True Horizon

I have a policy to not delve into politics here except when it is unavoidable due to the moral dimension that some political issue brings to the table. In cases like that, I can’t help myself. One of those cases is Barack Obama’s stance on abortion. A quick summary of my view:

When it comes to the abortion issue, Barack Obama is a moral coward.

That ought to be succinct enough. I don’t say things like that lightly so let me explain why I’m saying it now. I’ll start with Obama’s response to Rick Warren at his recent appearance at Saddleback Church in southern California. Here’s the exchange:

WARREN: … Now, let’s deal with abortion; 40 million abortions since Roe v. Wade. As a pastor, I have to deal with this all of the time, all of the pain and all of the conflicts. I know this is a very complex issue. Forty million abortions, at what point does a baby get human rights, in your view?

OBAMA: Well, you know, I think that whether you’re looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity, you know, is above my pay grade.

What pay grade is he talking about? His current, and lifetime appointed, pay grade as a human being or his potential pay grade as President of the United States of America? I can do no better than my friend Jay at addressing the “pay grade” issue (here) so I won’t. But this is nothing but a spineless diversion from the actual topic in question. Obama knows that if a fetus is a person (i.e. life begins at conception) he cannot defend his pro-abortion view. So instead of confronting that moral question, he punts. Let me just say that his answer to that question was all I needed to come to my “moral coward” assessment. But there is more that I have learned since that has only strengthened my confidence in that assessment. (Read on …)

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you are probably wondering if I’ve been hiding under a rock someplace for the last month or so.

Well … sort of.

I have to apologize for my anemic posting rate but I do have an explanation. In June I began to prepare for a couple of reading/study intensive months that were to follow. I spent most of the month of July and early August in Atlanta training to fly a new airplane (The Boeing 737-800 NG). While living in an airport hotel and getting abused in a flight simulator day after day is a luxury few get to experience, trust me, you’re not missing anything.

More importantly, during the same time and for a couple of weeks after, I continued to prepare for an apologetics training program that I am really excited about. Twenty-nine of us descended on Southern Evangelical Seminary in Charlotte, NC for 3 days of training in both the knowledge and presentation of the case for Christianity. We were invited by Dr. Frank Turek, to attend the CrossExamined Instructor Academy (CIA), a program based on his book, I Don’t Have Enough Faith To Be An Atheist. Dr. Turek has turned the material in this book into a presentation/ seminar he gives on college campuses for one reason — 75% of kids who are brought up in the church leave the faith after they leave home.

The reason they leave is that they are inundated by the secular-atheist tilted faculty that dominates most college campuses these days. They hear the arguments these folks give and they are woefully unprepared to deal with them. In short, our kids know that they believe but they don’t know why they believe. This is a problem that must be addressed and, to his credit, Frank Turek knows he cannot do it alone. His goal is to assemble a nationwide team to help. I am trying to engage myself to become a part of that team.

I believe Christianity is worth thinking about. I believe in the Vision of TrueHorizon and I intend to make it a reality. My hope is to become an active part of the The CrossExamined Solution. If you know of a church, school or group that may be interested in a guest speaker who can address these types of issues, please let me know. Better yet, please recommend me or, if you prefer, Frank Turek, to come make the case.

It’s good to be back but we have a lot of work ahead of us.

We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God … (2 Corinthians 10:5)

“The true gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self control is equal to all emergencies; who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity; who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another; who does not flatter wealth, cringe before power, or boast of his own possessions or achievements; who speaks with frankness but always with sincerity and sympathy; whose deed follows his word; who thinks of the rights and feelings of others, rather than his own; and who appears well in any company, a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe.” John Wayland

There are few in the news media, or anywhere else, whom I have admired and respected as much as I have this man. Today Tony Snow is with his maker in paradise.

R.I.P.

AP reports on a new study has just been released by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life that offers a bit support for the notion that religious “tolerance” in America is on the rise. When evangelical churchgoers were asked the following question …

Question wording: Now, as I read a pair of statements, tell me whether the FIRST statement or the SECOND statement comes closer to your own views even if neither is exactly right. First/next: My religion is the one, true faith leading to eternal life, OR: many religions can lead to eternal life.

• 36 percent said that their “religion is the one, true faith leading to eternal life.”
• 57 percent said they believe “many religions can lead to eternal life.”
• Among Catholics, the numbers were 16 percent and 79 percent, respectively.
• In all, 70 percent of Americans with a religious affiliation shared that view, and 68 percent said there is more than one true way to interpret the teachings of their own religion.

The higher percentage of inclusiveness among Catholics is expected. The Catholic Church teaches inclusivism (You can get to heaven if you do the right stuff, even if don’t believe in Jesus). The higher overall percentage of folks who believe this is also not surprising considering our culture is rife with the promotion of pluralism (Everybody gets to heaven regardless of what they believe) as a remedy to avoid offending anyone’s religious beliefs, no matter how nutty they are.

Another slant on this survey is that it is not very specific on what one’s “religion” is. A fellow apologist points out that some may think “denomination” when you say “religion.” In that case, the numbers are actually a little more encouraging to me. But sadly, the fact is that our culture trains us that to disagree is to be “intolerant.” Nobody wants to be intolerant. (This is a subject for another post but most don’t stop to think that, in order to be tolerant, it is a requirement that you disagree!). So we say things like, “All roads lead to heaven,” or, “Faith is like climbing a mountain. We all may be climbing a different path but eventually we arrive at the same place.”

Problem: That’s not what the Bible teaches. (Read on …)

On My (Qualified) Agreement With Sam Harris

To restate from the last post on this topic …

Assertion: Sam Harris was compelled to pen The End of Faith on September 12, 2001 and wrote his Letter To A Christian Nation a few years later. He is one of a growing number who equate the travesties perpetrated by Muslim terrorists with anyone who claims what he calls a “rigid” religious view. Rigid thinkers are dangerous in this world because they become too extreme.

Keep that idea in mind as you consider some points of agreement that Harris claims to share the hard-core “Christian right.” In summary, Harris agrees that (p. 3-4) …

• If one of us is right, the other is wrong.
• The Bible is either the word of God, or it isn’t.
• Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation, or he does not.
• True Christians believe that all other faiths are mistaken and profoundly so.

Response: For all the relativists out there I want to point out that Harris, like me, appears to believe in the existence of objective truth. That being the case, we each must admit that one of us is right and one of us is wrong. It has to be so. We cannot hold completely contradictory views and both be right.

In other words, in taking the opposite view of the nutty Christians, Sam Harris is actually admitting to hold some “hard-core” beliefs himself — beliefs that are exactly contradictory, and just as rigidly held, as those of his Christian opponents. He demands that Christians are wrong, that the Bible is not the word of God, that Jesus in not the one true path to salvation etc. In short, Sam Harris has described himself as a rigid thinker who, according to his own allegations, must also be dangerous.

My only beef with Harris is that he holds Christians in contempt for having the audacity to think they are right about the way they see the world, while he is doing the exact same thing.

Bottom line — Christianity may be true or false. We can debate the evidence (and we will). But whether it is true or not, the fact that Christians actually believe it to be true is not the problem. It is not a badge of honor to be wishy-washy. And it is not a prelude to oppression and violence to hold to concrete beliefs. It all depends on what those beliefs are, whether there is evidence to support them, and whether or not they comport with the way the world actually is. Harris cannot condemn religious belief until he first compares the nature of the religion, the worldview it creates, and the actions that result from its adherents.

Belief is not the problem. What matters is what one believes. That is what makes one dangerous. Those who actually practice Biblical Christianity should pose no threat to anyone. Conversely, following atheist ideas can be brutally dangerous to those with whom the atheist comes in contact. It goes both ways. But the simple act of actually believing something says nothing about whether or not it is true, or whether or not it is “dangerous.”

This becomes important later when we consider the problems Harris has with our “Christian Nation.”

On Sam Harris’ Understanding of Condemnation to Hell

Assertion: In the introduction to his Letter To A Christian Nation, Harris is quick to differentiate between harmless, liberal/moderate Christians and “the religious right.” Harris scolds the former if they should cover for the latter because, by doing so, liberal/moderates “give shelter to extremists of all faiths.” That’s the setup and it is important to remember in this discussion.

Remember that Harris was compelled to pen The End of Faith on September 12, 2001 and wrote his Letter a few years later. He is one of a growing number who equate the travesties perpetrated by Muslim terrorists with anyone who claims what he calls a “rigid” religious view. Keep that idea in mind as you listen to the beginning of Harris’ argument against the Christianity he despises …

First, he points out that he agrees with the hard-core “Christian right” and acknowledges several of the points on which he does so. In summary, Harris agrees that (p. 3-4) …

• If one of us is right, the other is wrong.
• The Bible is either the word of God, or it isn’t.
• Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation, or he does not.
• True Christians believe that all other faiths are mistaken and profoundly so.

and finally,

• If Christianity is correct, and I persist in my unbelief, I should expect to suffer the torments of hell.

Response: Last point first. Harris incorrectly implies that we Christians look down on him and condemn him because he refuses to join the right club — the Christian club that one must bear allegiance to in order to be saved. This is not the way I look at it. No one is relegated to “suffer the torments of hell” because he/she is not a Christian. They are so relegated because they have sinned against a perfectly holy and moral God. If such a person as God exists (and I believe there is ample reason to believe this to be true though I won’t discuss that now), that person must be a perfect, sinless being. That is the definition of what we understand God to be.

If you commit even the smallest immoral act against such a perfectly good being, you are guilty of sin — and you have, by your own actions, created an infinitely wide rift between yourself and that being — an infinite separation that cannot be repaired by a finite being such as yourself. The standard against which you are judged is the perfect standard of a perfectly holy God. It is the standard against which we are all judged and have all been found sadly deficient. And that is why we all should be condemned to be eternally separated (the definition of hell) from that perfect being we call God.

Now, Sam Harris or any of the rest of us are free to dispute this idea and claim we do not deserve to be condemned to such an eternal state. We are free to argue our case on our own. The only difference between a Christian and a non-Christian is that the Christian admits this to be a futile endeavor. Instead, the Christian accepts the gift that Christ’s life, death, and resurrection have promised to provide free of charge — the promise of redemption for our collective guilt. That’s it.

Yes there are arrogant, holier-than-thou Christians running around. This is unfortunate. But Christianity is not some exclusive club filled with people who look down their noses at all the lousy “sinners” out there and believe it is their God-ordained right to impose their religion on all those who may choose not to accept it. Quite the opposite. Christians actually believe they are lost without the undeserved grace of a loving, incarnate God.

Maybe I have been long-winded but I my point is that I think Sam Harris, by the way he words his critique, misunderstands the basic tenet of Christianity. Mr. Harris won’t be “condemned to hell” because he’s not in our club — because he persists in his non-acceptance of the Christian religion. Mr. Harris, if he is condemned to hell, will be because he, like all the rest of us, has violated the moral perfection due a perfect God.

That said, let it be known that I agree with Sam Harris about the other point he makes. More on that next time …

[cross-posted on the LTI Blog]

It is easy to become dismayed and frustrated in observing the general apathy and lack of urgency that seems to prevail within the general public toward the cause to which Scott Klusendorf and Jay Watts have dedicated their full-time professional lives. Jay’s poignant post (here) reflects the anguish that comes in dealing with the general disinterestedness we have all observed. Regardless, we must continue to minister, educate and multiply the forces that do both. We each have to make the case for human personhood at all stages of life in our own little corners of the world. But what is the prognosis for the project of moving the culture at large? I want to make two observations, one here, another in a separate post …

Peter Wehner, a former deputy assistant to President Bush, in his discussion (here) of the media’s hope-filled frenzy regarding the impending “crack up” of the modern evangelical movement, brings up some statistics that, when considered alongside some other pro-life thought, may offer pro-lifers some optimism. While Wehner is more concerned with the pure political and electoral implications of the changing evangelical movement, buried in his essay are some promising facts:

• According to a recent Pew poll, 70 percent of evangelicals age 18-29 favor making it more difficult for a woman to get an abortion compared with 55 percent of evangelicals 30 and above
• Younger evangelicals are more suspicious of big institutions and skeptical of big government
• Most evangelicals still care a great deal about the advancing culture-of-life agenda; abortion remains their most consistently important and galvanizing issue. Yet more and more evangelicals are showing concern for environmental issues like global warming; human rights issues like religious persecution and genocide; and “social justice” issues like poverty and AIDS. The evangelical movement’s longstanding concern about abortion isn’t receding; the area of concern is enlarging.

Included in this enlarged area of evangelical concern are issues that, though not specifically pro-life, share characteristics that cross political boundaries: sex trafficking in Africa, AIDS, tribal genocide, the plight of Tibet … and the list goes on. If Wehner is correct in his assessment of the concerns of younger evangelicals, they share these as pressing issues even with their secular peers. And while we conservative evangelicals rightly (no pun intended) knee-jerk to labeling many of these as left-leaning issues, they are at their core human rights issues that are considered important among the young. (Read on …)

Every year, my family vacations at an east coast resort in Delaware. Two houses down from us on our daily walk to the beach a red Dodge van is parked in the driveway. The back of the van is covered in bumper stickers, one of which I was reminded of this week. It says, “Listen To The Earth.”

I have addressed the issue of bumper sticker politics briefly elsewhere but, as we “celebrated” Earth Day this past week, that bumper sticker leaped into my brain and I wondered, just how does one go about “listening” to the Earth?

As I have discussed before, I believe we are duty-bound to be good stewards of our environment, but that is a far cry from the political agenda behind the Earth Day movement. I was going to comment on those ideas but, once again, my friend Rick Gerhardt not only beat me to it, but summarized the problem far more concisely and eloquently than I ever could have. Rick has advanced degrees in biology and works as an avian ecologist. In other words, Rick is not only much smarter than me, but he is well-versed in subject areas that directly effect environmentalist ideas.

Please check out Rick’s two recent posts here and here. But if you don’t have time, let me offer a Cliff’s Notes summary of Rick’s take on the basic issues Christians should consider as they approach the subject of environmentalism:

First, environmentalism as we know it today has largely been co-opted by those with a neo-pagan or pantheistic worldview. This is easily seen around Earth Day, whose most vocal participants openly honor “Mother Earth” or worship Gaia, the earth goddess. Thus, for Christians to join the existing environmental movement would involve closely aligning themselves with people whose religion and worldview are diametrically opposed to their own …

Similarly, the environmental movement in America has been twisted for political means, to the point that unbiased, reasonable discussions of environmental issues have become all but impossible …

Third, the modern environmental movement has a distinctly pro-death (anti-human) aspect to it. For many in this movement, the biggest problem facing the planet is human beings …

That’s it in a nutshell. And from that Rick draws the following conclusion:

… these amoral and anti-Christian elements makes it reasonable for Christians to avoid such alignment, it does not absolve them (us) of the responsibility of either personal or corporate environmental stewardship. If anything, it requires us both to stiffen our resolve to be the very best creation caretakers that we can be and to better understand why good stewardship makes more sense from within a Judeo-Christian worldview than from a pantheistic or atheistic perspective.

As usual, there is a lot of wisdom in his words. Though he would never be so self-serving as to suggest this himself, let me say that if you are encouraged by someone to “listen to the earth,” you might want to click back here and listen to Rick instead.

Good stuff …

When it comes to spiritual issues, I am always amazed that people will accept and defend things that they would never, ever accept when addressing any other subject. People will convince themselves (and try to convince you) that the most illogical, nonsensical claims make perfect sense as long as they are attached to religion, spirituality, or questions surrounding ultimate meaning for our existence. Case in point: Nica Lalli, who has recently written a book entitled, Nothing: Something To Believe In. In a recent interview, Lalli proclaims that:

I am an atheist. I have never joined, or been part of, any religious group or organization. I was raised without religion, and without much understanding of what religion is. I have never had much of an identity religiously, and I stayed away from much thought or discussion on the matter. It is only recently that I have really explored the many options for religious beliefs and have decided that rather than saying, “No comment,” I now call myself an atheist.

Though she admits that she has had little training in religious matters and that she really doesn’t even understand what religion is, she seems to feel comfortable making judgments about religious ideas — especially those attached to “organized religion.” What Ms. Lalli fails to see is that, by calling herself an atheist, she is in no way laying claim to a neutral position. Contrary to the deliberately provocative title of her book, she is most definitely not believing in “nothing.” Ms. Lalli is, by definition, making an explicitly religious claim.

The Dictionary definition of Religion is: “a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.”

The universe either has a natural or supernatural cause. Those are the only options available to us. By claiming atheism, Ms. Lalli is putting forth the specific notion that God does not exist and that the cause, nature and purpose of the universe must therefore be (respectively) random, materialistic, and meaningless. These ideas have real-world consequences that infer a deterministic, meaningless existence that has no grounding for any moral code.

This is hardly a detached, neutral stance. (Read on …)

To be honest, it can get bit discouraging to constantly attempt to defend the Christian worldview here. In my efforts to stay up to date on what is going on in the world, I am constantly searching for news stories that touch on worldview issues. The result of that is that I am constantly mind-wrestling with negativity. It wears you down. That’s the nature of the beast I guess.

And don’t get me wrong, it is a passion of mine, I think it is vitally important, and I love to do it. But weeks like this one are particularly dispiriting:

In Britain, researchers have combined genetic materials to produce human-bovine hybrids. Why? Because they can. And apparently they see nothing Frankensteinian about it. Just doing research, you know — maybe harvest some stem cells along the way — and they justify it by claiming it may help cure disease. The manipulation of the very nature of humanness is apparently not an issue.

In Georgia, a group of 3rd graders hatched a plot to kill their teacher, this in retaliation for the teacher making a student stand on a chair. These kids had assigned students to cover the windows of the classroom, duct tape and gag the teacher, and supply knives to finish the job. How does a society produce a batch of 8 year-olds who can even conceive of such a thing?

In Oregon, Thomas Beatie (that would be a “he”) announced that he is five months pregnant. Oprah had him on her show. And, without any exception I could find, the entire news media insists on referring to Beatie as a “pregnant man.” Hello! His sex-change surgery notwithstanding, “Thomas” Beatie is, by definition, a woman. This is not debatable. Yet we live in a society that condones and patronizes those who demand not only that their “gender” is a matter of personal preference, but that those who would question the idea are nothing but old fashioned bigots. How did we get here?

Finally, today it is being reported that intelligence officials have uncovered substantial evidence of Al-Qaida’s plans to bring a nuclear attack on the United States. Given the number of nuclear components once stored in the former Soviet Union, and the current corruption of the government there that yearns for the old totalitarianism, the materials needed to carry out such a plot cannot be too hard to obtain. And so we live under the constant possibility that the terrorist planning could well come to fruition.

All this is disgusting and demoralizing not so much for me, but for the state of the future world that my children will be forced to live in. Such a world is beyond my comprehension but I’m afraid that it will not be beyond my children’s realization. All of it stems from the fact that ideas matter. Some ideas are wrong and destructive. And those seem to be the ideas whose stock is on the rise. It can all be very depressing …

… and then came yesterday. (Read on …)