I am often annoyed by the things that the Traditional Values Coalition does. When they call for a boycott of Walmart I don’t expect much damage to be done except to the general reputation of Christians. But today I got an alert e-mail from them that strikes me as celebrating Christmas by stirring up hatred….
There’s been a bit of a dust-up around the blogosphere about this over the last few days to a large extent amongst people involved in science professionally in one way or another. Since I’m not responding directly, I will only note that I read of this debate through Dispatches from the Culture Wars, and you…
Al Johnson has posted a story about an abused wife on Recovery Poetry blog. Before I comment on this particular story, I want to note that a site like Johnson’s blog can be an important tool for people who are suffering abuse, no matter what the cause or the background. In working in ministry in…
When I’m challenged on historical facts about the separation of church and state, I usually simply tell people that if separation of church and state was not part of our constitutional law (and I believe it is), I would still support it. At least as strong as my political reasons for supporting the separation are…
Via Dispatches from the Culture Wars in which Ed Brayton responds to some of the scientific claims, I found this post. Now I’m not particularly interested in the specific scientific claim, and whether it makes the virgin birth more “possible” somehow. What interests me here is the tendency to try to find natural explanations for…
Paul tells us that we now “see dimly in a mrror” (1 Corinthians 13:12), but some of us are quite certain that we see clearly. While I believe we should make every effort to get closer to the truth, it’s important that we understand that God’s ways are not our ways, and thus we will…
Ed Brayton has again weighed in on the framing of the conflict over science education. I agree with the way in which Ed has laid out the issues, and strongly recommend reading his piece. As an advocate of sound science education, I would like to repeat some things I’ve said before, but that are often…
In a poll taken before the last election respondents indicated strong disapproval of congress (31% approve/63% disapprove) as a whole, and yet by an almost equal margin (60%/33%), they indicated approval of their own congressman (Fox Poll 10/13/06). This type of result occurs repeatedly in polls. I’m just using those numbers as an example. Similarly…
I value tolerance. Even more, I value and celebrate diversity. But frequently I see definitions of tolerance that must be considered self-destructive. I usually encounter these in the form of straw-man arguments. Someone may ask me if I believe in tolerance. When I acknowledge that I do, they will ask me then whether I will…
The Evangelical Ecologist has an excellent post on the value of skepticism in the appropriate place, and also touches on where it is appropriate. He says: There is an important distinction, then, between aggressively promoting environmental stewardship as a God-ordained moral ethic (which it is), and aggressively promoting a particular area of human-derived environmental science…