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--- Thursday, September 29, 2005
Newsflash: Guns Don't Kill People, Religions Do
A new study released by the Journal of Religion and Society suggests that America's widespread belief in God not only fails to create a better society, but might actually contribute to its decline.
Religious belief can cause damage to a society, contributing towards high murder rates, abortion, sexual promiscuity and suicide, according to research published today.
According to the study, belief in and worship of God are not only unnecessary for a healthy society but may actually contribute to social problems.
The study counters the view of believers that religion is necessary to provide the moral and ethical foundations of a healthy society.
It compares the social peformance of relatively secular countries, such as Britain, with the US, where the majority believes in a creator rather than the theory of evolution. Many conservative evangelicals in the US consider Darwinism to be a social evil, believing that it inspires atheism and amorality....
The paper, published in the Journal of Religion and Society, a US academic journal, reports: "Many Americans agree that their churchgoing nation is an exceptional, God-blessed, shining city on the hill that stands as an impressive example for an increasingly sceptical world.
"In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies.
"The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so." Was this study meant to be a serious academic endeavor? While I'm hardly going to question the moral decadence that is present, perhaps epidemic, in America, it seems a bit of a stretch to infer that such failure comes because the nation is too devout in its faith. And it is more than a little farfetched to place countries like France as bastions of purity. Whatever correlation exists between a society's religion and its immorality -- which I suspect changes greatly depending on methodology -- the implication is that all religions are equal, and equally bad. Thus an Islamic tyrrany becomes the same as a nation rooted in the Judeo-Christian ethic.
However, if there is any accuracy in this analysis, it is not so much an indictment on faith itself as it is evidence that American churches have ceased to take a stand for absolute moral truth ordained by God, that a postmodern worldview has so infected Christianity as to render it useless in defying the moral decay of culture. I hope things aren't that bad, but clearly followers of Christ must be uncompromising in the pursuit of righteousness
If No One Teaches a Controversy, Does That Mean It Doesn't Exist?
One of the pleas of those advocating to question the merits of evolution in the science classroom is that schools should "teach the controversy" -- arguing that while teachers do not necessarily need to support a view of origins beyond evolution, students at least deserve to know that the debate isn't over. In Inside Higher Ed, the English professor who coined the "teach the controversy" phrase doesn't appreciate that the science conversation co-opted his suggestion, but he suggests that the idea should be followed, if only to prove once and for all the reality of evolution.
[T]he anti-evolution assaults of the Intelligent Designers and the creationist Right could be viewed less as a threat than an opportunity. This moral is suggested by a recent news story in The New York Times that reports that museum staffs that are being challenged by religious patrons to explain why they should believe in evolution "are brushing up on their Darwin and thinking on their feet" (September 20, 2005). One museum has developed training sessions for staff members "on ways to deal with visitors who reject settled precepts of science on religious grounds."...
If the goal of education is to get students to think, then just telling students their doubts about Darwin are wrong is not going to be effective. And teachers being forced to engage their religious critics and explain why they believe in evolution might be a healthy thing for those teachers just as it seems to be for museum workers. In fact, I would like to ask Coyne, Dennett, Orr, and others who have written so cogently in defense of evolution if they don't feel just a tiny bit grateful to the IDers for pushing them to think harder about -- and explain to a wider audience -- how they know what they know about evolution.
How might such a debate be taught? Ideally in a way that would not become fixated on the clash of faith and science, which might quickly produce an unedifying stalemate, but would open out into broader matters such as the history of conflicts between science and religion and the question of how we determine when something qualifies as "science." At the broadest level, the discussion could address whether the ID-evolution debate is a smoke screen for the larger political and cultural conflict between Red and Blue states. Representing such a many-sided debate would demand the collaboration of the natural sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities, a collaboration that could make a now disconnected curriculum more coherent. Such a collaboration would also answer the scientists' objection that there just isn't time to debate these issues, given everything else they have to cover. Then, too, explaining how we know what we know against skeptical questioning is not an add-on, but an intrinsic part of teaching any subject. One of the most deceiving myths propagated in this debate is that the broad tenets of evolutionary theory are so widely accepted as to be beyond criticism -- declaring, in essence, that there is no "controversy" as to the claims of Darwinism.
Yet such unanimity is not present among scientists, and certainly doesn't exist among the general public. This is because the components of evolutionary biology that are truly observable do not conflict with the belief in a divine Creator; the theories inferred from those observances are rooted largely in worldviews that either accept or denie the presence of a designer. The "controversy" comes in determining whether the discussion of supernatural intervention can be reasonably presented within a "science" classroom.
Yet if evolutionary theory were truly as beyond doubt as many of its proponents proclaim, why shouldn't it be compelled to address, head-on, the contradictory premise of a being who could generate life without need of evolution? (As opposed to Darwinism's operating assertion that nature functions with no need of God.)
Contrary to much of the modern debate, intelligent design does not derive some from fringe idea of scattered holdouts to a primitive adherence to theism. Most of the country claims to believe that God created the universe (a plurality saying that He did it sans evolution). Thus the suggestion that life generated itself does indeed present a controversy, but not between the more abstract concepts of science and faith.
Rather, both are an intregal and inseparable part of the broader search for truth -- spiritual and physical. Strangely enough, evolutionary theory, being sufficiently ensconced in the public conscience, is the side claiming to have the answers to all of life's questions. Design theory, on the other hand, in its more formal establishment, does not presume to know whether God exists or whom He is. But the suggestion that reality may contain more than just what we can see and touch seems like a possibility true science would not be bold enough to reject.
--- Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Trial and Error
The Washington Times editorializes that while evolution is worthy of scientific criticism within the classroom, intelligent design does not yet present a viable alternative theory.
Clearly, the Dover Area School District, by forcing the issue with its requirement that teachers read a four-paragraph "statement" identifying intelligent design as an alternative theory to Darwinian evolution, has done neither science nor students any favors. Intelligent design is a proposition in a state of infancy, and has not earned a place in public school curriculums. A wide range of alternative propositions are never taught precisely because there is no structure to challenge prevailing opinion. That doesn't mean the alternatives are wrong; but students should learn first the best explanation, given what is known. Despite its many flaws, Darwinian evolution remains the standard....
A ruling against the school board now, or by the Supreme Court later on, would effectively cast all intelligent design theorists as enemies of science -- the worst possible outcome. "What we recommend," the institute says, "is that teachers and students study more about Darwinian evolution, not only the evidence that supports the theory, but also scientific criticisms of the theory." Any open mind would find this entirely reasonable.
Criticizing Charles Darwin does not make one a creationist, despite the allegations of many Darwinists, whose arguments often are reduced to petty ad hominem attacks. But instead of allowing for straight criticism, the Dover school district has promoted a single, countervailing proposition, opening it up to a premature dismissal by a federal judge. This is not how science works. The concerns presented here are certainly reasonable enough, though I'm not quite sure how fair it is to suggest that intelligent design is an entirely new theory. For most of American history -- and most of world history, for that matter -- the view that a divine being had created the cosmos was by far the dominant understanding of the universe's origins. Evolutionary theory, on the other hand, moved on the scene and with relative quickness became the "standard" -- without really stopping to disprove long held beliefs in the process.
This doesn't necessarily mean that schools today ought to require their teachers to defend the concept of design, though by no means in order to protect science from faith, as it were. Insofar as evolution is prolific in today's academic and pop culture, biology students should be taught at least the basic tenets of the theory. However, evolution must also be allowed to withstand scrutiny as well. This causes somewhat of a dilemma, of course, since it is no mystery that the unanswered questions of naturalism (of which there many) beg for a supernatural explanation -- or at least the possibility of one.
Hurricane Relief in Arkansas
I had thought this was the product of satire during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and certain organizations' "aiding" survivors with complimentary condoms and birth control. Truth is stranger than fiction, however, and a clinic in Little Rock is picking up where other groups left off by offering free abortions to those who escaped the storm's wrath.
A doctor has offered to perform free abortions on hurricane evacuees, saying it may be too dangerous for them to wait until they return home.
Despite protests from abortion opponents, Little Rock Family Planning clinic director Dr. Jerry Edwards said he has already performed six free abortions. The clinic usually charges between $525 and $600 for a first-trimester abortion.
"If we didn't provide it now, they would get it later -- a late-term abortion that would give greater risk to the mother's health," Edwards told KTHV-TV in Little Rock. In addition to the usual moral questions, it's a dangerous endeavor to make the escape hatch of ending a pregnancy an even easier option to take for those who are already emotionally taxed and who might be more willing to forfeit their unborn children in the midst of the devastation and loss they have just experienced. This is by no means a victory for "choice." These women need to hear a message of hope, not despair.
--- Tuesday, September 27, 2005
In Court Again - Another Chance Encounter
The tenets of science and science education are once again standing before the law, this time in Pennsylvania, where a school board is being sued for initiating a requirement that science teachers disclaim evolution as less than unquestionable fact.
New barrages sounded in the evolution war yesterday as lawyers for a group of parents challenged the teaching of ''intelligent design," referring to it as nothing more than an old argument wrapped in fancy new cloth.
''This clever tactical repackaging of creationism does not merit consideration," Witold Walczak, legal director of the Pennsylvania American Civil Liberties Union and a lawyer for the parents, told US District Judge John E. Jones in opening arguments. ''Intelligent design admits that it is not science unless science is redefined to include the supernatural."
This is, he added, ''a 21st century version of creationism."
Eleven parents from Dover, in central Pennsylvania, are seeking to block their school board from requiring that high school biology teachers read a four-paragraph statement to students that casts doubt on Darwin's theory of evolution. This mandatory statement notes that intelligent design offers an alternative theory for the origin and evolution of life -- namely, that life in all of its complexity could not have arisen without the help of an intelligent hand.
The foremost advocates of intelligent design are silent on whether that intelligent hand belongs to God or some other intelligent force, even including a space alien. The school board, represented by the Thomas More Law Center, a conservative, religiously grounded nonprofit firm, took the position that the case was about freedom of speech. Though I don't know how effective the school board's action would be, there seems to be no real justification for squeezing criticism of evolution out of the science classroom -- even if, God (or Darwin) forbid, that means acknowledging the possibility that nature may be guided by forces beyond itself. To suggest that such discussion results in a merger of church and state is beyond absurd. Religious liberty is not at stake here, though much else is.
And ultimately, the debate won't reach its conclusion within the forum of a courtroom -- and probably not in the classroom. Much broader issues exist that drive the discussion, which has at its root the fundamental ways that we, as a culture and as individuals, view the world.
Taking the Abstinence out of Abstinence
Planned Parenthood is releasing a new textbook that apparently seeks to reclaim and reform a subject that it has seemed more prone to marginalize and ridicule.
No matter what your opinion of sexual abstinence as a birth control method, you probably agree that it is an emotional flashpoint in our modern culture wars.
In the world of the eight-second sound bite, abstinence has become the simplistic "just say no" answer to the complex problem of teen pregnancy. The Bush administration happily jumped on that bandwagon. Despite the lack of conclusive evidence that abstinence-only sex education programs work, since 1996 nearly $1 billion in federal and state matching funds has been sunk into them. Comprehensive sex education, the kind that Planned Parenthood teaches, which includes an abstinence component, has been cast as "anti-abstinence," and the lines for classroom battles have been drawn....
Making Sense of Abstinence is based in the realities of young people's everyday lives. Teen sexuality is complex, and simplistic slogans like "quit your urgin', be a virgin" insult teens' intelligence....This manual is not a curriculum (which is taught from start to finish). Rather it is a menu of activities with 16 lessons, including defining abstinence, the process of conscious decision making, helping teens talk about abstinence with their parents and trusted adults, navigating cultural mixed messages about sex, and harmful sexual stereotypes.
The text acknowledges that abstinence often fails (people who intend to be abstinent often have sexual intercourse) and therefore helps participants think about what it takes to make abstinence work. It also prepares them for a healthy transition away from abstinence if that decision is made. Whatever the intentions and audience of this new "manual," the vocabulary used to depict the concept of abstinence belies the fact that true purity, body and soul, really isn't the objective. It is a non sequitur, for example, to suggest that "abstinence...fails." If it fails, then, by definition, it's not abstinence!
Neither is chastity a "birth control method," it's a lifestyle that transcends the simple decision to reserving sex for marriage. If preventing pregnancy were the only -- or even the primary -- purpose of abstinence, that is hardly enough motivation to resist in moment of passion. And Planned Parenthood is more than eager to point out that other options, moral or immoral, exist to fill the role of birth control.
Admittedly, abstinence programs must be responsible enough to treat their audience as young adults and address the subject accurately and articulately. But what could be more insulting to a teenager's intelligence than to presume that they cannot produce the self-restraint and moral wisdom needed to save physical intimacy for the realm of marriage?
--- Friday, September 23, 2005
Chasing Liberty
National Review's Rich Lowry adds his own commentary on the book I mentioned earlier this week bemoaning the counterproductive results of so-called sexual freedom.
It wasn't so long ago that pornography was disrespectable: "Think of Vanessa Williams, crowned the first black Miss America in 1983, and how quickly she was dethroned after her nude photos surfaced in Penthouse." In contrast, Paris Hilton's sex video rocketed her to stardom. Hookers and porn stars are mainstream figures.
This isn't quite the liberation feminism promised. "Raunch culture is not essentially progressive," Levy writes, "it is essentially commercial. By going to strip clubs and flashing on spring break and ogling our Olympians in Playboy, it's not as though we are embracing something liberal -- this isn't Free Love. Raunch culture isn't about opening our minds to the possibilities and mysteries of sexuality. It's about endlessly reiterating one particular -- and particularly commercial -- shorthand for sexiness."
No lustful man would have looked at Gloria Steinem in the 1970s and thought, "She is going to help fulfill my most absurd voyeuristic fantasies." But the currents unleashed by feminism, especially the drive to have women behave like men, have done just that. The mother of the hyper-sexualized pop star Christina Aguilera has said of her daughter, "She's a wonderful role model, trying to change society so that a woman can do whatever men do." Since women don't have the same interest in seeing members of the opposite sex expose themselves and dress in skimpy bunny costumes as men do, acting like men effectively means objectifying women, too, playing along with the sweaty teenage fantasies. Levy describes going to a gathering of a group called CAKE, devoted to female sexuality" and experiencing "feminism in action." It devolves into women performing Sapphic sex acts for the men in the crowd.
All of this isn't healthy for anyone, guys or gals. But men -- at least men without daughters -- will have very little interest in changing it, and as long as the feminist Left associates sexual restraint with outdated prudery, there won't be pressure for change from that quarter, either. So Levy cries in the wilderness, while all around her lascivious men ogle the movable bimbonic feast of American culture and lift their voices to the heavens: "Thank you, God." It is surely an irony of ironies that so much of the "freedom" that women have gained in the past few decades has come at the expense of the very femininity that has made them the precious treasures for which men have, traditionally and rightly, been willing to fight and, when necessary, die. Feminism is quick to scorn the princess-in-the-tower image of women, the damsels in distress awaiting salvation from their steed-riding knight, yet is the culture really better off to see the end of that stereotype?
It would be a fairy tale, of course, to believe that men have ever truly fulfilled their role as protector with the compassion, mercy, and strength that God commands and Christ exemplified. But demanding such a high standard at least provides the expectation that these flawed knights would make an attempt to properly cherish their fair maidens. When women lower the bar, however -- whether in the belief that no honorable men are left or in the pursuit of supposed "equality" -- they remove the natural motivators for men to remain faithful and devoted.
No wonder, then, that divorce and out-of-wedlock pregnancies, not to mention pornography and other forms of adultery, become more and more common as women have sought to acquire such "freedom." Not that men can be denied an even greater accountability (sorry, ladies, no equality here either). For however much the "modern" woman may be more willing to offer physical intimacy sans a wedding ring, men are not justified in gleefully accepting. Perhaps if chivalry were revived as a cultural standard, rather than an anomaly, women could find true freedom in embracing all that makes them women.
California's Wedding Plans
In a column in The Weekly Standard, Hugh Hewitt implies that media coverage over the California legislature's recent attempt to legalize same-sex marriage may have stalled because public opinion isn't quite tolerant enough yet.
National news media accounts of the votes and the vetoes quoted the backers of the proposal as well as the governor's spokespeople, and advocates and opponents on both sides of the debate.
But in no story that I can find did a reporter think to ask a national Democratic leader for their opinion on the vote by their California colleagues. Google News cannot even find San Francisco Democrat and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi's name in the same story as same-sex marriage. Neither can the San Francisco Chronicle over the past 30 days.
Hillary Clinton and Chuck Schumer made high-profile appearances on national television during the period of the California debate. Of course the big issues they discussed were Katrina relief and the Roberts nomination, but their omission of the California same-sex marriage issue is notable for a couple of reasons....
There isn't an honest journalist in the country who would deny that those are interesting questions which would generate news no matter how Senator Clinton or Senator Reid or Schumer answered. That they haven't been asked--by any reporter in any venue of any big-name Democrat--speaks volume about the mainstream media's bias and its adjunct status to the Democratic party.
The Democratic party's real voice on the issue of same-sex marriage was heard in California, but the media has judged it too soon to launch that debate on the national stage. As Gray Davis once allowed on television, "the people aren't ready for that yet." Exactly. An interesting analysis, though I'm not sure I would give reporters and editors -- even those ardently in favor of redefining marriage -- credit for being so shrewd and patient about keeping the debate low key until the public becomes more enlightened and inclusive. On the other hand, there also seemed to be a strangely minimal amount of rejoicing by same-sex marriage activists when the legislature passed this bill, and an equally unnoticeable uproar when Schwarzenegger declared his intent to veto it. Whether this is all part of a subversive strategy to slowly pick apart traditional marriage, I can't say. Clearly the nation conscience isn't quite ready to accept such a moral realignment. But considering the fairly rapid descent that changed marriage in Massachusetts as well as California being one signature away from radically altering that state's cultural landscape, one wonders how long we can hold out.
The window of opportunity to protect the concept of marriage as we've always known it, however, won't stay open forever.
--- Wednesday, September 21, 2005
The Truth - Not Feminism - Shall Set Them Free
A new book reviewed this week by many of the major US newspapers (an excerpt appeared in the NY Times) suggests that the sexual liberation trumpeted by the feminist movement may not have been so freeing after all. In an interesting review in the Wall Street Journal, Wendy Shalit argues that the fundamental principles of feminism lead to a life that fails to truly fulfill most women.
Why did feminism sell its soul to the sexual-liberation movement in the first place? After all, the original feminists were fighting to be taken seriously. Hugh Hefner, by contrast, said that his ideal girl "resembles a bunny . . . vivacious, jumping--sexy." There seems to be a contradiction here.
Ms. Levy's answer is that, after a brief and failed fight against pornography, feminism joined forces with Hef & Co. to fight for abortion rights. This is a plausible explanation, as far as it goes. Abortion has indeed assumed a primary importance in both feminist "rights" thinking and in the whole culture of soft-core libertinism: Mr. Hefner is a big fan of abortion, for obvious reasons.
But something else may be going on. Feminism grounded itself, in its early days, in the idea that there were no differences between the sexes. A girl wanting to keep her virginity was bad, for sexual reticence amounted to asserting a separate standard, a Victorian one at that. To Hef, modesty was a "hang-up," and to the feminists it was a "patriarchal construct." Ms. Levy believes that feminism was on the right track but then veered off-course: "What has moved into feminism's place . . . is an almost opposite style, attitude, and set of principles."
But maybe feminism's foundations were weak from the start. Everyone in Ms. Levy's book--whether it's middle-class girls who feel anxiety about appearing "hot" or grown women who confess to Ms. Levy that "accumulating sex for its own sake . . . is not that sexual"--shows that a woman's experience of sex and love is very different from that of an adolescent boy or a man. Indeed, the more a woman imitates a man, the clearer these differences become. Indeed, the heart of a woman seems to be the highest price -- and biggest casualty -- in the mainstreaming of the idea that women and men are thoroughly equal. This is tragic, particularly within a culture that was already failing to adequately teach men how to respect and cherish their wives and mothers and sisters. The attempt to convince women that abandoning prudence and self-restraint in physical intimacy would somehow set them on a level playing field with men is nothing short of deceitful, both in its disregard for offering women what they truly desire (which probably isn't sex) and in its justification for men unwilling to provide sacrifice, commitment, and devotion.
Don't Hedge on the Pledge
A column in the Denver Post argues that the pledging allegiance to a nation under God cannot conceivably represent an affront to the First Amendment.
For me, at least, it's common sense that the words "under God" in no way establish a religion. Our money, after all, says, "In God We Trust." Every president in my lifetime has signed off with "Thank you, and God bless."
Last I looked, no one was forcing me to pray or attend a church or synagogue.
Thank God. Or rather, "thank my chosen belief system."
Atheists, agnostics, civil libertarians, constitutional purists and the rest of us should be concerned with the other part of the First Amendment. Particularly, the phrase that reads "or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
Right now, reciting the Pledge is voluntary. If it's found to be unconstitutional, the Pledge may be outlawed in schools.
Which one of those options truly impedes free speech?
The question isn't whether we're under God or not. I'll find out soon enough. It's whether the establishment clause is violated or whether a minority wants to expunge the word "God" simply because it makes the few (parents) uncomfortable. The LA Times, on the other hand, seems to suggest that while the Supreme Court won't remove God from the Pledge, it probably should.
Unlike lawmakers who injected God in 1954 as a McCarthyite sneer at godless communism, many people now recognize that atheists, agnostics, animists and Buddhists -- none of whom believe in an all-encompassing God -- can be wonderful citizens. For all the renewed interest in religion in this country, it's unlikely today's Congress would add "under God."...
Even judges who back the divine wording sometimes provide cogent arguments for why it should be omitted. Last month, a Virginia appeals court upheld a state law requiring the daily recitation of the pledge in public schools. "Undoubtedly, the pledge contains a religious phrase, and it is demeaning to persons of any faith to assert that the words 'under God' contain no religious significance," Judge Karen Williams wrote. However, she decided that the pledge is a patriotic activity, not a religious one.
Religion ought to be a private matter and should play no role in a daily, government-sanctioned ritual. Children aren't required to say the words, but what Williams rightly calls a "religious phrase" is chanted each day in their presence, and they and their parents have no choice. It's unlikely, though, that anyone has ever been converted to a monotheistic religion simply from listening to repetitions of the phrase....
The colonists, though, had the right idea for carrying forward government in a truly patriotic way -- "for all," as the pledge ends. The pledge doesn't need deification. Its best and highest use is to bind us together as common citizens, regardless of faith, with a common commitment to this nation. The contrast between these two opinions largely mirrors the current cultural divide on where God fits in modern society. It is absurd to suggest that the American leadership from its founding until recent decades would hold the expectation or would have ever mandated that "religion" be kept completely distinct from public life. Whatever "separation" was meant to exist between church and state, it cannot be so sharp -- and seemingly impenetrable -- as to necessitate purging acknowledgement of God from the broader spectrum of society.
A nation's legal system and moral traditions must be built upon the foundation of its understanding of the purpose and responsibility of humanity, which is inseparable from its acceptance or rejection of the divine. To proclaim that America has, up till now anyway, grounded itself under the reality of nature's God does not demean those who choose not to identify themselves with Him.
If the culture at large determines to look elsewhere for its moral guidance, then perhaps we won't be able to defend the traditional references to God and His providence. But this won't be so much removing "religion" from the forefront of society as it will be replacing it with a new all-encompassing worldview, likely some form of secular humanism.
But is the culture really in danger of abandoning God's firm and unshakable standard? Your selected belief system forbid.
Sounds Like Progress
Apparently softening its long-held stance of wanting to drive Israel into the Mediterranean, Hamas now says that it might be willing to find a peaceful coexistence.
Hamas could one day amend a charter calling for the destruction of Israel and hold negotiations with the Jewish state, a political leader of the Islamic militant group in the West Bank said.
"The charter is not the Koran," Mohammed Ghazal told Reuters in an interview in Nablus on Tuesday.
"Historically, we believe all Palestine belongs to Palestinians, but we're talking now about reality, about political solutions ... The realities are different." File that in the believe-it-when-we-see-it bin, but there is a catch, of course.
Ghazal said it was still early to talk about recognizing Israel "while Israel doesn't recognize me as the victim."
He said any Hamas talks with Israel would still depend on its withdrawal from the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem to allow an independent state as well as a "right of return" for Palestinian refugees who fled in 1948 and their descendants.
He acknowledged a "strong belief" that those conditions were never likely to be met. With this usual set of untenable demands -- which will no doubt be used to continue to justify terror attacks, regardless of how many settlements Israel abandons -- it's difficult to find a news story here.
--- Monday, September 19, 2005
I Pledge a Grievance
The NY Times offers an editorial on the most recent Pledge ruling that is infuriating at times, but at least intellectually honest in acknowledging the absurdity of finding the tradition unconstitutional.
Last week, a federal judge again rejected Mr. Newdow's standing but ruled in favor of the two families. Judge Lawrence Karlton said he had no choice, given the appeals court ruling, but acknowledged that the decision would "satisfy no one involved." He's right - except for demagogues on both sides.
The phrase "under God" was inserted into the pledge in 1954 in an absurd attempt to link patriotism with religious piety at the height of anti-Communist mania. It should never have happened.
But in the half-century since, the phrase has become part of the backdrop of life. It hardly amounts to a prayer and is no more a constitutional violation than the singing of "God Bless America" at the Army-Navy football game. No child is required to say "under God" when reciting the pledge - or even to recite it at all. The court cases trivialize the critical constitutional issue of separation of church and state, and undermine important battles to be fought over prayer in school and the use of public money to support religious activities. It is certainly true that Newdow's incorrigible legal potshots serve no substantial purpose in furthering a legitimate debate on society's view of God. No serious legal mind could conclude that the Pledge's reference to a nation's God violates the spirit or letter of the First Amendment -- neither the Pledge, nor acknowledgement of the divine in other federal entities, in any way establishes a religion or constricts the worship of contrary belief systems.
However, Supreme Court decisions already on the books in last few decades regarding government's relationship to faith have already chipped away, in perhaps more subtle but no more constitutional ways, the prominence of spiritual things within the public conversation. This slide has, arguably, opened the door to seemingly preposterous notions like discovering an establishment of religion within two words of the Pledge of Allegiance. Granted, the culture at large has aided the process, often denying the reverence for or existence of the Almighty on one end, and declaring all worldviews to be equal on the other.
So while it's easy to view the Pledge fiasco as the fringe activism of a few hyper-liberals in California, do we have a future in which proclaiming a nation "under God" is considered just as silly?
--- Thursday, September 15, 2005
Left at the Altar in Mass.
How things can change in a year.
It looks as though marriage in Massachusetts won't be returning to its traditional definition any time soon, now that the legislature has turned down the chance to send an amendment to the citizenry that could have overturned the Supreme Judicial Court's decision to allow homosexuals to "marry" in the Bay State.
The Massachusetts Legislature overwhelmingly defeated a proposed constitutional amendment yesterday to ban same-sex marriage and establish civil unions, reflecting a dramatic change of heart by dozens of moderate lawmakers and a new strategy by staunch opponents of legalized gay marriage.
The measure failed by a vote of 39 in favor to 157 against, after less than two hours of debate, ending efforts to bring the amendment to the 2006 ballot. The Legislature had voted 105 to 92 to give preliminary approval to the same amendment in March 2004, weeks before the Supreme Judicial Court's landmark ruling legalizing same-sex marriage took effect.
The lopsided defeat for the amendment was largely due to the fact that 55 lawmakers -- more than 25 percent of the Legislature -- who had supported the amendment last year switched and voted no yesterday. Seventeen of the Legislature's 18 freshmen lawmakers also voted against the amendment....
Many of the Legislature's most ardent opponents of gay marriage also abandoned the compromise measure, preferring another proposed amendment that seeks an outright ban on same-sex marriage. If backers obtain roughly 66,000 signatures in the fall, that measure will require just 50 backers in two successive sessions of the Legislature to appear on the 2008 ballot.
Yesterday's vote was a marked contrast to the emotional meetings of the Constitutional Convention in 2004 that brought thousands of chanting, placard-waving activists from both sides to the State House. By contrast, only a few hundred spectators came to the State House yesterday, most of them supporters of same-sex marriage. As I recall, the amendment put before the legislature was fairly weak in its defense of marriage, so perhaps there is little substantially lost in its defeat. Yet one wonders how long the window of opportunity will remain open to reverse the direction of Massachusetts -- not to mention the rest of the country -- in growing more accepting and tolerant of a radically different concept of marriage that history has offered.
How Far Isn't Far Enough?
The Washington Post reports a study claiming that a majority of 15- to 19-year-olds have engaged in a certain degree of physical intimacy. If accurate, it's a heartbreaking statistic -- particularly with the finding that girls may be as or more promiscuous than their male counterparts.
Perhaps it is telling, however, that it is not until the last third of the article that the morality of such activity is even remotely questioned, and then only in terms of how "safe" it is, even suggesting that abstinence education may be driving kids to other so-called "risky" behaviors. But it's certainly not defenders of the importance of chastity who are the ones suggesting that myriad other forms of physical contact are just as good as abstinence. How we are deceiving and cheating young people with such a mixed message.
It's not just their bodies that are at stake. Even the "safest" form of sex outside the boundaries of marriage carries an emotional and spiritual dimension that cannot be protected by taking a pill or using a condom.
--- Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Finding Works without Faith
An interesting column in the Guardian concedes that faith in Christ produces moral individuals, but resists crediting a supernatural source for the acquisition of such sacrificial love.
The correlation is so clear that it is impossible to doubt that faith and charity go hand in hand. The close relationship may have something to do with the belief that we are all God's children, or it may be the result of a primitive conviction that, although helping others is no guarantee of salvation, it is prudent to be recorded in a book of gold, like James Leigh Hunt's Abu Ben Adam, as "one who loves his fellow men." Whatever the reason, believers answer the call, and not just the Salvation Army. When I was a local councillor, the Little Sisters of the Poor - right at the other end of the theological spectrum - did the weekly washing for women in back-to-back houses who were too ill to scrub for themselves.
It ought to be possible to live a Christian life without being a Christian or, better still, to take Christianity a la carte. The Bible is so full of contradictions that we can accept or reject its moral advice according to taste. Yet men and women who, like me, cannot accept the mysteries and the miracles do not go out with the Salvation Army at night.
The only possible conclusion is that faith comes with a packet of moral imperatives that, while they do not condition the attitude of all believers, influence enough of them to make them morally superior to atheists like me. The truth may make us free. But it has not made us as admirable as the average captain in the Salvation Army. This seems to be an atheist's take on the perpetual question, Can man be good absent God? His answer seems to be, "I'm not sure."
To the extent that the discrepancy exists, however, one cannot bridge it by taking an "a la carte" approach to the Christian worldview. The reason that belief in God produces morality (or at least it ought to) is that the Holy One calls His people to a radical pursuit of His righteousness. A half-hearted approach can only lead to an infiltration of selfishness and fallenness -- as even every Christian has found on one occasion or another. ("The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.")
Yet without God's moral standard -- expressed in the Scriptures and written in the hearts of men -- we have no basis upon which to ground our understanding of what is good, and we have no motivation to seek it.
Who Is God to Judge?
After the tsunami devastated southeast Asia nearly a year ago, American media moderated a fairly deep, seemingly heartfelt, and ultimately brief conversation about the nature and existence of God in the midst of such tragedy. Now that the destruction has hit our own soil, however, reporters and pundits apparently have the divine all figured out. And the conclusion is that no God of America would dare send a natural catastrophe as a form of judgment against our good nation. As a New York Times article describes:
In the online post-Katrina theorizing, much darker musings have also emerged. Radical Christian Web sites are celebrating the fire-and-brimstone clobbering of a promiscuous city; anti-abortion groups have mounted spam campaigns that count the clinics now under water; and neo-Nazis have raised virtual fists, having somehow spotted Jews behind Katrina's 150 m.p.h. winds....
For some, the hurricane was a Sodomesque comeuppance for a city that brought us Mardi Gras and played backdrop to "Girls Gone Wild."
For others, the storm was simply a divine gay-bashing, with numerous Web sites noting that Katrina landed just two days before the start of Southern Decadence 2005, the annual New Orleans celebration known informally as the Gay Mardi Gras.
"Although the loss of lives is deeply saddening," wrote Michael Marcavage at RepentAmerica.com, the Web site for the organization in Philadelphia that he directs, "this act of God destroyed a wicked city."...
All this has not gone without response from other Christians on the Web.
"Our Creator is not a Murderer" reads an Internet petition petitiononline.com/katrina) created by Nathan Nelson, a contributor at Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, a left-leaning Catholic blog. God would not kill thousands of people, the petition insists, "as punishment for purported sins." A couple of theology professors writing in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram add:
As members of a theological faculty including a number of Protestant denominations, Roman Catholics and a Jewish scholar, we resist and deplore any theological interpretations that view this tragedy as God's judgment, punishment or will.
God's creative love among us is a source for the flourishing of life, not an arbitrary power for death and destruction. For the record, I doubt that Hurricane Katrina was a spectacular display of God's wrath against America -- we must take the utmost care in pronouncing God's explicit judgment upon a person or group of people. Yet it might be even more presumptuous to confidently declare that such a disaster couldn't be the product of our spiritual and moral failure. America is probably one of the most moral nations on the planet, but it certainly cannot claim to be deserving of God's good grace or immune from His anger.
We don't know why this storm so brutally assaulted our brothers and sisters in Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Florida, but we can know that it wasn't outside of God's grasp. In our haste to free ourselves from the possibility that God may be pouring trickles of judgment upon our great nation, let us not make the hurricane bigger than the Almighty One.
God Still Unconstitutional in California
Here we go again. Michael Newdow's fight to ban the Pledge of Allegiance from the public school system has gained some traction again in (where else) a California court, where a judge claimed to be "bound by precedent" to rule that references to God make unconstitional the traditional declaration of solidarity with America.
Besides bludgeoning a dead horse, if nothing else this ruling demonstrates how important it was for the Supreme Court to have provided definitive support for the Pledge -- not to mention the First Amendment -- when Newdow's case was brought before them last year.
--- Sunday, September 11, 2005
An Almighty Fortress
America, not to mention the rest of the world, has seen its share of catastrophe this decade. From the ruthless attack by the nation's enemies, of which we are in humble remembrance today, to the recent assault by natural forces that have ravaged the South, mourning and uncertainly are present even in the most technologically advanced age -- and nation -- in world history. Amidst the pain and destruction, humans are bound to barge into the presence of the Almighty to demand answers. Where is God when terrorists are unleashing their havoc on innocent civilians? Where does He reside when the forces of nature seem to show just as little deference to the preciousness of life?
The answers don't come easy, but God certainly would never be intimidated by them. After all, His very reputation is on the line. In a recent column, however, preacher Tony Campolo suggests that the questions should not be directed as accusations toward God, since He remains as stunned and helpless as the rest of us when the attacks come.
I don't doubt that God can bring good out of tragedies, but the Bible is clear that God is not the author of evil! (James 1:15) Statements like that dishonor God, and are responsible for driving more people away from Christianity than all the arguments that atheistic philosophers could ever muster. When the floods swept into the Gulf Coast, God was the first one who wept.
There are still other religionists who take the opportunity to tell us that God is punishing America for its many sins. Undoubtedly, there are some al-Qaeda fanatics who right now are saying that Katrina is the hand of God, striking America for what we have done to the people of Iraq and to the Palestinians. Furthermore, there are Christians who, in the weeks to come, can be counted on to thunder from their pulpits that Katrina is God's wrath against the immorality of this nation, pointing out that New Orleans is the epitome of our national degradation and debauchery. To all of this I say, "Wrong."
The God revealed in Jesus did not come into the world "to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved." (John 3:17) There can be no arguments over the claim that, for a variety of reasons, our nation deserves punishment. But when the Bible tells us about the grace of God, it is giving us the good news that our loving God does not give us what we truly deserve. Certainly, God would not create suffering for innocent people, who were--for the most part--Katrina's victims.
Perhaps we would do well to listen to the likes of Rabbi Harold Kushner, who contends that God is not really as powerful as we have claimed. Nowhere in the Hebrew Scriptures does it say that God is omnipotent. Kushner points out that omnipotence is a Greek philosophical concept, but it is not in his Bible. Instead, the Hebrew Bible contends that God is mighty. That means that God is a greater force in the universe than all the other forces combined. Yet would it really be an encouragement to the fate of mankind to suggest that the Creator of the universe is somehow bound to the laws and powers of His Creation? There hardly seems to be comfort in the idea that in the face of disaster, God is left to weep and mourn with the rest of us. Who then is left to save humanity from more severe assaults -- by nature or by ourselves?
That's not to suggest that the Lord is emotionless in the midst of our suffering. But while man may find it easier to accept a deity who shares some of our physical and spiritual limits, it would be absurdly illogical for the Almighty One to be so bound. Can He who formed the galaxies out of nothing, and man from the dust of the ground, really be at the mercy of a raging flood or a terrorist's bomb?
In an FuS article, Jason VanDorsten notes that our understanding of God must rest upon the foundation of His absolute soveriegnty.
Scripture clearly teaches both the goodness and the sovereignty within God's character. Yet, in times when great disaster occurs, is it not our tendency as men to put God on trial? We tend to attack one or both of these attributes of God. We cry, "Look at these hurricanes! Look at these people suffering! How could God have let this happen? Is He really in control?"
Or if we do not doubt His sovereign control over a given situation, we are more than prone to put His goodness on trial. Who among us has never asked, in some form, "How could a good God allow this horrible thing to happen?"
It is only the frailty of man that feels either God's goodness or His sovereignty is somehow diminished by disaster. Did God know -- even ordain -- that Hurricane Katrina would wreak such havoc upon our neighbors to the south? Absolutely. Did He know all those people would be left houseless, possessionless, fleeing their homes for their lives? Yes indeed. Did He ordain each death, each loss of a child, a parent, a spouse, a friend? He foreknew every single one. But His sovereignty and His goodness remain intact. Our doubt takes nothing away, just as our belief adds nothing to them. His attributes need no defense, least of all this very writ. Everything that has taken place amidst the recent hurricane -- from loss to life, from hatred to love -- demonstrates the goodness and sovereignty of almighty God. Do we understand it? Hardly. But doubt neither His goodness nor His sovereignty. In the aftermath of immense, incomprehensible tragedy, trust in the will of a sovereign God doesn't always come easy. Even to the most faithful and diligent follower of the Lord, evil holds a mystique that rarely lends to simple or satisfactory explanation. Yet if we cannot look to God as supreme over natural forces, how can we accept His provision for the redemption of man's spiritual depravity? Indeed, the miracles performed by Christ during His time on earth were meant as evidence of His authority over the spiritual realm.
Matthew records, "For whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith he to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house."
While America was certainly humbled by the events of September 11, 2001, and September 2005's hurricane, the God of Heaven remains unfazed and unhindered. And by His infinite power, we know that the evil that plagues our world will not have the final say.
--- Friday, September 09, 2005
Intolerable
FuS reader Aliel sends along a passage that offers a countercultural view on the limits of "tolerance."
I've heard different things said about how the word "tolerance" is used to excuse any morally deviant behavior or language and shame those who would call in judgment. I found a quote by John Stott that seemed to sum up the Christian perspective on how the word "tolerant" should be used:
"It is very easy to tolerate the opinions of others if we have no strong opinions of our own. But we should not acquiesce in this easy-going tolerance. We need to distinguish between the tolerant mind and the tolerant spirit. Tolerant in spirit a Christian should always be, loving, understanding, forgiving and forbearing others, making allowances for them, and giving them the benefit of the doubt, for true love 'bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things' (1 Cor. 13:7). But how can we be tolerant in mind of what God has plainly revealed to be either evil or erroneous?" (From "Christ the Controversialist") Indeed, if what we believe and whom we worship are true, then neither our love nor our commitment to righteousness should be without limit. Though they may seem contradictory at times, particularly with the societal call toward "tolerance," the unflinching pursuit of love and truth must abide together. Sacrificing one necessarily leads to the destruction of the other -- for love without moral truth leads to anarchy and rampant immorality, and truth without love leads to tyrrany and coldness. Christians are often stereotypically accused of the latter imbalance, though the former is equally present -- and equally dangerous. While the "love" typified by political correctness and so-called tolerance might appear to bring harmony among man, in reality it can only bring a false security without appealing to fundamental, unchangeable principles of morality.
So Help Him God
The Washington Post reports that Judge Roberts' confirmation hearing may have as much to do with his faith in God as in his faith in the law.
The degree to which Roberts's religious beliefs may inform his judicial philosophy could be a significant line of questioning, especially given that Roberts is replacing Sandra Day O'Connor, a key vote on many contentious social issues. Conservatives distrusted O'Connor for the same reason that liberals are sorry to see her go: She supported abortion rights and took moderate stances on other social causes, including voting to strike down Texas's sodomy law, a 2003 case that was a turning point for gay rights.
The signals with Roberts are mixed. Liberal women's groups believe that based on his legal record, he may attempt to overturn Roe v. Wade. Conservative groups also have found material not to like in the Roberts dossier, such as the Supreme Court case he helped to prepare challenging a Colorado constitutional amendment excluding gays from anti-discrimination laws.
The issue for both sides is not so much what Roberts believes is right or wrong. Rather, it is the degree to which he believes religious morality may be permitted to influence public policy. Liberals believe in a firewall between church and state, but as Christian conservatives see it, the Supreme Court should allow elected officials to restrict abortions or permit a Ten Commandments monument to be displayed on public property, if those actions have voter support. Gary Marx, executive director of the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network, described the ideal judge as "a neutral umpire...who respects what state legislatures are doing and doesn't try to be a lawmaker from on high." For as tightly as liberal ideology clings to an immensely strict separation of church and state, there seems to be a substantial effort to make the belief system of John Roberts a central focus of his nomination to the Supreme Court. Roberts' appointment supposedly does not hinge upon any kind of religious litmus test, yet it is not difficult to see the beginnings of one -- unless the judge is willing to, at times, drastically depart from his faith in interpreting the Constitution. This isn't a request that would have likely made comfortable the founders of the nation, or most of its leaders since. Even if Roberts allows deeply held convictions to have sway in his legal decisions, are we really prepared to ask him to set faith aside? Would that in any way ensure or protect justice?
Granted, the balance of personal belief and established law is not always easy to obtain -- and there are undoubtedly times that a judge must rule contrary to his own opinion out of deference to the legal process. But it would be a frightening precedent to strip a justice -- and the law itself -- of the prerogative to consult a power higher than the law in order to promote it.
--- Thursday, September 08, 2005
Governor Terminates Redefinition of Marriage
Though a bill to authorize same-sex marriage in California made it past both the state assembly and senate, the traditional definition of marriage appears to be secure in the state -- at least for a while longer -- thanks to a stand by Gov. Schwarzenegger.
A day after California's Legislature became the first in the nation to pass a bill to legalize same-sex marriage, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced through an aide Wednesday that he would veto the measure "out of respect for the will of the people."
In a careful statement, Schwarzenegger press secretary Margita Thompson invoked the voter approval in March 2000 of Proposition 22, which said: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California."
"The governor believes the matter should be determined not by legislative action -- which would be unconstitutional -- but by court decision or another vote of the people of our state," the statement said. "We cannot have a system where the people vote and the Legislature derails that vote."
The statement also said Schwarzenegger "believes that gay couples are entitled to full protection under the law and should not be discriminated against." It did not offer his opinion on same-sex marriage, but when asked about it last year, the governor said, "I don't care one way or the other."
The California Supreme Court is likely to decide next year whether Proposition 22 and other state laws that define marriage are constitutional. I haven't been an especially big political fan of the "Governator," but I'll give him credit for making a somewhat risky and certainly controversial move by blocking a bill that would have radically altered California's already sticky cultural scene. I wish he would adopt the position based as much on moral principle as democratic, but it is refreshing to see a governor pay actual deference to already established, voter ordained law.
--- Thursday, September 01, 2005
Winds of Change on the West Coast, Too
In a week of natural disaster, apparently the cultural disasters aren't too far behind, as the California senate has passed a bill that would legalize same-sex marriages in the state.
The 21-15 vote made the Senate the first legislative chamber in the country to approve a gay marriage bill. It sets the stage for a showdown in the state Assembly, which narrowly rejected a gay marriage bill in June.
"Equality is equality, period," said one of the bill's supporters, Sen. Liz Figueroa, D-Sunol. "When I leave this Legislature, I want to be able to tell my grandchildren I stood up for dignity and rights for all."
But Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth, R-La Mesa, suggested that a "higher power" opposed the legislation.
"This is not the right thing to do," he said. "We should protect traditional marriage and hold all of those values and institutions that have made our society and keep our society together today."
But Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Redondo Beach, said a number of churches supported the bill: "I don't think anyone should claim God as being on their side in this debate," she said. Though it seems up in the air whether the redefinition of marriage in California will pass the state assembly and go to the governor, it is unquestionably a different debate when the issue rests in the hands of the legislature, rather than an overreaching judiciary. The fundamental moral questions, however, do not change, and the culture cannot afford to be apathetic while the concept of family and marriage is radically altered -- whether the changes comes via government action or a shift in societal attitudes.
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