to testify to the truth" (John 18:37) Jesus’ mission was to fulfill the will of the Father in living a full human life, thus demonstrating the ideal of human living. Ordinary men cannot avail themselves of supernatural powers to escape pain and death. Jesus could have used supernatural powers to triumph over his enemies, but he refused to do so.

He died as a human on the cross. But as he foretold, on the third day, he rose from the dead. The 20^th chapter of John tells us about the meeting between the resurrected Jesus and Mary Magdalene, one of his most loyal disciples. The passage describing this meeting is one of the most profound and inspiring statements in the Bible. By telling Mary, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God” Jesus is affirming that not only is he the Son of God, but also that you and I—every single person—is likewise a child of God. Of course Jesus is unique in his divinity, but you and I share with him the status of children of God. This status is inherent in who we are and who God is. It is not conditional upon any concept of sacrifice. All that is necessary for us to realize the truth of salvation is simple faith. Many times Jesus told people, “Your faith has saved you” or “Your faith has made you whole.”

After Jesus’ death and resurrection, a myth arose that his death was somehow a necessary sacrifice to satisfy the justice of God, that by dying Jesus atoned for the sins of mankind. This notion is wholly false. Mankind had no curse of sin that prevented him from realizing God’s love and acceptance. The door to salvation was open to mortal man before Jesus of Nazareth was born. Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection greatly illuminated the path to salvation, but it was in no way a prerequisite. Faith alone saves us. The prophet Jeremiah had said, 11For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Let us seek God with all our heat so we can realize the truth that Jesus taught us, namely that each of us is a child of God and, by faith, can realize God’s eternal love for us.

Thanks be to God!

Amen

Scriptures:

Matthew 16:13-17

13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” ¹⁴And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” ¹⁵He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” ¹⁶Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” ¹⁷And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.”

John 20:1-18

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, ‘They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.’ Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went towards the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

Atonement

Sun, 16 Aug 2015 21:57:39 GMT

In his Atonement: A Guide for the Perplexed, Adam Johnson calls the doctrine of the Trinity the “foundation” of the doctrine of the atonement. The atonement only makes sense in the light of a richly Trinitarian theology proper. Johnson shows how the Trinity is necessary both to explain the coherence of the atonement and to rebut critiques of atonement.

He argues, for instance, that the question “Why the God-Man?” isn't answered by referring to the nature of sin, since “there are other ways that sin could be dealt with.” Rather, “the necessity lies in the divine will itself. To be clear, this necessity does not force God into an undesired path; rather, it is the necessity of relentlessly self-giving divine love, the necessity of the delight God takes in the most fitting or appropriate way to fulfill his creative purposes: sharing the divine life with the creature.” And the necessity of relentless divine love is the necessity of God's own Triune being (66).

The Trinity also enables us to respond to the criticism that the atonement is a form of divine child abuse. Many of these critiques, often from feminist theologians, rest on “an account of God bordering on, if not fully embracing, a tritheistic interpretation of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit as distinct entities or personalities, in which the Father relates to the Son in a violent and abusive manner” (69).

But the Triune God is one, with one will in which “there is no struggle, no difference of will within the Godhead, as if the Father wills one thing, and the Son wills another” (71). Johnson rightly emphasizes that “this does not mean . . . that God wills everything he wills monolithically, in the same way - for he wills what he wills in the oneness of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” In short “God wills the passion of Christ triunely,” such that “the one God willed the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ” (71).

This means that “the one God willed to send himself by means of a threefold willing: as Father he willed to sacrifice; as Son he willed to be sacrificed; and as Spirit he willed to accompany and enable the sacrifice” (72). When the Father sends the Son, He doesn't “hold himself back but gives himself fully in giving the Son. . . . In coming to us, the incarnate Son does not leave behind the Father, but is the mode of the Father's presence with us. In the death of Christ the Father is not hidden, for his death is the revelation of the Father - the Father who suffers in the suffering of the Son” (73). Thus, “critiques of the atonement as intra-divine abuse fall radically short of the threefold self-involvement of the one God of the Gospel” (73).

The Trinity also essential to understanding how God could “take our sin up into his own life, and deal with it as God by means of the relationships proper to his own being and life. The bearing of and doing away with our sin is thus a thoroughly Trinitarian event,” so much so that “were it not for God's triunity, such an event would be impossible - for it is God's freedom to relate to himself as himself by means of himself that enables him to bring sin into his own life. Were God monolithic, a single God, he would not be free to relate to himself in this way” (82). The voice is the voice of Hegel and Balthasar, but the force of this is deeply rooted in the gospel account of the atonement, which is as thoroughly Trinitarian, albeit less abstract. Here as elsewhere it's important to heed Johnson's warning about marginalizing the resurrection: Trinitarian atonement is fulfilled when the Father raises the Son by the Spirit.

I had reservations about to Johnson's chapter on “the atoning life of Jesus.” He appeals, rightly, to the Irenaean concept of recapitulation, arguing that “the history of Adam and Eve, Israel and indeed all of humanity is repeated and yet transformed in the course of the life of Christ.” He cites the temptation of Jesus, a reversal of the temptation of the first Adam (129). True and important; but can we really account for the atonement without talking about the specifics of Jesus' ministry of healing, exorcism, teaching, assembling a new Israel? Shouldn't the specifics of Jesus' life (and death) be part of our theology of atonement?

In response, I submitted this Letter to the Editor:
Peter J. Leithart approvingly cites Adam Johnson's view that "The atonement only makes sense in the light of a richly Trinitarian theology proper." But the problem is that atonement does not make sense at all. Mankind did not suffer from a curse that required an expiating atonement. Salvation was open to men before Jesus of Nazareth was born. Jesus' life, death, and resurrection greatly illuminated the way of salvation, but in no way did it first make salvation possible. The Incarnation is an essential Christian doctrine; the atonement is neither essential nor true.

In support of my letter, Berosus Vendidad submitted this:

I would affirm Daniel's comment and add that Jesus told people they were saved by their faith (Mark 5:34; Luke 7:50; 8:48, etc.), without any reference to his coming death. He showed them that the door to salvation was already open, not that it would be opened when he died. He had a very positive view of humanity's potential, calling himself the "son of man," after all, and saying that some people were "pure in heart" (Matt 5:8), some were doing the will of God (Mark 3:35; John 7:17; Luke 8:21).

More than "in God's Image" | Wesley J. Smith | First Things

Tue, 28 Jul 2015 21:54:33 GMT

We live in an increasingly secular society. One consequence (among many) of this cultural shift has been an increasing rejection of the once uncontroversial belief that humans reside uniquely at the pinnacle of moral worth.

Activist academics, purveyors of popular culture, and issue ideologues across a wide swath of movements—from bioethics, to animal rights, to environmentalism—seek to knock us off the pedestal. Public intellectuals like Princeton University’s Peter Singer even argue that being human is morally irrelevant; what matters is possessing sufficient cognitive capacities to qualify as a “person.”

In this view, some humans—such as the unborn, infants, and those people with advanced Alzheimer’s—don’t qualify as persons, meaning that they can be killed, have their organs harvested, or become subjects of experiments. At the same time, some animals are deemed persons, making their captivity equivalent to slavery.

Deeper in the realm of the surreal, some of the world’s leading environmentalists consider us the villains of the planet—a “plague on the earth, according to Sir David Attenborough, or, as Canadian television and environmental celebrity David Suzuki once put it, “maggots defecating all over the environment.”

Such blatant anti-humanism is often dismissed or unanswered in the public square. But, as recent headlines about Planned Parenthood and the push for assisted suicide demonstrate, now is the time to defend intrinsic human value. What, however, is the best defense? The case for humankind is often made in religious terms. For example, Christian leaders may say that we have unique value because only humans are created in God’s image. As true as I think that is, imago Dei will not persuade those who don’t believe in God.

A belief in human exceptionalism, on the other hand, does not depend on religious faith. Whether we were created by God, came into being through blind evolution, or were intelligently designed, the importance of human existence can and should be supported by the rational examination of the differences between us and all other known life forms.

After all, what other species in known history has had the wondrous capacities of human beings? What other species has been able to (at least partially) control nature instead of being controlled by it? What other species builds civilizations, records history, creates art, makes music, thinks abstractly, communicates in language, envisions and fabricates machinery, improves life through science and engineering, or explores the deeper truths found in philosophy and religion? What other species has true freedom? Not one.

Only humans have the capacity to embrace the good and to engage in evil—a moral attribute embedded in our very natures. Moreover, we alone comprehend the grandeur, beauty, and importance of the natural world. The elephant is not awestruck at the sight of sunset. Nor can the squirrel appreciate the beauty of the blue jay and the butterfly. Yet even small children can love animals and wonder at the world.

Perhaps the most important distinction between the fauna and us is our moral agency. The sow that permits the runt of her litter to starve is not a negligent parent, but a human mother doing the same would be branded a monster. The feline that plays with a fallen baby bird before consuming it is not being sadistic; she is acting like a cat! But any human who tortures an animal is rightly seen as pathological.

Some see the claim of human exceptionalism as hubristic and dangerous; if we are so superior, aren’t we then entitled to treat animals as cruelly as we want? Just the opposite, in fact. We are capable of apprehending the difference between right and wrong, good and evil, proper and improper conduct. Or, put another way: If being human, in and of itself, isn’t what requires us to treat each other, animals, and nature properly, then what in the world does?

I believe that our morality in the twenty-first century will depend on how we respond to this question: Does every human life have equal and incalculable moral value simply and merely because it is human?

Answer yes, and we have a chance of achieving a truly humane, free, and prosperous society. Answer no, and we are just another animal in the forest. If that is how we define ourselves, it is precisely how we will act.

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism and a consultant to the Patient’s Rights Council.

In Polls We Trust | Robert Wuthnow | First Things

Tue, 28 Jul 2015 21:51:41 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/08/in-polls-we-trust

Marriage, Family Life, and the Importance of Fatherhood | Daniel Love Glazer

Mon, 15 Jun 2015 21:50:09 GMT

Have you heard?

I married an angel.

I'm sure that the change'll be

awf'lly good for me.

Have you heard?

An angel I married.

To heaven she's carried this

fellow with a kiss.

She is sweet and gentle,

so it isn't strange,

when I'm sentimental,

she loves me like an angel.

Now you've heard.

I married an angel.

this beautiful change will be

awf'lly good for me.

[I Married an Angel, by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart]

As I just illustrated by singing Rodgers and Hart’s song, I Married an Angel, American popular culture has long exalted the institution of marriage. The Urantia Book echoes this praise. Consider these quotes from the paper on “Marriage and Family Life:”

Marriage has given mankind the home, and the home is the crowning glory of the whole long and arduous evolutionary struggle….The family is the master civilizer. A child learns most of the essentials of life from his family and the neighbors.

The progress of marriage itself is a reasonably accurate gauge registering the advances of human civilization.

The security of civilization itself still rests on the growing willingness of one generation to invest in the welfare of the next and future generations. And any attempt to shift parental responsibility to state or church will prove suicidal to the welfare and advancement of civilization

Marriage, with children and consequent family life, is stimulative of the highest potentials in human nature and simultaneously provides the ideal avenue for the expression of these quickened attributes of mortal personality. A true family—a good family—reveals to the parental procreators the attitude of the Creator to his children, while at the same time such true parents portray to their children the first of a long series of ascending disclosures of the love of the Paradise parent of all universe children.

Here is one more quote, from paper 177, where Jesus is talking to John Mark about ome life.

The child must derive his first impressions of the universe from the mother’s care; he is totally dependent on the earthly father for his first ideas of the heavenly Father.

Given these statements, it behooves us who want to promote progressive civilization to ask, “What is the state of marriage today?” The answer is “Not good.” In 1965, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, then an Assistant Secretary at the US Department of Labor, conducted a study of the state of the black family. He reported that for blacks, 24% of births were born to single mothers; in contrast, only 3% of births to whites were nonmarital. Moynihan declared that the huge rate of nonmarital births was a major cause of poverty and other problems for the black underclass. He said that this was breeding unruly young males, who were prey to a “tangle of pathology:” Surly, unschooled, unambitious, drug-trading and drug-using, making a perverse cult of tangles with the law, in short an underclass.

Some commentators, including Moynihan, attributed the high rate for blacks to the legacy of slavery, but this doesn’t seem to be true. The Economist Walter Williams reports that even during slavery, where marriage was forbidden, “most black children lived in biological two-parent families. And in 1925, in New York City, in 1925 … five in six children under the age of six lived with both parents.”

The Moynihan report noted with alarm that the nonmarital birthrate for blacks increased from 19% in 1940 to 24% in 1963. And by 1975 it would reach 49%.

How to account for this increase? One factor may be the welfare system. One study, based on 1979 data, found that “a 50 percent increase in the monthly value of welfare benefits led to a 43 percent increase in the number of out-of-wedlock births.”

I have a question for you: the nonmarital birth rate for blacks was 24% in 1965. What do you think the rate is now?

Pause for input from audience]

For blacks, the nonmarital birth rate is now a mind-boggling 72.5 percent. The rate for American Indians and Alaska Natives is 66 percent; for Hispanics, 53 percent; for Asians and Pacific Islanders 17 percent; and for whites, 29 percent—significantly higher than the 24% figure for blacks that was so alarming in 1965. For the population as a whole, the rate is 41 percent.

Moreover, the 29% rate for whites conceals something even more ominous: The rate for white women who are college graduates is 5%, while the rate for white women who did not finish high school is over 60%. In 2010, among the white upper and upper middle class, 83 percent of adults 30-49 were married, but only 48 percent of working class whites were married. In other words, alongside the black underclass, there has developed a large white underclass.

What are the implications of these staggering numbers of nonmarital births? Let me quote the social scientist Charles Murray:

No matter what the outcome being examined—the quality of the mother-infant relationship, childhood aggression, delinquency, and hyperactivity, delinquency in adolescence, criminality as adults, illness and injury in childhood, early mortality, sexual decision making in adolescence, school problems and dropping out, emotional health, or any other measure of how well or poorly children do in life—the family structure that produces the best outcomes for children, on average, is two biological parents who remain married. Divorced parents produce the next-best outcomes. Whether the parents remarry or remain single while the children are growing up makes little difference. Never-married women produce the worst outcomes. All of these statements apply after controlling for the family’s socio-economic status. I know of no other set of important findings that are as broadly accepted by social scientists who follow the technical literature, liberal as well as conservative, and yet are so resolutely ignored by network news programs, editorial writers for the major newspapers, and politicians of both major political parties.

Recently I’ve gained a glimpse into the culture of fatherless children. For the past two years, my wife Karen has taught math at a high school on the south side of Chicago. The school is 100% black and 92% of the students qualify for subsidized meals. I don’t know how many students live in fatherless homes, but in Chicago 82% of births to blacks are out of wedlock, and I suspect the percentage in my wife’s school is at least this high. Last year Karen learned that five of her sophomore students have the same father, while having five different mothers. She asked, “Does your father ever have family get-togethers?” The answer was, “No, he’s a deadbeat.”

One day a student noticed and commented on Karen’s wedding ring. Karen responded, “Yes, my husband and I have been married for 27 years.” The student said, “I don’t know anyone who’s married.” Karen asked about her grandparents. Yes, her grandparents had been married, but no one she knew in her parents’ generation.

Only 24% of parents showed up on report card pickup day. The truancy rate for sophomores is about 30%. The achievement level of Karen’s math students is, on average, several years behind their grade level.

Yes, children fare best in two-parent families. Children of single mothers commit 72 percent of juvenile murders, have 70 percent of teenaged births, and constitute 70 percent of high school dropouts.

If, as The Urantia Book maintains, “The child …is totally dependent on the earthly father for his first ideas of the heavenly Father.” [page 1922], we might ask, do children of absent or dysfunctional fathershave trouble believing in God? The answer is “Yes.” The psychologist Paul Vitz has examined the lives of prominent atheists in history. In his book, The Faith of the Fatherless, he asserts that almost all those known for their intense atheism grew up with fathers who were either absent, through death or abandonment, or seriously defective.

Let’s start with Ludwig Feuerbach. Feuerbach was a German philosopher active in the 1840’s. Feuerbach proclaimed that there was no God. God was just a projection of human psychology. He was a major influence on Freud.

Feuerbach’s father was a well-known judge and university professor. When Ludwig was 12 or 13, in the 1820’s, his father abandoned his family and went to live with another woman, the wife of the father’s best friend. He lived with her for several years, until she died. Then he moved back to his original family. The father also had a notorious temper—his nickname was Vesuvius. So it’s clear that Ludwig Feuerbach’s father can be considered defective.

Now we come to Sigmund Freud. Freud, following in Feuerbach’s footsteps, is famous for asserting that religious beliefs are “illusions, fulfillments of the oldest, strongest and most urgent wishes of mankind….The terrifying impressions of helplessness in childhood aroused the need for protection—which was provided by the father….Thus the benevolent rule of a divine Providence allays our fear of the dangers of life.” But, of course, this analysis can easily be reversed. Freud himself was to write that “Psychoanalysis…daily demonstrates to us how youthful persons lose their religious belief as soon as the authority of the father breaks down.”

Freud’s father, Jacob Freud was a religious, liberal, Enlightenment Jew, and weak in many ways. One day, Jacob was confronted on the street by someone who called him a “dirty Jew” and knocked his hat off. When Sigmund asked his father, “What did you do?” he replied, “I just picked up my hat and walked away.” This incident caused Sigmund to lose respect for his father. Moreover, he wrote letters stating that his father was a sexual pervert.

What about Friedrich Nietzsche, famous for proclaiming “God is dead”? He was obsessed with religion and repeatedly condemned Christians and Christian ideas. Nietzsche was very close to his father, a Lutheran pastor, who incurred a brain disease and died when Friedrich was about to turn five years old. The death of his father was shattering. He came to associate his father’s sickness and weakness with his father’s Christianity. Nietzsche would criticize Christianity for its morality of weakness, for its absence of what he called the “life force.” Nietzsche worshipped Dionysius, a strong pagan expression of the life force. It is easy to see his rejection of God and Christianity as a rejection of his weak father.

More recently, we have the case of Madalyn Murray O’Hair. Ms. Ohair was president of the organization American Atheists and the initiator of the lawsuit that led the Supreme Court to ban prayer in public schools. One of her sons reported that he saw Madalyn pick up a 10-inch kitchen knife and threaten her father, saying, ‘I want to kill you; I want to dance on your grave.”

And there are many other notable atheists that fit the pattern of having a father who died with no good substitute or else aroused hatred in their children. These include Schopenhauer, Voltaire, David Hume, Jean-Paul Sartre, Bertrand Russell, and Albert Camus. The story is similar with prominent political atheists: Stalin, Hitler—whose father beat him regularly and died when Hitler was 14, and Mao Zedong. And the so-called “New Atheists,” Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett also fit the pattern of having a defective father.

On a lighter note, let me relate an incident from my own parenting experience. Some years ago, when my daughter was eight years old, we planned to spend several days visiting friends in Kingsport Tennessee. My wife asked me to oversee Rachel’s packing. Rachel had a new child-size suitcase, colorfully decorated in red and blue. I asked her to see to her own packing. As we were about to leave, my wife asked whether I had supervised Rachel’s packing. I told her not to worry, that I was sure the suitcase was properly packed. When we got to our destination, lo and behold, it turned out that Rachel had packed her toys, but no clothes whatsoever. My wife was not pleased. This incident shows that, at times, even a generally attentive father can be defective at times.

If we compare the ideals of family life enunciated by The Urantia Book with the reality of contemporary family fragmentation, we find ourselves shaking our heads and wondering, what in the world can be done?

To begin with, each one of us can strive to manifest the highest values of marriage and parenthood in our own lives. If we do so, we and are children will be blessed.

But what about for the society as a whole? In terms of fragmented families, I’ve described a great divide between the educated upper class, whose rate of nonmarital births is not alarming, and the less educated, lower class, whose rate is catastrophic. Yet, even the upper class may be suffering from what Arnold J. Toynbee called a “schism in the soul” that he named as a sign of the forthcoming collapse of a civilization. Toynbee characterizes this “schism in the soul” as comprising a collapse of self-confidence, a lapse into truancy, a rejection of the obligations of citizenship, a vulgarization of manners, the arts, and language that are apt to appear first in the ranks of the lower class and to spread from there to the ranks of the elite.

Examples of this “schism in the soul” are legion. Here is one illustration. In the late 1990’s, Sports Illustrated published an article, “Paternity Ward,” about the profusion of children fathered by NBA players with single women. The authors listed several concerns that this behavior raised:

Did the “distraction of unplanned fatherhood and paternity suits” affect the athletes’ performance?
Did the “temptations” of the NBA lifestyle encourage sexual irresponsibility?
Did women target athletes in order to obtain large child support payment?
How should judges determine proper child support?
And last of all, how would a child “deal” with having a father he or she might hardly know, except for an occasional glimpse on television?

It is noteworthy that the question of the child’s welfare is the very last question raised.

In the Victorian Age in England, the upper class succeeded in propagating its code of morals and behavior among the rest of the population. In America today, the elite, while mostly maintaining their own traditional code, are loath to put this code forward as a model for others.

Charles Murray believes that the elite is as dysfunctional in its way as the lower class is in its way. Individually, its members are successful, but they have abandoned their responsibility to set and promulgate standards.

A number of attempts have been made to address the problem of fragmented families. In 2002, the Federal government initiated three sophisticated experiments designed to improve the relationships of unmarried low-income couples who had a baby. Without going into details, I will simply say that an evaluation by a Policy Research organization found that the programs showed no improvement in family structure. Of course a variety of programs can or may be tried. Mitch Pearlstein, in his book, From Family Collapse to America’s Decline, examines many of these efforts. He concludes that the most successful attempts are paternalistic or religious. He quotes the principal of a Catholic elementary school who said her school’s mission was “To manifest God’s love to every child.”

We need a new Great Awakening, a spiritual awakening that will inspire the upper and lower class alike to return to the traditional values of marriage, faith, industriousness, and honesty. To the extent this happens, we can realize the blessings described by William Bennett, in his book The Broken Hearth:

The blessings that come to us through marriage and parenthood—I speak here of the deepest kind of human fulfillment—are immeasurable and irreplaceable and…incomparable. We live in an age in which we are continually being torn away from that which is priceless and enduring. This means that ours is the task of reminding ourselves, and each other, not only of what we have lost but of what, when it comes to marriage and the family, is still ours to regain.

Let us not despair. The Urantia Book tells us that “The family occupied the very center of Jesus’ philosophy of life—here and hereafter.” And on the last page of the Book, we are told, “Be not discouraged; human evolution is still in progress, and the revelation of God to the world, in and through Jesus shall not fail.”

The Religious Crowds | Roberto Rivera | First Things, 6-4-15

Thu, 04 Jun 2015 21:48:43 GMT

Note: I include the text of this article, rather than a link, because accessing the link requires a subscription to First Things. Daniel

In the 2002 Brazilian film City of God (Cidade de Deus), the narrator, Rocket, provides the audience with a kind of social taxonomy of the eponymous favela during a street party. There was the “samba crowd,” the “soul crowd,” the gangs and the “religious crowd.” (Comunidade do crença, literally “community of belief.”)

By “religious crowd” he almost certainly meant Pentecostals. (Pentecostals play an even more prominent role in another acclaimed movie about a poor Brazilian community, O Homen do Ano, The Man of the Year.)

It could scarcely be otherwise. By some estimates, twenty percent of all Brazilians are Pentecostals of some sort. In addition, half of all practicing Catholics in the country identify with the Charismatic renewal in their church.

In the Philippines, forty percent of the country’s approximately seventy-five million Catholics “identify as charismatic” and seventy percent of Protestants “indicate they are either Pentecostal or charismatic.”

It goes way beyond Brazil and the Philippines. In The Next Christendom, Philip Jenkins informs us that “According to current projections, the number of charismatic/Pentecostal believers [around the world] should cross the one billion mark before 2050. In terms of the global religions, there will be by that point roughly as many charismatics/Pentecostals as Hindus, and twice as many as there are Buddhists.”

An “unintended” consequence of the competition from Pentecostalism in places like Latin America and the Philippines is that it forced the Catholic Church to “up its game.” In many instances throughout the Global South, this included embracing the charismatic renewal, including some of its features, such as lay evangelists.

Then there’s China. In his award-winning Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China, Evan Osnos only mentions the explosive growth of Christianity in China in passing—he devotes more words to Tibetan Buddhism—but his passing references show he much he is burying the lede.

He tells readers that are as many Christians in China as there are members of the Communist Party. (Given the risks associated with the former and the potential benefits of the latter, that fact is extraordinary.) He says that “as I traveled around China, I stopped being surprised by my encounters with Christians.”

Aslan is on the move. You just have to have eyes to see and know where to look.

Someone who knows where to look is Wes Granberg-Michaelson. In a recent Washington Post article, he brought some much needed perspective to the overblown “Christianity in decline” meme that followed the publication of a recent Pew Survey showing the percentage of Americans calling themselves Christians in decline while the number of the religiously unaffiliated was growing.

Granberg-Michaelson tells readers that “While rising numbers of “nones”—those who claim no religious affiliation when asked—claim the attention of religious pundits, the world tells a different story. Religious convictions are growing and shifting geographically in several dramatic ways.”

The story he tells will be familiar to readers of Jenkins’s The Next Christendom and The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South

What won’t be as familiar is his argument that the effects of this revival—what else can it be called?—isn’t limited to Rio, Lagos or Manila. Of the nearly 214 million migrants in the world, nearly half are Christians. And they are bringing their faith with them to the new homes, including the U.S.

Ever heard of the Redeemed Christian Church of God? Neither had I. But this Nigerian denomination has 720 churches in the United States, just opened a 10,000-seat “worship pavilion” in Dallas, and has churches all across Europe, and even in India and Pakistan.

Closer to (my) home, the women who clean my home come from Mexico, Peru, and El Salvador. You know what they talk about while they work? Jesús. I ask them to pray for me and my friends and family. (I give my friends Spanish names like Tomás and Juan. The Lord knows who they are.)

It isn’t only Pentecostal immigrants. “Fifty-four percent of Hispanic Catholics identify themselves as charismatics, and fifty-one percent believe that the Second Coming will take place during their lifetimes. Charismatic Hispanic Catholics are more likely than non-charismatic Hispanic Catholics to believe in transubstantiation, go to confession, pray the Rosary, and serve in a parish ministry.”

National Public Radio, citing its own research done in conjunction with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Harvard’s School of Public Health, says that “about one-third of Latino Catholics in the U.S. identify as Charismatic.” Half or one-third; in either case, we are talking about a lot of people about whom little, if anything, is said in public debates about religion in American life.

When I read the reactions to the Pew report, both among the religious and the nonreligious, the word that comes to mind is “blinkered.” In all the talk about Christianity’s “decline’ and the rise of the “nones” it is clear that those doing the talking had a particular image of Christianity in mind that definitely did not include the people I just mentioned or even their children or grandchildren.

Take the the much-talked-about rise of the religiously unaffiliated or “nones.” Pew tells us that “Whites continue to be more likely than both blacks and Hispanics to identify as religiously unaffiliated,” adding “But the religiously unaffiliated have grown (and Christians have declined) as a share of the population within all three of these racial and ethnic groups.”

If you dig a little deeper (and do a little math) and the story is a bit more complicated. The “nones” were asked whether religion was “important” or “not important” in their lives. Both African-Americans and Hispanics were significantly overrepresented, relative to their percentage of those who were described as “unaffiliated,” among those who answered that religion was “important,” while whites were significantly underrepresented.

Specifically, Hispanic “nones” were nearly twice as likely as their white counterparts to say that religion was “important,” while African-American “nones” were two and a half times as likely. This raises the question of whether being religiously unaffiliated among African-Americans and Hispanics means something different than it means among their white counterparts. (For instance, an earlier Pew survey found that 39 percent of religiously-unaffiliated Hispanics had a religious symbol, such as a crucifix, in their homes.)

Are they “secular” and/or “post-Christian?” Or are they “unchurched?” Those are questions worth asking in any discussion of Christianity’s future in America, especially given our changing demographics.

Bem-venidos ao comunidade do crença.

Roberto Rivera is a fellow at the Colson Center for Christian Worldview and a writer for Breakpoint.

What a Friend We Have in Jesus | A Homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bethany Terrace Nursing Centre | May 10, 2015

Sat, 30 May 2015 21:46:46 GMT

Scripture: John 15:9-17 (NRSV)
15:9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.
15:10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.
15:11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.
15:12 "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
15:13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.
15:14 You are my friends if you do what I command you.
15:15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.
15:16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name.
15:17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.

What a Friend We Have in Jesus

A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bethany Terrace Nursing Centre

May 10, 2015

I once heard a talk by a professor of psychology. He said that he used to survey his psychology students, asking them how many really good friends they had—how many friends with whom they could share their deepest joys and concerns. Let me ask you, “How many friends do you think the students said? [responses were “one” “none” “two”]

Well, you are all right. Some said they had one such friend; some said two; many said they had none.

But we who are Christians, however many human friends we have, know of a certainty that we have a friend in Jesus. Jesus commanded us to love one another as he loves us. If we love one another as Jesus loves us, we will be his friends and he will tell us what the Father reveals to him. As Jesus said, “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” And Jesus’ love was so great that he laid down his life for his enemies.

Jesus said, “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.” And “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.” And further, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”

To know the joy that is in Jesus, we must share his love. And to share his love, we must share his service. To experience such service does not enable us to avoid the trials and tribulations of this world. No, it does not create a new world, but it does make the old world new.

Recall that when the apostles gathered for the meal that has become known as The Last Supper, they refused to wash the dust of the streets off one another’s feet. But then Jesus, their Master, himself washed their feet. This has been called the parable of divine love. In washing his apostles’ feet Jesus illustrated the command to love one another as he loves us. If we are willing to become fellow servants with Jesus in doing the Father’s will, then in the kingdom to come we will be with Jesus, still doing the Father’s will in future glory.

Jesus’ entire life demonstrates his dedication to others. Remember his words when he was nailed to the cross. He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” He could not have so lovingly and mercifully interceded for his executioners unless his whole life had been dominated by such thoughts of affectionate devotion.

Realize that what Jesus requires is not sacrifice, but affectionate service. Our service should not be considered a sacrifice; rather if we serve with wholehearted affection, our service is a joy. We must serve as friends and for friends. Friendship transcends duty. The service of a friend for a friend is not a sacrifice. Jesus said “I have called you to be friends.” If we live in him and his words live in us, we will be able to commune freely with him, and then can Jesus’ spirit so infuse us that we can ask whatever his spirit wills and do so with the assurance that the Father will answer our prayer.

Jesus does not insist that his followers believe in him, but rather that they believe with him, believe in the reality of the love of God and confidently accept the certain knowledge that they are children of the heavenly Father, who loves each one of us with an infinite love. Jesus desires that all his followers fully share his sublime faith. He challenged his followers not only to believe what he believed, but as he believed. This is the significance of his supreme requirement, “Follow me.” Let us follow Jesus by personally sharing his religious faith and entering into the spirit of his life of unselfish service.

Amen!

Orthodox Terrorism | |Mykhailo Cherenko | First Things | May 2015

Sat, 30 May 2015 21:45:05 GMT

Long before Russia’s annexation of Crimea and unproclaimed war in the Donbass, Ukraine had become a religious battleground. Despite the warning of Yurii Chernomorets, Cyril Hovorun, and other observers, none of the leading Ukrainian and Western politicians foresaw the threat posed by an increasingly aggressive form of Orthodox Christianity being promoted by Moscow. As events in Ukraine have now shown, Orthodox fundamentalism is no less aggressive than Islamic fundamentalism, and the “Russian Spring” is no less bloody than its Arab counterpart.

The facts speak for themselves: Greek Catholics and Kiev-patriarchate Ukrainian Orthodox churches have become de facto illegal entities in the annexed Crimea; in the Donbass region, an “Orthodox army” is active; dozens of Protestant churches have been seized; there have been cases of kidnapping, torture, and killing of pastors; Moscow-patriarchate priests openly bless terrorists and refuse to pray over deceased Ukrainian soldiers; Patriarch Kirill of Moscow predicts the downfall of Ukraine as a “kingdom divided against itself.”

Russia&rsqursquo;s war against Ukraine has exacerbated a series of international, interethnic, and interconfessional conflicts. It is the religious aspect of the conflict that may prove to be the most significant, because Moscow Orthodoxy has been presented as the thing holding the “Russian world” together, and thereby as the main actor in the bloody Russian Spring.

Putin has justified the annexation of Crimea by saying that it has “sacred meaning for Russia, like the Temple Mount in Jerusalem for Jews and Muslims.” He calls it “the spiritual source of the formation of the multifaced but monolithic Russian nation. . . . It was on this spiritual soil that our ancestors first and forever recognized their nationhood.”

There is a nineteenth-century saying: “To be Russian is to be Orthodox.” This is becoming the main motive for the consolidation of “Russians” and the defense of the “Orthodox.” The Declaration of Russian Identity, passed at the end of the 2014 Global Russian National Assembly, asserts: “Claims that every Russian must acknowledge Orthodox Christianity as the basis of their national culture are both justified and fair. Rejection of this fact, and even worse, a search for a different religious basis for the national culture, testifies to a weakened Russian identity, to the point of its loss.” In short, Putin has reversed the old principle “Whose realm, his religion” (cuius regio, eius religio) that settled religious loyalties in post-Reformation Europe by allowing the ruler’s Protestant or Catholic commitment to define the religion of the realm. Now Putin seems to presume an expansionist principle: “Whose religion, his realm.”

“The conflict in Ukraine has a clear religious underpinning,” wrote Patriarch Kirill to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople in a letter published on the website of the Moscow patriarchate. “Uniates, and schismatics that have joined them, are trying to seize the upper hand over canonical Orthodoxy in Ukraine. . . . I ask Your Holiness to do all you can to raise your voice in defense of the Orthodox Christians in eastern Ukraine who, in a situation of increasing violence on the part of Greek Catholics and schismatics, live in daily fear.”

For the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, there are no other Orthodox churches—they are all impostors and schismatics. Additionally, the patriarch hides the well-known fact that even if one accepts the notion of “canonical territory,” Ukraine is on disputed canonical territory and belongs more rightly to the ecumenical patriarchate than to the Moscow patriarchate.

The identification of Orthodox faith with the Moscow patriarchate is becoming a mighty propaganda tool. The Orthodox militant Igor Druz, adviser to the minister of Defense of the Donetsk People’s Republic, remarked:

On the Ukrainian side there are no Orthodox at all, because not a single churched Orthodox individual would go to fight against New Russia, because they know that the unity of Holy Rus is pleasing to God. All saints who have spoken on this topic are unanimous in saying that Holy Rus must be united. Meanwhile Ukrainian fascists are the real separatists and they want to divide New Russia from Holy Rus and unite it to the decaying warmongering West. Therefore there are no church people on the Ukrainian side at all. Their battalions are made up mainly of uniates, schismatics, neo-pagans, and sectarians.

In July 2014, Metropolitan Onuphrius of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate addressed a personal letter to Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, explaining that he was “forced to draw attention to the violation of the rights and freedoms of believers and interference in the work of the parish of the Donetsk diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by the Ukrainian military in eastern Ukraine.”He did not mention the problems of other confessions or abuses by the occupying forces and terrorists. Thereby the UOC-MP confirmed not only its spiritual, but also its political dependence on Moscow. In a conflict between an Orthodox empire that swallows Ukraine and a nation, between imperial ideology and civil society, the “Ukrainian” Orthodox Church has chosen its side.

In one sense, it is no longer Russia as a country, but Russian Orthodoxy as a supranational movement, that is becoming a geopolitical factor. Claiming to defend “true” traditional canonical Orthodoxy, Orthodox leaders justify the actions of the “Orthodox army” in the Donbass region.

Through the efforts of Russian Spring ideologues, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, between Moscow Orthodoxy and Ukrainian “Uniates, schismatics, and sectarians,” is portrayed as part of a global conflict, represented as a contest between the “Russian world” and the “decaying West,” between “traditional values” and “gay Europe,” between salvific spirituality and corrupting secularity.

Moreover, as the main unifying force for the New Russia, the Russian Orthodox Church today is trying to create an alliance with those Protestants, Jews, and Muslims who agree with the Orthodox view of Russian history and accept without a murmur their own subservient position. As the director of external communications for one of the Protestant denominations in Russia told me, “We Protestants understand that all the seats at the government table are taken, but we don’t object to feeding on crumbs that fall from the table.”

These allies of “true Orthodoxy” will soon become the next victims. Indeed, they already are. While Protestant leaders are participating in government councils and receiving presidential awards, their churches are being mercilessly persecuted.

The defense of “purity of faith” is being put forward in order to justify the horrors of the Russian Spring in Ukraine. Only the defense of mythical traditional values can cover up the imperial ambitions of Moscow Orthodoxy. Only a fanatical faith in the faith itself and in its own exclusivity could close its eyes to the commission by Orthodox crusaders of unmentionable crimes against humanity, against Ukraine and the world, against God and their neighbors.

Sooner or later the global community will have to acknowledge the fact of “political Orthodoxy” and the “Orthodox terrorism” connected to it, supported by Russia and destabilizing all of Eurasia. The sooner this happens, the better—for regional and global security, for defense of religious freedoms and civil rights, and for the self-determination of individuals and nations. One of the first steps in this direction should be the recognition that the “Orthodox” people’s republics that have formed in eastern Ukraine (Donetsk and Lugansk) are terrorist organizations. Such honesty would bring clarity to the situation and allow a nonpolitical and nonaggressive Orthodoxy to separate itself from the political and aggressive pretender to the Slavic world’s Christian inheritance.

Mykhailo Cherenkov, a Baptist theologian, is the former provost of Donetsk Christian University, which was seized by pro-Russian terrorists in 2014. He now is associate professor of philosophy at Ukrainian Catholic University.

The Church of Darwin | John G. West | First Things | June 2015

Sat, 30 May 2015 21:42:43 GMT

Right from the start, Darwin’s theory was about much more than scientific truth. Darwin himself believed that evolution by natural selection refuted the idea that nature displayed evidence of purposeful design. Writing near the end of his life, he wrote that “the old argument from design in Nature . . . fails, now that the law of natural selection has been discovered.” He recalled poignantly the sense of wonder that as a young man he once experienced in a Brazilian rainforest, which inspired in him a “conviction that there is more in man than the mere breath of his body.” “But now,” he concluded, “the grandest scenes would not cause any such convictions and feelings to rise in my mind.”

Darwin also believed that his theory diminished the case for human uniqueness, writing in one of his notebooks that “it is absurd to talk of one animal being higher than another” and complaining that “people often talk of the wonderful event of intellectual Man appearing” when, in fact, “the appearance of insects with other senses is more wonderful.”

This led him to grim conclusions about social policy. In The Descent of Man, he fretted that civilized| J societies undermined natural selection by caring for the poor, saving the sick, and even vaccinating people to protect them against smallpox. “There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox,” he wrote. “Thus the weak members of civilised societies propagate their kind.” In his view, the result of this interference with natural selection was likely to be catastrophic: “No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. . . . Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.”

A kindly man, Darwin was ambivalent about applying the dictates of natural selection to human society, worrying that it would erode “the noblest part of our nature.” Despite those qualms, he ended up insisting that if man “is to advance still higher he must remain subject to a severe struggle.”

It can be debated whether all of the subsequent examples of social Darwinism during the past 150-plus years were logically connected to Darwinian theory or only to illegitimate extrapolations of it, but one thing is indisputable: Darwin’s ideas were understood by many scientists as well as many nonscientists to have wide-ranging application to human society. Darwinian rhetoric permeated debates over eugenics, imperialism, immigration, sexuality, medicine, and criminal responsibility.

Nowhere did Darwinian thinking exert a more powerful influence than in Germany, where it was enthusiastically employed to justify world conquest, genocide in southwest Africa, the killing of the handicapped, and ultimately the extermination of the Jews. Darwin no doubt would have been horrified. But in retrospect it is still hard not to be chilled by the hopes he expressed to one of his German correspondents in 1868: “The support which I receive from Germany is my chief ground for hoping that our views will ultimately prevail.” German scientists and social thinkers ended up embracing Darwinian ideas with fanatical zeal, but not in the way Darwin might have wished.

In our own day, evangelistic “new atheists” have continued to make unguided Darwinian evolution the cornerstone of their gospel of secular materialism. Last year, University of Washington evolutionary psychologist David Barash boasted in the New York Times about “The Talk” he gives to students each autumn, when he tells them: “The more we know of evolution, the more unavoidable is the conclusion that living things, including human beings, are produced by a natural, totally amoral process, with no indication of a benevolent, controlling creator.”

Harvard evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson similarly proclaims that the existence of a God “who directs organic evolution and intervenes in human affairs . . . is increasingly contravened by biology and the brain sciences.” No wonder that in an interview earlier this year he argued that “for the sake of human progress, the best thing we could possibly do would be to diminish, to the point of eliminating, religious faiths.”

Barash’s and Wilson’s views are not exceptional. A survey by researchers at Cornell University of leading scientists in the field of evolution showed that 87 percent denied the existence of God, 88 percent disbelieved in life after death, and 90 percent rejected the idea that evolution was directed toward an “ultimate purpose.” More recently, a survey released in late January by the Pew Forum revealed that only 8 percent of members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science believe that “a supreme being guided the evolution of living things for the purpose of creating humans and other life in the form [in which] it exists today.” In academic circles, Darwin’s version of haphazard and unguided evolution reigns supreme.

It shouldn’t have happened this way. Only by forgetting the limits of scientific theory were Darwinians able to extend natural selection to irreligiosity. Only by losing the distinction between inquiry and speculation could they fuse biological evolution with materialism. What if they had chosen a different path?

It is certainly possible to conceive of the evolutionary process as compatible with the Judeo-Christian tradition. There is nothing intrinsically anti-Christian or antireligious about a long history for nature, change over time, or even the idea that humans descended with modifications from prehuman animals. A theory of evolution need not rule out planning and purpose in the development of the wonders of life. Others have recognized this fact even if Darwin did not.

Robert Chambers, one of the most noted proponents of evolution prior to Darwin, argued that the natural laws that produced nature were the means of implementing the overarching and preordained plans of a designer. According to Chambers, “the whole plan of being is as symmetrical as the plan of a house, or the laying out of an old-fashioned garden! This must needs have been devised and arranged for beforehand. And what a preconception or forethought have we here!”

Perhaps an even more intriguing figure is the scientist who shared credit with Darwin for developing the theory of evolution by natural selection—Alfred Russel Wallace. Much to Darwin’s dismay, Wallace eventually embraced a purposeful version of evolution that historian Michael Flannery has aptly called “intelligent evolution.”

Wallace expounded his views at length in two scientific books near the end of his life: Man’s Place in the Universe (1903) and The World of Life (1910). He saw evidence of purpose in the functional complexity of the cell, the exquisite design of biological structures, and the rare constellation of physical factors that allows life to exist on the earth in the first place. “Everywhere, not here and there, but everywhere, and in the very smallest operations of nature to which human observation has penetrated, there is Purpose and a continual Guidance and Control.”

In our own day, Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe and geneticist Michael Denton are prime examples of scientists who, like Wallace, see evolution as a fundamentally purposeful process. That they are regarded as beyond the pale by most current evolutionary biologists reflects the triumph of the metaphysics of Darwinism enforced by academic pressures of conformity that oppress dissent rather than consider evidence. The Church of Darwin is so narrow today that even the cofounder of the theory would have to be declared a heretic.

Fortunately, in the world of ideas, there are second chances, and we may be experiencing one right now in debates over the nature of nature. In recent years, experimental studies have raised serious doubts about just how much innovation unguided processes like natural selection can actually produce. At the same time, continued discoveries of exquisite fine-tuning throughout nature—from the laws of nature that make life possible to the protein sequences inside our cells—have reopened vigorous discussions of purpose in nature among physicists, mathematicians, philosophers, and, yes, some biologists. One knows that something significant is surely afoot when a prominent atheist like philosopher Thomas Nagel can announce that the materialist worldview spawned by Darwinian theory “is ripe for displacement.”

The reaction to Nagel’s book, which Leon Wieseltier compared to a mob attack, proves its importance as a spur toward ongoing scientific thought as opposed to dogmatic catechesis. A story in Prospect magazinehad to assure readers with its title “Thomas Nagel is not crazy,” while a notice in Wilson Quarterly bore the subtitle “Philosophers cast a notable dissenter into the outer darkness.” Darwinian atheism has become an orthodoxy, the contrary of scientific method. Doubters aren’t brave Galileos. They are heretics.

Given the ways in which evolutionary materialism has provided pseudoscientific justifications for some of the most barbaric and inhumane social and political policies of the last century, I certainly hope Nagel is right.

John G. West is a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute and author of Darwin Day in America: How Our Politics and Culture Have Been Dehumanized in the Name of Science.

Review of "God's Planet" by Owen Gingerich | Stephen M. Barr | First Things

Sat, 30 May 2015 21:40:29 GMT

According to a famous formulation of Stephen Jay Gould, science and religion constitute “non-overlapping magisteria” or “NOMA.” What he meant is that they are separate domains, deal with different questions, and can never conflict if they keep within their own boundaries. Gould’s term caught on (despite its misuse of the word magisterium), but his idea is not tenable. Some religions make claims about matters on which science has something to say. And some scientific discoveries are relevant to important philosophical questions. So theology cannot be walled off from science. But it is also the case, as Owen Gingerich shows in this set of lectures, that science itself is often influenced by wider currents of thought.

Gingerich is emeritus professor at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and a renowned astronomer and historian of science. He is an expert on Copernicus and Kepler, and especially on Copernicus’s great treatise De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, which sparked the Scientific Revolution. He therefore has an intimate knowledge of how modern science has operated both in its early centuries and lately.

God’s Planet consists of three lectures Gingerich gave at Gordon College in 2013 as the Herrmann Lectures on Faith and Science. The first two deal with the theories of Copernicus and Darwin. The third ranges over several questions in modern cosmology.

In the first lecture, Gingerich considers why it took so long for heliocentrism to gain acceptance. Copernicus’s book was published in 1543, and yet few astronomers advocated heliocentrism until the 1600s. Arthur Koestler suggested this was because the book went unread; but Gingerich famously tracked down all extant early copies and found that many were carefully annotated by the sixteenth-century astronomers who owned them. Most of those astronomers, however, saw Copernicus’s heliocentric system as just another way of doing astronomical calculations, not as a claim about which bodies are in actual motion.

The idea then current was that astronomy is a branch of mathematics devoted to calculating where and when things appear in the sky, whereas it was the job of “philosophy” (as science was then called) to explain the nature and causes of things. It is telling that the great astronomers Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler held the title of “Imperial Mathematician” in Prague, whereas Galileo, when accepting a position at the Medici court, insisted his title be “Mathematician and Philosopher to the Grand Duke.” Boundaries between the disciplines were differently drawn and highly permeable. So too with science and theology. Astronomers on all sides made scriptural and theological arguments to support their ideas. Kepler saw Trinitarian symbolism in the relation of the sun and planets. And Newton invoked divine intervention—in a scientific treatise—to explain the stability of the solar system.

Copernicus was led to his new system partly by aesthetics. He regarded a feature of the Ptolemaic system called “the equant” as ugly and artificial. And the way that system explained certain aspects of planetary motion was ad hoc. Moreover, some beautiful patterns emerged if one assumed the sun was at the center: For example, the speeds of the various planets became correlated in a simple way with their distance from the sun. As late as 1674, the English scientist Robert Hooke noted that the strongest and “better reasoned grounds” for embracing the Copernican system were its “proportion and harmony.”

Some might question whether such subjective criteria as “beauty” and “harmony” belong in science, where theories can be evaluated objectively by whether they fit the data. But things are rarely that simple. The Ptolemaic system (suitably refined) did fit the data. Or at least it did until 1610, when Galileo discovered the phases of Venus, which revealed that the sun, Earth, and Venus were sometimes configured in ways not possible in the Ptolemaic system. But this only refuted Ptolemy’s version of geocentrism. A different version had been proposed in 1588 by Tycho Brahe, and Tycho’s system fit all the data, including the phases of Venus, just as well as the system of Copernicus.

In fact, better. There was one fact that posed a great difficulty for heliocentrism. If the Earth really moved around the sun, the apparent positions of stars should change slightly over the course of a year, an effect called “stellar parallax,” and no parallax was seen. Copernicans had to explain this by saying the stars were extremely far away, but this ran into a formidable objection. The Jesuit astronomer Riccioli noted that stars had a width as seen in telescopes, and therefore, if as far away as Copernicanism required, must be incredibly large. Astronomers did not realize back then that the type of lenses they were using smeared the images of stars slightly, making them look bigger than they are.

By 1632, Galileo thought he had found two proofs of the Earth’s motion, one of them based on his theory of the tides. It is one of the great ironies of scientific history that both of Galileo’s proofs and his theory of the tides were wrong. In fact, it simply wasn’t possible to resolve the dispute over heliocentrism with the data available in the 1600s. The first real observational evidence of the Earth’s motion came in 1729 with the discovery of the “aberration of starlight.” In 1736, the slight flattening of the Earth at the poles due to its rotation, which had been predicted by Newton, was confirmed by the arctic expedition of Maupertuis (“the man who flattened the earth”). Only in 1838 was stellar parallax finally observed. In the same year, the Catholic Church removed its censure from Copernicus’s De Revolutionibus. (Though Gingerich doesn’t mention it, the general censure of books defending heliocentrism had been lifted already in 1758, at the urging, it seems, of the Jesuit scientist Rudjer Boskovic.)

By 1700, scientific opinion had shifted toward heliocentrism. What caused this, and why did it take so long? In Gingerich’s words, “it was the gradual abandonment of an entrenched world view,” which envisioned “a tidy universe, the Earth in the center surrounded by the planetary spheres, and, beyond the stars, Dante’s layers of the empyrean.” There was an impressive coherence to this view, which smoothly integrated the science of the ancient Greeks, theological notions, and common sense. Things fall toward the Earth’s center, so it made sense that it should be the center of the universe as well. And nothing was more obvious than the enormous contrast between the earthly realm, with its corruptible beings and unpredictable changes, and the eternal heavenly realm, with its luminous bodies moving in circles that have no beginning or end. Placing the Earth in the heavens threw everything into confusion. Gradually, however, acceptance of Copernicanism grew, “based not on proofs but on the persuasion of what was increasingly seen as a coherent system.” The decisive role was played by Newton:

Newton’s [Principia, published] in 1687[,] described a solar system [circling] a Sun vastly more massive than any of the planets, yet holding them in orbit by the mysterious yet mathematically expressed gravitational power. Even the wayward comets fell into elliptical orbits rounding the Sun. Likewise, calculations showed that people would not be spun off into space by the rotation of the earth. Here was an awesome coherency, persuasion par excellence.

In the story of the gradual acceptance of Darwin’s theory, as discussed in Gingerich’s second lecture, one can see several parallels. Darwin was led to the idea of evolution by patterns he noticed in the distribution of species. For example, living species were often similar to extinct ones of the same region. And species in the Galapagos Islands seemed related to those on the nearby mainland. Of course, special creation could fit this data, but only in an ad hoc way, whereas evolution provided an elegant explanation of the patterns.

As with heliocentrism, though, the data was at first inadequate or even misleading. Certain transitional forms were not seen in the fossil record till long after Darwin. And there was a formidable scientific objection to Darwin’s ideas. He could not explain why new traits wouldn’t simply be diluted away as they blended with more common traits in later generations. Not until Mendel’s discoveries were known could this be answered satisfactorily. Mendelian genetics did for Darwinism what Newtonian physics did for Copernicanism: make it into a consistent and coherent system.

The theological issues Copernicanism had raised were rather peripheral, though they didn’t seem so in the feverish times of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. Even Cardinal Bellarmine had admitted that astronomical matters concerned the faith only “incidentally.” Darwinian evolution, however, necessarily involves theological and philosophical issues of the highest importance. One cannot discuss human origins without dealing with the question of what it is to be human, which empirical science alone cannot answer. Gingerich quotes with approval the following statement of Pope John Paul II:

With man, we find ourselves facing a different ontological order—an ontological leap we could say. . . . The moment of passage into the spiritual realm is not something that can be observed with research in the fields of physics and chemistry—although we can nevertheless discern, through experimental research, a series of very valuable signs of what is specifically human life. But the experience of metaphysical knowledge, of self-consciousness and self-awareness, of moral conscience, of liberty, or of aesthetic and religious experience—these must be analyzed through philosophical reflection, while theology seeks to clarify the ultimate meaning of the Creator’s designs.

As Gingerich pithily puts it, “the transition to a spiritual being . . . does not fossilize.”

With the developments in modern cosmology discussed in Gingerich’s third lecture, the domains of science, philosophy, and theology again overlap. Some physicists were skeptical of the Big Bang theory, Gingerich notes, because “it was too much like the Genesis account of God saying ‘Let there be light!’” And other scientists were doubtful for philosophical reasons. The lesson of the Copernican controversy, for them, was that science must avoid any trace of anthropocentrism, such as the idea that we live in a special part of the universe. This was formulated as the “Copernican Principle,” according to which all regions of the universe must be qualitatively alike. In its strong form it said that all cosmic times must be alike as well; that is, the universe has forever been and forever will be much as it is now. This notion led the astrophysicist Fred Hoyle and others to develop the so-called “Steady State Theory” of cosmology as an alternative to the Big Bang theory.

As with heliocentrism and evolution, the Big Bang theory at first faced problems with the data. The first estimates of the age of the universe based on its rate of expansion gave about a billion years, which was inconsistent with the known ages of the oldest rocks and of stars. But those first estimates turned out to be based on a mistaken calculation of the distances between galaxies. Eventually things got sorted out, and evidence for the Big Bang mounted to the point where it is regarded as conclusive. Nevertheless, the idea of an everlasting universe remains philosophically appealing to some scientists. It has inspired numerous speculative cosmological models in which the Big Bang was not the beginning of time, but only one of an infinite number of such explosions in a universe without beginning or end.

The issue of anthropocentrism looms large in two other much-debated questions that Gingerich discusses toward the end of his book: Is there intelligent life elsewhere in the universe? And are the laws of physics “fine-tuned” to make such life possible? This latter idea is often called the “Anthropic Principle.” Ironically, it was Fred Hoyle who discovered one of the most famous and impressive examples of “anthropic fine-tuning”: He showed that if a certain property of the carbon-12 nucleus were not precisely what it is, the universe would have very little carbon, an element crucial for life. This led Hoyle, once an outspoken atheist, to say, “A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology,” to make life possible.

For decades, the subject of “anthropic” features of the laws of physics was virtually taboo among scientists. It had obvious religious overtones and looked like an attempt to bring discredited teleology back into science. But some anthropic features were too obvious to ignore, and the “multiverse” idea gave a respectably naturalistic way to account for them. So now many papers on these subjects, including some by top physicists, appear in reputable physics journals. Nevertheless, most physicists remain hostile both to anthropic explanations and to the multiverse idea as untestable and therefore not belonging in science.

One sees from Gingerich’s absorbing narratives the extent to which scientists are sometimes guided by philosophical ideas. Some of these are theological or (more recently) anti-theological. More often, however, they are hunches about the way the world works or convictions about what a valid scientific explanation should look like. This does not impede science; it often propels it. But the older controversies surveyed by Gingerich also show something else. Whatever roles philosophical and theological ideas played in the debates over heliocentrism, biological evolution, and the Big Bang theory, the scientific issues were eventually settled by more and better data and by considerations that were purely “scientific” in the modern sense. To that limited extent Gould was right. There is an internal logic and dynamism to the development of science that determines in the long run where it will end up, notwithstanding the philosophical leanings of scientists themselves.

Now, however, we seem to be entering a new era. Many of the most interesting and fundamental questions that science has stimulated are unlikely to be decidable by new data: Was there something before the Big Bang? Did the universe have a beginning? Do we live in a multiverse? Is the universe infinitely large? Are the laws of nature fine-tuned for life? Are there other intelligent species in the universe? How did the “transition to the spiritual” occur? Increasingly, one finds science lapping over its seawalls. Indeed, in some areas, the boundary between science and speculation has been entirely washed away. Science began with philosophical speculation twenty-five centuries ago, and it seems likely that it will end in the same place.

Stephen M. Barr is professor of physics at the University of Delaware.

Does "brotherhood" comprise only males?

Tue, 28 Apr 2015 21:38:45 GMT

Does "brotherhood" comprise only males? Consider these definitions of brother and brotherhood:

In the Oxford English Dictionary, one definition of brother is “A fellow member of a Christian society or of the Christian Church as a whole; a fellow Christian, a co-religionist generally.

Under brotherhood, one definition is “The fellowship or communion of Christians with one another and with Christ.” A citation is from R. W. Dale: “There is a brotherhood between Christ and all believers.”

Another definition of brotherhood is “Fellowship; community of feeling between man and man. A modern notion frequent in brotherhood of man, universal brotherhood, etc. One citation is from Farrar, 1800, Early Christianity: “In the Church the beautiful ideal of human brotherhood was carried into practice.” Neither this nor any of the other several citations implies a restriction of brotherhood to males.

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Similarly, in Webster’s New International Dictionary, Second Edition Unabridged, 1950, one definition of brother is “A fellow Christian or coreligionist, esp. a member of the same congregation or religious society; specif. A fellow member in a religious order.” And one of the definitions of brotherhood is “Brotherliness; fellowship; companionship.”

I believe the Urantia Brotherhood erred in changing its name from "Brotherhood" to "Fellowship." The Urantia Book says that "the greatest truths mortal man can ever hear" are "the living gospel of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man." Though the truth is not dependent on a particular linguistic expression, making a gratuitous change falsely implies there is something suspect in the original formulation.

Review of "Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now," by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Tue, 28 Apr 2015 21:36:09 GMT

Katherine Ernst
The Heretic We Need
Once again, Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s pen is mightier than any barbarian’s sword.
27 April 2015

Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali (Harper Collins, 288 pp., $27.99)

Remember Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, former president of the Islamic Republic of Iran? I always had a soft spot for his vainglorious lack of cognitive dissonance: the way he would chase after Western missile and nuclear technology while wearing his quasi-Members Only jacket—because donning the classic suit and tie was too indicative of the decadent infidel West. Turns out Mahmoud was more progressive than I gave him credit for: in 2010, he offered support to those Iranian men who preferred a clean shave and a tie to ayatollah chic. That prompted an internecine battle with Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, who eventually proclaimed: “The supreme guide [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] himself has said in a fatwa that the wearing of ties or bow ties is not permitted.”

I was reminded of this episode while reading Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now, which, among other theses, points out the intellectual bankruptcy of a political/religious ideology that preaches a return to seventh-century law and disorder while utilizing the tools of twenty-first century Western progress. This ideology practically screams “Topple Me With Satire and Post-Enlightenment Ideas,” and yet few have dared try, for doing so is (even in a free society) to risk death, whether your name is Salman Rushdie, Lars Vilks, Theo van Gogh, Charlie Hebdo—or Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

If you’re not familiar with Ali and her story, buy a copy of her 2007 memoir, Infidel. I’m confident you’ll eagerly purchase the follow-up, Nomad, and maybe even The Caged Virgin, an earlier collection of essays. Born into a devout though not extremist Islamic household in Somalia, Ali bounced from there to Saudi Arabia, then Ethiopia, and finally Kenya—all before the age of 12. In 1992, she left Africa for the Netherlands to escape an arranged marriage, but not before suffering genital mutilation, beatings (including a skull-bashing that nearly took her life), and radicalization in the name of Islam and tribal tradition. A little over a decade later, she was a Leiden University graduate and “Westernized” member of the Dutch parliament, gaining notoriety for her impassioned critique of Islamist violence, particularly against women. She’s now an American citizen, having fled the Netherlands after the murder by Islamists of Theo van Gogh— her collaborator on the film Submission—and a tempest over her Dutch citizenship.

Heretic, as its subtitle suggests, is not a third bio but rather Ali’s most academic and aspirational book to date. It clearly and cleverly offers five “amendments” to Islamic orthodoxy in order to alleviate its violent and oppressive tendencies. But before getting into those, let’s tackle some clichés Ali battles on the press circuit. Most interviews with her go something like this: “You’ve lived a tough life and are a fiery critic of Islam—but aren’t you painting with a broad brush? You know that the vast majority of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims are peaceful, right? You know that the Bible has violent parts, right? You know that some people today take the Bible literally, right? Also, the Crusades. Oh look, we’re outta time.”

An elongated version of this lazy script was enacted during Ali’s recent appearance on “The Daily Show.” Host Jon Stewart talked in circles to Ali, at one point musing, “But did the Bible change, or did people’s interpretation of it change?” He seemed unaware that the freedom to interpret and debate Islam’s holy texts is Ali’s first proposed reform. Another deep Stewart-ism: “[I]t feels like Muslims are being asked to answer to something that has not much to do with them, that a group of radicals has stolen a text [from them].” Someone didn’t do his homework.

Heretic carefully separates Muslims into three categories. “Medina Muslims,” as Ali calls them, are the jihadists and their supporters, who intertwine the faith with seventh-century political and martial order, as Muhammad did during his time in that city. A low-ball estimate puts this population at 48 million, a tiny fraction of the world’s Muslims—but, considering that it took only 19 men armed with box cutters and the “Medina” ideology to bring us 9/11, it’s a number to be concerned about. In the second group are the apostates and heretics, like Ali herself, who have left the faith altogether or are so critical of it that they can no longer be considered “true” Muslims. This population is tiny but growing. Finally, what Ali terms the “Mecca Muslims” comprise the majority of Islam’s adherents. These are the hearts and minds to whom she preaches reform: devout Muslims who desire access to Western thought, education, technology, and civil law, but who find that “pure” Islamic scripture and discipline (or their government’s adoption of sharia law) renders accommodation all but impossible. Torn by this conflict, many of these Muslims find themselves ripe for jihadist plucking: better to side with the devil you kinda know (Medina Islam) than the one you don’t (hell-bound apostasy).

“Avoidance was my main strategy to deal with the terrible dissonance” while in Holland, writes Ali. For others, it’s silent disapproval (or approval) of the Medina crew, a stifled life, or a bullet through the brain (see: Noble Prize winner Malala Yousafzai). That Islam itself might be incongruent with basic human rights is an argument met with much derision, but as Ali drolly replies: “To me, however, when a murderer quotes the Qur’an in justification of his crime, we should at least discuss the possibility that he means what he says.” She dedicates whole chapters to diagnosing the five root problems in Islam that manifest themselves via violence and oppression: 1) The Qur’an’s status as the immutable word of God and the infallibility of Muhammad as the last divine messenger; 2) an emphasis on the afterlife over the here and now; 3) sharia’s claims to be a comprehensive system of law governing the spiritual and temporal realms; 4) the obligation of ordinary Muslims to command right and forbid wrong; and 5) the concept of jihad, or holy war.

Millions of Muslims currently live under systems of sharia law that Westerners would be hard-pressed to distinguish from the fictional, Medieval-inspired fantasy of Game of Thrones: the men employed full-time as sword-wielding head-n’-limb choppers, the strategic marriages for honor and power, and the heartless tunnel vision of hoisting one flag above another, rivers of blood and bodies be damned. Western academics and liberals, Ali notes, should confront this fact with the same outrage they brought to the anti-apartheid movement in the 1970s and 1980s. Instead, they mostly respond with silence, or with some face-palm-inducing counterpoint, à la Stewart.

I have two quibbles with the book. The first arises, ironically, out of Ali’s being a victim of her previous success. Heretic’s introduction states that it was written for “not only Muslims but also Western apologists for Islam.” I couldn’t help but think that every “amendment” chapter would have been buttressed by the in-depth personal anecdotes that packed Infidel and Nomad. Granted, Ali can’t write her biography three times (and Heretic does include another truncated telling of her life story), but the beauty of those earlier books was how they immersed the Western reader in the Muslim Ummah: the omnipresence of clan mentality, violence (both real and threatened), and malevolent personal and spiritual guilt. The intended audience might do better to read Ali’s earlier books first.

The second quibble is with Ali’s case for optimism. Page after page is filled with disconcerting statistics. Scientific polls—nearly all taken within the last decade—show staggering support for “Medina” opinions in the most populous and fecund Islamic nations, including those supplying the bulk of Western immigration. Seventy-five percent of Pakistanis “favor the death penalty for leaving Islam.” According to Pew, “91 percent of Iraqi Muslims and 99 percent of Afghan Muslims supported making sharia their country’s official law.” And, Ali writes, “65 percent [of European Muslims] say that religious rules are more important to them than the laws of the country in which they live.” And so on. Ali even writes off any hope for a modern-day Reagan or Thatcher regarding the shadow of Medina: “I do not expect our political leadership to take the lead in directly challenging the inequities of political Islam. The ideological self-confidence that characterized Western leaders during the Cold War has given way to a feeble relativism.”

Given all this, it's thus not overly convincing that the scales tip toward optimism, but how clearly Ali can read the crystal ball shouldnâ€™t detract from Heretic’s message of “reform now.” And Ali is blunt about what the world is up against in that effort: “Indeed, the term ‘ijtihad,’ the nearest thing to reform in Arabic, means trying to determine God’s will on some new issue . . . Islam even has its own pejorative term for theological trouble-makers: those who indulge in innovations and follow their passions (the Arabic words ahl al-bida, wa-l-ahwa).” She then reminisces on the statement that earned her heretic status in Amsterdam: “[J]ust allow us Muslims one [Voltaire], please.”

Voltaire, Locke, Luther, Spinoza . . . it’s tempting to call Ali the modern incarnation of one or another of these. Yet just being the Ayaan Hirsi Ali of our own time is more than enough: she’s the heretic who risks her life with rich intellectual treatises and memoirs to hasten an ideological reformation that could liberate millions. We ignore her quill to our shame and peril.

Katherine Ernst is a writer living in Los Angeles.

Frank Capra's America and Ours | John Marini | Imprimis

Sat, 25 Apr 2015 21:33:12 GMT

Frank Capra’s America and Ours

March 2015 | Volume 44, Number 3

John Marini
University of Nevada, Reno

John Marini, a professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Reno, is a graduate of San Jose State University and earned his Ph.D. in government at the Claremont Graduate School. He has also taught at Agnes Scott College, Ohio University, and the University of Dallas. He is on the board of directors of the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy and a member of the Nevada Advisory Committee of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. Dr. Marini is the author or co-author of several books, including The Progressive Revolution in Politics and Political Science; The Politics of Budget Control: Congress, the Presidency, and the Growth of the Administrative State; and The Founders on Citizenship and Immigration.

The following is adapted from a speech delivered at Hillsdale College on March 3, 2015, during a conference on the films of Frank Capra sponsored by the College’s Center for Constructive Alternatives.

Filmmaker Frank Capra was not an American by birth or blood. Consequently he did not understand America, as many Americans do today, in terms of personal categories of identity such as race, ethnicity, gender, or sexuality. He understood America in terms of its political principles—the moral principles of America that can be shared by all who understand them and are willing to live up to them. This was Abraham Lincoln’s understanding as well. In a speech in Chicago in 1858, Lincoln noted that many citizens of that time did not share the blood of the “old men” of America’s Founding generation. But, he continued,

. . . when they look through the old Declaration of Independence they find that those old men say that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” and then they feel that that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principles in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are. That is the electric cord in that Declaration that links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together, that will link those patriotic hearts as long as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world.

Frank Capra was born in Sicily in 1897 and came to America in 1903. Yet by the 1930s, his movies—movies like Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and Meet John Doe—were said to embody the best in America. Capra’s films were nominated for 35 Academy Awards and won eight, including two for best picture and three for best director. But Capra’s star faded after the Second World War, and by the end of the revolutionary decade of the 1960s, the actor and director John Cassavettes could say: “Maybe there never was an America in the thirties. Maybe it was all Frank Capra.” By that time, Capra’s films were widely viewed as feel-good fantasies about a country that never was. But is that view correct?

Capra, like Lincoln, believed that our inherited political edifice of liberty and equal rights is a fundamental good. He believed that if our treasure is in the ideas of our fathers, it is the duty of each generation to make those ideas live through the proper kind of education—including through literature and art, including his own art of filmmaking. Accordingly, he believed it is important to celebrate the deeds of those ordinary individuals who continue to exercise the virtues necessary to maintain those ideas.

In celebrating these deeds in his movies, Capra rejected social or economic theories based on progressivism or historicism—theories in which the idea of natural right is replaced with struggles for power based on categories such as race and class. Such theories had taken root not only in Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany, but elsewhere in the West—especially in the universities. As political theorist Hannah Arendt observed during World War II:

Among ideologies few have won enough prominence to survive the hard competitive struggle of persuasion, and only two have come out on top and essentially defeated all others: the ideology which interprets history as an economic struggle of classes, and the other that interprets history as a natural fight of races. The appeal of both to large masses was so strong that they were able to obtain state support and establish themselves as official national doctrines. But far beyond the boundaries in which race-thinking and class-thinking have developed into obligatory patterns of thought, free public opinion has adopted them to such an extent that not only intellectuals but great masses of people will no longer accept any presentation of past or present facts that is not in agreement with these views.

It is not surprising, then, that Capra’s films came to be viewed by critics, especially after the 1960s, through the lens of those economic or social theories.

* * *

Capra was often thought to be a populist. But Capra did not assume that a virtuous opinion existed in the people, or that the people simply needed mobilizing. He was aware that the modern public is created by modern mass media whose techniques spawn mass society, posing a danger to individual freedom. Capra wrote that his films “embodied the rebellious cry of the individual against being trampled into an ort by massiveness—mass production, mass thought, mass education, mass politics, mass wealth, mass conformity.” He did not believe in the use of mass power to improve society or to right historical wrongs. Reform, he thought, must take place through moral regeneration—thus through moral education.

Consider Capra’s 1939 film, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, in which an idealistic man goes to Congress, runs into rampant corruption, becomes despondent, is later inspired at the Lincoln Memorial, decides against hope to stand on principle, and prevails. Capra had doubts about making Mr. Smith. While in Washington preparing for the film, he attended a press conference in which President Roosevelt outlined the great problems facing the nation. Capra wondered whether it was a good time to make a dramatic comedy about Washington politics. In his troubled state he visited the Lincoln Memorial, where he saw a boy reading Lincoln’s words to an elderly man. He decided, he later wrote, that he “must make the film, if only to hear a boy read Lincoln to his grandpa.” He left the Lincoln Memorial that day, he recalled,

with this growing conviction about our film: The more uncertain are the people of the world . . . the more they need a ringing statement of America’s democratic ideals. The soul of our film would be anchored in Lincoln. Our Jefferson Smith [the film’s lead character, played by Jimmy Stewart] would be a young Abe Lincoln, tailored to the rail-splitter’s simplicity, compassion, ideals, humor. . . . It is never untimely to yank the rope of freedom’s bell.

When watching Mr. Smith, it is important to notice where Capra locates the corruption. FDR customarily attacked “economic royalists,” or the private corruption of corporations and monopolies. For FDR, the solution to corruption was to be found through the government and through the unions, which would combat the economic forces of the private sphere. But in Mr. Smith, Capra located the corruption not in the private but in the political sphere—it was the politicians who had usurped the institutions of government on behalf of their own interests and the special interests. When Smith goes to Washington he reveres a Senator from his state who had been a friend of his father. Smith’s father, a newspaperman, had been killed while defending an independent prospector against a mining syndicate that was likely in cahoots with the union. Capra, like Smith and his father, understood America in terms of a common good—a good established by the principles of equality and liberty as the foundation of individual rights.

The setting of Mr. Smith is deliberately timeless. There is no mention of the Depression or of impending war. There is no indication of partisanship. What Capra hopes to bring to life are the words that have been carved in stone on Washington, D.C.’s monuments, but which are now forgotten. That is Jefferson Smith’s purpose as well. In a central scene in the movie, gazing at the lighted dome of the Capitol, Smith says:

. . . boys forget what their country means by just reading “the land of the free” in history books. Then they get to be men, they forget even more. Liberty is too precious a thing to be buried in books. . . . Men should hold it up in front of them every single day . . . and say, “I’m free to think and to speak. My ancestors couldn’t. I can. And my children will.”

What Smith is advocating in the film is the establishment of a boys camp that will teach them about the principles of their country. Moreover, it is not to be paid for by the taxpayers, but with a loan from the government to be paid for by the boys themselves. At the climax of Smith’s battle in the Senate, he says this:

Get up there with that lady that’s up on top of this Capitol dome—that lady that stands for liberty. Take a look at this country through her eyes. . . . You won’t just see scenery. You’ll see . . . what man’s carved out for himself after centuries of fighting . . . for something better than just jungle law—fighting so he can stand on his own two feet, free and decent—like he was created, no matter what his race, color, or creed. That’s what you’d see. There’s no place out there for graft or greed or lies—or compromise with human liberties. And if that’s what the grown-ups have done with this world that was given to them, then we better get those boys camps started fast and see what the kids can do. It’s not too late. . . . Great principles don’t get lost once they come to light. They’re right here. You just
have to see them again.

For Capra, like Lincoln, the problem is how to make people see the principles again.

The politicians in Washington in 1939 did not like their portrayal in Mr. Smith. Many tried to keep the movie from being shown. Capra thought it to be a ringing defense of democracy—and the people agreed. It was a tremendous success, not only in America, but throughout the world. In 1942, a month before the Nazi occupation of France was to begin, the Vichy government asked the French people what films they wanted to see before American and British films were banned by the Germans. The great majority wanted to see Mr. Smith. One theater in Paris played the movie for 30 straight nights.

* * *

By the time America entered World War II, Capra had become America’s most popular director and was president of the Screen Directors Guild. Yet four days after Pearl Harbor he left Hollywood to join the Armed Forces. He was sent to Washington and was given an office next to the Army Chief of Staff, General George Marshall. Marshall was worried that millions of men would be conscripted, many right off of the farm, having little idea of the reason for the war. He assigned Capra to make “a series of documented, factual-information films—the first in our history—that will explain to our boys in the Army why we are fighting, and the principles for which we are fighting.” Capra was nearly cowed by the assignment. He had never made a documentary. But after giving it some thought, he brilliantly dramatized the difference between the countries at war by using their own films and documentaries, in this way illustrating the character and danger of tyranny.

After the war, with the danger gone, it became increasingly clear that American intellectuals, who had rejected the political principles of the American Founding, had not understood the phenomenon of tyranny. For them, it was simply historical conditions that had established the distinction between right and wrong—or between friend and enemy—during the war. For them, in fighting the Nazis, America had simply been fighting a social movement. Subsequently, they looked on those who still revered America’s Founding principles as representing a reactionary economic and social movement to be opposed here at home. For the same reason, Capra’s wartime documentaries—known collectively as Why We Fight—came to be seen merely as propaganda.

Capra never thought of his documentaries as propaganda. He saw them as recognizing the permanent human problems—those problems that reveal the distinction between right and wrong, good and evil, justice and injustice. The fundamental distinction in politics is between freedom and slavery or democracy and tyranny. Winston Churchill said of Capra’s wartime documentaries, “I have never seen or read any more powerful statement of our cause or of our rightful case against the Nazi tyranny.” In his view, they were not propaganda at all. Churchill insisted that they be shown to every British soldier and in every theater in England. At the end of the war in 1945, General Marshall awarded Capra the Distinguished Service Medal. And on Churchill’s recommendation, Capra was awarded the Order of the British Empire Medal in 1962.

* * *

Capra’s last great movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, was made in 1946. Shortly before making it, he said, “There are just two things that are important. One is to strengthen the individual’s belief in himself, and the other, even more important right now, is to combat a modern trend toward atheism.” This movie, he wrote, summed up his philosophy of filmmaking: “First, to exalt the worth of the individual; to champion man—plead his causes, protest any degradation of his dignity, spirit or divinity.” Capra understood that Hollywood would be changing, because the culture and society had begun to change. The historical and personal categories of class and race had become political, and self-expression and self-indulgence had replaced those civic virtues that require self-restraint. In his 1971 autobiography—imagine what he would think today—he wrote that “practically all the Hollywood filmmaking of today is stooping to cheap salacious pornography in a crazy bastardization of a great art to compete for the ‘patronage’ of deviates.”

In 1982, when he was in his 85th year, Capra was awarded the American Film Institute’s Life Achievement Award. In his acceptance speech, he touched on the things that had been most important in his life. He spoke of celebrating his sixth birthday in steerage on a 13-day voyage across the Atlantic. He recalled the lack of privacy and ventilation, and the terrible smell. But he also remembered the ship’s arrival in New York Harbor, when his father brought him on deck and showed him the Statue of Liberty: “Cicco look!” his illiterate peasant father had said. “Look at that! That’s the greatest light since the star of Bethlehem! That’s the light of freedom! Remember that. Freedom.” Capra remembered. In his speech to the Hollywood elite so many years later, he revealed his formula for moviemaking. He said: “The art of Frank Capra is very, very simple. It’s the love of people. Add two simple ideals to this love of people—the freedom of each individual and the equal importance of each individual—and you have the principle upon which I based all my films.”

It is hard to think of a better way to describe Frank Capra’s view of the world, and America’s place in fulfilling its purpose, than to turn to another great American who made his living in the world of motion pictures. Ronald Reagan was a friend and admirer of Frank Capra. They were very much alike. The inscription that Reagan had carved on his tombstone could have been written by Capra: “I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always eventually triumph. And there is purpose and worth to each and every life.” Both Capra and Reagan looked to a benevolent and enduring Providence, and the best in man’s nature, as the ultimate grounds of political right. For them, as for Lincoln, America was more than a geographical location or a place where citizens shared a common blood or religion, or belonged to a common culture or tradition. America was a place where an enlightened understanding of “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” had made it possible to establish those principles of civil and religious liberty that gave “purpose and worth to each and every life.”

Capra was aware that the moral foundations established by those principles, as well as belief in God, had become endangered by the transformations in American life following World War II. He saw the necessity of reviving the moral education necessary to preserve the conditions of freedom, because he understood that in a democracy, the people must not only participate in the rule of others, they must also learn to govern themselves.

In his last and most personal tribute to his adopted country, Capra recalled his family’s arrival at Union Station in Los Angeles after their long journey across America in 1903. When they got off the train, his mother and father got on their knees and kissed the ground. Capra’s last words to his assembled audience were these: “For America, for just allowing me to live here, I kiss the ground.” Capra did not believe that he had a right to be a citizen of America. Rather he was grateful for the privilege of living in America. He understood that freedom not only offers economic opportunity, but establishes a duty for all citizens—a duty to preserve the conditions of freedom not only for themselves, but for their posterity. Only those willing to bear the burdens of freedom have a right to its rewards.

For Capra, the real America was to be understood in terms of its virtues, which are derived from its principles. In his view, his art was dedicated to keeping those virtues alive—by making those principles live again in the speeches and deeds of that most uncommon phenomenon of human history, the American common man. It was the simple, unsophisticated, small-town common American that Capra celebrated in his films. But for Capra, as for his friend John Ford, no one epitomized this phenomenon better than Abraham Lincoln.

For American elites today, and for too many of the American people as well, the past has come to seem no longer meaningful to the present, and the celebration of the heroes of the past, like Lincoln, has come to seem naïve. Looking ahead, I’m afraid, the moral regeneration of America that Capra had hoped to bring about will require more than a Capra. It will require a Lincoln.

Jesus’ Father and Our Father: A sermon preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Northbrook United Methodist Church July 20, 2014

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 21:30:58 GMT

Happy Father’s Day! What, you say, “This isn’t Father’s Day; Father’s Day was a month ago.” Well, If you look at the calendar or ask greeting card companies, they will tell you that Father’s Day is the third Sunday in June. But when we consider our Heavenly Father, the Father Absolute who is the creator controller, and infinite upholder of the universe, we realize that today and every day is Father’s Day.

Toward the end of his life, Jesus told his followers numerous times that he would be killed, and he also said that on the third day he would rise from the dead. Very few of his disciples believed him. They didn’t think he could die. But, in fact, he was crucified and died a painful death. The question then became, would he rise from the dead, as he predicted? Again, very few of his disciples believed that he would.

One of his most loyal disciples was Mary Magdalene. In today’s scripture passage from the 20^th chapter of John, we are told that on the morning of the third day following Jesus’ crucifixion, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb where Jesus had been lain. And, lo and behold, there she met Jesus, who indeed had risen from the dead! And Jesus said to her, “Go to my brothers and sisters and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”[1] In this passage, Jesus is proclaiming that God is not only his father, but he is also the father of every person. As Christianity developed, it emphasized that God was the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, but it often neglected the more robust truth that, as Jesus himself declared, God is also the loving father of each one of us. In this regard, we are equal with Jesus. Of course, Jesus is unique in other ways, such as having divine power. But we are each one of us a child of God, as Jesus is.

And because we are all God’s children, we are all brothers and sisters to each other. Jesus said, “all of you are brothers and sisters….you have one Father, who is in heaven.”[2]

Jesus’ God is not far away, but is readily available and ever full of tender mercy. God is not just the Father, but “our Father.”[3]

Yes, we are all God’s beloved children and, by faith, simple trust in God, we can realize this saving truth. If we do so, we will be “born from above.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.[4] Jesus is not telling us to become childish, but rather childlike, to trust God as a child trusts his earthly parents.

What kind of father is God? Perhaps we can answer this by considering the scripture we have heard today of the parable of the Prodigal Son, as told by Jesus.[5] This parable introduces us to two very different brothers. The older brother is responsible, serious, and hard-working, but also self-centered and conceited. The younger brother avoids responsibility; he likes to enjoy himself; he is cheerful, lively, and lazy. It’s no wonder that the two brothers did not get along.

The younger brother decides to leave home. He approaches his father and asks to be given the 1/3 share of his father’s estate that will be his due upon the father’s death. When you think about it, this is pretty insulting: it’s as though the son is wishing his father dead. But the father agrees to the request. The son proceeds to leave home and travel to a distant land. There he indulges his appetites in riotous living, until he has wasted all of his wealth.

And then this far country is afflicted with famine. In hunger and despair, the son goes to work for a man who has him feeding pigs. And he wishes he could eat what the pigs eat. Finally, he “comes to his senses.” He realizes that while he is starving, his father’s servants are well-fed. He recognizes that he has sinned against heaven and his father and resolves to go back home and ask that he be treated not as a son, but as a servant. So he sets out on the long journey home.

His father, meanwhile, has been mourning him and hoping for his return. When the son is still far away from home, the father sees him, rushes to him, and hugs and kisses him. “Father,” the son blurts out, “I have sinned against heaven and against you.” But the father cuts this confession short. He calls his servants and instructs them to bring the finest robe, a ring for the son’s finger, and sandals. He tells them kill the calf they have been fattening and to celebrate with a feast. He is elated, because his son, who was lost, has now been found.

Meanwhile, the older son, who has been working in the fields, comes back to the house and hears sounds of merrymaking. He asks a servant what is happening and is told that his brother has returned and the father has called for a celebration. This dutiful son is angry and refuses to join the party. The father comes out and pleads with him to come in, but this son is too proud and too stubborn. He complains that, though he has always been the good son, doing what his father asked for and what his duty required, the father never even gave him a baby goat so that he could party with his friends, while the younger son, who has wasted his father’s money, is rewarded with a celebration.

My son, the father replies, everything I have is yours. Anytime you could have had a party for your friends. But it is right that we celebrate, for your brother was dead and now he is alive; he was lost and now is found.

Henri Nouwen has suggested that this parable, instead of being called the parable of the prodigal son, might better be called the parable of the compassionate father. Indeed, the father’s compassion shines brightly. He isn’t even interested in hearing the confession of the younger son, but simply rejoices in his return. And his compassion extends to the older son, whom he urges to join the celebration.

Have you ever had an experience like that of the prodigal son? I have. When I was in college in New York, I was very unhappy. I had no interest in school, and spent most of my time in the downtown pool halls. I got involved in gambling at pool halls and at the race track. I wanted money to fund my gambling habit and I thought of a way to get it. My grandfather had long maintained a savings account in my name. Whenever I would visit him at his apartment in Brooklyn, he proudly showed me the passbook that indicated how much money he had put away for me. I decided to get this money. I paid a visit to my grandfather, and when it was over, I shut the door as if I were leaving, but instead, went into the second bedroom and hid under the bed. I lay there, covered in dust, for several hours, until I heard my grandfather leave the apartment. Then I got up, took the savings passbook from the drawer where he kept it, left, and went to the bank, where I withdrew the $600 in the account.

I then proceeded to lose all the money in a poker game. I had become the prodigal son, but I never “came to my senses” like the son in the parable. I don’t know what would have happened if I had gone to my grandfather and confessed my misdeed. Perhaps, like the father in the parable, he would have forgiven me and embraced me, but I was too afraid and ashamed to find out.

The father in the parable does not judge, punish, or even criticize the prodigal son. He is simply joyful that the son has come back home. And he also embraces the stubborn older son, encouraging him to join in the joy of celebration. Note the contrast between the attitude of the father in this parable and the attitude of God the Father in much of Christian theology, which insists that a punishment must be enacted to satisfy God’s justice and enable us to be reconciled to him. In contrast, for Jesus, God’s love and mercy overshadow his justice. His forgiveness requires no bribe or sacrifice.

When the paralyzed man had his friends remove tiles in the roof so they could lower him to be by Jesus, Jesus said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.”[6] Salvation is offered right away, in response to honest spiritual desire. Many times, Jesus said to people, “Your faith has made you well”[7] or “Your faith has saved you.”[8] He also assured us, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”[9]

Jesus declared that “the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”[10] And that God is even “kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.”[11]

Dear brothers and sisters, let us rejoice that our Father in heaven requires no payment to bestow his grace and salvation on us. He loves each of us with an infinite love and it his great joy to embrace us, like the father in the parable, and to welcome us home.

Happy Father’s Day!

Hosanna! Blessed is the One Who Comes in the Name of the Lord: A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bethany Terrace Nursing Centre March 29, 2015

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 21:27:02 GMT

Happy Palm Sunday! I am delighted to be here to join you in celebrating one of the most glorious days in the earth life of Jesus. It was on this day, that Jesus entered Jerusalem to the cheers of crowds who shouted “Hosanna” and waived palm leaves. Palm Sunday marked the beginning of what has become known as Holy Week. One day later Jesus would expel the money-changers and the sacrificial animals from the temple precincts. On Thursday, he would eat the Last Supper with his apostles. Immediately following that he would be arrested and crucified. And, as we Christians know, in three days he would return from the dead, on Easter Sunday.

Palm Sunday occurred a few days after Jesus performed perhaps his greatest miracle while here on earth, the resurrection of his friend Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus and his two sisters, Martha and Mary, lived in a village called Bethany, two miles from Jerusalem. On his visits to Jerusalem, Jesus would generally stay at the home of these good friends. It was from Bethany that Jesus started the procession into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.

What was on Jesus’ mind as he planned to enter Jerusalem this day? Up to now he had tried to suppress the public acclaim of him as the Messiah, but things were different now. He was approaching the end of his life in the flesh. The Sanhedrin, the ruling body of the Jews, had proclaimed that Jesus must die. What harm could come from allowing his disciples to give expression to their feelings?

So he decided to make a public entrance into Jerusalem. There were various Hebrew Scriptures that prophesied the coming of a Messiah. The passage from Zechariah that we heard earlier seemed the most suitable:

Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!
    Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
    righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
    on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

A warrior king would enter a city riding upon a horse; a king on a mission of peace and friendship would enter riding upon a donkey. Jesus would not enter Jerusalem as a warrior on horseback, but he was willing to enter peacefully and with good will as the Son of Man on a donkey.

At this time there were thousands of pilgrims in Jerusalem, Jews from various Roman provinces who had come to celebrate the Passover festival. Evidently, some of Jesus’ disciples went ahead and circulated among the pilgrims, spreading the news that Jesus was about to enter the city. So the crowd knew of Jesus’ coming and provided themselves with palm leaves to waive in greeting him. And they shouted

‘Hosanna!

‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!’

¹⁰‘Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!’

‘Hosanna in the highest heaven!’

When Luke told the story of the noisy procession, he reports that ”Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Him, "Teacher, rebuke Your disciples." But Jesus answered, "I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!"

Mark ends his story of the procession by saying, “Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.”

Does this strike you as a bit anti-climactic? Jesus has just led this huge crowd to the temple courts and then, what? “He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.” I wonder how the disciples reacted to this. Some of the disciples were among those who were hoping that Jesus would lead a military revolution against the old order. I imagine that Simon Zelotes, for example, would have wanted Jesus to lead the multitude in revolt, destroying the Sanhedrin and its followers, and then proclaiming Jesus King to occupy the throne of King David. Those disciples must have been bitterly disappointed.

And I guess that Peter would have been disappointed. Jesus allowed the crowd to dissipate without preaching the gospel of the kingdom or allowing Peter, a great preacher, to do so.

I can think of one apostle who might have been relieved when Jesus allowed the crowd to disperse. I suppose that, in the organization of the 12 apostles, one of them was probably designated the steward, the one responsible to supply food and supplies for the apostles and those who followed them. Perhaps this was the Apostle Phillip. Whoever it was, he must have been relieved that he did not need to feed the great crowd that had gathered to welcome Jesus.

I suppose that the apostle John might have had the best understanding of what Jesus was up to. John was someone who thought in symbols—he would later write the Book of Revelation, which is chock-full of symbols—and the symbol of Jesus riding on a donkey would have been meaningful to him.

And the apostles must have realized that by entering Jerusalem to a cheering crowd, Jesus effectively disarmed the Sanhedrin’s plan to arrest him. They no doubt feared to arrest him while he was being acclaimed by the crowd.

What about Judas? Judas was one of those with a material-minded view of the kingdom. He wanted Jesus, by the supposed miraculous methods of Moses, to overturn Roman rule and restore the kingdom of David. When he saw Jesus fritter away the opportunity to take advantage of the huge crowd, he must have realized that Jesus would not usher in the kingdom according to his material desires. This episode may have been what decided Judas to betray his Master and to make his peace with the old order, which, evidently, was not going away.

You and I know that Jesus was not going to be a material-minded Messiah, for he often said that “my kingdom is not of this world.” Jesus told of a kingdom which God would set up in the hearts of his children on earth. The power of this kingdom does not consist in the strength of armies or the power of wealth, but in the glory of the divine spirit that indwells the minds and rules the hearts of all who are reborn as citizens of this heavenly kingdom, as children of God.

Hosanna! Thanks be to God!

Amen!

Appendix: Mark 11: 1-11

11 As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples, ²saying to them, ‘Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. ³If anyone asks you, “Why are you doing this?” say, “The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly.”’

⁴They went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway. As they untied it, ⁵some people standing there asked, ‘What are you doing, untying that colt?’ ⁶They answered as Jesus had told them to, and the people let them go. ⁷When they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks over it, he sat on it. ⁸Many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields. ⁹Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted,

‘Hosanna!

‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!’

¹⁰‘Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!’

‘Hosanna in the highest heaven!’

¹¹Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.

[1] This homily is based on two scripture passages: Zechariah 9:9, quoted in the homily, and Mark 11:1-11, appended at the end

The social gospel and mysticism | Thomas R. Kelly

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 21:22:45 GMT

The straightest road to social gospel runs through profound mystical experience. The paradox of true mysticism is that individual experience leads to social passion, that the nonuseful engenders the greatest utility. If we seek a social gospel, we must find it most deeply rooted in the most mystic way. Love of God and love of neighbor are not two commandments, but one. It is the highest experience of the mystic, when the soul of man is known to be one with God himself, that utility drops off and flutters away, useless, to earth, that world-shaking consciousness of mankind in need arises in one and he knows himself to be the channel of Divine Life. The birth of true mysticism brings with it the birthday of the widest social gospel. "American" Christianity is in need of this deeper strain of expression of direct contact with God, as the source, not of world-flight, but of the most intensely "practical" Christianity that has yet been known.

from The Eternal Promise, reprinted in Quaker Spirituality: Selected Writings

The amazing inner sanctuary of the soul | Thomas R. Kelly

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 21:18:53 GMT

Meister Eckhart wrote, "As thou art in church or cell, that same frame of mind carry out into the world, into its turmoil and its fitfulness." Deep within us all there is an amazing inner sanctuary of the soul, a holy place, a Divine Center, a speaking Voice, to which we may continuously return. Eternity is at our hearts, pressing upon our time-torn lives, warming us with intimations of an astounding destiny, calling us home unto itself.

from A Testament of Devotion, excerpted in Quaker Spirituality: Selected Writings.

A Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 21:16:30 GMT

I am no longer my own, but yours. Put me to what you will, place me with whom you will. Put me to doing, put me to suffering. Let me be employed by you or set aside by you, praised for you or criticized for you. Let me be full, let me be empty. Let me have all things, let me have nothing. I freely and heartily yield all things to your glory and service.

And now, O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, you are mine, and I am yours.

So be it.

And the covenant which I have made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven.

Amen.

Muslims and Terror: The Real Story | Joshua Muravchik | Commentary Magazine | 2.23.15

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 22:15:33 GMT

Nothing

Abraham Lincoln and the Jews | Gary Phillip Zola | Commentary Magazine | 5.1.14

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 22:15:01 GMT

Nothing

Angels: a plaque on the wall of San Miguel Mission, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 22:13:20 GMT

The angels carry out God's will. Let us pray that we too may listen carefully for his voice and hear his call.

We beg you hear us; that our prayers may rise like a pleasant fragrance before the Lord, through the hands of your angels.

We beg you hear us; that we may proclaim glory to God in the highest and peace to his people on earth, with the multitude of the heavenly armies.

We beg you hear us; that the angels may receive us at the end of our days, and lead us home to paradise.

We beg you hear us; that the holy standard-bearer, Michael may bring into the light of your presence, the souls of those who have died.

We beg you hear us.

Biblical Archaeology's Top Ten Discoveries of 2014

Sat, 10 Jan 2015 22:11:44 GMT

Nothing

The Be Healthy Plan, by Bob Moyers

Sat, 10 Jan 2015 22:09:14 GMT

Be Healthy Plan For Happy People
The following pro-active, preventive, positive strategies for healthy, happy,
humble, stress-free people promises to strengthen the immune system, balance the
emotions, balance mental-emotional-physical-spiritual energies, help prevent
sickness-illness-disease, reduce and eliminate negative stress, improve
communications, and create an awareness and understanding of the power of love,
the joy of forgiveness, and the peace of a humble heart within the individual who
decides to follow the suggestions outlined in the plan.
*************************
The Promise Of Compassion
I promise to love, care, listen, encourage, and forgive. I promise to tell the
truth, be happy, be healthy, be humble and give. I promise to ask good questions,
give good answers, and pray. I promise to control my words, admit my
shortcomings, trust God and do God’s will each day.
The Plan Of Happiness
Declare the day a joy-filled, happy day when you wake up. This is the day that
God has made. I will have joy and be glad in it.
SPEAK the truth with love. ASK good questions. LISTEN with understanding
and not just for agreement. THINK in silence and do not interrupt. We are the S.A.L.T. of
the earth. This is the process of great communication.
Do not give permission for fear, anger, sadness, or hurt to take away your joy.
When you experience negative feelings and emotions, have faith that this is a sign that
something may be wrong and that there may be conflict. Say thank you to God and then
ask for help if needed to solve the problem and see what lessons you are to learn.
Restore, repair, and rebuild damaged relationships by asking what you can do to
make the relationship better.
Ask for forgiveness and forgive others. Say these words: Please forgive them.
Please help me to forgive them. Please forgive me for what I may have done wrong.
Please help me to forgive myself for what I may have done wrong. Please take away my
anger and bitterness. Please restore my joy.
Know that negative distress is caused by having to be right, by finding fault, by
trying to control things we cannot control, and by being selfish.
Stop bad habits and addictions and distress by saying these words: I want to stop. I
can’t stop. Take away my desire. Be willing to admit shortcomings with a humble heart..
Use your super powers. You have the power to control love, encouragement,
forgiveness, truth, attitude, humility, and the words that come out of your mouth.
Say these wellness words as often as possible. I’m wrong. I’m sorry. Forgive me.
You did a good job. What is your opinion? I love you. Thank you. Please.
Make the decision to do the will of God each day.

The Name of Jesus, by John Newton

Sat, 10 Jan 2015 22:07:44 GMT

John Newton

How sweet the Name of Jesus sounds
in a believer's ear!
It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,
and drives away his fear.

It makes the wounded spirit whole,
and calms the troubled breast;
'tis manna to the hungry soul,
and to the weary, rest.

Dear Name, the rock on which I build,
my shield and hiding-place,
my never-failing treasury, filled
with boundless stores of grace!

Jesus! my Shepherd, Brother, Friend,
my Prophet, Priest and King,
my Lord, my Life, my Way, my End,
accept the praise I bring.

Weak is the effort of my heart,
and cold my warmest thought;
but when I see thee as thou art,
I'll praise thee as I ought.

Till then I would thy love proclaim
with every fleeting breath;
and may the music of thy Name
refresh my soul in death!

John Newton

Mother Teresa on The Golden Rule

Fri, 21 Nov 2014 22:36:21 GMT

The Golden Rule, by Mother Teresa

I am sure that if we all understand The Golden Rule—that God is Love and that He has created us for greater things, to love and to be loved—we would then love one another as He has loved each one of us. True love is a giving until it hurts. It is not how much we give—but how much love we put into the giving.

Lincoln's Faith and America's Future | Timothy George | First Things

Fri, 21 Nov 2014 22:28:24 GMT

Though Abraham Lincoln was neither baptized nor joined a church of any kind, he was the most spiritually minded president in American history. His faith was wrought on the anvil of anguish, both personal and national, and because of this he has much to teach us in our own age of anxiety.

Some historians interpret Lincoln as a proto-secularist, not only because he never professed Christian faith in a public way but also because he made a number of skeptical comments about Christian teaching in his early years. But it’s well to remember that even great people of faith, including Mother Teresa, experience dark nights of the soul. John Calvin once said that all true faith is tinged by doubt.

When accused of being a scoffer, Lincoln said that he had never denied the truth of the Scriptures nor shown intentional disrespect for any Christian denomination. In the midst of the Civil War, when Lincoln was told that the Methodist church had sent more soldiers to the field, more nurses to the hospitals, and more prayers to heaven than any other church, he replied: “God bless the Methodist Episcopal church! Bless all the churches! And blessed be God, who in this our trial giveth us the churches.”

So why did he never join a church himself? Two reasons. First, he was offended by the religious rivalry and braggadocio of the frontier preachers of his day. None of them made a compelling case to his lawyerly mind that only one denomination was right and all the others wrong. Further, Lincoln was reticent, “the most shut-mouthed man I know,” as his law partner William Herndon said. He did not want to cross the thin line between sincerity and self-righteousness. There was nothing smug about Lincoln’s faith.

Lincoln’s great achievement was to see the terrible times through which he lived in the context of God’s providential purposes. He referred to America as the almost-chosen nation and came to see himself as a “chosen instrument in the hands of the Almighty.” His firm belief that God is concerned for history and reveals his will in it drew on the wisdom of the Hebrew prophets, the teachings of the New Testament refracted through the tradition of St. Augustine, and the Calvinistic Baptists among whom he grew up. Though he read Voltaire as a young man, he had no interest in a deist God who dumbly peers down on human struggles. The God of Lincoln meets us in judgment and mercy and in the crucible of suffering that shapes the destiny of us all.

Lincoln also held in uneasy equipoise two other cardinal teachings of the Christian tradition: the inherent dignity of every person made in the image of God, and the corporate character of original sin. His abhorrence of slavery was rooted in the former; his disdain for utopian solutions to social problems grew out of the latter. Thus he was hated by secessionists and abolitionists alike. The tragedy of slavery and the Civil War would not be resolved, Lincoln thought, by appealing to human goodness, but by calling the nation to repentance and prayer. On nine separate occasions during the forty-nine months of his presidency, Lincoln called his fellow citizens to humble themselves before God in public penitence, prayer, fasting, and thanksgiving. At the urging of the United States Senate, Lincoln issued a proclamation appointing April 30, 1863 as a day of national repentance, fasting and prayer. Between the smoke and blood of Antietam and Gettysburg, with the outcome of the war still in doubt, Lincoln declared:

And, insomuch as we know that, by God’s divine law, nations like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment, inflicted upon us, for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

After the death of his beloved son Willie in 1862, the burdens of his office became intolerable, and he sought solace in the faith of the Bible he loved and knew so well. “I have been driven to my knees many times by the realization that I had nowhere else to go,” he said.

He and his wife Mary rented a pew at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, a short walk from the White House, and here Lincoln listened to the sermons of the Princeton-trained pastor. During special prayer services he would often sit in a side chamber lest he draw attention to himself in the congregation. Here he placed himself and his nation in the hands of God, seeking justice, imploring mercy, needing grace.

On March 4, 1865, just six weeks before he was assassinated, Lincoln presented his Second Inaugural, which has been called, “a prayer of confession for the whole nation”—“more like a sermon than a state paper,” according to Frederick Douglass. At that point the Civil War was practically won, but Lincoln refused to be vindictive. He knew that the evil of slavery, rooted so deeply in the South, had also been supported by business interests in the North. The purposes of the living God could not be equated with the sectional ambitions of either side but transcended them both. By refusing to idolize the North or demonize the South, Lincoln called the entire country to its true vocation as one nation under God. Quoting the psalmist, Lincoln said, “The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether” (Psalm 19:9 KJV).

Two hundred years after Lincoln was born in a rough-timbered cabin in Kentucky, America still longs for “a new birth of freedom.” In times of economic collapse, international uncertainty, of war, suffering, and terrorism, the faith of Abraham Lincoln can help us as a people act with courage and hope. Lincoln’s belief in the Bible, his reliance on prayer, his humility and acknowledgement of God’s providential design in the tumult of history, and his call for national repentance and thanksgiving beckon us forward now as then.

The words chiseled in stone in the Lincoln Memorial are still a creed for us to live by:

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations.

New-Time Religion | Wesley J. Smith | First Things

Fri, 21 Nov 2014 22:04:59 GMT

The West, we are told, has entered the secular age. Religious faith is irreversibly shriveling, opening space for a society governed by reason. What such statements miss is that while traditional religion may well fade, we will never see an end to something like religious belief. We’re subjective beings whose need for meaning will never be satisfied merely by what can be “proved.” Thus, even if Judaism and Christianity are reduced to vestigial influence in America, they will be replaced not by unbelief but by different creeds.

Nothing illustrates this phenomenon better than the recent rise of transhumanism, a futuristic social movement that offers a worldly transcendence through faith in technology. Why consider ourselves made in the image and likeness of God when we can recreate ourselves in our own, individually designed, “post-human” image? Why worry about heaven, hell, or the karmic conditions in which we will be reincarnated when we can instead enjoy radical life extension, perhaps even attain immortality by uploading our minds into computers? Indeed, transhumanist prophets such as Google’s Ray Kurzweil and University of Oxford’s Nick Bostrom assure believers that science will soon wipe away every tear from our eyes, and there will be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain, for through technology, the former things will all pass away.

I took in this new religion at the recent Religion and Transhumanism Conference in Piedmont, California. The human heart’s thirst for meaning was epitomized by the opening speech of conference organizer Hank Pellissier, director of the Brighter Brains Institute. He seems a very sweet man—evinced by his stated zeal for “charity,” which he criticized transhumanism for lacking. (More on that in a bit.) Pellissier traveled a long and peripatetic road to transhumanism—from Catholic, to hippie, to Daoist, to Quaker, to an atheism so “militant” that he once organized an atheists’ conference that included a “Bible-throwing contest.” When he found Dawkins-style atheism “too bashing,” he embraced transhumanism—although he now is thinking of converting to Judaism (Reformed, he assured the audience) because one of the lesbians in a couple to whom he donated sperm is a rabbi.

The religious nature of transhumanism was described by the conference’s keynote speaker Ted Peters, a professor emeritus at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley who researches how “displaced religious sensibilities resurface in secular forms.” He sees transhumanism as aspiring to replace the worship of God with a perception of evolution as something of a mystical force to which “homage must be paid.” Transhumanists view evolution as ultimately increasing intelligence—a benevolent deity of sorts. Therefore, they assume a moral obligation to “increase evolution” to the end that “just as humanism freed us from the chains of superstition, transhumanism would free us from the chains of biology.” This goal will be fulfilled when we have successfully redesigned ourselves into “cosmic beings”—a technological new heaven and new earth.

To be sure, there is no liturgical worship in transhumanism, and it doesn’t see belief or behavior determining eternal destiny, as do traditional religions. Still, in his speech Peters noted that transhumanism—like traditional religion—perceives itself as a “grand vision in which all the broken things get fixed.” Later he told me, “Much of what we have gotten out of religions we now get from science and technology: human fulfillment, salvation, (the potential for) eternal life. So, ironically, discarded religious beliefs come back disguised in scientized forms.”

Or not so disguised, as in the case of the Raelian science cult. Its representative—the almost surely pseudonymous Felix Clairvoyant—presented two videos on the supposed encounter of cult leader “Rael” with space aliens. Unlike orthodox transhumanists, Raelians deny evolution; they claim that all life on earth was intelligently designed by extraterrestrial visitors. That point of doctrine aside, the Raelians and transhumanists have much in common. Both deny theism and embrace scientism as the way to attain ultimate truth. Thus, Raelians claim that our interstellar “creators” are already trans-humans. Through applied biotechnology and other scientific advances, their bodies last for one thousand years. When they can no longer be maintained, their minds are uploaded into computers, they are cloned, and then their software is downloaded back into their new brains and they are good to go for another millennium. I could almost hear the sighs of longing from the audience. O Death, where is thy sting?

Meanwhile, Jason Xu, a “community organizer” for “Terasem,” a transhumanist church of sorts, told the audience that by embracing rituals, people who reject God can defend themselves against the gravitational pull of “nihilism and secular pessimism.” Terasem’s “devotion to technoutopianism” thus provides transhumanists with “the fulfillment and syncretization of all faiths.” Its four “core beliefs” range from platitudinous to wishful: 1) life is purposeful, 2) death is optional, 3) God is technological, and 4) love is essential.

What does this mean in practice? In Xu’s telling, it was all pretty vague. There are no creeds to which one has to adhere, nor moral codes to follow. Instead, Terasems cohere around a devotion to technology in the understanding that it will take more than achieving post-humanity to give meaning to daily life. To fill the spaces in the soul left empty by that God who is technological, Terasems meet regularly to share art, poetry, and music, and to do yoga.

Terasem comes across as Unitarian Universalism squared. Xu assured the audience that one can be a Terasem and a Catholic, Orthodox Jew, Buddhist, faithful Muslim, or member of any other religion. This would come as a surprise to many believers. After all, if God is “technological,” where does that leave the omnipotent God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? This was not a question Terasems seem to be asking. Maybe theology, like death, is optional.

Not a problem for Mormons, it seems, at least not if we believe Lincoln Cannon, a Latter-day Saint and cofounder of the Mormon Transhumanist Association. He claims that Mormonism “mandates transhumanism.” According to Cannon, Mormonism is a “materialist religion, in which everything is matter and God is material.” Indeed, he said, “even God did not start as God.” Moreover, the transhumanist idea of recreating deceased loved ones through cloning or other technologies is consistent with the Mormon interest in genealogy and the faith’s practice of baptizing the dead. Thus, rather than rejecting their faith, Mormon transhumanists can come to the movement because of their religion. Or so says Cannon. Mormon authorities, I suspect, would disagree.

New Mexico State University English professor Mike LaTorra presented the Buddhist perspective on transhumanism. He also argued that Buddhism “mandates” a transhumanist pursuit. “Life is not satisfactory because of suffering,” and transhumanism can be the path leading to something better. An extended life span and the material abundance that hyper-technology will create will allow Buddhists to pursue their practice with greater concentration. Thus, with “transhumanism at the base,” the seeker will be better able to attain “transcendence at the apex.”

Buddhism and Mormonism notwithstanding, according to a recent poll the belief of most transhumanists is atheism. Zoltan Istvan writes for the Huffington Post and authored a novel called The Transhumanist Wager. He offered the atheistic point of view, flatly stating that transhumanism unequivocally “cuts at the core of” Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. “If you don’t have restrictions that religion casts upon our moral system,” he said, “you [are] more free to think.” As people learn they can “live indefinitely,” religion will erode, since people will stop worrying about death. Istvan also argued that for transhumanism, the only hope is in a material world, and therefore interfering with life extension research should be a crime. In fact, substantially thwarting efforts to achieve transhumanism would be a just cause for war. Onward transhumanist soldiers!

Although the sects disputed finer points of doctrine at the conference, it is clear to me that transhumanism aspires to be what monotheism was to polytheism. It seeks to supplant theism as society’s reigning source of mores and values. If it can be said to worship anything, it is an intense and potentially eugenic pursuit of a perfected humanity. We will be free from sin by definition—none of those moral restrictions on life. And we will be delivered from death by technology. Like many faith systems, transhumanism offers consolation in suffering (we can eliminate it) and hope in the face of death (it’s “optional”).

Different strokes for different folks, as they say. But there are dangers. Terasemite principles aside, at the ten-hour conference there was little discussion of love for, or duties toward, others. The one exception was Pellissier, who ended the day with an angry story of excitedly organizing a charity drive to collect used cell phones for Africa from fellow transhumanists, only to receive zero responses from his brethren.

This sadly confirms my observations of transhumanism over the last ten years. Even the utopianism that should be one of its most attractive characteristics has a cruel aspect. Transhumanists tacitly—sometimes explicitly—reject the principle that each and every human being deserves respect and protection simply by virtue of being human. Such a morality impedes the benevolent god known as evolution—thus delaying the perfected human future they envision. To bring about the hoped-for future we must discard the notion of each human’s intrinsic dignity. One need not think transhumanists’ predictions will come true to worry that their values might take hold.

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism.

Homily: "Choose this Day Whom You Will Serve" by Daniel Love Glazer

Wed, 12 Nov 2014 22:25:51 GMT

I am a huge baseball fan. I was born in New York City, but when I was four years old, my family moved to Ohio. My mother was a schoolteacher who had summers off so each summer we would return to New York and stay with my mother’s parents. It happened that my grandfather was a big fan of the New York Yankees and he would often take me to Yankee Stadium. We would sit in the bleachers for 75 cents and watch the great Yankees teams of the fifties: Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, Elston Howard, Phil Rizzuto, and so on. So I became a big fan of the Yankees, as well as of baseball in general.

For a baseball fan, the highlight of the season is the World Series. On Wednesday, October 29, the seventh game of the World Series, the most important game in baseball, took place. After a regular season in which each major league team played 162 games, after a one-game playoff in each league between the two teams qualifying for the wild card, after the four Division Championships—each three games out of five, after the two League Championship series—in this case, four games out of seven, there finally occurred the World Series showdown between the Kansas City Royals, the American League pennant winners, and the San Francisco Giants, the National League Champions. And after six games, the teams were tied at three wins apiece. Everything came down the seventh game.

So Wednesday October 29 was the climactic game, to determine which team would be crowned the World Champions. As I said, I am a huge baseball fan and normally nothing would keep me from watching the seventh game of the World Series on television. But I had a conflict. I was scheduled to preach the homily here at Bethany Terrace today. And my schedule recently has been so jam-packed that as of October 29^th I had written very little of my homily. And my schedule for the several days afterwards was also extremely busy. Therefore, I had a difficult choice to make: Should I watch the seventh World Series game or should I write my homily?

I chose to write my homily. Had I chosen otherwise, my homily today might have consisted simply of a report on the outcome of the World Series.

Life is a series of choices. When we wake up in the morning, we have to choose whether to get out of bed or go back to sleep. When we have breakfast, do we choose eggs or cereal? Each person we meet throughout the day presents us with a choice: How do we relate to this person? Do we treat him or her as an object, a thing to be used, or do we recognize that we are encountering a fellow child of God? And the choices continue until we choose to fall asleep at the end of the day.

Yes, life is a series of choices. Many choices are relatively, inconsequential, such as whether to eat eggs or cereal for breakfast. Other choices, such as whom I should marry and what career I should follow, are more significant. In the lectionary reading today from the book of Joshua, the Israelites are confronted by Joshua, the successor to Moses, with a momentous choice. He says, “ Revere the Lord and serve him in sincerity and faithfulness; put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt; and serve the Lord…Choose this day whom you will serve…As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

A thousand years after Joshua, the Israelites were again confronted with momentous choice. A dynamic teacher named Jesus, from the village of Nazareth in Galilee, arose. Jesus preached about the kingdom of God. He taught that God our Father in heaven, that all people were his beloved children, and that by faith everyone could realize this saving truth. He went about the land preaching this gospel of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. He healed the sick, performed miracles, even raised the dead. Jesus also proclaimed that he was the bread of life and, indeed, that he and the Father were one.

Would the Israelites choose to accept Jesus or reject him? Many, including 11 of his 12 closest followers, the apostles, did accept him. Others, such as Judas Iscariot and the religious leaders of the Jews did not. As a result of this rejection, the Jewish nation forfeited its mission to be a spiritual light to the world.

It’s been 2000 years since Jesus walked the earth, and, like the Israelites, you and I must make a choice whether or not to serve the Lord. God is our heavenly Father and he loves each of us with an infinite love. He “finds delight with mankind.”[1] Jesus said, “It is the Father’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom.”[2] But God refuses to compel the allegiance of his children. He does not impose any form of required recognition, mode of worship, or abject bondage upon us. He has given us spiritual free will. Each one of us, in our own heart, must choose whether to accept or reject him. And this choice to accept God and to follow his will must be wholehearted. Partial devotion is insufficient. We are to love our gracious God with “all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind.” This complete and loving dedication to doing the Father’s will is our greatest gift to God. Indeed, such a consecration to God’s will is our only possible gift of value to the heavenly Father. In God, we “live, move, and have our being.”[3]

What are the results of choosing to follow God’s will, serving him and our brothers and sisters? They are peace in our souls while on earth and the bliss of eternal life after death. Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, which we heard earlier, assures us that we will rise to be with the Lord forever.

God so loved the world as to provide for the eternal spiritual progression of every one of us, his beloved children. Let us choose with our whole hearts to follow our loving God!

Listening, by Henri Nouwen

Wed, 12 Nov 2014 22:22:41 GMT

Our Ministry to the Christian World, by Preston Thomas

Wed, 12 Nov 2014 22:11:53 GMT

Jesus spent the whole night in communion. The way I would like to define communion here is that Jesus spent the night listening to the Father calling him the Beloved. That is the voice Jesus heard when he came up out the Jordan River (Luke 3:22) and he hears that same voice on the mountain: “You are my beloved Son, on you my favor rests. I declare you to be my Beloved, the one in whom I pour out all my love. You are my favorite one.” (See Luke 9:35.) It is with this knowledge of being the Beloved that Jesus could walk freely into a world in which he was not treated as the Beloved. People applauded him, laughed at him, praised him, and rejected him. They called out “Hosanna!” and they called out “Crucify!” But in the midst of all these voices, Jesus knew one thing—I am the Beloved; I am God’s favorite one.

Why is it so important that we are with God and God alone on the mountaintop? It is important because it’s the place in which we can listen to the voice of the One who calls us the beloved. Jesus says to you and to me that we are loved as he is loved. That same voice is there for us. To pray is to let that voice speak to the center of our being and permeate our whole life. Who am I? I am the beloved. If we are not claiming that voice as the deepest truth of our being, then we cannot walk freely in this world.

This listening is not easy. Jesus spent the night in prayer. God’s voice is not a voice we always hear with physical ears. God’s word is not always an insight that suddenly comes to us in our minds or that satisfies our hearts.

That is where the disipline of prayer comes in. We are called to pray not because we feel like praying or because it gives us great insights but simply because we want to be obedient, to listen to the voice that calls us the beloved. The word listen in Latin is audire. If we listen with full attention, it’s called ob-audire, and that’s where the word obedience comes from. Jesus is the obedient one—totally open to the love of God. But if we are closed, we are surdus. That is the Latin word for deaf. The more “deaf” we get, the more absurdus we become, and an absurd life is precisely a life in which we no longer listen and are constantly distracted by all sorts of voices, losing touch with the truth that we are the beloved.

Real freedom to live in this world comes from hearing clearly the truth about who we are, which is that we are the beloved. That’s what prayer is about. And that’s why prayer is so crucial and not just a nice thing to do once in a while. It is the essential attitude that creates in us the freedom to love other people—not because they are going to love us back but because we are so loved, and out of the abundance of that love we want to give.

This is where ministry starts because our freedom is anchored in claiming our belovedness. Being the beloved allows us to go into this world and touch people, heal them, speak with them, and make them aware that they too are beloved, chosen, and blessed. It is an incredible mystery of God’s love that the more we know how deeply we are loved, the more we will see how deeply our sisters and our brothers in the human family are loved.

But we have to pray. We have to listen to the voice that calls us the beloved.

Legal Ageism | Wesley J. Smith | First Things

Fri, 03 Oct 2014 21:07:26 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2014/10/lethal-ageism

Muslim Scholars vs. ISIS: Is the Open Letter to the Islamic State Really Enough? | Ayman S. Ibrahim

Fri, 03 Oct 2014 21:03:29 GMT

n Wednesday, September 24, 2014, “More than 120 Muslim scholars from around the world joined an open letter to the ‘fighters and followers’ of the Islamic State.” The signees represent the Sunni branch of Islam (with the exception of one Sufi person), and include important Muslim figures such as the former and current Grand Muftis of Egypt and the Muftis of Jerusalem, Bulgaria, Kosovo, and Malaysia. They live and teach on Islam in the Middle East, North, Central, and West Africa, Europe, North America, and the Far East. The letter relies heavily on the Qur’an and various “trustworthy” sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, as well as classical Sunni writings and interpretations. It attempts to rebut the ideology of ISIS with cardinal Islamic texts that ISIS itself has cited.

This is a terrific initiative. The world has long waited for the Islamic community worldwide to react in such a clear way to the “Islamic State.” The letter is meticulously composed, and contains twenty-four sections in twenty-eight pages in Arabic (the English translation has seventeen pages). These sections attempt to refute the awful deeds and claims of ISIS—deeds including killing unarmed innocents, slaying prisoners of war, mutilating dead bodies, taking women as concubines, forcing non-Muslims to convert to Islam; and claims including the “Prophet Muhammad was sent with the sword as a mercy to all worlds” and the Yazidis “are Devil’s worshippers.”

The letter demonstrates the stark divergence in the Muslim world on how to interpret the Qur’ānic verses that call for jihad, especially in its armed form, and that expound the meaning of the Islamic caliphate (Ar. khilāfa). The signees and addressees of this letter represent two distinct groups of interpretation. Both interpretations exist. Both groups are “Muslim.” This is most likely the reason why the letter refers to the leader of ISIS as “doctor,” and its members as “fighters and followers,” with no reference or mention at all of “terrorism” or “terrorists” in the entire document. The reader may get the impression that the letter is addressed to a “prodigal son” among the Muslims. The signing this letter (which took place in the U.S.) reflects a desire of some Muslims to live in peace with non-Muslims.

The writing of this letter in itself, however, is not enough. The statement is ambiguous in crucial areas, which not only weaken its argument, but also question whether it is truly a rigorous and valid refutation of ISIS’s deeds and claims. In what follows, I will focus only on two of them: the concept of jihad and the restoration of the Muslim caliphate. While this letter claims to present the correct version of the Muslim teaching, its imprecise description of important areas makes it subject to different, and sometimes opposite, understandings, leaving the reader, especially the non-Muslim, puzzled regarding correct Islamic teaching.

First, concerning the concept of jihad, the letter reads: “The word ‘jihad’ is an Islamic term that cannot be applied to armed conflict against any other Muslim.” Okay, but what about non-Muslims? Can jihad be applied against them? The letter, though recommending jihad as a form of self-piety or a way to strive against one’s ego, does not specify against whom armed jihad should be applied. This leaves the door open for interpretation.

Moreover, it states that “All Muslims see the great virtue in jihad,” and does not explain what “the jihad against the enemy” really means. In fact, the letter applauds and praises the “intentions” of the members of ISIS, noting, “it is clear that you [Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi] and your fighters are fearless and are ready to sacrifice in your intent for jihad.” The approval sends mixed signals. At the end, the reader doesn’t know what to think. Is armed jihad forbidden only against Muslims? The letter seems to convey so. If this is a true Islamic teaching, then it is seriously damaging to free societies, especially if we consider the non-Muslim groups marauded and slaughtered by ISIS under the banner of jihad.

Second, regarding the restoration (or reestablishment) of the Islamic caliphate, the letter affirms that “There is [an] agreement (ittifaq) among scholars that a caliphate is an obligation upon the [Muslim] Ummah . . . [which] has lacked a caliphate since 1924 CE.” This is a serious point. In their attempt to refute ISIS’s claims regarding the caliphate, the Muslim scholars seem to affirm the ideology of the caliphate with some restrictions. They continue: “a new caliphate requires consensus from Muslims and not just from those in some small corner of the world.” This is puzzling. Does it mean that the restoration of the Muslim caliphate is an obligation upon the Muslim community worldwide these days? Is it only a matter of “consensus”? The letter does not specify. What one may understand of such statements is that ISIS’s caliphate is rejected by some other “Muslims” mainly because there is no “consensus” about it, but the Muslim caliphate and its restoration is a real Muslim commitment, and only needs an agreement among the Muslims in order to reestablish it.

What the signers forget is that, historically speaking, it is difficult even to argue that there was a “consensus” among the Muslims in previous caliphates. On the same day of Muhammad’s death, Muslims disagreed about the caliph, and that is for the most part the reason why we have the Shia–Sunni division among Muslims today. Thus, the Muslim scholars, in their attempt to refute ISIS’s claims, create even more serious questions about Muslim teaching and ideology regarding the restoration of the caliphate.

The ambiguity in this letter reflects the sensitive and critical situation of the Muslim scholars who signed it, and stems probably from at least three reasons: 1) It is obvious that original Muslim texts include statements and stories that could support ISIS’s claims and deeds if interpreted literally, so Muslim scholars try to be both sensitive in choosing their words and selective in their quotations from sacred texts, which results in ambiguity in some cases; 2) Scholars realize that outright denunciation of ISIS’s interpretation is quite difficult, as such interpretations run throughout Muslim history, in addition to the fact that Abu Bakr himself holds a PhD in Islamic Studies; and 3) In the Muslim perception and mindset, the concept of one unified umma (community) obliges Muslims to defend and support their Muslim fellows all the way.

The initiative of these highly acclaimed and respected Muslim scholars is praiseworthy. It speaks loudly that there are many Muslims who want to coexist in peace and mutual respect with non-Muslims. Nevertheless, the world needs more from the Islamic community. Unfortunately, the letter is unclear about crucial beliefs, such as jihad and caliphate, and it does not refute central claims advanced by ISIS. In fact, it raises serious questions about correct Islamic teaching in general. I believe that the leaders of ISIS would most likely find various gaps in this letter, and it would not be too difficult for them to counter its arguments. In all this, non-Muslims worldwide need clearer denunciation of the so-called “Islamic” ideologies that hurt international society by amplifying hatred and discrimination against the non-Muslims. With all due respect to the Muslim scholars who signed this valuable letter, thank you, but it is not enough.

Ayman S. Ibrahim is a post-doctoral fellow of Middle Eastern History, holding a PhD from Fuller Graduate Schools, California.

Sermon: Jesus' Father and Our Father

Tue, 02 Sep 2014 20:58:42 GMT

And because we are all God’s children, we are all brothers and sisters to each other. Jesus said, “all of you are brothers and sisters….you have one Father, who is in heaven.”[2]

Jesus’ God is not far away, but is readily available and ever full of tender mercy. God is not just the Father, but “our Father.”[3]

Jesus declared that “the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”[10] And that God is even “kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.”[11]

Happy Father’s Day!

Rabbi David Saperstein Nominated for Religious Freedom Post

Fri, 01 Aug 2014 20:54:11 GMT

Press Release

Rabbi David Saperstein Nominated for Religious Freedom Post

"We pray for his boldness and his success as America's newly designated advocate for the religiously oppressed around the world."
-Faith J. H. McDonnell, IRD Religious Liberty Program Director

Institute on Religion and Democracy Press Release
July 29, 2014
Contact: Jeff Walton office: 202-682-4131, cell: 202-413-5639, e-mail: jwalton@TheIRD.org

Washington, DC--U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced Monday the nomination of Rabbi David Nathan Saperstein for the position of ambassador at large for international religious freedom.

Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, has long been a fixture in Washington, D.C. activist circles. The religious freedom post was vacant for two years until filled by Suzan Johnson Cook in 2011, with some calling into question the administration's commitment to making international religious freedom a priority. Cook departed in October.

Saperstein has served as an appointee to the White House Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and as the first chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), a watchgdog group that functions independently of the U.S. State Department.

IRD Religious Liberty Program Director Faith J. H. McDonnell commented:

"Rabbi David Saperstein has over the decades nearly always aligned politically with liberal Protestant groups and the wider Religious Left. His recent apparent stands against protecting domestic religious freedom on the HHS contraceptive/abortifacient mandate and on LGBTQ advocacy have been unfortunate. But he has long been a tireless defender of international religious freedom for all, including persecuted Christians.

"He likely will bring energy and enthusiasm to his new role. We pray for his boldness and his success as America's newly designated advocate for the religiously oppressed around the world."

www.TheIRD.org

Why No One Cares About the Christians of Mosul

Thu, 31 Jul 2014 18:58:38 GMT

No one cares about the Christians of Mosul–or perhaps we should say the Christians formerly of Mosul. The reports in recent days suggest that the last Christians have now fled that city, forced out by Islamist militants who implemented a “convert or die” policy for Iraq’s ancient Christian community. The most assistance they have received thus far is an offer of asylum from France. If they can make it there, that is, since they have faced robbery, torture, and murder as they’ve made their exodus.

None of this has gone entirely unreported. These events have been allotted some headlines and the kind of procedural news coverage that the persecution of Christians usually elicits. But if the last remnants of Iraq’s beleaguered Christian population were hoping for any real outrage or anguish from the West, then they were setting themselves up for disappointment. Not only has it long been apparent that no one was ever going to take any action on behalf of these people, but as we have seen, Western publics weren’t even going to trouble themselves to get too worked up about these atrocities.

Given the huge demonstrations, United Nations Security Council resolutions, and endless hours of reporting on events in Gaza, one is tempted to say that Iraq’s Christians had the misfortune of not being Palestinian. However, that suggestion would be unfair. The world has also neglected the suffering of thousands of Palestinians murdered and starved by the Assad regime in Syria. It is not being Palestinian that wins the world’s attention; it is the accusation that culpability rests with Israel that really provokes some strength of feeling. If only the Christians fleeing Mosul could somehow frame the Israelis for their plight, then they might stand a chance of seeing their cause championed by a host of tweeting celebrities, UN delegates, far-left radicals, and perhaps even the West’s Muslim immigrant populations who have turned out in huge numbers to passionately demonstrate on behalf of Gaza like they never did for their coreligionists in Syria or Libya.

With reports of how the doors of Christian homes were ominously marked by Islamists so as to streamline this campaign of ethnic cleansing, with incidents of Christians having been crucified–yes, crucified–you might have thought that some of those avid humanitarian activists attending the recent anti-Israel rallies could have at least organized a sub-contingent to highlight the terrible fate of the Iraqi Christians, but no, that might have risked detracting in some way from the anti-Israel political objectives of these protests.

There is always something distasteful about playing the numbers game with such situations. It is, however, the favorite pastime of Israel’s detractors. The body count in Gaza is endlessly wheeled out to justify the preeminent importance that so many attribute to this cause. You can almost feel the most hardline anti-Israel activists willing it upwards so as to better serve their campaign. Undoubtedly that is Hamas’s calculation. Yet if the liberal college kids and left-leaning journalists who refer to these figures as justification for their obsessive focus on the subject were being remotely honest with themselves, then they would have to find some way of explaining the utter disinterest that they have shown events in Iraq and Syria, where the death toll has been surpassing that in Gaza on almost a weekly basis.

The long-suffering Christians of Mosul are perhaps considered by the anti-Israel campaigners with the same suspicion with which they viewed the victims of MH17. When news of that attack broke, the first reaction of prominent British news anchor Jon Snow was to unguardedly tweet out: “Awful danger that the shooting down of flight MH17 will provide cover for an intensification of Israel’s ground war in Gaza.” Those attending demonstrations against Israel’s actions in Gaza essentially made the same complaint, that that incident was being awarded too much media attention. The only reason that they weren’t expressing the same accusation regarding the Iraqi Christians is because those atrocities have only been allotted the most token coverage.

The contrast between the world’s non-reaction to the decimation of Mosul’s once 60,000-strong Christian community and the hysterical hate-fueled frenzy being directed against Israel over the casualties in Gaza reminds us that in the liberal imagination, all human suffering is not considered equal. The determining factor here is not the identity of the victims, but rather who can be framed for the crimes. No one has protested Hamas’s execution of Gazan “collaborators” or the reports of the many Palestinian children killed during the construction of Hamas’s terror tunnels. Every misfiring rocket that kills Gazans is attributed to Israel if at all possible. The only Palestinian casualties that anyone has claimed to be concerned with are those that can be used as ammunition in the war to delegitimize Israel and its right to self-defense.

Hobby Lobby, Religious Liberty, and the Dangers of Complacence

Wed, 09 Jul 2014 18:56:17 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/07/09/hobby-lobby-religious-liberty-and-the-dangers-of-complacence/

Genetic Science vs. Belief: Racial differences are real, but no cause for discrimination | Michael Barone

Wed, 09 Jul 2014 18:50:48 GMT

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/382160/genetic-science-vs-belief-michael-barone

Bowdoin's Crackdown on Religious Liberty

Thu, 03 Jul 2014 18:48:06 GMT

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/380283/bowdoins-crackdown-religious-liberty-michael-toscano

Religious Freedom Should Be Foreign Policy Priority

Thu, 03 Jul 2014 18:43:43 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/07/03/religious-freedom-should-be-foreign-policy-priority/

Trademarking the Name of God

Fri, 27 Jun 2014 18:40:25 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2014/06/trademarking-the-name-of-god

“I am a Christian, and I Will Remain a Christian” What We Can Learn from Meriam Ibrahim | Gabriel Said Reynolds

Fri, 27 Jun 2014 18:38:05 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2014/06/i-am-a-christian-and-i-will-remain-a-christian

Hobby Lobby Critics Demonize Belief | Jonathan S. Tobin | Commentary Magazine

Tue, 17 Jun 2014 18:35:15 GMT

The legal and political world is awaiting the Supreme Court’s decision in the Hobby Lobby case with bated breath. The court’s ruling will determine whether the Obama administration’s efforts to restrict religious freedom or the plaintiffs’ belief that faith may be practiced in the public square will prevail. The arguments over the merits of the case in which the government’s attempt to impose a contraception and abortion drug mandate on private businesses as well as religious institutions have been endlessly rehearsed as a sidebar to the general debate about ObamaCare. But, as I noted earlier this year, rather than confining the debate to the question of constitutional rights, critics of the plaintiffs in Hobby Lobby v. Sebelius have done their best to portray the business owners who seek to strike down the government mandate as not merely wrong but a threat to liberty.

In order to do this, the administration and its cheering section in the mainstream media have sought to transform the debate from one that centers on government using its power to force people of faith to choose between their religion and their business to the dubious notion that dissenters from the mandate wish to impose their beliefs on others. This is a false premise since even if the owners of Hobby Lobby win, its employees won’t be prevented from obtaining birth control or abortion-inducing drugs. The only thing that will change is whether their Christian employers will be forced to pay for them.

But efforts to demonize Hobby Lobby are not confined to these specious arguments. As today’s feature in Politico on the Green family shows, the goal of the liberal critics of Hobby Lobby isn’t so much to draw the line on religious freedom as it is to depict their foes as crazy religious extremists who want to transform America into a “Christian nation.” That this is an unfair distortion of their intent as well as the point of the court case goes without saying. But the fact that mainstream publications feel free to mock the Greens in this manner tells us exactly why the plaintiffs’ fears about restrictions on religious freedom may be justified.

In Politico’s telling, the Greens are religious fanatics who not only are willing to conduct their businesses along religious lines, including closing their chain of hobby stores on Sunday, but also want to promote their beliefs to others. The Greens may wind up investing hundreds of millions of their vast fortune to the building of a Bible museum in Washington D.C. The also want to promote Bible study and a funding a textbook and curriculum about religious studies they’d like to see be adopted by school systems. According to Politico, these efforts are stirring concern in the ranks of the American Civil Liberties Union, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and other liberal organs.

Were one of the Greens running for national political office, all this would, of course, be fair game. But it bears repeating that these people are private individuals who are merely using their personal resources to do exactly what the Founders sought to guarantee for all Americans: express their opinions and practice their faith without government interference.

As with their views about contraception or abortion, you don’t have to agree with the Greens to understand that they have every right to practice their faith and to promote their ideas. These are, as Politico admits, not your typical tycoons. They are more interested in faith than profit and are willing to stake their fortune on a fight to preserve their ability to conduct business without being forced to violate their religious beliefs. That may be alien to the mindset of many Americans in an era where much of our popular culture rests on the premise that we live in a world where there is no God and that those whose lives are built on faith are somewhat screwy. But the notion that such people, even very rich ones who build museums and promote Bible study, are a threat to non-believers is utterly fanciful.

Contrary to their government opponents in their lawsuit, the Hobby Lobby owners are not trying to force the actions of others to conform to their beliefs. What they want is to be left alone to practice their faith while also trying to persuade others to share it. Bible study may not be everyone’s cup of tea but the notion that it is a threat to democracy would have been hard to sell to this nation’s Founders. The attacks on the Greens illustrate the intolerance of openly expressed faith that is at the core of the mandate the administration is seeking to enforce. The Greens are no threat to the liberty of non-believers who need not visit their bible museum nor read the religious materials they publish. But a government, egged on by a liberal media establishment, that can’t tolerate Hobby Lobby’s practices is one that has little interest in defending anyone’s religious freedom. In such an atmosphere, it’s little wonder that Hobby Lobby’s advocates see the outcome of this case as a crucial moment in the fight to defend constitutional liberty.

http://urantiabook.designtechstudio.com/Admin/commentarymagazine.com

Hobby Lobby Critics Demonize Belief | Jonathan S. Tobin | Commentary Magazine

Tue, 17 Jun 2014 18:33:00 GMT

http://urantiabook.designtechstudio.com/Admin/commentarymagazine.com

Mideast Christians, Dhimmis Once More? | Mark Movsesian | First Things

Tue, 17 Jun 2014 18:30:42 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2014/04/mideast-christians-dhimmis-once-more

Homily I preached 6-15-14: "Jesus' Father and Our Father"

Tue, 17 Jun 2014 18:19:30 GMT

A homily preached by Daniel Love Glazer at Bethany Terrace Nursing Centre

June 15, 2014

Happy Father’s Day! I am delighted to be preaching today on Father’s Day because it provides me with the perfect opportunity to talk about God the Father.

And because we are all God’s children, we are all brothers and sisters to each other. Jesus said, “all of you are brothers and sisters….you have one Father, who is in heaven.”[2]

Jesus’ God is not far away, but is readily available and ever full of tender mercy. God is not just the Father, but “our Father.”[3]

And then this far country is afflicted with famine. In despair, the son goes to work for a man who has him feeding pigs. And he wishes he could eat what the pigs eat. Finally, he “comes to his senses.” He realizes that while he is starving, his father’s servants are well-fed. He recognizes that he has sinned against heaven and his father and resolves to go back home and ask that he be treated not as a son, but as a servant. So he sets out on the long journey home.

Jesus declared that “the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”[10] And that God is even “kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.”[11]

Hallelujah!

Abraham Lincoln and the Jews | Gary Phillip Zola

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:48:38 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/abraham-lincoln-and-the-jews/

The Myth at the Heart of the 9/11 Museum Film Backlash | Jonathan Tobin

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:45:08 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/04/23/the-myth-at-the-heart-of-the-911-museum-film-backlash/

Priest's Execution in Syria Should Be Call to Action | Christine M. Flowers

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:42:14 GMT

http://jewishworldreview.com/0414/flowers042114.php3#.U5J8eCiGf-B

The Surprising Discovery About those Colonialist, Proselytizing Missionaries | Christianity Today

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:39:15 GMT

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/january-february/world-missionaries-made.html

'Jesus Was a Palestinian': The Return of Christian Anti-Semitism | Melanie Philips

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:15:25 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/jesus-was-a-palestinian-the-return-of-christian-anti-semitism/

A Biological Basis for Race? | Steven Malanga

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:11:15 GMT

http://www.city-journal.org/2014/bc0606sm.html

The Churchill Bust | Mark Steyn

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:05:50 GMT

http://www.steynonline.com/6296/the-churchill-bust

Freedom for Religion, Not From It | Jonathan S. Tobin

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 18:01:36 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/05/05/freedom-for-religion-not-from-it-greece-v-galloway-church-state-separation/

Which Are The Most, And Least, 'Bible-Minded' Cities In The U.S.?

Sun, 23 Mar 2014 18:36:07 GMT

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/01/24/265738369/what-are-the-most-and-least-bible-minded-cities-in-the-u-s?utm_content=socialflow&utm_campaign=nprfacebook&utm_source=npr&utm_medium=facebook

The Name of Jesus, by John Newton

Sun, 23 Mar 2014 18:31:16 GMT

How sweet the name of Jesus sounds
In a believer’s ear!
It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,
And drives away his fear.

It makes the wounded spirit whole,
And calms the troubled breast;
’Tis manna to the hungry soul,
And to the weary, rest.

Dear name, the rock on which I build,
My shield and hiding place,
My never failing treasury, filled
With boundless stores of grace!

By Thee my prayers acceptance gain,
Although with sin defiled;
Satan accuses me in vain,
And I am owned a child.

Jesus! my shepherd, husband, friend,
O prophet, priest and king,
My Lord, my life, my way, my end,
Accept the praise I bring.

Weak is the effort of my heart,
And cold my warmest thought;
But when I see Thee as Thou art,
I’ll praise Thee as I ought.

Till then I would Thy love proclaim
With every fleeting breath,
And may the music of Thy name
Refresh my soul in death!

Just War Revisited and Revitalized | George Weigel | First Things

Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:28:04 GMT

Every once in a while, a truly special book comes down the theological pike: a book both scholarly and well-written, a book that stretches the imagination, a book that changes the state of a discussion, if it’s taken with the seriousness it deserves. The late Servais Pinckaers’s Sources of Christian Ethics was such a book. So was N. T. Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God. Now comes Nigel Biggar’s In Defense of War (Oxford University Press). Biggar’s careful moral reasoning offers a model that, if followed, would deepen and mature the Christian discussion of the ethics of war and peace. And, if I may say, his book ought especially to be read by those who, at first blush, will be shocked or even appalled by its title.

Nigel Biggar, Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at Oxford and director, there, of the McDonald Center for Theology, Ethics and Public Life, is not well-known to American readers, save among that shrinking band of Catholic and evangelical thinkers who take the classic just war theory seriously and work to develop it in light of the realities of twenty-first century politics and technology. He is no ivory tower don, however, and in the bracing introduction to his book, he lays his cards squarely on the table:

This is the dilemma: on the one hand going to war causes terrible evils, but on the other hand not going to war permits them. Whichever horn one chooses to sit on, the sitting should not be comfortable. Allowing evils to happen is not necessarily innocent, any more than causing them is necessarily culpable. Omission and commission are equally obliged to give an account of themselves. Both stand in need of moral justification.

Throughout his book, Biggar, a close student of both military history and the just war way of thinking, inveighs “against the virus of wishful thinking.” And while he is appropriately critical of the wishful thinking of those prepared to give political and military leaders a moral blank check in times of war, Biggar understands that that form of moral irresponsibility is not a major problem in the Christian churches today (as it was, say, during World War I). No, the prevalent Christian wishful thinking today is that which imagines there to be just solutions to the evils caused by murderous men like Slobodan Milosevic, Saddam Hussein, Bashar al-Assad, and the Iranian mullahs without the effective threat, or the effective use, of proportionate and discriminate armed force.

That wishful thinking is the result of several bad ideas that Nigel Biggar confronts with Christian intellectual vigor: the bad idea that radical pacifism is implicit in the Gospel and was normative in the early Church; the bad idea that moral authority to wage war today is held by the United Nations alone; the bad idea that contemporary international law adequately reflects the moral reasoning of the just war tradition; the bad idea that the prudential norms within the just war tradition (like “last resort”) trump other considerations.

And while he doesn’t say it in so many words, his able and detailed review of the moral arguments for and against the invasion of Iraq in 2003 makes clear that bad political ideas can combine with bad theological ideas to produce morally incoherent and politically irresponsible judgments and policy prescriptions. Prominent among those bad political ideas is the reflexive anti-western and anti-Israel bias that was palpable among many churchmen in the debate before the second Iraq War—a kind of gag reflex that warps too much church-based commentary on the Middle East today.

Biggar shares my longstanding concern that much of the Christian leadership of the West is functionally pacifist today. Many churchmen affirm what they understand to be the moral criteria of the just war tradition, but as a practical matter they cannot imagine a just use of armed force—which tends to subtract religious thinkers and their insights from the debates where policy is actually devised. If Nigel Biggar’s book gets churchmen thinking seriously about war and peace again, that might change.

George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center.

No, We Are Not Part Chimp! | Wesley J. Smith | National Review

Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:22:16 GMT

Anti-humanists love to point to the seeming genetic closeness of the expressing genomes between us and chimpanzees. It is all a vain attempt to reduce us to their level–or sometimes, try to raise them to ours.

It’s all nonsense, of course. As I have written before http://www.nationalreview.com/human-exceptionalism/323921/humans-are-not-98-genetically-identical-chimpanzees
, the seeming closeness masks the millions of biological differences contained in this seemingly small divergence.

Now, my Discovery Institute colleague Ann Gauger further deconstructs the “humans are chimps, too” meme. From, “The Mismeasure of Man:” http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/03/the_mismeasure083011.html

To be specific, in addition to the 1% distinction already noted, entire genes are either duplicated or deleted between the two species, sometimes in long stretches called segmental duplications. Such duplications represent a 6.4% difference between chimps and humans.

There are also insertions and deletions within genes, which affect the structure and function of the proteins they encode. That contributes another 3%, according to some estimates. And there are entirely new genes, specific to humans. There are also changes that affect the timing and amount of gene expression. These changes include the insertion of new regulatory sequences upstream of genes.

For example, some 6% of our genome is unique Alu insertions, as they are called. And Alu sequences are known to affect gene expression. In addition, there are human-specific increases in DNA methylation that affect gene expression in the brain, and increased RNA modifications in the brain. These changes would not be detected by simply comparing DNA sequences. Yet they affect gene expression and interaction. Indeed, by one measure, 17.4% of gene regulatory networks in the brain are unique to humans.

Then there are DNA rearrangements. How genes are organized along chromosomes, and even the chromosomes structures themselves can be different. Our Y-chromosomes are strikingly different from those of chimps, for example. This was a surprise to researchers, given the relatively short time our species supposedly diverged from one another. Rearrangements are also not included in the 1% number, and are difficult to quantify.

Gauger notes that these distinctions make a huge difference:

You can have two houses built of the same materials — two by fours, pipes, wall board, nails, wires, plumbing, tile, bricks, and shingles — but end up with very different floor plans and appearances, depending on how they are assembled. So it is with us. We may have almost the same genes as chimps, but the timing and distribution of their expression are different, and matter in significant ways.

Of course, these biological difference are not as important as the moral distinctions between us and our closest genetic relatives:

Going beyond the physical, we have language and culture. We are capable of sonnets and symphonies. We engage in scientific study and paint portraits. No chimp or dolphin or elephant does these things. Humans are a quantum leap beyond even the highest of animals. Some evolutionary biologists acknowledge this, though they differ in their explanations for how it happened.

Gauger makes another point I frequently emphasize:

In truth, though, we are a unique, valuable, and surprising species with the power to influence our own futures by the choices we make. If we imagine ourselves to be nothing more than animals, then we will descend to the level of animalism. It is by exercising our intellects, and our capacity for generosity, foresight, and innovation, all faculties that animals lack, that we can face the challenges of modern life.

Yes, we are exceptional. Own it!

Jesus of Palestine? | Clifford D. May | National Review Online

Fri, 03 Jan 2014 19:17:54 GMT

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/367310/jesus-palestine-clifford-d-may

Asian Christmas | Peter Leithart | First Things

Fri, 03 Jan 2014 19:13:50 GMT

Department stores in Thailand put up Christmas trees, snowmen, advertise Christmas specials. In November, 800+ school children formed a record-breaking human Christmas tree at a mall in Bangkok. In India, you can buy Christmas meals at restaurants, carolers sing in the malls, and cities are decorated for the holidays. Indians dress like Saturday Evening Post Santas.

Thailand is 94% Buddhist and 5% Muslim, and only about 2% of Indians are Christian.

Christmas is big stuff all over Asia, with one thing missing: the birth of Jesus. “Christmas in India, and Asia in general, has undergone something of a transformation in recent decades, with countries around the region embracing the gift-buying, food, decorations, and singing—pretty much everything but the religious commemoration of the birth of Christ.”

Asian Christmas

Tuesday, December 24, 2013, 5:23 AM

Peter J. Leithart | @PLeithart

Thailand is 94% Buddhist and 5% Muslim, and only about 2% of Indians are Christian.

The Personhood Pincer | Wesley J. Smith ! First Things

Fri, 03 Jan 2014 19:09:39 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2013/12/the-personhood-pincer

The Closing of the Scientific Mind | David Gelentner | Commentary Magazine

Fri, 03 Jan 2014 19:05:28 GMT

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/the-closing-of-the-scientific-mind/

Prince Charles Draws Attention to Persecution of Mideast Christians

Mon, 23 Dec 2013 19:02:18 GMT

This year has been a dreadful one for Mideast Christians. In Egypt, Islamists frustrated at the fall of the Morsi government have singled out Copts for vengeance. By some accounts, Copts are suffering the worst persecution they have experienced in 700 years. In Syria, Islamist rebels are targeting Christians, whom they accuse of siding with the Assad regime. In Iraq, Islamist gangs demand exorbitant protection money from the few Christians who remain–unless the Christians agree to convert to Islam. Across the region, Christians are being kidnapped, driven from their homes, killed. Their churches are being burned, their schools bombed. Christianity faces an existential threat in the place where it was born.

Mostly, the persecution of Mideast Christians has failed to attract attention in the West–although the media seems to be catching on. Mideast Christians lack strong lobbies in Western capitals, and the Western human rights community has a hard time seeing any Christians as victims rather than oppressors. So praise goes to Britain’s Prince Charles, who last week met with representatives of Mideast Christians in London to draw attention to the ongoing persecution:

“It seems to me that we cannot ignore the fact that Christians in the Middle East are, increasingly, being deliberately targeted by fundamentalist Islamist militants,” he said. Noting Christianity’s roots in the region, the Prince observed that today the Middle East and North Africa have the lowest concentration of Christians in the world—just 4 percent—and that this has “dropped dramatically over the last century and is falling still further.” He said that the effect of this was that “we all lose something immensely and irreplaceably precious when such a rich tradition dating back 2,000 years begins to disappear.”

The BBC’s report of the Prince’s meeting is here.

Jesus the Muslim Hippie | Gabriel Said Reynolds | First Things

Fri, 20 Dec 2013 18:59:37 GMT

Many Christians and other non-Muslims who want to understand the Christ of Islam turn to the Qur’an, yet the Qur’an won’t tell them much about Jesus. It mentions his miraculous birth. It refers to miracles such as raising the dead and bringing a clay bird to life. It speaks of his disciples, although it does not give them names.

Otherwise the Qur’an has precious little to say about Jesus’ life. There is nothing in the Qur’an, for example, of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee, his confrontations with the scribes and Pharisees, his entry into Jerusalem, or the Last Supper.

As for his death, the Qur’an relates laconically that the Jews “did not crucify or kill Jesus” and in a following verse that “God raised him up to Himself.” Whether Jesus was killed by someone else and then rose again, or whether he escaped death entirely, is left for the reader to ponder. The Jesus of the Qur’an, in other words, is a figure shrouded in mystery.

Muslim scholars, however, have not left him that way. Instead they record a great variety of stories about Jesus, some of which describe episodes the Qur’an never mentions and others of which offer definitive explanations for things the Qur’an leaves ambiguous.

This history of storytelling, more than the Qur’an itself, shapes the common Islamic understanding of Jesus today, by which Jesus is a prophet who emphasized the spiritual life above all, who valued austerity, and who taught his disciples always to think about the fate of their souls on the Day of Judgment. Any serious appreciation of the Christ of Islam—and in particular of how Muslims think about Jesus today—must involve this history of storytelling. The Christ of Islam, in other words, is not simply the Christ of the Qur’an.

This is evident, for example, in The Messiah, a 2007 Iranian film directed by Nader Talebzadeh. Also titled Jesus, The Spirit of God, The Messiah was a considerable success in Iran and was later dubbed into Arabic and shown widely in the Middle East. It opens with a lone figure—Jesus—walking in a desolate landscape through the fog as an eerie soundtrack of acoustic guitar and female chanting plays in the background. Jesus is found next in front of his twelve disciples, looking a bit like Gandalf the White with long wavy hair and a white robe as he gazes off into the distance.

He preaches to them in a way that calls to mind the Beatitudes, yet which also reflects a special concern with self-denial: “Happy are the poor who truly turn their face away from worldly enjoyments, for they shall soon be blessed with enjoyments from the kingdom of God.” And: “Will the true wayfarer carry with him the heavy burden of what is afar? No; he carries with him what is light and useful. Take this as an example for your life.”

In The Messiah, the disciples of Jesus call their master “Spirit of God,” a title based on a verse in the Qur’an that calls Jesus “a messenger of God, a word which He cast into Mary, and a spirit from Him.” Jesus is so spiritual that he is only just barely on earth. He has no concern for the burdens of this world, and teaches those around him to think only about the next world. Self-denial aside, he seems to be something of a Muslim hippie.

The end of the film, or rather the two ends of the film, complete this portrait. The Messiah first presents a version of the crucifixion of Christ as recounted in the Christian gospels. It then presents an alternative ending offered by (post-Qur’anic) Islamic tradition, in which someone else—in the film, Judas—is transformed into the likeness of Jesus and killed in his place. Thus Judas is tortured, crucified, and killed, while Jesus ascends, like a spirit, into heaven.

For its part the Qur’an does not make Jesus a wandering guru. It never suggests that Jesus had a particular interest in asceticism, or that he taught his followers to meditate on the day of judgment. Nor does the Qur’an have Judas crucified; indeed, it does not mention Judas at all.

The Jesus in Talebzadeh’s film is recognizable instead from medieval Islamic traditions. Medieval Muslim scholars of all sorts, but especially those with mystical (or “Sufi”) tendencies, present Jesus as a spiritually enlightened master who taught renunciation of the world and its pleasures. They seem to have developed this idea about Jesus, on the one hand, because of the Qur’anic statement that he was “a spirit from God” and, on the other hand, because of the doctrine (accepted by Muslims though not explicit in the Qur’an) that Jesus was celibate.

Islamic tradition holds that the Prophet Muhammad prohibited Muslims from consecrating themselves to a life of celibacy. He is said to have declared on one occasion, “The monasticism of Islam is jihad!” However, most Muslim scholars accept the possibility that earlier prophets might have allowed, and practiced, the celibate life. The tradition that Jesus did just that seems to have inspired a certain fascination with Jesus among Muslims concerned with spirituality.

First among these are Sufis, Muslims dedicated to a spiritual practice that leads to mystical union with God. In order to advance, they live lives of prayer, self-deprivation, and obedience to their spiritual masters.

Medieval Islamic traditions make Jesus just such a master. One such tradition has him declare, “Blessed is he who guards his tongue, whose house is sufficient for his needs, and who weeps for his sins.” Another (with echoes of Matthew 7) has Jesus ask his disciples, “Which of you can build a house upon the waves of the sea? . . . Beware the world and do not make it your abode.”

A third medieval tradition suggests that Jesus indeed was wary of the world: “The day that Jesus was raised to heaven, he left behind nothing but a woolen garment, a slingshot, and two sandals.” Still other traditions relate how Jesus would forgive sinners of all kinds. The thirteenth-century Sufi writer Ibn al-Arabi notes how Jesus taught people to turn the other cheek and adds, “This aspect [of his teaching] derives from his mother, since woman is lowly and humble, being under the man, both theoretically and physically.” None of this—neither the spirituality of Jesus, nor his asceticism, nor the maxim of turning the other cheek—is found in the Qur’an.

Yet neither do these traditions reflect the Bible, even if they include biblical, or biblically flavored, material. In these traditions Jesus plays no particular role in salvation history. He does not fulfill prophecies. He does not transform the Passover meal into the Eucharist. He does not establish a new covenant between God and humanity. Like a sage or a guru, he offers timeless wisdom, but he does not really do anything meaningful at all.

This Jesus of medieval Islamic traditions is the Jesus of most modern Islamic representations of Jesus. The well-known 1959 novel Children of the Alley (or Children of Gebelawi, according to the first edition of the English translation), by the Egyptian Muslim Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz, tells the story of a neighborhood in Cairo, its troubles, and the men who fix its troubles. At the same time, it is an allegory for the history of man and the prophets whom God sends to help him.

The first hero of the neighborhood is a man named Gabal (“mountain”—a reference to Sinai and therefore Moses), who deals with the neighborhood’s oppressors by collecting a chosen group of people who lead a rebellion and establish a just—yet severe—law. Next comes Rifaat (a name that means “lifting up” and is meant to call to mind the ascension of Jesus), who is gentle and prayerful. He preaches forgiveness to the people of the neighborhood. While some are attracted to his message, the troublemakers plot against him and kill him.

Finally, Qassem (an allusion to Abu l-Qasim, one of the Prophet Muhammad’s names) arrives. Qassem is a reliable and practical leader who drives out oppressors and hooligans alike, and establishes an equitable law.

While Rifaat is a sympathetic character in Mahfouz’s Children of the Alley, his role in the story is to highlight the excesses of Gabal and to prepare the way for Qassem. If Mahfouz’s story later led some Muslims to accuse him of blasphemy (in part because even Qassem has character flaws, including an unseemly love of women), it nevertheless reflects a standard trope of modern Islamic apologetics: Moses was a prophet of law, Jesus a prophet of mercy, and Muhammad a perfect combination of both.

According to this way of thinking, Muhammad is the only prophet who is both good and practical and Islam is the only religion that can lead to flourishing societies. Muslims find support for this notion in the Qur’an: “Thus We have appointed you a middle nation, that ye may be witnesses against mankind.” This notion, furthermore, explains the confidence with which the Muslim Brotherhood employs the slogan: “Islam is the solution.”

To Muslims who share this perspective, Jesus was a good prophet, a holy prophet, and yet his principal contribution to humanity was to correct the excesses in Jewish law and thereby to prepare things for Muhammad. Jesus taught his followers to focus on the next world because Moses taught people to focus on this world. Muhammad, on the other hand, taught his followers to focus on both. Jesus was the prophet of forgiveness because Moses was the prophet of justice. Muhammad was the prophet of both. Thus Muhammad, and only Muhammad, is the prophet who can set things straight.

The portrait of Jesus as a prophet of spirituality and gentleness is meant in part to distinguish him from Muhammad. The Jesus presented by Talebzadeh and Mahfouz, the otherworldly figure who preaches rather endlessly about otherworldly matters, is not the sort of prophet who could organize military campaigns and build a small empire.

The contemporary Islamic conception of Jesus is hardly a simple reflection of what the Qur’an says about him. Indeed, in many ways this conception developed despite the Qur’an, and not because of it.

Gabriel Said Reynolds is professor of Islamic studies and theology at the University of Notre Dame.

Our Souls Magnify the Lord, a homily by Daniel Love Glazer

Thu, 19 Dec 2013 18:53:59 GMT

One day, just over 2000 years ago, the angel Gabriel appeared to a young woman named Mary and told her that she was to give birth to a son named Jesus, who will be called ”Son of God.” Today’s scripture reading, from the Gospel of Luke, relates Mary’s response.[1] She exclaims, “My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior. The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.”

But I am here today to proclaim that the Mighty One has done great things not only for Mary, the mother of Jesus, but has done great things for each and every one of us. Every one of our souls glorifies and magnifies the Lord. We can all rejoice in God our Savior, holy is his name.

To begin with, we live in a world created by God. As Isaiah says, “God created the heavens and formed the earth; he established the universe and created this world not in vain; he formed it to be inhabited.”[2] No, the world is not a fortuitous combination of molecules which, in a purely random way, has resulted in the flight of birds, the beauty of sunsets, the ability of our eyes to see, glorious sounds of Mozart’s music, the discoveries of science, the wisdom of our great thinkers, and the love we share with each other. Evolution is real, but it is a process initiated and guided by God. As the Apostle Paul says, in God, “we live, move and have our being.”[3]

And God not only created the universe, but he created man in his own image. This does not mean that we look like God, but rather that God has indwelt us with his own spirit, sent from Paradise and living in the depths of our minds. Jesus taught that “The Kingdom of God is within you.”[4] We do not have to wander the world, like a lost soul, searching for God. God’s Spirit is within us. This Divine Spirit is God’s will for us. It partakes of God’s perfection. It ever stimulates us to greater realizations of the Truth, Beauty, and Goodness which are part of God’s nature. And by following this Spirit’s guidance, we will eventually fulfill the great commandment Jesus proclaimed to us, to “be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.”[5]

Mary was blessed by a visit from the angel Gabriel. Likewise, you and I are blessed by our own guardian angels, ministering spirits who strive to help us as we pursue our lives in this challenging world. They may rarely appear to us in the way Gabriel appeared to Mary, but they do watch over us and guide us in life. Perhaps at times you have sensed their presence.

And our God is much more than a creator spirit. Jesus told us that “God is love.”[6] He taught that God is our “heavenly Father,” [7] and that he loves each one of us with an infinite love. God the Father treasures each one of us as a unique personality, without a duplicate in the whole universe. We are precious in the Father’s sight. Yes, God loves us. He delights in us and rejoices when we follow the guidance of his indwelling spirit and his ministering angels. He longs to be in communion with us for all eternity.

And since God is our Father, we are all brothers and sisters in his family. Because we know this truth, we reach out to each other in love.

Let me ask you, how would you define love?

…

As we see, there are many possible definitions. A favorite of mine is, “God is the desire to do good to others.” Recently a number of children were asked to define what love is. A seven-year old named Bobby said “Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.” I pray that this Christmas, each of us will stop and listen, listen for the voice of our guardian angel, listen to the still, small, voice of the Divine Spirit within us, listen to the love expressed by our brothers and sisters. When we do that, our souls, like Mary’s will magnify the Lord. We will rejoice in God our savior, holy is his name!

Amen!

Living the Word (thanks to Preston Thomas)

Thu, 07 Nov 2013 18:52:13 GMT

;A few years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago .. They had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night's dinner. In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these salesmen inadvertently
kicked over a table which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly-missed boarding...

ALL BUT ONE!!! He paused, took a deep breath, got in touch with his feelings and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned. He told his buddies to go on without him, waved good-bye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later flight.

Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor. He was glad he did. The 16-year-old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying, tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her; no one stopping and no one to care for her plight. The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her display. As he did this, he noticed that many of them had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket.

I Will Write My Law in their Hearts: A Homily, by Daniel Love Glazer

Thu, 07 Nov 2013 18:47:51 GMT

About 600 years before Christ, the prophet Jeremiah proclaimed:

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah….I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [1]

This notion, of God writing the law on the hearts of the people, was revolutionary. The Jewish religious authorities believed that the divine law had been given by God to Moses and this law was fixed for all time. It defined what was holy and acceptable and what was not. This law, as interpreted by the recognized authorities was final. There could be no challenge to it.

The Jewish leaders believed that God had given the law, called the Torah, to Moses at Mount Sinai. The Torah consisted of two parts: written and oral. The written Torah was recorded in the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures, called the five books of Moses. But in addition, there was an oral Torah, which was also binding. This too came from God and had been preserved by tradition.

The Jews took the law very seriously. After all, it was God who had dictated it. The observation of the commandments of the Torah ensured salvation.

The Jews were highly nationalistic. They believed that they were the chosen people and they looked down on non-Jews, called gentiles, whom they considered to be heathen. So Jeremiah‘s proclamation that God would write the law in men’s hearts was a radical departure from tradition. In other words, Jeremiah said the law was not what was written in the five books of Moses or even what the religious authorities asserted to be tradition, but rather it was to be an affair of the heart, something each individual could know personally in his own heart and soul.

The Jewish priests, along with the Pharisees and the scribes, held the Jews in a terrible oppression of rituals and laws, an oppression that was even more onerous than that of Roman political rule. These legal traditions, as interpreted by the religious authorities, dictated the details of every area of both personal and social life.

So it was revolutionary when Jeremiah said, on behalf of God, “I will put my law within them and I will write it on their heats; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”

Jeremiah also boldly asserted that Yahweh was not simply the God of the Hebrews, but rather the God of the entire world, of all nations and peoples. He dared to say that that God was not on the side of the Jews in their wars with other peoples. He said, “Righteous is our Lord, great in counsel and mighty in word. His eyes are open upon all the ways of all the sons of men, to give everyone according to his ways, and with the proper fruit of his deeds!”[2]

When Jerusalem was besieged by Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, Jeremiah advised that the city should be surrendered. The civil rulers and priests regarded this counsel as treason and blasphemy; they threw Jeremiah into the miry pit of a dungeon.

Six hundred years after Jeremiah was cast into the pit, another prophet arose in the land proclaiming a radical message, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus taught that “God is love,”[3] and also that “The Kingdom of God is within you.”[4] He proclaimed that “God is your heavenly Father,”[5] and that “you are all brothers.”[6] God’s love need not be coaxed through some ritual or sacrifice, for “The Father himself loves you.” And rather than our approaching God with “fear and trembling,” [7] Jesus assured us, “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”[8] And one enters the kingdom simply by accepting that God is his Father. “Whosoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”[9] More important than the specific rules of the Law of Moses were “the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith.”[10] And the greatest commandment is to love.[11] [Matthew 22:36-40] “Goodness flows from the fullness of the heart.” [12]

Jesus was not bound by the rules laid down by the religious authorities. He allowed his hungry disciples to pluck ears of corn from a cornfield and eat them, even though it was the Sabbath.[13] When the Pharisees saw this they complained, “Look your disciples are doing what is forbidden on the Sabbath.”[14] And when, on the Sabbath, a man with a withered hand asked for healing, Jesus healed him.[15] He said that “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”[16] When a Pharisee was surprised that Jesus did not wash before a meal, he said, “You clean the outside of the cup and plate, but inside you are full of great wickedness.”[17] They also criticized him for eating with sinners, but Jesus said, “I come not for the righteous, but for the sinners.”

And like Jeremiah, Jesus’ message was not just for the Jews but for the entire world.

So it is little wonder that Jesus’ fate was no better than that of Jeremiah. The religious authorities of his day could not tolerate one who broke the law when the spirit moved him and proclaimed that salvation was not just for the Jews, but for all. Jesus was crucified.

But, as we know, he had the last laugh. He was resurrected. And after his resurrection, he appeared to Mary Magdalene and told her, “I go to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God.”[18]

Our Failed Religious Freedom Policy | Thomas F. Farr | First Things

Thu, 07 Nov 2013 18:44:03 GMT

The religious freedom policy mandated by the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act has now been in operation for fifteen years. Notwithstanding the hard work of the State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom, it would be difficult to name a single country where that policy has reduced persecution or increased freedom. In most of the countries into which the United States has in recent years poured blood and treasure—Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt, China, Saudi Arabia, and Russia in particular—freedom is on the decline, persecution on the rise.

The basis of America’s support for religious freedom abroad is the assertion that religious freedom is not only a good in itself but one that also advances our national interests. In approximately seventy countries, persecution and restrictions on religion are severe. That list includes virtually all the nations whose internal stability, economic policies, and foreign policies are of substantial concern to the United States, including China, Indonesia, Russia, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Iraq, as well as Egypt, Libya, and most of the nations comprising what was once called “the Arab Spring.” In many of these countries, the lack of religious freedom has led to religious conflict and has increased social, economic, and political instability.

The terrible Syrian civil war in large part stems from generations of religious persecution, first of Alawites by Sunnis, and then of Sunnis by the Alawite regime of the Assads. Today the religious dimensions of the conflict have deepened with the entry of Iranian and Lebanese (Hezbollah) Shia terrorists in support of Assad’s Alawites, and of al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorists in support of Syrian Sunni insurgents.

With the passage of IRFA, Congress provided several vehicles to advance religious freedom. The centerpiece is the State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom, headed by a very senior diplomatic official—an ambassador-at-large—who has authority to represent the United States in implementing American policy. The act also requires the department to issue annual reports on the status of religious freedom in every country abroad, and an annual list of the most severe violators, the “countries of particular concern.”

IRFA also created an independent advisory Commission on International Religious Freedom with a mandate to issue its own reports, make recommendations to the president and Congress, and act as a watchdog over American policy. Unlike the State Department office and its ambassador, both of which are by law permanent diplomatic entities, the commission requires periodic reauthorization by Congress.

The “countries of particular concern” list has had virtually no impact. The president is required to take some action against those on the list or explain why no action is warranted. IRFA requires that the list be issued annually, but as of this writing the Obama administration has not done so since 2011. Congress, it seems, takes little notice of this omission, although the commission, under its new chair, Robert George, has publicly and vigorously voiced its concern.

IRFA permits economic sanctions against the nations on this list, but in fifteen years only one country, Eritrea, has ever been sanctioned anew, and religious freedom has declined there. For the most part, the “actions” taken against severe violators (as permitted under IRFA) have been to reaffirm existing sanctions, such as those in place barring the export of crime-control and detection equipment to China. In countries where there are no sanctions in place, such as Saudi Arabia, the president is permitted to waive any action if a waiver will further the purposes of the law or is deemed to be in the “important national interests of the United States.”

In other words, nothing has ever really been done, except perhaps to irritate our banker (China) or our erstwhile ally in oil (Saudi Arabia). I know of no evidence that either the listing or the sanctions have improved the status of religious freedom in any country. At one time there was an argument to be made that Vietnam had improved, but that no longer seems to be the case. The commission has recommended that Vietnam, which was removed from the list a few years ago because of improvements in religious freedom, be returned to the list this year.

Religious freedom has played little or no role in diplomatic programs to achieve fundamental American interests. Officials, including presidents and secretaries of state, have done almost nothing to integrate religious freedom into our democratic, economic, and counterterrorism strategies. Some have spoken publicly about religious freedom, but foreign policy speeches are empty words if they are not followed by strategic planning and policy action.

In June 2009, President Obama traveled to Cairo to give his first major address on Islam and American interests. In that speech, he identified a number of issues, including religious freedom, that were to be part of his new engagement with the Muslim world. Afterward, our foreign policy agencies geared into action, forming interagency working groups to develop strategies on all the issues identified by the president in the Cairo speech—except for one. There was no working group on religious freedom. Indeed, it took the administration two and a half years even to get its ambassador for religious freedom in place. Since then, the administration’s religious freedom policy has largely been passive and ineffective.

But there is substantial evidence that an increase in religious freedom in the Middle East, China, India, Russia, Nigeria, and elsewhere could enhance American interests by helping to reduce religious violence and religion-based terrorism. Religious freedom plays a necessary role in the consolidation of democracy, in economic development, and in social harmony. Sociologist Brian Grim has written in the International Journal for Religious Freedom that “the empirical data are clear [that] religious freedom is part of the ‘bundled commodity’ of human freedoms that energize participation in civil society by all religious groups, which is conducive to the consolidation of democracy and to socioeconomic progress.” And yet American programs to advance and support religious freedom have played little or no role in American strategies to stabilize key struggling democracies such as Iraq or Pakistan, encourage economic growth in places like Egypt or Nigeria, or undermine the religion-related terrorism that is still being incubated in many nations of the broader Middle East.

What is the explanation for this ineffectiveness? There is much to be said here, but let me focus on two problems: first, the anemic, largely rhetorical methodology employed by all three administrations under which IRFA has operated, and second, the decline among our policy makers of the conviction that religious freedom is “the first freedom” and that religious freedom benefits all people, whether they are religious or not.

None of the three administrations responsible for IRFA have adopted a capacious view of the law and the policy it mandates. Each has assumed a narrow, highly rhetorical approach—characterized by reports, speeches, lists of severe persecutors that have little effect on the persecutors’ actions, and a State Department activity known as “raising the issue” with governments (an activity that should not be confused with “solving the problem”).

IRFA has driven some internal progress at the State Department. For example, in Afghanistan the American embassy has established a program “to support traditional [Afghan] voices that oppose violent extremism.” There is a powerful logic here: Muslims throughout the Middle East who want to make liberal arguments from the Qur’an—for example, that God forbids suicide bombing and stoning, that men and women are equal, or that non-Muslims must be treated with respect—risk criminal prosecution for blasphemy. A few years ago, an Afghan graduate student was sentenced to death for writing a paper arguing that the Qur’an supports the equality of men and women. In 2011, two Pakistani officials, one a Christian and one a Muslim, were murdered for opposing blasphemy laws and supporting religious freedom. Polls showed support for the laws, and for the murderers.

Anti-blasphemy laws and practices ensure that public discourse in these countries is dominated by extremists. The United States should be doing everything it can to convince erstwhile democracies such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Egypt that they will not succeed unless they move toward greater religious freedom. Their failure to do so will not only prevent the emergence of stable democracies but also increase extremist threats to American national security. Unfortunately, American programs designed to address this problem, such as that in Afghanistan, are entirely ad hoc. They are not part of a comprehensive religious freedom strategy.

Indeed, there is no comprehensive American strategy in place to advance religious freedom in the Muslim world or anywhere else. While Congress appropriates millions of dollars annually for democracy and counterterror programs, little of that money is spent on promoting religious liberty. All three presidents, and all secretaries of state who have presided over the implementation of IRFA (Albright, Powell, Rice, Clinton, and Kerry), have insisted that they support international religious freedom.

But none has made any serious attempt to integrate the advancement of religious freedom into the foreign policy of the United States, even though that is the express purpose of the International Religious Freedom Act. Madeleine Albright admitted as much in her book The Mighty and the Almighty. Religion, she wrote, “was above and beyond reason; it evoked the deepest passions; and historically, it was the cause of much bloodshed. [American] diplomats of my era were taught not to invite trouble, and no subject seemed more inherently treacherous than religion.”

The State Department’s annual report has had some positive effects, and Ambassador-at-Large Suzan Johnson Cook and her staff are to be congratulated for its quality and breadth. It has taught younger American diplomats (who typically provide the initial drafts) to ferret out the status of religious freedom in the countries in which they serve. The report has long been considered the gold standard in showcasing the facts. But illuminating the persecutory acts of governments and others, and the fates of victims, has, at best, limited effects. Rarely does it lead persecutors to change their behavior.

Chinese actions, for example, have no more been affected by these reports than they have by China’s perennial appearance on the list of “countries of particular concern.” Beijing still imprisons, tortures, and generally terrorizes religious groups that don’t conform. It still supports forced sterilizations and abortions and forbids Catholic priests and Protestant ministers from criticizing the “one-child” policy from the pulpit. It continues to brutalize Uighur Muslims in China’s northwest province, and to attack the culture and religion of the people of Tibet.

IRFA also mandates training for diplomats, a necessary element of any worldwide foreign policy initiative. The Obama administration has experimented with a potentially useful training program conceived under its predecessor. I have had the opportunity to teach in this program at the Foreign Service Institute, and several scores of foreign service officers have attended the courses offered.

Unfortunately, the program remains voluntary, which ensures that the busy diplomats who run American foreign policy seldom participate. Moreover, the overall curriculum is diffuse and confusing on the meaning and value of religious freedom. Some presenters suggest that a vigorous American policy may transgress the constitutional ban on establishment of religion, or that advancing religious freedom constitutes cultural imperialism (do we really have the right to “impose our values” on others?). Diplomats who attend these courses have the right to wonder whether they are being trained to advance religious freedom or to protest the religious freedom policy mandated by Congress.

The stark reality is that fifteen years after IRFA’s passage, our diplomats are not being trained to know what religious freedom is and why it is important, let alone how to advance it. This deficiency reflects a continuing, deep-seated skepticism in our foreign policy establishment. Its members continue to doubt that religious freedom should be considered real foreign policy.

That skepticism also helps explain why all ambassadors-at-large for religious freedom have been isolated within the State Department, and severely under-resourced. Other ambassadors-at-large report directly to the secretary of state (for example, those for global women’s issues and for global AIDS coordination). But the religious freedom ambassador and office have been placed many levels below the secretary. The ambassador has reported, and reports today, to a lower-ranking official. It is as if an army general were reporting to an army colonel. The religious freedom ambassador does not attend meetings of other senior State Department officials on a regular basis.

In addition, the ambassador-at-large and the Office of International Religious Freedom are marginalized in a bureau (Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor) that itself has long been marginalized at the State Department, notwithstanding the outstanding people who serve there. Sadly, foreign service officers tend to avoid that bureau in general, and the religious freedom office in particular, as dead ends for their careers, places where real foreign policy is not practiced. Neither the office nor the ambassador have direct control over the modest amounts of funding available that could be marshaled to develop effective strategies abroad.

Given this isolation, it is hardly surprising that neither American diplomats nor foreign governments see religious freedom as a priority for American foreign policy. Many diplomats seem already to believe that a vigorous pursuit-of-religious-freedom policy would be unconstitutional, or would constitute cultural imperialism. Others think it is a policy imposed by Christians and is designed to clear the way for Christian missionaries. Some conservatives are hesitant to support religious freedom for Muslims around the world.

This latter attitude is particularly damaging. Conservatives, for the most part, are defenders of religious freedom in the United States. Given the well-founded fear of Islamist terrorism, the hesitancy of some conservatives to afford the same right to Muslims abroad is perhaps understandable. But their logic rests on the erroneous assumption that religious freedom means clearing the way for extremist versions of Shari’a law or other forms of Islamist extremism. As Richard John Neuhaus was fond of saying, religious freedom carries with it a self-denying ordinance. In a democratic polity, religious liberty does not mean “anything goes.” To the contrary, it imposes its own limits, the most important of which is equality under the law.

An Egyptian democracy grounded in religious freedom, to take but one example, would permit Muslim reformers to speak openly about their own religion, criticize the Muslim Brotherhood, and present liberal conceptions of Islamic practice without fearing criminal prosecution for blasphemy. It would broaden and deepen public debates over what stable democracy requires of Islam. To date, that debate has been dominated by the extremists, as it is in most Muslim-majority countries. Equally important, religious freedom would not only provide protections to Coptic Christians. It would also grant them the right to build churches and establish Coptic institutions in civil society, run for political office, and make Christian arguments in debates over Egyptian laws and policies.

False perceptions and destructive attitudes exist among secular liberals and conservative Christians—I personally have encountered each of them. But they do not, in my view, sufficiently explain our diplomatic ineffectiveness. The major problem, it seems to me, is that a significant proportion of our foreign policy officials no longer believe that religious freedom is the “first freedom”—of American history, of the Constitution, and of all people everywhere.

At the State Department, and in the foreign affairs establishment in general, too many have rejected the proposition, central to our founding, that religion is necessary for the survival of democracy. For America’s founding generation, and most generations since, religious freedom constituted the “first freedom” because it was thought necessary for the well-being of individuals and societies. In particular, religion in the public square was considered crucial for the health of democracy. The founders believed that religious freedom entailed not only the right to believe and worship but also the right to act on the basis of religious belief, individually and in concert with others, privately and in civil society and political life—all within broad and equally applied limits. James Madison viewed religious actors in civil society as a critical check on the power of government. In his farewell address, George Washington argued that religion was necessary for the “dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity.”

Many of our political and foreign policy leaders today, however, see religious freedom as a private matter with few legitimate public purposes. Religious liberty is in no sense necessary to individuals and societies. Rather, it is merely one in an ever-growing list of rights claims—in this case, a claim of privilege by religious people. As such it warrants no special protection but must be “balanced” against all other claims. Such views are reflected in positions taken by the Obama administration on the HHS mandate, but also in its international religious freedom policy. In a 2009 speech on the importance of human rights in foreign policy, which remains the clearest explanation of the administration’s human rights priorities to date, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton insisted that “to fulfill their potential, people . . . must be free to worship . . . and to love in the way that they choose.”

Secretary Clinton invokes the freedom to worship, not religious freedom. But “worship” is essentially a private activity, with few if any civic implications. It is certainly easier to balance against other rights claims. Clinton also suggests that a putative “right to love” is a comparable right. Clearly the Obama administration has in its domestic policy weighed religious freedom against other rights claims it believes important, such as the right to contraceptives and abortifacients, or to same-sex “marriage,” and religious freedom has been found to be an inferior right. This helps to explain why, in its foreign policy, the Obama administration has applied far more policy energy in its international pursuit of a “right to love” than in its pursuit of religious freedom.

It is no accident that the first affirmation in our Bill of Rights is that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The Establishment Clause was intended to protect the free exercise of religion, in part by ensuring that no particular religious group was given any privileged position within the country.Today the threat of “establishment” comes not from any church but rather from a secular ideology quite willing to abridge religious freedoms. For these new ideologues, “error has no rights.” Religious individuals and entities must toe the line on abortion, contraception, and the redefinition of marriage. Recently, the New Mexico “Human Rights” Commission swept aside concerns about religious liberty and fined Elane Photography over $6,000 for refusing on religious grounds to participate in a same-sex-commitment ceremony. In August, the New Mexico Supreme Court unanimously upheld that ruling. In his decision upholding the Obama administration’s position on same-sex “marriage” (U.S. v. Windsor), Justice Anthony Kennedy declared that those who resist this innovation in human affairs—that is, those who continue to support a religious view of marriage as between one man and one woman—are acting with malice, seeking to “disparage and injure,” to “demean” and “humiliate” same-sex couples.Is it any wonder that this new aggressively secular creed, which privatizes and relativizes religious freedom, undermines our will and our capacity as a country to defend religious freedom abroad?

Europe provides an example of what lies ahead. The official American understanding of religious freedom is in many ways reminiscent of the French ideology of laïcité, which relegates religion to an entirely private role in society and politics. Roger Trigg, a philosopher at the University of Oxford, notes that one of the characteristics of the European privatization project is its willful dilution of religious freedom to a right of freedom of “religion and belief.” The problem here is that “belief” can mean virtually anything one feels strongly about, from environmentalism to the Manchester soccer club. Religion in Europe has long since lost much of its special status in law, society, and politics and is now routinely treated as merely one human preference among an infinite possible number of preferences.

Thus the problem with the appearance of the following sentence at the beginning of the 2012 State Department annual report, in a section describing why this right is important for the United States: “Freedom of religion and belief and the right to worship as one chooses fulfill a deep and abiding human need.” To drive this point home, Secretary of State John Kerry, in his remarks on the release of the report, used the “worship” phrase twice to describe the content of U.S. policy. Regarding his own actions, Kerry said he pressed foreign leaders “to safeguard freedom of belief.”

Although the problem is deeply ideological, some concrete steps can be taken to remedy it. Members of Congress should speak out about the value of religious freedom as the first freedom, pay more attention to this issue in our foreign policy, and demand answers from State Department officials in public hearings and private meetings.

In addition, five simple amendments to the International Religious Freedom Act would remove some of the institutional obstacles to a more effective religious freedom policy.

First, require that the ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom report directly to the secretary of state and attend all regular meetings of senior State Department officials. This will ensure that foreign governments and American diplomats alike see that the administration takes religious freedom seriously enough to give it the same priority they do other key issues.

Second, give the ambassador resources to develop and implement new strategies. This need not involve the appropriation of new monies. Funds can be reallocated from existing appropriations for programs such as democracy promotion and counterterrorism. For example, require 20 percent of congressional appropriations for the promotion of democracy abroad to be allocated to the Office of International Religious Freedom.

Third, make training of American diplomats in religious freedom mandatory at three stages: when they enter the Foreign Service, when they receive “area studies” training prior to departing for post, and when they become deputy chiefs of mission and ambassadors. This training should tell them what religious freedom is, why it is important for individuals and societies, why advancing it is important for America’s national interests, its status in the country and region to which they have been assigned, and how to advance it.

Fourth, amend the IRFA to require that the list of particularly severe violators (the “countries of particular concern”) be issued annually with the report. Require the State Department to provide a comprehensive analysis of policy tools being applied in each country, including programs that target democratic stability, economic growth, and counterterrorism.

Fifth and finally, require the State Department to respond in writing to recommendations by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. At the same time, require the commission to report on why the United States is not succeeding in advancing religious freedom, as gauged by objective reports such as those by the Pew Research Center.

Such changes will not transform our policy overnight. But until they are made, America’s religious freedom policy will remain a powerful idea that has not yet gelled, one that is not reducing religious persecution, advancing the institutions and habits of religious freedom, or serving the national security of the United States.

Thomas F. Farr is director of the Religious Freedom Project at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs. He was the first director of the State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom.

America's Mainline: Telling the history of Charles Clayton Morrison and the Christian Century |Gary Dorrien | First Things

Thu, 07 Nov 2013 18:38:14 GMT

The idea that American Protestantism has a “mainline,” or ever did, was born in irony. The mainline is usually identified with seven Protestant denominations, all of which were small in their heyday of the 1950s. Moreover, just after they acquired the name “mainline,” they began to shrink. The idea of the mainline had a basis, but it had little to do with numbers. The mainline churches assumed a leadership role in American society, they built a large stock of cultural capital, they crafted a persuasive rhetoric about modern Christianity and America, they built an ecumenical national church, they were (and still are) overrepresented in the corridors of power, and they served as guardians of America’s moral culture. One of the best ways to see how they did it is to track the history of the Christian Century magazine, the flagship of mainline Protestantism.

For many years I have been telling colleagues and graduate students that somebody ought to write this story. Nobody understood twentieth-century ecumenical Protestantism better than the founder and editor of the Christian Century, Charles Clayton Morrison. Though forgotten today, he influenced this tradition more than almost anybody. In addition, Morrison wrote an unpublished autobiography chock-full of insights about his ambitions for the Century and how he kept it going.

Academic fashions long ago turned against everything associated with the unfortunately named mainline. The mainline would have done slightly better to stick with its other names, “liberal” and “ecumenical.” But denominations and formal ecumenism are hopelessly passé by any name, so Morrison and the Century had to wait for Elesha J. Coffman, whose graduate advisor at Duke, Evangelical historian Grant Wacker, realized what was odd about this situation. Thus, we finally have an account of the Christian Century’s role in the rise of the so-called Protestant mainline, in a book that tells only part of the story, but does so splendidly.

Coffman, who teaches church history at Dubuque Theological Seminary, presses hard, with a nod to social theorist Pierre Bourdieu, on the concept of cultural capital. She argues rightly that mainline Protestantism richly illustrates both meanings of the term “mainline”: principal, as belonging to the first rank, but also conventional, as belonging to the mainstream or middle-of-the-road. It is exceedingly difficult to be first rank and conventional at the same time.

The story begins with a tiny Disciples of Christ magazine, the Christian Oracle, founded in 1884 in Des Moines, Iowa. A typical denominational organ, it helped Disciples carry on their early nineteenth-century Restorationist heritage, which had Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian roots. The church’s Presbyterian founders, Barton Stone and Alexander Campbell, sought to restore the anti-hierarchical democracy of early Christianity; their efforts yielded a Disciples tradition advocating church unity and minimal church tradition. By the late nineteenth century the Disciples had a conservative wing and a liberal one, the latter especially in Chicago, where the Christian Oracle moved in 1900 and changed its name to the Christian Century. Eight years later the magazine folded, and young Disciples minister Morrison bought it at a mortgage foreclosure.

Like many Protestant ministers of his time, Morrison came from a clerical family of humble means, and he cherished the liberal theology movement for rescuing him from an unhappy choice between letting go of Christianity and trying to believe unbelievable things. Liberal theology taught that the Church had no future if it opposed modern science and biblical criticism, and the Social Gospel taught that Christianity has a mission to transform the structures of society in the direction of social justice.

From the beginning, Morrison wore his Social Gospel liberalism proudly, already writing in his distinctly forceful, clear, vivid, and arresting prose style. He later recalled: “By the end of my first year, the Christian Century had become something more than a journalistic organ; it was distinctly identified with a cause—the cause of liberalism.”

The Century was pushy about its ecumenical bias. Morrison said that denominationalism was a spiritual disaster that prevented the Church from winning souls and society to Christ. The Church should be unified on the basis of Christ and his Gospel and nothing else. This was in fact conventional Disciples’ theology, but Morrison called it ecumenism. He knew very well that the tiny and mostly conservative Disciples church did not provide much of a basis for the magazine. To succeed, he had to attract the audience of progressive ministers that he believed was out there. In 1917, the Century quietly announced that it was no longer a Disciples organ, having become “An Undenominational Journal of Religion.”

Morrison never really acknowledged that he had a business model or even business acumen. In his telling, he gave himself wholly to a winning idea—Social Gospel liberalism—and the Century “just growed,” like Topsy. What mattered was that he stuck to this idea, he had the independence to do so, and he resisted the secular temptation, enabling the Century to thrive while rivals struggled and crashed.

The Century pulled away from a crowded field of denominational periodicals and from the two gold-standard magazines of religious journalism, the Independent and the Outlook. Some denominational organs were ably produced, but all suffered from a headquarters mentality and a numerically small base. The Independent and the Outlook, though historically Congregationalist, were independent and thus did not face the temptation to the parochial and party-line. But the Social Gospel had a tendency to breed secular children, and both of its major magazines turned secular in pursuit of social relevance and larger audiences.

Morrison knew he was getting somewhere when, in the 1920s, Congregationalists became the Century’s leading audience, followed by Presbyterians, Baptists, and Episcopalians. By 1928, he had 35,000 readers—impressive for a magazine featuring seminary-level theology. Morrison always hoped for lay readers, but targeted the intellectual and spiritual needs of ministers. He yearned for the cachet of Harper’s or the New Republic and thus felt the temptation to secularize. Yet he stuck to what had already worked for him, judging that the Independent and Outlook had lost their way by secularizing. Morrison had a favorite story about a dream his business manager had in approximately 1926. In the dream, Morrison was drowning in Lake Michigan, and just before he drowned he thrust up his hand and cried, “Keep it religious! Keep it religious!”

In the 1920s Morrison had two obsessions: abolishing war and defending Prohibition. Social Gospel ministers were ashamed of the pro-war sermons they had given in 1917 and 1918. Harry Emerson Fosdick, Reinhold Niebuhr, and many other ministers vowed never to do it again, and the Century cheered them on, promoting Morrison’s involvement in the international movement to outlaw war. His other obsession, Prohibition, flowed straight from the Social Gospel commitment to Christianize society. For Morrison, Prohibition was a milestone moral achievement. A good society cared about the moral character of its people and the social ravages of alcohol.

Morrison found a fire hydrant of opinions in Niebuhr. He urged Niebuhr to keep sending articles, although he and Niebuhr disagreed about the 1928 presidential election, an augur of things to come. Niebuhr was turning socialist at the time; Morrison held out for Herbert Hoover and Prohibition, and Niebuhr was incredulous. As usual with Niebuhr, he changed his mind about politics before rethinking what he believed theologically. But Coffman keeps theological discussion to a minimum, which is problematic when dealing with a profound theologian like Niebuhr. Morrison, too, though hardly a profound theologian, had an operative theology that influenced the Protestant mainline.

Though Coffman does not mention it, in 1933 Morrison published The Social Gospel and the Christian Cultus, the most illuminating account ever written of the legacy and limitations of the Social Gospel. He observed that the Social Gospel had succeeded spectacularly at the seminary level. It was taught at every seminary that he respected. An entire generation of pastors had been trained in it, but its reach usually stopped with them. Every minister knew somebody who got fired for preaching about economic democracy or biblical criticism, and as a result many preached innocuous church-talk and kept their real beliefs to themselves.

Morrison had a theory about what happened and what to do about it. The Social Gospel recovered the religion of Jesus, he reasoned. “Thy kingdom come” was the center of Jesus’ teaching, and the Church was supposed to be a Christ-following fellowship that welcomed the stranger, loved its enemies, and helped to bring about the commonwealth of God. But this idea of what the Church was supposed to be contradicted the church that existed. Modern Christianity proposed something that had never been done—making the kingdom ideal of Jesus central to the Church’s religion.

Early Christianity had the kingdom ideal, Morrison explained, but without an established church. Then the Church obscured the kingdom ideal by building an institutional church. Then the Social Gospel tried to reclaim the kingdom within the established church. But that did not work. The radical religion of Jesus did not fit into the “cultus of existing Christianity—its total theological, ethical, liturgical, and cultural expression.” Morrison put it emphatically: Christianity had never taught that the Church should exist for the sake of the kingdom. This idea was distinctly modern, a novelty of the Social Gospel. If modern Christians wanted to reclaim the Gospel of Jesus, they had to completely reinvent the cultus of the Church.

Meanwhile, ministers labored in churches where congregants still believed in biblical inerrancy, six-day creation, and a myth of origins about the exclusive truth of their denomination. Coffman has a poignant section about the letters that ministers wrote to Morrison. Many thanked him profusely, grateful for the Century’s substance and inspiration. Some were feisty, telling Morrison that he should get a clue about what they were up against. Many were sorrowful, telling stories about dogmatic congregants, anti-intellectualism, reactionary politics, and having to hide their beliefs. “An acute sense of isolation permeated many of the letters,” Coffman notes. “For them, the Century constituted the only link to the kinds of people and conversations they had found so stimulating in college or seminary.”

In the 1930s, nearly every mainline denomination vowed never to support another war. Some issued ringing statements condemning the war business as anti-Christian. Niebuhr, having played a sizable role in building up Social Gospel pacifism, began to turn against it in 1932 with his icy, slashing, brilliant polemic, Moral Man and Immoral Society. Human groups never willingly subordinate their interests to the interests of others, he argued. Morality belongs to the sphere of individual action; there is no such thing as a moral group; and politics is always about struggling for power. Thus the Social Gospel’s appeal to reason and Christian love was maddeningly stupid.

Liberals howled that Niebuhr had invented a Christian ethic that got rid of Jesus, so, three years later, he addressed this issue in An Interpretation of Christian Ethics, contending that the teaching of Jesus has no relevance in the social sphere except as an impossible ethical ideal. A very personal debate erupted over this argument, yielding further charges of misrepresentation and “fighting dirty” between Niebuhr and the Century editors. Coffman skillfully recounts the in-house back-and-forth, noting that by 1941 Morrison detected an “evil spirit” in Niebuhr’s polemics, and Niebuhr sharply told Morrison to stop claiming that they were friends.

Each side offended the other with statements about what counted as a Christian position. The Century urged that it was possible for a mainline denomination to become a peace church. The anti-war proclamations of the 1930s suggested that Morrison might be right. By 1941, however, liberal Protestants fiercely debated whether Nazi fascism had changed the moral calculus, and Niebuhr broke from the Century to found Christianity & Crisis magazine. Then, one December morning, the Empire of Japan obliterated the pacifist ethos of the Protestant mainline, leaving Morrison with little company.

Had the Century stuck with Morrison’s tendency to equate his anti-war position with the mind of the Church, the magazine would have disqualified itself from its leading role in the glory years of the late 1940s and early 1950s. It should be noted, however, that Morrison would have disputed Coffman’s repeated description of him as a pacifist. He regarded himself as a pragmatic peacemaker—not a doctrinaire pacifist—who took the teaching of Jesus as seriously as possible. He had a similar position about liberalism. Liberalism was simply the method of free inquiry, not a position about anything. On the latter issue, Niebuhr rightly countered that liberalism had an ample supply of doctrines and presuppositions. Liberals did not deserve to win if they were unwilling to defend their position in an argument.

Nine months before Pearl Harbor, Time magazine magnate Henry R. Luce issued a manifesto in his other magazine, Life, on what he called “The American Century.” The entire world, Luce proclaimed, stood to gain from being led by the great American colossus. Morrison blasted Luce incredulously, calling his pronouncement a “counsel of madness,” an obnoxious call for “American imperialism,” and “an appeal to our national egotism.” The previous year, Morrison had opposed Franklin Roosevelt’s reelection, charging that FDR was an American-style fascist who militarized a peaceful nation. Now Time and Life wanted America to dominate the world, just as Morrison pleaded that it was not too late to stay out of World War II. At the end of that fateful year, he bitterly contended that Pearl Harbor could have been prevented, but now Americans had to support their nation at war.

Coffman aptly sets Luce’s “American Century” against Morrison’s Christian Century to account for the postwar establishment. Both visions were loaded with mainline presumption, but Luce’s routed Morrison’s, shaping a new public consensus that the Century struggled to accommodate. By the end of Morrison’s editorial run in 1947, much of what he cared about had been eviscerated, yet the Century came into a moment of glory for things it shared with Luce, Niebuhr, and the Protestant establishment. These things defined the idea of the mainline. Coffman calls it the idea of “a unified American Protestantism, culturally dominant, socially progressive, fulfilling its obligation as a shepherd of the nation’s soul.”The Century had to scale back to a modest version of a still-grandiose agenda. There was plenty of work to do if liberal Protestants were willing to make the essential adjustments. It was still their job to look after America’s moral culture, preserve a role for religion in American life, expand the ecumenical movement, and, perhaps, revive the dream of a cooperative world order, or at least contain communism. The mainline could still claim its Social Gospel legacy, while dropping the fantasies about economic democracy and reinventing Christianity. By the end of the 1950s, the movement even had a new name befitting its establishment status: the mainline. It was enough to be culturally powerful—except that this was threatened too.

Morrison saw it coming. His last editorial series for the Century, published in 1946, was titled “Can Protestantism Win America?” Despite being progressive about almost everything else, Morrison had never granted that religious diversity beyond the boundaries of the Federal Council of Churches added anything of value to the nation. His editorial successors at the Century, Paul Hutchinson and Harold Fey, tried uneasily to sustain this presumption without saying it too impolitely. Morrison shook his head: Ecumenical Protestantism was killing itself with politeness.

The book version of Morrison’s plea, published under the same title, put it aggressively. There were two rising threats to American Christianity: Roman Catholicism and secularism. Billy Graham was not yet famous, and Morrison could not imagine that fundamentalism would become culturally powerful. He was very worried, however, that secularism and Catholicism were getting stronger. Atheists and Catholics had every right to vie for influence, he allowed. What galled him was that liberal Protestants refused to fight, or even recognize that they were in a fight for America’s soul.

Morrison admonished that winning converts was the mark of any serious faith: “The missionary spirit is of its essence.” After the Social Gospel petered out, though, liberal Protestantism stopped trying to win converts. Liberal Protestants shunned all words smacking of missionary zeal; they liked to pretend they were not in competition with Catholicism, and they took pride in being secular, which was a self-liquidating attitude. They were too ecumenical, too secular and soaked in relativism to evangelize for anything.

Within Protestantism, Morrison argued, ecumenism was a good thing; in fact, it was desperately necessary. But liberal Protestants were making ecumenism look ridiculous by asking Catholics to join it. Protestantism was about freedom and democracy, while Catholicism was about dogmatism and authoritarianism: “Protestantism cannot cooperate ecclesiastically with a dictatorship. It must make a clear-cut decision to accept its task of winning America to Christ without any illusion that it has a collaborator in Roman Catholicism.”

Morrison implored liberal Protestant leaders to stop minimizing their core beliefs in the hope of creating a wider ecumenism. This strategy, he insisted, was a loser. It would not modernize Catholicism, and it would never win America. Moreover, the greatest threat to America’s soul was ascending secularism. Protestantism was not losing members to the Catholic Church, but it was losing multitudes to the culture of disbelief.

There was a bitter irony here, which Morrison stressed. Liberal Protestantism had tried valiantly to accommodate modern culture, only to be snubbed by it: “The assumption that modern culture has been moving toward a Christian goal has been the undoing of Protestantism. It has weakened its will and confused its faith. Too long has Protestantism stood in awe of modern culture. Its sense of mission has been obfuscated by the messianic pretensions of science, by the prestige of public education, and by the benefits which technology and an ever enlarging state paternalism were conferring upon the people.”

Though mainline Protestants were building churches across the landscape and setting attendance records, Morrison was not impressed. Postwar America, oozing superficial religiosity, didn’t come close to the Social Gospel vision of a good society. It had no spiritual depth and no passion for social justice. Moreover, the Protestant churches were disadvantaged by lacking a competitive history. They had never had to “win” America, since they assumed that America was culturally Protestant. Now they were paying for their privileges and their secularism.

Morrison urged them to change course before it was too late. The resurgent Protestantism that was needed would be militant, united, and theologically purified. It would get rid of the denominations, form an ecumenical super-church, and proclaim that Christ is Lord. Everything else was divisive and sectarian; it had to go.

In other words, Morrison ended exactly as he began, learning nothing from the decades of cultural pluralization that he lived through. “Can Protestantism Win America?”was an echo from a lost world. A few years later the terms “WASP” and “mainline” gained currency. Both were markers of a changing cultural consciousness. The former term reflected the startling idea that white Anglo-Saxon Protestants constituted one American ethnic group among others. The latter term registered that there were other kinds of Protestants, although the term obscured that they, whoever they were, were the majority. With this shift in consciousness, Morrison’s dream of a victorious “Protestantism” became an object of ridicule. The bland unconsciousness of hegemonic white Protestant Americanism was no longer possible.

Jesuit theologian John Courtney Murray does not play a role in Coffman’s account, but Morrison clashed with him over these issues. Murray stewed over Morrison’s book, wrestling with a belief that Murray was trying to give up, that the differences between Catholicism and Protestantism were incommensurable. Murray struggled with the disagreements among American Protestants, Catholics, Jews, and secularists that seemed, to him, to obviate meaningful discussions across religious lines. Yet Murray burned at Morrison’s prejudiced way of putting it. He countered that no group should have dominant cultural privileges, and he insisted that pluralism was a justice issue.

Murray was sensitive to the irony of Morrison’s argument that Protestantism had wrongly accommodated secular culture and thus lost its spiritual and public power. Like Morrison, he believed that American Christianity was in a life-or-death struggle with secular disbelief. Like Morrison, he believed that nearly everything precious in the American experiment was at stake in the secularization of American culture.

But Murray had a contrasting strategy for holding off the tide of secular destruction. It was to respond creatively to religious pluralism. To respect the diversity of religions was to reject the usual options of watering down Protestantism, stripping religion from the public square, treating democracy as a substitute for religion, or reducing religion to values. Murray got many things wrong, and some of his claims are still up for grabs. But the crucial thing—respecting religious diversity—he got brilliantly right.

There are four main interpretations of the 1950s heyday of the mainline. Some say it was the golden moment of American Protestantism, when Protestant leaders forged a national church featuring commanding assemblies of the National Council of Churches. Some say it was a triumph of illusion, when Protestant leaders built an impressive façade upon sand. Some say it hollowed out the historic denominations and contributed mightily to their demise. Coffman affirms all three while adding her version of the fourth option, the “cultural victory” thesis. Several others have taken this line, notably Jay Demerath and Christian Smith, but Coffman provides ballast for the case that liberal Protestantism succeeded by insinuating its values into American culture.

The mainline helped to unify American society, and it spoke for American values in ways that most Americans appreciated. It preserved the idea that the United States was a nation with the soul of a church, and it did so in a way that made religion respectable. But most Americans were not interested in formal ecumenism, or even weekly low-key organized religion, so Protestant churches got diminishing returns for their efforts.

During these years, however, America experienced a resurgence of fundamentalist and near-fundamentalist religion. In 1956, a handful of conservative Evangelicals clustered around Sun Oil millionaire J. Howard Pew, and the now-famous Billy Graham founded Christianity Today magazine to provide an alternative to the Century. It dwarfed the Century from day one. Christianity Today issued an initial print run of 285,000 copies, secured nearly 40,000 subscribers in its first year, and went on to more than triple that figure. The Century, meanwhile, had oscillated between 30,000 and 40,000 subscribers since the mid-1920s, as it still does.

In 1958, Christianity Today commissioned a nationwide survey of Protestant ministers conducted by the Opinion Research Corporation of Princeton, New Jersey. It asked ministers to categorize themselves theologically. The results were: 39 percent conservative, 35 percent fundamentalist, 14 percent liberal, and 12 percent neo-orthodox. The Christian Century had probably never represented more than 15 percent of America’s Protestant clergy. But it made an outsized imprint on American society by presuming and acting otherwise. Coffman notes that the Century carried on as though it spoke for the American Church, “convinced that a statistically accurate picture could be utterly wrong.”

Vast parts of this story are left untold in Coffman’s account, notably the American liberal Protestant role in creating the United Nations and World Council of Churches, and how the mainline dealt with America’s original sin of racism. Near the end Coffman mentions a scathing letter from Gardner Taylor, a Baptist pastor in Brooklyn, protesting that the Century did not mention a single black congregation in its series on great American churches. And she notes that the mainline played an active role in the civil rights movement. Otherwise, racial justice is barely mentioned in this book, which ends the story in 1960, five years after Martin Luther King Jr. entered the national stage.

But subverting an established narrative is precisely what dealing with racism does. The Christian Century espoused a theology of progress and idealism during the very period that African Americans were stripped of their voting rights, subjected to the brutalities of Jim Crow segregation and abuse, and terrorized by an epidemic of lynching. If Christianity had any ethical meaning in this context, it should have given highest priority to the ravages of racism. Instead, the Century rarely said anything, even about lynching. What it did say, here and there, sometimes with a brave word, is important for the record. What it did not say, while the Congress on Racial Equality organized sit-ins through the 1940s and early 1950s that the white press ignored, is equally important.

In its own way, however, Coffman’s book makes a powerful point through its silence. Had the book crossed into the 1960s, there would have been a chapter featuring King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” which the Century published, and clergy getting arrested to abolish Jim Crow. As it is, we are left with a picture of white supremacy playing out in the heyday of the mainline, with very little notice from its flagship journal that American religion contributed mightily to America’s greatest evil.

A Prayer for Study Groups, by Charles Laurence Olivea

Thu, 19 Sep 2013 17:35:34 GMT

Dearly beloved Jesus, please join us as we gather to study the teachings of the Fifth Epochal Revelation. We seek your amazing grace in order to be more cognizant of your presence among us. We know your Spirit of Truth blesses the whole world, but this is an invitation directly and personally from us to you. We reach out to you in friendship and gratefully acknowledge what you do for us:

You bring peace to our hearts.

You fortify our souls.

&nnbsp; You unite us when we come together in an attempt to comprehend more of God’s creation.

You steady our aim in the search for truth.

We seek some of your wisdom—the quest of the ages—in order to center our learning around you.

Master, you foster within us a respect and interest in the art of listening.

Indeed, you enhance our discernment of facts, meanings, and values.

Your Spirit of Truth leads to a greater sense of truth co-ordination.

You help us to realize that study is really the search for God.

Your light of truth enables us to think more clearly.

Through you, our conversation is elevated to the greater glory of God.

You encourage love between brothers and sisters, strengthening their gentle ties.

In you, we are all family.

Your very presence aids us in appreciating the Father’s spirit in our fellow mortals.

You whet our appetite for unselfish service motivated by love.

It is your good cheer that causes laughter and study to go hand in hand.

Experiencing the joy of knowing you dispels a myriad of cares.

We are comforted in the moment and feel secure about our future when you embrace us, oh Lord.

Your very name, Jesus, is a tonic for heart and soul.

You are both God and friend to us.

Thanks be to you, we are blessed with an intimacy of divine spirit and material mind.

The convergence of mind and spirit, in your name, opens up new social possibilities for sharing insights with others.

Jesus, we love you very much. We will continue studying with faith and intelligent inquiry. And as we go forward, please bless our efforts to create, maintain, and perpetuate a worldwide network of new study groups in the beautiful hope of contributing to the eventual rehabilitation of Urantia. Amen.

For Michael’s sake

China' s New Christians | Jillian Kay Melchior | First Things, October 2013

Thu, 19 Sep 2013 17:31:54 GMT

The Boxer Rebellion did not end until eight colonial powers, enraged by the attacks on their embassies and missionaries, shipped an expeditionary force to China, ending a fifty-five-day rebel siege of Beijing’s Legation Quarter. By then, the Boxers had slaughtered two hundred Western missionaries and tens of thousands of Chinese Christians. Peace was won with a lopsided treaty that infuriated the Chinese, especially in the context of the concessions already imposed after the nineteenth century’s Opium Wars.

Sidney Brooks’ story has haunted me. He died for Christ at twenty-four; at twenty-five, I moved to China, writing about Christianity as a Robert Novak Fellow with the Phillips Foundation. To some extent, our experiences bookend the changing history of Christianity in modern China. He had come to spread the Word; I had come to report back on how the Word was doing. He was an unwelcomed ambassador of a foreign religion; when I arrived, I was foreign but my faith was not. Christianity had endured and adapted, becoming one of the few cultural commonalities I shared with my sources.

I crisscrossed China, attending state-sanctioned churches and “underground” or “house” churches and talking with Catholics and Protestants. And through my travels, I discovered that Christianity in China is entering a new phase: Where it once carried thick association with Western cultural influence, it has now developed into something truly Chinese. It is no longer a niche religion, either, having become something with mass appeal.

Christianity has struggled to find its place in China for centuries. And although the message of Christianity is culturally neutral, the medium rarely was. Western missionaries long sought cultural converts to Christianity. The Jesuit Alessandro Valignano (1539–1606) was among the first to articulate missionary policies, not only emphasizing the importance of “accommodation and adaptation to Chinese culture,” as historian Daniel H. Bays writes, but also “indirect evangelism by means of science and technology to convince the elite of the high level of European civilization.”

But the Chinese already had a high civilization when Christianity arrived, so the religion was often viewed as a cultural threat. This tension intensified particularly beginning with the Opium Wars of the mid-1800s. European missionaries faced a moral dilemma. On one hand, they had witnessed the drug’s deleterious effects on Chinese society and understood the push for prohibition.

On the other hand, European victory in the Opium Wars meant greater opportunity for spreading the Gospel. Indeed, the first round of treaties, from 1842 to 1844, stipulated that Westerners be permitted to build churches, schools, and other community buildings in five key coastal cities. The second round, from 1858 to 1860, granted Western missionaries extensive travel rights, and included, explicitly or implicitly, the right of Chinese to become Christians.

The result was to link Christianity to colonialism, which would bear catastrophic consequences. The Chinese despised the treaties imposed upon them, reasonably considering them humiliating and unequal. And Beijing already feared faith for legitimate reasons; historically, religion had already played a central role in the Yellow Turban, White Lotus, and Taiping rebellions.

The Boxer Rebellion was the first violent national expression of these frustrations. The ensuing violence undermined the legitimacy of the beleaguered Qing dynasty, contributing to its collapse in 1911. The second expression began in 1949, when Mao Zedong founded the decidedly atheist People’s Republic of China. He sought to purge the country of superstition, religion, and foreign influence. Christians became a special target. Foreign missionaries were expelled, and the Church’s fate fell to the indigenous leaders who had emerged since the Boxer Rebellion.

Persecution was most intense during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), years when Christian faith could become a death warrant, as it was for Chinese pastor Wang Zhiming, executed in 1973. In Liao Yiwu’s God is Red, which recounts the struggles of the Chinese Christians in the Maoist and post-Maoist years, the pastor’s son recalls how, because of their faith, his family was beaten, bound, and spit upon during public condemnation meetings. The communists then cut out the pastor’s tongue so he couldn’t preach, paraded him around the village, and shot him.

Christianity was forced underground. Most believers from this era are dead or elderly, so I rely on the second-hand stories of those who inherited their faith. A church worker in Beijing repeated to me the tale of a church that had worshipped in a cave during the Cultural Revolution. These Christians had somehow saved a single Bible from destruction, but they lived in terror that it, too, would be lost. So the believers each memorized a book—as long as they lived, so did the Word.

Ironically, persecution strengthened Chinese believers’ faith and determination, and religion eventually proved stronger than its opposition. Document 19—one of the primary policy statements on religion in China, derived from the same party gathering that established Deng Xiaoping’s rule—states that “those who expect to rely on administrative decrees or other coercive measures to wipe out religious thinking and practices with one blow are even further from the basic viewpoint Marxism takes toward the religious question. They are entirely wrong and will do no small harm.”

That’s an incredible acknowledgement of failure from the government. Since Deng Xiaoping, Beijing has attempted to manage and control religion through an elaborate religious bureaucracy, all the while predicting religion will die out naturally.

But statistics, however fuzzy, suggest precisely the opposite has happened: Christianity’s growth in China has been dramatic. Some believers worship in the state-sanctioned churches, but most still worship in so-called house or underground churches, which operate outside the sanctioned system—making them tough to number. But there are rough estimates. The Chinese government’s lowballed statistics numbered twenty-three million Protestants and 5.7 million Catholics. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life reported fifty-eight million Protestants and nine million Catholics; other plausible studies suggest the total number of Christians has surpassed one hundred million.

It’s true that persecution still endures—and it’s been meticulously documented each year by the Texas-based ChinaAid, an organization founded by a former Chinese house-church pastor who was himself targeted once. I saw that persecution myself, visiting the Qiao Tau Mang Catholic Church in Wenzhou. Two months before my visit, the local police had essentially kidnapped the underground bishop, Peter Shao Zhumin, taking him to Sichuan Province, where Catholic leaders had bent to Beijing’s control. It was an attempt to coerce Shao to likewise yield to government control, but it failed, and he was eventually returned to his congregation.

Church members spoke to me about how the government had cut them off from the Vatican and the global Church, and how their isolation weighed on them. They met relatively openly—in a five-story building next to a state-run hospital—but were ever aware of the potential for a crackdown.

But, to my surprise, I learned through my reporting that as Christianity finds its place in Chinese culture, its adherents are less defined by how they cope with state-sponsored adversity.

Part of that is Christianity’s unique theology: Its fundamental prerequisite is belief, not adherence to specific rules or customs. As a rule, the Christians I met wanted to both honor God and obey the government whenever possible. One businessman I met was part of the underground church, and he prided himself on his openness with the local officials. He invited them to Christian functions and notified them when he was hosting a big event, essentially acting as a PR rep for God and trying to persuade them that they had nothing to fear and much to learn.

Other Chinese Christians avoid politics altogether. I met a young man in Beijing who led a Bible study at a house church. He was endearingly blunt, talking to me over pizza about his mother’s illness and how it had led him to God, and about his longing to find the wife God had reserved for him. But when I brought up politics, he clammed up completely. Chinese Christians invite trouble when they get political, he suggested before changing the subject.

Nevertheless, Christianity’s explosive growth has undeniable potential for political reform. Religious practice assumes freedom of speech, assembly, and even some property rights.

And Christians are also working to improve rule of law; a disproportionate number of Chinese rights lawyers are Christian. Some theorize this is because legal theory drove them to natural law, which in turn directed them to God. Others speculate it’s exactly the opposite. Nearly all these supposed subverters of state power work within the existing legal framework, trying to reform China by forcing it to adhere to the laws established by existing authorities. Of course, the powerful and politically connected are the ones undermining rule of law, but challenging them takes courage, which rights lawyers often derive from their faith.

But Christianity’s biggest legacy may be its restoration of the nation’s fractured civil society. China’s Christians, I observed, feel compelled to change every aspect of their lifestyle once they convert. They are radical in their dedication to service. They define themselves by the way they change their own lives and the lives of others. And that has a cultural impact.

It’s hard for a Westerner to understand just how morally destructive communism has been. Famine drove many to thievery, and neighbors murdered or beat neighbors under the guise of revolutionary heroism. One simply doesn’t ask elderly Chinese about the sixties; some speculate the whole generation has post-traumatic stress disorder.

Interviewing migrant workers at the Beijing West Railway Station earlier this year, I met an old man with twisted hands and a compelling face who was willing to talk about his life. He briefly referenced the Maoist era, and I pushed the topic. His friend nearly slapped the chopsticks out of his hand—there’s peer pressure to stay silent, too. And earlier this year, a sixty-one-year-old official in Jinan, Shandong Province made international news when he printed an apology—“despite huge family pressure,” as media accounts noted—for acts of violence he had committed as a teenage Red Guard.

The enduring ethic from this era became self-preservation at all costs. Older generations view money as the only guarantor of safety, and younger generations were raised to revere wealth. Greed is prolific, and power is envied and abused. Occasional horrific news stories hint at the me-first legacy of Maoism: A toddler was run over by a car, and no one stopped to help; a greedy company put melamine in milk destined for baby bottles; a Red Cross worker apparently pilfered funds meant for victims of the Sichuan earthquake, spending the money on designer bags and fancy cars.

Christianity becomes an appealing answer. Both Catholic and Protestant churches are extraordinarily charitable, creating communities by engaging in philanthropy and social work. They also forge kinship in China’s urban centers, where mass migration has left many feeling isolated. These developments, though not directly political, have the potential to change China by addressing some of the most fundamental material, emotional, and spiritual needs of its people.

And, to bring it full circle, Chinese Christians are now sending missionaries of their own. They’re avid proselytizers within their own borders, spreading the Word across provinces. Many feel a special calling to bring the Word back to the Middle East; others become unintentional missionaries as their work carries them to the West and beyond. Christianity has become Chinese. Now, its converts are paying it forward.

The Materialists Rapture | Wesley J. Smith | First Things

Fri, 28 Jun 2013 17:28:42 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2013/06/the-materialistsrsquo-rapturehttp://

Review of "A Jew Among Romans: The Life and Legacy of Flavius Josephus" by Frederic Raphael | Stephen Daisley | Commentary Magazine

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 17:25:00 GMT

It is no meager feat to defend a man whose own mother could not bring herself to forgive his sins—but this is the task to which Frederic Raphael sets himself in A Jew Among Romans, his apologia for the classical Jewish historian and arch-turncoat Titus Flavius Josephus.

Little is known about the biography of Josephus, born Joseph ben Mattathias in 37 c.e., other than his claim to priestly and royal lineage. The historical record—largely his own hand—first encounters him as leader of the Jewish rebels of first century Judaea in their Great Revolt against Rome. He offers himself as a pious Jew who is also a pragmatist, resisting the Empire’s petty impositions but equally frustrated by the Zealots who agitate for all-out war. Josephus is dragged into direct conflict with Rome and tasked in 67 c.e. with defending Jotapata, modern-day Yodfat, against Vespasian’s men.

When the hilltop fortress falls, Josephus escapes the suicide pact struck by his comrades and surrenders to the Romans, becoming first a prisoner and later, by dint of his supposed prophetic abilities, a counselor to Titus. He takes the Empire of its coin, even adopting the Romanized name Titus Flavius Josephus, and begins to document the ensuing sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Second Temple from his handsome sinecure as defeated Jewish rebel turned Roman stenographer. His Jewish War rails against the fanatic garrisons who, as he saw it, provoked the suppression of the Jewish polity in Judaea before dying by their own hand at Masada.

Josephus provided the world’s first case study in the internal struggle of the defector who reaps execrations from his ex-friends while being eyed suspiciously by his new ones. His decision to switch sides marked him as a shameful figure in Jewish history, serving the emperor whose army laid bloody siege to Jerusalem.

Raphael—novelist, screenwriter, translator, and Commentary contributor—does not seek to exculpate Josephus of the self-interest that partly motivates all defectors. A Jew Among Romans is no hagiography. But he casts his subject as a Judaean Cassandra, who “tried to talk the Jews into surrender, for as long as there was any hope of averting the culminating horror.” Once his people were defeated, he chose to live: “If he was a coward because he had failed to die, he was also egregiously brave; if a traitor, it was to a reckless nationalism he never favored, not to Judaism.”

Although Jewish historians, led by Louis H. Feldman, have come to recognize Josephus’s contributions to classical and biblical scholarship, his critics remain. The most compelling, Martin Goodman, frames Josephus as a creature of the Judaean and later Roman elite and suspects that his “instinct for apologetic overcame his conscience as a historian.” But it is against Yigael Yadin’s glib epigram—“he was a great historian and a bad Jew”—that Raphael sets his argument. The real offense of this “bad Jew” was not apostasy or treason but endurance: “He survived to report news no one wanted to hear.” Josephus had admonished his Zealot compatriots against suicidal extremism. He proved horrifically prescient, and lived to record the downfall of those who dismissed him. “Memory was the vessel of Jewish solidarity,” Raphael notes. Josephus tainted the heroics with ugly facts.

The Judaea of Josephus’s time was, for Desmond Seward, an interregnal land that “had long ceased to be Israel while it was not yet Palestine.” This duality was reflected in Josephus, the Hellenistic Jew who was a rigorous follower of Jewish law; the traitor to the Jewish cause who would write a defense of Jewish history and philosophy; a Romanized Jew who, for Raphael, “was never one of them, nor could he ever again be what he was before.”

In the eyes of Josephus, his nemesis, Zealot leader John of Gischala, was a man whose “desires were ever carried to great things.” He did not intend this as a compliment. Here Raphael’s apologia runs into trouble. If we are to draw parallels between Josephus and modern-era assimilated Jews, as Raphael thinks we should, may we not also read the cautious pragmatist as a forerunner to those integrationist and internationalist Jews who agitated against the establishment of a Jewish state in the 20th century? They also damned their opposite numbers as fanatics whose needless provocations would bring misery and destruction upon Jews everywhere. The reader who wonders if Josephus would have deemed Menachem Begin a latter-day John of Gischala, obsessed with “great things,” will not be alone.

There is another significance to Josephus’s legacy often overlooked in academic debates. His narrative, the sole surviving account of the fall of Jerusalem, documents the simple but stark fact that the Jews were there. The object of much contemporary anti-Zionist scholarship is the dejudaization of Palestine—writing the Jews out of the history of the land until the 19th century in order to characterize Zionism as an alien colonialism. This revisionist project has been so successful that statements of historical fact can be judged inflammatory or (that weasel word of enforced non-offensiveness) “unhelpful.” Whenever an Israeli politician commits the sin of referring to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria,” a sort of linguistic settlement expansion in the eyes of liberal commentators, the New York Times rushes to label these terms “biblical names.” The secular schoolmarms of Eighth Avenue deem that a demerit, but thanks to Josephus’s writings, we know that these Jewish provinces thrived long after the days of the Torah just as they thrive once again today. Wherever the borders of Israel and Palestine are drawn in an eventual peace treaty, the scholarship of this “bad Jew” reminds us to whom the land ultimately belongs.

Raphael joins a distinguished line of historians of Josephus, but few have accounted for the outcast sage so vividly. Raphael’s motion for acquittal is written in such spirited, lambent prose that he deserves to succeed where previous scholars have failed. Far from a “bad Jew,” his Josephus is a chronicler of Jewish courage, misjudgment, and ruin. A flawed character, for sure, but a consequential historian, and despite his traitorousness, a Jewish one at that.

About the Author

Stephen Daisley is a British journalist whose blog is the Eclectic Partisan. He writes regularly for Commentary.

Christianity and King | Mark Movesian | First Things

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 17:22:22 GMT

https://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tnmnhttp://

Christendom's Greatest Cathedral to Become a Mosque

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 17:19:42 GMT

http://pjmedia.com/blog/hagia-sophia-to-become-mosque/?singlepage=true

Nones Across the Globe | Mark Movsesian | First Things

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 17:16:00 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/06/14/nones-across-the-globe/

Solzhenitsyn and Modern Literature | M. D. Aeschliman | First Things, August/September 1990

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 17:09:58 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2007/09/007-solzhenitsyn-and-modern-literature-7

Only Speak the Word and Let My Servant Be Healed: What is this Thing Called Faith? A sermon by Daniel Love Glazer

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 17:07:37 GMT

When I was growing up in the 1950’s, in Akron Ohio, the paperback book revolution was in full bloom. You could buy quality paperbacks for what now seems like a pittance. Here is an edition of Machiavelli’s The Prince that I bought back then. How much do you think I paid for it?_____It cost me 35 cents!

Once a week or so, my best friend Beaner and I would ride our bikes the six blocks to a book store that sold nothing but paperbacks. We would leave our bikes outside the store—no need for locks—and spend an hour or so browsing the shelves. Several times I bought a book by my favorite philosopher, Bertrand Russell. Indeed, I read so much Bertrand Russell that friends called me “Bert.”

I particularly remember Russell’s book Why I Am Not a Christian. In that book, Russell asks, “If Jesus was as powerful and merciful as Christians believe, why, instead of simply healing a few lepers, did he not banish disease from the face of the earth?” To me, that seemed a knockdown argument.

Russell’s philosophy purported to base everything on logic and nothing on metaphysical assumptions. In one passage, he wrote:

" [Man’s] origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins -- all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand."

And, of course, Russell is not the only prominent thinker to embrace materialism. In our day, there has arisen a movement called “The New Atheists,” whose partisans loudly reject God and consider religion to be a poison. Perhaps the most prominent of this group is Richard Dawkins, a professor of biology at the University of Oxford. Consider what Dawkins says in his book The God Delusion: “There is almost certainly no God.” Belief in God, says Dawkins, is infantile, like faith in the Tooth Fairy or in Santa Claus, and can be described as a “virus of the mind.” Dawkins insists that the universe has “no design, no purpose, no evil, and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.” So it is not surprising that he maintains that “bringing up children within a religious tradition is a form of child abuse.”

Well then, shall we all just go home and resolve to stop abusing our children by raising them as Christians? What response can we give to the materialists? What justifies our faith?

We cannot prove that God exists by scientific experiment or by the pure reason of logical deduction. No, God can be realized only in the realms of human experience. Against Russell and the New Atheists, we believers maintain that God created mankind in his own image.[i] Does this mean that we are like God in form and physique? No, rather, it means that we are indwelt by the divine spirit. Yes, we have physical bodies subject to material laws. But as the Apostle Paul says, “Your body is the temple of the indwelling Holy Spirit and the Spirit is God’s gift to you.”[ii] We have something from God himself that actually dwells within us.

Jesus taught that “The Kingdom of God is within you.” It is possible to ignore or obscure this indwelling Spirit that is the deepest, truest part of us. But when we search for God with all our being, we discover the indwelling Spirit that is part and parcel of the divine. It is this Spirit that is the source of our faith. The wholehearted search for God ultimately leads the seeker to recognize that to doubt God’s existence or his goodness would be to deny the deepest and most real part of himself—the divine spirit within.

The prophet Jeremiah, speaking for God, said “When you call me and come and pray to me, I will give heed to you. You will search for me and find me, if only you seek me wholeheartedly.”[iii]

I know the reality of Jeremiah’s declaration from my personal experience. I was born into a Jewish family and was bar mitzvahed. In high school, under the influence of Bertrand Russell, I became an agnostic. Some years later, I discovered yoga, which presented a vision of spirituality and a spiritual path that appealed to me. I devoted myself to yoga and almost became a swami. But after several years, I came to realize that the yoga goal of attaining enlightenment by losing your individuality in the Absolute ocean of Being was an illusion. I left the yoga path and for several years did not think about ultimate things.

But in time, I became reawakened to the idea that, beneath the surface, there was a spiritual reality. I resolved to devote myself heart and soul to realizing this spiritual truth. When I did so, the Spirit within answered me. It gave me the assurance that my passion for seeking the truth and following it wherever it led had earned God’s favor. And shortly thereafter, the Spirit made Jesus known to my hungry soul.

Do we realize what a gift this Spirit is? It is nothing less than the will of God abroad in the universe. By aligning our will with God’s will, we can achieve the sublime and dynamic peace that passes all understanding, the peace that comes from our confidence that our career in time and eternity is wholly in the hands of an infinitely wise, powerful, and loving God. We can become like Paul who said, “I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else shall be able to separate us from the love of God.”[iv]

It is the divine presence within that enabled the Roman centurion to have such faith in Jesus.

This Spirit is also the inspiration for our aspirations to discern truth, experience beauty, and recognize and achieve goodness. God is not the psychological projection of our yearning for truth, beauty, and goodness. Rather God is the very source of the yearning for these supreme values.

Paul, in his letter to the Romans, tells us that “those who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God….When we cry, ‘Abba, Father,’ it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are God’s children….If we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.”[v] We can share Christ’s service. We can share his love. We can share his joy. And we can share his sonship with God the Father.

In the scripture passage from John, Jesus tells Nicodemus and us that if we are reborn of the Spirit, we will have eternal life. In John 20:17, the risen Jesus says, “I ascend to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God.”

So, my brothers and sisters, let us rejoice! We have been reborn, reborn by the spirit into eternal life! The Spirit has told us that we are God’s children, the children of the everlasting Father who loves each of us with an infinite love.

If we are reborn of the Spirit, we know with certainty that, of all facts, God is the most real; of all truths, God is the most alive; of all friends, God is the most loving; and of all values, God is the most Divine.

The Gods of Social Media | Collin Garbarino | First Things

Thu, 30 May 2013 17:03:29 GMT

This morning I tumbled down a rabbit hole of divinely inspired social media. I always knew that I could connect with friends and acquaintances through Facebook and Twitter, but I hadn’t considered using those platforms to strengthen my connection to God. As it turns out the Internet offers ample opportunities to reach the divine.

For those of you who haven’t figured it out yet, Facebook and Twitter are different genres. They’re both social media, but each has its own emphasis. Facebook helps you keep up with friends, while Twitter is the place for pithy commentary on the world. God obviously knows the difference between the two.

You can follow multiple Twitter accounts that claim to speak for God, and most of them tend to be fairly snarky. God attempts to tweet ironically, but unfortunately he’s not very funny. TheTweetOfGod tends to be a little cleverer and a lot angrier. He also seems to be very concerned with selling his snarky book. I’m not sure that TheTweetOfGod actually believes in himself. More than 500,000 people follow Jesus on Twitter, but I can’t figure out why. Though he attempts to be witty, his tweets don’t even make sense half the time.

Facebook’s divine presences tend to be kinder, gentler deities. The Gods of Facebook like posting cute pictures. GodQuotes doesn’t really post very many quotations from God, but he does upload numerous pictures of landscapes. Nothing says “God” like light breaking through the clouds. Sometimes he mixes it up and gives us a picture of a cute child or a puppy. Don’t just settle for “liking” GodQuotes because you won’t want to miss out on God’s official page. This Facebook page specializes in scary pictures of Jesus coupled with inspirational sayings. Speaking of Jesus, don’t forget to check out Jesus Daily. This page delivers just the right mix of sentimentality, humor, and guilt.

The Gods of Facebook tend to be a needy bunch. They shamelessly beg you to “like” all their kitsch. If you don’t “like” this picture then you’re not thanking God for love. Shame on you. But these Facebook pages are about more than liking to be liked. They also offer valuable opportunities. God’s Official Page and Jesus Daily both want you to get an online degree from Liberty University. Jesus Daily also hopes that you might pay for a program to get out of debt. Just to be clear, these aren’t Facebook ads; these are status updates containing affiliate links. Not that there’s anything wrong with affiliate links, but I’m just surprised that God needs the cash.

After looking at all this divine social media, I have a suspicion that God isn’t actually running these accounts. Why don’t the Gods of social media sound like the God of the Bible? The Gods of Twitter are flippant, ironic, and snarky, and their counterparts on Facebook are earnest, heartfelt, and saccharine. Their messages either conform to contemporary culture or exhibit empty emotivity. Might it be that we tend to make God in our own image? It seems that these accounts tell us nothing about the Lord our God, but they tell us a great deal about what our culture wishes he were like.

Is the US Selling Out the Middle East's Christians?

Fri, 10 May 2013 17:00:52 GMT

Elizabeth Prodromou, a former Vice Chair of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, or USCIRF, has some harsh words for the commission’s annual report, issued last month. Prodromou sharply criticizes USCIRF and the entire US foreign policy team for ignoring human rights violations endured by Orthodox Christians in the Middle East.

For example, Prodromou complains that neither the US Administration nor USCIRF (an independent agency) has issued a statement about the kidnapping in Syria last month, most likely by Islamists in the opposition, of two Orthodox bishops. The kidnapping of two bishops sends an ominous message to Syria’s Christians, and Prodromou is outraged that the US did not see fit to introduce a Security Council resolution condemning the kidnapping. Russia, she notes, did introduce such a resolution.

I share Prodromou’s outrage about what is happening to Christians in Syria, most of whom are Orthodox, and her frustration at the West’s lack of attention to the problem. (This lack of attention is nothing new; the last US administration seemed more or less indifferent to the plight of Iraq’s Christians). But I’m not sure that official American statements would help the situation. Perversely, official expressions of concern from the outside often increase the danger for Christians in the Middle East. When Pope Benedict spoke about the obvious mistreatment of Copts a while ago, for example, Egypt withdrew its Vatican ambassador in protest. Things have not improved for the Copts since.

Moreover, it’s not plain how much credibility US government statements have in Syria at the moment. The US has worked itself into a situation in which neither of the major players in the conflict, neither Assad nor the Islamists who dominate the opposition, have an incentive to listen to what the US says. I’m not suggesting the US and the West should ignore the plight of Syria’s Christians and leave them to their fate; not at all. I mean only that official statements, without the wherewithal to back them up, do little, and often backfire.

Prodromou is on firmer ground when she criticizes the USCIRF report’s about-face on Turkey. Last year’s USCIRF report declared Turkey a “country of particular concern,” or CPC, a designation that signified that Turkey had an especially problematic record on religious freedom. This year’s report upgrades Turkey’s status from a CPC to a country that merely warrants monitoring. But, Prodromou notes, there hasn’t been any appreciable improvement of the situation for Orthodox Christians (and other religious minorities) in Turkey over the last year:

By the USCIRF’s own report in 2013, Halki [a famous Greek Orthodox seminary] remains shuttered 42 years after its closing and 10-plus years into the Erdogan era; there has been no overhaul of the property rights regime used to economically disenfranchise the country’s Orthodox Christian citizens and strip Orthodox foundations of their lands, so that the USCIRF characterized random returns of property, as in the case of forest lands around Halki returned to the Ecumenical Patriarchate, as “commendable” but “not codified by law.” The 2013 USCIRF report also cited rising fear amongst Armenian Orthodox citizens of Turkey, because of hate crimes committed against members of their community, the most grotesquely emblematic case being that of an 84-year-old Armenian woman who was murdered in her Istanbul home with a cross carved into her chest. The Commission obliquely commented that the “Turkish local police promptly launched investigations into three cases, but it is not known if any arrests have been made connected to any of these incidents.”

It does seem very strange that a country could go from being a “country of particular concern” to one merely “worth watching” in the space of a year, especially a country with Turkey’s spotty religious-freedom record. In fact, four commissioners dissented from USCIRF’s decision, including current Vice Chair Mary Ann Glendon and Commissioner Robert P. George, both of whom are affiliated with First Things. USCIRF shouldn’t have named Turkey as a CPC in the first place, the dissenters wrote, but, having made that decision, USCIRF is now making the opposite mistake. “We believe that Turkey has not shown nearly enough improvement in addressing religious freedom violations over the past year to justify its promotion to the status of a country that is merely being monitored,” they explained. The dissenters would have placed Turkey in an intermediate category–among “Tier 2″ religious freedom violators, in the parlance of USCIRF.

You can read Prodromou’s entire post at http://www.archons.org/news/detail.asp?id=638.

Lost and Found

Fri, 10 May 2013 16:59:16 GMT

I once lost my car. I was living in Washington DC in an apartment. I had a car, but no garage or regular parking place, so I had to find parking on the street in a crowded neighborhood. There was no telling where I would find a space, and, of course, the location changed every day. As a rule, I was pretty good about remembering where I had parked, but one day, I did not see my car where I thought I had parked it.

I walked up and down the block, on both sides. I walked around the block and looked in all the places I usually parked, but no car. Finally, I gave up. I decided the car must have been stolen. So I walked to the nearest police station, about eight blocks away, to report a stolen car. And--guess what?—while walking to the police station, I stumbled upon my car! You can imagine how happy I was. I was sure that it was lost, but now it was found!

Today’s Gospel reading is the 15^th chapter from Luke. At the beginning of the chapter, we are told that tax collectors and sinners are drawn to Jesus. And Jesus ate with these sinners, thus incurring the criticism of the Pharisees and scribes. The religion of the Pharisees and scribes sought to avoid contact with those they deemed sinners in order that they not be defiled. But, as Jesus said, “The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.” [Luke 19:10] God is even “kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.” [Luke 6:35]

In response to the criticism of the Pharisees and the scribes, Jesus tells three parables about lostness. In the first parable, he tells of a shepherd who is missing one sheep from his flock of 100. The shepherd leaves the 99 sheep in their pen and goes searching for the one lost sheep. And he finds it! When he does, “he takes it joyfully on his shoulders and goes home to call his friends and neighbors, “Rejoice with me! I have found my lost sheep! In the same way, I tell you, there will be greater joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous people who do not need to repent.”

This parable teaches that God goes in search of those who are lost. The fact that we are lost only stimulates God’s desire to find and save us.

How many of you are shepherds? None? I thought so. But how many of you have had children? Ah, most of you. If you went to the mall one day with your children and somehow one got separated from you, would you say, “Oh, well, I still have my other children” or would you go searching for the missing child? Of course, you would search for the missing child. Every one of your children is precious and you will not let any be lost.

Then Jesus tells the parable of the lost coin. A woman who has 10 silver coins loses one, so she sweeps out the house and searches every nook and cranny—and she finds the missing coin. “And when she does, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says ‘rejoice with me! I have found the coin I lost.’” Jesus comments that “There is joy among the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” This story teaches that God searches diligently for those who are lost and rejoices when they are found.

In the parable of the lost sheep, the shepherd goes in search of a sheep who has accidentally gotten lost. In the next parable, the parable of the lost or prodigal son, the son deliberately separates himself from his father’s family, goes off to a far land, and wastes the inheritance that he asked the father for in advance.

But when the son comes to his senses and repents, he returns home in humility to ask that his father treat him like a hired servant. And what does he find? “When he was still a long way off, his father saw him and his heart went out to him. He ran to meet him, flung his arms around him and kissed him.” The father does not condemn or rebuke the son for his misdeeds, but simply rejoices that he has returned home. The father doesn’t even seem interested in his son’s confession—he cuts it off. Without any scolding, the father exults in the son’s return, clothing him in the finest robe and sandals, and putting a ring on his finger. He calls for a feast with the fatted calf and with joyous dancing.

But when the older son returns from his day working in the field and finds out what is happening, he becomes angry and refuses to go inside. And, note: the father pleads, yes pleads with him to come join the party. But the son refuses. He complains that he has always been a good, obedient son, yet the father never threw a feast so that he could celebrate with his friends. The elder son is stubborn and full of pride. He has trouble accepting his father’s answer, “My boy you are always with me and everything I have is yours. How could we fail to celebrate this happy day? Your brother here was dead and has come back to life. He was lost and has been found.”

The father in this parable is like the Father in heaven that Jesus revealed to us. At the center of Jesus’ gospel is the Father in heaven, who loves each of us with an infinite love. Jesus said, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” [Luke 12-32] Also, “Your heavenly Father knows what you need” [Matthew 6:32] and “The Father himself loves you.” [John 16:27] In the Gospel of John, after Jesus’ resurrection, he appears to Mary Magdalene and says, “Go to my brothers and tell them that I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” [John 20:17] So God the Father is not only the Father of Jesus, but he is the loving Father of each one of us. This is the Good News that Jesus proclaims, and, by faith, we can realize this saving truth. Thanks be to God!

"Religion and Public Life in America" | R. R. Reno

Thu, 09 May 2013 15:29:48 GMT

Religion and Public Life

in America

R. R. Reno

Editor, First Things

The following is adapted from a speech delivered on

February 20, 2013, at a Hillsdale College National Leadership

Seminar in Bonita Springs, Florida.

Religious Liberty is being redefined in America, or at least many would like it to be. Our secular establishment wants to reduce the autonomy of religious institutions and limit the influence of faith in the public square. The reason is not hard to grasp. In America, “religion” largely means Christianity, and today our secular culture views orthodox Christian churches as troublesome, retrograde, and reactionary forces. They’re seen as anti-science, anti-gay, and anti-women—which is to say anti-progress as the Left defines progress. Not surprisingly, then, the Left believes society will be best served if Christians are limited in their influence on public life. And in the short run this view is likely to succeed. There will be many arguments urging Christians to keep their religion strictly religious rather than “political.” And there won’t just be arguments; there will be laws as well. We’re in the midst of climate change—one that’s getting colder and colder toward religion.

Recent court cases and controversies suggest trends unfriendly to religion in public life. In 2005, a former teacher at Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School in Redford, Michigan, filed an employment lawsuit claiming discrimination based on disability. The school fired her for violating St. Paul’s teaching that Christians should not bring their disputes before secular judges. The subsequent lawsuit revolved around the question of whether a religious school could invoke a religious principle to justify firing an employee. The school said it could, drawing on a legal doctrine known as the ministerial exception, which allows religious institutions wide latitude in hiring and firing their religious leaders. It’s in the nature of legal arguments to be complex and multi-layered, but in this case the Obama administration’s lawyers made a shockingly blunt argument: Their brief claimed that there should be no ministerial exception.

The Supreme Court rejected this argument in a unanimous 9-0 vote. But it’s telling nonetheless that lawyers in the Justice Department wanted to eliminate this exception. Their argument was straightforward: Government needs to have broad powers to address the problem of discrimination—in this case disability—as well as other injustices. Conceding too much to religious institutions limits those powers. Why should the theological doctrines of the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, or of any other church, trump the legal doctrines of the United States when the important principle of nondiscrimination is at stake? It is an arresting question, to say the least—especially when we remember that the Left is currently pushing to add gay marriage to the list of civil rights.

Concerns about the autonomy of religious institutions are also at work in the Obama administration’s tussle with the Catholic Church and her religious allies over the mandate to provide free contraceptives, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs. After the initial public outcry, the administration announced a supposed compromise, which has been recently revised and re-proposed. The Obama administration allows that churches and organizations directly under the control of those churches are religious employers and can opt out of the morally controversial coverage. But religious colleges and charities are not and cannot. To them, the administration offers a so-called accommodation.

The details are complex, but a recent statement issued by Cardinal Dolan of New York identifies the key issue: Who counts as a religious employer? It’s a question closely related to the issue in the Hosanna-Tabor case, which asks who counts as a religious employee. Once again the Obama administration seeks a narrow definition, “accommodating” others in an act of lèse majesté, as it were. The Catholic Church and her allies want a broad definition that includes Catholic health care, Catholic universities, and Catholic charities. The Church knows that it cannot count on accommodations—after all, when various states such as Illinois passed laws allowing gay adoptions, they did not “accommodate” Catholic charities, but instead demanded compliance with principles of non-discrimination, forcing the Church to shut down her adoption agencies in those jurisdictions.

Cardinal Dolan’s statement went still further. For-profit companies are not religious in the way that Notre Dame University is religious. Nonetheless, the religious beliefs of those who own and run businesses in America should be accorded some protection. This idea the Obama administration flatly rejects. By their progressive way of thinking, economic life should be under the full and unlimited control of the federal government.

Religious liberty is undermined in a third and different way as well. For a long time, political theorists like John Rawls have argued that our laws must be based on so-called public reason, which is in fact an ambiguous, ill-defined concept that gives privileged status to liberalism. In 2010, Federal District Court Judge Vaughn Walker overturned Proposition 8—the ballot measure that reversed the California Supreme Court’s 2006 decision that homosexuals have a right to marry—citing the lack of a rational basis for thinking that only men and women can marry. “The evidence shows conclusively,” he wrote, “that Proposition 8 enacts, without reason, a private moral view that same-sex couples are inferior to opposite-sex couples.” He continues by observing that many supporters of Proposition 8 were motivated by their religious convictions, which—following Rawls—he presumes should not be allowed to govern public law.

This line of thinking is not unique to Judge Walker. The influence of Rawls has been extensive, leading to restrictions on the use of religious reasons or even religiously-influenced reasons in public debate. In striking down Texas sodomy laws, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy noted that moral censure of homosexuality has “been shaped by religious beliefs.” The idea seems to be that moral views historically supported by religion—which of course means all moral views other than modern secular ones—are constitutionally suspect.

Here we come to the unifying feature of contemporary challenges to religious freedom—the desire to limit the influence of religion over public life. In the world envisioned by Obama administration lawyers, churches will have freedom as “houses of worship,” but unless they accept the secular consensus they can’t inspire their adherents to form institutions to educate and serve society in accordance with the principles of their faith. Under a legal regime influenced by the concept of public reason, religious people are free to speak—but when their voices contradict the secular consensus, they’re not allowed into our legislative chambers or courtrooms.

Thus our present clashes over religious liberty. The Constitution protects religious liberty in two ways. First, it prohibits laws establishing a religion. This prevents the dominant religion from using the political power of majority rule to privilege its own doctrines to the disadvantage of others. Second, it prohibits laws that limit the free exercise of religion. What we’re seeing today is a secular liberalism that wants to expand the prohibition of establishment to silence articulate religious voices and disenfranchise religiously motivated voters, and at the same time to narrow the scope of free exercise so that the new secular morality can reign over American society unimpeded.

Rise of the Nones

This shift in legal thinking on the Left reflects underlying religious trends. As the religious character of our society changes, so do our assumptions about religious freedom. The main change has been the rise of the Nones. In the 1950s, around three percent of Americans checked the “none” box when asked about their religious affiliation. That number has grown, especially in the last decade, to 20 percent of the population. And Nones are heavily represented in elite culture. A great deal of higher education is dominated by Nones, as are important cultural institutions, the media, and Hollywood. They are conscious of their power, and they feel the momentum of their growth.

At the same time, the number of Americans who say they go to church every week has remained strikingly constant over the last 50 years, at around 35percent. Sociologists of religion think this self-reported number is higher than the actual one, which may be closer to 25 percent. In any event, the social reality is the same. As the Nones have emerged as a significant cohort, the committed core of religious people has not declined and in fact has become unified and increasingly battle tested. Protestants and Catholics alike know they’re up against an often hostile secular culture—and although a far smaller portion of the population, the same holds for Jews and Muslims as well.

These two trends—the rise of the Nones and the consolidation of the committed core of believers—have led to friction in public life. The Nones and religious Americans collide culturally and politically, not just theologically.

For a long time, the press has reported on the influence of religious voters, especially Evangelicals. Polling data shows that religiosity has become increasingly reliable as a predictor of political loyalties. But what’s far less commonly reported is that this goes both ways. In their recent book, American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, Robert Putnam and William Campbell focused on the practice of saying grace before meals as an indication of religious commitment and found a striking correlation. Seventy percent of those who never say grace before meals identify as Democrats, compared to slightly more than 20 percent who identify as Republicans. Nones are extremely ideological. Meanwhile, among those who say grace daily, 40 percent identify as Democrats and 50 percent as Republicans. Religious people are more diverse, but they trend to the political right, and the more religious they are the more likely they are to vote Republican.

Other data also suggests a growing divide between the irreligious and religious. A recent Pew study confirms that Nones are the single most ideologically committed cohort of white Americans, rivaled only by Evangelical Protestants. They overwhelmingly support abortion and gay marriage. Seventy-five percent of them voted for Barack Obama in 2008, and they played a decisive role in his victory in 2012. In Ohio, Obama lost the Protestant vote by three percent and the Catholic vote by eleven percent—and both numbers rise if we isolate Protestants and Catholics who say they go to church every week. But he won the Nones, who make up 12 percent of the electorate in Ohio, by an astounding 47 percent.

I think it’s fair to say that Obama ran a values campaign last fall that gambled that the Nones would cast the decisive votes. For the first time in American political history, the winning party deliberately attacked religion. Its national convention famously struck God from the platform, only to have it restored by anxious party leaders in a comical session characterized by the kind of frivolity that comes when people recognize that it doesn’t really matter. Democratic talking points included the “war on women” and other well-crafted slogans that rallied their base, the Nones, who at 24 percent of all Democrat and Democratic-leaning voters have become the single largest identifiable cohort in the liberal coalition.

This presents the deepest threat to religious liberty today. It’s not good when the most numerous and powerful constituency in the Democratic Party has no time for religion. This is all the more true when its ideology has the effect of encouraging the rest of the party to view religion—especially Christianity—as the enemy; and when law professors provide reasons why the Constitution doesn’t protect religious people.

Religious Liberty Under the Gun

From the end of the Civil War until the 1960s, the wealthiest, best educated, and most powerful Americans remained largely loyal to Christianity. That’s changed. There were warning signs. William F. Buckley, Jr. chronicled how Yale in the early ’50s could no longer support even the bland religiosity of liberal Protestantism. Today, Yale and other elite institutions can be relied upon to provide anti-Christian propaganda. Stephen Pinker and Stephen Greenblatt at Harvard publish books

that show how Christianity pretty much ruins everything, as Christopher Hitchens put it so bluntly. The major presses publish book after book by scholars like Elaine Pagels at Princeton, who argues that Christianity is for the most part an invention of power hungry bishops who suppressed the genuine diversity and spiritual richness of early followers of Jesus.

One can dispute the accuracy of the books, articles, and lectures of these and other authors. This is necessary, but unlikely to be effective. Experts savaged Greenblatt’s book on Lucretius, The Swerve, but it won the National Book Award for non-fiction. That’s not an accident. Greenblatt and others at elite universities are serving an important ideological purpose by using their academic authority to discredit Christianity, whose adherents are obstacles not only to abortion and gay

rights, but to medical research unrestricted by moral concerns about the use of fetal tissue, to new reproductive technologies, to doctor-assisted suicide, and in general to liquefying traditional moral limits so that they can be reconstructed according to the desires of the Nones. Books by these elite academics reassure the Nones and their fellow travelers that they are not opposed to anything good or even respectable, but rather to historic forms of oppression, ignorance, and prejudice.

I cannot overstate the importance of these ideological attacks on Christianity. Our Constitution accords us rights, and the courts cannot void these rights willy-nilly. But history shows that the Constitution is a plastic document. When our elite culture thinks something is bad for society as a whole, judges find ways to suppress it. The First Amendment offered no protection to Bob Jones University, which lost its tax-exempt status because of a policy that prohibited inter-racial dating. As the Supreme Court majority in 1983 wrote in that case: “Government has a fundamental, overriding interest in eradicating racial discrimination in education . . . which substantially outweighs whatever burden denial of tax benefits places on [the University’s] exercise of their religious beliefs.”

In recent years the Supreme Court has been largely solicitous of religious freedom, sensing perhaps that our cultural conflicts over religion and morality need to be kept within bounds. But the law professors are preparing the way for changes. Martha Nussbaum, who teaches at the University of Chicago Law School, has opined that the colleges and universities run by Catholic religious orders that require their presidents or other leaders to be members of the order should lose their tax exempt status, because they discriminate against women. She allows that current interpretations of the First Amendment don’t support her view, but that’s not much comfort. All Nussbaum is doing is applying the logic of the Bob Jones case to the feminist project of eradicating discrimination based on sex.

Former Georgetown law professor Chai Feldblum—who is also a current Obama appointee to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission—has written about the coming conflicts between gay rights and religious liberty. With an admirable frankness she admits, “I’m having a hard time coming up with any case in which religious liberty should win.” Again, the Bob Jones case is in the background, as are other aspects of civil rights law designed to stamp out racial discrimination. For someone like Feldblum, when religious individuals and institutions don’t conform to the new consensus about sexual morality, their freedoms should be limited.

It is precisely the possibilities evoked by Nussbaum and Feldblum that now motivate the Obama administration’s intransigence about allowing places like Notre Dame to be classified as religious employers. In the Bob Jones case, the justices were very careful to stipulate that “churches or other purely religious institutions” remain protected by the First Amendment’s principle of free exercise. By “accommodating” rather than counting Notre Dame and other educational and charitable organizations as religious employers, secular liberalism can target them in the future, as they have done to Catholic adoption agencies that won’t place children with homosexual couples. A recent book by University of Chicago professor of philosophy and law Brian Leiter outlines what I believe will become the theoretical consensus that does away with religious liberty in spirit if not in letter. “There is no principled reason,” he writes, “for legal or constitutional regimes to single out religion for protection.” Leiter describes religious belief as a uniquely bad combination of moral fervor and mental blindness, serving no public good that justifies special protection. More significantly—and this is Leiter’s main thesis—it is patently unfair to afford religion such protection. Why should a Catholic or a Baptist have a special right while Peter Singer, a committed utilitarian, does not? Evoking the principle of fairness, Leiter argues that everybody’s conscience should be accorded the same legal protections. Thus he proposes to replace religious liberty with a plenary “liberty of conscience.”

Leiter’s argument is libertarian. He wants to get the government out of the business of deciding whose conscience is worth protecting. This mentality seems to expand freedom, but that’s an illusion. In practice it will lead to diminished freedom, as is always the case with any thoroughgoing libertarianism.

Let me give an example. The urban high school my son attended strictly prohibits hats and headgear. It does so in order to keep gang-related symbols and regalia out of the school. However, the school recognizes a special right of religious freedom, and my son, whose mother is Jewish and who was raised as a Jew, was permitted to wear a yarmulke. Leiter’s argument prohibits this special right, but his alternative is unworkable. The gang members could claim that their deep commitments of loyalty to each other create a conscientious duty to wear gang regalia. If everybody’s conscience must be respected, then nobody’s will be, for order and safety must be preserved.

* * *

The Arabic word dhimmi means non-Muslim. Under Muslim rule, non-Muslims were allowed to survive only insofar as they accepted Muslim dominance. Our times are not those times, and the secularism of the Nones is not Islam. Nevertheless, I think many powerful forces in America would like to impose a soft but real dhimmitude. The liberal and Libertarian Nones will quarrel, as do the the Shi’a and Sunni, but they will, I think, largely unify against the public influence of religion.

What can be done to prevent them from succeeding?

First and most obvious—defend religious liberty in the courts. Although I have depicted deep cultural pressures that work against religious liberty, we live in a society governed by the rule of law. Precedent matters, and good lawyering can make a substantive difference.

Second—fight against the emerging legal theories that threaten to undermine religious liberty. This is a battle to be carried out in the law schools and among political theorists. For decades, legal activists on the Left have been subsidized by legal clinics and special programs run in law schools. Defenders of religious liberty need to push back.

Third—fight the cultural battle. Legal theory flexes and bends in accord with the dominant consensus. This Brian Leiter knows, which is why he does not much worry about the current state of constitutional law. He goes directly to the underlying issues, which concern the role of religion in public life.

We must meet the challenge by showing that religion is indeed special. Religious people are the most likely Americans to be involved in civic life, and the most generous in their charitable contributions. This needs to be highlighted again and again. Moreover, we need to draw a contrast with the Nones, who tend to outsource their civic responsibilities and charitable obligations to government in the form of expanded government programs and higher taxes.

There is another, deeper argument that must be made in defense of religion: It is the most secure guarantee of freedom. America’s Founders, some of them Christian and others not, agreed as a matter of principle that the law of God trumps the law of men. This has obvious political implications: The Declaration of Independence appeals to the unalienable rights given by our Creator that cannot be overridden or taken away. In this sense, religion is especially beneficial. As Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI both emphasized, it gives transcendent substance to the rights of man that limit government. Put somewhat differently, religion gives us a place to

stand outside politics, and without it we’re vulnerable to a system in which the state defines everything, which is the essence of tyranny. This is why gay marriage, which is sold as an expansion of freedom, is in fact a profound threat to liberty.

Finally, we must not accept a mentality of dhimmitude. The church, synagogue, and mosque have a tremendous solidity born of a communion of wills fused together in obedience to God. This gives people of faith the ability to fight with white fury for what they perceive to be a divine cause, which is of course a great force for righteousness—but also a dangerous threat to social peace, as early modern Europe knew only too well.

In conclusion, I want to focus not on fury but on the remarkable capacity for communities of faith to endure. My wife’s ancestors lived for generations in the contested borderlands of Poland and Russia. As Jews they were tremendously vulnerable, and yet through their children and their children’s children they endured in spite of discrimination, violence, and attempted genocide. Where now, I ask, are the Russian and Polish aristocrats who dominated them for centuries? Where now is the Thousand Year Reich? Where now is the Soviet worker’s paradise? They have gone to dust. The Torah is still read in the synagogue.

The same holds for Christianity. The Church did not need constitutional protections in order to take root in a hostile pagan culture two thousand years ago.

Right now the Nones seem to have the upper hand in America. But what seems powerful is not always so. If I had to bet on Harvard or the Catholic Church, Yale or the Mennonites in Goshen, Indiana, the New York Times or yeshivas in Brooklyn, I wouldn’t hesitate. Over the long haul, religious faith has proven itself the most powerful and enduring force in human history.

Review of two books by Harry Emerson Fosdick, by Berosus Vendidad

Sun, 31 Mar 2013 15:27:13 GMT

These books are collections of sermons from early and late in the career of possibly the most influential liberal churchman in American history. Histories of religious thought in America often speak of a decline in the influence of liberal theology following World War I and/or following the Great Depression, but this preacher had a radio program that was heard nationwide for decades during and after the Depression.

Fosdick was a Baptist who happened to be hired by New York’s First Presbyterian Church and became well known as a preacher and writer there, from 1918 to 1924. He is credited with having coined the term “fundamentalism,” and waged a very public battle with it in the 1920s (The Living of These Days: An Autobiography [Harper, 1956] 144&ndasndash;76). Asked by the Presbyterian General Assembly to pledge his acceptance of Presbyterian creed, he resigned his post, writing that such “creedal subscription” was “dangerous” to individual integrity (Living, 172). He went on to an even more prominent position at the non-denominational Riverside Church in Manhattan, where he preached until 1946. He also taught at Union Theological Seminary. His books were read by millions, but he was most well-known for his program on NBC radio for 19 years.

The sermons collected in these books are persuasive, accessible, and moving. Fosdick brings out essential aspects of the gospel without being pedantic, and speaks of Christian character without becoming moralistic. If “liberal” means an emphasis on growth, experience, and the responsible use of freedom, then Fosdick’s liberalism is clear from beginning to end. The first sermon, “Adventurous Religion,” identifies the gospel as a way of living, not a doctrinal system. “Discipleship was a costly spiritual exploit [that] required insight and bravery” (Adventurous, 2). Over time, faith “was increasingly drained of its vital elements” and turned into creeds and institutions “awaiting only the credence of the faithful” (3-4). Removal of creativity from the spiritual life is fatal, and a reformation is needed every time it happens. The religion of Jesus is not about passive acceptance.

“Moral Autonomy or Downfall” affirms the values of inward thoughtfulness and responsibility. Our problem, in America, is not our lack of science, technology, or external structures, but a lack of good inner direction and self-control. This problem is made worse by a materialism that tells us we are mere collections of atoms, “mechanically determined” (27). Fosdick could be speaking to our own generation when he says that churches need to counter this depressing belief with “the internal world, with its possibilities of goodness, truth, and beauty,” and take seriously “the vital needs of their generation” (28-29).

The essay “I Believe in Man” effectively makes the point that what got Jesus in trouble was not his belief in God (his enemies had that) but his belief in humanity, his “seeing people in terms of their possibilities” (34). Fosdick takes this to a new level, arguing that “this attitude of Jesus . . . is one of the major springs of Western democracy,” as it affirms the potential of ordinary people (35). Such connections are not argued systematically, but this is a book of sermons, not an academic work, and it works here. Fosdick assumes an intelligent reader who can follow his occasional leaps.

Science and religion is the subject of several sermons. Fosdick’s father had no difficulty believing in evolution (107), and Fosdick refuses to believe that “evolution crowds out God” (123). God may work through “slow gradation” (126). The advances of science do not replace religion’s uniqueness, its “warm confidence that something abides forever, grows and bears fruit” (182).

Liberalism and modernism are the themes of the last third of the book. Religious liberalism will only thrive through a “deepening of the spiritual life” and by clarifying what it affirms, not what it denies (240). Modernism arose as a critique, but to abide “it must pass through protest to production” (273–74). The last two sermons are on modern religious leadership and reformation. “The Master’s spirit has not divided Christians” though theories about him have (326).

The later book affirms the same values, but deals with complexities more deeply. “A Religion That Really Gets Us” returns to the dichotomy of creedalism and lived religion, but this time he gives creeds and institutions their due. They provide “some steady truth” in “a chaotic society” (What Is Vital, 56). Further, conservative religion affirms transcendent realities and can speak against those who would reduce man to a thing, as did the Bishop of Berlin against the “terrible creed” of Nazism (58). Fosdick argues that the battle against tyranny is also a battle against mechanistic philosophy, to which Christianity answers “man is the child of the Eternal Spirit,” and so “love is the law of life” (63). There is such a thing as objective religious truth, and it does not imprison the mind, any more than does scientific truth (64).

The next two sermons stress that honesty of character is essential; belief is not enough; “only the pure in heart can see God” (70). Even honest doubt and inquiry are valuable: “the sturdiest faith has always come out of the struggle with doubt” (91).

“Conservative and Liberal Temperaments in Religion” brilliantly uses the ark of the covenant as an illustration of the tendency to over-value symbols. Joshua thought God dwelt in the ark of the covenant, but Jeremiah was more advanced when he said we no longer need the ark nor even its memory (75). Differing views of the ark simply cannot be “iron[ed] out to one level” (77). There is such a thing as progress in religion. We all have an ark, a “special doctrine [or] ritual, some special theory of the Atonement” that acts like a fetish for us (83). This is not despicable, since genuine faith is involved. The symbols are like trellises around which our faith has grown. Liberalism makes a big mistake when it wants to smash all arks, because it will also be smashing the faith that has grown up around them. Some liberalism would cleanse religion with an acid that eats away religion itself, but we need a cleanser that does not destroy (84).

Fosdick remains liberal in the 1955 collection (progress is still necessary), but he has come to respect conservative instincts. He notices that “we Christians are separated by our creeds and rituals but are united by our prayers and hymns” (86), and gives examples from Unitarian, Catholic, and Quaker hymns.

The intriguing title “The Danger of Going to Church” pays off with an indictment of mind-numbing types of religion. Worship may give needed peace, but “it is not a lullaby. . . . I want some ethical consequences from our worship” (138). Instead, we often get a focus on appearances, adoration of popular preachers, or sectarian snobbery (135). It is religious people in Nazareth who are ready to kill Jesus after he speaks of God’s grace toward “Syrians and Sidonians” (134), and it is the religious who hurry by without helping the wounded, in the Good Samaritan story.

In “A Religion to Support Democracy” Fosdick returns to an earlier theme, but with a sobered awareness that “democracy stands now in critical peril” (199). Democracy depends upon the continuous renewal of certain spiritual factors; its enemy is not external, but an internal loss of certain “ideas and qualities,” the loss of “a religion that dignifies personality” (200). Democracy “trusts people with freedom to think,” and utters the revolutionary view “that the state exists primarily for the sake of persons,” not vice versa, but Jesus had first established the principle that “it is not the will of your Father that one of these little ones should perish” (201). Jesus is one of our essential sources for the valuation of persons: “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath”; Fosdick says “our democracy has sprung from two main sources: early Greek experiments with popular government and Christ’s emphasis on the worth of persons” (202). Democracy is not simply the rule of the majority, which can also happen in a dictatorship, but is rather the respect for minorities, which one does not see in communist or fascist states (204). But democracy is in danger when character and public-spiritedness are in decline (209).

The next sermon states that the mature are those who begin to build—and are able to finish (215). But this can then lead to “The Temptations of Maturity”—complacency and pride (216). On the other side there is the temptation of sad bitterness (218). What is the secret of staying power, of sustained dignity?—“Creative faith” (219).

Finally, in “Faith and Immortality.” Fosdick argues that immortality is an inseparable part of the gospel. “Many cannot believe it” because they do not accept the Christian philosophy itself (222–24), which asserts that life is about always finding more truth, more goodness, and especially more love; we do not have a “God of unfinished business” (229–30). “Without faith in immortality, a closed door is the ultimate symbol of this universe” (231).

This review may seem, to some readers, to be too full of quotes, but surely a good sermon inspires thought as well as faith, and this was the best way to show that these sermons do both. Whether first uttered 55 or 85 years ago, these sermons still possess that power. Stimulated by their logic and their passion, I found myself imagining my own ways of elaborating these truths.

BOMFOG, or brotherhood of man, fatherhood of God, from "The New Language of Politics," by William Safire

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 15:23:40 GMT

From The New Language of Politics, by William Safire, Random House, 1968

BOMFOG:

A high-sounding, glittering generality.

The Word comes from reporters’ shorthand covering Governor Nelson Rockefeller’s speeches in his 1964 campaign against Barry Goldwater in the New Hampshire primary, which resulted in an upset victory in New Hampshire for Henry Cabot Lodge.

Nancy Shea, of Governor Rockefeller’s staff, informs the author:

Bomfog was originated by Hy Sheffer who as at one time the Governor’s stenotypist. Hy told me he started using it in the late 1959-60 national effort. Since the Governor used the phrase “the brotherhood of man under the fatherhood of God,” so often, Hy began to simplify it on the stenotype machine. Bomfog took only two strokes on the machine compared to several more strokes for the whole phrase. The reporters traveling with the Governor’s party picked it up and made it famous.

“Brotherhood of man, fatherhood of God.” is part of the Rockefeller family credo, a speech by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., etched in marble near the statue of Prometheus in New York’s Rockefeller Center: “These are the principles upon which alone a new world recognizing the brotherhood of man and the fatherhood of God can be established.”

The initials had an appeal as a political word because it seemed to combine “bombast” with “fog,” or amorphous oratory. So fat, its use has been limited to critics of Nelson Rockefeller.

Lent, Attention, and Invisible Gorillas

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 16:17:48 GMT

In attempting to better understand the nature of focus and attention, a group of researchers showed test subjects a video of a half dozen students, differentiated by shirt color (half wearing white shirts, the other half black shirts) passing basketballs back and forth while weaving in and out of a circle, and asked the test subjects to count the times a white-shirted player passed the ball.

In the midst of all the ball-passing, a man in a gorilla suit saunters into the middle of the circle, mugs for the camera, beats his chest, and ambles off. Fully half of the test subjects are so focused on counting the number of passes that they do not even notice the gorilla.

Earlier this week, NPR reported on a related study, where attention researchers at Harvard Medical School asked a cohort of well-trained radiologists &ndashndash; people capable of detecting the most minute signs of cancer -- to review various slides of lungs for cancer nodules. Superimposed upon the slides in the upper right hand corner was an image of a large man in a gorilla suit angrily shaking his fist.

Fully 83% of the radiologists entirely missed the gorilla.

How is this possible? The researchers concluded that by focusing on the search for one thing – in this case, cancer nodules – the brain had effectively framed one’s vision, and filtered out the appearance of the extraordinary: “they look right at it, but because they’re not looking for a gorilla, they don’t see that it’s a gorilla."

NPR’s Alix Speigel concluded: “In other words, what we’re thinking about – what we’re focused on – filters the world around us so aggressively that it literally shapes what we see.”

It is an extraordinary insight, with application not only for radiologists, but for all of us who wish to see clearly: what we focus on shapes what, how, and whether we see. Our attention shapes our understanding of our lives, relationships, and reality.

Which brings us to Lent. Part of the discipline of Lent is to turn our focus away from our appetites and ambitions to the contemplation of our limits and mortality, our need for God, and His sacrifice for us.

In a cultural climate where it is all too easy to be distracted by entertaining trivialities, or fixated on self-advancement, Lent offers a reality check.

In the commemoration of this Ash Wednesday, we’re forced to acknowledge our own inevitable death. In recognizing the limits of our capacity, we can more fully see the wonder of God’s power and work all around us. In silence, we may hear His voice more clearly. In solitude, we may better discern His presence. In changing our focus, Lent offers the opportunity to see anew the extraordinary and divine Love that has been right in front of us all along.

Warmly,

Cherie Harder
President

Recommended Readings:

* Alix Spiegel, “Why Even Radiologists Can Miss a Gorilla Hiding in Plain Sight,” National Public Radio, Morning Edition, February 11, 2013: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/02/11/171409656/ why-even-radiologists-can-miss-a-gorilla-hiding-in-plain-sight

* Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons, The Invisible Gorilla: How Our Intuitions Deceive Us, Crown Publishing Group, 2011. (You can take the “selective attention test” here: http://www.theinvisiblegorilla.com/videos.html)

* Curt Thompson, Anatomy of the Soul, SaltRiver Publishers, 2010.

* Ruth Haley Barton, Invitation to Solitude and Silence, IVP Books, 2004.

* Simone Weil, “Wrestling with God,” The Trinity Forum Reading, 2008.

Melchizedek in Ancient Texts, by Berosus Vendidad

Fri, 08 Feb 2013 16:13:44 GMT

Melchizedek is an intriguing, infrequent, yet important figure in a number of different, but related, bodies of literature: the Old Testament, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Jewish Pseudepigrapha, the New Testament, and in the Nag Hammadi library.

I must give some brief definitions of terms here, so that the reader is not in the dark about the subject matter here. For a deeper understanding of this subject, the reader will need to invest the time and effort to delve into biblical scholarship, which is a vast and challenging area of study. Hopefully this article will stimulate interest in researching our spiritual heritage.

Much of this literature is eschatological. This term refers to “end-times things.” Some common eschatological themes include a final battle between good and evil, divine intervention on earth, a judgment (either earthly or pertaining to the afterlife), and the destruction of the wicked. One must be cautious in reading these documents, not assuming that all these themes are present or that all these documents teach the same things, since they do not.

The Bodies of Literature

Old Testament (hereafter, OT) is a Christian term, since it implies the existence of a New Testament (abbreviated NT). Hebrew Bible (HB) is the Jewish term for this same body of literature. Actually the Roman Catholic OT includes some books not in the Jewish HB and the Protestant OT—books preserved in Greek but not in Hebrew and Aramaic. This detail, while interesting, does not concern us here.

The Dead Sea Scrolls (abbreviated DSS) are a 20^th century discovery of Jewish scrolls dating from the second and first centuries B.C. (or B.C.E., “before the Common Era”) and the first century A.D. (or C.E.). This was probably the library of the Essene sect of Judaism, and contains many books of the bible (in fact, the oldest biblical manuscripts in existence), some translations of the Bible into Aramaic, commentaries on Biblical books, rules and instructions for life in this particular community, and some eschatological works, one of which is called 11Q Melchizedek (having been found in Cave number 11Q). Many of these works were new discoveries for modern scholarship, having been lost to the world when the Essenes buried them during the Jewish War against Rome.

I will also take a look at some Jewish Pseudepigrapha: nonbiblical writings attributed to a biblical character, such as the Books of Enoch. Actually I will only look at Second Enoch, far less significant in most ways than the earlier book, First Enoch, parts of which date back to the third century B.C. First Enoch is the one Jesus read. (UB 126:3.6-8).

The Nag Hammadi codices (“books”: having a bound spine) are another extraordinary rediscovery of ancient literature, mostly Christian and/or Gnostic, including unorthodox “gospels” mostly composed in the third and fourth centuries, as well as highly symbolic and obscure mythological texts, and some Platonistic wisdom literature. Gnosticism was a religious trend more than a religion, as such. Gnostics were anti-traditional, cosmopolitan intellectuals who believed they had access to secret wisdom, of which ordinary Jews and Christians were ignorant. Gnostic trends were very widespread in the Hellenistic world, and they penetrated deeply into early Christianity. Gnosticism was attacked by some orthodox thinkers but remained intertwined with Christianity until it began to be edged out (and edged itself out, with its increasingly hostile, anti-biblical formulations) in the third to fifth centuries. These books were buried in the Egyptian desert in the fifth century, when the monks who read them realized that they were liable to get in trouble for possessing such books. The Nag Hammadi Library is also referred to as the Coptic Gnostic Library (CGL).

The Melchizedek Passages

OT

Now we can begin to look at the occurrence of the Melchizedek character in these various bodies of literature. Melchizedek appears in only in only three places in the whole Bible, but the passages are suggestive and influential beyond their number. Melchizedek occurs in two chapters of the OT, in Genesis 14 and Psalm 110.

Melchizedek of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was priest of God Most High. He blessed him and said, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!” (Genesis 14:18-20 NRSV)

The LORD says to my lord, “sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.” . . . The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” . . . He will shatter heads over the wide earth. Psalm 110:1, 4, 6

This is a royal psalm, and so is being used to support the power of the Davidic dynasty. Head-shattering is a common theme in this nationalistic ideology that becomes dominant in Israel (such politicization happens in virtually all religions). Melchizedek is here being drawn into political ideology, but remains an enigmatic figure, more than just “king of righteousness,” as his name suggests, in Hebrew. He is a special figure, but the Bible does not spell it how or why he is special.

NT

The Epistle to the Hebrews is the one place in the NT where Melchizedek is mentioned. This letter brings in sacrificial themes, and so eventually came to be considered a Pauline letter by some parts of the ancient and by much of our contemporary church, but not so considered by scholars, since its anonymous author uses a much more educated and showy style of Greek than occurs in Paul’s letters. Hebrews does mention Melchizedek repeatedly, and builds part of its argument on the legitimacy of Melchizedek’s priesthood, and yet Melchizedek’s status remains as mysterious as in the OT. Of course, the focus in Hebrews is not on Melchizedek, but on the Messiah.

“You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.” In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications . . . . Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. Hebrews 5:6-8

Without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever. See how great he is! Even Abraham the patriarch gave him a tenth of the spoils. Heb 7:3-4

Hebrews is the only book in the NT that bases its Christology on the idea of Christ as the new high priest, but he cannot picture Christ as a Levitical priest, since Christ came from the tribe of Judah, not Levi (7:14). So he utilizes the Melchizedek priesthood, which is earlier and (according to Hebrews) higher than Levi’s priesthood: “the inferior is blessed by the superior”; and “perfection” was not “attainable through the levitical priesthood” (Heb 7:7, 11). He can make a virtue out of the absence of a lineage for this semi-divine figure, Melchizedek, who was a priest “not through a legal requirement concerning physical descent, but through the power of an indestructible life” (7:16). With Melchizedek, he has the suggestion of a heavenly priest, and he certainly sees Jesus that way: “we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens” (8:1), one who accomplishes a heavenly cleansing through his earthly death.

One thing for us to notice in these different literary occurrences is how thoroughly contextual these meanings are. Genesis 14 and Psalm 110 highlight Melchizedek’s religious status, which implies a high status for Abraham, who receives a blessing from Melchizedek after his (Abraham’s) military victory. Hebrews highlights Melchizedek’s non-genetic and independent priestly status, his “forever” status, and his heavenly status (probably derived from his sitting at God’s right hand in Ps 110:1).

DSS

When we see Melchizedek in the DSS, it is as a heavenly and eschatological figure, perhaps a heavenly priest, but more concerned with military than with liturgical matters:

In this year of jubilee . . . every creditor shall remit the claim that is held against a neighbor [Deut 15:1-2] . . . . It applies to the Last Days and concerns the captives . . . . Melchizedek will return to them what is rightfully theirs. . . . releasing them from the debt of all their sins. 11QMelchizedek 2:2-6[1]

This is the time decreed for “the year of Melchizedek’s favor” [Isa 61:2], and by his might he will judge God’s holy ones and so establish a righteous kingdom, as it is written about him in the Songs of David, “A godlike being has taken his place in the council of God; in the midst of the divine beings he holds judgment” [Ps 82:1]. Scripture also says about him. . . “Take your seat in the highest heaven; A divine judge will judge the people” [Ps 7] . . . . Melchizedek will thoroughly prosecute the vengeance required by God’s statutes. Also, he will deliver all the captives from the power of Belial, and from the power of all the spirits . . . Allied with him will be all the “righteous divine beings.” 11QMelchizedek 2:9-11, 13-4

OT passages that speak of God are here made to speak of Melchizedek. And again:

“Your divine being reigns” [Isa 52:7] . . . . “Your di[vi]ne being” is [Melchizedek, who will del]iv[er them from the po]wer of Belial. 11QMelch 2:16, 24-25[2]

This document pictures Melchizedek playing an eschatological (“end-times”) role, fighting and defeating Belial, a devil figure.[3]

Other scholars have noticed a remarkable similarity between the role played by Melchizedek in this document, and the role of Michael in another document, the War Rule:

Melchizedek is clearly understood as a heavenly redeemer figure . . . . and judge on God’s behalf. . . . The role attributed to Melchizedek in 11QMelch is very similar to that of Michael . . . . [Both play the role of] heavenly warrior.[4]

Michael fights Belial or a dragon in the War Rule and in Revelation, while Melchizedek fights Belial or a similar enemy in the DSS and Nag Ham.[5]

Jewish Pseudepigrapha

Second Enoch is a strange first century (C.E.) Jewish work, which includes God telling a holy man:

I will establish him so that he will be the head of the priests of the future. . . . Melkisedek will be the head of the 13 priests who existed before. And afterward, in the last generation, there will be another Melkisedek, the first of 12 priests. 2 En. 71:29,33-34[6]

This highly garbled passage is the best evidence for a human tradition about the twelve Melchizedek receivers who took over planetary watchcare after the rebellion. Do not expect any real cosmic understanding or clarity, however, in Second Enoch. This is typical of most human traditions about events connected with the first three epochal revelations. Some human being, evidently, had some cosmic knowledge, but as he or she told the story, the hearers assimilated the information to their already-existing stories and mythologies.

CGL

Melchizedek is a badly damaged Christian Gnostic text, with the confusing cosmology that is typical of Gnostic texts. This passage seems to be about Melchizedek’s heavenly status:

He is from the race of the High Priest which is above thousands and thousands and myriads of myriads . . . . The adverse spirits are ignorant of him and of their own destruction.
Melchizedek 6:16-22[7]

Here we see the typical Gnostic theme of evil powers (usually called “archons”) who oppress humanity, but who are ignorant of the powers that are above themselves.

[I, Melchizedek] . . . . have offered up myself to you as a sacrifice, together with those that are mine, to you yourself, (O) Father of the All, and (to) those things which you love, which have come forth from you . . . even the [perfect] laws. I shall pronounce my name as I receive baptism. Melchizedek 14:17; 16:7-14

This seems to express the idea of Melchizedek offering a symbolic sacrifice, and this was probably re-enacted in a Gnostic ritual.

[Holy are you, Mother of the] aeon(s), Barbelo . . . . Holy are you, [First-]born of the aeons, Doxomedon . . . . [Holy are you], Commander, luminary [. . .] Oriael. . . [Holy are you], Man-of-Light . . . . [Holy are you], Commander-in-chief . . . Jesus Christ . . . . Be [strong, O Melchizedek] . . . [they] made war . . . they did not prevail over you. Melchizedek 16:25–17:16; 18:4-6; 26:2-7

Gnosticism is famous for such lists of aeons (gods) and spirits. Further, “Commander-in-chief” is one of the titles given to Michael in some ancient rabbinic documents.[8]

Finally, there was a group of Jewish Christians who were called Melchizedekians by their opponents. We know very little about them, except what we learn from one church father’s (Epiphanius of Salamis) attack on them, which probably contains distortions. He says they consider Melchizedek to be a greater power than Christ.[9]

The superior cosmology of the UB is obvious, yet we cannot help but notice some broad similarity in the following areas: in the UB, as in these other literatures, Melchizedek is a unique religious leader and plays an eschatological role. Let us start with the UB's unique remark about (one) Melchizedek’ role in fostering the prophets, then move on to UB eschatology.

Machiventa Melchizedek continued to take a great interest in the affairs of the descendants of….Abraham….This same Melchizedek continued to collaborate throughout the nineteen succeeding centuries with the many prophets and seers.93:10.3-4 [Foundation ed. 1024D]

Recent rulings handed down from the Most Highs of Edentia, and later confirmed by the Ancients of Days of Uversa, strongly suggest that this bestowal Melchizedek is destined to take the place of the fallen Planetary Prince. 93:10.6 [1025:2]

These 24 Urantia counselors….will no doubt continue to serve in their present capacities until some change in planetary status ensues, such as the end of a dispensation, the assumption of full authority by Machiventa Melchizedek….114:2.6 [1252:4]

Note the over-abundance of revelation regarding Melchizedek. They tell us almost as much as they know.

Machiventa….[has] been elevated to the position of personal ambassador on Jerusem of the Creator Son, bearing the title Vicegerent Planetary Prince of Urantia….forever a planetary minister representing Christ Michael. 93:10.5 [UF 1025A]

Notice how they deliberately echo the “forever” of Heb 5:6; 6:20; 7:17, although they now refer to Melchizedek himself, not to Jesus.

My summarizing remarks concern the evident importance of the tradition about Melchizedek. It seems that Melchizedek is a name that needed to be preserved in evolutionary religion, no matter how fragmentarily, because he will rule this world one day.

Both the UB and our religious traditions affirm the seriousness of the human predicament, and the surety of the eventual triumph of goodness, with Melchizedek playing some key role in that. This is a remarkable point of similarity. Of course, to understand what the UB says about Melchizedek, one needs to understand the UB's cosmology, yet even our garbled human traditions were able to preserve some truth about Melchizedek, who is “a godlike being in the council of God,” and, “allied with him will be all the ‘righteous divine beings’” (11QMelchizedek 2:10, 14).[10] As for humans, “they are receiving from [you] yourself, O [Melchizedek], Holy One…the perfect hope” (Melchizedek 5:15-16).[11]

William Gladden on the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:11:28 GMT

"If God is the Father of all men, all men are brethren; and there can be but one law for home and school and shop and factory and market and court and legislative hall. One child of the common Father can not enslave another nor exploit another; the strong and the fortunate and the wise can not take advantage of the weak and the crippled and the ignorant, and enrich themselves by spoiling their neighbors; each must care for the welfare of all, and all must minister to the good of each. This is the law of brotherhood which directly follows from Christ’s doctrine of Fatherhood, and which is beginning to be seriously considered, all over the world, as the only solution of the problems of society."

William Gladden on the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:06:42 GMT

“Divine Fatherhood and human brotherhood” cited at the World’s Parliament of Religions, 1893

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:03:44 GMT

John Henry Barrows, a Presbyterian minister, was chairman of the General Committee on the World’s Parliament of Religions, which convened in Chicago on September 11, 1893. In his “Words of Welcome” to the Parliament, Barrows said,

“If anything great and worthy is to be the outcome of this Parliament, the glory is wholly due to Him who inspired it, and who, in the Scriptures which most of us cherish as the Word of God, has taught the blessed truths of divine Fatherhood and human brotherhood.”

The Daily Inter Ocean of September 12, 1893, in reporting on the gathering of religionists from disparate countries and traditions, referred to “a medley of universal brotherhood. The fair sex were there, too, and they were not neglected. But sisterhood in such a gathering was superfluous. The air was full of brotherhood, and it was the generic kind, such as fits both sexes."

Environmentalism’s Deep Misanthropy

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 15:56:32 GMT

That someone of Attenborough’s stature (he has been knighted, among other official honors, and is so popular in the U.K. that he was named one the One-Hundred Greatest Britons in a 2002 BBC poll) would compare us to cholera evidences how mainstream anti-humanism has become within the environmental movement. Indeed, in the wake of the media firestorm about Attenborough’s remark, Population Matters—the U.K.’s largest population control trust, for which Attenborough serves as a patron—affirmed the analogy as “apt,” stating that we are indeed “like a plague of locusts, which consumes all it sees and then dies off.”

This is nothing new for environmentalists. In 1972, the young David Suzuki told students: “One of the things I’ve gotten off on lately is that basically . . . we’re all fruit flies.” He likened us to “maggots” who are “born as an egg” and “eventually hatch out and start crawling around” eating and “defecating all over the environment.”

One might forgive the excessive zeal of a young radical in a socially radical time for calling us embryonic flies. But given the opportunity in 2009 in a Canadian television interview to retract his insulting depiction of humanity, the now world-famous Suzuki demurred, lamenting merely that “Humanity is humanity. . . I just wish they’d stop being so human!”

In recent years, deep misanthropy has seeped into the popular culture. For example, the 2008 remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still starred Keanu Reeves as Klaatu, an alien come to earth to commit total genocide to “save the earth.” At the end, he shows “mercy” by stripping us of our technology—an event which, were it actually to occur, would result in billions of human deaths. Illustrating how times have changed, the 1951 original version had Klaatu on earth to save humans, not wipe us out.

This deep misanthropy has found its way into curricula. A few years ago, for example, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation website carried a children’s feature called Planet Slayer, featuring “Dr. Schpinkee’s Greenhouse Calculator,” with which kids added up their carbon score. The game ended with a “carbon hog” bloodily exploding. Data then told children how much longer they could live until they used up their respective “share of the planet”—strongly implying a duty to die thereafter in order not to be a plague on the earth.

Deep misanthropy has helped renew the Malthusian drive to radically depopulate the planet of people as a remedy for environmental ills and human deprivation. Population Matters, for example, would have us voluntarily reduce our current population of seven billion by about half to save the planet. Another Population Matters patron, Paul Ehrlich, author of The Population Bomb, says the optimal human count would be much lower, around 1.5 billion.

Like The Day the Earth Stood Still, such advocacy has distinct genocidal overtones. But the Malthusians always assure us that they only support “non-coercive” measures, such as legally mandated access to “reproductive health”—which means, in part, contraception and universal abortion-on-demand.

But actual population reduction to the extent for which the Malthusians yearn can’t be accomplished voluntarily. Consider China’s infamous “one child” policy. Despite more than forty years of forced abortion, ubiquitous female infanticide, eugenics, and other draconian population control policies, the population in China continues to grow. Indeed, while China’s tyrannical policies have succeeded in slowing of the rate of growth, today the country has a larger population than any time in its history.

Massive depopulation would also require mass euthanasia of the aging and infirm—in part in order to balance the population pyramid. In this regard, the Japanese Finance Minister recently opined that his country’s elderly should “hurry up and die,” and yet, he retains his position.

The Malthusians also want radical wealth redistribution. Thus, the “vision” of Population Matters advocates:

Sustainability means greater equity. Renewable resources are insufficient for many to live in great luxury, while continued dire poverty is a recipe for resource overexploitation and conflict. Our vision, then, is of a global community with a relatively equal lifestyle, living in balance with nature and respecting the valid claims of all of its members.

“All its members,” of course, means flora and fauna.

The ongoing convergence of deep misanthropy, radical Malthusianism, and renewed advocacy for wealth redistribution is very dangerous. Advocates always claim that the profound changes they seek will be accomplished freely. But these are all Utopian endeavors, meaning that the perceived all-important ends will come eventually to justify coercive means.

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism. He also consults for the Patients Rights Council and the Center for Bioethics and Culture. His previous “On the Square” articles can be found here.

The Father's Name

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:50:05 GMT

In the first paper, in section 1, “The Father’s Name,” The Urantia Book says, “The First Source and Universe Center has never revealed himself by name, only by nature.”

But in 182: 1: 9, we are told,

^182:1.9 The Master, during the course of this final prayer with his apostles, alluded to the fact that he had manifested the Father’s name to the world. And that is truly what he did by the revelation of God through his perfected life in the flesh. The Father in heaven had sought to reveal himself to Moses, but he could proceed no further than to cause it to be said, “I AM.” And when pressed for further revelation of himself, it was only disclosed, “I AM that I AM.” But when Jesus had finished his earth life, this name of the Father had been so revealed that the Master, who was the Father incarnate, could truly say:

I am the bread of life.
I am the living water.
I am the light of the world.
I am the desire of all ages.
I am the open door to eternal salvation.
I am the reality of endless life.
I am the good shepherd.
I am the pathway of infinite perfection.
I am the resurrection and the life.
I am the secret of eternal survival.
I am the way, the truth, and the life.
I am the infinite Father of my finite children.
I am the true vine; you are the branches.
I am the hope of all who know the living truth.
I am the living bridge from one world to another.
I am the living link between time and eternity.

^182:1.26 Thus did Jesus enlarge the living revelation of the name of God to all generations. As divine love reveals the nature of God, eternal truth discloses his name in ever-enlarging proportions.

Has American Fiction Lost Sight of God? | John Daniel Davidson | First Things

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:47:33 GMT

In an article in the New York Times Book Review last month, Paul Elie ponders why Christian belief figures, “as something between a dead language and a hangover,” in current fiction. He observes that the literary heirs of Flannery O’Connor and Walker Percy are strangely absent from the present class of MFA-credentialed young novelists now in vogue. And while Elie is right that it is a strange development, he misdiagnoses the reasons why.

“The current upheavals in American Christianity—involving sex, politics, money and diversity—cry out for dramatic treatment,” he writes. While Christian writers, “who do draw on sacred texts and themes see the references go unrecognized,” other novelists are, &ldquldquo;depicting the changing lives of American Jews and Muslims with great success.”

But is the ultimate purpose of fiction to depict the changing lives of certain demographics, or give dramatic treatment to sex and politics in the church? One hopes not, for the sake of fiction. Maybe the absence of faith or even a curiosity about it among contemporary novelists has more to do with a basic misunderstanding of the point of both fiction and Christianity than with the perceived “upheavals” of the latter. After all, fiction that is interested in Christianity (or any other religion) primarily as a way to explore identity or politics is really not all that interesting. In fact, it’s rather boring.

A glibly-named NPR series that ran last week, Losing Our Religion, ponders why a fifth of Americans now choose not to identify with an “organized” religion. As you might imagine, the program does not delve very deep. But it is notable—not for what it thinks it reveals about American society, but for what it unintentionally reveals about a growing tendency in the American character, especially among young people. Listening to the interviewees talk about God, one gets the impression that their views are the result of ignorance and apathy, not a rejection of religion on its own terms. Simply put, they seem like they are bored of God—bored and blasé and for the most part unconcerned.

In an essay published a few years ago in the Los Angeles Times Book Review, Jonathan Lethem responded to a negative review James Wood had written of his novel, The Fortress of Solitude, some eight years before, in which Wood complained that the reader never saw Lethem’s protagonist thinking about God or the meaning of life. Lethem’s response is telling, and helps explain why we don’t see more novelists taking religion seriously:

As for “thinking about God,” was there ever a more naked instance of a critic yearning for a book other than that on his desk? Can Wood’s own negative capability not reach the possibility that in some life dramas “God” never made it to the audition, let alone failed to get onstage? Pity me if you like, but I can’t remember even considering believing in either God or Santa Claus. The debunking was accomplished preemptively, preconsciously.

There’s not much reason to work out how you feel about religion if the question of God’s existence is preemptively decided in the negative. Perhaps the growing numbers of Americans who consider themselves religiously unaffiliated feel like Lethem; they didn’t have much interest in God to begin with. No wonder they have little stomach for grappling with the questions and contradictions of faith.

Same for novelists. If the question of God isn’t taken seriously, why bother exploring it in any depth? Let faith be a prop, a way to talk about politics, or just another aspect of one’s identity.

But part of why religion was always a compelling, even essential, aspect of literature is that novelists used to take it seriously—even those who didn’t, in the end, believe. The struggle to keep one’s faith, even in the face of suffering, and to be transformed by it, is one of the hallmarks of human experience: working out the inherent tensions between body and spirit, judgment and mercy, right and wrong—this is interiority par excellence, and exploring that interiority, making it come alive, is what fiction is supposed to do.

It is also, in a larger sense, what the practice of religion is supposed to do. But the prerequisite is to understand religion as a lifelong undertaking that obliges, and in fact requires, believers to grapple with their faith and fears and doubts. To do that, you have to believe there’s more at stake than your own identity or experience. If that were all there was to religion, it would be very boring indeed.

John Daniel Davidson’s writing has appeared in n+1, The Morning News, The Claremont Review of Books, The Millions, and elsewhere.

The (g)odless Inaugural Prayer | Paula Bolyard | pjmedia.com

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:44:07 GMT

If President Obama’s goal with the inaugural prayers was to marginalize and offend devout, conservative Christians and orthodox Jews, it would be fair to say: mission accomplished.

The choice of Myrlie Evers-Williams, widow of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, departed from historical protocol. She was the first female and first non-clergy member to lead an inaugural prayer. She did so in the wake of Pastor Louie Giglio’s unceremonious removal from the dais after the discovery he had preached a sermon 20 years ago expositing the Bible’s position on homosexuality. While it’s understandable that Evers-Williams would feel the need to temper her prayers, lest the current administration banish her from future public speaking engagements, her words represent a stunning departure from historical inaugural prayers and from anything resembling a Christian, Jewish, or even a generic Judeo-Christian prayer.

Evers-Williams, when asked to describe her religious affiliation by Religion News Service, said,

I have been Baptist, I have been Methodist, I have been Presbyterian. I have attended all of those churches depending on where I have lived in my life.

The answer seems rather dodgy, but nothing out of the ordinary, so when her “prayer” began as something of an announcement, we waited for the “prayer” part to begin:

America, we are here, our nation’s Capitol on this January the 21st 2013, the inauguration of our 45th [editor’s note, should be 44th] president Barack Obama.

And we waited some more…

We come at this time to ask blessings upon our leaders, the president, vice president, members of Congress, all elected and appointed officials of the United States of America. We are here to ask blessings upon our armed forces, blessings upon all who contribute to the essence of the American spirit, the American dream. The opportunity to become whatever our mankind, womankind, allows us to be. This is the promise of America.

Was this a prayer or a speech? If it was a prayer, note that Mrs. Evers-Williams addressed it simply to “America,” imploring “America” to bestow blessings upon our leaders and our country.

And it became more confusing from there:

As we sing the words of belief, “this is my country,” let us act upon the meaning that everyone is included. May the inherent dignity and inalienable rights of every woman, man, boy and girl be honored. May all your people, especially the least of these, flourish in our blessed nation.

To whom is this prayer directed? Evers-Williams still hasn’t given any indication, other than to begin simply with “America, comma.” And again, near the end of the speech, she quotes the words of a hymn and appears to be addressing “America” rather than a deity:

There’s something within me that holds the reins. There’s something within me that banishes pain. There’s something within me I cannot explain. But all I know America, there is something within. There is something within.

Finally, about halfway through the speech, after invoking the “spirit of our ancestors” in the civil rights movement, Evers-Williams gives a quick shout-out to… something:

One hundred fifty years after the Emancipation Proclamation and 50 years after the March on Washington, we celebrate the spirit of our ancestors, which has allowed us to move from a nation of unborn hopes and a history of disenfranchised [votes] to today’s expression of a more perfect union. We ask, too, almighty that where our paths seem blanketed by [throngs] of oppression and riddle by pangs of despair we ask for your guidance toward the light of deliverance. And that the vision of those that came before us and dreamed of this day, that we recognize that their visions still inspire us. [emphasis added]

We aren’t told if it’s the “almighty” spirit of the ancestors or the “Almighty and all-merciful Lord, by Whom all powers and authorities are ordained,” the deity invoked by the archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Church at President Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961. Even so, she looks to the “visions of those that came before us” in the civil rights movement for inspiration rather than the “almighty.”

Mid-speech it seems that Evers-Williams went out of her way to exclude God when she recited a section from the Pledge of Allegiance, omitting the words “under God”:

We now stand beneath the shadow nation’s Capitol whose golden dome reflects the unity and democracy of one nation, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Like President Obama has done on numerous occasions, Evers-Williams engaged in selective editing to remove religious references.

In the RNS interview, Evers-Williams sheds some light on why she may have been so obtuse in her word choices about the deity (or lack thereof):

I have never been shy in mentioning my relationship with what I call God, a Spirit, and there certainly have been times over the years that I have called on him — or her, if you wish — in public. I deeply believe that there is a Supreme Being that sees us through.

That’s very similar, in fact, to Obama’s spiritual line of thinking, as he explained in a 2004 interview with Cathleen Falsani:

I believe that there are many paths to the same place, and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people. That there are values that transcend race or culture, that move us forward, and there’s an obligation for all of us individually as well as collectively to take responsibility to make those values lived.

Ah, the “collective” that Obama referred to in his inaugural address: “Preserving our individual freedom requires collective action.”

The vague spirituality (and the nod to collectivism) is reminiscent of the ’60s counterculture and their rejection of organized religion. It brings to mind Norman Greenbaum’s hippie folk anthem “Spirit in the Sky.” Greenbaum, a practicing Jew at the time he wrote the song, said cowboy movies inspired him to write it, explaining that: “even though I’m a bad guy, I want to redeem myself and go to heaven. I just chose the spirit in the sky. The part about Jesus was just a natural part when I put it all together.” He has also said, “It wasn’t like a Christian song of praise it was just a simple song. I had to use Christianity because I had to use something. But more important it wasn’t the Jesus part, it was the spirit in the sky.”

Never been a sinner I never sinned
I got a friend in Jesus
So you know that when I die
He’s gonna set me up with
The spirit in the sky
Oh set me up with the spirit in the sky
That’s where I’m gonna go when I die
When I die and they lay me to rest
I’m gonna go to the place that’s the best
Go to the place that’s the best

There was a sense when listening to Evers-Williams’s speech-prayer that she “just had to use something.” We get the same feeling when we listen to President Obama’s uncomfortable religious explanations.

In Evers-Williams’s prayer, just like in Greenbaum’s song, Jesus makes a token appearance:

In Jesus’ name and the name of all who are holy and right we pray. Amen.

Fortunately, the names of “all who are holy and right” are left to our imagination and we don’t have to suffer through a list of Evers-Williams’s choices.

Those of us who are Bible-believing Christians take particular offense at a civil-rights-leader-turned-pontiff adding Jesus, who was given “the name that is above every name,” to a shopping list of afterthoughts at the end of a motivational speech.

I understand that we live in a diverse land with Americans of many different faiths. No legal obligation requires the president to represent my faith or any faith on the podium at the inauguration.

However, I think it’s important to stop for a moment and note this moment in history when we first witnessed a distinct change in the nature of the inaugural prayers. Read through the modern presidential prayers and see the difference. Read the religious content of the inaugural speeches of the Founders and compare them to President Obama’s speech and you will see the stark contrast. When considering this in the context of Louie Giglio’s removal from the inaugural prayer and the many attacks on religious liberties in Obama’s first term, we must ask if our country has crossed the spiritual Rubicon.

I believe that God is in control. That President Obama serves with Almighty God’s permission; He “removes kings and sets up kings” (and presidents, too). That should make the president tremble, and I hope and pray that he realizes the implications of that verse. The president has the prayers of my family and my church.

After listening to the inaugural prayer, I needed a spiritual shower. If you feel that way too, you might enjoy refocusing on God with a good helping of Phillips, Craig and Dean’s “Revelation Song.” If you’re not familiar with the song, it’s from Revelation 4, the apostle John’s vision of God on the throne in heaven. It may be just what you need after a 24-hour news cycle of Obama worship.

At once I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne. And he who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian, and around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald. Around the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders, clothed in white garments, with golden crowns on their heads. From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God, and before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal.

And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say,

"The Angel Inside," by Allison Zopel

Thu, 17 Jan 2013 15:42:39 GMT

This remarkable book tells the story of a young woman who was in a car accident which caused brain damage and put her in a coma for five years. From the Introduction: "A coma is not what most people think it is...a person sound asleep until one day they, hopefully, wake up!...My name is Allison Zopel and I recently spent five years coming out of a coma with traumatic brain injuries."

"Faith of the Fatherless," by Paul Vitz

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 15:39:20 GMT

I recommend this book, in which Paul Vitz examines the lives of prominent atheists througout history and finds that, in almost all cases, these thinkers had defective fathers, i. e. fathers who had died, were absent, or abusive.

"Daring Greatly" by Theodore Roosevelt

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 15:36:34 GMT

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again,

because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;

who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly…”

from Theodore Roosevelt’s speech “Citizenship in a Republic,” Sorbonne in Paris, France, April 23, 1910

Counting China's Christians | First Things, May 2011 | Golden Oldie: posted on SocAdmin 4-23-11

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 15:33:32 GMT

Through much of the twentieth century, it was widely believed among Western intellectuals that the Chinese were immune to religion—an immunity that long preceded the communist rise to power. When, in 1934, Edgar Snow quipped that “in China, opium is the religion of the people,” many academic and media experts smiled in agreement and dismissed the million Chinese claimed as converts by Christian missionaries as nothing but “rice Christians”—cynical souls who had frequented the missions for the benefits they provided. Then, in 1949, Mao Zedong came to power. Religion was outlawed, and it was widely agreed among social scientists that China soon would be a model of the fully secularized, post-religious society.

But it wasn’t to be. Instead, belief in a coming post-religious China turned out to be the opium of Western intellectuals. The Chinese Christians of 1949—those ridiculed in the West as rice Christians—were so “insincere” that they endured decades of bloody repression during which their numbers grew. And as official repression has weakened, Christianity has been growing at an astonishing rate in China.

Unfortunately, there is a great deal of disagreement over just how astonishing the growth has been: Are there now 16 million or 200 million Christians in China? Both numbers have been asserted with great confidence and with claims of being “official,” but perhaps the most widely accepted claim is that there are 130 million Chinese Christians. That total is often attributed to a survey conducted by the Chinese government. But it seems unlikely that there was such a poll—at least no Chinese scholars and polling agencies know of it—and that total is not supported by any of the known surveys. Some of the confusion may arise from the fact that the Chinese government does keep track of how many people belong to Christian groups officially registered under the terms of the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM). These groups now enroll about 16 million members. But there are tens of thousands of Christian house churches in China that are not registered with the TSPM. Not surprisingly, there is considerable interest among diverse groups in learning how many members these house churches have. Estimates have been based not on solid data but rather on intuition and anecdotal accounts of largely Western observers.

At last it is possible to make a relatively accurate estimate of the total number of Christians in China. Our starting point is a national survey of China conducted in 2007 by Horizon, Ltd., one of China’s largest and most respected polling firms. It is based on a national multistage probability sample of Chinese in mainland China. Respondents had to be sixteen or older, have lived at their current residence for three months, and not been part of a survey in the past six months. The survey involved face-to-face interviews conducted by a regular staff of trained interviewers—Horizon does frequent surveys. Respondents were chosen by using a multistage method to select metropolitan cities, towns, and administrative villages. The final survey was administered in fifty-six locales throughout China, including three municipal cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing) and six province capital cities (Guangzhou, Nanjing, Wuhan, Hefei, Xi’an, and Chengdu). In addition, eleven regional level cities, sixteen small towns, and twenty administrative villages were sampled. Within each locale, households were sampled within neighborhoods, and neighborhoods were sampled within administratively defined total neighborhood committees (government-defined collections of neighborhoods). A grid procedure was used to randomly select one respondent from each household for a face-to-face in-home interview. In all, 7021 Chinese were interviewed.

These data have been made available to the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University by means of a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation.

Of these 7021 Chinese respondents, in 2007 3.1 percent of Chinese indicated they were Christians (2.9 percent Protestants and 0.2 percent Catholics). Based on these data, one can argue for a total of 35.3 million Chinese Christians over the age of sixteen.

But for several reasons we know this total is substantially too low. Many Chinese refuse to participate in survey studies, and it is assumed that Christians are unusually likely to do so—it remains somewhat risky for Chinese to be identified as Christians. In addition, some Christians who do agree to be interviewed are likely to think it unwise to admit being a Christian when asked that question by a stranger. To get an accurate estimate of the number of Chinese Christians requires a correction factor for both of these suppressors.

To address these concerns we launched a follow-up study in cooperation with colleagues at Peking University in Beijing. Based on contacts in the Chinese Christian community, we were able to obtain samples of members of Chinese house churches from many of the same areas used in the original survey sample. Survey interviewers were sent to seek interviews with these people, all of whom were active Christians (though this was unknown to the interviewers). Of these known Christians, 62 percent refused to be interviewed compared with an overall refusal rate of 38 percent for the original survey. Adjusting for this difference in response rates yields an estimate of 58.9 million Christians sixteen and older.

In addition, of those known Christians who did agree to be interviewed, 9 percent did not admit to being Christians when asked. Correcting for that suppressor brings the number of Christian Chinese sixteen and older to 64.3 million. Of course, this total is for 2007. Obviously the total is higher now. It seems entirely credible to estimate that there are about 70 million Chinese Christians in 2011.

We do not know how people have arrived at the estimates of 200 million Christians in China. We have not been able to uncover one article, story, or reference that includes an estimate with an accompanying explanation—let alone an estimate that provides a sound research methodology and appropriate scientific rigor. It would appear that so-called experts have simply repeated unsubstantiated figures they have heard from others.

Beyond this important finding, the survey also makes it possible to gain some insights into who is converting to Christianity. As is consistent with all religious groups around the world, Chinese women are almost twice as apt to be Christians as are men. Not surprisingly, no current member of the Communist Party confessed to being a Christian, although 1.7 percent of those belonging to the Communist Youth League did so.

Some suppose that older people are more apt to have become Christians, while others believe that the elderly cling to tradition and that it is young people who are converting. But the survey data show that age has no significant effect. It is widely believed that Christianity has stronger roots in the rural areas than in the cities, but the data do not support this claim. In addition, when Chinese are separated according to where they grew up (lived until age fifteen), no significant differences emerge.

Contrary to standard sociological wisdom, some observers have suggested that Christianity is spreading more rapidly among the more privileged Chinese. In fact, the data support that view: When Communist Party and Youth League members are excluded (since they are clustered among those with higher incomes), the higher their income, the more likely Chinese are to be Christians.

Of course, even if Chinese Christians total 70 million, they still make up only slightly more than 5 percent of the population, although they are about as numerous as are members of the Chinese Communist Party. Thus, it may be vital for the safety of the Christian community that Christians are clustered among the more affluent and are not concentrated in rural areas. Indeed, American visitors to leading Chinese universities are struck by the Christian climate that often prevails in contrast even with most American church-supported campuses. Despite many years of dramatic religious persecution, we now have empirical evidence of the resiliency of Christianity in China and the remarkable trajectory of growth it continues to experience.

Rodney Stark and Byron Johnson are distinguished professors of the social sciences and Carson Mencken is professor of sociology at Baylor University.

The cure for fear

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 15:31:26 GMT

"The only known cure for fear is faith."

William S. Sadler, The Mind at Mischief, 1929

The Eternal Father

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 15:27:53 GMT

"He is the eternal Father. He is that in Himself. It is as such that He is then Father for us and reveals Himself to us and is the incomparable prototype of all human creaturely fatherhood."

Templeton Report: Promising Prospects for the Future of Science and Religion

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 15:25:00 GMT

What has been achieved in over forty years of dialogue between science and theology? What might the future of the discipline look like and how might it best progress?

These questions framed a major conference last month at the University of Heidelberg in Germany. The Science and Religion Dialogue: Past and Future, supported by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, gathered leading scholars in the field to assess the current and future state of the academic study of science and religion. “The weekend attracted 400 visitors from 33 countries, in addition to the 60 or so academics who presented papers and chaired discussions,” says Michael Welker, professor of systematic theology at the University of Heidelberg and conference host. “There is work of real quality and diversity being undertaken, and the future is exciting.” Videos from the conference, including the opening ceremony and presentations, are now available online.

A key feature of the work is that it engages seriously and deeply with cutting-edge science. “Scientific innovation is not a threat to religious belief and theology but a source of inspiration for renewal,” said Hans Joas of the Universities of Freiburg and Chicago in his opening remarks.

For example, Günter Wagner of Yale University presented a paper on how the complexities of contemporary developmental biology have exploded the notion that organisms are merely the expression of genomes. Rather, epigenetics is demonstrating how organisms are a unique synthesis of all manner of factors, including the social and environmental. This insight carries ethical significance. “Life has real dignity,” Wagner believes. Other cutting-edge science discussed included whether or not the cosmos is causally closed, and the ramifications this has for the possibility of divine intervention.

Several young scholars who won the Manfred Lautenschlaeger Award for Theological Promise, formerly the John Templeton Award for Theological Promise, gave presentations at the conference, including Jan Stievermann from the University of Heidelberg. His presentation argued that knowing about the history of the dialogue between science and religion can correct misapprehensions commonly made today.

It's Merry Christmas, not Happy Christmas | Matthew Schmitz | First Things

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 15:22:26 GMT

Christmas is conspicuously the only time of year when the word “merry” receives heavy use. The greeting “Merry Christmas” dates back to at least 1565, in which year the author of the Hereford Municipal Manuscript wrote “And thus I comity you to god, who send you a merry Christmas & many.” Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published in 1843, pushed it forward, as did industrialization: The first commercially sold Christmas card (also printed in 1843) contained the salutation “A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You.”

Yet “Merry Christmas” did not gain universal support. The Night Before Christmas (Clement C. Moore’s, I mean, not Nikolai Gogol’s) ends with the words, “A Happy Christmas to all and to all a good night.” Queen Elizabeth II wishes British subjects a “Happy Christmas” in her annual Christmas broadcasts, and the phrase enjoys a broad general currency the U.K.

What accounts for the difference? Queen Elizabeth, a woman of serious low-church piety, is said to prefer “happy” to “merry” because she dislikes “merry’s” connotation of boisterousness, even slight intoxication. (Similarly, in Holland some of the more strictly reformed Dutch prefer Zalig Kerstfeest—“Blessed Christmas”–to Vrolijk Kerstmis—“Merry Christmas.”)

This moral suspicion of “Merry Christmas” dates back to the Methodist churchmen of the Victorian era who sought to promote sobriety among the English working class. Merrymaking of the ancient, alcoholic sort was frowned on year-round, perhaps never more so than during the celebration of the Savior’s birth. The phrase “Merry Christmas” would hang on, but the image of a family sharing a bottle of port or wine in the first commercial Christmas card was to give way to more temperate holiday depictions.

We may no longer associate “merry” with spirits alcoholic as well as high, but the meaning was once familiar. “Merry” appeared in both the Wyclife and King James bibles in reference to intoxication, where it describes an evening in the life of the rich man Nabal: “He held a feast in his house, like the feast of a king; and Nabal’s heart was merry within him, for he was very drunken.” (To wish someone a holiday feast like Nabal’s was to wish him a very good Christmas indeed.)

To certain ears, then, “Happy Christmas” conveys a sober, well-earned enjoyment, the satisfaction resulting from hard work and virtuous living. “Merry Christmas” stirs in us an impulse more primitive and unrestrained: The childlike giddiness of Christmas morning, the rush down the stairs and tearing at paper, the intemperate delight in gifts long hoped-for and wholly undeserved.

Which phrase conveys a more fitting response to the overwhelming, unearned, gift of Christ’s birth? Suffice it to say that when our Lord comes I hope I do not greet him with dignified reserve but instead rush at him with the unguarded, unembarrassed joy of a child at play or man at his cups. Merry Christmas to all!

h/t Christine Emba

Review of "Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith from First Things

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 15:20:03 GMT

Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith:
Religion in American War and Diplomacy
by Andrew Preston
Knopf, 832 pages, $37.50

America, G. K. Chesterton famously observed, is “a nation with the soul of a church.” In his masterful new survey Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith, Cambridge historian Andrew Preston demonstrates that the influence of religion in American life has been as pervasive in diplomacy and warfare as it has been in domestic politics and culture.

Preston’s approach to his subject is disinterested and evenhanded. He avoids judgment on the wisdom or morality of American foreign policy and offers no evaluation as to whether the influence of religion in shaping that policy has been a salutary one. His analytical assessments are acute and provocative, but he displays no ideological bias in laying them out or, indeed, any indication of his own religious or political inclinations. It’s refreshing to encounter such an admirably old-fashioned exercise in objective historical analysis—and all the more so to see it brought off with such intelligence, sophistication, and grace.

The scheme of the book is at once ambitious and restrained. It provides a comprehensive and exhaustively researched account of the shaping influence of religion on foreign affairs from the nation’s colonial origins through the presidency of Ronald Reagan (a hurried and hopelessly condensed concluding chapter—one suspects a publisher’s influence—dashes from Bush the elder to Barack Obama in fewer than fifteen pages), but it imposes no dominant theme on that account. It highlights recurring motifs in the conduct of foreign policy but is everywhere sensitive to complexity, nuance, and ambiguity.

It is religion’s ubiquitous influence on foreign relations, Preston suggests, that explains why America’s foreign policy has so often taken on the “tenor of a moral crusade.” But if religion has served as the primary source of the tendency to idealism in foreign relations, he notes, it has not been univocal in its effects. Its presence can be felt in justificatory themes of American forcefulness—providence, manifest destiny, the New Jerusalem, the shining city on a hill—but it also has been the fount of contrary impulses toward pacifism, anti-imperialism, anti-interventionism, and internationalism.

Indeed, critics of American policy have been as quick as its defenders to rest their arguments on religious grounds. Preston argues not that religion has determined American foreign policy—that, he concedes, would claim too much—but that, in diplomacy as elsewhere, it has been a taken-for-granted part of the language of politics.

The most obvious reason why religion has counted in foreign affairs is that policymakers, like the vast majority of their countrymen, have themselves been religious (Preston’s survey reminds us that most American presidents have been genuinely pious Christians), and even those who were not recognized the need to take into account the religious sentiments of their constituents.

Beyond that, Americans gave religious sentiments a significant place in their diplomacy because they could afford to. Unlike most nations, the United States had the luxury of free security. Protected by two oceans, strategically unthreatened on their own continent, Americans were less bound than other nations by the imperatives of realpolitik and comparatively free to imagine—and even, on occasion, to conduct—an idealistic diplomacy in which the meliorating impulses of religion had more than customary influence.

The faith culture in which diplomacy operated was not, of course, simply one of religion in general. It was specifically Christian, and for the greater part of the nation’s history Protestant Christian. Beginning in the colonial period—when, Preston notes, Protestant Christianity was the English settlers’ most common tie—and proceeding well into the twentieth century, most Americans saw the survival and flourishing of Protestantism as essential to the survival and flourishing of the nation. Theirs was a crusading faith, committed initially to the conversion (or removal) of the Indians and the containment of Catholicism, and it linked the spread of Protestantism to the spread of liberty and prosperity.

Religious and political ideas came together most substantively (and most enduringly) in the idea of “Christian republicanism,” which combined Protestant theology with Lockean Whig liberalism. The revolutionary generation’s embrace of republicanism was based on a natural law theory of God-given rights and freedoms that existed antecedent to all political authority.

But if republican liberty was to be sustained, it required a virtuous people, and the necessary source of virtue was religion. As Preston nicely summarizes the argument: “If [a] republic was essential for liberty, and virtue was essential for a republic, and religion was essential for virtue, then religion was essential to a healthy republic.”

It was inevitable that a religion-saturated society would produce a religion-saturated political culture. Since religion and politics make for a volatile mix, this has raised the ideological temperature of American public life, including diplomatic life. Americans confronted the world with a crusading spirit, and they often turned on each other in intense disagreement as to the nature or rightness of particular crusades.

Take, for example (and one can only touch on notable instances in Preston’s panoramic survey), the Civil War, where the victorious North’s “ideology of universal redemption,” presupposing America’s duty to promote and protect liberty wherever possible, resulted in what Preston suggestively terms the nation’s first war of “humanitarian intervention.”

That same spirit of universal redemption, appropriate to a society that saw itself as God’s latter-day chosen people, increasingly led the United States in an expansionist and interventionist direction in the world, though almost never without provoking significant internal controversy and dissent. Preston traces those controversies—always with careful balance and subtle appreciation of conflicting views—in America’s four twentieth-century “crusades”: the conflicts over Cuba and the Philippines following the Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, and the Cold War.

Similarly, while almost all American Christians once believed that church-directed missionary work was central to the nation’s responsibility to the world, they held conflicting views about what mission work should accomplish. Until America’s emergence as a world power at the turn of the twentieth century, most of them focused on saving souls, converting “heathens” into Christians.

But the liberalizing theological influences of modernism gradually turned mainstream Protestantism away from evangelism and toward an ethical application of Christian teaching, acting as “an international extension of the Social Gospel” and an unofficial participant in the larger American project of what Preston calls the “imperialism of human rights.”

The author does not put it this way, but what happened in private missions serves as a rough model for the trajectory of public religious influence, at least among most Protestants, on diplomatic developments. The pattern of events, though often uneven and never uncontested, moved in an ecumenical, secular, humanist direction.

The old piety, to be sure, lingered well into the twentieth century. During World War II, Franklin Roosevelt proclaimed several official days of prayer (Preston convincingly portrays FDR as more deeply pious than many have supposed), and Harry Truman followed suit in marking the victories over Germany and Japan. And in Preston’s estimation, Dwight Eisenhower’s understanding of postwar Russian-American differences rested on an updated version of Christian republicanism: A Soviet Union without religion would be a Soviet Union without liberty.

It was the collapse of the anticommunist Cold War consensus that presaged the turn toward the secular in the Protestant establishment. Eisenhower’s first Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, served as the establishment’s most prominent public figure from the 1930s until his death in 1959. Ecumenical in theology, devout in piety, he combined over the course of his career the tensions between liberal internationalism and conservative anticommunism common to his generation.

Those tensions reflected competing strands of realism and idealism in both diplomacy and religious thought. One thinks here most obviously of Reinhold Niebuhr, whose neo-orthodox theology kept in rough balance social-democratic instincts and (mostly) liberal Protestantism, with a disdain for sentimentality, political or religious, rooted in insistence on original sin.

The 1960s, the most disruptive decade in modern American history, demolished that uneasy equilibrium. From the raging moral conflict over Vietnam onward, the shape and focus of religious disagreement shifted. The Protestant-Catholic divide was gradually replaced by coalitions of conservative Protestants and Catholics—with Evangelicals prominent among the former—pitted against their liberal denominational counterparts. That realignment in turn reflected the emerging priority of ideology over theology in the interplay between politics and religion.

As Preston shows, religious identification became defined at least as much by where people stood on divisive political issues as on debated items of doctrine. The religious influence on foreign policy did not disappear, but the Protestant establishment’s rapid dissolution during the decade made it less effective than before.

The divisions engendered by the war in Vietnam lingered on in the presidencies of Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. And even with the collapse of the USSR and the end of the Cold War, the foreign policy differences between liberals and conservatives—and the religious divisions that coincide with them—have perpetuated themselves, though in somewhat less incendiary form, right up to the present.

Chesterton’s nation with the soul of a church is today a divided congregation. Preston’s splendid history illuminates how we came to our present pass. That history cannot, of course, patch over our abiding and legitimate differences, but its author’s supple combination of hard thought and sympathetic imagination demonstrates how the friction generated by our finally irresolvable moral conflicts might best serve the perpetual dialectic of democratic politics.

James Nuechterlein is an editor at large of First Things and a senior fellow of the Institute on Religion and Public Life.

The Christian Origins of Islam | Peter J. Leithart | First Things | 12-07-2012

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:16:57 GMT

http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2012/12/the-christian-origins-of-islam

A Prayer of Martin Luther King, Jr. Golden Oldie posted on SocAdmin 7-12-2012

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:13:40 GMT

From the book "Thou, Dear God": Prayers that open hearts and spirits, a collection of prayers of Martin Luther King, Jr.

This prayer came at the end of King's sermon, "The Birth of a New Nation," preached at his Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama,on April 7, 1957. King had recently returned from the independence celebrations in Ghana, which explains the reference to "this new nation."

O God, our gracious Heavenly Father, help us to see the insights that come from this new nation. Help us to follow Thee and all of Thy creative works in this world. And somehow we will discover that we are made to live together as brothers. And that it will come in this generation; the day when all men will recognize the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Amen.

Martin Buber: What do Christians and Jews have in common? Golden Oldie posted on SocAdmin 5-7-2010

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:00:43 GMT

Comments made by Martin Buber in 1930 to a conference on Christian missions to the Jews (published as “The Two Foci of the Jewish Soul” in The Writings of Martin Buber):

What have you [Christians] and we [Jews] in common? If we take the question literally, a book and an expectation. To you, the book is a forecourt; to us, it is the sanctuary. But in this place, we can dwell together, and together listen to the voice that speaks here. . . . Your expectation is directed toward a second coming, ours to a coming which has not been anticipated by a first. . . . But we can wait for the advent of the One together, and there are moments when we may prepare the way before him together.

Pre-messianically, our destinies are divided. . . . This is a gulf which no human power can bridge. But it does not prevent the common watch for a unity to come to us from God, which soaring above all of your imaginations and all of ours, affirms and denies, denies and affirms, what you hold and what we hold, and replaces all the creedal truths of earth by the ontological truth of heaven which is one.