Religious diversity as part of civil religion

Sociologist of religion Peter Berger relates the story of his visit to a Hindu house of worship in Temple, Texas:

A few months ago I was driving with a colleague in central Texas. As we passed the town of Temple, he asked me whether I would like to look at the recently constructed Hindu sanctuary. Of course I did. (I don’t know whether the choice of location was dictated by the name of the town.) My colleague was not sure of the way, so we had to ask. Everyone knew how to get to the “Hindu church”. It is an impressively large building. The architecture is unmistakably Indian. There was no priest there, but we were shown around by a very friendly lay member of the community, an engineer. (As is typical of Hindus in America, most of whom are professionals with higher education). Two things impressed me on this tour. One was the physical setup inside the sanctuary—a large common area for community worship services, attended on important holidays by large numbers from all over the region, and some eight or ten small chapels, each dedicated to a specific divinity. Our guide explained that in India, most temples are dedicated to one or two gods. This cannot be done here, as immigrants come from all over India. So the temple has to have provisions for the worship of an array of gods and goddesses—a wonderfully American modification of Hindu piety. The other thing that impressed me was our guide’s reply to a question of mine. I asked him whether they had encountered any hostility from the neighbors. None at all, he said. People were curious, but consistently friendly. Note: This is the heart of the Bible Belt. I wonder whether the neighbors’ reaction would have been equally friendly, say, fifty years ago. Putnam and Campbell are right: America has become both more diverse and more tolerant. Good news, I think.

Berger discusses this in the context of how Americans deal with religious diversity (and he believes that religions are truly diverse, in contrast to the belief that all religions are basically the same).  Interestingly, he also discusses religious diversity in the context of American civil religion, which I usually think of as a broad belief that God is pleased with our political system and a hope that he will bless us in the present in future as he has in the past.  Berger defines American civil religion differently:

As to the American civil religion, it is built on a very profound insight indeed—the intrinsic worth of every human individual as an individual, regardless of any collective identifications, including the ones based on religion. This civil religion has, of course, its sacred texts (notably the Constitution), which are often understood in a fundamentalist manner. But more importantly, I think, this creed is lived by many people who don’t read any texts.

I found these insights to be quite interesting.  I don’t know what all the positive or negative implications for Christian faithfulness are, but I thought that I would pass this on.

A Thought-provoking article on health care reform

Last fall, David Goldhill wrote an article that seemed to get a lot of attention.  I finally read it this summer and now I’m finally posting about it.  Sure, health care reform passed in March, but I don’t think anybody believes that will be the last word.  Many liberals felt it fell short of their hopes and they will almost certainly press for future reforms along the same lines, and many conservatives want it repealed.  So I think that it’s still a relevant topic, if only to become more informed for the whatever the next round of proposals is.

Goldhill, a Democrat, argues that the health care system is based on many faulty premises, like the idea that health insurance should pay for everything.  Two of the subtitles in the article show some of his important points: “Health Care Isn’t Health (Or Happiness)” and “Health Insurance Isn’t Health Care.”

I could do the hard work of summarizing the article, but instead I’m going to give an excerpt the estimable Peter Leithart’s post (from which I originally learned of Goldhill’s article) in which he includes two key quotes that show the gist of the argument:

The problem is with the incentives built into the system: “Accidentally, but relentlessly, America has built a health-care system with incentives that inexorably generate terrible and perverse results. Incentives that emphasize health care over any other aspect of health and well-being. That emphasize treatment over prevention. That disguise true costs. That favor complexity, and discourage transparent competition based on price or quality. That result in a generational pyramid scheme rather than sustainable financing. And that—most important—remove consumers from our irreplaceable role as the ultimate ensurer of value.”

The solution is not the kind of reform on the table in DC; insisting on universal insurance is only dealing out more of the problem in Goldhill’s view.  Rather, the solution is to return the consumer to the center of the system: “To achieve maximum coverage at acceptable cost with acceptable quality, health care will need to become subject to the same forces that have boosted efficiency and value throughout the economy. We will need to reduce, rather than expand, the role of insurance; focus the government’s role exclusively on things that only government can do (protect the poor, cover us against true catastrophe, enforce safety standards, and ensure provider competition); overcome our addiction to Ponzi-scheme financing, hidden subsidies, manipulated prices, and undisclosed results; and rely more on ourselves, the consumers, as the ultimate guarantors of good service, reasonable prices, and sensible trade-offs between health-care spending and spending on all the other good things money can buy.”

I’d really recommend the article.  I don’t know if all of his solutions are right, but the analysis of the system seems quite good.

No unions, no paid sick days, no layoffs, no unshared profits

Religion and Ethics Newsweekly had a story over the summer about a Cleveland company called Lincoln Electric.  Check out the video in the link (a little less than 10 minutes) or see the transcript by clicking on the link.  Do you think that this is a good business model?  I wish I knew more about business and economics so I’d have a better answer.

Defending Christendom

There’s a lot in Peter Leithart’s interview with Jason Hood at the Society for the Advancement of Ecclesial Theology’s website, so I won’t try to summarize it all.  Leithart is, as he says, “an advocate of Christendom” who believes that Christians are to tell rulers that they must “kiss the Son” (Psalm 2) and obey the risen Lord of the universe, Jesus Christ.

Here are a couple of excerpts, but I’d really suggest that you take 15 minutes or so to read the whole thing if this topic interests you:

Political theology is not some specialized branch of theology, but a dimension of all theology.  Politics is not simply about passing this legislation or electing that candidate.  Politics addresses questions about the distribution of power, and more broadly questions about the shape and future of a group.  Theology cannot help but address those questions, and do it all the time.  The Bible certainly deals with political questions like this.

So, even when I am not doing political theology, I am doing political theology.  Let me given a couple of examples of what I mean.  Ecclesiology has been a major focus of my work, and, as I see it, that bumps directly up against political questions.  The intimate connection between ecclesiology and politics has been obscured in modernity because the church has been marginalized and has allowed itself to be transformed into a sociologically invisible and politically innocuous religious group.  Scripture, by contrast, treats the church as a political entity in itself, each individual congregation as an outpost of the heavenly empire of a heavenly Emperor.   That means that the church and its claims about Jesus, sin, and salvation are political claims, necessarily.

Secondly,

7.  Some political theologians note that Daniel simultaneously models service, critique, and a message of divine judgment.  Are all three of these to be implemented by believers?  Are they postures we should always exhibit, or are they more appropriate at some times than others?

PL:  I do think that the mix of these three postures varies depending on the political circumstances, and depending on the person involved.   And Scripture indicates that men and women can work faithfully even under the worst of rulers – think of Obadiah during the days of Ahab.  In thinking through this, my thoughts again gravitate to ecclesiological issues.  Daniel was able to serve, but also maintain a critical distance, because he was a member of another community, of Israel.  It seems that Christians today have difficulty maintaining that complex stance, or doing that complicated dance, because we don’t have an alternative home.  When Christians enter political life deeply conscious of the fact that they are members of the church, Christians first and foremost, that gives them a place to stand when they critique and when they serve.

I noticed significant overlap between the eccelesiology of Leithart and that of James Davison Hunter in To Change the World.  Both long for a church that is a true alternate community and that forms its members so that they can engage with society in a way that pleases God.  A big difference, of course, is Leithart’s postmillenial confidence that the kingdom will triumph in history, while Hunter has more of a two kingdoms view.

To see a bit of where Leithart is coming from eschatologically, check out his sketch of “the long view.”  The consideration of just war and total war that he discusses can be found here.

Hat tip: Justin Taylor

Losing Old Church Buildings

I’m hearing that the court case against the Virginia CANA churches may not go well. Truro, Falls Church and others may be forced to leave their historic buildings. I’ve never been a fan of the “defend the property” strategy, but this is still very sad news. Turning these buildings over to heretics is akin to the North African Church falling to Islam a long time ago.

With that said, it occurred to me today that one reason that it is such a blow to lose these venerable buildings is because there is so little chance of replacing them in our lifetime. Our theology of architecture is so impoverished, and the buildings that we typically build as Protestant churches are generally so awful, that losing these old buildings is a great tragedy.

Most new church buildings are ephemeral, not durable. They are ugly, functional, “multi-purpose” facilities where people worship in the gym. There is generally no art, no stained glass windows and nothing that would really differentiate these buildings from the prison-like school buildings that we build today. On the other hand, places like Truro have a simple elegance and exude a sense of tranquility and “churchiness” that is lacking in most modern Protestant facilities. It seems that Catholics have kept their senses and are producing some great buildings even today. I live down the street from one and I’ve seen many others, such as the gorgeous Holy Apostles in Meridian, Idaho.

So if we are going to continue to think that buildings don’t matter or that we need to build the cheapest, ugliest thing we can get away with and call it good, then losing the old places like Truro (and the many, many United Methodist parishes in Virginia that are gorgeous and given over to heresy) is a very sad event indeed.

Living in God’s Two Kingdoms

Living in God’s Two Kingdoms: A Biblical Vision for Christianity and Culture by David VanDrunen was released recently by Crossway Books and presents a readable, comprehensive view of two-kingdom theology. I’m just a youngster in terms of theology, especially that of a reformed flavor, so I was excited to dive in with VanDrunen and stretch my brain.

The main premise is a counter to the “transformationalist” view of culture that seems to be pervasive with emergent theologians, those who ascribe to the New Perspective on Paul and neo-Calvinists (depending on your definition of neo-Calvinists). In transformational theologies, the church and Christians are about the work of restoration, as we march across creation and culture putting things back how they were meant to be before all this sin and death entered the world.

Whilst that can sound all well and good, the ramifications of that worldview are twofold:

1) When Scripture asserts that this world will be put away and a new heaven and a new earth will come, we have to reject any of the cataclysmic language that accompanies such claims. Instead, the new heaven and earth will come by a restoration to utopia.

2) VanDrunen states that when we embrace a transformationist view of culture, we cling to the work of Adam in the common kingdom rather than living in the grace of the redemptive kingdom which Christ has already won for us by living the life Adam, and each of us, should have lived.

James K.A. Smith Offers Thougthful Analysis on Thanksgiving, Military, and American Idolatry

Check his post out, titled “The Secularization of Thanksgiving and the Sacralization of the Military”, at: http://forsclavigera.blogspot.com/2010/11/secularization-of-thanksgiving-and.html

Here are a few paragraphs:

But I think I’ve discerned the logic to this. I know I’ve noted (complained!) about this before, but I think I’ve further crystallized the linkage. For some reason, broadcast television always feels compelled to secularize religious and quasi-religious holidays; this is, in some ways, part and parcel of other secularizing currents in commercial culture. But when Thanksgiving is secularized, what’s lost is precisely the Object to whom we would render gratitude. In other words, we end up being thankful for “gifts” without being able to recognize the Giver.

So we come up with a substitute Giver, which is something like the idea of “America”–the land of the free. And while there are alternative conceptual histories that would actually honor how much the United States was conceptually forged–that the U.S. is really the experimental product of ideas–our current anti-intellectual climate would rather think of “America” as the product of force and might (as the national anthem prefers). So if we are thankful for America, we’re thankful to the military who, proverbially, “protect our freedom, ” “keep us free,” “make the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom,” etc. Soldiers are thus revered as the warrior-priests of freedom.

And what are we free for? Well, to shop. And so the best expression of thanksgiving is precisely Black Friday, that Dionysian display of consumerist passion when people literally die in the frantic pursuit of consumer goods.

In sum, the secularization of thanksgiving leads to the sacralization of the military as the guardians of consumer freedom. Such secularization, then, is not a-religious but otherwise-religious. Thus a secularized thanksgiving yields a uniquely American idolatry.

Free Ebooklet from Al Mohler – “Homosexuality and the Bible”

Here it is: http://www.sbts.edu/resources/files/2010/09/homosexuality-and-the-bible.pdf

Book Review of David VanDrunen’s “Living in God’s Two Kingdoms: A Biblical Vision for Christianity and Culture”

Living in God’s Two Kingdoms: A Biblical Vision for Christianity and Culture

Copyright © 2010 by David VanDrunen

Published by Crossway Books

PRELIMS: This book was provided by Crossway for my personal review.

First off, Dr. VanDrunen is a credible author on the points in which he engages. He is a studied scholar in the realm of divinity and law. Such background is necessary for the topic in which he engages. Secondly, this book is much needed in the “Evangelical” world today as the church struggles and flounders through the murky issues of Christian engagement of culture, politics, etc. Lastly, VanDrunen approaches this work from the rich heritage of the “Two-Kingdom” theory you will find in Augustine, Luther, Calvin (although open to debate), and many contemporary Reformed thinkers.

THE GOOD:

VanDrunen establishes a historical understanding of the issues of how God rules in the world generally and in the Church specifically. He is well aware of Niebuhr’s work on “Christ and Culture” and establishes the framework of the debate judiciously. Before making an inductive thesis in support of the “Two-Kingdom” perspective, he engages critically in modern distortions of the Christians obligation to the world: N.T. Wright and the Emergent Church. His criticisms are insightful and helpful. Read the book for the nitty gritty.

I commend VanDrunen’s covenantal redemptive-historical framework throughout the book. He deals specifically with the covenant with Adam and how it consisted of his tending the garden (priestly duties), as well as governing the land (kingly duties). If Adam and his righteous progeny had succeeded, eternal bliss and rest would have followed, meaning that the “Creation Mandate” had a goal in view. Adam and Eve weren’t to perpetually bear children and work the land forever and ever as the last climatic act in their God-given charge. The priestly duties would have brought about consummated holiness in destroying the serpent and partaking of the tree of life, while the kingly duties would have brought earth under perfect subjection and thus a perfect consummate rest from labor. VanDrunen dedicates an entire chapter in elaborating upon these themes because the rest of the book makes no sense apart from this framework.  VanDruned then dedicates an entire chapter to exactly how Jesus has and will fulfill these charges given to Adam. VanDrunen states the following:

Before the second Adam no one accomplished the task of the first Adam, and after the second Adam no one needs to accomplish it. The last Adam has completed it once and for all. Christians will attain the original destiny of life in the world-to-come, but we do so not by picking up the task where Adam left off but by resting entirely on the work of Jesus Christ, the last Adam who accomplished the task perfectly.

 How did Christ accomplish Adam’s original task perfectly? Jesus did not personally fill the earth with his descendants or exercise dominion over all creatures in his human nature during his earthly ministry. But as considered in chapter 2, Adam was to have his entire obedience in the entire world determined through a particular test in a particular location. So it was for the last Adam. Like the first Adam, the Lord Jesus was confronted by the devil who tried to entice Christ to obey him, and King Jesus resisted the devil and conquered him (Matt. 4:1–11; Col. 2:15; Heb. 2:14). Like the first Adam, the Lord Jesus was called to priestly service, and Christ the Great High Priest purified God’s holy dwelling and opened the way for human beings back into his presence (Heb. 9:11–28; 10:19–22). Like the first Adam, the Lord Jesus was to enter God’s royal rest in the world-to- come upon finishing his work perfectly, and this is precisely what Christ did, entering into heaven itself, taking his seat at God’s right hand, ministering in the heavenly tabernacle, and securing our place in the world-to-come (Heb. 1:3; 4:14–16; 7:23–28).

This is absolutely essential for issues of Christianity and culture! If Christ is the last Adam, then we are not new Adams. To under- stand our own cultural work as picking up and finishing Adam’s original task is, however unwittingly, to compromise the sufficiency of Christ’s work. Christ perfectly atoned for all our sins, and hence we have no sins left to atone personally. Likewise, Christ perfectly sustained a time of testing similar to Adam’s: he achieved the new creation through his flawless obedience in this world. He has left nothing yet to be accomplished. God indeed calls Christians to suf fer and to pursue cultural tasks obediently through our lives. But to think that our sufferings contribute to atoning for sin or that our cultural obedience contributes to building the new creation is to compromise the all-sufficient work of Christ.

VanDrunen even pulls out the exclamation mark in reference to how important understanding the work of Christ is for determining our own obligations as a Christian.  We are now heavenly citizens who taste the world to come, but do not in any way bring it about. He states:

Joseph D’Souza on the Caste System

Kevin DeYoung posted his friend Jason Carter’s thoughts about the Lausanne Congress here.  Here’s one part that grabbed my attention:

Perhaps the strongest prophetic voice issuing from Cape Town came from Dr. Joseph D’Souza from India when he spoke out against the Indian Caste System as (a form of modern) slavery in its subjugation of 250 million Dalit peoples.  D’Souza made the point that if apartheid was wrong, then so too the Caste System:  “25% of India’s population —  250 million people — has no rights, dehumanized, segregated, and silently enduring an apartheid system in India. We, of course, in India hang our heads in shame…”  D’Souza stated that there are more slaves in our world today than when William Wilberforce fought the Transatlantic slave trade and closed his rousing and prophetic message by calling forth the involvement of the global church:   “I am here to say to you here at Cape Town that nothing but the concerted opinion and involvement of the global church will bring down human civilization’s longest lasting slave system.”

I think that D’Souza’s eight minutes on the Lausanne platform, 20 years from now, might be one of the defining hallmarks of Lausanne III if the global church – working with Dalit Christians – manages to prophetically speak out and live out Christ’s transforming power in the midst of this (unbelievably) large-scale injustice, reconstituting Indian society from the bottom-up for the glory of Christ.

The link in the quote goes to D’Souza’s speech.

He says that the Dalits (Untouchables) have four pleas for the church:

1. Free our children from socialization into inferiority and vulnerable to abuse and discrimination.
2. Free our women from sexual predation.
3. Be a voice.
4. Bring the alternative community that Jesus promised, the church in which there is no discrimination.

Notice that in the first two points he gives examples of Dalits who saw redemption in their lives.

The BBC story that he referred to, about the Catholic graveyard with a wall between Dalit and non-Dalit graves, is here.  That’s the kind of stark image that can really symbolize injustice, like the separate Bibles for swearing in witnesses in the Jim Crow South.  Wikipedia’s article on caste and Christianity has more information.

Lord, move in the hearts and lives of your people everywhere to build your church into the community that you desire.

Opposing Abortion Across Racial Lines

Rick Hogaboam pointed out a series of posts by Thabiti Anyabwile that reacted Brian Kemper’s defense of comparing abortion to slavery and the Holocaust.  Kemper believes that we must make the comparison because of the horrible reality of abortion that parallels slavery and the Holocaust and the denial of personhood that has taken place in defense of all three.  He believes that people take offense to these comparisons because “we have elevated what they consider to be a blob of tissue to personhood status.”

Rick posted a good quote from the first three posts.  Anyabwile’s consideration of this issue spanned four posts:

• Reacting specifically to Kemper’s article
• Suggestions for a white man addressing a black audience about abortion
• How he might do the same thing as himself addressing a black audience
• An evaluation of John Piper’s well-known advocacy for the unborn, especially in the context of Piper’s exhortations to bridge the racial divides among Christians (includes a sermon video on abortion and racism)
  

I wanted to focus on his first post, and you can read his others for his opinions on those topics.  Here are Anyabwile’s central objections to Kemper’s article:

Okay, the argument is basically fine.  But read Mr. Kemper’s opinion piece and tell me how many times he seems to deeply affirm the human pain and suffering African Americans endured in slavery.  He seems quite aware of the Jewish holocaust, referring to monuments and observances dedicated to never forgetting that human tragedy.  But how many such monuments and museums exist in honor of African people treated as chattel?  How many institutions work to ensure there is a deep, abiding recollection of those centuries of torture?  Not many.  Kemper certainly doesn’t mention many.  Now, here’s why some of us say “how dare you?”  Without demonstrating any genuine empathy, any continuing affirmation of the humanity of African people, the comparison simply seems to lack authenticity, familiarity, and empathy.  It merely sounds expedient.  Those who use the argument don’t really sound like they care about black people as such, but only about exploiting the pain of black people as a political expedient….

There’s one more element to this I’d like to highlight.  When I say, “How dare you make this comparison?” I’m also identifying someone who hasn’t shown up to support a lot of other causes I care about.  Not only have you not shown up to support, you really haven’t shown up to dialogue, understand, or persuade.  Most of your political and social positions lie across the river from my own, and though you own a boat you’ve never tried to row across.  Now you show up saying how much I ought to support your cause.  And you tell me how much this cause ought to mean to me, how I ought to care about the death of black babies.  You tell me this as if I don’t already care about the death of black babies.  But when I talk about the death of black babies due to crime, or poverty, or drugs, or slow death from a sub-par education, you tell me that’s my problem.  When you do that, you seem to care more about your political issue than you care about my black life.  You need to know that’s how we see you.  Your comparison reminds us of all of this.

So, yes, how dare you compare abortion to slavery?!  I love you.  But I’m afraid you don’t love me… at least not long enough to hear how your comparison affects me.  I’m in the trenches with you–at least I want to be–but the shrapnel from your rapid fire makes it hard for me to fire with you.

I think that these two objections both deserve attention.  From everything that I know, Anyabwile is first and foremost an evangelical Christian who doesn’t have a vested interest in racial politics and doesn’t subscribe to Afrocentric theology.  He wants to proclaim the gospel to all people, and knows that God is creating a new, multiracial people in Christ.  If he is right about how many black Christians will react to Kemper’s defense, then what he is pointing to is a fundamental mistrust and disconnect between white and black Christians.  I think that’s largely the case in American Christianity today; white and black Christians have such separate institutions and cultures that we often don’t register on each other’s radar.  Anyabwile’s thoughts here highlight the perils of white tonedeafness, but I think that both circles share some of the blame.

I also want to note something in Anyabwile’s article that I’m not so sure about.  We may not have monuments and museums about slavery, but I think that our educational system and the public presentation of history do pretty well with making people aware of slavery and the civil rights movement.  I think that it’s necessary sometimes to point out that America didn’t invent slavery, but that societies across history have had different forms of it.  This is not, of course, meant as a justification, but context is important.  We’ve got a long way to go in having a really just society or even agreeing exactly what that would look like here.  But to me this criticism, while it is surely sincere, does not describe the cultural reality.

Compassion Fatigue

Krista Tippett recently interviewed Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times.  Kristof has become well-known for his writing about humanitarian crises around the world, and has praised the concern of evangelicals for some of these crises.

Tippett and Kristof discussed compassion fatigue and how Kristof tries to work around it by describing an individual who illustrates the larger issue:

Ms. Tippett: But there’s some way you put that and somewhere you said that the emotional response becomes a portal and then rational arguments like numbers can play a supporting role.

Mr. Kristof: Exactly.

Ms. Tippett: It’s really interesting.

Mr. Kristof: That opening, that connection, that empathy, is really an emotional one. It’s done based on individual stories. And we all know that there is this compassion fatigue as the number of victims increases, but what the research has shown that is kind of devastating is that the number at which we begin to show fatigue is when the number of victims reaches two.

Ms. Tippett: Right. Would you tell the story about Rokia and Moussa, the photograph that they used to illustrate this?

Mr. Kristof: Yeah. This is from the work of a psychologist called Paul Slovic. There were experiences where people were shown a photo of a starving girl from Mali called Rokia, a seven-year-old girl, and asked to contribute in various different scenarios. And then also a boy named Moussa. And essentially people would donate a lot of money. If they saw that Rokia was hungry, they wanted to help her. Likewise, when they saw a picture of Moussa, they wanted to help him. But the moment you put the two of them together and asked people to help both Rokia and Moussa, then at point donations dropped. And by the time you ask them to donate to 21 million hungry people in West Africa, you know, nobody wanted to contribute at all.

Ms. Tippett: Because they’re overwhelmed by that, or it doesn’t spark the same reaction that actually enables people to act. Is that…

Mr. Kristof: Yeah. I think it’s not real. I mean, I think that my job as a journalist is to find these larger issues that I want to address, but then find some microcosm of it, some Rokia who can open those portals and hopefully get people to care. And once that portal is open, then you can indeed begin to put in some of the background, some of the context, some of the larger issues, and hopefully get people to engage with that issue.

The blog for Tippett’s NPR show, On Being (it used to be Speaking of Faith), had a bit more on this phenomenon:

In the non-profit world, some organizations have found success by creating a model around this idea — child sponsorship organizations or Kiva, for example. Microfinance organizations weren’t new, but a model in which one could seemingly loan directly to an individual was. As a result, Kiva exploded onto the American donor scene. Even though in both of these cases donations aren’t going directly into the hands of the recipient, Kiva capitalized on the human instinct to take action to help one person in need. Organizations like DonorsChoose.org have used this same model to fund education projects within the United States.

It is not altogether shocking that we feel more compassion when we have relatable stories. But what stands out in Slovic’s paper is a study in which groups were either given the story of Rokia, a list of statistics, or the story of Rokia combined with more general statistics.

“Donations in response to the identified individual, Rokia, were far greater than donations in response to the statistical portrayal of the food crisis. Most important, however, and most discouraging, was the fact that coupling the statistical realities with Rokia’s story significantly reduced the contributions to Rokia. Alternatively, one could say that using Rokia’s story to ‘put a face behind the statistical problem’ did not do much to increase donations.”

My point here isn’t that more people just need to “do something” and “make a difference” as if all well-motivated actions are equally valuable.  I have some more to write about intelligent, biblical compassion, which I hope to do soon.  But compassion fatigue seems to be a reality that we need to think about too, as well as something in human nature that cries out for the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit in all of us.

The Destiny of the Unevangelized

I recently had a very thought provoking class on the destiny of the unevangelized. It was our last class for Soteriology through Reclaiming the Mind Ministries. Have you ever been asked the question, “Is Jesus the only way to God?” “Is it necessary to believe in Christ to be saved”? “What about those who have never heard the Gospel of Christ? Can they make it to heaven?”  Now let me ask another question, have you really thought through the implications of your answer? The following will be an overview of what we covered in class. Is Christ necessary ontologically (what he did) and is Christ necessary epistemologically (knowledge of what he did)?

Mark Horne Needs to Chill Out about John Piper’s Veteran’s Day Post

I think Horne should have heeded his suspicions in his first words, “Perhaps I’m over-reacting”. Read Piper’s brief post: http://desiringgod.org/blog/posts/thankful-they-embraced-the-risk

And then compare with Horne’s reaction. You woulda thunk Piper gave an apologetic for WWI from Horne’s response. He honestly sounds like he is ranting and raving and it is way out of bounds for him to take it out on Piper. Piper was merely giving a brief historical background of how we got Veterans Day, something that we can all benefit from in a historically illiterate society. Piper’s last words show proper empathy with the soldier,

“There have been agonizing choices the veterans have had to make. May they (and we all) turn to the cross of Christ for the final resolution of what we have done. I am thankful they embraced the risk”

This simple empathy– acknowledging complexities, horrors, and sacrifice, without seeking to pretend to know such plight firsthand, nor qualify thanks according to one’s notions of just war contrasts Horne’s tone:

“There may be a time and situation in which to thank veterans for defending our freedoms. When someone from Mexico or Canada tries to invade and we have to rise to the defense of the homeland, it would be totally appropriate.  But rather than thanking them, we usually need to tell them how glad we are that they survived the attack on freedom that regularly comes from our overlords and their volunteer cheerleaders in the Church of King Jesus.”

These qualifications on when to either thank veterans or inform them of the corrupt system that placed them there makes Horne sound like an arrogant, ungrateful elitist. BTW, the only scenario he provides as meeting his litmus test for thanksgiving would deny gratitude to just about everyone who has died in battle.  Mr. Horne simply needs to say, “Thank You”, and instead reserve his vitriol for the corrupt government if he is so convinced. Don’t deny thanks to our vets because you disagree with Wilson’s foreign policy or that they happened to lay their life down in a battle that didn’t involve Canada or Mexico.

Piper wrote a very brief piece expressing his personal thanks. Piper is well aware of the complexities, as is most of the readership, and the veterans themselves. Our vets don’t need a lecture on just war theory or be enlightened by the profound news that the poweres that be may have missed the mark in foreign policy. Horne’s expose of failed foreign policy and pointers on when to give thanks to vets fails my litmus test for the decency that is required on this day for our vets. Horne intends to be prophetic, but the weary soldier simply needs our quiet empathy.

Thabiti Anyabwile on Slavery and Abortion

Pastor Thabiti Anyabwile offers a 3 post series on abortion, slavery, race relations, and more. I am providing links to each part with some quotes that I found insightful:

Part One ”How Dare Compare Abortion to Slavery?!”

Thabiti offers a stinging analysis of Toby Mac’s “Blues” music:

Yesterday I went to a restaurant with a brother in the Lord.  While there a Toby Mac song began playing on the restaurant speakers.  There was something oddly familiar, yet clearly distant.  The particular song seemed to be an effort at playing the blues by someone who grew up pretty affluent and problem free.  There was the basic form and melody of the blues, but won’t no blues in it.  The way, the how, of this comparison lacks blues for slaves and descendants of slaves.  It lacks familiarity with the suffering, pays passing tribute to the humanity of slaves, and moves too quickly to the rhetorical and political comparison.  It’s all too expedient and neat for an experience whose icon is a lacerated, bleeding, whipped back.

Part Two  “How I Would Talk About Abortion and Slavery to an African American Audience Were I a White Man”

Because the reality is this: There is among us another form of willful ignorance destroying life by the thousands every day.  There is another “looking the other way” by Americans who know better and should be better. There are significant numbers of people professing to be Christians either participating in, supporting, or playing blind bystander to untold human suffering.  These are the people living in our day who remain uninvolved in ending abortion the way some remained uninvolved in ending slavery.

Were a black man to remain uninvolved in ending slavery he would be called a “sell out.”  Were a white man to be uninvolved in ending slavery he would be worst than the slaveowner.  And my brothers and sisters, if a black man or woman remains uninvolved in the ending of abortion when abortion destroys more black babies than any other thing since slavery… that black man or woman is a “sell out” to his children before they see the light of life!  And if a white man or woman remains uninvolved in ending abortion… that white man or woman takes their place on the side of slave owners and slave merchants who were destroyers of life!

Ignoring suffering wasn’t right in 1830, and it’s not right in 2010.  Black life should have been valued and protected in 1830 and 1950, and it should be valued and protected now!

Part Three  “Now I’m African American and I’m Talking to African Americans about Abortion and Slavery”

In our short time tonight, we have not come to talk about slavery.  We’ve come to talk about its modern day step-child: abortion.  And I’ve come to tell you, beloved, my mama and daddy had a lot of things right.  But they were wrong when they told me that “abortion was a white person’s problem.”  It may have seemed that way to them watching the images on the TV in the 1970s.  It may seem that way to you and me when we see the images and protests on our TVs today.  But, beloved, you might be horrified to know the truth.

Since abortion became legal in 1973, over 13 million African American babies have been killed in the womb! Thirteen million!  That’s more than heart disease, cancer, accidents, violent crimes, and AIDS combined!  That’s more than some estimates of lives lost in 200 years of slavery!  In the 1980s, we labeled black males an “endangered species” because of the life-threatening effects of drugs, violence, and imprisonment.  But next to abortion, drugs, violent crime, and prison look like Spring break at Virginia Beach.  Write it down.  Make it plain.  The new slavery, the new force devastating black life, is abortion.