Stones Cry Out

Our contributor Tom said recently, "These are tough times to be a Democrat."  A commenter, noting that line, replied, "It still appears that McCain can’t even beat Clinton – with her huge negative ratings – much less Obama."

If you put your stock in opinion polls, McCain’s looking better all the time.

The poll showed Arizona Sen. McCain, who has clinched the Republican presidential nomination, is benefiting from the lengthy campaign battle between Obama and Clinton, who are now battling to win Pennsylvania on April 22.

McCain leads 46 percent to 40 percent in a hypothetical matchup against Obama in the November presidential election, according to the poll.

That is a sharp turnaround from the Reuters/Zogby poll from last month, which showed in a head-to-head matchup that Obama would beat McCain 47 percent to 40 percent.

Now, as I’ve said, I’m not a big fan of opinion polls.  They tend to judge emotion moreso that anything else, as I think this one does.  Nonetheless, I think Tom’s point stands, especially when you consider, as he did, the primary season debacle.

So now Democrats find themselves in a thoroughly uncomfortable position. Their nominee will ultimately be selected by the party’s elite, unelected delegates rather than by the millions of voters who turned out in during the primary season. Depending on which way they go, they run the risk of alienating a huge portion of their base. They could potentially disenfranchise millions of voters (particularly if they cannot resolve the Michigan/Florida problem). It’s rather ironic that the same party that since 2000 has routine accused Republicans of disenfranchising voters may do the same to their own base. How they solve these issues in selecting their nominee could mean the difference between a huge victory in November and utter self-destruction.

It ain’t over ’til it’s over, right Yogi?

[tags]politics,Democrats,John McCain,Hillary Clinton,Barack Obama,presidential primary,disenfranchisement[/tags]

Senator Barack Obama gave a speech in Philadelphia yesterday on race issues.  The speech was precipitated by connections being drawn between Obama and his black liberation theology pastor of 20 years, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Many people have been turning to the Internet to view statements by his longtime pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who suggested in one sermon that the United States brought the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on itself and in another said blacks should damn America for continuing to mistreat them.

Obama rejected Wright’s divisive statements but still embraced the man who brought him to Christianity, officiated at his wedding, baptized his two daughters and inspired the title of his book "The Audacity of Hope."

Not disown, perhaps, but much of that association has been scrubbed from Obama’s website and elsewhere on the Internet.  And that’s begging the question; are Rev. Wright’s view extreme for black liberation theology?  See here for Mark Olsen’s look into this.  If they are extreme, what does it say about the candidate who supports that church by his attendance and, likely, his money?  If they aren’t extreme, what does it say about the theology, in addition to the candidate?  [UPDATE: James Taranto reports that they may be more mainstream than some would like to think.]

So then, are a candidate’s pastor’s views fair game for consideration on the campaign trail?  Before you answer, consider how the occasional words of Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell have been used to paint evangelical Christians with a broad brush, both in the media and in the blogs.  But Falwell wasn’t, and Robertson isn’t, the pastor of the vast majority of those people for whom the Left likes to suggest they speak for.  Obama, on the other hand, attends by personal choice.  If the Left wants to make Robertson the spokesman for millions who may have not heard him speak, doesn’t that standard then apply to someone with a 20-year, close association with a presidential candidate? 

Or is there one standard for the Religious Right, and another for the Religious Wright?

Please vote in the poll on the right; do you think it’s fair game?

[tags]Barack Obama,Rev. Jeremiah Wright,race issues,Jerry Falwell,Pat Robertson,Religious Right,Christianity[/tags]

• That speech thing. Reasonable responses from the right. Here too. Analysis from Mr Fernandez. From the Libertarian. Da text. The Middle East angle. Author author!
• Folk science defined … again.
• Rowan Williams talks about science and theology.
• Lily, not of the Valley?
• “Not wanting to do that which you’re not good at” … considered Biblically. My motto: “Get up, do what you can. Go to sleep.”

For this months Carnival of Christian Reconciliation, the topic Mr Platypus suggests is:

All of this prompts me to propose “Reconciliation and Liturgical Time” as the special topic for this Carnival. How are divergent or competing understandings of the liturgical year an obstacle to reconciliation? Conversely, how does the idea of liturgical time open up possibilities for greater unity? In any event, how do we live out our Christian discipleship among fellow believers who approach liturgical time differently?

As I write this most of the readers of this entry will likely be entering their Holy week celebrations. Many will be looking forward to finally breaking their fast, to celebrating, “getting their alleluia’s back”, and in general filling their own traditional ways of celebrating the Resurrection of our Lord and our God.

In A Secular Age philosopher Charles Taylor begins by noting the secular comes from the Latin: saeculum which relates to an “age” a specified length of time. Secular consequently is bound up in time. The Sacred is not. And this is true of our worship. Sunday worship “connects” and is “closer” to other Sunday’s and specifically that first Easter Sunday, than it is to Monday even though “in time” it is not. Our liturgical calendar pierces our secular time lines as the tines of a fork pinning us to the Eternal. The Orthodox teaching is that there is no time in liturgy. That in the divine liturgy we participate in the eschaton, in the timelessness of God.

But it is true there is division and unity in our liturgical calendars. Having the same calendar does aid ecumenical union. Last week, on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, while traveling on business I visited and had a wonderful experience at a very small rural ROCOR (Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia) parish in Northern Georgia (web site here). Orthodoxy does not precisely share the same calendar … but for Lent/Pascha/Pentacost we do. Orthodoxy is split between the Julian and Gregorian calendar for the rest of the year. But because we share the same calendar in this season, I heard the same readings, and the homily was preached on the same subject. There were some differences, no parade of Icons and a little over half of the service was in old Slavonic … which was something of a challenge to sing. But … enough about me (or alternatively … I digress). The point is ecumenical connections between myself as a new OCA (Orthodox Church of America) member were eased by our liturgical similarities including our calendar. I would have felt out of place, having just finished my first week of Lenten fasting in joining a Lutheran, Anglican, Catholic, or other Protestant church which was celebrating Palm Sunday … not “the Triumph of Orthodoxy” and the victory over iconoclasm.

But while, the non-shared liturgical calendar hurts the ecumenical meeting of Orthodox an non-Orthodox does it help for instance the meeting of main line Protestant churches and Catholic? And here, I must confess my ignorance of what praxis and calendars are followed by the non-liturgical Protestants. But it seems to me likely, in for the traveller or the visitor, the non-sharing of secular (set in time) of the Sacred events is a hindrance to the mixing of our sectarian splits.

And that is perhaps a most important point. For noting our ignorance we have an opportunity to fill that void. As we are widely ignorant of the “Others” calendar … we can try to share. So in the interests of informing the y’all, I’ll point to this program, a free download, provided by (yet another) Atlanta (this time OCA) church. It provides the hymns (troparia and kontakia) assigned for the day, the Scripture readings, and the Saints as well as the official record of those Saint’s life for each day.

If you could, leave as comments here, links or references to your liturgical year … so we can all share and by our differences find what we have in common.

• One difference is that Opus Dei, certain mainstream novelists notwithstanding, is exemplary.
• In memoriam, Metropolitan Laurus, the “best article so far”.
• A simpler climate model.
• No.
• The Law didn’t help.

He was captured at 16 years of age and forced to be a slave in a foreign country.  He was a herdsman for 6 years until he believed God told him to escape, which he did, back to England.  A few years later, he had a vision of someone from that foreign country asking him to return to spread the Gospel of Christ, which he did.

As you wear your green today, spare a thought for the country of Ireland, the country to which Saint Patrick was taken, and back to which he went to lead them to Christ.  St. Patrick’s Day isn’t about shamrocks and green beer any more than Christmas is about reindeer and Christmas trees.

[tags]Saint Patrick,Ireland,St. Patrick’s Day[/tags]

• Mr Hansen is right and Mr Obama wrong on this one.
• Starbucks and Harry Potter.
• Heh.
• The Prime Directive is evil.
• A film to see.

• For a guy who has essayed on the violence of categorization … Mr Schraub sure depends on it, with Black Conservative, Black Liberal, (how about Black Jew?), Black (or is it not racially linked) paleo-conservative and so … to note a few categories. Personally I find categories of that sort less than useful when discussing individuals for rarely do they actually line with the “bins” like they should. Once I was “two letters of WASP”, being White and Protestant, now I am down to only one, “White”, but for me, I find the notion “White” and “Black” so filled with internal inconsistencies that the categories are next to useless … so why use them?
• Jonathan Rowe at Positive Liberty wonders “Can One Be a Good Christian and a Good American?”. I think this is a better question than his discussion of the topic envisions. I think his quoted notation, that “I would simply note that Americanism and Christianity are not the same thing; Christianity is compatible with American style republican government because Christianity is compatible with almost any form of government, even and especially tyrannical government that is hostile to Christians (indeed, the very government in which Christianity was born!).” I think this misses the point, from a Christian standpoint. With respect to tyranny, Christianity may allow one to submit more to incursions on one’s “rights” (whatever they might be), but it never allows one to participate. I think the early Church notion, following Rowan Williams description, that a Christian must be a “resident alien” in his land held in tension with “render unto Caesar” and what that entails in a Republic is the essential tension … not ideas of tyranny and submission.
• Recent postings on Mr Obama’s plate offering to Trinity, one wonders at the paucity of his gifts. This seems endemic of the Left who find charity to be the job of government. There are suggestions that his donations have picked up in recent years as he’s noted the negative political effects small charitable donations hurt Gore and Clinton.
  

  In 2002, the year before Obama launched his campaign for U.S. Senate, the Obamas reported income of $259,394, ranking them in the top 2 percent of U.S. households, according to Census Bureau statistics. That year the Obamas claimed $1,050 in deductions for gifts to charity, or 0.4 percent of their income. The average U.S. household totaled $1,872 in gifts to charity in 2002, according to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University.

  Gifts to help for the Tsunami and New Orleans seem conspicuously lacking as well. I don’t tithe yet, as my fears of two college tuition bills looming 5-6 years away keep me from doing that as yet. But … Mr Obama’s income seems above noticing such bumps when compared to mine … which is not 6 figures.

• One thing to note on the Wright/Obama thing, which is in Mr Obama’s favor. I have sat in pews listening to politically slanted sermons I didn’t agree with. For example, I highly value N.T. Wright’s theological writings … but his political statements seem naive to me. Furthermore, when we speak of Rev. Wright as Mr Obama’s spiritual adviser … the question arises … what is meant by this term? Spiritual adviser brings to mind ideas of the Orthodox staretz. It’s pretty clear that isn’t the relationship. Does Trinity even hold to a Sacrament of Confession? I doubt it. It’s also clear however, Mr Obama wasn’t unknown or just a random anonymous pew sitter from Wright’s point of view in this large mega-church. So the issue is likely muddy. Here is one, somewhat cynical take, from the opposite side of the aisle (at least the first half of it). That sort of idea,rings more true, for me, in that Mr Obama to me via his spin/message of “hope and change” notwithstanding offers a fairly vanilla middle of the road liberal package of proposals. To call the “ordinary” package “change” brings to mind a certain amount of cynicism that comes with an ease of with manipulating meaning. Mr Obama’s response seemed Clinton-esque in the careful wording, “I never heard” … left “but was certainly aware of it all along” on the table and unspoken. I wonder if the linked piece also gives credence recent display of Biblical exegetical ignorance given lately about Romans and the Beatitudes?

Abortion

Christian doctrine and tradition from the earliest writings, e.g., the Didache and Barnabas all speak against abortion. However, even as Christian teaching and tradition all speak strongly against abortion … it’s not as clear that the consequence should be that we should seek to make abortion illegal or for that matter invalidate Roe vs Wade (although I think that should be done for other political reasons completely unrelated to whether it’s “good law” or not).
In this not-so-little book, Saint Silouan, the Athonite,there is a section in which monastic order is described. It is told that St. Silouan and others leaders in the monastic community might have occasion to give a command to another monk. If that command was not obeyed, there was no censure, no rebuke or correction. Making abortion illegal, when we’ve “made it clear” that it’s immoral (and on that most but not all of the abortion proponents actually agree, e.g., the “safe, legal, rare” crowd implicitly agree that it is wrong by adding “rare” to the list) might be all we should rightly do. If I recall rightly, I think the monastic logic goes something like this:

• God will judge us for our actions and deeds at the eschaton.
• God gave us all free will.
• Any action is judged once.
• Thus if I command you to do a thing, and you do it (out of righteous obedience) … only one of us will be judged and that will be the one who commanded. That is, I will be judged not you.
• And if you do not follow that command, you will be judged and furthermore (and more importantly),
• Finally, because God gave us free will how can I do different and I should therefore allow you to do what you wish without censure or restriction.

So the question is this: In a Christian ethical view, keeping in mind God’s judgement and free will, besides explaining that abortion is wrong and immoral what other action is righteous in God’s eyes? It is likely the answer is … none.

Now I realized that lack of censure does not apply to child-rearing and that a government’s laws and institutions form a crucial part of the tripartite effort to keep us civil (state, church, and academe, being the three). My point is that it seems that Christian teaching would indicate that we shouldn’t make abortion illegal.
Hypocrisy

Mr Spizer is the latest public official in the new. Hypocrite is a common charge. Now there may be many reasons to condemn Mr Spitzer, but hypocrisy is a tricky charge to make if one lacks mind reading skills or omniscience. It seems that there is only one circumstance one can press the charge of hypocrisy correctly. That is the case in which one does, as Congress often does, passes laws which apply to others but not oneself. If Mr Spitzer had gone after “johns” in the sex trade industry but had pushed for or added a loophole excluding gentlemen named “Spitzer” that would be hypocritical. However just because I say a thing is wrong and do it, that in itself does not make me a hypocrite. As St. Paul famously remarked the “spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” I can think a thing wrong, do it and still think that it is wrong. The only way I’d be a hypocrite is if I say it is wrong (by lying), do it myself, and for myself yet believe when I do it it is not wrong. The only way someone else can know I’ve that is if they can read into my heart and know truly if I believe a thing is wrong and fell to temptation or am dishonest.

Prostitution

It is a common conceit of the libertarian (and “liberal”) crowd, that prostitution as a “victimless” crime should be legalized. There is however, this (quoting another column):

I changed my mind [on legalization] after looking at the experiences of other countries. The Netherlands formally adopted the legalization model in 2000, and there were modest public health benefits for the licensed prostitutes. But legalization nurtured a large sex industry and criminal gangs that trafficked underage girls, and so trafficking, violence and child prostitution flourished rather than dying out.

and the associated discussion. Mr Cowen’s remark, “I see the costs and benefits of legalization as murky.” I think is spot on. I think both sides of that debate would be better served if they first admitted “murky” as a correct assessment on the costs and benefits.

• Cracks in the ranks in Israel.
• An interesting meditation on Melchizedek.
• Very cute.
• Shocking report on a government panel … they didn’t get it wrong.
• Obama and McCain … cricket races and the youth vote.
• Combinatorics on the seven deadly sins … As an exercise for the reader, add the 8th sin (self-esteem) and the 7 (or is it 8) theological virtues.

Two noted, “cricket race” is my term for opinion polls as I think the results are just about as useful. Also, these links are culled from my daily “highlights” that I post on my personal blog, for example here.

• Hostility toward individualism on the left coast.
• Dawn notes that GKC’s Orthodoxy is available for free on mp3. Also, GKC again, in which it is noted by Carl Olson (no relation) “I first read it in 1993 as an Evangelical Protestant; it played a significant role in my journey to the Catholic Church, which my wife and I entered in 1997.” For myself, Orthodoxy was the catalytic book propelling me back into Christianity.
• On the cult of Ms Rand. (HT: Swap Blog). For my part, anybody who has ever read (suffered through?) Atlas Shrugged should also read Matt Ruff’s absolutely hysterical romp Sewer, Gas and Electric: The Public Works Trilogy.
• The Christian Carnival is here.
• Helping street girls in India.

These are tough times to be a Democrat. After months of battling through primaries and caucuses, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are practically deadlocked in the race for their party’s presidential nomination. Even though several states are still slated to hold their primaries they aren’t going to ultimately decide who the nominee will be. That decision will be made by 796 “superdelegates” who are party officials who will ultimately select the nominee. Never before has the Democratic party had to rely on these unelected delegates to decide a nomination. This was the year the Democrats were supposed to win back the White House. Now, it looks like the party may implode before they can select a nominee.

To make matters worse, Senator John McCain has already wrapped up the Republican nomination which means he can focus on the general election and raise a boatload of campaign cash.

The question now facing Democrats in how to bring their nomination process to a peaceful end. Unfortunately for them, no one has a good solution.

Read the rest of this entry

The conversation with Mr Sandefur of Freespace has continued. He answered, and then I replied (at my blog). He then replied again and here is my response.

Mr Sandefur seems to use only one method of argument, deliberate misconstrual. In his latest sally before I respond, it might be instructive to count both his rhetorical points and his misconstruals and see which wins out [note: score is 0 arguments, 4 misconstruals]. Again, to save space, find the rest below the fold. Read the rest of this entry

Actor Chuck Norris weighs in on last week’s court ruling in California with his own thoughts on homeschooling. An excerpt:

The reason government courts are cracking down on private instruction has more to do with suppressing alternative education than improving educational standards. The rationale is quite simple, though rarely, if ever, stated. If one wants to control the future ebbs and flows of a country, one must have command over future generations. This is done by seizing parental and educational power, legislating preferred educational materials, and limiting private educational options. It is so simple any socialist can understand it. As Josef Stalin once stated: “Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.”

Read the whole thing.

Scott Ott, writer at the fantastically funny Scrappleface, also has a more serious blog at the Townhall website.  Today’s entry is a sobering look at the situation with Eliot Spitzer and the prostitute.  The money quote: "The difference between me and Eliot Spitzer is largely this: I have never been elected governor of New York."

Please read the whole thing before you, Republican or Democrat, pass judgement.

[tags]Eliot Spitzer,Scott Ott,politics[/tags]