Muddling Toward Maturity Blog

Gene Veith's Thoughtful Response to a Deist/Agnostic

I found Gene Veith's noteworthy response very much in the spirit of 1 Peter 3:15 - that of giving a reason for the hope that is in you "with gentleness and respect."  Veith is the  Culture Editor of WORLD Magazine and the Executive Director of the Cranach Institute at Concordia Theological Seminary.  He writes:

SteveG, if the only Christianity I knew was mainstream liberal Protestantism, I would be like you. I'd much rather be an agnostic--or even a "bright"--than a theological liberal. Theological liberals don't believe Christianity either, gutting it of the good parts (the Incarnation, the Atonement, the Gospel) and leaving only religiosity and do-gooderism. I have no respect for that. You are better off leaving, as you did.

As a Lutheran, I confess, in the words of our catechism, that "I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord, or come to Him." Luther continues: "but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith." Faith is a gift. I can't help having it.

Why do I have it and you don't? I don't know. It is certainly not because I am better than you. It is probably because I am worse than you. I suspect that you consider yourself to be a good person and are fairly satisfied with your life. If so, you are right. Christianity has nothing for you.

If, however, you do not live up to your own standards, if you have known guilt and failure, if you ever feel lost in the cosmos, if you struggle with the meaning of life and death, then the message that God became a human being; that somehow He took into Himself your griefs and transgressions; that God died for you; that He rose from the dead and somehow carries you with Him. All of that can become quite compelling. Not as an intellectual theorem but as something--rather, someone--that possesses you.

Anne Bayefsky on the Fiasco that is the U.N. Human Rights Council

Click here.  Bayefsky begins her excellent report with these words:

When President Bush told the United Nations General Assembly this week “the American people are disappointed by the failures of the Human Rights Council,” his words could not have been more timely or deserved. He pointed out “This body has been silent on repression by regimes from Havana to Caracas to Pyongyang and Tehran — while focusing its criticism excessively on Israel.” On Friday, the Council piled the dung heap higher. It wrapped up another session in Geneva by adopting two more resolutions against Israel and no resolutions critical of the human-rights record of any of the other 191 U.N. member states.   (more)

Me: Read the whole thing.  It's amazing... and disgusting.

On the Lighter Side

A friend e-mailed me the following: 

A woman was trying hard to get the ketchup to come out of the jar.  During her struggle the phone rang so she asked her 4-year-old daughter to answer the phone.  "It's the minister, Mommy," the child said to her mother.  Then she added, "Mommy can't come to the phone to talk to you right now. She's hitting the bottle."

Vaclev Havel Calls on the Int'l Community to Support Freedom in Myanmar

Update 10/1/07 - The "Daily Mail" reports Thousands Dead in Massacre of the Monks Dumped in the Jungle.  It looks like the hoped-for revolution has been put down.  - The Heritage Foundation offers analysis of the roles China, India and ASEAN play (or should play)

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Michelle Malkin is keeping close tabs on the Burmese crisis.  Vaclev Havel has issued a call for the international community to add genuine support to the pro-democracy movement.   National Review Online's editorial offers excellent background and analysis.  An excerpt:

Backing the protesters is morally sound because the Burmese regime is among the cruelest on the planet. It is responsible for a campaign of ethnic cleansing that has killed scores of thousands and displaced multitudes more. It is an unapologetic practitioner of forced labor. It conscripts children into its armed forces. It keeps Aung San Suu Kyi — the leader of an immensely popular pro-democracy opposition — under house arrest or worse (reports surfaced this week that she had been thrown in prison). It has shattered the Burmese economy: Resource-rich and once relatively prosperous, Burma now has a per capita income of just $200. What wealth does exist is concentrated in the hands of its rulers. Top general Than Shwe, who sees himself as a god-king, recently moved the capital from Rangoon to Naypyidaw, a place whose extreme remoteness protects his opulent palace from the righteous anger of the dispossessed.
 
Small wonder the Burmese have taken to the streets. Their protests began last month when a few hundred gathered to decry the junta’s decision to raise fuel prices by 500 percent. The protests have now spread across the country, and their ranks have swelled to the tens of thousands. Significantly, they are led by Buddhist monks, who represent

Colleges as Brothels

I guess I should say "colleges as brothels without the exchange of money."  Once again Chuck Colson points out the deplorable state of sexual license on American colleges and universities.  This time he focuses on a movie Princeton University freshmen are required to attend, a movie which warns about alcohol and date rape, but at the same time glorifies the destructive hook-up culture.  (Note Colson's links at the end of this and all his articles.)

Getting Straight on What Motivates al Qaeda. Hint: It's Not Anything Specific the West Has Done

So what is it?  It's Islamist theology.  Note this post from Carol Iannone:

Writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Raymond Ibrahim, editor of the Al Qaeda Reader, tells how, in a position at the Library of Congress that gave him access to much literature in Arabic, he discovered that al Qaeda is not inspired by anger at Israel, Western imperialism, American foreign policy, and so forth, as the Left would have it, but by ...Islamic theology!   According to one ex-jihadi:

The main reason why radicals have managed to increase their following is because most Muslim institutions in Britain just don't want to talk about theology. They refuse to broach the difficult and often complex truth that Islam can be interpreted as condoning violence against the unbeliever — and instead repeat the mantra that Islam is peace and hope that all of this debate will go away.

Ibrahim notes that denunciations of the West appear only in al Qaeda propaganda aimed at the West.  The exhortations to Muslims are about the war against the infidel and bringing all the earth to Allah.   As bin Laden has written:

Allah Almighty's Word to his Prophet recounts in summation the true relationship: "O Prophet! Wage war against the infidels and hypocrites and be ruthless. Their abode is hell — an evil fate!" Such, then, is the basis and foundation of the relationship between the infidel and the Muslim.  Battle, animosity, and hatred — directed from the Muslim to the infidel — is the foundation of our religion. And we consider this a justice and kindness to them.

Looking for a Job? TV Pays Well. Oprah made $260 million Last Year

If anyone is interested, here is what TV personalities made from June 2006 to June 2007:  Ophrah made $260 million; Jerry Seinfield $60 million; David Letterman $40 million;  Simon Colwell (American Idol judge) $45 million;  Donald Trump ("The Apprentice")  $30 million; Barbara Walters ("The View") $12 million;. Jay Leno, $32 million;

Sodom and Gomorrah Revisited: Depraved San Francisco "Folsom Street Fair" Scheduled

Update 10/4/07 - Michelle Malkin updates with links to photos (with lots of warnings!)  I confess I haven't clicked through to see the photos and don't advise anyone else to do so either. 

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WorldNetDaily reports:

Responding to pressure from Christian groups, the Miller Brewing Co. is asking organizers of a "gay" street celebration in San Francisco to remove its logo from a promotional poster portraying Jesus Christ and his disciples as "half-naked homosexual sadomasochists."

As WND reported, the poster for the Folsom Street Fair replaces the bread and wine representing Christ's blood and body with sadomasochistic sex toys.

The annual street event, which includes displays of nudity and sexual activity, is scheduled for Sept. 30. It describes its mission as

Evangelicals,the Environment, and the Democratic Strategy to Garner Votes

Jay Richards notes that the major media now pays plenty of attention to evangelical views on the environment, especially since  86 evangelical leaders signed the "Evangelical Climate Initiative (ECI), although many others refused to sign it. There are powerful political reasons for this new attention to evangelical environmental views and I urge readers of this blog to click through to Richards' article and read it in its entirely.  Some notes follow (underlinings are my own).

Richards distinguishes between "theological principles" and "prudential judgments", saying that on theological principles, evangelicals are in agreement:

Human beings, as image bearers of God, are placed as stewards over the created order. We bear a responsibility for how we treat and use it. We are part of the creation, as well as its crowning achievement. God intends for us to use and transform the natural world around us for good purposes. Proper use is not misuse. But as fallen creatures, we can mess things up. No serious Evangelical thinker questions these basic principles.

Well and good.  But prudential judgments are something quite different.  Richards says we need to recognize at least four separate questions with regard to global warming.

(1) Is the planet warming?

(2) If the planet is warming, is human activity (like CO2 emissions) causing it?

(3) If the planet is warming, is it bad overall?

(4) If the planet is warming, we’re causing it, and it’s bad, would the policies commonly advocated (e.g., the Kyoto Protocol, legislative restrictions on CO2 emissions) make any difference and, if so, would their cost exceed their benefit?

He goes on to say:

Tough questions all, and theology doesn’t provide much help in answering them. To answer (1) and (2), one must consider a wide range of scientific evidence, theorizing, and speculation, drawing on disciplines as diverse as meteorology, astrophysics, geology, and probability theory. And the very nature of the questions and the evidence means answers will always be tentative and uncertain.

To answer (3) and (4), one must do careful economic reasoning. As a result, Evangelicals who agree disagree on how to answer these questions (the application).

The problem with the chief defenders of the Evangelical Climate Initiative is that they haven’t thought through these four questions, at least not publicly. What they have done is label

Former New York Mayor Ed Koch Asks Chancellor Bollinger of Columbia U.: "As an Encore, Why not invite Hugo Chavez?"

Former Mayor of New York City, Ed Koch, expresses my views exactly:

All in all, it was a fiasco for America and a blunder by Mr. Bollinger, as well as a coup for Mr. Ahmadinejad. His goal was not to respond to Mr. Bollinger, the Columbia students, or Americans seeing him on television. His goal was to talk over their heads to the Islamic world and its terrorists and show how he bearded the Columbia lion in its own den.

President Bollinger, as an encore, why not invite Hugo Chavez? I think he'd come. You could provide him with a platform to enhance his reputation.

Hugh Hewitt comments on Bollinger's "Fantasy World":

Even a cursory examination of The Looming Tower or Inside The Jihad or any of many other serious books on the Islamist war against the West dwells on the crucial role of propaganda in pushing the extremist message, both Salafist and Shia versions. Today's fiasco

Dennis Prager: "Does the Left Value Truth?"

Prager answers the question negatively here.  He asserts that

In the hierarchy of leftist (as opposed to traditional liberal) values, truth is below other values, such as equality, opposition to war, the promotion of secularism and a number of other highly regarded values on the Left.

The column is worth reading.  In addition to the numerous examples he offers, he could well have discussed the Left's willful lies regarding abortion.

Update 7/28/07 - The controversy generated over Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly by Media Matters illustrates well Dennis Prager's point.  The Left smears by making blatantly false accusations in a desperate attempt to blunt the reputation and effectiveness of O'Reilly and Limbaugh.   Later - Peter Wehner of the Ethics and Public Policy Center defends Rush Limbaugh against the Media Matters' smear saying:

The problem, of course, is that that the charge leveled against Limbaugh is obviously false . . . The Left in America clearly wants to take Limbaugh out, and for obvious reasons: he is a deeply influential conservative voice and during the last 20 years he has changed American politics and the American media in profound ways. The Left hates him — but they have found no way to stop him. Like the Mississippi, he just keeps rolling along. . . .

Juan Williams sets the record straight.

The Phoniness of "Free Speech" Boasts on Colleges Campuses

Mark Levin nails it:

Free Speech on College Campuses?

Who's kidding whom? Ask David Horowitz, FIRE, and other people who have to deal with left-wing administrators, faculty, and students about free speech. While Columbia University opened its arms to a leading terrorist, over at Seton Hall in New Jersey, Tom DeLay and Sirius radio host Andrew Wilkow had been invited by the campus Republicans to speak on Wednesday. The University has now canceled the event apparently claiming that DeLay would cast a negative light on their precious school. This is disgraceful.

At Stanford University, the Hoover Institution has appointed Donald Rumsfeld to a short-term chair, and students, led by an ex-professor, are leading protests against it — even though Hoover is an independent entity on campus.

Ask Ann Coulter, Bill Kristol, Pat Buchanan, Jim Gilchrist, and numerous others about the reception they've received at some of these schools. Ask these schools about their tenure policies, and how they discriminate against conservative academics. Ask them about their free speech codes, which have the effect of crushing civil dissent.

How the Korean Hostages Were Treated by the Taliban

I blogged extensively and almost daily concerning the Korean hostages held captive for so long by the Taliban in Afghanistan.  See, for example, here and here.

A few weeks after their release I should have posted a report of how they were treated by their Taliban captors.  The BBC issued such a report:

S Koreans told 'convert or die'

A group of South Koreans held hostage by Taleban militants in Afghanistan have said they were beaten and ordered at gunpoint to convert to Islam. 

At a news conference in Seoul, the former captives also said they were made to work "like slaves" during their six-week ordeal.

Twenty-one members of the group were freed last month following an agreement between South Korea and the captors.

Two of the hostages - all Christian aid workers - had already been killed.

Beaten and kicked

The former hostages said they feared for their lives at times when their captors turned violent.

"We were beaten with a tree branch or kicked around. Some kidnappers threatened us with death at

Katherine Jenkins Sings "Here is Love, Vast as the Ocean"

 

I was flipping through a little notebook of old jottings and came across this cryptic entry: "Welsh - 'Here is love, vast as the ocean."  I figured it was a reference to a hymn and vaguely remembered being moved by it. I went to the internet and came upon this lovely rendition by Katherine Jenkins sung in both Welsh and English in the Morriston Tabernacle Chapel in Wales. The hymn was said to be the love song of the 1904 Welsh Revival.  I think you'll find it very moving.  Here are the words from the Cyber Hymnal

Here is love, vast as the ocean,
Lovingkindness as the flood,
When the Prince of Life, our Ransom,
Shed for us His precious blood.
Who His love will not remember?
Who can cease to sing His praise?
He can never be forgotten,
Throughout Heav’n’s eternal days.

On the mount of crucifixion,
Fountains opened deep and wide;

George Soros: The Chief Financial Backer of MoveOn.Org

Today Investor's Business Daily posted a major, lengthy editorial profile.  See also the profile produced by Discover the Networks.

** Update 7/26/07 - It turns out that Soros's "Open Society Institute" funded "media stories" that we, the naive public, thought were spontaneous and free from manipulation.  Matt Drudge headlined:

"NASA scientist who accused Bush Administration of censorship received $720,000 from George Soros...

Drudge linked his headline to the Investor's Business Daily report:

It's all part of the $74 million OSI spent on "U.S. Programs" in 2006 to "shape policy." Who knows what revelations 2007's report will bring around events now in the news?

It also turns out that Soros partners with the Tides Foundation and the "Democracy Alliance" to manipulate stories and events.  Read the article for details.

Academic Freedom and the Problem of Indoctrination in the Classroom: NAS vs. AAUP

Stanley Kurtz tells us the historical importance of this debate in these words:

History in the Making   [Stanley Kurtz]

I’d like to urge folks to go an read what I think will someday be looked back on as an historic debate on the meaning of academic freedom and the problem of classroom indoctrination. At the Inside Higher Ed website, Peter Wood, of the National Association of Scholars, has just posted a powerful reply to the recent "Freedom in the Classroom" statement issued by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). (See "Truths R Us.") More important, Wood links to an extraordinary, formal, point-by-point response to the recent AAUP statement, co-authored by Peter Wood and Stephen Balch, and posted at the website of the National Association of Scholars (NAS).

Debates over academic freedom commonly hark back to now legendary statements by the AAUP from 1915, 1940, and 1970 on the topic. I believe that when future generations want to understand the nature of the debate over academic freedom and classroom indoctrination in our own era, they will hark back to the AAUP statement and the reply by the leaders of the NAS of 2007. This is history in the making, and compelling reading as well.

If for no other reason, you should look at Wood’s piece in order to read the "lost" section of the AAUP’s founding statement of academic freedom, which apparently exists nowhere else on the Internet, and which puts the AAUP of today to shame. But don’t stop there. These dueling statements on academic freedom and proper conduct in the classroom will resonate for years.

Annotated Bibliography In Apologetics, Religious Pluralism, And New Religious Movements - by Dr. Douglas Groothuis

Very useful.  Click here.

Dr. Douglas Groothuis of Denver Seminary posted back on August 31st the following:

Free Groothuis Syllabus for Apologetics    

To all Loyal (and other) Constructive Curmudgeon Readers:

I am offering the syllabus for my Defending Christian Faith class to you. Email me at [email protected].  It contains several hot links and many references to apologetic works. Take this material and use it for the glory of God.                    

Me: I e-mailed him and he sent me a copy of his syllabus in short order. I found it interesting and useful.  Among other things, it provided a convenient list of some of Groothuis' online articles such as:

Basic Logical Principles Required for Apologetic Endeavors

Learning From an Apostle: Christianity in the Market Place of Ideas  (Acts 17:16-34)

Annotated Old Testament Bibliography by Professors at Denver Seminary

Click here.

A Superior European Education?

Click through to this You Tube video.  You'll find it hard to believe. 
(HT: Tim at Random Observations)

Why All Anglican Eyes in London are Nervously Fixed on a Powerful African Archbishop

Philip Jenkins writes about Anglican Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria.  Jenkins says:

The most important figure today in the Anglican Communion, a worldwide federation of churches with some 75 million adherents, is probably a man few people in the West know anything about : Archbishop Peter Jasper Akinola, of Nigeria. An uncompromising traditionalist, Akinola presides over the most vibrant and almost certainly the largest Anglican community in the world-at a time when the Anglican world's true center of gravity has shifted to Africa.

It was no small matter, then, when Akinola went public this past summer with blistering denunciations of proposals to consecrate openly gay bishops and to sanctify gay marriage . . .  (more)

Theodore Dalrymple: "Islam, The Marxism of Our Time"

Dalrymple begins his City Journal article this way:

From an Islamist point of view, the news from Europe looks good. The Times of London, relying on a police report, recently observed that the Deobandis, a fundamentalist sect, now run nearly half of the 1,350 mosques in Britain and train the vast majority of the Muslim clerics who get their training in the country. The man who might become the sect’s spiritual leader in Britain, Riyadh ul Haq, believes that friendship with a Christian or a Jew makes “a mockery of Allah’s religion.” At least no one could accuse him of a shallow multiculturalism.

He goes on:

According to Le Figaro, 70 percent of Muslims in France intend to keep the fast during Ramadan, up from 60 percent in 1989. Better still, from

Hugh Hewitt Recommends the Books Needing To Go On The "Must-Read-to-Understand-Where-We-Are-In-the-War" Shelf

 Hugh Hewitt posts the following:

New York Times' reporter Tim Weiner new history of the CIA, Legacy of Ashes, is an amazing and important book, one that goes on the must-read-to-understand-where-we are-in-the-war shelf along with Lawrence Wright's The Looming Tower, Mark Steyn's America Alone, Robert Kaplan's Imperial Grunts and Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts, and Norman Podhoretz's World War IV.

Americans Spend an Unbelievable Amount of Money on Pets

Gary Haber reports "an explosion in spending on pets that runs the gamut from organic food to aromatherapy to hip replacements."

The American Pet Products Manufacturers Association forecasts Americans will spend $40.8 billion on their pets this year, nearly double the $21 billion dished out in 1996.  This year's tab will include $16.4 billion for food, $9.9 billion for supplies and over-the-counter medications and $9.8 billion for veterinary care.

Pet ownership is at an all-time high, with 71.1 million households in teh U.S., or 63 percent, owning at least one animal, the group says.

Me: I find this report absolutely astonishing. 

Corporations Continue to Cave In to Homosexual Political Correctness

A year ago I wrote

Corporations, unfortunately, have bought into mainstreaming homosexuality.  A report says 138 major U.S. Corporations earned the top rating of 100 percent from the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates for homosexual issues. That's up from 101 companies the year before.  Here's the top-ranked list of homosexual friendly companies.

Today a new report has been issued with the headline "'Gay-friendly' companies up 41%."   According to the report:

Another 57 corporations have been added to an annual list of the nation's "gay-friendly" major businesses, an increase of 41 percent over last year.

For the sixth year, Human Rights Campaign, a homosexual-rights group, released its Corporate Equality Index of businesses earning a perfect score of 100.

The score is based on

Chuck Colson Waxes Enthusiastic Over Neglected Mainstream film, "The Ultimate Gift"

Colson says that:

The day after a recent televised Republican debate, some people asked me what I thought of the candidates. Well, the truth is, although I had intended to watch the debate, Patty and I got sidetracked. Just before the debate, we started to watch a DVD of a little-known film produced by a fellow Christian named Rick Eldridge.

Once we started watching, we could not stop. That’s because the movie we watched was beautiful, wholesome, and full of timeless truths. In fact, I would argue that it was even more relevant to some of our current crises than any political debate. The film was "The Ultimate Gift"

Western Feminism: Silence in the Face of Muslim Honor Killings

Robert Fulford writes  in the National Post:

On the question of honour killing, defined as the murder of women to protect men's pride, the news from Jordan has recently grown slightly worse. Although it's among the most civilized and modern of Arab countries, Jordan hasn't come close to eliminating this repellent crime, a bizarre remnant of the region's tribal past. It was only five years ago that the penal code made honour killing clearly illegal. Till then it was rarely punished.

In August, five Jordanian men were charged with the premeditated murder of a 22-year-old woman whose crime was to have a love affair with the man she later married. When the pre-marital affair came to light, her father, three uncles

The Scandal of Social Work Education

Update 10/15/07 - George Will offers an article on the same subject here.

**
Click here for a major report prepared by the National Association of Scholars.  The Executive Summary can be found here.

Update 9/20/07 - Peter Wood, the executive secretary of the NAS, offers a commentary.   Excerpts:

The NAS report, “The Scandal of Social Work Education,” tracks the ideological requirements for becoming a licensed social worker. You may have thought social work was about helping the unfortunate. No; up-to-date social work is about combating “poverty, racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, ableism, and ageism” by advocating “social and economic justice.”

. . . Moral reservations about abortion? Doubts about gay adoption? Emily Brooker, a traditional Christian student, sued Missouri State University in 2006 after it brought her up on charges for

Facebook and Privacy Issues: A Real Problem

Or at least some see it as a problem. Recently I have received a number of invitations to be a friend on Facebook.  (Begun 3 years ago, it claims 40 million active users and 200,000 more signing up every day). I have reluctantly declined because I vaguely remembered reading something about privacy issues. Then yesterday I read this article that restates and reinforces the privacy concern.

Facebook plans to escalate its use of personal data to target advertisements to individual users, despite mounting privacy concerns surrounding social networking sites.

. . .Chris Kelly, the chief privacy officer, added: “We have always said that information [submitted by users] may be used to target adverts.”  . . . He suggested that internet-users could no longer expect to remain anonymous online, but

Ayn Rand's Novel "Atlas Shrugged" Published 50 Years Ago

** Updated 9/23/07 - Gene Veith adds comments.

There is an atheism that attacks Christianity on the grounds that it is not true. The new atheism, described below, attacks Christianity on the grounds that it is not good. But Rand's atheism, with that of her mentor Nietzsche, is far more devastating, attacking Christianity on the grounds of its strengths. The ethic of "love," they claim, inhibits the natural law of survival of the fittest, making successful people feel guilty, and draining the culture of its strength, with Christian compassion begetting expensive welfare programs, protectionist economic policies, and other misguided attempts to prop up failures, etc., etc. And unlike most atheists, she offers a positive ideology to fill the void she creates.

When I was in high school, a good friend got way into Rand and this kind of thinking. It challenged my then rather minimalistic faith more than anything else. Trying to answer her led me to C. S. Lewis, among other writers, and drove me deeper into Christianity. But it is driving even more away.

 

A reader of Veith's post says:

For a real eye opener go to Booknotes on c-span and see the July of 1989 interview of Nathaniel Branden. He was one of the founders of the self esteem movement in psychology. Branden was part Rand’s inner circle with Greenspan he also was Rand’s consort. It seems Rand’s personal life was nearly as depraved as her philosophy.

Another writes:

Rand did not hate American Christians. Some of her views can be seen here: http://forums.4aynrandfans.com/index.php?s=09ef5a488c877095b98a1e8f212f2dc2&showtopic=4867&st=0&p=42353&#entry42353

I would also suggest that John Piper has some worthwhile things to say about what Miss Rand achieved and where she fell short:
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Articles/ByDate/1979/1486_The_Ethics_of_Ayn_Rand/

**
For those of us who have heard of Ayn Rand (1905-1982), but haven't read her books, this New York Times article (9/15/07) will serve as an introduction to her ideas and her influence. One of Rand’s most famous devotees is Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve. 

The Wikipedia article is comprehensive and helpful.

Rand was an atheist.  She summarized her philosophy this way:

"My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute."

Whitaker Chambers wrote a classic critique (required reading!) of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. He notes that no children appear in this novel saying "the strenuously sterile world of Atlas Shrugged is scarcely a place for children."   Near the end of his review he speaks of

the book's dictatorial tone, which is much its most striking feature. Out of a lifetime of reading, I can recall no other book in which a tone of overriding arrogance was so implacably sustained. Its shrillness is without reprieve. Its dogmatism is

Political Correctness on American University Campuses

Update: 9/17/07 - Stanley Kurtz offers a powerful positive review of "Indoctrinate U."  He notes further that "folks in the Washington DC area have a chance to see it–and more. Indoctrinate U will be showing at the Kennedy Center as part of the American Film Renaissance film festival, which looks like it will be traveling to Dallas, Traverse City, and Hollywood as well. This festival will be showing a number of movies of interest to conservatives, including "The Call of the Entrepreneur" and "ACLU: At War With America."

**
Deroy Murdock writes of Indoctrinate U. as

a fascinating and jarring new film by first-time documentarian Evan Coyne Maloney. Supported by the Moving Picture Institute and premiering September 28 at Washington, D.C.’s American Film Renaissance festival, “Indoctrinate U.” CAT-scans the politically correct cancer that gnaws away at American higher education.

Murdock writes further:

Maloney reports that 91 percent of campuses restrict student speech. Brown University banned words that cause “feelings of impotence, anger, or disenfranchisement.” West Virginia University instructed students that “instead of referring to…‘girlfriend’ or ‘boyfriend,’” they should

Video: Evel Knievel Testifies of His Newfound Faith in Christ. Don't Miss It!

Update 11/30/07 - Evel Knievel dies at 69.

**
This is one of the most moving services I have ever seen.  It makes available to everyone the telecast at which Evel Knievel testified of his newfound faith in Jesus Christ.  I don't speak often of the "presence of the Holy Spirit" in a church service, but when I first saw this program on television some months ago (4/22/07), I recognized at once how extraordinary it was.  The presence of the Spirit is powerfully evident as streams of people come forward after Evel's testimony to profess faith in Christ and be baptized.  If you watch this video, you will see that there was no manipulation, just an amazing moving of the Spirit of God.

I suggest you not only watch Evel Knievel's testimony, but then click the little picture below to see everyday, ordinary people, coming forward to profess faith in Christ and be baptized.  What's so extraordinary about all this, is that it takes place in the Crystal Cathedral in California, a place where such things are anything but routine, to say the least.  Finally, click the picture of Dorothy Benham (Miss America, 1977) to see and hear an energetic, magnificent solo of  "Ride On, King Jesus."   This, too, is extraordinary!  What a video!

Amr Khaled: Islam's Popular Televangelist

The  Washington Post's Robin Wright has the story.   
(HT: Smart Christian)

Landmark Study: Change for Homosexuals is Possible

Update:  Additional news coverage can be found here.  It supplements and expands the earlier article posted below.

Nicholas A. Cummings, former American Psychological Association president, praised the research.

"This study has broken new ground in its adherence to objectivity and a scientific precision that can be replicated and expanded, and it opens new horizons for investigation," he said.

**
For initial posted article, click here.   Article reproduced as follows:

Posted on Sep 14, 2007 | by Michael Foust NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--In what some are calling groundbreaking research, a new four-year study concludes it is possible for homosexuals to change their physical attractions and become heterosexual through the help of Christian ministries.

The data was released Sept. 13 at a news conference in Nashville, Tenn., and will be published in the forthcoming book, "Ex-Gays?" (InterVarsity Press) by psychologists Stanton L. Jones and Mark A. Yarhouse. Thirty-eight percent of the subjects followed in the study said

Robert Spencer's "Religion of Peace" Revisited

I have blogged before about Robert Spencer's Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't. I mention it again because of a useful interview  just published by Bernard Chapin.

Spencer explains his books this way:

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) is a general overview of the elements of Islam that jihadists are using to recruit and motivate terrorists today. The Truth About Muhammad is a biography of the founder of Islam. Religion of Peace is neither of those things. It is an evaluation of the Christian theocracy scare (as enunciated by bestselling books such as American Fascists by Chris Hedges) and a comparison of various aspects of Christian and Islamic Scripture and history in order to demonstrate what the real threat is, and to resist the moral equivalence that blankets the popular culture today.

As for Muslim reaction to his books, Spencer says:

Invariably reactions from Muslims feature denial of the points I make about Islam, despite the fact that I work exclusively from Islamic sources and the words of Islamic spokesmen, plus personal abuse. I haven’t received a formal fatwa, but many death threats, including one from a man who was determined to kill me because Islam is a religion of peace. One of his messages read in part: “I will be violent against anyone who hurts muslim feelings about Prophet. It is a religion of peace for everyone until some duckhead sprews out his damn saliva on a sensitive topic as this. Spencer will be delivered.”

The interviewer, Bernard Chapin, asked about the allegation that Spencer ignores many of the positive passages in the Koran, to which Spencer responds:

 This is wholly false, as anyone who read my books will know. In "Religion of Peace?" I discuss at length the passages of the Qur’an that enjoin tolerance of unbelievers, and explain how mainstream Muslim exegetes understand those passages in light of passages that enjoin violence. Also, I am now Blogging the Qur’an weekly at HotAir.com (archive here), going through the text cover to cover – no one can say I am ignoring any passage at all in this endeavor. 

Christian Apologetics: J. P. Moreland Offers His Choice of 5 Best Books

J. P. Moreland, for whom I have the utmost respect, lists his choice (with comments) of "top 5 books on apologetics."  His list appears in the Sept., 2007 Christianity Today:

Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics by William Lane Craig.   "Craig is the finest apologist to come on the scene in 50 years, and this is his classic work for a thoughtful, general audience.  It starts with

Webcast Memorial Service for Dr. D. James Kennedy (1930-2007)

Updated 9/17/07 - Excerpt from Dr. Dobson's sermon printed below

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Dr. James Dobson preached the sermon at Dr .D. James Kennedy's funeral.  Dr. Kennedy passed away on September 5, 2007.  A complete webcast of the inspiring 2 hour service may be found here.  A generation of Christian leaders is passing.

WorldNetDaily has posted a partial transcript of Dr. James Dobson's sermon titled "Who Will Answer the Call?"

The passing of Dr. D. James Kennedy, which we mourn today, poses serious concerns about the future of the conservative Christian movement. Its senior leadership is undergoing a dramatic and inevitable change at this time. Many patriarchs of the church are coming to the end of their journeys, and are leaving this earth one by one. In the past few years, we've lost Dr. Bill Bright, Dr. Adrian Rogers, Dr. Jerry Falwell, Dr. Ted Engstrom, Mrs. Ruth Bell Graham, and now, Dr. Kennedy.

So many other leaders who have been used mightily by the Lord in the past 40 or 50 years are about to hand the

"Most-Linked" Political Blogs

Wonkoblog lists the top 10 most linked blogs - Liberal, Conservative and Neutral.   "Most linked" refers to “inlinks” or the number of times a blog is pointed-to by other blogs via their blogrolls.

Vatican Says Food, Water Must Be Provided to Vegetative Patients

Click here.  Amazingly (and disappointingly) Fred Thompson didn't have an opinion on the Terri Schiavo case when asked. 

Why You May Not Want to Check the "Organ Donor Box" On Your Driver's License

David Freddoso posts the following:

Organ donations save lives, of course. But transplant organizations also troll hospitals like "vultures," as one bioethicist tells today's WaPo, front page below the fold.

The story centers around a doctor accused of hastening a patient's death so that his organs would still be useful by the time he died — the first time a surgeon has been thus charged in a transplant case.

After a long fight with a degenerative disease, Ruben Navarro appeared close to death. So the hospital caring for him alerted the

Quotes of the Day

From Fred Thompson:

At the Villages: "It’s more and more apparent to me every day that the average 20 year old who is serving us in Iraq knows more about national security than many of the 20 year veterans in Congress.”  (HT: K.J. Lopez)

World-Wide Anti-Semitism Spreading

Victor Davis Hanson surveys the situation with quotes from many (sometimes surprising) sources.

Support These Brave Ex-Muslims

I thank God for Michelle Malkin who keeps us abreast of a wide-range of important developments.  Here she alerts us to a movement of ex-Muslims that needs worldwide support.  She writes:

Apostates are standing up in Europe:

A group of young Muslim apostates launches a campaign today, the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America, to make it easier to renounce Islam.

The provocative move reflects a growing rift between traditionalists and a younger generation raised on a diet of Dutch tolerance.

The Committee for Ex-Muslims promises to

The Christian Worldview: Most Popular Veritas Forum Lectures Now Available on the Internet

Updated 3/22/08 - I see that the links below no longer work.  Here is a new website address for Veritas Forum lectures. Those listed below are easily accessible.

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I was astounded earlier today to discover that Veritas Forum lectures are now available on the internet.  The new technology is making my box of cassette tapes obsolete!  Here is a list of the most popular talks (audio and sometimes video): 

1. The Jesus of Myth and History N. T. Wright (28063 views)
2. Does God Exist? William Lane Craig (23793 views)
3. What Does It Mean To Be Human? Dallas Willard (19059 views)
4. So What? N. T. Wright (15820 views)
5. The Power of Porn Gene McConnell (15607 views)
6. Atheism, Theism, and the Meaning of Life JP Moreland (15445 views)
7. The Genius of Jesus Dallas Willard (13083 views)
8. Rethinking Relationships Don Miller (13066 views)
9. Time for Truth Os Guinness (11695 views)
10. The Fingerprint of God Erwin McManus (11278 views)

Here's a list of popular topics:

Arts, Atheism, Authority of Scripture, Beauty, Big Bang, Business, C.S. Lewis, Career/Vocation, Catholicism, Christianity, Communication, Creation, Death, Depression, Dostoevsky, Drama/Theatre, Economics, Education, Engineering & Technology, Environmental Studies & Natural Resources, Ethics, Evangelicalism, Evil, Evolution, Existence of God, Faith, Feminism, Gender/Body, Government & Public Policy, Health Sciences, History, Hope, Humanities, Humanity, Hypocrisy, Identity, Islam, J.R.R. Tolkien, Jesus, Law, Lord of the Rings, Love/Relationships, Materialism, Media, Movies/Film, Music, Natural Sciences & Math, Naturalism, Origins, Pain/Suffering, Pluralism, Politics, Pop Culture, Pornography, Post Modernism, Poverty, Power, Relativism, Religion/Multi-Faith, Resurrection, Salvation, Science, Sin, Social Justice, Social Sciences, Theism, Theology & Religious Studies, Tolstoy, Truth, University/Scholarship, Violence, War, Worldview,

You may also explore the archive by talk, presenter, or forum using the links above.

"Veritas Forums are university events that engage students and faculty in discussions about life's hardest questions and the relevance of Jesus Christ to all of life."

Senators and Representatives Send Their Children to Private Schools

Congress believes in school choice -- for their own families.  John J. Miller writes: 

A lot of members of Congress are for school choice — at least for themselves. A new Heritage Foundation study finds that 37 percent of representatives and 45 percent of senators with school-age children sent their kids to private schools. That's almost four times the rate of the general population.

LifeHouse YouTube Drama

A friend sent this to me.

One person commented: "Slow at first, but by the end I was crying like a baby - wow, just wow."Another said, "AMEN!! wow this has made me understand Gods love for us more! what an amazing drama!! love the end bit where shes fighting to get back and Gods pulling her back and then he takes the pain and stuggle of the sin, just for her! God i love you!!!!!!!!" 

Things I Didn't Know Before

What I learned from a recent e-mail:

- "Stewardesses" is the longest word typed with only the left hand...

- And "lollipop" is the longest word typed with your right hand.

- No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, purple.

- The sentence: "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" uses every letter of the alphabet.

- The words 'racecar,' 'kayak' and 'level' are the same whether they are read left to right or right to left (palindromes).

- There are only four words in the English language which end in "dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.

- There are two words in the English language that have all five vowels in order: "abstemious" and "facetious."

- Typewriter is the longest word that can be made using the letters only on one  row of the keyboard.

The Nicene Creed as Mormons Would Amend It

I thought the following a unique and helpful post. It is excerpted from "Grace" at This Side of Glory blog.  She introduces the Nicene Creed and then red-pencils it in a way the LDS (Mormon) church would change it. 

The Nicene Creed is the most widely accepted and used brief statements of the Christian Faith. In liturgical churches, it is said every Sunday as part of the Liturgy. It is Common Ground to East Orthodox, Roman Catholics, Anglicans, Lutherans, Calvinists, and many other Christian groups. Many groups that do not have a tradition of using it in their services nevertheless are committed to the doctrines it teaches.

Grace continues:

"I’ve  marked up the Creed as a Mormon would have to in order to fit their beliefs (as near as I can figure out — see my remarks at the end), and I’ve got footnotes in case you think I’m making this up. I tried to use Mormon sources whenever possible.

There are some other notes of interest that follow the footnotes . . .
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We believe in one God, the main God of a number of Gods(1), who acquired His place as Supreme Being over a long period of time by living a righteous life(2), the FatherMaker one of the Makers (3) of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible (and Who is married, by the way) (4); Almighty,

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, one of the spirit children of God (Lucifer being another), (5) the Only-begotten, Begotten of the Father before all worlds, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, Begotten, not made; of one essence with the Father (6) by whom all things were made: Who won God’s favor by agreeing with God’s plan of salvation when Lucifer disagreed,(7) and who was called Jehovah in the Old Testament(8).

Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, of a physical relationship between God the Father and Mary,and was made man, and was married at the wedding in Cana (10);
(9)

And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried;

And the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures;

And ascended into heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of the Father in the celestial kingdom, the highest of the three kingdoms of heaven;(11) And He and Joseph Smith (12) shall come again with glory to judge the quick and the dead, Whose kingdom shall have no end.

And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, and Giver of Life, Who proceedeth from the Father, Who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, Who spake by the Prophets;

And we believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. in the Mormon Church, which restores Christianity to the form it had in the time of the apostles.(13)

We acknowledge one Baptism – for both living and dead – (14) for the remission of sins as long as that baptism is conducted by the Mormon Church (15)

We look for the Resurrection of the dead which will be presided over by Joseph Smith,(16)

And the Life of the world to come. And Joseph Smith. (17) Amen.

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Footnotes:

1 - “In the beginning, the head of the Gods called a council of the Gods; and they came together and concocted

Have We Begun to Grasp the Rapid Changes Taking Place in the World?

Bruce Edwards: C.S. Lewis Scholar

I posted earlier today about the C.S. Lewis Society of California.  I might note for those interested, that a conference on C.S. Lewis is scheduled for October 26 and 27, 2007 on the campus of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, NC.  Invited speakers include Walter Hooper, James Como, and Bruce Edwards, all well known to Lewis aficionados.  Professor Bruce Edwards has a personal website with a link to his blog, Further Up and Further In.   

On July 27th, Edwards posted reviews on his blog of some new books related to C.S. Lewis. Of The Company They Keep: C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien as Writers in Community by Diana Pavlac Glyer, Edwards wrote:

Diana Glyer’s impressive achievement immediately supersedes in scope and authority all previous treatments of the Inklings in extant biographies and encyclopedia.  .  .   This volume so surpasses in wisdom and cogency the late Humphrey Carpenter’s "The Inklings," I would urge you to sell your copy back to the used bookstore from whence it may have come, take the proceeds, and buy this one. It is a model of responsive, responsible, lucidly written scholarly work worthy of Lewis’s own high standards. It both educates and entertains. Selah

Well, it so happens I bought a copy of Carpenter's book The Inklings years ago and just may take Bruce Edward's advice and turn it in!  (Though I probably won't, since I find it hard to part with books).

He also reviews Teaching C. S. Lewis by Richard A. Hill and Lyle Smith.  This book looks really interesting.  I am always wondering how to teach or structure a class on C.S. Lewis.  Edwards says it's

a very fine, compact volume that will help Sunday School teachers, novice and advanced readers, pastors, and campus faculty to plan and teach C. S. Lewis courses in their respective venues. Its value is in offering insight in how to teach and engage varied audiences interested in Lewis’s fiction and apologetics. Questions and assignments accompany each chapter focused on a single work of Lewis’s.

Edwards also calls attention to the Summer 07 edition of The Christian Scholars Review which is on “C. S. Lewis and Gender.”

Edwards is a leading scholar of C.S. Lewis and helpfully makes available online his articles and book contributions. He also provides links to other C.S. Lewis sites and to Inkling resources such as The Tolkien Society, The Charles Williams Page, The Dorothy L. Sayers Society, George MacDonald resources, the GKC Website and The American Chesterton Society. Notable also is the Mythopoeic Society.

C.S. Lewis Revisited: The C.S. Lewis Society of California

Those who know me readily recognize my great debt to C.S. Lewis. Another time I must write about the many writers he has introduced me to, including George MacDonald, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Charles Williams, Austin Farrer, and others.

But for now I will write once again about C.S. Lewis. I have posted various items related to C.S. Lewis before.  Today I discovered the website of the The C.S. Lewis Society of California.  There I learned the schedule of "Chronicles of Narnia" film production. I only knew it vaguely before.

With the enormous success of the first of these new Narnia films, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has grossed more than $740 million worldwide. The next film, Prince Caspian, is scheduled for release in mid-2008, with Voyage of the "Dawn Treader" planned for a mid-2009 release and The Silver Chair scheduled for release in mid-2010. In addition, other novels by Lewis are being made into films, including The Screwtape Letters which is underway for release in theaters for Christmas 2008, and efforts are being pursued for a film based on The Great Divorce. . .

For those unfamiliar with Lewis's work, the website offers a useful list of some of his books.

The scope of Lewis’s work is quite remarkable, including philosophy and theology—The Abolition of Man, Christian Reflections, Mere Christianity, The Four Loves, The Problem of Pain, Miracles; literary history and criticism—The Discarded Image, The Allegory of Love, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century; fiction—The Screwtape Letters, Perelandra, That Hideous Strength, The Great Divorce, Till We Have Faces; autobiography—Surprised by Joy, A Grief Observed; current affairs—God in the Dock, Present Concerns; poetry—Narrative Poems, Poems; and much more.

Not mentioned in the list above (among others) I note the omission of Reflections on the Psalms, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer,  and A Preface to Paradise Lost -- all of which have been important to me. 

The website offers a list of interviews with a great variety of people (not always about C.S. Lewis) including Francis Collins, Dallas Willard, Armand Nicholi, Jr., J.I. Packer, Rodney Stark, and many others.  Particularly stunning are the essays and articles. Again, many are about CSL, but many others are on a variety of subjects. The number, scope ,and quality of these articles blew me away.  I will return to this webpage again and again.  Do check it out!

Finally, the C.S. Lewis Society of California has collected comments on C.S. Lewis from various notables.  I offer a sample from a much longer list.

“Rarely is so much learning displayed with so much grace and charm.” “Lewis combines a novelist’s insights into motives with a profound religious understanding.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Lewis’s words appear often in my Mitford stories—where would the Christian thinker be without Lewis? He is pivotal.”—Jan Karon, author of The Mitford books

“Somebody pointed me towards C.S. Lewis's little book called Mere Christianity, which took all of my arguments that I thought were so airtight about the fact that faith is just irrational, and proved them totally full of holes. And in fact, turned them around the other way, and convinced me that the choice to believe is actually the most rational conclusion when you look at the evidence around you. That was a shocking sort of revelation, and one that I fought bitterly for about a year and then finally decided to accept.”—Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D., Director, Human Genome Research Institute; author, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief

“Learned, brilliant and lively, Lewis was always an artist with words, whether as a professional academic writing for colleagues in his own field; as an author of novels, fantasies and tales for children; or as a composer of didactic expositions, apologetic discussions, and journal and newspaper articles by the bushel, all seeking to commend and consolidate Christian faith.  He was fastidious and fair-minded (while sometimes satirical), probing and thoughtful, logical and magisterial, orthodox and arresting, and clear and compelling. . . . In short, he was never less than a first-class read. . . . The two lobes of our brain, left for the logical and linear and right for the romantic and imaginative, were both thoroughly developed in Lewis, so that he was as strong in fantasy and fiction as he was in analysis and argument. There is always a didactic dimension to his spiritual-life writing, just as there is always a visionary dimension to his apologetics. The combination made him in his day, and makes him still, a powerful and haunting communicator in both departments.”—J. I. Packer, Board of Governors' Professor of Theology, Regent College