Wayne Leman has published the first part of his report on the survey he has been taking on Biblical teachings about headship. While this was not a scientific poll it did point to some interesting things. I’d suggest reading it with a primary focus on what people understand as an “explicit teaching” of scripture. What does that phrase mean?
It appears to me that people use the phrase without any concrete meaning, but that’s just my general, unscientific observation!
MSNBC reports that funding may be cut off for the Arecibo Observatory.
But among astronomers, Arecibo is an icon of hard science. Its instruments have netted a decades-long string of discoveries about the structure and evolution of the universe. Its high-powered radar has mapped in exquisite detail the surfaces and interiors of neighboring planets.
. . . and later another interesting wrinkle:
One is that Arecibo is home to what is widely regarded as the world’s foremost upper atmosphere and “space weather” research center. Funded at about $2 million by a separate NSF division, the center studies the impacts of solar flares on satellite and cellphone communication; evaluates climate change; and has developed methods for cleaning up the atmosphere after a nuclear attack.
That one would have to close as well.
I would think that this would rank high on the list of scientific projects that should be funded, what with its uses in weather studies as well as in studies of near objects in the solar system. Personally, I prefer that most scientific research be privately funded, and I welcome the increasing private participation in space research, but we are funding some projects, and this one seems like a good one with long term impact. Theoretical research may not be sexy for the politicians, but it is critical for the long term progress of science.
It would be a good idea to start distinguishing between investment in the future and simple expenditure of money.
I appreciated this post from Monastic Mumblings. (HT: The Moderate Christian Blogroll [RSS])
I would like two add just a couple of notes. First, I think we begin to depend on politics when we cease to depend on the gospel. If we truly believe that Jesus can change lives, then we also must believe that we have a better weapon to use fighting against evil than the law.
Second, I think it’s dangerous when we place our focus on being right about information, rather than on living right and on being in right relationship. Do I mean righteousness by works? No. That is simply another form of being right about things. Our right relationship with God should not make us feel better than other people. We simply have received more grace.
Finally, while the article I referenced is largely about the religious right, I think we must be careful never to make a political stance the equivalent of being Christian. There are activities we can definitely point to as un-Christlike, but we should not make a political philosophy–a strategy for living in this world–our criteria for one’s place in the next. That applies not just to [tag]right wing[/tag] politics (which I opposed), but to [tag]moderates[/tag] (with which I identify) and to [tag]liberals[/tag] (who make me more comfortable than the right wingers). None is a necessary aspect of faith, and none are excluded from the label “brother or sister” based on their view.
I recall an argument in my freshman year in college, in which a fellow-student who was much larger than I was decided to end the debate by saying, “I think I’ll just beat you up!” He could have too. I wouldn’t have stood a chance. So obviously he was right.
Well, I’ve found a second thing today that I would like to say isn’t true, but there it is. Via Locusts and Honey and Ignite I found this article by [tag]Mark Driscoll[/tag]. Now I must confess Driscoll has been dropping lower on my favorite list after his comments on the ESV which I discussed here.
But in the referenced post Driscoll discusses his love of mixed martial arts. Now I’m not going to attack people for the sports they watch. I’m a baseball fan myself, even more so than usual because my stepson John Webb is a pitcher (AAA this year though he has some big league time). I get illustrations for spiritual things from baseball. Sometimes I even get some from football. I don’t generally watch boxing. I’m probably not “manly” enough in Driscoll’s world.
Then he concludes thus:
Because I am a Christian pastor I now need to find something that connects all of this to being a Christian. So, I’ll just say that while young men are watching tough men compete, the reason they don’t go to most churches is because they could take the pastor and can’t respect a guy in a lemon-yellow sweater, sipping decaf and talking about his feelings.
Well, let me suggest something just as blunt: If you determine whether someone is worth listening to based on whether you could take him in a fight, if you despise someone because they wear a lemon-yellow sweater, sip decaf, or talk about their feelings, then you need to seriously reexamine both your intellectual and your spiritual life.
Soon!
When I see a headline like The Search for the Heterosexual SUV, I go to the actual source hoping against hope that it will turn out to be in the Onion. Of course, since I know that the American Family Association has called for a boycott of Ford, I know I don’t have much hope.
But I go read the source story anyhow, and there I see this:
The ministry leader says Ford’s diversity policies meant his ministry could not purchase a Ford vehicle. “Ford lost out on a huge amount of money,” he points out. “And this was money that was raised by SBM’s ministry partners — and it is just very sad that Ford continues to promote this agenda.”
Instead, Bennett’s ministry purchased a GMC SUV that will be used to crisscross the nation, transporting a ministry team of former homosexuals who will visit churches and give their testimony of freedom from homosexuality through Christ.
This is followed by comments from dozens of people talking about how horribly they will hurt Ford’s business by going and buying GMs or Dodges. The interesting thing is that the Human Rights Campaign (HT to Ed as well for this link) rates GM, Daimler-Chrysler, and Ford all at 100% in their support of equality for gays and lesbians. I’m really hoping to see all these people refuse to buy any of these models of cars because the employers treat their employees fairly. This isn’t family values; this is a campaign against fairness and decency!
Folks this is why “hate the sin but love the sinner” has such a bad reputation. The problem is that in most cases when someone says they hate the sin but love the sinner they actually hate (or at least despise) the sinner as well, and that is especially true in cases of sexual orientation. When one can’t even tolerate someone else treating a person fairly, then one needs to look more carefully at just how one truly feels.
I like this response to a recent court decision regarding the so-called Patriot Act. Hey Christine–people who read, and even worse write Haiku are extremely dangerous. Didn’t you know that? And those peonies for your garden? Indeed there ought to be a law! 🙂
OK, I’m shocked and amazed. Well, not so much. This time it’s Democrats, as the FBI arrests officials in New Jersey. This story just reminded me that people who have power will be tempted, and some of them will turn out to be corrupt. The question is what we’ll do about it. In this case, the FBI seems to have answered that one.
But this reminded me of this post which tells us how awesomely horrible George W. Bush is, followed by comments in which various people repeatedly discuss how truly horrible the current president is.
It happens I’m not a George W. Bush fan. I think the war in Iraq was a strategic mistake. But get some perspective folks! You can oppose someone without regarding them as corrupt. You can disagree, even on major issues, without assuming they are stupid. People can disagree on intelligence assessments without being congenital liars. Do preconceptions impact intelligence reports? Sure they do. Is that right? No. The appropriate congressional oversight committees should do their jobs when it does. (They probably won’t. They usually have their own agendas!)
Some very smart people disagree with me on the war in Iraq. How do I know that? Well, first, I don’t make the assumption that disagreeing with me is the equivalent of being stupid. If I assume that, everyone who disagrees is stupid by definition. But supposing that I eliminate that one question from consideration. Is the person smart in other ways? If so, I should consider the possibility that an intelligent person can disagree. I know a fair number of them.
Is it hard? Sometimes it certainly is. The Iraq war seems wrong to me in so many different ways that I have a hard time understanding how someone can support it. But I’ve had intelligent conversations with people who do.
It’s interesting watching liberals get all frothy about W, because here in the Florida panhandle it was much like that during the Clinton administration, only it was the conservatives who were over the top. They would have a hard time telling me precisely what was so awful about what Clinton had done compared to Republican administrations. It sounded to me like they just disagreed with him on policy. But to many of them, Bill Clinton was a strong candidate for the antichrist.
They have similar feelings about Hillary Clinton. There’s a certain “anyone but Clinton” attitude down here in these parts, because while they hated Bill Clinton for reasons passing understanding they reserved greater vitriol for his wife.
And that’s where I come full circle to corruption. Partisans on both sides want to use the fact that some politicians are corrupt as leverage to get their own party into power. Thus they will try to spin corruption so that it falls largely on one party or the other. To hear the partisans, there’s always an excuse when “their” politician fails, but there’s never any excuse for the other politician. Republicans who were involved in impeaching Bill Clinton certainly don’t think it’s an appropriate remedy in the case of George W. Bush.
Unfortunately this tactic often works, because people don’t really study candidates and issues in any detail. Whoever can work the media just right to make the other guy look more corrupt without crossing an invisible line and losing support for being nasty and mean will become a winner. That’s what we need to avoid.
The discovery that a candidate who supports your views otherwise is corrupt should not cause you to vote for an opponent whose views you despise. It should make you look for a different candidate who supports your views. Corrupt people will get into office. Get over it. That’s why we have terms of office and elections. We can throw them all out.
The partisans who are pushing corruption as an issue that favors one party over the other are doing themselves and the nation a disservice. Unfortunately, the greatest–and final–disservice is done by voters who let themselves be influenced by a general smear without digging out the specifics.
If the voters were intelligent, 30 and 60 second ads would have no impact on a campaign. People would ignore them as the trash that they are.
. . . why should I listen?
This story from MSNBC discusses how Fred Thompson upstaged the Republican debate. Since I’m an independent, these debates are generally of limited interest to me, though I do like to follow the candidates so as to have prior knowledge about the nominees.
What surprised me here was that anyone would think that people might be more interested in the debate than in the new announcement. For the moment, Thompson has one advantage over everyone else: He’s new. We will all wait anxiously (well, not so much me) to see if he’ll say anything substantially different. If (I suspect “when”) he doesn’t, we can go back to being bored.
As long as we put up with this sort of campaign with canned talking points that are rolled out in answer to every question we’ll just get more of it. We need some free-for-all presidential debates in which candidates can’t dodge the questions and in which they’ll be told outright that they didn’t answer a question when they don’t.
OK, enough whining I think! Back to our regular programming.
