The next theory of truth and religious knowledge is pragmatism. Developed initially by Charles Sander Pierce and expanded by William James, pragmatism is the theory that truth is not determined by what one thinks, feels, or discovers but rather by what works.

Christians may instinctively recoil from this initially. However, the proper response to this epistemological methodology needs to be more nuanced than the believer might originally suspect.

Providing in part an alternative to the early 20th century viewpoint promoted in large part by Sigmund Freud that belief in God was psychologically harmful, in works such as The Varieties Of Religious Experience, James believed religion should be judged by its results in the life of the individual. Overall, James concluded that, “In a general way…on the whole…our testing of religion by practical common sense and the empirical method leaves it in possession of its towering place in history. For economically, the saintly group of qualities is indispensable to the world’s welfare (109).”

However, any alliance the Christian apologist may make with William James is tenuous at best. For example, James categorized the pantheistic outlook of Mediterranean paganism as healthy and those emphasizing the need to be “twice born” as epitomizing a Germanic dourness characterized by an obsession regarding man’s fallen nature and need to be saved by God (105).
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The next methodology is experientialism. Though fideism strives to make faith alone the justification for religious knowledge or belief, Geisler observes that this faith is ultimately justified in terms of an experience had by the individual (65).

To the experientialist, God or the Ultimate is not so much something to be understood or comprehended but rather felt. Stretching all the way back to the Neoplatonist Plotinus, experientialism views what the believer refers to as God as “the one beyond all knowing and being (66).”

In fact, God is so far beyond what the finite mind is capable of comprehending that to really say anything about God is highly inaccurate as to do so would be limiting God. As such, the best the individual can aspire to is an intuitive mystical union with the universal by turning inward through an ascetic detachment from the physical world around us in pursuit of a metaphysical unity.

Friedrich Schleiermacher provided for a more accessible apprehension of the cosmic or divine by equating religious experience not so much with monastic solitude but rather with the feeling of absolute dependence we all feel from time to time. According to Schleiermacher, this feeling is actually the World Spirit reaching out to us and actualizing within each of us.

To experientialists, dogmas and doctrines are not that important (that itself actually a doctrine though) as these conceptual formulations are merely shadows or echoes of the deeper experience. While experientialists are correct that the individual must have some kind of encounter with God beyond that often referred to as “book knowledge”, one begins to trod upon dangerous ground when the experience becomes the ultimate criteria for judgment by positing that those having more intense experiences are somehow more in touch with the cosmos as in the case of certain meditation cults. (more…)

For anyone pursuing a degree in Apologetics that was given a dollar for every time they were asked “What is that, learning how to say you are sorry” upon answering the question of what it is that they study so many times, many would have financed a considerable portion of their academic pursuits. Unfortunately, such ignorance as to what exactly this theological discipline entails symbolizes the neglect the defense of the faith has fallen into in the contemporary church and is one of the reasons that everywhere the believer and student of religion turns today they find Christianity losing considerable ground both within and without its boundaries to a wide variety of opponents and adversaries. To the serious student of this field of study, one of the best tools around which to build a fundamental understanding of the discipline’s ins and outs is “Christian Apologetics” by Norman Geisler, one of the field’s foremost living practitioners.

Basic to any academic discipline is the approach or methodology which scholars and researchers apply to the subject matter. The field of Apologetics is no different. Geisler lists the methodologies to knowledge in general and about God in particular as agnosticism, rationalism, fideism, experientialism, evidentialism, pragmatism, and combinationalism. In the course of his analysis, Geisler evaluates each in terms of their epistemology regarding religious matters and how these approaches stack up under the weight of being scrutinized by their own criteria.

The first approach to knowledge of God is agnosticism. Coined by T.H. Huxley, the term agnosticism means “no knowledge” and thus contends one is unable to know anything about God (13).

Agnosticism is itself divided into two branches. The one holds that not yet enough conclusive evidence pointing in one direction or the other regarding the existence of God has been gathered. The other holds that God is not knowable.
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The Council Of The Religious Leaders Of Metropolitan Chicago have released a statement condemning the Arizona immigration law. Given that Chicago is perennially going to hell in a handbasket because of its high crime rate and the legendary corruption of the city’s municipal authorities, you’d think these clergymen would be too busy to comment on affairs taking place halfway across the country. Perhaps conservative pastors in Arizona with virtually no connections to Chicago whatsoever should hand down as a group their own lengthy proclamation as to what they perceive as to the shortcomings of Obama’s adopted hometown.

A fuss is being made over the abandoned boyhood home of Mitt Romney being torn down. Any other time the power of government to snatch homes from people is heralded as a wonderful sign of progress and anyone thinking otherwise had better remain silent or they will be labeled as one of those “Tea Party Terrorists”.

When questioned by a member of Congress, Attorney General Eric Holder was unable to admit that radical Islam is responsible for the vast majority of terrorist attacks upon the United States. Can you imagine in the 1940′s what a mess this country would be in if its highest officials were unable to even enunciate how we were at war with Germany or Japan? I bet these Obamaphiles have no problem about saying things against White folks, Christianity, and the Tea Party movement.

If George Bush is to be derided as an intellectual lightweight because of his rumored aversion to dense lengthy tomes, isn’t Eric Holder even more of a mental nit for failing to read the Arizona immigration law despite proceeding to make pronouncements on it in an almost ex-cathedra fashion as America’s highest practicing barrister?
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To religious progressives wanting to at least acknowledge the morality of Jesus without having to acknowledge His rightful place as the Lord of the their lives, the resurrection of the body is viewed as a disposable dogma more suited for less scientific times when the masses of humanity were less capable of comprehending the harsh realities of life. Often the believer confronts this kind of thinking in contemporary academic forums such as the Quest for the Historical Jesus and the like. However, this attempt to undermine this teaching goes back even further among beloved historical figures from the past such as Thomas Jefferson who exorcised from the pages of the Bible those passages attesting to the miraculous truth. However, by analyzing I Corinthians 15, the believer is assured that the Resurrection is perhaps the most important doctrine in the pages of Scripture.

In verse 1, Paul points out that what he is about to teach is not some new doctrine pulled out of the sky but rather a reminder of the fundamental Gospel on which believers in the church have taken their stand often without regard to earthly consequences. In verse 2, Paul makes it known that the Gospel is not just a set of intellectual propositions but rather the message through which the believer is saved if they “hold firmly to the word I have preached to you” outside of which there is no hope.

Sometimes when confronted with the complexities of both daily life and raging religious debates, it is easy to neglect and even forget about the basics upon which our faith rests. Thus, in verses 3 and 4 Paul provides the Corinthians with a recap of the basic Gospel message which he summarized as the following: “that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scripture, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.”

Either in an attempt to lull believers into lowering their discernment or, as in the case of the Neo-Orthodox to curry favor with the elites of academic theology, occasionally one will find that the cultured despisers of the old time religion will allow those comforted by traditional religious language to speak of some kind of belief in Christ’s Resurrection. However, these propagandists turn around and insist that at best the Resurrection be understood merely as a metaphorical or spiritual event meaning Jesus simply went on living in the memories of those that loved him or in a manner outside of verifiable empirical history.
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By Brujo Blanco

Amendment 1 – Freedom of Religion, Press, Ratified 12/15/1791

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

There is something going on in this country that should be addressed and addressed seriously and aggressively. Whenever there is a legal question regarding religious freedom or the activities of a church one should read the 1st Amendment literally as it is stated above. This part of the constitution is a restriction on what government can do regarding religion, speech, press, right to assemble, and to petition government for a redress of grievances. The consitution does not in fact place any restriction on religion.

The problem we are having regarding this freedom is that this concept of “wall of separation of church and state” is being used to identify the 1st Amendment and use it to stifle or control the free practice of religion. As far as I am concerned that no government entity to include the courts have any legal jurisdiction over religious activities. Of course no right is absolute and no group should be allowed to do harm to others.

In California there was Proposition 8 which defines marriage as a union of man and woman not Adam and Steve. This really sticks in the craw of the pro-homo groups. These groups for some reason believe that if you do not believe what they do you should be vilified and run through a legal gauntlet. Now the people attempting to overrule the will of the people are using the courts to intimidate churches and pastors that do not believe the way that they do. Since the beginning of Christianity we Christians have been addressing the cultural issues of the time from a biblical point of view. Now in California several pastors have been ordered by the federal court to appear and present information regarding their associations, sermons, and to provide their sermon notes. When I read this in an Article written by the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) I about hit the ceiling. Now we have federal courts wanting to review the content of sermons. This would also be the judging of free speech based on content. Now when I hear that something of this nature is being reviewed by a court that means that there is a possibility that the courts will issue orders and restrictions. Anytime one goes to court one is in jeopardy of having something go wrong. The ACLJ will be appearing in court in an attempt to quash the subpoenas.

Can you imagine a church having to answer such queries? What legal authority does any government entity have to get involved in reviews of sermons?

I believe that there is really no conspiracy to violate the construction. I believe that it is simply the left keeping in tune with their ideology. Hopefully we will no see a future wherein a pastor and a church has to have doctrine and sermons reviewed for legal sufficiency. Pastors also have free speech rights in accordance with the constitution. Should they be restricted and controlled because they are preachers? One should understand that the left in many instances see churches as dangerous institutions. I suppose from their viewpoint it churches are dangerous.
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By Jake

Have you seen the coexist bumper stickers?

You’ve seen these, right? They make me mad. Why? Because they don’t really mean what they say.

Let’s break it down. We’ll call each worldview by the letter it’s supposed to represent. So:

* C = Islam
* O = Pacifism
* E = “Gender equality” (=the LGBT agenda)
* X = Judaism
* I = Wicca / Pagan / Bah’ai
* S =Taoism / Confucianism
* T = Christianity

And let’s assume a very broad definition of “coexist”: living together without calling for the destruction of each other. Here are the problems with that:

* C wants to kill E, X, T, and (by implication) O. If they achieved the world they wanted, I and S would also no longer exist.
* O doesn’t allow for effective resistance or defeat of C.
* E stands in direct opposition to C, X, and T, and accuses those who speak against them of hate speech. Also, they’re trying to edge X and T out of public schools in favor of their own agenda. (They’re afraid C will be offended, so they get less trouble.) E is actually very, very intolerant.
* X’s existence is threatened not only by C but also by O, who invariably supports C over X.
* I and S are statistically insignificant and are mainly on there to complete the bumper sticker.
* T is who the bumper sticker is really arguing against, but poses no physical threat to any of the others. (more…)

from the PVRC blog

In an earlier post today, I talked about the bumper sticker catch phrase, “Pray for Obama, Ps 109:8.” Remember what I said about the Left taking it to the extremes? According to Frank Schaeffer (who I’m not sure is really a credible anything, especially not to speak on spiritual issues), the people who have this bumper sticker on the back of their cars, unaware of the context of this verse, are the American version of the Taliban. Seriously, can Rachel Maddow actually be considered a journalist? She’s far from unbiased, but then again, I don’t watch MSNBC, maybe she doesn’t proclaim to be. The scary thing is that people really believe this crap. MY uber liberal, Obama-loving BF believes that the people behind this slogan actually pray for Obama’s death, that they are comparable to the Taliban. That just seems so absolutely ridiculous to me. I can’t imagine that this “campaign” is that deeply rooted in hatred, but then again, maybe I’m just naive.
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The White House has announced plans to expand its Office of Faith-Based Initiatives. In an address to the National Prayer Breakfast, President Barack Obama said the office would reach out to nonprofit organizations and “help them determine how to make a bigger impact…and learn their obligations under the law.” From a number of things said in the speech and that have transpired in relation to the economic bailout, those who cherish both religious liberty and sound theology should be deeply concerned.

Under the Bush Administration, those not wanting to pollute the purity of their doctrine by accepting government funds were pretty much free to say “No thank you”. However, under the Obama regime, will reluctant religious organizations be permitted to back out amicably? Don’t be so sure.

In regards to the bailout of the nation’s floundering financial institutions, it has been insinuated that Wells Fargo did not want the government’s handout but had its arm twisted by Lurch Jr, Hank Paulson into accepting the funds. For in the glorious opening days of socialism, no organization or individual can be seen as better or sounder than any other without at least some kind of penalty being inflicted.

If an administration at one time as dedicated as that of George W. Bush to liberty and free market principles can begin to nationalize the economy on the turn of a dime, then how much quicker will an administration already dedicated to socialistic principles such as experts being able to order your life better than you jump at the opportunity to manage the minutest aspect of our lives.?

For example, if financial institutions can be forced to accept bailout money whether they want to or not, what is to prevent this White House office from exerting pressure on small churches and organizations not having the resources to resist such coercion? And once these religious organizations have buckled under to the demands as in the case of financial institutions accepting assistance, what is to prevent snobs in the Obama administration from dictating what policy preferences and doctrines these institutions will then be permitted to enunciate?

Those not accustomed to exercising spiritual discernment wonder with befuddlement about what’s the big deal with granting the government a more direct role in influencing doctrinal content. After all, activists from both sides of the spectrum hope to influence the values embodied by the state.

That is correct, but that is the church or other institutions existing apart from the government playing their role in the political process rather than the state imposing its values on the other associations of private individuals. For when this is done in areas other than those delineated constitutionally in a free republic, one begins to step onto dangerous ground since the state is the only one of these that can use force and confiscate property in the process to ensure that its purposes prevail.

For example, at the national prayer breakfast, President Obama remarked, “And today,…it strikes me that this is one of the rare occasions that still brings the world together in a moment of peace and goodwill.” It is this spirit of peace and goodwill, one might argue, that President Obama hopes to promote and expand through the Office of Faith and Neighborhood partnerships.

However, the President’s remarks are rife with contradictions as well as other assumptions in the background regarding his worldview that will spell the ruination of religious liberty if his ideas are allowed to come to fruition. For example, Obama insists in his remarks, “There is no God who condones the taking of innocent human life.”

On the surface that is correct. However, that seemingly simple utterance requires the discerning to dig much deeper.

By making this statement and claiming to be a religious man, Obama has proven himself to either be a liar or deceived. For example, recounting her testimony before the Illinois state legislature, Jill Stanek recalled how uncaring Obama seemed regarding a baby surviving an abortion but who was tossed aside like the contents of a used bedpan. So either Obama must confess his complicity in the murder of the innocent, admit he really doesn’t give a flip about the laws of God, or that the God he serves really does condone the taking of innocent human life.
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The early 21st century stands as a period of profound moral confusion. On the one hand, mothers and doctors are permitted to crack open the skulls and suck out the brains of nearly-born babies with government sanction under the banner of partial birth abortion. Should these very same people hike into the woods and crack open a bald eagle egg, they could face serious prison time.

It would therefore seem that contemporary society is marked by two seemingly contradictory extremes — that of extreme license and that of excessive control. However, upon closer inspection it could be concluded that these conditions are not as contradictory as the situation might originally appear. Rather, it would seem each is the result of the systematic removal of the ethical balance provided within the Judeo-Christian tradition with its emphasis upon transcendent standards provided by an infinitely just and loving God.

With the increasing complexity of knowledge and technology, those trained in the acquisition and use of this complex body of thought (those broadly referred to as “intellectuals”) have taken on increased levels of influence and responsibility throughout society. No longer does agriculture or manufacturing dominate society to the degree it once did.

Futurists from Alvin Toffler to Newt Gingrich have characterized the current sociological epoch as information-based, with those manipulating this information from government bureaucrats to Hollywood producers exercising unfathomable power over the composition of the contemporary mind. Therefore, it must be remembered, as Lord Acton is believed to have said, “Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Through a historical process too complicated to detail to a significant degree in this brief analysis, the prevailing secular elite came to see the world around them and their own assorted intellectual systems as satisfactory explanations in and of themselves for the reality in which these thinkers found themselves. According to Phillip Johnson in “Reason In The Balance”, this way of viewing the world prevalent among the most influential intellectuals is naturalism. Naturalism is the idea that the material reality constitutes the totality of existence and the idea of God is merely a mental construct promulgated in an attempt to cope with the stark realities of the universe in which man finds himself (7).

The average person might naturally conclude that naturalism by its nature would confine itself to the issues of blunt observable scientific fact. However, naturalism has left the tedium of the laboratory and now seeks to influence fields as divergent from science as education, ethics, and government. It is through this set of paradigms embracing the present material reality as the highest criteria of judgment that the twin siblings of chaos and tyranny have become so prevalent throughout world society.

No matter what the secular elites call their particular systems or what concerns these systems emphasize, it is the goal of the secular elite to remake man in the image of the prevailing secular elite. According to Alister McGrath in “Intellectuals Don’t Need God & Other Modern Myths”, prominent ideologies competing for the minds of men include Enlightenment rationalism, Marxism, and scientific materialism (160).
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By Brujo Blanco

There are situations in Europe involving violence spurred on by religion and that religion is Islam. Belgium and Sweden are really having a problem. I have known many people in my time that would say words to the effect, “You do not have a problem unless you acknowledge it.” Now taking that comment at face value it can be a reason to take action. However, it Europe it is just the opposite. If you do not make an issue of misbehavior then you can claim that it is not happing.

The Muslim custom of fasting during Ramadan requires believers to not eat from sun up until sundown. It seems that this custom has made the Muslim youths restless. When it comes time to eat then that is when the action begins. The Socialist mayor of Molenbeek, Belgium, Philipe Moureaux, has ordered the police, out of respect for Muslim culture, to obey the Sharia law and also fast during this time. Can you imagine telling any employee in the USA, or anywhere, that because of someone else’s religious beliefs and practices you cannot eat or drink while on duty. This is a serious matter in that it is hot in Belgium and not being able to eat or drink is a serious health risk. The results of this type of tolerance of Muslims have rendered Molenbeck unsafe for non-believers. If you travel to Europe make certain before going out, particularly in the evening, that you question the locals such as hotel staff before doing anything that will ruin your day or get you killed.

During my research I found out that this is also a problem in Muslim countries. In fact in Muslim countries the cops actually step up patrols to counter the misbehavior. In Belgium they generally do not because they do not want to offend the Muslims. The young Muslims are particularly on edge during Ramadan and these evening feasts spill over into spasms of mayhem, vandalism, and violence. In one town in Belgium the cops are not allowed to eat or drink during the day time to avoid offending the Muslims.

One might say that this is not a problem in the USA. Got news for your. Check out Dearborn, Michigan. Dearborn is a prime example of what happens when Muslims fail to assimilate into the American culture. In fact a problem has surfaced in a public high school in Dearborn which is 80% Muslim and is identified as a Muslim school. What would have happened if a public school had identified itself as Christian.
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Try as the atheist might to manipulate objective data to fit their hypothesis with some evolutionists going so far as to invoke the law in order to suppress perspectives conflicting with their origins account, the assumptions of atheism fail to square with the facts of nature and with the revelation of nature’s God. At one time earlier in the modern era, it was quite common for the atheist to portray himself as the true friend and ally of science. However, as impartial observational science has probed deeper onto the macroscopic realm of cosmic space as well as the microscopic world of the subatomic particle, this relationship once prided by the atheist turned out not to be as solid as originally thought.

The scientific establishment and the philosophical elites once derided the so-called “theistic proofs” for the existence of God as the outdated wisdom of a less-enlightened era. It turns out, however, that these time-honored arguments may be as relevant as the latest academic journals.

The cosmological argument, perhaps the best known, states that all finite realities and structures have a cause. Therefore, ultimately there must be an uncaused cause complete in itself in order to get the proverbial billiard ball rolling; this the theist declared to be God.

Naturalistic cosmologists steeped in atheism such as Carl Sagan once tried to dance around the issue by saying that the cosmos is all there was, is, or ever will be. But it seems that the laws of physics don’t exactly have a record of contributing to their local PBS station.

The Laws of Thermodynamics declare that, left to themselves, systems degrade to the maximum level of entropy; or in laymen’s terms, things wear out. Employing this principle, one is forced to conclude that, if the universe is an infinitely-old closed system those like Sagan claim it to be, then the universe would have already wound down in eons past. Therefore, the universe must have had a beginning. And since something finite cannot come from nothing, the hypothesis of a divine creator provides the most plausible alternative.
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If the Middle Ages are to stand in history books as the Age of Faith, it could be equally asserted that the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries will no doubt be remembered as the Era of Unbelief. Whereas unbelievers in the Middle Ages were careful in how they expressed their theological doubts for fear of befalling persecution, theists (be they Protestant, Catholic, or Orthodox Jew) have today learned selectivity in how they go about expressing challenges to the prevailing lack of belief impacting fundamental cultural institutions such as government, academia, and the scientific establishment. And like the Catholic Church of the Middle Ages, the atheistic establishment of today seeks to foster a worldview influencing all aspects of society and binds all individuals whether they wish to be or not. Such an assertion will become more obvious in the following analysis which identifies significant atheistic thinkers, clarifies why some chose
to adhere to this particular belief system, and critiques this worldview and contrasts it with Christian monotheism.

As an intellectual tradition, atheism has captured the minds of some of history’s most formidable thinkers. Creation science apologist Ken Ham of Answers In Genesis has astutely pointed out that social issues and public policies rest upon a foundation of thought and belief. Keeping with this analogy, atheism proceeds from a theoretical base up through a practical program designed to influence various spheres of culture such as politics and education with prominent luminaries within the movement solidifying this mental edifice along the way.

As stated elsewhere within these introductory comments, atheism did not suddenly appear on the doorstep of the twentieth and twenty-first century fully formed demanding things like the removal of school prayer and the enshrinement of evolution as biological dogma. Rather like a weed strangling the other plants around it, today’s culture of unbelief sprang from the soil in which it was planted. While atheism can trace its pedigree back throughout much of human history, a number of modern thinkers have ensured this system a place of prominence within the cultural consciousness.

One pivotal intellect laying a foundation for atheism was Ludwig Feuerbach. In The Essence Of Christianity, Feuerbach set out to undermine the claims of the supernatural by providing religious belief with a naturalistic basis postulating that the idea of God is merely a mental projection of the goodness and nobility residing within man’s own bosom (McGrath, 95). Once mankind realizes that there is no transcendent deity to rely on, Feuerbach argued, his sense of alienation could be overcome by reembracing the notions of perfectibility once reserved for God as an integral component of human nature (Lawhead, 399).

Attempting to solidify these claims regarding man’s position atop a materialistic universe through a veneer of science was Charles Darwin. According to The Cambridge Dictionary Of Philosophy, Darwin was among the first to popularize theories of materialistic gradualism or evolution with a naturalistic mechanism, namely the process of natural selection where adaptations are accumulated in surviving organisms and passed on to succeeding generations (177-179). According to Darwin in The Origin Of Species, it is through the accumulation of these adaptations in response to varying environmental conditions that biologists find the diverse plethora of organisms that inhabit the earth today. Alister McGrath points out in Intellectuals Don’t Need God & Other Modern Myths that The Origin Of Species and its ensuing theory of evolution was not accepted as much for its scientific insight than for its justification of passionately believed ideological assumptions
such as the free trade policies of the English Whig Party, various strands of socialism, and assorted theories regarding the perceived hierarchy of human races and ethnic groups (161).

Standing upon thinkers such as Feuerbach and Darwin who provided atheism with theoretical and allegedly scientific justifications were other formidable intellects pursuing the implications of a social order divorced from the influence of God. One such figure drawing upon the fonts of atheism for such a purpose was Karl Marx.

Marx served as a kind of intellectual middleman between the theoretically-inclined such as Feuerbach and Darwin and the later activists such as Lenin and Mao who would adapt Marx’s own writings for the actual political arena. Borrowing from the materialism of Feuerbach, Marx believed that religion and the notion of God were devised by bourgeois elites in order to subjugate the proletarian masses. Borrowing from Darwin’s theory of growth through conflict, Marx believed these religious notions would have to be swept away along side with most forms of private property in order to make a way for the pending socialist utopia. Marx’s call for action and summary for analysis were sounded in The Communist Manifesto; his beliefs received further exposition through the massive Das Kapital, much of which was compiled by Friedrich Engels after the death of his comrade.

Another prominent twentieth century thinker dedicated to the cause of atheism was Bertrand Russell. Though best remembered in academia as a foremost philosopher of mathematics, it could be argued that Russell’s most widespread contribution remains as an influential proponent of applied atheism. (more…)

By Frederick Meekins

With the passing of Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy along with the dissolution of the Center for Reclaiming America and the Center for Christian Statesmanship, the issue has arisen once again as to whether or not conservative Evangelicals should participate in political activity. Since things have not gotten any better and if anything continued their downward spiral since the advent of the contemporary conservative Evangelical movement popularly referred to as the “Religious Right”, it has been suggested by some that politically interested Christians should be herded back into their pews to once again await the Apocalypse.

Interestingly, one of the foremost voices now opposed to conservative Evangelical political involvement is none other than columnist Cal Thomas, who at one time served as a Falwell underling as vice president of Moral Majority and spoke at Dr. Kennedy’s Reclaiming America for Christ conference. Thomas, in a column analyzing the passing of his former colleague titled “The Legacy of Jerry Falwell”, concludes of the Religious Right, “The movement also had its downside, because it tended to detract from a Christian’s primary responsibility of telling people the ‘good news’ that redemption comes only through Jesus Christ.”

While there is a degree of truth to that as during the early to mid 90′s at times it seemed Falwell’s ministry did place too much emphasis hawking videotapes exposing the criminality of Bill Clinton and replaying week after week snippets of homosexual excesses to the point where one had to send children out of the room or have to explain why mommy and daddy’s faces were turning red, some of this is more the fault of how the Evangelical subculture is structured sociologically than the result of Christian political participation per say.

All throughout Sunday school and the Christian day school environment, those spending most of their lives in this branch of the Christian faith are conditioned with the assumption that those holding professional ministry positions such as pastors and missionaries are some how a cut above the remainder of the congregation even though the traditional Protestant position held to the priesthood of all believers and that all moral work was as equally holy. As such, it is no wonder most believers are paralyzed unless there is a so-called “man of the cloth” there on the scene to direct their every movement. Thus, it was only natural that clergy such as Falwell and Kennedy would have to play prominent roles in these movements. (more…)

By Frederick Meekins

The human mind and spirit cannot endure for very long the chaotic vacillation of such lawlessness before the individual eventually cries out for answers to the extremes of licentiousness and total control. Throughout much of the Modern Era, the Christian apologist could appeal to a shared respect for historic and scientific fact common to both Christianity and commonsense realism. Today, the Christian must first reestablish why anyone ought to believe in anything at all and then assert how the Biblical approach provides the best possible explanation for the condition in which man actually finds himself and the facts as they are rather than how he might like them to be.

The apologist must begin this process by exposing the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the Postmodernist system. James Sire writes in The Universe Next Door, “If we hold that all linguistic utterances are power plays, then that utterance itself is a power play and no more likely to be more proper than any other (187).”

This claim by Postmodernists that all utterances are merely power plays fails the test of systematic consistency where a philosophical proposition must square with the external world as well as logically cohere with the other statements comprising the set of beliefs under consideration. But more important than the sense of satisfaction resulting from the discovery of this contradiction allowing for a degree of one-upmanship in the battle of ideas is the realization that this contradiction exposes the unlivability of a particular worldview.

Big deal, the Postmodernist might quip in response to this inconsistency since they are not known for their devotion to logical argumentation. Try as they might to gloss over this oversight with platitudes honoring the glories of relativism and tolerance, Postmodernists still deep down possess that human yearning for a universal justice. Romans 2:14-15 says, “Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts…”

It might not be fashionable to contend that there is no such thing as right and wrong and often believing such is even an occupational requirement in certain academic and governmental circles. But when it comes down to it, no one really wants to be treated as if that was the case. C.S. Lewis was fond of noting that those among us preaching the loudest in favor of relativism would cry bloody murder just like the rest of us if egregiously wronged. Just see what happens the next time the faculty nihilist is denied tenure when up for review.

Once it is established by our own existential makeup that there is something to right and wrong beyond the whims of those strong enough to have their way with the weak, it needs to be highlighted where these standards come from. John Frame in Apologetics To The Glory Of God writes, “Now, where does this authority of the absolute moral principle come from? Ultimately, only two kinds of answers are possible: the source of absolute moral authority is either personal or impersonal (97).”
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‘Hateful words’ may be prosecutable

A Democratic congresswoman’s candid remarks in the House Judiciary Committee yesterday bolster the fears of Americans who are concerned they one day may be convicted of a “hate crime” for merely publicly expressing their opposition to homosexuality.

The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act was reported out of the Judiciary Committee yesterday in the House (see earlier story). The bill, which is expected to face a vote in the full House on Wednesday, would add gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, and disability to the list of protected categories under federal hate crimes law.

Proponents of the hate crimes bill claim that Christians and others who speak out publicly against homosexuality are not threatened with the same type of prosecution that criminals would face for committing acts of violence against homosexuals and transgender people.

crime scene smallIn response, Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-Michigan), a co-sponsor of the measure, stated: “The bill only applies to bias-motivated violent crimes and does not impinge public speech or writing in any way.”

However, during the Judiciary Committee markup yesterday, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-Texas) reinforced the notion that people could be prosecuted for having a particular belief. “We also need to protect those potential victims who may be the recipients of hateful words or hateful acts, or even violent acts,” said the Democratic lawmaker.

Congressman Louie Gohmert (R-Texas), a former judge, offered several amendments that would have provided religious-freedom protections from hate crimes prosecution, but they were all rejected by Democrats on the Judiciary Committee.

Read the rest here.

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Politico first notes that Pelosi said she was never briefed on the waterboarding: (h/t Gateway Pundit)

Nancy Pelosi denies knowing U.S. officials used waterboarding

But when confronted with the evidence that she did indeed know…evidence including a 2007 WaPo article referencing a hourlong briefing in 2002 where she and three others were told of the waterboarding and given a tour of the detention facility…she does the tried and true “well…but” excuse.

“Well…But” the CIA didn’t tell me they would really use it!

Which proves she lied. Period.

The Democrats deserve this worthless piece of work…they really do.

UPDATE

And now we’re finding out that the left’s hyperventilating about the number of times waterboarding was used was another nimrod moment:

A Corner exclusive: How many times have you read and heard in the mainstream media that terrorists were waterboarded more than 180 times?

It turns out that’s not true. What is?

According to two sources, both of them very well-informed and reliable (but preferring to remain anonymous), the 180-plus times refers not to sessions of waterboarding, but to “pours” — that is, to instances of water being poured on the subject.

Under a strict set of rules, every pour of water had to be counted — and the number of pours was limited.

Also: Waterboarding interrogation sessions were permitted on no more than five days within any 30-day period.

No more than two sessions were permitted in any 24-hour period.

A session could last no longer than two hours.

There could be at most six pours of water lasting ten seconds or longer — and never longer than 40 seconds — during any individual session.

Water could be poured on a subject for a combined total of no more than 12 minutes during any 24 hour period.

You do the math.

Hmmm….works out to about one hour of waterboarding if my math is correct.

also:

The Straight Story on the Whole Miss America Brouhaha

This might be one of those superficial “who cares?” stories, if not for the fact that this strikes at the core of culture and society.

I could care less about the Miss America pageant. But what I’ve found appalling is the media pile-on assumptions that equates the issue of gay marriage to the civil rights movement for the 21st century. It’s the new “good fight”; and if you stand opposed to gay marriage, then you must be a cultural neanderthal equivalent to racists who stood against the equal rights of blacks and other ethnic minorities.

I’ve also found it disgusting how the liberal do-gooders lack the ability to perceive themselves for the intolerant moral narcissists they are.

There’s an inconsistent disconnect between the reasons Perez Hilton is saying Carrie Prejean lost the Miss America crown, and how he then goes on to shout “bravo” for each contestant, official, or celebrity who makes a political statement in support of gay marriage.

(more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

And yet he visited the Blue Mosque in Turkey without a similar request!

Georgetown Says It Covered Over Name of Jesus to Comply With White House RequestWednesday, April 15, 2009
By Edwin Mora

(CNSNews.com) – Georgetown University says it covered over the monogram “IHS”–symbolizing the name of Jesus Christ—because it was inscribed on a pediment on the stage where President Obama spoke at the university on Tuesday and the White House had asked Georgetown to cover up all signs and symbols there.
…
Georgetown, which is run by the Jesuit order, is one of the most prestigious Catholic institutions of higher education in the United States.

Roman Catholics traditionally use “IHS” as an abbreviation for Jesus’ name.

The pediment as it normally appears is in the photo at right with a highlight in red. The pediment as it appeared during Obama’s speech is below.

It seems an odd request from the White House especially when you consider the protests against pro-abortion Obama’s planned speech at Notre Dame University. Will he ask the Fighting Irish to cover their religious symbols during his visit? What’s next? Will the Secret Service confiscate the Nun’s Rosary Beads?

Obama Visits Mosque and Complies with Islamic Edict

And yet when President Obama visited the Blue Mosque in Istanbul earlier this month he “padded, shoeless like his entire entourage in accordance with religious custom, across the carpeted mosque interior.”

Photos from that visit and this video do not show any religious symbols in the mosque covered.

Neither do we recall any requests to Israeli authorities to cover Jewish symbols when Obama visited the Western Wall in Jerusalem last year. On the contrary, Obama donned a yarmulke, the traditional Jewish headdress.

Apparently, it’s only Christian symbols that offend Obama!

Also:

CNN Activist Reporter Brings Her Pitchfork

ROESGEN: OK, well, Kiran, we’ll move on over here. I think you get the general tenor of this. Uh, it’s anti-government, anti-CNN, since this is highly promoted by the Right-wing conservative network, FOX. And since I can’t really hear much more, and I think this is not really family viewing, toss it back to you, Kiran.

Kyra Phillips: I know Susan Roesgen is having a hard time hearing me, but wow. That is the prime example of what we’re following across the country there. Susan pointed out everything plain and clear of what she’s dealing with.

Amidst criticism leveled at this “activist confronts activist” manner of interview, CNN defends its representative, Susan Roesgen:

“She was doing her job, and called it like she saw it.”

Move along, folks…nothing more to see here but media activism.

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Good news….

The captain of the Maersk Alabama was freed Sunday after being held captive since Wednesday by pirates off the coast of Somalia, a senior U.S. official with knowledge of the situation told CNN.

The official said Capt. Richard Phillips is uninjured and in good condition, and that three of the four pirates were killed. The fourth pirate is in custody. Phillips was taken aboard the USS Bainbridge, a nearby naval warship.

Earlier Sunday afternoon Maersk Line Limited, owner of the Maersk Alabama, said the U.S. Navy informed the company that it had sighted Phillips in a lifeboat where pirates are holding him.

Phillips was spotted another time earlier in the day, the Navy said.

A man who answered the door at Phillips home in Underhill, Vermont, told CNN’s Stephanie Elam that the family has known the news for hours. He said details would have to come from Virginia, apparently referring to the home base of Maersk Line Limited, based in Norfolk, which owns the ship.

On Saturday, the FBI launched a criminal investigation into the hijacking of the U.S.-flagged cargo ship by Somali pirates, two law enforcement officials told CNN. The probe will be led by the FBI’s New York field office, which is responsible for looking into cases involving U.S. citizens in the African region, the officials said.

The Maersk Alabama reached port in Mombasa, Kenya, on Saturday. Crew members aboard the freed cargo ship described how some of their colleagues attempted to “jump” their pirate captors.

A scuffle ensued and one of the sailors stabbed a pirate in the hand in the battle to retake the container ship, one of the sailors told CNN.

Apparently the Captain jumped overboard again but this time there were Navy SEALS in the water who then took the pirates out. Good job Navy!

Also:

Reviews of Obama’s World Wide Apology Tour are In!

And they’re not great!

I doubt anyone will be surprised that I discovered a surfeit of critical commentary on Obama’s world apology tour. After all, few can recall a President going overseas and doing more groveling, bowing, blaming his own country and then coming back with nothing to show for it. Not even a lousy t-shirt like we got from his July 2008 tour.

You can read glowing and gushing media commentary on Obie’s big tour just about everywhere so it’s time for an application of the Mike’s America Fairness Doctrine. Let’s start with my favorite from a writer in the United Kingdom underwhelmed by Obie’s big show in his country:

Barack Obama: President Pantywaist – new surrender monkey on the block
By: Gerald Warner
U.K. Telegraph
April 10, 2009

President Barack Obama has recently completed the most successful foreign policy tour since Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. You name it, he blew it.

Then came the dramatic bit, the authentic West Wing script, with the President wakened in the middle of the night in Prague to be told that Kim Jong-il had just launched a Taepodong-2 missile. America had Aegis destroyers tracking the missile and could have shot it down. But Uncle Sam had a sterner reprisal in store for l’il ole Kim (as Dame Edna might call him): a multi-megaton strike of Obama hot air.

“Rules must be binding,” declared Obama, referring to the fact that Kim had just breached UN Resolutions 1695 and 1718. “Violations must be punished.” (Sounds ominous.) “Words must mean something.” (Why, Barack? They never did before, for you – as a cursory glance at your many speeches will show.)

President Pantywaist is hopping mad and he has a strategy to cut Kim down to size: he is going to slice $1.4bn off America’s missile defence programme, presumably on the calculation that Kim would feel it unsporting to hit a sitting duck, so that will spoil his fun.

Watch out, France and Co, there is a new surrender monkey on the block and, over the next four years, he will spectacularly sell out the interests of the West with every kind of liberal-delusionist initiative on nuclear disarmament and sitting down to negotiate with any power freak who wants to buy time to get a good ICBM fix on San Francisco, or wherever. If you thought the world was a tad unsafe with Dubya around, just wait until President Pantywaist gets into his stride.

Next up, Ralph Peters, who is always a good read had this to say:

O’S AMATEUR HOUR
APPEASING ISLAMISTS IN TURKEY
By Ralph Peters
New York Post
April 8, 2009

…Obama means well. Just as Jimmy Carter, his policy godfather, meant well. But the road to embassy takeovers and strategic humiliation is paved with good intentions — coupled with distressing naivete.
…
Which brings us to the even bigger problem: Obama has no idea what’s going on in Turkey. By going to Ankara on his knees, he gave his seal of approval to a pungently anti-American Islamist government bent on overturning Mustapha Kemal’s legacy of the separation of mosque and state.

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party, the AKP, means headscarves, Korans, censorship and stacked elections. The country’s alarmed middle class opposes the effort to turn the country into an Islamic state. Obama’s gushing praise for the AKP’s bosses left them aghast.

Obama’s embrace of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (now orchestrating show trials of his opponents) was one step short of going to Tehran and smooching President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
…
Obama went to Turkey, undercut secular political parties, infuriated the Europeans — and disclaimed our country’s Judeo-Christian heritage. (Did Turkey’s leaders respond by denying Islam’s importance to them? Naw.)

In Turkey, Obama got . . . nothing we didn’t already have.

Then he went to Iraq and told its prime minister that Iraq would get nothing.

I believe that our president wants to do the right thing. But he doesn’t have a clue how. For now, he’s enraptured by the applause. But he hasn’t tried to charge his fans for their tickets. And they’ve already made up their minds they won’t have to pay.

Another must read is Charles Krauthammer:

It’s Your Country Too, Mr. President
By Charles Krauthammer
Real Clear Politics
April 10, 2009

I’m not against gift-giving in international relations. But it would be nice to see some reciprocity. Obama was in a giving mood throughout Europe. While Gordon Brown was trying to make his American DVDs work and the queen was rocking to her new iPod, the rest of Europe was enjoying a more fulsome Obama gift.

Our president came bearing a basketful of mea culpas. With varying degrees of directness or obliqueness, Obama indicted his own people for arrogance, for dismissiveness and derisiveness, for genocide, for torture, for Hiroshima, for Guantanamo and for insufficient respect for the Muslim world.

And what did he get for this obsessive denigration of his own country? He wanted more NATO combat troops in Afghanistan to match the surge of 17,000 Americans. He was rudely rebuffed.

He wanted more stimulus spending from Europe. He got nothing.

From Russia, he got no help on Iran. From China, he got the blocking of any action on North Korea.

And what did he get for Guantanamo? France, pop. 64 million, will take one prisoner. One! (Sadly, he’ll have to leave his swim buddy behind.) The Austrians said they would take none. As Interior Minister Maria Fekter explained with impeccable Germanic logic, if they’re not dangerous, why not just keep them in America?

When Austria is mocking you, you’re having a bad week. Yet who can blame Frau Fekter, considering the disdain Obama showed his own country while on foreign soil, acting the philosopher-king who hovers above the fray mediating between his renegade homeland and an otherwise warm and welcoming world?

After all, it was Obama, not some envious anti-American leader, who noted with satisfaction that a new financial order is being created today by 20 countries, rather than by “just Roosevelt and Churchill sitting in a room with a brandy.” And then added: “But that’s not the world we live in, and it shouldn’t be the world that we live in.”

It is passing strange for a world leader to celebrate his own country’s decline. A few more such overseas tours, and Obama will have a lot more decline to celebrate.

What explains this desire on the part of Obama and liberals to trash their own country and make futile appeals to extra-territorial entities for help? Former Senator Rick Santorum has the answer:

The Elephant in the Room: Obama vs. United States
The president is contemptuous of American values. And one key nominee prefers the judgment of other countries and global elites.By Rick Santorum
Philadelphia Inquirer
Apr. 9, 2009

Watching President Obama apologize last week for America’s arrogance – before a French audience that owes its freedom to the sacrifices of Americans – helped convince me that he has a deep-seated antipathy toward American values and traditions. His nomination of former Yale Law School Dean Harold Koh to be the State Department’s top lawyer constitutes further evidence of his disdain for American values.
…
What is indisputable is that Koh calls himself a “transnationalist.” He believes U.S. courts “must look beyond national interest to the mutual interests of all nations in a smoothly functioning international legal regime. …” He thinks the courts have “a central role to play in domesticating international law into U.S. law” and should “use their interpretive powers to promote the development of a global legal system.”

Koh’s “transnationalism” stands in contrast to good, old-fashioned notions of national sovereignty, in which our Constitution is the highest law of the land. In the traditional view, controversial matters, whatever they may be, are subject to democratic debate here. They should be resolved by the American people and their representatives, not “internationalized.” What Holland or Belgium or Kenya or any other nation or coalition of nations thinks has no bearing on our exercise of executive, legislative, or judicial power.

Koh disagrees. He would decide such matters based on the views of other countries or transnational organizations – or, rather, those entities’ elites.

Unsurprisingly, Koh is a strong supporter of the International Criminal Court, which could subject U.S. soldiers and officials to foreign criminal trials for their actions while fighting for our security. He has recommended that American lawyers work to “undermine” official American opposition to the court.

If only Koh’s transnationalism ended there. Our Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment? Koh believes it should be reinterpreted in light of foreign and international law to pay “decent respect to the opinions of humankind.”

Old fogies like me believe we ought to pay more attention to the opinions of the Founders who wrote the Constitution and the people who have lived under it. If Americans want to end the death penalty, they can do so through their elected state representatives.
…
Koh tops the list of Obama’s potential Supreme Court nominees. Is this what Sen. John Kerry meant when he once suggested that American policy must pass a “global test”? Or what Barack Obama meant when he said last week that we have failed to “appreciate Europe’s leading role in the world”? Or when he spoke of “change we can believe in”? And just who are “we”?

Transnationalism is by it’s very definition unAmerican. It defies any idea of American exceptionalism and national sovereignty. It’s pretty clear that after 20 years of listening to Rev. Wright’s sermons where “America’s chickens coming home to roost” Obama learned his lessons well.

Everything the right said about Obama during the campaign was true. And I don’t mind telling the namby-pambies who insisted we give him a chance that WE TOLD YOU SO!

Also:

Replacing God

While speaking in Ankara, Turkey this week, President Obama made an astonishing proclamation. He claimed, “We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation.” Instead, he said, “We are a nation of citizens”, essentially assigning fealty to ‘the state’ over fealty to God. The world listened, and nodded.

Back home in the U.S., Newsweek editor Jon Meacham welcomed The End of Christian America: “The decline and fall of the modern religious right’s notion of a Christian America creates a calmer political environment and, for many believers, may help open the way for a more theologically serious religious life.”
(more…)