Should Christians be Social Justice Warriors?

Should Christians be Social Justice Warriors (SJWs)? The question may sound like a no-brainer. Of course Christians should be SJWs! Taking care of the poor and promoting equality are Christian pastimes, right? After all, didn't Jesus preach social justice?

It is true that the Bible shows a great deal of concern for the poor, widowed, orphaned and foreigner. This should not be overlooked. If a person regularly reads the Bible they will be regularly reminded that they have a duty to bring love and justice to their fellow humans. But the Bible's view of social justice and the SJW view of social justice are incompatible. Here's why:

SJWs reject the concept of sin and believe that humans are by nature good:

This is a key SJW belief. Since SJWs believe that humans are basically good they are inclined to place the blame of evil and injustice upon societal issues rather than individuals. SJWs insist that power structures cause oppression and oppression leads to civil strife. With this mindset, the SJW can view the criminal as a victim.Those with a Biblical mindset see crime as a result of sinful hearts which create selfish desires.

The people around Jesus were eager to blame their problems on social injustices, but Jesus never took the bait. Jesus never pointed an accusing finger to Roman structural injustices or inequality. During Jesus' ministry the Roman governor of Israel, Pontius Pilate, executed a group of Galilean Jews at the temple where he mixed their blood with the blood of the daily sacrifice. Jesus' comment on this sacrilegious atrocity is revealing. Jesus could have taken this event as an opportunity to speak against the pagan injustices of the ruling class which caused suffering among the Jews, but instead Jesus says something shocking to his audience: "Repent, or you too will perish." (Luke 13:3)

The Bible always takes our pointing fingers and turns them toward ourselves. Had Jesus been an actual SJW he would have stoked the hatred that the Jews had for the Romans and would likely have gained many more followers. SJWs can never get to the heart of societal evils because they refuse to believe that these evils stem from the human heart.

Like Jesus, the earliest Christians never blamed an unjust culture for their problems. The epistles could've been filled with all kinds of social commentary lamenting the great injustices and inequality prevalent throughout the Roman Empire, but there is none of that. Yet, the early church accomplished the SJW dream. The early church was diverse, containing many women and slaves, and even people of privilege. The church also included many cultures as it spread into Asia, Africa and Europe. The beginning of the church is marked by a multi-cultural influx at Pentecost as recorded in the book of Acts. Acts also records how the apostles preached to Greeks, Samaritans and an Ethiopian. All of this was accomplished by the gospel, not by social activism.

SJWs sow seeds of resentment which encourage hate: 

The SJW mindset seeks to level the societal playing field. An increasingly diverse American landscape has caused SJWs to see inequality in nearly everything. The idea is that certain groups are privileged and have an unfair head start and this in turn creates an unfair and an unjust society. The onus is on the privileged to "check their privilege." Most SJWs come from a place of privilege and likely feel great shame for having privilege while others do not. They check their privilege as a form of penance and expect others to follow suit.

SJWs will also work hard to convince various groups that they are victims. This gives the SJWs political power and it creates incredible resentment from special interest groups toward those that SJWs label as privileged. The result is to divide various groups of people along racial, gender, ethnic, and religious lines. This creates resentment and the resentment creates hate. Those who are told to "check their privilege" will also become resentful and hateful over the fact that they are being labeled as oppressors and privileged. The hate that SJWs stoke never ends. Someone will always be perceived as having more privilege and in this way the SJW advocates for a continual cycle of resentment and hate.

While the SJW may think that they are fighting for a noble cause they area actually creating a dysfunctional society. The SJW tells the "oppressed" that everyone hates them and this leads them to hate the "oppressors," while the "oppressors" are told that they deserve to be hated. What sort of people will this create?

SJWs promote an entitlement mentality:

Biblical justice is objective, seated in God's perfection. When humans compare themselves to God's high standards we find that we fall short. We're all equally condemned. We are entitled to nothing and we deserve nothing. God does not owe us. For the rich who have been touched by God's grace the proper response is thankfulness and gratitude which will naturally express itself in charity. For the poor who have been touched by God's grace the proper response is to rejoice in one's heavenly reward and to look to the Heavenly Father for daily bread.

The social justice of an SJW is subjective, seated in the individual. With no ultimate standard for morality or justice SJWs are inclined to compare themselves to each other. This causes an entitlement mentality. The rich become proud and arrogant while the poor become jealous and miserable. Injustice becomes synonymous for "not having what my neighbor has." SJWs encourage people to compare themselves to their neighbor while Biblical justice encourages people to compare themselves with God. The former creates resentment, self-promotion and strife while the latter creates humility, repentance and graciousness.

SJWs seek government involvement: 

Some have rightly described SJWs as cultural Marxists. While Marxism dealt with economic inequality, the worldview that SJWs share with Marxism is strikingly similar. If the privileged will not relent then the oppressed must rise up and enforce equality with the heavy-hand of government. Marxism is a failed ideology that has caused more misery, death and economic ruin than any other ideology in the history of human existence.

SJWs might point to the communal nature of the early church to support their social agenda. This community of equality and charity took place in the context of the church and not the government. Jesus and his apostles looked to gospel as the root of social change, never the government.

The solution to the human condition is spiritual and as a result any atheistic-Marxist utopian vision is destined to fail. The SJW can never succeed because they are unable to diagnose or heal the condition of the human heart. They seek legislative solutions through the government. The law will only harden hearts. The gospel is what breaks them.

SJWs seek a worldly solution:

Jesus' beatitudes are a famous set of statements both inside and outside of Christian circles. He calls the poor, persecuted and the hated "blessed." Later in his ministry Jesus describes a poor widow and the poor beggar Lazarus as blessed. Jesus' words to the rich are not very comforting. He says that it is difficult for the rich to get into heaven. For Jesus, spiritual blessings trump earthly blessings. Worldly wealth is to be scorned if it chokes out spiritual riches. The SJW cannot understand this.

When a person follows Christ their focus is heavenward. This sounds backwards to an SJW and they will think that a heavenward focus will detract from taking care of the poor, the earth, etc. This is not true. C.S. Lewis once wrote: "If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this."

A heavenward focus gives us the proper orientation. Imagine trying to walk across a large snow-covered field. On the other side of the field is a light. You keep your eyes fixed on the light and walk until you reach it. The more you focus on the light the straighter your path will be. As soon as you take your focus off the light you veer off course.  If a person travels across the same field but their focus is on their feet rather than the light then they wander aimlessly. The tracks will wind all over the field and the light will never be reached. SJWs seek the light of social justice but they are focused on their feet.

Jesus takes social justice to the next level:

Let's keep our focus on the cross where the greatest injustice occurred. Let's keep our eyes focus on Jesus, the true innocent victim, tortured and terrorized by those desperate to cling to their privilege. Let's keep our eyes focused on Jesus' love, a love so great and so selfless that he didn't just seek justice for others; rather, he sought injustice for himself for the sake of others - others who deserved only punishment. Let it sink in: Jesus sacrificed himself for the unjust. "While we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom. 5:8). Jesus does all of this and then gives his followers the most difficult command ever: "Love one another as I have loved you." In the end, Christ doesn't want us to be just. He wants us to be unjust. Unjust by showing love to others who do not deserve it.

The Secular Trojan Horse

I encountered a pro-choice argument that went something like this: "The pro-life position is a religious position and therefore has no role in public debate."

The argument rests on two false premises. The first premise is that the secular world belongs in the public world of facts while the religious world belongs in the private world of opinions and preferences. For the secular humanist, any position that is religiously informed ought to be excluded from public debate. In effect, the opposition can be silenced if its position is framed as religious. It's a clever form of censorship. In the abortion debate you may hear someone say something like, "I personally would never have an abortion (private, religious) but I'm not going to tell a woman what to do with her body. (public, secular)." This sentiment is indicative of someone who has grown up in the secular culture where this false dichotomy is neither questioned nor examined. Many, if not most, Christians have imbibed some form of this postmodern dichotomy.

The other premise (which the first is dependent upon) is the idea that the secular point of view is not religious. I would argue that secular humanists are just as dogmatic and religiously informed as anyone else. The anti-science transgender movement illustrates the religious nature of today's secular humanists. Gender designation is now by faith and not by sight. Nevermind the genitals, beards, testosterone-infused body structures, and DNA. Gender, in the secular world, is now regarded as a subjective taste relegated to personal preference. This smacks of religion.

Consider the secular stress on equality. Equality is a religious belief. Should supporters of human equality not have a public say on the matter since their position is religious? While the Christian has a theological basis for promoting equality the secularist does not. Do the ideas of the secular saint Charles Darwin not imply that certain breeds of the same species might be more likely to survive and are therefore superior to their kin? In order to maintain a belief in equality secular humanists must borrow from the theology of their religious neighbors.

Consider some of the faith-based assumptions in the scientific community. Naturalism, which under-girds the secular-scientific approach, is the idea that everything in the universe can be explained by natural causes. Is that not an item of faith? What about science itself? Is science not built upon the dogma that the universe is ordered and that it is governed by fix laws? Science rests on the assumption that there is law, order, and uniformity in the universe. These assumptions require a leap of faith.

Not only are the pet secular dogmas faith-based but so is the secular reaction to those who challenge their dogmas. Discussion is not permitted and those who waver from secular dogma are branded as haters (heretics). In the secular environment of the university there seems to be an uptick of thought policing and censorship resembling the methodology of witch-hunting inquisitors.

Secular humanists once understood that they preached dogma. Consider the first and second theses of the Humanist Manifesto written in 1933: "First: Religious humanists regard the universe as self-creating and not created. Second: Humanism believes that man is a part of nature and that he has emerged as a result of a continuous process." Interesting. Notice the prominence of the words "religious" and "believe." At least they were honest back then.

That was 1933. Today the semantics have changed. Secular humanism is now sold to the public as the neutral position. This is their Trojan horse. By pretending to not be religious they give themselves the only legitimate voice in the public sphere. The inhabitants of the horse now control the culture, media, higher education and even mainline Christianity.

To see the secular Trojan horse in action consider the history of Princeton University. Princeton was initially a Presbyterian school set up to train students in theological matters. The first professors were ministers. In recent years one of Princeton's more notorious professors, Richard Rorty, candidly said the following,“The goal of education is to help these youth escape the grip of their frightening, vicious, dangerous parents…. We are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable.” The Princeton Presbyterians allowed the secular Trojan horse into their gates and as a result they have been replaced and pushed out by the likes of Richard Rorty. The same thing has occurred in most American colleges and universities.

There are two things that Christians need to do to protect themselves from the secular Trojan horse. First, we need to unmask the horse. The secularists need to be exposed for what they are: religious adherents, and some could rightly be labeled as fanatic iconoclasts.

Second, we need to stop playing their game and following their rules. Why should secular humanists be allowed the neutral position? Why should they be allowed to push their dogmas in the public world? Why should we allow this secular, postmodern mindset to strip the Christian faith of its objective claims to truth?

Secular humanists are wolves in sheep's clothing. They are bent on consuming the sheep and taking over the pen. Christians have done very little about it. The temptation is to safely hunker down in our pens and ignore the ravishing of the other pens. But when the wolves invade, it will be too late. A couple will sneak into the pen, one will hold the gate open for the other wolves and then the sheep will be gone.

Facebook status: Prayer bombs or F bombs?

A recent study analyzed the status updates of 12,000 religious and non-religious Facebook users from the United States and the United Kingdom. The study performed a differential language assessment or "DLA" indicating which words the religious and non-religious used in their statuses. The vast majority of  those in the religious category identified themselves as Christian. The 75 words that are most common to each group are visualized below. The size of the word indicates how well it correlates with the group while the color indicates its frequency (red is frequent, gray is less frequent).



Wow.

As a whole, I would describe the religious cluster as gracious, thankful, content and happy while the non-religious cluster is angry, bitter, vulgar and critical. The most prominent word in the cluster for the religious is prayer while the most prominent word for the non-religious is f---. Life, love and smile are prominent in the religious cluster while dead, bloody (British respondents?), and sh-- are prominent in the non-religious cluster.

Religious Facebook users were more likely to use plural pronouns: us, we, you, let's and pronouns that referred to other people: you, u, ur, him. The non-religious used more 1st person singular pronouns: I, I've, I'd, I'm, my.  

The religious were more likely to use words that referred to family and friends: mom, father, fam, friends, friendship; while the non-religious used words that referred to media and entertainment: internet, film, episode, album, computer, laptop.

The non-religious were more likely to use descriptive words, adjectives and adverbs while the religious used words that referred to emotional states of being. This seems to indicate that the non-religious tend to be more critical and judgmental in their statuses.

As Christians the proper response to this study is to not pat ourselves on the back or to think we're better than our non-religious neighbors. The Bible teaches us that a thankful heart and gracious words are fruits of the Holy Spirit. Without the Spirit of God our natural default is to be miserable, vulgar, and self-absorbed. As the Apostle Paul said, "I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature" (Rom 7:18).

Godly attitudes and godly words originate with God as he breathes his Spirit into us through his Word.

When Nineveh Silenced the Skeptics

The Assyrian capital of Nineveh was arguably the greatest city in the world during the 8th century BC, ruling over an empire that stretched from Persia to Sudan.

Nineveh occupies an important place in the Biblical record. God sent his prophet Jonah to Nineveh to call the city to repentance. The prophets Isaiah, Micah, Nahum and Zephaniah ministered during the empire's existence and some of the most important Messianic prophecies were recorded during this time period (Isaiah 7:14, Micah 5:2).  The Assyrians destroyed the northern tribes of Israel and most of Judah. In fact, Jerusalem appears to be the only major city in the Middle East that escaped Assyrian destruction due to God's miraculous intervention. (Isaiah 37:36)

What most people do not know is that up until the last century and a half there was very little evidence for Nineveh's existence outside of the Biblical record. In his Philosophy of History Voltaire wrote that the existence of a large city called Nineveh "does not seem credible," that the existence of a powerful empire like Assyria has "but very little the air of probability," and that "Nineveh was not built...or at least had very little importance during the time of Jonah."

During the 1840s French archaeologist Paul-Emile Botta uncovered the palace of Ashurbanipal II at the Assyrian capital of Nimrud. Meanwhile, English archaeologist Austen Henry Laynard uncovered Sennacherib's palace at the Assyrian capital of Nineveh. These archaeological finds in northern Iraq uncovered a treasure trove of artifacts that silenced the skeptics.

Here's a list of some of the more significant findings:

• Details on the destruction of Samaria and the exile of the northern tribes. (2 Kings 17:3-6, 24; 18:9-11)
• The first non-Biblical evidence of King Sargon II (Isaiah 20:1)
• Assyrian king Sennacherib mentions King Hezekiah and admits that rather than taking Jerusalem he left Hezekiah in his city like a "bird in a cage." (2 Kings 18:13-16)
• Large wall reliefs of the destruction of Lachish, Judah's second largest. The ruins of which have been found in Israel. (2 Kings 18:14, 17)
• King Ahab mentioned by name as a member of an anti-Assyrian coalition. 
• A relief depicting the submission of Israel's king, Jehu. 
• The assassination of Sennacherib by his own sons (2 Kings 19:37)
• Records that king Manasseh paid tribute and accompanied the Assyrians on a military campaign in Egypt.

(Image: King Jehu submitting to Shalmaneser III)

The discovery of Nineveh and the records of the Assyrian kings teach us that the Bible is historically reliable. Most skeptics I interact with know very little of Biblical and Assyrian history.  Even Christians are content to ignore the historical significance of the Bible. This historical apathy has a way of undercutting the Bible's claim to truth. Christians and skeptics need to know that the Bible has a historical context that can be investigated.  

If the Bible is historically reliable is it reliable in other ways? Is the Bible a reliable book on theology and prophecy? Nineveh's discovery not only supports Biblical history but also Biblical prophecy. The prophet Nahum predicted the fall of the great city. Consider Zephaniah's description of Nineveh's destruction: "He will stretch out his hand against the north and destroy Assyria, leaving Nineveh utterly desolate and dry as a desert. This is the city of revelry that live in safety. She said to herself, "I am the one! And there is none besides me." What a ruin she has become, a lair for wild beasts! All who pass by her scoff and shake their fists" (Zeph. 2:14, 16).

Had Voltaire heeded Zephaniah's prophecy he would not have been so quick to doubt Nineveh and Assyria's existence. Nineveh was discovered in the exact condition that Zephaniah had prophesied centuries before: "a dry, desolate place...a lair for wild beasts."

Did the discovery of Nineveh make men like Voltaire more open to the truth of Scripture? No, their approach to the Bible has always followed the pattern of "guilty and never to be proven innocent no matter what evidence turns up!" They will continue to cling to their foolish assumptions and inaccurate caricatures of the Bible no matter what archaeology turns up. Their position does not stem from an open mind but from a spiritually rebellious heart. The proper response to such skeptics is to shake the dust from one's feet and to relay the message that they will share the same fate as the defiant and arrogant city of Nineveh.

New Atheism Is Aging Terribly

In the early 2000s the four horsemen of the non-apocalypse charged out of the starting gates to declare war on religion. The four militant atheists included Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennet and the now-deceased Christopher Hitchens. Others who hopped onto the religion bashing bandwagon included Bill Maher, Dan Barker, Matt Dillahaunty, Peter Atkins, Lawrence Krauss and even Penn & Teller.

What caused such a godless commotion in the early 2000s? Some would argue that 9/11 and a religiously charged political landscape triggered the new atheist movement. Progressives worried that they were being sandwiched in-between fanatical Islam and fanatical fundamentalist Christianity. The LGBT movement also saw a useful ally in the new atheists.

But times, they are a changin'. A theocratic boogeyman has not taken over the White House. We are no where close to the dystopian world of the Handmaid's Tale. The last two presidents have not appeared to be very religious. The LGBT movement is getting its way. College-aged kids now have no recollection of 9/11 and the person who is currently the greatest threat to the United States is a chubby little atheist in North Korea.

What do post-9/11 millennials hate these days? They hate “hate-speech.”  This has become a huge PR problem for the new atheists. I'm not sure when "hate-speech" became a popular phrase but it seems that most secular thinking people are distancing themselves from certain new atheists over incendiary remarks. Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Bill Maher have all lost followers due to crude remarks. While harsh criticisms of Christianity seem to be tolerated, a religion like Islam has achieved special-interest status among progressives and criticism of the multi-ethnic religion of Islam is seen as racist. Consider the following interchange between atheist Bill Maher and Hollywood progressive Ben Affleck:

While the new atheists are being silenced on the secular front it seems that they have met their match on the religious front. The new atheist movement breathed new life into Christian apologetics. Christian thinkers met the atheist challenge by not only defending Christianity but by exposing many of the new atheists argument and as untenable and the atheistic worldview as irrational. The new atheist movement took on 2000 years of Christian thought and philosophy and found themselves lacking.

Does this mean that the world is becoming increasingly religious? No, not really. For the Christian, atheism is a mere outlier in the world of unbelief. Just because the secular world is not inherently atheist does not mean that they are inherently Christian.

Trumping Truth

The 1966 cover of Time: IS GOD DEAD? sparked considerable controversy. Fifty years later Time will soon launch a similar cover which asks if TRUTH IS DEAD? The catalyst for the cover: President Trump.

Forget Trump for a moment. Did Time unwittingly connect the death of truth to the death of God? Does eliminating God eliminate any hope for objective truth? Observers have described the last several decades as postmodern. Postmodernism suggests that there is no absolute truth, that truth is relative. Before postmodernism, if I had a truth claim someone may challenge the truthfulness of my claim. In postmodern times, if I have a truth claim someone may challenge the fact that I have a claim to truth! This has been especially true in the realm of religion and morality.

Consider a metaphor from Kurt Vonnegut's postmodern novel, Cat's Cradle. The novel centers around a terrifying man-made substance called "ice-nine" which remains a solid at room temperature. When ice-nine comes into contact with water it turns the property of water into solid ice-nine. Place ice-nine on your tongue and all the liquid in your body freezes. Pour ice-nine into the ocean and all water connected to the ocean would soon become solid wiping out all life on earth.

Was eliminating God the ice-nine that began to erode truth? And why would the relativism of ice-nine end with religion and morality? Would it not eventually spread to any and all truth claims?

Several decades ago, Francis Schaeffer observed that faith, values and morals were sequestered and isolated into the irrational private sphere of non-truth while reason and science were allowed to remain in the rational public sphere of truth. Faith and religion were relegated to the world of relativism while reason and secularism remained in the world of facts and absolutes. Mainline Christian churches fell prey to this mindset as they bought into the idea that religion is subjective and personal, ignoring the fact that the Scriptures make a historical, objective claim to absolute truth.

Schaeffer argued that humans cannot live with a split between the secular and sacred. Humans cannot live like machines. In order to have meaning, humans must make a "leap of faith" from the rational world of secular facts to the irrational world of faith. Failure to make this leap results in a tension that can lead to nihilistic despair.

As humans leap from one sphere to the other the ice-nine of postmodernism infiltrates the secular sphere. Secular subjects like history, logic and science are falling prey to relativism. Secular truth, like sacred truth, is no longer objective but subjective. This means that I get to determine weather or not they are true for me. For example, if someone makes a scientific claim about gender differences and this claim does not fit my preferences then they are oppressing me. In today's postmodern world, claims to absolute truth are now viewed as oppressive power plays.  As Obi Wan Kenobi said, "Only Sith's deal with absolutes."

Are you absolutely sure about that Obi Wan?

Enter Sith Lord Trump. The Time article bemoans the fact that Trump doesn't seem concerned about the truth or that he is adjusting reality to fit his subjective and ideological views. Should this surprise anyone? The reason why progressives are so terrified of Trump is that they are now on the receiving end of  their own tactics. The ice-nine of postmodernism has boomeranged back on them. Trump has taken their tools and weapons and is effectively wielding them against the progressive mainstream. For example, after the election many progressives suggested that fake new sites helped Trump win the election. Rather than argue about the fakeness of news sites or their impact on the election Trump took the "fake news" grenade and hurled it back at his critics by calling the mainstream news fake.

Like it or not, we are in a new era where all truth is becoming subjective and as a result power determines truth. Trump is the new King Saul anointed by a reluctant and defeated religious right to wage war against the progressive Philistines. Unlike the religious right, Trump is not afraid to use the weapons of postmodernism.

The secular-progressive monopoly on truth is crumbling and I don't have much sympathy for them. They are the ones that unleashed the ice-nine postmodern  plague of relativism. They should look back at the March 1966 Time magazine cover and consider if that is when this all started.

Humanism, Christianity and Marriage

I once worked at Sicilian restaurant where the chef created culinary masterpieces for his menu. I cringed when a patron decided to change the ingredients. I would return to the kitchen with the special request and the chef would roll his eyes and prepare an imperfect dish. Sometimes he would point down the road and suggest that his costumers go to a fast-food restaurant where they can stuff their faces with whatever they want.

The battle for the definition of marriage rests on a very simple question. "Who's the chef?" Christians view marriage as a dish designed by God, similar to an item on a menu designed by a master chef. To question the form and function of marriage is foolish, arrogant, and an insult to the God who instituted it.

While Christians live under the institution of marriage created by God, humanists throw on the chef's hat and place themselves above it. Humanists deconstruct the chef's dishes and place the ingredients upon a buffet table for their perusal. The end result is fast-food that I can have my way. If a Christian criticizes a humanist's design for marriage the humanist naturally becomes offended and views the Christian as arrogant and rude. "How dare you criticize my tastes. This is a buffet!"

We are no longer living in a Christian context where truth is determined by God. Understanding this will help to keep Christians from committing one of two errors.

Error #1: Christians will try to force God's "menu" on others. This legalistic approach fails because even if you successfully force a menu into people's hands they'll still desire a buffet. Legalism requires the heavy hand of authority or government. Jesus did not try to recruit Pontius Pilate or King Herod and neither should we. Christians must proclaim, offer and defend the truth but we must be careful not to force it.

Error #2 Christians will join others in the buffet to appear relevant. This approach makes Christianity indistinguishable from the rest of the world. Why join a church for more of the same? Over time the menu gets twisted and the remaining Christians become enamored by the buffet. This is the plight of most mainline denominations.

So what's the Christian to do?

The prophet Daniel lived in godless Babylon where he was literally offered a buffet. The Babylonians expected Daniel and his friends to eat food that was forbidden on God's menu. Daniel did not force his food on the Babylonians but he stood firm and refused the Babylonian fare. He challenged his overseer to observe him and his friends, to see what sort of impact his diet would have on him and his friends. Daniel's Babylonian overseer observed Daniel and saw that God's diet had a beneficial effect.

Christians are to treat marriage as an institution authored by God. We can offer it to others but we must not force it. We can be kind and respectful to others but we dare not change who we are or water down God's menu to appear relevant. Let's sit down together and enjoy God's menu. Perhaps someone who is sick of the junk food will observe the benefits of a faithful, God-centered marriage and ask to see a menu.

Climate Change, Paganism, Bill Nye and Bovine Flatulence

There's a story of a toddler using the toilet during an earthquake. When the earthquake ended the child asked his mother, "What did I do?" The story is amusing and it's a good reminder that we think more highly of ourselves than we ought to. Dogs also do this. The mailman arrives every day, the dog barks and the mailman goes away. The dog lies back down proud that his barking once again drove off the mailman.

This mindset is evident in paganism. Pagans generally adopt a pantheistic view that assumes an interconnectedness between the world, themselves and god(s). Through the proper knowledge, spells, sacrifices and incantations pagans believe that they can influence their environment. The Aztecs slaughtered, beheaded and ripped out hearts in hopes of appeasing the sun. The sun relents and the Aztecs are reinforced in their barbaric practice. The ancient neighbors of Israel brought their prostitutes to the tops of hills in order to arouse the sky god. The rains came and the pagans continue in their fertility rites.

The dog barks and the mailman goes away.

Today we're told that our actions are having an enormous impact on the environment and I wonder, are we like the child sitting on a toilet during an earthquake? Are we returning to a pagan mentality? Growing up in Alaska I was told that we caused a hole to appear over the arctic. The ozone hole was a rather frightening thing to learn about. I wondered if I was going to get skin cancer and I heard rumors that salmon were going blind. In 1987 the Montreal Protocol initiated a series of steps that would deplete the use of chloroflurocarbons which were thought to deplete the ozone. By 1996 chloroflurocarbons were no longer in use and now today, twenty years later, the ozone hole no longer exists or is, at least, no longer a concern. Al Gore swooped in on his plane, pulled the inhaler out of my mouth and replaced it with one twice as expensive and half as effective. Alaskans can once again lay out in the sun and tan their beautiful bods while asthmatics cough up a little more money.

Did we save the planet in 1987? Was the rapid healing of the ozone due to the decisions made in Montreal or did the mailman go away after we barked? Why isn't 1987 celebrated as the day we saved the ozone and, by extension, the planet? As soon as the ozone scare dissipated another scare replaced it. The concern floated from the arctic to Florida which would be underwater in the not too distant future. California and the rest of the West would become a vast desert, although every picture I see of the West lately includes a ton of water. A few years back we witnesses a polar vortex and the semantics shifted from global warming to climate change. Recently I watched a video suggesting that we don't see the huge effects of global warming because our planet is actually supposed to be in an ice-age. The world should actually be very cold right now and it just so happens that human-caused global warming has made things appear normal. Talk about interpreting facts to fit your conclusions! The beauty behind the science of human-caused climate change is that any environmental fact can be used to support the theory. The earth is too cold, the earth is too hot, the climate is stagnant, the climate is dynamic, there are no hurricanes, there are lots of hurricanes - any of these facts can be placed into the climate change model. Facts should mold models, models should not mold facts.

Consider Tucker Carlson's recent interview with Bill Nye in the clip below. After Bill talks about the settled science of climate change Tucker asks a very simple question: "To what degree is climate change caused by human activity?" Bill can't answer it and he obviously gets very uncomfortable as he tries to buy time by playing word games. The interview becomes very awkward and Bill seems to be in a very bizarre mental state by the end.

One of the reasons why children abandon their religious faith is because their questions are not taken seriously or they are chided for questioning authority. The same thing happens when questions are raised over human-caused climate change. When I was in middle school I asked why I shouldn't be a suspicious when a politician like Al Gore becomes the voice of global warming. I asked about the historical ebb and flow of glaciers and even sea levels. Later I asked about the medieval chills and warm periods. After that I asked if the relationship between carbon and temperature is logarithmic rather than linear and if urban heat islands account for the apparent rise in global temperature. I asked about solar activity and sunspots. The responses to such questions amount to condescending shrieks or patronizing attempts to educate. I believe that the greatest enemy to those who preach climate change are, in fact, the climate change zealots and their inability to recognize their dogmatic methodology.

I'll never forget my middle-school self watching a show called Sea Quest which took place in a submarine in the not too distant future. There was an episode where one of the characters had smuggled beef. Yes, smuggled beef, because cow farts kill the planet. Farts were supposed to be funny not threatening. I turned the TV off and thought about the large herbivore dinosaurs and how their farts must have destroyed the environment which led to their extinction. Good riddance to the brontosaurus, I guess. Last year I was very amused when I learned that cows in Argentina are now decked out in fart collecting backpacks.

The absolutism of human-caused climate change is not based upon science but upon a belief system Since human-caused climate change is based upon a belief system, skepticism is not tolerated.  Radical environmentalists appoint themselves as priests endowed with a special gnosis which lies beyond the reach of the unenlightened.The pantheistic fantasy of James Cameron's Pandora is a religious parable that teaches the dogma of pagan environmentalism. The planet and its contents are deified and the pillaging mechanistic hordes of humans are demonized. Since the pagan mindset deifies both humans and the planet, our actions (even small ones) impact the environment. Our evil actions can kill the environment and our good actions can save it. We can drive our hybrids, reduce our carbon footprint, and pat ourselves on the back like proud little ecological Messiahs.

Humans can certainly have an impact on the environment, but I wonder to what extent. Just because I'm skeptical of certain climate claims doesn't mean that everything climate change advocates preach is inherently false. Why throw the polar bear out with the arctic bathwater? Skepticism also does not mean that I'm not going to do my part to care for the environment. In fact, the people I know who have the smallest carbon footprints are not the hip urban dwellers who preach an ecological end of days, but the out of touch country bumpkins who live in nature, respect it, understand it and do their best to conserve it.

Perhaps when the metaphorical waters clear and the smog lifts we will be able to see the truth more clearly. Until then I would advocate that we treat the earth like God's masterpiece rather than an impersonal deity that pathetically needs our protection. The Bible begins in a garden and pictures the land of Israel as a beautiful blessing worthy of respect, care, and at times, rest. Scripture teaches that the earth groans and awaits redemption. Christianity gives hope not just to dying humans but to a dying planet. Christians need to articulate an environmentalism that views humans as stewards and curators of God's masterpiece rather than slaves that must sacrifice themselves to Gaia.

Is Jesus Sarcastic?

Was Jesus ever sarcastic? Did Jesus ever use satire? The most obvious use of sarcasm and satire is in Jesus' treatment of the Pharisees and the religious leaders of the day. Jesus likened them to dirty dishes, unmarked graves, blind guides, a beautiful whitewashed tomb that contains a carcass, and a brood of vipers. Jesus says that Pharisees strain out a gnat (so that they don't accidentally eat an unclean thing) but they swallow a camel; they decorate the tombs of the prophets that they killed; they convert someone only to make them twice the child of hell; they show off their huge prayer phylacteries, long robes and tassels; they take impressive places of honor while devouring the widow's home; they love the praise of men more than the praise of God. Jesus even told them that prostitutes are entering the kingdom of heaven before them.

Some of Jesus' parable contain satirical jabs at the Pharisees and other religious leaders. In the parable of the Good Samaritan a heretical half-breed is pictured as more righteous than a priest and temple worker. In the parable of the Pharisee and the tax-collector the tax-collector goes home justified because he has a repentant heart. In the parable of the Prodigal Son the older son, who clearly represents the Pharisees, is left outside of his farther's home fuming with self-righteous jealousy.

I also sense a bit of sarcasm when Jesus compliments the Pharisees. If you say to someone, "Must be nice to be perfect!" They will probably be offended. It seems that Jesus did something similar after the Pharisees chided him for eating with the "sinners" and tax collectors. Jesus replied, "It's not the healthy that need a doctor, but the sick." In another place Jesus says that a person's righteousness must exceed that of the Pharisees. This is a classic back-handed compliment that would've irritated the Pharisees. I would love to have seen their faces.

Most of Jesus's satirical criticisms are reserved for the self-righteous and the unrepentant. On one occasion he made an offensive remark to test the faith of a Canaanite woman. After she asked for his help he compared her to a dog. She took the insult and persisted. Jesus commended her for her great faith.

Jesus may be using a hint of sarcasm when he refers to himself by his favorite title. The Son of Man is a title that is first seen in the book of Daniel. The Son of Man clearly refers to the glorified Messiah. While the Pharisees would stone Jesus if he publicly said that he was the Son of God he could get away with saying that he was the Son of Man. This must have irritated the Pharisees as they understood the Messianic implications of the phrase. Jesus also played on words with his various I AM statements. He was especially bold when he declared, "Before Abraham was born, I AM." Here, Jesus was clearly identifying himself as God who had revealed himself to Moses as the I AM.

What lessons are we to take from this?

1. Jesus is not a wimp

As children we learn of a very gentle Jesus. We picture him embracing children and cradling a little lamb in his arms. Jesus was certainly loving and gentle with his flock. As children grow older it's also important that they see Jesus as a warrior and as a lion who will defend his flock. That love prompts him to lash out, and to expose the wolves who wear sheep's clothing.

2 Audience matters

Jesus knew who needed to be knocked down with the law and he knew who needed to be uplifted by the gospel. Jesus could see self-righteous hearts and repentant hearts. Jesus knew how to afflict the comfortable and how to comfort the afflicted.

3. Jesus's sarcastic remarks and satire came from a place of love

After Jesus condemns the pharisees he weeps for them. He says that he longed to gather them as a hen gathers her chicks. Jesus tears them to pieces so that they might see the error of their ways and repent. This is love's last resort.

4. Jesus is shrewd and intelligent

Jesus' knowledge of the scriptures and his audience was immense, deep and obviously divine. His retorts, parables, and questions silenced his critics. He was able to say things that were forbidden to say without really saying them.

5. Jesus was not afraid of causing offense

Jesus sought humility and repentance. Throughout the Scriptures the prophets preached repentance and the need for a new heart. This is offensive. Today's Christianity is scared to offend. If Christians are afraid to offend then they will be afraid to share the Word of God.

6. Satire is useful for exposing hypocrisy

Jesus makes the Pharisees look ridiculous by simply placing a mirror before them. The hypocrite brings the satire upon themselves. Satire is an effective way to expose hypocrisy.

What will I tell her?

No. I won't set her up to be a loser. I won't tell her that things are impossible. I don't want my daughter seeing herself as a victim. I don't want her to blame all of her problems on others or on the "patriarchy." I don't want her to be hateful.

I also don't think that she is at a disadvantage. I do not think her culture values her less. This is 2017, not 1947. The make up of college students is 57% female. My daughters are more likely to attend college than my son. If she gets harassed or becomes a victim of a sexist remark I want her self-respect, solid convictions and confidence to send those cockroaches scurrying away. I want her to be a warrior, even if the deck is stacked up against her, not a whiner who pouts in the corner because she didn't get her way.

I also don't want a German car company lecturing the United States over issues related to gender. Audi has set records in its sales growth in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia ranks 2nd in growth in Audi sales among countries in the Middle East. I expect that within the next year Audi will boycott Saudi Arabia until women can freely drive cars. I'm sure that their principles will trump their desire for sales.

Feminism's Final Wave

A few years ago I wondered if feminism was dead. The transgender movement seemed poised to inherit feminism's cultural waves. Girls would have to step off the high school softball field as transitioning male to female athletes stepped up to the plate with their biological advantages. Last year a transgender student made it to the Alaska state track meet which means that the young lady that finished behind him could not compete. There is a social justice pecking order and feminists are beginning to find themselves left behind in the world of social justice grievances. The feminist movement looks old, white and hopelessly binary. How can such a movement survive when Facebook allows you to choose from over 50 genders?

But wait, not so fast! A well-organized army of feminists flooded Washington D.C. like a pink tsunami. The choice of head-wear at the Women's March included hats that resembled reproductive organs and hijabs. For those who do not see the world through the social justice warrior lens the presence of hijabs alongside "pussyhats" seemed bizarre and out of place. While pro-life feminists were dis-invited from the march, Muslim feminists were readily accepted. Observers might scratch their heads as they consider the anti-abortion stance of most Muslims as well as the rights and status of women in Islamic societies. Saudi Arabia is the beating heart of Islam and also happens to be a place where women are publicly segregated and something as mundane as driving a car is frowned upon if you are female. Controversy erupted when Saudi women participated in the Olympics. An Islamic cleric likened the athletes to prostitutes.

The most noticeable leader of the Women's March was a Muslim woman who lamented the fact that sharia law was not welcome in the United States. Her name is Linda Sarsour, a daughter of Palestinian immigrants and an activist who pushed for NYC public schools to close for certain Islamic holidays. Linda was invited to be a leader of the event. I assumed that those who invited her to the march were white women who didn't want the march to be about white women. After doing a quick Wikipedia search on the organizers my suspicions were confirmed. The white organizers of the march were quick to hide behind minority individuals.

All of this points to a new social justice movement known as intersectionality. Feminists have adapted intersectionality as a way to survive the ever-evolving world of social justice causes. Intersectionality is a term used to describe the way that various social advantages or disadvantages overlap. The following video is an instructional piece that uses pizza to describe intersectionality:

The problem with your typical feminists is that they look super privileged when they walk about with their $4 Starbucks and their homemade, hand-knitted "pussyhats." According to the video they are nothing but "cheese pizzas." Feminism is thus allowed to survive as long as it checks its historical privilege and couples itself with other victim groups (or other pizzas in their fight against a world run by burgers). The Women's March, while predominantly white, was careful to include various minority, trans, and lesbian groups. Without intersctionality the feminist movement would be cannibalized or co-opted by those who are higher up on the social justice scale.

Social justice warriors also breathed life into feminism because it is politically useful. They can build a case against President Trump based upon sexism and Islamophobia. Trump is not as vulnerable on issues related to race, homosexuality and transgenderism. Currently, victimizing Muslims and women is politically expedient, but that could all change with a shift of the political winds. By the way, whatever happened to the BLM movement?

What intersectionality gives it can also take away. Beneath the social justice veneer of solidarity is paranoia and infighting. There are signs that social justice warriors are beginning to turn their weapons on each other (cheese pizza vs. deluxe pizza). A cannibal can survive with other cannibals as long as they're not competing for resources. If feminists are not careful they may find themselves next on the dinner plate as their social scale tips from victim to privileged.

Atheists, Unicorns and Narwhals

"God is a myth like the unicorn." 

"Prove to me that an invisible pink unicorn does not exist and I'll prove to you that there is no God." 

The unicorn is a common symbol for atheists. Atheists love to compare God to unicorns.

In his book, Illogical Atheism, Bo Jinn exposes the fallacious thinking of atheism. Bo includes a memorable discussion on the unicorn as it relates to the discussion on God:

"There is a theory that the myth of the unicorn first came about when ancient nomadic people of Europe discovered strange objects washed up along their shores. These objects were long, pointed conical and had the weight and texture of bone. So, the nomads inferred that they must have been the horn of some kind of animal. The only animals they knew of with horns were land animals like the antelope and the elk. But these horns looked like they could not belong to either. The ancient nomads would have proposed the best possible explanation for what animal the horns might have belonged to, by observing their own surroundings and reasoning things out. So, they concluded that the best explanation was that the horns must have belonged to a large and powerful species of horse that roamed some far away land. If one considers the position of the ancient nomad, one might appreciate that this is hardly an illogical explanation. A horse was a land creature, it was large enough and strong enough to bear the weight of the big horn and since the horns were found washed up on shore one may assume that these large horses died at sea, their bodies were devoured by sea beasts and that the horns floated to their coastal waters. And that is how the myth of the unicorn came about." (Bo Jinn, Illogical Atheism: Book II, chapter 5).

The horn of course is the tusk of a narwhal.

Bo uses this story to make the following two points:

First: The unicorn is not a random concoction of some imaginative ancient person but rather a possible explanation for the horn. 

Let's add to this scenario. Suppose another nomad comes along and disputes the idea that the horn came from a horse-like creature. Perhaps this nomad has some additional evidence that suggests that the horn comes from a sea creature. Maybe he's seen a walrus and thinks that the horn is a tusk that came from a similar type of animal. Let's imagine a few more nomads arrive and argue about the origin of the horn. Most of them agree that it came from a creature that died at sea. They may not know that the horn is actually the tusk of a narwhal but the nomads have correctly concluded that it came from an animal that died at sea.

Now compare the nomads to practitioners of different religions. Does the existence of many religions indicate that there is no God as some atheists presume? Hardly. The many religions of this world are a testament to the fact that God has left knowledge about himself in the natural world. More evidence, however, is needed. Christians would point to the additional evidence in the prophetic scriptures which center around God's Son who became one of us poor nomads and then resurrected from the dead.

Second: The unicorn hypothesis was not refuted by saying that there was a lack of evidence but by new evidence that the horn was a tusk that belonged to a narwhal. Atheists have yet to find their narwhal!

When an atheists refutes a theistic position they will often claim that they are doing so due to a lack of evidence. They will go so far as to say that there is no evidence at all and that faith in God is blind and tantamount to believing in an invisible pink unicorn. The problem for the atheist is that while they claim that God is not the explanation to the universe they are unable replace God with a substitute explanation.

Bo Jinn adds to the nomad scenario by proposing the arrival of another nomad who tells the others that they are all wrong. This nomad claims that there is a lack of evidence to suggest that the horn came from an animal. Naturally, the other nomads press him for an alternative explanation of the horn. The dissenting nomad offers one of two explanations: 1. "The horn popped out of nothing." 2. "The horn has always been there." Obviously, this nomad would not be taken seriously by the others. What he's advocating is unreasonable and more incredible than a miracle.

Atheists have a similar problem. Their explanation for the universe is that it has either always been there or it popped out of nothing. For this reason, out of all the belief systems in the world atheism is the most illogical. Atheism is also the most exclusive of all faiths in that it shares nothing in common with other views. The nomads could all agree that that the horn came from an animal. Most religions agree that there is at least one higher power.

If God is not the proper explanation to the universe then what is? The atheist should not ridicule the notion of God and offer nothing to replace it. The atheist ought to admit that they simply don't want there to be a god. As Thomas Nagel put it, "I don't want the universe to be like that." At the heart of atheism is not evidence or the lack thereof but a stubborn and rebellious heart.

The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." - Psalm 14:1

Intricacies of Psalm 23

Yahweh

-Yahweh (LORD) is the first word of the psalm

-Yahweh (LORD) is mentioned twice in the psalm, once at the beginning and once at the end.

- The center of the psalm is the phrase "for you are with me." There are 26 words before the phrase and 26 words after the phrase. 26 is the numerical value of the Hebrew word for Yahweh. The four consonants are also the numbers 10, 5, 6 and 5. 

Chiasm

A. Going home with the Lord. No lack

      B. Leads me

           C. Still Waters, Green Pastures

                D. Restores my Soul

                     E. Shadow of Death

                          F. No Fear

                              G. You are with me, Your Rod, Your Staff

                          F. Comfort

                     E. Presence of my Enemies

                 D. Prepares a Table 

           C. Oil, Cup

      B. Follow me

A. At home with the Lord. Forever

A Chiasm of 7 Verbs

He Shepherds

     He Makes Me

          He Leads Me

               He Restores

          He Leads

     He Prepares

He Anoints

He and You

Notice how at the climax of the psalm the pronouns for God switch from he to you. Now that the author knows that God is with him the psalm becomes more personal. He's not being directed rather he is being doted upon by God. It's almost as if the valley of the shadow of death caused him to turn toward his shepherd. Notice also the triple "you" in the climactic phrase. God is often described in threes throughout the Scripture. 

Echoes of Exodus

"The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing."

     Exodus 16:18 - Everyone had gathered (manna and quail) just as much as they needed.. 

     "I lack nothing" is the same word as "as much as they needed."

"He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters."

     Exodus 15:13 - In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling. 

     "He leads me..." is the same word as "you will guide."

     Exodus 15:23 - "Bitter Waters" ME MARAH

     Numbers 20:13 - "Troubled Waters ME MERIBAH 

     Psalm 23:2 - "Quiet Waters" ME MENIHOT

"He restores my soul"

     Exodus 14 - The word for "restored" is used to describe how God restored the waters of the Red          Sea.

"Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil. For you are with me. Your rod and your staff they comfort me. 

    Israel travels through the Red Sea with a wall of water on the right and on the left. Moses stretched     his staff out over the Sea to split it. 

"Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life."

     Exodus 14:19-20 - The Angel of the LORD, and the pillar of cloud moved behind Israel as                  they crossed the sea. 

"And I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever

     Exodus 13 - Describes Israel's condition in Egypt as living in the House of Slavery

Psalm 23 in the Broader Context of the Psalms

- Psalms 15-24 are often taken as a group. 

- A chiasm is evident

A. Psalm 15: Who may live on God's holy mountain?

     B. Psalm 16: Trust

          C. Psalm 17: Cry for help

               D. Psalm 18: God Delivers

                    E. Psalm 19 - Creation Praises God

               D. Psalm 20-21: God Delivers

          C. Psalm 22: Cry for help

     B. Psalm 23: Trust

A. Psalm 24: Who may live on God's holy mountain?

Psalm 23 and Psalm 16 are in parallel positions. They also have similarities.

     Psalm 16:1 - Yahweh is my Lord

     Psalm 23:1 - Yahweh is my Shepherd

     

     Psalm 16:5 - "You alone are my portion and cup"

     Psalm 23:5 - "My cup overflows"

     

     Psalm 16:10 - "You will not abandon me to the grave (Sheol)"

     Psalm 23:4 - "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death."

     Psalm 16:11 - "Eternal pleasures at your right hand."

     Psalm 23:6 - "I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever."

     Psalm 16:11 - "Path of life"

     Psalm 23:3 - "Paths of righteousness"

Stop Saying that You Believe in Science

"I Believe in Science!"

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The statement I believe in science is not a scientific statement. When a person says that they believe in science what they really mean is that they believe in philosophical materialism. Philosophical materialism is the belief that matter is all that exists. This is not scientific but speculative. Since the dogma of philosophical materialism is equated to science it often goes unquestioned and unexamined. Philosophical materialism reduces everything to matter rendering things like thought, memory, values, free-will, freedom, equality, good, evil, morality, meaning, and love as illusionary possessions of a bunch of duped robots. Philosophical materialism is existentially bankrupt, narrow-minded and woefully inadequate in its ability to explain the human experience.

The statement I believe in science is used as a personal attack to cut off debate or to silence critics. The statement is often employed as an ad hominem that paints the other person as ignorant and uneducated. If I watched a video of Bill Nye rambling about abortion and I said that he was wrong because he's a clown, I would be committing an ad hominem logical fallacy. Bill Nye being a clown has nothing to do with the truthfulness of his statements on abortion.

The statement I believe in science is committing a categorical error. When we look at the context of how this phrase is used, belief in science is often juxtaposed to belief in God. Science and God are in two completely different categories. The former describes nature and the latter explains why nature is there or why we are even able to describe nature (science!). Responding to belief in God with the statement I believe in science is like saying I don't believe in Picasso, I believe in art!

The statement I believe in science is self-refuting when used in an epistemological sense. Scientism is a relatively new term which refers to the belief that science is the only source of knowledge. While philosophical materialism limits the state of being (ontology) scientism places limits on knowing (epistemology). Scientism is self-refuting because scientism cannot be verified scientifically! Scientism can also be turned against science since many of the assumptions behind science cannot be proven scientifically.

The statement I believe in science is really a belief in the infallibility of  the scientific establishment. This is ironic since much of history's scientific heroes were people who went against the scientific establishment by questioning their assumptions. Today's science has become dogmatic and authoritative. I guess when you ignore the history of science you are doomed to repeat it.

A Church that Reads the Koran

A few years ago Luther's church in Germany began their Reformation service with a call to worship from an Islamic minister. A lone German woman protested from the balcony. Her testimony is in the video clip below:

The disease has apparently spread to Scotland where an Episcopalian cathedral celebrated the Epiphany of Jesus with a reading from the Koran. The lector read about the annunciation of Jesus from the Koran in Arabic. Within the Koran's annunciation of Jesus is the anti-Christian teaching that Allah (God) could not have a son. The Koran also describes Jesus talking as an infant, a tradition which Mohammad inherited from the Gnostic sects that inhabited the once diverse area of Arabia.

This church is not interested in the teachings of Christ but in cultural acceptance. Their goal is more political than spiritual and it spills over into their sermons. An excerpt from the Christmas sermon likened King Herod to Donald Trump:

But Herod didn’t manage to kill the Christ child, didn’t manage to kill hope, didn’t manage to wipe out love either.And neither will Trump. Nor Putin. Nor any of the putative far right big men (or big women, that’s not impossible either) be able to wipe love out either.Love always wins.

The midnight mass sermon also began with a mention of Trump and Brexit.

I believe that people of Europe have three options: Christianity, Islam, or nationalism. I think that nationalism will check the Islamic surge and that it will be godless and brutal. Christians have stepped aside and in their eagerness to be agreeable to secularism they have rendered themselves irrelevant in Europe. Their desire to be acceptable will only allow evil to flourish. 

Perhaps it won't be nationalism. Perhaps apathy and inertia will allow Islam to finally take over Europe. If Europe becomes an Islamic continent the culture, languages, and rich history of Europe will disappear under Islam's heavy yoke. The cathedrals will become mosques and diversity will be a thing of the past. 

I think about the Hagia Sophia, that beautiful domed mosque in Istanbul. Was it built by Muslims? Was it designed to be a mosque? 

No, it was a church, a product of Christianity which was converted into a mosque in 1453. The dome architecture of Islamic mosques is not original to Islam but to an ancient, eastern Christianity which today is but a shadow of its former self and a warning to what will happen to a Christianity that compromises. 

   

Pseudomodernism: A Fake New World

By the mid-nineties we tossed the last few shovelfuls upon Truth's grave and looked about the grim reality that Americans possessed everything and yet at the same time had nothing. Science and technology had bequeathed history's bloodiest century. The Soviet Union dissolved. Our aspirations for space travel petered out with the Challenger explosion. Utopias had become as unreachable as the stars. Global-warming alarmists prophesied doom. Reckless presidents dabbled in the Mideast and philandered with interns. Seattle grunge and the Midwest melancholy existential musings of the Smashing Pumpkins echoed postmodernism's postmortem of the enlightenment. From Kurt Vonnegut to Kurt Cobain the message was clear - the truth is that Truth was dead. Truth had been deconstructed, dismembered, and disemboweled - never to be disinterred. Only ignoramuses in the hinterland held on to a bygone absolutism.

Then, some jetliners pierced our existential fog eliminating New York's lofty pillars. We ran about like disoriented farm animals in a hail storm. We needed Truth but we had buried her. Our golden eggs were threatened and the mangled carcass of the goose lay on our dinner table. Then, a strange and unexpected deus ex machina descended upon us; the internet sprinkled its benevolent digital pixy dust upon the corpses of Truth and her children. The grim reality of our world was replaced by a new world, an undiscovered country. Our whirling compasses finally settled on a direction. All the needles pointed back to their operators.

The postmodern world eliminated truth and then gave us the digital tools we needed to create our own truths. We became the standard bearers. We became masters of a new universe that lay quite literally at our fingertips. Search engines and social media fed our preferences. We no longer had to be meaningless pawns in a chaotic universe; rather, we were given Brahman-like power to create one of many universes where our avatars can run amok. Welcome to the pseudomodern world.

The first dozen years of the new millennium had a pleasant veneer. We clicked and voted through our mobile devices controlling reality stars and elevating nobodies to prominent positions. We recognized the great interconnections of all things and if our codes and timing were correct we could tap into power, a power similar to the power wielded by ancient Shamans who sought to control their world through mantras and spells. Like Zeus we could cloud ourselves in the elements of our new universe and sow our wild oats in disguise. We could assume even more power through endless social pantheons by advertising ourselves through various "upvotes" "likes" and "followers." The thrill of power caused a lust for more. Something else happened, all the unpleasant failings and character flaws of the former world no longer needed to haunt us. We filtered, edited, selected and morphed. Like chameleons we could adjust to the demands of our surroundings. Gender, religion, sexuality, education, history and marriage were uprooted from their absolute moorings and placed upon a digital smorgasbord. We could feast without restraints.

Vestiges of objective Truth remained, threatening the autonomy and authority of a billion new gods and goddesses. Once the dust of the twin towers settled we looked skeptically at religion. Christianity closely resembled the Truth that the West had deconstructed. Secularists placed pressure on her from the outside like a horde of elitist Romans while the Judases of subjective spiritualism continued the onslaught from within. Like parasites they feasted upon the Christian worldview, using the sustenance to attack the host. If the parasites were to emerge they would need a new religion, a meta-narrative that would provide meaning, hope, goals, morality and value. The secular vultures left their religious prey, combed their feathers, and embraced a new, secular religion that advocated social justice, diversity, inclusion and permitted a divinity that could be found only within. Universities became temples where a secular priestly caste of professors preached dogma ensconced in a flowery perch of terminology known only to the enlightened. The media functioned as their prophets and the culturally elite regurgitate their platitudes. They walk on two legs like Orwell's pigs, scorning their roots, and we follow blindly choosing the path of least resistance.

But a tension lingered unexamined. We embrace new truths after deconstructing Truth. We embrace new moralities after deconstructing morality. We elevate ourselves to godhood after deconstructing life to blind mechanistic forces of zero value. We vocally give our approval and distaste but our pronouncements have no force because their foundation is nothing but preference.  We hurdle about in a moral vacuum driving ourselves mad because we have no firm ground to push off of and nothing to orbit. We have climbed into God's throne and we have found that we do not fit. Our wings melt off as we strive to achieve his brilliance.

And so when there is nothing left to consume we must consume ourselves.The parasite has tried on the costume of its host but a parasite without a host will cannibalize itself.  In our goal to become like God we become less that human. Our utopias become hell. Our desire to become like the ancient stars results in black-holes, the gravitational pull of which there is no escape. We can bide our time by pulling and tugging on our fellow man, climbing and clamoring over his shoulders but soon we'll be consumed. The pseudo-secular dam is about to burst and the coming deluge is prophetically reflected in the vacant eyes of the opioid addict who wanders around a land flowing with milk and honey.

Postmodernism removed fences and we embraced the freedom without considering why the fences were there in the first place. We have forgotten that the greatest thing we need protection from is ourselves. Nations rise and fall. Their eventual demise comes not from the outside but from a decay within. We mask the decay with progressive semantics but one day a passerby will walk by the wall and put his hand through it realizing that it is brittle paper mache. He will then urge his friends to walk through the wall and gorge upon the ruins of the gods.

The "Set Apart" God

When I was in Sunday School the thought of ancients worshiping items of wood and stone baffled me. The practice seemed common and the Old Testament Jews couldn't help but be drawn to it. God delivered his chosen tribe from Egypt and the next thing they do is worship a golden bull-calf. How stupid.

Pagan idol worship no longer strikes me as a historical oddity. Today, a college-educated young woman might mix some herbs next to a statue of a Babylonian goddess that she prays to. Later that night she'll meet some acquaintances in the forest around a fire where they will lift their hands toward the moon in prayer and praise.

At the heart of idol worship, nature worship, astrology and a host of other pagan practices is pantheism. Most non-Christian religions share a pantheistic worldview. Pagans, Wiccans, Hindus, New Agers, mystics, and many others view God as immanent. God is one and the same with the universe. God, humans, and creation are all interconnected and therefore it's reasonable to worship the deity through rocks and trees. For the pagan, deity is not transcendent, only immanent. A transcendent deity is distinct from creation, can act upon creation and can hold creatures accountable. Many pagans believe in gods and spirits that might be offended by humans or hold humans accountable, but even these deities are extensions or emanations of a greater, impersonal deity reminiscent of the Force in Star Wars. The great draw to this mindset is that deity lies within. Idols, spirits, gods, spells, worship, prayer and praise are not relational expressions between the creator and the created but are rather tools that are used by the worshiper to manipulate their environment.

The Christian God is both immanent and transcendent. He is immanent in that he is in all things. Paul says in Acts 17 that in God "we live and  move and have our being." The Bible also teaches that God is transcendent. He is exalted, he is above all things, and he is holy. The word "holy" relates to the transcendence of God. The word in the Hebrew is qodesh and means "to be set apart." The "set apartness" of God leaps off the page throughout the Bible. Sin, or a lack of holiness, caused Adam and Eve to be banished from God's presence. On Mount Sinai the Israelite were not allowed to go near the mountain because God was there. The focal point for much of the Old Testament is the tabernacle in the wilderness and the temple in Jerusalem. Multiple boundaries and barriers set God apart from his people in the tabernacle and temple. Priests were set apart. The firstborn were set apart. The seventh day was set apart. Certain foods were set apart. Circumcision demonstrated that the Jews were set apart. The prophets envisioned a time when the Messiah would bring man and God back together. Immanuel means "God with us." A blessing that Christians have through faith because Jesus was abandoned by God the Father. The apostle John begins his gospel by describing Jesus as the Word who was with God, became flesh and made his dwelling (tabernacled) with us. Redemption and atonement through Jesus thus make a loving relationship between the Creator and the created possible. If God is not transcendent then love can only be self-directed since loving the deity is tantamount to loving yourself.

Atheists will often group the Christian God with other pagan deities. The phrase, "I simply believe in one less god than you," is common among atheists. This fallacious thinking is a categorical error. The pagan concept of deity is far different than the Christian concept. The "set apartness" or transcendence of God also has an effect on the way we look at universe. For the pagan all things have a supernatural explanation since God is immanent. For the atheist there are only naturalistic explanations since the supernatural does not exist. For the Christian there are both natural and supernatural explanations. Christianity is often criticized for being anti-science. I would contend that a scientific view of the world is difficult to have without the transcendent notion of God. When God acts upon creation we expect law and order. Scientific progress flows naturally from the assumption that the universe is a system governed by laws and by extension governed by a Lawgiver (aka God) who is "apart." The atheist and pagan must borrow this assumption. Left on their own devices pagan and atheist worldviews must conceive of a universe that is inexplicable, random, chaotic, eternal and lawless.

Worldviews matter.

Toxic Masculinity

The University of Wisconsin Madison is sponsoring a new program called the Men's Project which "aims to explore masculinity and the problems accompanied by simplified definitions of it."

According to the University's website:

The UW Men’s Project is a six­-week program open only to men-identified students that kicks off with an overnight retreat where the group or groups will talk about what “masculinity” means to them.

“A key element of the program is intersectionality. There isn’t just one masculinity, there are many,” says Sam Johnson, a violence prevention specialist at University Health Services (UHS), one of the campus offices organizing the program. She explained that other components of one’s identity—including religion, sexual orientation, and race—all contribute to individual perceptions and experiences of masculinity.

The "introspection" through "questioning" and the project's goal of exposing participants to "different types of masculinity" is designed to deconstruct the "toxic masculinity" that Social Justice Warriors believe is part and parcel to the Patriarchy. This is not education but rather indoctrination into the social justice narrative. Young men ought to be warned.

“We know that men are underrepresented on campus when it comes to campus leadership roles and getting needed medical and mental health services,” Johnson says. “They’re also overrepresented in acts of violence and use of drugs and alcohol. With this program, we want to find out why this is and how we can change that culture campus-wide to encourage healthier expressions of masculinities.”

Sam Johnson is one of the organizers of this program and was a former coordinator of the "Sex Out Loud" tuition-funded club which probably holds the world record for most pictures of condoms on a Facebook page. Sam observes how men are underrepresented on campus and campus leadership roles. Well Sam, if an institution labeled femininity as toxic they would probably avoid it too. The fact of the matter is that from little on boys will get good grades if they behave like girls.

The program operates on a transformative model of social justice allyship. First, facilitators ask students to consider how the students’ opinions about masculinity affect their own perceptions every day. Second, they consider how those opinions affect the people around them. Finally, the program examines how those perceptions affect the whole campus community, and that’s where facilitators and the Men’s Project program coordinators from the UW Division of Student Life, UHS End Violence On Campus, and UW Housing hope to learn the most from the experience.

The program is somewhat similar to an existing course available to men in the Greek community at UW-Madison called "Greek Men for Violence Prevention.“ A two-credit course in the School of Social Work, that class has been available to qualifying students for over ten years.

The goal is pretty clear: deconstruct masculinity and get young men to accept and promote social justice causes. Notice also the correlation in the article between masculinity and violence. Blaming violence on masculinity is like blaming abortion on femininity.

In a previous post I created a glossary of words that Social Justice Warriors use. Social Justice words and catch phrases found in this article include intersectionality, individual perception, vulnerablity, gender-based, diverse, gender-based, and social justice allyship, Knowing the terminology will create valuable red-flags when SJW narrative pops up in a school, church, occupation, institution or program near you.