Archive for November, 2008

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ANNOUNCEMENT – Comments and Spam

Friday, November 28th, 2008

Well. Imagine my joy when I discovered that I had about 65+ comments/trackbacks that were all advertisements for Viagra or Tramadol. Took me about 15 minutes to repair the damage.

So I have made a few changes.

  1. I still allow anyone to register even though I am fairly sure that some “users” are spambots or users who wish to exploit their registration in order to send spam. I occasionally delete users who have odd names or addresses (like wxmdf@domain.ru or webcontrz@whatever.net I mean really).
  2. But comments will no longer be posted without approval. And no one can post a comment who has not had a comment approved before. The only reason for being more strict is to prevent this kind of spam attack in the future.
  3. I also noticed that I can add key words or IP addresses in order to prevent some comments from ever being posted. (Words like… well… you know obvious spam words.)

Posted in Announcement | No Comments »

REVIEW – "Quantum of Solace"

Tuesday, November 25th, 2008

Quantum of Solace movie poster

When we were in New York visiting my mom we went to see a movie with my brother and his family. It was the first time he had seen the preview for the next (now) Bond film. When he saw the title he leaned over and said “Quantum of Solace?!? What the heck does that mean?”

Call me a fool but I typically read review of a movie before I see it. The general pattern was “Quantum of Solace is good but not as good as Casino Royale”. Rotten Tomatoes summarizes:

Brutal and breathless, Quantum Of Solace delivers tender emotions along with frenetic action. Not as good as franchise reboot Casino Royale, but still an impressive entry to the Bond canon.

I would suggest those reviewers are not getting the point.

“Quantum of Solace” is outstanding and should not be compared especially unfavorably to “Casino Royale”. It is not better or not-as-good. It is different. And therein lies its power.

It is one of only two Bond films that I can remember continue a story line from a previous film (here the death of Vesper Lynd). Despite his consistently brooding stone-face Daniel Craig manages to show that James Bond has… feelings. And is capable of being deeply wounded. He can admit he was wrong. Genuinely touching is the scene where he holds his dying friend. Also nicely handled is when he explains to Camille how to prepare yourself to kill someone. (Watch the clip here.)

The action sequences (chases and fights) are spectacular although one reviewer is correct to note that they are at times muddled and confusing (exactly what is going on? what did Bond do just then?). The new Bond films with Daniel Craig show violence as it truly is – brutal bloody and frightening. Forget the cartoon punch-them-out cartoon violence of the Moore era. Several times I cringed and even said “Ow!” when Bond slammed into a wall, landed onto a stone balcony 20 feet below, or sunk an axe into someone’s foot. This Bond does not smirk and adjust his tie after a grueling kill-or-be-killed hand-to-hand fight. He looks like h#ll.

One thing that always amazed me is how Bond adapts and improvizes when frankly he is deep in the poo and it is hitting the rotary air moving device. Steal a wooden fishing boat to take on two speed boats full of men with machine guns? Yeah sure that sounds like a strategy! And yet somehow Bond pulls it off. The way he flushes out the conspirators in the opera hall is simply spellbinding.

One small point about politics. The story line (which admittedly is a bit too complicated to follow easily) contains a subtle point about the environment. It is not entirely fictional either. But one does not feel the movie is pushing a political-environmentalist agenda. The point is simply there and the story stands on its own. That is how art should be I believe. Art can include politics (or theology or whatever) but the agenda must not define the art.

Finally – what does the film suggest about the motivations for sin and human violence? Yes there is genuine malice and the banality of evil (portrayed well in the character Dominic Greene). There is also dehumanizing brutality (seen more in the character of the general). But to what extent are violence and sin driven by our own brokenness? This is not to excuse it! But to help understand the helplessness of human beings in their sinful condition. As Judy Dench (playing M) says in one of the most memorable lines of the film:

I think you are so blinded by inconsolable rage that you don’t care who you hurt.

Watch the clip here.

Precisely.

Posted in Environment, Hamartiology (sin), Movies and film | No Comments »

Art to experience in Minneapolis – my sister Cathy Wright

Thursday, November 13th, 2008

Yeah like anyone in the Twin Cities reads this.

But I need to do a better job of bragging on all the brilliance in my family such as my sister Cathy Wright. Studied dance at the University of Utah (no kidding) then after a few years returned to Apple Valley High School not as student but as teacher of dance. She of course was brilliant as such for years – despite all the rubbish she had to endure thanks to No Child Left Behind and incompetent/dishonest administrators.

Cathy Wright, Cannibal Mother

Because of budget cuts she is taking a “sabbatical” (read – can no longer afford to teach there and is trying to figure out what comes next). But even before that she was becoming increasingly involved in choreography and productions outside of th school. Reviews of her work have been universally positive:

Wow. Where did Cathy Wright come from? And do her colleagues at Apple Valley High School run and hide, or flatten themselves against the wall, when she walks by? One has to ask, because if her dark, ritualistic work “Return” is any indication, she’s “into some seriously heavy s**t” (as one of her high-school students might say). And we’d all better pay attention, because it’s good. Intriguing. Weird. Fantastical. Creepy, even. But good.

(Heh – that was complimentary right?) Check out her propaganda page at MNArtists.Org.

Recently got word of a show “Admittance: An Evening in Seven Parts” this December 04-07 at the Ritz Theater in Minneapolis:

ADMITTANCE at Ritz Theater, MinneapolisBush Fellowship Composer Matthew S. Smith presents an evening-length production, engaging choreographers Deborah Jinza Thayer and Cathy Wright in a work combining dance, film, and music. Set in the fear-laden atmosphere of the Cold War 1950s, at a time when the government was denying the effects of nuclear testing on its own soldiers, ADMITTANCE imagines the layers of trauma and denial in a family stunned by a mother’s schizophrenia and institutionalization. Paired with Thayer’s unique movement vocabulary and Wright’s arresting choreographic urgency, ADMITTANCE features Smith’s layered electro-acoustic score, weaving sound and bodies into a space where detonations obscure or expose what we’re able to admit.

Be there. If you dare.

Posted in Dance, Personal, Society and Culture | No Comments »

Camille Paglia – An intelligent liberal crying out in the wilderness

Thursday, November 13th, 2008

I can handle people who hold different views from me – when it is apparent they know what they think and why and can engage rather than ignore facts. What I found troubling about the presidential election season was not people wanting to vote for a Democrat. Big whoop. So what. I pushed a few Democrat buttons myself (mayor and House races in case you are curious).

What troubled me far more was the at times display – particularly by the mainstream media – of “grotesque lock-step… bourgeois provincialism, shallow groupthink and blind prejudice”.

Camille Paglia BW

That rather pungent description comes from a recent piece by Camille Pagalia, “Obama, Palin, and the next four years”:

How dare Palin not embrace abortion as the ultimate civilized ideal of modern culture? How tacky that she speaks in a vivacious regional accent indistinguishable from that of Western Canada! How risible that she graduated from the University of Idaho and not one of those plush, pampered commodes of received opinion whose graduates, in their rush to believe the worst about her, have demonstrated that, when it comes to sifting evidence, they don’t know their asses from their elbows.

Liberal Democrats are going to wake up from their sadomasochistic, anti-Palin orgy with a very big hangover. The evil genie released during this sorry episode will not so easily go back into its bottle. A shocking level of irrational emotionalism and at times infantile rage was exposed at the heart of current Democratic ideology — contradicting Democratic core principles of compassion, tolerance and independent thought. One would have to look back to the Eisenhower 1950s for parallels to this grotesque lock-step parade of bourgeois provincialism, shallow groupthink and blind prejudice.

I like Sarah Palin, and I’ve heartily enjoyed her arrival on the national stage. As a career classroom teacher, I can see how smart she is — and quite frankly, I think the people who don’t see it are the stupid ones, wrapped in the fuzzy mummy-gauze of their own worn-out partisan dogma. So she doesn’t speak the King’s English — big whoop! There is a powerful clarity of consciousness in her eyes. She uses language with the jumps, breaks and rippling momentum of a be-bop saxophonist. I stand on what I said (as a staunch pro-choice advocate) in my last two columns — that Palin as a pro-life wife, mother and ambitious professional represents the next big shift in feminism. Pro-life women will save feminism by expanding it, particularly into the more traditional Third World.

Read the whole thing here. You do not have to register. (Hat tip to BJ via BabyBlueOnline.)

I am not much of a Sarah Palin fan and did not understand the enthusiasm of some Republicans. (Perhaps I have been brainwashed by all the anti-Palin propaganda. But surely that would not include Charles Krauthammer!) But I can appreciate Paglia’s critique of how shallow thoughtless and uninformed some of the anti-Palin sentiment was. (I saw a little too much of this at Baptistlife.com.) I also appreciate how a liberal(?) like Paglia demonstrates the intellectual honesty to ask some hard questions that were not asked during the presidential election season.

*And yes for the record – the above critique can and does apply to people who share my views and vote the way I do. Sometimes when reading a conservative blog I hold my nose and roll my eyes. Knee? Meet jerk.

Posted in Media, News, Politics, Society and Culture | No Comments »

How to kill a sick economy

Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

A gentleman who lives north of Baton Rouge clearly understands chemistry better than he understands political and economic reality:

I anxiously await the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which will give workers a great deal of power to join a union and bargain for their wages and working conditions.

The people rejected the lies of business about this legislation.* Let the unionizing begin!

Even former Sen George McGovern – hardly a stalwart conservative or friend of “Corporate America” – is on record against the Employee Free Choice Act. Donald Lambro describes the bill-proposal:

The labor-law reform is known as the “card-check bill” because it would allow employees to form a union simply by publicly collecting a majority of cards signed by workers supporting unionization of their employer’s business.

Sounds simple and innocent yes? The catch is that the union will then know how you the employee voted. As opposed to the secret ballot system we currently have in place. If a business unionizes – the employers do not know who voted in favor. If a business does not unionize – the union does not know who voted against. No pressure and no punishment.

I am not going to suggest unions are bad. I did not grow up in a “working class” family. (Okay so my dad worked 60-80 hours per week and sometimes more but he was a salaried high level manager which means he was not really a “working man”. Feel free to laugh.) Perhaps with a different background I would be a stronger supporter of unions. And I assume – assume - that there are times and places and situations where a union would be a very good thing indeed. (I am sure there are legitimate historical reasons they came into being.) But let me share a few things.

Consider the proposed bailouts for Detroit automakers. Why is General Motors doing so badly? Not the only reason but one is the constraints put on automobile makers by the unions. They used to spend $86/hour per automobile worker. (And people who work in automobile factories absolutely do not make $86/hour. That is how much the companies have to spend.) That has since dropped to $75/hour. Toyota is not unionized. Their workers are the highest paid in the industry with $45/hour in benefits and wages. Workers get more. Company spends less. No union. Hmm. (See “Breakdown” by Cal Thomas at Townhall.com.)

My mom lives in New York – as do most of my relatives. You want to see a sick stagnant economy? Visit the state of New York. Boy do my relatives sit around and complain including the economy in New York. Almost impossible to get a teaching job (at least in the nice rural districts). Difficult and expensive to get anything built or fixed. Almost nobody starting new businesses or industry because of the taxes and regulations and costs. One of the reasons – certainly not the only one – is the power/influence/control of unions.

My cousin in high school worked at a grocery store outside Syracuse. We are in New York so that means you will be part of a union and you will pay union dues. Took a nice little chunk out of his tiny little paycheck. You think making $5.50/hour is pathetic? Take out union dues.

I worked at a grocery store in Virginia while in seminary. Not unionized. I made $7/hour. That is pretty darn good pay for working in a grocery store. Oh and the store (chain) dominated with a 60+% share of the local market. The competition pretty much made their money on Sundays when our grocery store chain closed.

In other words – you can have a great thriving business that pays its workers well and gives them decent benefits and time off without a union.

I am sure that there are situations where the local business that employs half the town is evil and exploitative and nasty and boy we could use a union to stand up to those fat cats. But what I have seen (experience and anecdote) is that life is harder when unions are in control of the local workplaces. They create a system in which you have to play certain games and go along with the system for enough years before you get a decent position with decent hours and decent pay and benefits and so on.

And at the same time I have seen (experience and anecdote and concrete examples from industry) what can happen when you have decent people running a business that is not unionized.

You know the “economic crisis” facing the United States? Guess where the economy is still thriving or at least not doing that badly? Yeah Louisiana has a lot of problems and can be pretty backwards sometimes. But the economy is doing mostly fine here. And this is a “right to work” state (unions are not in charge although unions can form by secret ballot and people can choose to join them or not). Business are much more free to do what works best – and more often than not employees benefit.

I can see the difference between the health of the economy in New York and Louisiana. And I know what one of the chief reasons is. (Tell me – where are people moving to and starting businesses more? In the Northeast or in the Southeast?) I will not lambaste or badmouth or demonize unions as some do. But from what I see and what I have experienced…

Economies (which includes businesses – which are not bad things because you know they hire people and stuff) are better off when they allow unions but do not have unions just for the sake of having them.

*While we are at it – I find it curious how rhetorically some people assume that what a “business” says and wants is suspect. Business owner bad. Employee/worker good. Could be worse. Business owner never start business. Business owner never hire employee/worker. Oh well.

Posted in Economics, Media, News, Personal | No Comments »

Waxing positive for the President-elect (and others newly elected)

Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

Called my brother last night not so much to discuss politics as to share with him the unusual and interesting fact that University Baptist Church has been playing host lately to a movie production crew. They are filming “Burning Palms” starring Dylan McDermott and Shannon Daugherty (and Paz Vega – never ignore Paz Vega) at a Mediterranean style house about 400m from us along Highland Road. They are using the church property as their base – place to park trucks feed the crew and so on.

It surprises me how much my brother and I think alike politically. Moderately conservative Republicans with a libertarian bent. (I think that is a fair way to describe our political views.) He is lunch buddies with the Governor of Minnesota although apparently he has not seen Gov Pawlenty for a few months.

Anyways we shared how “upset” we were at first when Sen Obama won the presidential election. “What were the American people thinking?!? Were they thinking?” But how within a single day we began to see this much more positively. America finally has its first African-American president and this is something even moderately conservative Republicans can and should and do celebrate.

It is interesting how many conservative websites commentators and blogs were quick to say “congratulations and well done” to President-elect Obama. Honestly and sincerely.

A few went so far as to note that conservatives/Republicans should wish President Obama genuine success:

When he is inaugurated, President Obama will be my president. He cannot be otherwise. I will disagree with him at just about every turn, likely, and that is my right and duty as an American. However, in an emergency he will have my unqualified support, and I will always wish him wisdom and hope that he may do what is best for this great country of ours. I do not wish – I do not ever wish – to see my country suffer so that I may gain political leverage. If at this same time four years from now, President Obama has acted in such a way to make us more prosperous, more safe and more free, it will be my greatest pleasure to admit I was wrong about the man. I look forward to that day. I hope to see it come to pass.

Read the whole thing here at Eject! Eject! Eject! You do not have to register.

Wise words. You cannot want the President to fail miserably and to see the United States decline and suffer just so the political party you prefer can stage a comeback.

This does not mean conservatives/Republicans are not permitted to function as the Honorable Opposition(tm). Which is why I found the “let us unite now” rhetoric a bit tiresome.

But at the same time we should unite in praying for the President-elect as well as new and returning Senators and Representatives and state legislators and governors and mayors and metro councillors and so on. May God protect them from all harm. May he guide them to govern wisely and justly and with compassion for the widow and the orphan for the poor and the powerless. (Waxing biblical there for a bit. It is okay to invoke the Bible when it sounds liberal right?)

As Dennis Prager recently penned at Townhall.com:

Conservatives will be able to show how much more decently they act when they are out of power.

Or as my brother suggested “that’s the difference between Democrats and Republicans”.

Okay that might be a hyperbolic and sweeping generalization. Yes I am aware that not a few conservatives/Republicans have been showing their uglies since November 05. I had a few hours of ugly myself. But overall – congratulations and well done!

Posted in Media, News, Personal, Politics | 1 Comment »

SERMON – "We are our message but our message is not us" (1 Thessalonians 2)

Monday, November 10th, 2008

Richard M. Wright
“We are our message but our message is not us”
1 Thessalonians 2
Church of the Nations
November 02, 2008
31st Sunday Ordinary Time (A) or All Saints’ Sunday

Fourteen trillion dollars in new taxes – from Congressional liberals.

Not what the person says but the way this person says those words. Early Saturday morning on my way to buy some new plants I listen to the radio – National Public Radio. And the interviewer is talking with two men who do the talking on political attack ads. You know – those advertisements on television or on the radio in which the goal is to tell you how dangerous or bad or scary the other politician is.

Not this is why you should vote for me but Senator So-and-So – bad decisions bad for Louisiana.

They admit that what they do is a job. It does not matter which political party they support or if they believe in what they are saying. (And there is nothing wrong with that by the way.) They are actors – voice actors – who are paid to use their voice to say words in a political advertisement. So the interviewer says “say something ridiculous that sounds really scary”. One of them pauses for a moment and then says in a deep dramatic voice -

Fourteen trillion dollars in new taxes – from Congressional liberals.

In our Bible reading for this morning from the book of First Thessalonians chapter two – actually a reading from last week but I want to talk about it this week – in our Bible reading the apostle Paul makes it clear that he and the people he works with are not voice actors for political attack advertisements.

You know brothers and sisters that our visit to you was not a failure. We were treated badly and insulted in Philippi (the place we visited before we came to see you) but with the help of God we dared to tell you his good news in spite of opposition. Because the appeal we make does not come from wrong or dishonest motives. Nor are we trying to trick you. Instead we speak to you as people approved by God and entrusted with the good news. We are not trying to please human beings but God who tests our hearts. You know we never used flattery nor did we put on a mask to cover up our greed – God is our witness. We were not looking for praise from human beings – not from you not from anyone else.

What Paul addresses is the method of Christian mission. God has called his people the Christian church to participate in his divine mission of healing and justice and forgiveness. How do we serve others? How do we teach the Bible? How do we proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ the Son of God? How do we share the Christian faith and invite others to come follow Jesus and participate in the Christian movement?

Paul says many things – we do not trick do not flatter do not cover greed – the Christian movement must never use wrong or dishonest methods for even the best of goals. We must not trick people flatter people manipulate people and tell ourselves it is okay because we are doing this for God.

No – because we are our message. One thing we hear so often from people in Church of the Nations is they say you Christians are so kind you welcome us you help us you care about us and that is why we want to study the Bible learn about God hear about Jesus. People do not say we are interested in your message in the good news of Jesus even if you are not kind do not welcome do not help do not care.

Pau writes We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the good news of God but our lives as well. A visiting scholar from Beijing said one Sunday several years ago, “You have shown me what Christianity is”. We are our message. The quality of our lives and the quality of our relationships with other – how we show honesty generosity justice mercy love – these reflect who is God and what God has done through the life death resurrection of Jesus Christ his son.

We are our message but our message is not us. The politician says vote for me! But even though we are our message – we are not asking people to believe in us. And when Christians are honest when we are just when we welcome when we serve when we care – that is wonderful. But the message is not us. Not look at us how wonderful and good we are. Oh we are such nice people who do such nice things – come join us!

No – the message is the good news of Jesus. Not look at us! vote for us! join us! but Jesus. The message of our lives points others to Jesus. Who does not want to trick us manipulate us flatter us but invites us trust him and follow him because he wants us to know how much God loves you. And through his son Jesus Christ who died on a cross and was raised from death – how God through Jesus offers you the free gift of forgiveness of salvation of eternal life which is life in harmony with God that we experience here and now and continues even beyond death.

Posted in Missiology, New Testament, Sermons | No Comments »

SERMON – "(Not just eat but) Chew your Bible" (Psalm 1)

Monday, November 10th, 2008

Richard M. Wright
“(Not just eat but) Chew your Bible”
Psalm 1
Church of the Nations
October 26, 2008
30th Sunday Ordinary Time (A)

Well – we are out of food. So what will we eat now?

The first days after Hurricane Gustav when we have no electricity. For the first two days not a problem. We cook what we have in the refrigerator and the freezer. Hot dogs and hamburgers and eggs and pancakes.

And then we begin to run out of food. And out of ice. And we cannot get any more from the grocery store because they do not have electricity either. No power – no food.

So what will we eat now?

Two people in our church family who live at Tiger Towers tell me how for two days that eat – are you ready for this? – they eat their Bible.

Oh really? You mean cook it on the grill? Chop it up with vegetables and use it to make dumplings? What spices do they use? How does it taste?

Let me explain.

Our Bible reading for this morning is chapter one of the book of Psalms. The translation that we read together is my translation.

Blessed is – or more literally the blessings of – the person who does not walk in the advice of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of those who make fun (of God). But instead his delight is in the teaching of the Lord and on his teaching he meditates? recites? chews day and night.

That verse – but instead his delight is in the teaching of the Lord and on his teaching he meditates, recited, chews day and night – is where I want us to focus our attention. We will come back to this.

It is the first chapter and therefore introduces the book of Psalms which is one of the most important books of the Bible. Most of the Bible is God speaks to the world to his people to us or the story of what God speaks to the world to his people to us. “This is what God says to you. This is what God said to them.”

Most of the Bible is what God says to human beings. But the book of Psalms is what human beings say to God. People in Church of the Nations often ask me how do I pray? What words do I use? And here we are in Sunday morning worship. We can also ask how do we worship? What words do we use?

Usually when we learn a new language we use a textbook. I have many language textbook in my office for French German Hebrew Greek Arabic and so on. Is there a textbook to help us learn how to speak to God? For how to worship? For how to pray?

The book of Psalms is our primary textbook for the language of prayer and praise. Let me say that again and I ask you to write this down and remember it. The book of Psalms is our primary textbook for the language of prayer and praise.

And our Bible reading for this morning the book of Psalms chapter one is the opening chapter the chapter that introduces us into the book of Psalms. And what does it say?

The blessed person – the one who is just – his delight is in the teaching of the Lord and on his teaching he meditates / recites / chews day and night.

Two words are especially important. In Hebrew the word torah and the verb haga(h). His delight is in the Torah of the Lord. This word torah can have many meanings. English Bibles usually translate torah as law but a better translation is teaching. It can mean just the first five books of the Bible – Genesis through Deuteronomy. It can mean the Bible as a whole. And since the book of Psalms is divided into five different sections – just like the Torah the first five books of the Bible – there is a sense in which Psalm one invites us to see the book of Psalms as a kind of Torah.

Blessed is the person whose delight is in the teaching of the Lord in the Torah of the Lord in the Bible of the Lord in the book of Psalms of the Lord.

And on his teaching he haga(h) day and night. This verb haga(h) also has many meanings. It can mean to meditate. It can mean to recite – to speak the words to say them over and over. And there are a few places in the Old Testament where haga(h) means the noise that an animal makes when it enjoys its food. That sort of growl moan hrum hrum we make when we chew taste eat something so delicious that we cannot be quiet we make noises of delight like when we enjoy our favorite food in the whole world.

Blessed is the person who enjoys the teaching Torah Bible Psalms so much he speaks the words she spends time thinking about she chews and tastes and eats the words of God day and night.

Eugene Peterson is a Christian pastor and a writer who wrote a book called Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading. He invites us not only to read the Bible – like you read a novel or read an article for your research for information. He invites us not only to study the Bible – like you study a textbook for a class you are taking. But to eat – no not just eat but to chew – the Bible. Taste it. Let it enter you so that just like we are what we eat the words of the Bible the teachings of God the language of prayer and praise becomes part of who we are the chemistry not just of our bodies but the chemistry of our souls the chemistry of our lives we become like walking Bibles the teachings of God come to life that people can see hear touch experience.

This is why I cannot imagine prayer without a psalm. Why I cannot imagine a worship gathering without a psalm. Why I can imagine that two Chinese men in a hot dark apartment without electricity because of a hurricane can spend two days eating their Bible.

Posted in Hebrew Bible, Lectio divina (holy reading), Sermons | 2 Comments »

Cal Thomas – conservative Christians just might try to imitate Jesus instead

Friday, November 7th, 2008

That is my not Cal’s title for the column.

There has been much handwringing (what a great word) and debate the last few days concerning the Republican party and why it lost so badly this week (not just the presidential election but many others) and gee maybe it needs to get rid of the social issues elements of its platform. There has been a particularly thorough and dynamic discussion of this at Baptistlife.com.

Cal Thomas is pretty darn conservative theologically and politically – but he is remarkably consistent in telling conservative Christians not to see political power as a means to advancing(?) the kingdom of God(?):

Thirty years of trying to use government to stop abortion, preserve opposite-sex marriage, improve television and movie content and transform culture into the conservative Evangelical image has failed. The question now becomes: should conservative Christians redouble their efforts, contributing more millions to radio and TV preachers and activists, or would they be wise to try something else?

I opt for trying something else.

Too many conservative Evangelicals have put too much faith in the power of government to transform culture. The futility inherent in such misplaced faith can be demonstrated by asking these activists a simple question: Does the secular left, when it holds power, persuade conservatives to live by their standards? Of course they do not. Why, then, would conservative Evangelicals expect people who do not share their worldview and view of God to accept their beliefs when they control government?

Read the whole thing here. You do not have to register.

I would quibble slightly with his question about the secular left – surely the secular left does as a matter of fact try to use political power to change attitudes as well as behavior. The Episcopal Church illustrates this well. What they ask for as optional quickly becomes mandatory.

But the point is still well made and taken. Thomas does not say conservative (a terrible word in this context – what do we mean by conservative?) evangelical Christians should not care about marriage or unborn human beings or the like:

[D]o conservative Evangelicals want to feel good, or do they want to adopt a strategy that actually produces results? Clearly partisan politics have not achieved their objectives. Do they think they can succeed by committing themselves to 30 more years of the same?

If results are what conservative Evangelicals want, they already have a model. It is contained in the life and commands of Jesus of Nazareth.

One can I believe overstate the distinction between “moral issue” and “governance issue”. Surely there is always some moral dimension to governing. But still – is it all about who controls Washington? Or is it about following Jesus Christ the son of God who strangely enough did not want people to make him king.

Posted in Christian Practice, Media, Politics, Society and Culture | No Comments »

For the record – where I plot politically

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

Hey remember this post?

Where I stand politically

With the accompanying graph:

Political Leanings Graph

That was in June 2008. Some might think I am uber-conservative but do notice that – at least according to this measurement tool – I am smack bang in the middle. In fact I am… apparently… a libertarian. Go figure.

Well thought I might take the test again to see if there is any change. Ready? Here we go.

<five minutes later>

What on earth?!? Must have been the pot and porn questions. <wink>

November 2008

Where does this come from? My guess is a combination of factors:

  • I believe more or less in the free market – but I also believe the government has a stake in protecting the environment and preventing any business from becoming exploitative or too powerful and I believe businesses should practice compassion and responsibility toward the poor powerless and the disadvantaged
  • I believe in orthodox (small o) conciliar Christian faith – but I also believe the government has zero business in trying to spread religion (especially mine) in the public schools
  • I believe in the teachings of God in the Bible concerning holy and just living – but I also believe that except for a few basic core principles for social justice that people should be allowed to do more or less what they want (whether or not it is something of which I approve)
  • Okay so my “basic core principles for social justice” might be a little more strict than some libertarians would allow
  • Did I mention I care about protecting the environment?
  • Did I mention that people should – if freely and voluntarily – look out for the needs of the poor powerless and disadvantaged?
  • I guess I believe rather a lot in freedom as well as in justice (in the full robust and biblical sense of the word)

Christian anarchism here I come. <lol>

Posted in Fun and Geek Stuff, Personal, Politics, Uncategorized | No Comments »

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