Wednesday, August 5, 2015
"Joyful Exiles, Penitent Strangers"
One for the Church in the West today -- here's a good post dealing with biblical perspective by Scott Redd of sunergoi at The Christward Collective
Joyful Exiles
And here a sermon by Scott Redd which describes
Walking in the Light in Cultural Darkness
Screwtape Pipes Up
Here is a site, goodreads, with some of the memorable quotes from Under Secretary Screwtape in C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters.
The kids and I listened to the book on our road trip this summer to Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina. (Nothing like a captive audience. But they enjoyed it more than they thought they would.)
To begin with a little humor:
And moving on to the more serious:
-- “[M]an has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to having a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn't think of doctrines as primarily "true" or "false," but as "academic" or "practical," "outworn" or "contemporary," "conventional" or "ruthless." Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don't waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong or stark or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That's the sort of thing he cares about.”
The kids and I listened to the book on our road trip this summer to Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina. (Nothing like a captive audience. But they enjoyed it more than they thought they would.)
To begin with a little humor:
-- "She's the sort of woman who lives for others - you can tell the others by their hunted expression.”
And moving on to the more serious:
-- “Courage is not simply one of the virtues but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means at the point of highest reality.”
-- "...thousands of humans have been brought to think that humility means pretty women trying to believe they are ugly and clever men trying to believe they are fools. And since what they are trying to believe may, in some cases, be manifest nonsense, they cannot succeed in believing it and we have the chance of keeping their minds endlessly revolving on themselves in an effort to achieve the the impossible.”
-- "Whatever their bodies do affects their souls. It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out...”
-- “[M]an has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to having a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn't think of doctrines as primarily "true" or "false," but as "academic" or "practical," "outworn" or "contemporary," "conventional" or "ruthless." Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don't waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong or stark or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That's the sort of thing he cares about.”
-- "When He [God] talks of their losing their selves, He means only abandoning the clamour of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.”
Changing Your Mind about Abortion
Sometimes the bravest thing to do is change your mind.
For those pro-choice women considering changing their minds about abortion in light of the new video documentation, please read the following article, written by a PhD and former pro-abortion advocate.
I Thought Planned Parenthood Supported Family Values
Over our summer road trip the kids and I listened to The Screwtape Letters by Oxford professor C.S. Lewis. I was reminded of that shrewd tempter Screwtape's gleeful reporting that, while in former days men and women would change the course of their lives based on one solid, consistent line of reasoning about an issue....in modern days that kind of noble behavior -- the behavior of following truth even when it means change -- need not concern tempters.
(And if you balk about facing religious people, know that no honest Christian can look down in pride on those who have found they are wrong. All Christians have altered the course of their life based on a change of heart and mind.)
Sometimes a change of mind and heart is an integral part of your own story, your own personal narrative of who you are -- You-Now grows out of You-Then. Sometimes "Then" is "just yesterday" or even "just this morning."
"Just yesterday, I believed...But today I realize..."
Will you change your mind?
“The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid 'dens of crime' that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."
[From the Preface] ― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
For those pro-choice women considering changing their minds about abortion in light of the new video documentation, please read the following article, written by a PhD and former pro-abortion advocate.
I Thought Planned Parenthood Supported Family Values
Over our summer road trip the kids and I listened to The Screwtape Letters by Oxford professor C.S. Lewis. I was reminded of that shrewd tempter Screwtape's gleeful reporting that, while in former days men and women would change the course of their lives based on one solid, consistent line of reasoning about an issue....in modern days that kind of noble behavior -- the behavior of following truth even when it means change -- need not concern tempters.
(And if you balk about facing religious people, know that no honest Christian can look down in pride on those who have found they are wrong. All Christians have altered the course of their life based on a change of heart and mind.)
Sometimes a change of mind and heart is an integral part of your own story, your own personal narrative of who you are -- You-Now grows out of You-Then. Sometimes "Then" is "just yesterday" or even "just this morning."
"Just yesterday, I believed...But today I realize..."
Will you change your mind?
“The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid 'dens of crime' that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."
[From the Preface] ― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
Paper airplanes
Paper airplanes: warm, sweet ad about a military childhood, and about fathers, sons, and good neighbors.
Paper airplanes
Paper airplanes
Conquest's Conquests
Robert Conquest, a man who described misrule in Stalinist Russia when information was scarce, has died.
What an interesting man: historian, advisor to Margaret Thatcher, poet, and writer of prose. I enjoyed reading this obituary:
What an interesting man: historian, advisor to Margaret Thatcher, poet, and writer of prose. I enjoyed reading this obituary:
Stalin's daughter also recently died. She lived in Wisconsin.
About her life in Wisconsin:
Lana about Svetlana
Review of a biography of her (by Rosemary Sullivan)
Stalin's Daughter
About her life in Wisconsin:
Lana about Svetlana
Review of a biography of her (by Rosemary Sullivan)
Stalin's Daughter
Monday, August 3, 2015
#lovewins #ifyou'renotababy
Crowing over Obergefell, Quiet on Nucatola
Scott Redd at sunergoi on clamor and silence in the cultural space. (Scott is my brother and the President of Reformed Theological Seminary's DC campus.)
But What about the Mammograms?
And here's one for those concerned that women in poverty won't get mammogram referrals if Planned Parenthood doesn't receive government funding:
Washington Post op ed: The Tipping Point on Planned Parenthood
Straw Man at the Women's Clinic
And finally -- a few thoughts on the conversation as I have watched it play out on social media.
While I don't have statistics, it wouldn't surprise me if all or almost all of the funding and support for Crisis Pregnancy Centers around the country are received from Evangelicals, Catholics, and political Conservatives. I would also suspect that a hefty amount of funding and volunteer man-hours at relief and support organizations for families -- both nationally and internationally -- are also provided by the these same interests and by pro-lifers (like my own small evangelical church in Texas whose members provide significant funding and basic, human, boots-on-the ground support for both a shelter for single mothers and also a local homeless shelter) -- above and beyond whatever taxes they already pay the government. I also suspect that a significant number of foster and adoptive parents of needy children (children living in America and around the world) are pro-life Evangelicals, Catholics, and Conservatives. Just an anecdotal survey of my evangelical friends and the churches I know reveals adoption as a trend. It's hip to adopt, in these circles.
But whether or not my assumptions and experiences are true and typical (and of course there is need for continual dialogue within pro-life circles on how to better love mothers and fathers and children in need) at this moment, critiques of pro-life methodology by Democrats ring a bit hollow.
When Buchenwald and Auschwitz were opened, and the ashes and tales and bones clattered out, the story of that day was the not the degree to which the German resistance or the Polish resistance or any other anti-Nazi group could or could not have done more or done things a little differently, a little more strategically.
When Rosa Parks took her courageous stand on a regular bus on a regular day in the segregated south, the truth "clicked" in people's minds -- and the story of the day was not whether or not the black community in America could have done more.
In the 19th century, no one serious about slavery questioned whether or not that little Presbyterian woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, could have done more. "COULD she have squeezed out one more book in the same amount of time? If ONLY she'd done more. We'll have Deborah Wasserman Schultz, James Carville, and Cecile Richards in to discuss Stowe's failure to do more in our studio at 6:00!"
And likewise, whether or not religious pro-lifers and political conservatives can do more about abortion is not the story of the day today. Nor is whether or not Republicans (and Fox News talking heads, apparently) do or don't help low-income women and children by not voting for Democrats.
The Story of This Day is the gruesomely glib, cool-headed, wine-sloshing, lip-smacking, sonogram-guided, cranium-removing traffic of human baby body parts by a group of powerful, educated professional women in America (whether or not their own pockets are lined). (Talk about having a price on your head!)
The ones to be corrected are the cheerleaders of these women, who are predominantly groups like: Democrats, atheists, agnostics, liberal feminists, unions, liberal Catholics, and mainline Protestants. Round up the usual suspects.
Will pro-life Democrats speak truth to power? Will they be heard by their party? One hopes the pro-life remnant that does exist in these circles -- they are there, I know and love some of them -- have a voice and are courageous and heard.
About a Boy
But Fox News (and I am not generally a Fox New apologist), with all of its round-the-clock media coverage of this gruesomely compelling story, is not to be blamed. Look to the other networks for their comparative silence.
Likewise, the story of the day is simply and obviously NOT the undercover sting operation to catch these doctors, lawyers, leaders, and researchers in the act of pushing a baby boy's bloody legs and arms around a glass pie dish, sifting through his parts, his little eye, his little head -- a baby boy they'd just killed intentionally.
As Redd says, above: folks, this one is not hard to figure out, or nuanced.
The story of the day is The Brutal Act itself.
Scott Redd at sunergoi on clamor and silence in the cultural space. (Scott is my brother and the President of Reformed Theological Seminary's DC campus.)
But What about the Mammograms?
And here's one for those concerned that women in poverty won't get mammogram referrals if Planned Parenthood doesn't receive government funding:
Washington Post op ed: The Tipping Point on Planned Parenthood
Straw Man at the Women's Clinic
And finally -- a few thoughts on the conversation as I have watched it play out on social media.
While I don't have statistics, it wouldn't surprise me if all or almost all of the funding and support for Crisis Pregnancy Centers around the country are received from Evangelicals, Catholics, and political Conservatives. I would also suspect that a hefty amount of funding and volunteer man-hours at relief and support organizations for families -- both nationally and internationally -- are also provided by the these same interests and by pro-lifers (like my own small evangelical church in Texas whose members provide significant funding and basic, human, boots-on-the ground support for both a shelter for single mothers and also a local homeless shelter) -- above and beyond whatever taxes they already pay the government. I also suspect that a significant number of foster and adoptive parents of needy children (children living in America and around the world) are pro-life Evangelicals, Catholics, and Conservatives. Just an anecdotal survey of my evangelical friends and the churches I know reveals adoption as a trend. It's hip to adopt, in these circles.
But whether or not my assumptions and experiences are true and typical (and of course there is need for continual dialogue within pro-life circles on how to better love mothers and fathers and children in need) at this moment, critiques of pro-life methodology by Democrats ring a bit hollow.
When Buchenwald and Auschwitz were opened, and the ashes and tales and bones clattered out, the story of that day was the not the degree to which the German resistance or the Polish resistance or any other anti-Nazi group could or could not have done more or done things a little differently, a little more strategically.
When Rosa Parks took her courageous stand on a regular bus on a regular day in the segregated south, the truth "clicked" in people's minds -- and the story of the day was not whether or not the black community in America could have done more.
In the 19th century, no one serious about slavery questioned whether or not that little Presbyterian woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, could have done more. "COULD she have squeezed out one more book in the same amount of time? If ONLY she'd done more. We'll have Deborah Wasserman Schultz, James Carville, and Cecile Richards in to discuss Stowe's failure to do more in our studio at 6:00!"
And likewise, whether or not religious pro-lifers and political conservatives can do more about abortion is not the story of the day today. Nor is whether or not Republicans (and Fox News talking heads, apparently) do or don't help low-income women and children by not voting for Democrats.
The Story of This Day is the gruesomely glib, cool-headed, wine-sloshing, lip-smacking, sonogram-guided, cranium-removing traffic of human baby body parts by a group of powerful, educated professional women in America (whether or not their own pockets are lined). (Talk about having a price on your head!)
The ones to be corrected are the cheerleaders of these women, who are predominantly groups like: Democrats, atheists, agnostics, liberal feminists, unions, liberal Catholics, and mainline Protestants. Round up the usual suspects.
Will pro-life Democrats speak truth to power? Will they be heard by their party? One hopes the pro-life remnant that does exist in these circles -- they are there, I know and love some of them -- have a voice and are courageous and heard.
About a Boy
But Fox News (and I am not generally a Fox New apologist), with all of its round-the-clock media coverage of this gruesomely compelling story, is not to be blamed. Look to the other networks for their comparative silence.
Likewise, the story of the day is simply and obviously NOT the undercover sting operation to catch these doctors, lawyers, leaders, and researchers in the act of pushing a baby boy's bloody legs and arms around a glass pie dish, sifting through his parts, his little eye, his little head -- a baby boy they'd just killed intentionally.
As Redd says, above: folks, this one is not hard to figure out, or nuanced.
The story of the day is The Brutal Act itself.
Sunday, July 12, 2015
"Behold, I make all things new."
"When we preach the gospel, we preach the promise of new life,
new mind,
new hope,
new purpose,
new union with Christ,
new company of the Holy Spirit,
new pardon of sin,
new affinity for repentance and closeness with God,
new love of the law,
new ability to obey,
new understanding of why God demands chastity outside of marriage and fidelity inside of marriage,
new patience with people who do not yet know Jesus,
new perspectives of suffering and affliction, addiction and change,
new hatred of our own sin and patience with the sin of others,
new responsibilities,
new heartaches,
new friendships,
a new family from within the body of Christ,
new allegiances,
new dangers, and
new grace.
I needed the expulsive love of my risen Savior to whisper in my ear that my burgeoning conviction of sin was truer than what my flesh craved."
-- Rosaria Butterfield in Openness Unhindered
(with my formatting)
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