Stones Cry Out

Good morning.

1. Continuing to work through the meaning of the Transfiguration.
2. Sort of a better moustrap.
3. Mr Obama, losing the pretentious demographic? I don’t think so, to where else might they turn their stuck up noses?
4. Stopping that pesky terrestrial rotation.
5. Addiction.
6. The problem with objecting to zoning the basis of “its offensive” is that … it is indeed the rightful basis of zoning. We don’t have industrial warehouses and residential houses mixed for exactly that reason, not to speak of bars and schools.
7. Are you one of the lucky?
8. Of love and marriage.
9. A (non-religious) conversion noted.
10. Talking about English and Orthodoxy.

Ann had an interesting meme post which I noticed today, the “Ann Rice” meme. This meme asks us to:

1. Name 3 things that really annoy you about church in general.
2. Name 3 reasons why you stay.

So, without further ado: here’s my list.

Annoyances

1. When Christians make references to “those sinners” with a tacit assumption that “they” are not us. That is having the hubris to make the claim that there are groups and categories more sinful in the sight of the Lord than any group that includes me.
2. That the “the road is narrow and the path is steep” doesn’t mean that there isn’t more than one road. It means that the getting there is difficult.
3. How often we fail to treat other Christians as our brother and to love those who hate us.

Things Keeping me there:

1. The Creator created, the tomb was empty, and the Spirit descended.
2. Those times in which we succeed to treat Christians as our brother and to love those who hate us.
3. The stories and writings of those who it seems before us did manage well to trod that narrow path.

From the source of all knowledge, Wikipedia:

In 711 AD, a Muslim army from North Africa had conquered Visigoth Christian Iberia. Under their leader Tariq ibn-Ziyad, they landed at Gibraltar and brought most of the Iberian Peninsula under Islamic rule in an eight-year campaign. The Iberian Peninsula was called Al-Andalus by its Muslim rulers. When the Umayyad Caliphs were deposed in Damascus in 750, the dynasty relocated to Córdoba, ruling an emirate there; consequently the city gained in luxury and importance, as a center of Iberian Muslim culture.

Once the Muslims conquered Iberia, they governed it in accordance with Islamic shariah law. Christians and Jews were treated as dhimmis or "protected" persons subject to a poll tax allowing them to live in peace and security under the Islamic state. Under shariah, blasphemy against Islam, whether by Muslims or dhimmis, and apostasy from Islam are all grounds for the death penalty.

Though four Christian basilicas and numerous Christian monasteries mentioned in Eulogius’ martyrology remained open, the Christian population was gradually becoming converted to Islam in the process driven by taxation, legal discrimination and other indignities imposed on the Christians, and the marriage laws assuring Muslim offspring from mixed marriages. Notably Reccafred, Bishop of Córdoba, taught the virtues of toleration and compromise with the Muslim authorities, which did nothing to slow the process. To the scandal of Eulogius, whose texts are the only source for these martyrdoms, and who was venerated as a saint from the 9th century, the bishop sided with Muslim authorities against the martyrs, whom he regarded as fanatics. The closures of monasteries begins to be recorded towards the middle of the 9th century. The monk Eulogius encouraged the martyrs as a way to reinforce the faith of the Christian community. He composed tractates and a martyrology to justify the self-immolation of the martyrs, of which a single manuscript, containing his Documentum martyriale, the three books of his Memoriale sanctorum and his Liber apologeticus martyrum, was preserved in Oviedo, in the Christian kingdom of Asturias in the far northwestern coast of Hispania. There the relics of Saint Eulogius were translated in 884.

Cordoba refers to a time of ascension of the Caliphate and conquest, especially conquest of Christians.  Today, writing in The Ottawa Citizen, two Muslims, Raheel Raza and Tarek Fatah, condemn the idea of building an Islamic mosque very near to Ground Zero, to be built by "The Cordoba Initiative".

New York currently boasts at least 30 mosques so it’s not as if there is pressing need to find space for worshippers. The fact we Muslims know the idea behind the Ground Zero mosque is meant to be a deliberate provocation to thumb our noses at the infidel. The proposal has been made in bad faith and in Islamic parlance, such an act is referred to as "Fitna," meaning "mischief-making" that is clearly forbidden in the Koran.

The Koran commands Muslims to, "Be considerate when you debate with the People of the Book" — i.e., Jews and Christians. Building an exclusive place of worship for Muslims at the place where Muslims killed thousands of New Yorkers is not being considerate or sensitive, it is undoubtedly an act of "fitna"

So what gives Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf of the "Cordoba Initiative" and his cohorts the misplaced idea that they will increase tolerance for Muslims by brazenly displaying their own intolerance in this case?

Do they not understand that building a mosque at Ground Zero is equivalent to permitting a Serbian Orthodox church near the killing fields of Srebrenica where 8,000 Muslim men and boys were slaughtered?

There are many questions that we would like to ask. Questions about where the funding is coming from? If this mosque is being funded by Saudi sources, then it is an even bigger slap in the face of Americans, as nine of the jihadis in the Twin Tower calamity were Saudis.

Legally, I’m sure they have a right to build it.  But their actions belie their stated intentions. 

Meanwhile, a church actually destroyed in the 9/11 attacks, St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, still has roadblocks before it can be rebuilt.

Well, mid-to-late morning (I’m running a bit late) … but have a good day nevertheless.

1. What those living in freedom don’t remember.
2. School days.
3. Taxi licenses and no good deed goes unpunished.
4. Forest fires and politics.
5. Our Administration, pushing lower efficiencies to save jobs? Let’s go back to all living on one horse farms.
6. A blogging meme and the institutional Church.
7. Two useful sites noted for the Orthodox in our midst.
8. On the modern marriage culture.
9. Liberal vs Conservative and its (non) relevance for the church.
10. A photo essay from the Ukraine.
11. Mr Krugman and an argument applied now that was conveniently not present during the healthcare debate.
12. One of the leading evangelical atheist bloggers neatly skewered, although that seems to be a bit like shooting ducks in a barrel.
13. Of computer games and protein science.

[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they’ve had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time. Who should be on this list?]

45.  Os Guinness. Modern de Tocqueville  b.1941

 As a European visitor to the United States and a great admirer but somewhat detached observer of American culture today, Os Guinness stands in the long tradition of outside voices who have contributed so much to America’s ongoing discussion about the state of the union.

Great-great grandson of Arthur Guinness, the Dublin brewer, Os was born in China in World War II where his parents were medical missionaries (and where his siblings died of illness). He was named Oswald after Oswald Chambers, a friend of his parents. A witness to the climax of the Chinese revolution in 1949, he was expelled with his family and many other foreigners in 1951 and returned to Europe–where he was educated in England. He completed his undergraduate degree at the University of London and his D.Phil in the social sciences from Oriel College, Oxford.

Guinness is a Christian cultural critic with deep theological awareness and penetrating insights into character, social interaction, historic lessons, and unyielding devotion to God. He has written or edited more than twenty-five books, including The American Hour, Time for Truth, The Call, Invitation to the Classics, Long Journey Home, and Unspeakable: Facing up to the Challenge of Evil. His latest book, The Case for Civility was published by HarperOne in January 2008.

“Civility,” Guinness says, “ is how we must live with our deep differences. It’s the American way as described by James Madison, with no state church and no religious monopoly. The framers [of the U.S. Constitution] got religious liberty right with the First Amendment in 1791, long before they got race or women right. However, the way the founders set the country up has been breaking down since the 1960s, or really since the Everson case in 1947. We have incessant cultural warring with, as Richard Neuhaus put it, the sacred public square on one side and the naked public square on the other. Both of the sides are well funded, both employ batteries of lawyers, both are nationally led and it’s a disaster for America. What Neuhaus and others call the “civil public square” is a key to the American future; Christians should be champions of that civil public square.”[1]

Guinness is perhaps best known for his writings, as a co-laborer with Francis Schaeffer at L’Abri, for his work on the Williamsburg Charter—which attempted to establish decorum in political discourse; and for his founding and leadership of the unique outreach of The Trinity Forum to leaders often untouched by traditional means.

 The Trinity Forum is:

 “a leadership academy that works to cultivate networks of leaders whose integrity and vision will help renew culture and promote human freedom and flourishing. Our programs and publications offer contexts for leaders to consider together the big ideas that have shaped Western civilization and the faith that has animated its highest achievements.”

I had the good fortune of working with Os during the start-up years of The Trinity Forum. He is probably the most gracious and gentle intellectual I have worked with (and I have worked with many, in case I needed additional reasons for humility), while at the same time Guinness also maintained intellectual rigor and British propriety. It is a blend that allows you to establish a warm friendship with him, appreciate his everyday brilliance, and yet never become overly chummy. To have it any other way would negate his unique character.

 Years after I worked with Os, when I was going through a difficult personal time, he was one of the few friends and certainly the only Christian leader who called me to offer encouragement to my spirit and solace to my soul. He was self depreciating and assured me that I was not alone in any wrongdoing. It is the kind of kindness one never forgets.

 Guinness lives with his wife Jenny in McLean, Virginia.

James Taranto notes that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia basically predicted the ruling against Prop 8 in California.  Judge Walker, in this decision, cited, among other things, Lawrence v. Texas which struck down state laws criminalizing consensual sodomy.  "It’s just personal behavior", was the argument from those trying to get those laws overturned.  The Supreme Court justices themselves, who wrote the opinion in Lawrence successfully overturning the state laws, said that the Lawrence case "does not involve" the issue of same-sex marriage.

Scalia essentially called that disingenuous in his dissent.

Today’s opinion dismantles the structure of constitutional law that has permitted a distinction to be made between heterosexual and homosexual unions, insofar as formal recognition in marriage is concerned. If moral disapprobation of homosexual conduct is "no legitimate state interest" for purposes of proscribing that conduct, and if, as the Court coos (casting aside all pretense of neutrality), "[w]hen sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring," what justification could there possibly be for denying the benefits of marriage to homosexual couples exercising "[t]he liberty protected by the Constitution"? Surely not the encouragement of procreation, since the sterile and the elderly are allowed to marry. This case "does not involve" the issue of homosexual marriage only if one entertains the belief that principle and logic have nothing to do with the decisions of this Court.

Same-sex marriage is not the first step on some slippery slope.  It is, for some, the destination; the result of supposedly innocuous rulings that have come previously which laid a foundation that backers, including liberals on the Supreme Court, claimed had nothing to do with same-sex marriage. 

This is how they remake society; by lying to you until such time as they’ve built up enough steam, by whatever means necessary, to force through what they ultimately want.  This destination has been predicted for some time; Scalia’s prediction came in 1986.  He (nor I) could believe that the liberals on the bench were that stupid as to not know what they were doing.  It was, and is today, not so much about the law as it is about the politics for them. 

Also, Scalia’s prediction was not "fear mongering"; it was an honest conclusion drawn based on an understanding of the law and its ramifications.  Neither it is "fear mongering" to suggest that this destination is itself not final, but simply a stopping point on the way to who knows where else.  One simply has to look at history, even just recent history, to know that.  After same-sex marriage, the Netherlands began giving civil unions to unions of 3 or more in 2005.  And in 2004:

Tucker Carlson, host of CNN’s "Crossfire", debated with Human Rights Campaign President Cheryl Jacques on the polygamy issue. Carlson asked her why shouldn’t polygamists be able to marry and all she could say was, "I don’t approve of that."

Jacque was pushing for same-sex marriage, but figured it would all just stop in its tracks right there, because she didn’t approve of it.  I’ve got news for you:  jokes about "boogetymen", trying to ignore this history and the considered opinions of law scholars much smarter than they or I, display an ignorance and dismissiveness that belie a facade of thoughtful consideration.

In 1986, few people who argued against sodomy laws thought that it was any more than a privacy matter.  They were naive and/or misguided.  Those who think today that the debate over what is marriage will be done once we have same-sex marriage are equally naive and misguided.  But they will have less of a reason to claim, down the line, that they couldn’t have had an idea what would come of it.  Willful blindness will be the only explanation.

Scalia was right.  Remember that.

Wow.  Don Sensing offers up a philosophical discussion, but a very readable one, about what makes marriage, marriage.  It really is a very good read.  His conclusion is, in essence, that the same-sex-marriage proponents are trying to take the results of marriage and turn them into the definition of it.  But in reality, marriage is what marriage has always been; a male-female relationship.

But if you think I’ve spoiled the ending, don’t worry.  It’s getting there that is very instructive.

Read. The. Whole. Thing.

Good morning.

1. Canine stuff and more here. Our new puppie, Sophie, is 3 months old today.
2. But puppy-cide? 
3. It seems to me this is a good argument against government involvement, as when rationing occurs, it seems “ability to pay” is one of the fairest ways of deciding who gets what instead of a lottery mixed with “who has political connections” with the party in power.
4. Crunch.
5. Zoooooom.
6. Stupid tourist tricks.
7. Up in the air.
8. What we celebrate today.
9. A revolt on ICE.
10. Keep using the word “unexpectedly” and it shouldn’t be unexpected if there is no confidence in government economic meddling.

Glenn Reynolds notes, there’s that word again.

Jobless Claims in U.S. Unexpectedly Climb to Three-Month High

More Americans than projected filed applications for unemployment insurance last week, indicating firings remain elevated as the recovery moderated.

Initial jobless claims climbed by 19,000 to 479,000 in the week ended July 31, the most since April and exceeding the highest estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. The number of people receiving unemployment benefits dropped, while those getting extended payments rose.

And there’s talk of more and more bailouts, because hey, they’ve worked so well so far, eh?  Eighteen months and billions upon billions of dollars later, this is the Obama economy.  Inheriting a mess is one thing; making it worse is your own doing.

It has been said that if you wish to remake a culture, you have to disassociate it from it roots, its foundation.

Having said that, here is John Adams, 2nd President of the United States and signer of the Declaration of Independence, from 1798:

We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion . . . Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

And from today’s paper.

Reporting from San Francisco and Los Angeles —

A federal judge declared California’s ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional Wednesday, saying that no legitimate state interest justified treating gay and lesbian couples differently from others and that "moral disapproval" was not enough to save the voter-passed Proposition 8.

[…]

"The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples," Walker wrote.

What are the reasons we have laws against marrying children?  Are they not, really, almost entirely moral arguments?  Dismissing those types of arguments, and we dismiss our heritage.  Sweep that out of the way, and those in power get to remake society.

Update:  La Shawn Barber ends her post on the subject with this:

Considering that we’re all sinners, even us forgiven ones (including me), I offer you Romans 1: 18-21:

“Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

“For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.”

It’s this morality and religion that, in my opinion, has been the prime reason our country, and Western civilization in general, has led the world in so many areas.  Chuck Colson has some good thoughts that (as well as some on yesterday’s ruling).

Obligatory disclaimer:  Yes, yes, Western civilization has not been as pure as the driven snow.  However, as poorly as we may have done and as many mistakes as we made over the centuries, the overall driving force has indeed been one that at least revered the Bible if not fully following it to the letter.  (Which you could say about pretty much everyone.)  As opposed to those following other religions and philosophies, Western civilization has been blessed with so much, more so than other cultures, and I think we have the religion we’ve at least given tacit approval to to thank for it.  The farther we stray from that, the fewer those blessings will be.

Good morning.

1. A man remembered.
2. Corporate leadership and party demographics.
3. Don’t talk to the man … and consequences therein.
4. Superman rescues family home … really.
5. Hack your A/C.
6. Weeeee.
7. Of Mr Kerry and his boat kerfuffle.
8. Is outrage.
9. A conversation continues.
10. Hmm, do you believe it? 
11. A picture/graph of interest.
12. Stupid Congress-critter tricks.
13. So does an asterisk come with that?
14. Two lawyers and that recent court/marriage thing, here and here.

Tossing around charges of racism seems to be in vogue, as of late. Indeed, with some playing not only the race card, but just about the entire race deck of cards, is it incongruous that there are Black members of the Tea Party?

Uncle Toms? Oreos? Or, maybe, just concerned U.S. citizens?

I wonder, are these individuals predisposed to intolerance?

What will cost billions of dollars, make demands on you never made before, and look like this?

It’s your new health care system!  (Click for a PDF suitable for zooming in on.)  Don Sensing notes that this is just a third of the whole picture.

Feeling better yet?

Read more about this behemoth at his blog.

Good morning.

1. Friday night lights, discussed. 
2. A report by HHS as smokescreen?
3. Tired? 
4. Mud juice?
5. So are you W.E.I.R.D (and not just weird)?
6. Hacking apples.
7. Huh? What the heck does he mean by “we know more about it.” 
8. So, why are coal burning cars so popular?
9. Yikes (more here).
10. Cute packaging.
11. A life lived and choices made.
12. A quote from a time when sexual predilections where not bound with ontology.
13. In the media is completely out of touch department, royal wedding indeed.

Some ink (some virtual) has been spilled on novelist Ms Rice announcing that she has “left the Church” but not left Christ. Recently I have been reading and studying the five theological orations by St. Gregory the Theologian (also known as St. Gregory of Nazianzus where he was Bishop for a time). These orations (or homilies) in an important sense define what it means to be an orthodox Christian today. In the time just prior to the convening of the 2nd Ecumenical council in Constantinople, the majority of those in the area and expected in attendance were (roughly speaking) Arian in sympathy. St. Gregory just before this council gave in short succession, just outside the city, a series of 5 orations and the matter was settled in the cause of orthodoxy. And for the following 800 or so years, these lectures were the primary pedagogical examples of the art of rhetoric for those studying the art of the rhetor in the Eastern Roman world. An American analogy might be Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, after which the case for the Civil war was arguably settled and subsequently this has been a speech studied by debators and rhetors as a jewel of the art.

What does this have to do with Ms Rice and her disillusionment with the earthly Church? Her situation came to mind when I read this (from the 1st homily of this set, which is Oration #27 in oeuvre of St. Gregory). He wrote (spoke):

Such is the situation: this infection [to much bitter disputation and argument over theological detail] is unchecked and intolerable; “the great mystery” of our faith is in danger becoming a mere social accomplishment. [emphasis mine]

Later in that homily he writes (speaking again against bitter theological quarrels):

But first we must consider: what is this disorder of the tongue that leads us to compete in garrulity? what is this alarming disease, this appetite that can never be sated? Why do we keep our hands bound and out tongues armed?

Do we commend hospitality? Do we admire brotherly love, wifely affection, virginity, feeding the poor, singing psalms, night-long vigils, penitence? Do we mortify the body with fasting? Do we through prayer, take up our abode with God? Do we subordinate the inferior element in us to the better — I mean, the dust to the spirit, as we should if we have returned the right verdict on the alloy of the two which is our nature? Do we make life a meditation of death? Do we establish our mastery over our passions, mindful of the nobility of our second birth? … 

So, what might this have to do with Ms Rice? Well, it might be said that her disappointment with the Church was that it wasn’t good enough as a social accomplishment. It might be offered, in the Church’s defense, that to complain of the failings of others and their tarnished social accomplishments is something like fretting about the log in my brother’s eye. Recall 1st Timothy 1:15. 

The orations can be found in this small paperback: On God and Christ: The Five Theological Orations and Two Letters to Cledonius