Who's Next?
Most thinking people see folks like Alex Jones and Louis Farrakhan as unsavory and potentially dangerous individuals. Most people, then, would see Facebook's announcement that they will ban these people from Facebook and Instagram as a good thing. Surely Facebook (as a private entity, not a government entity) has the right to choose who they will allow free speech to on their platform. I'm just concerned that the parameters are a bit vague. "We've always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology," a Facebook spokesman said. So what about individuals (like you and me) or organizations (like the church) who hold that homosexual behavior is a sin or that science indicates that gender is binary? Is that promoting or engaging in violence or hate? I don't think so, but I think if you ask the masses, they'd say it is. But it gets worse. Facebook isn't banning them for what they say on their account; they're banning them for what they say elsewhere. Farrakhan, for instance, hasn't engaged in violence or hate on Facebook, but he has made anti-Semitic remarks in his speeches, so he's right out. Christians, you're next if you hold to biblical principles and views. I note, also, that those who genuinely hate Christians and even promote or practice violence against them are not likely to be banned from Facebook, etc. Facebook is deciding 1) what they classify as "hate," 2) which hate to ban, and 3) which hate to allow. (Note: Their statement on the subject says that their primary concern is conservative hate speech. The headline you will not read is "While Cracking Down On Fringe Conspiracy Theorists, Facebook Accidentally Bans CNN.")
The Nonsense of the Modern Culture
Following up on a previous story, the governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, signed legislation that would save lives -- in Georgia it looks like around 30,000 a year or so. He signed it "to ensure that all Georgians have the opportunity to live, grow, learn and prosper in our great state." Of course, there is little applause. The media is calling it an "early abortion ban" instead of its actual name, the "Living Infants Fairness and Equality Act," because everyone knows that living infants deserve no fairness and no equality unless their mothers say they do. Don't worry, folks. Planned Parenthood and the ACLU is on this and they will fight to eliminate the parenthood of as many women and the civil liberties of unborn children as they can.
And, of course, the mouthpiece of America has its say. Hollywood is declaring it will boycott the state of Georgia for defending babies. "Dirty rotten Georgia! Why can't you discard babies like everyone else does? Killing 30,000 babies isn't a tragedy; it's a good start!" Thank you, Hollywood, for your wise and tender input.
Christine Quinn, the former speaker of the New York City Council, assured CNN watchers that "When a woman gets pregnant, that is not a human being inside of her. It is part of her body ..." I guess it becomes a human being ... when it leaves her body? When its viable? No, they New York law allows for abortion any time. So it's not clear when it stops being "part of her body" and becomes "a human being." Clearly not when it has its own separate heartbeat. One college student assured us that a baby that survives an abortion attempt is not a baby. Go figure. What is?
(On a related note, can somebody help me? One of the most common concerns people raise is, "When abortion becomes illegal, women will still have them but in dangerous ways, so we have to keep it legal." How does that logic work? "If we outlaw heroine, we know people will still take it but in dangerous ways, so we need to keep it legal." "If we outlaw child molestation, we know people will still do it but in dangerous ways, so we need to keep it legal." Can anyone make sense of this for me?)
In Contrast
In contrast to the "illegal" desire of lawmakers in Georgia to save lives, baseball fans have decided that Trevor Bauer should die ... because of a rough night pitching against the White Socks. Bauer revealed numerous death threats through Instagram But, I suppose that's not a contrast. That's agreement -- human life is of no value if it doesn't give me what I want. Sorry, Mr. Bauer. Sorry, kids. I guess we all lose.
Pubic Education
The opening line of this news item says, "California has overhauled its sex education guidance for public school teachers, encouraging them to talk about gender identity with kindergartners and give advice to LGBT teenagers for navigating relationships and having safe sex."
You may be surprised. I was. I thought they already encouraged gender identity issues in the youngest and gave advice for teenage sexual deviancy, so that it is an overhaul surprised me. That there are still Christians sending their kids to public schools in California surprises me, too. Mind you, I'm not reflecting on Californians. "Parents and conservative groups assailed the more than 700-page document as an assault on parental rights, arguing it exposes children to ideas about sexuality and gender that should be taught at home." It's the overbearing, far left, immoral California government here in play. I mean, seriously, is it the school's job to teach middle-schoolers about safe masturbation? Come on!
The Mile High City
It appears as if Denver is aiming to be more of a "mile high city" than merely in elevation. Colorado already led the charge in making DUI more than driving under the influence of alcohol by legalizing recreational marijuana. As a result DUIs and emergency room visits are on the rise. Who'd have thought? Now they've decided to legalize hallucinogenic mushrooms. Seriously, what could go wrong? The goal, they say, is to remove substances from the controlled substances list. That way less people will be arrested. More people hurt, maimed, killed, harmed ... maybe ... but not arrested, you see? And if it's off the controlled substances list, doesn't that make it no longer harmful? Must be, considering our current social climate where we define reality, not the other way around.
Assuming Rights Not In Evidence
"'Hopefully this is the day discrimination against businesses that publicly espouse religious convictions comes to life in Texas,' said State Rep. Judy Johnson, D-Carrollton, after using a procedural maneuver to shut down debate of the so-called 'Save Chick-Fil-A' bill before it began." No, that's not quite what she said. Yes, that's what she intended. She believes that governmental entities should take "adverse actions" against organizations that espouse religious convictions over LGBT concerns. That is, while religious freedom is a constitutionally protected value in America, "the gender with whom I want to have sex" trumps that right regardless of what anyone thinks. I'd like to think that she is alone or at least a minority in the Texas government that holds to this, but the story says, "Lawmakers cheered its demise," so I think that would be optimistic of me. Instead it looks like the intent is an actual, head-to-head battle between religious freedom and gay rights in Texas, too. Don't worry. It's not just Texas.
Filed Under "Politics"
Congressional Representative Ilhan Omar made the news again when she slammed Israel for refusing a generous gift from Palestine. Hamas, she said, had spent lots of time and money picking out those rockets and freely launched them to Israel, and Israel retaliated with violence. Appalling!
Must be true; I read it on the Internet.
49 comments:
"No, they New York law allows for abortion any time."
When you lie about facts, you destroy you credibility in making reasoned arguments.
New York does not allow abortion after 24 weeks unless the mother's life is in danger or the fetus is non-viable.
"One of the most common concerns people raise is, "When abortion becomes illegal, women will still have them but in dangerous ways, so we have to keep it legal." How does that logic work?"
Conservatives: "if we ban guns, people will still kill each other."
Feodor, on the first comment, surely you have to see the irony here. You don't like it when people read the Bible in a woodenly literal way (neither do I), but then you read what I wrote in a woodenly literal way when I'm clearly trying to make a point, not an argument or a science class.
New York and others have decided that abortion up to and after birth is acceptable if the delivery after 24 weeks would endanger the mother's life or health. And if the child is not viable. All well and good. But then we encounter an odd thing. We see "life or health" defined loosely, so that if the mother would suffer undue emotional stress, for instance, that is a threat to the her health. If according to a medical professional's "reasonable and good faith professional judgment based on the facts of the patient's case" the pregnancy is a risk to her health, that child can be removed killed.
(Full disclosure: I'm not opposed to abortion. Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy. Miscarriage is an abortion. Removing a dead child is an abortion. I'm not opposed to removing a dead baby. I am opposed to killing live ones. I am not anti-abortion; I am pro-life. And if medical science came up with a way to remove a living fetus from a woman and keep it alive "to term" outside her, releasing her from the responsibilities, risks, etc., you wouldn't find me protesting the abortion.)
In the interest of actual accuracy, when I wrote that about New York, it was the words of the governor of Virginia I was thinking about who argued that if an infant survives an abortion -- is born alive -- but was intended not to be, they'll decide whether or not to kill it later. "Abortion anytime," including postpartum abortion. In the interest of accuracy, then, you're right. New York has not indicated they will kill babies postpartum. Neither have they denied it. The principle remains -- abortion on demand.
On the "let's keep it legal" comment, the difference between the two is the former are saying, "Let's keep abortion safe" without addressing the problem, just the "safety," and those conservatives to whom you refer are saying, "Let's find something that will address the problem because outlawing guns won't do it." (I don't think I've ever entered the "gun control" ring on this blog.)
I'm too wooden to understand what your "have decided that abortion... after birth is acceptable" could possibly mean. Can you elaborate?
New York homicide statute still defines a “person” as “a human being who has been born and is alive.” Killing a baby once born was and is still considered a homicide. So...
You clarify rightly that the conditions are the life AND health of the mother. But this is no change from the Supreme Court's decision in Roe. Thus, the law of the land: "For the stage subsequent to approximately the end of the first trimester, the State, in promoting its interest in the health of the mother, may, if it chooses, regulate the abortion procedure in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health. Additionally, in what is considered a companion case, Doe v. Bolton, the U.S. Supreme Court held that “medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors — physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age — relevant to the wellbeing of the patient. All these factors may relate to health. This allows the attending physician the room he needs to make his best medical judgment.”
It seems to me that what must be inferred from your wariness of the way we necessarily have to decide this moral issue is a strategic distrust of physicians. The relationship between an individual and her doctor is and must remain protected from demands from others who do not have her values, particularly from those who would seek Sharia like imposition of control over that relationship. This keeps us more humane than extreme fundamentalism.
Keep it up. You'll go a long way toward making conversations with you possible. I didn't say you were too wooden for anything.
Yes, I am wary of the current methods of determining what is and is not moral because it is constantly fluid, without firm foundation. It would seem that you're fine with it, so you shouldn't much care what I have to say about it.
No, seriously! What are you saying with “abortion after birth”?
Do you see a parallel between the radical Protestant claim that the church went off the rails soon after the close of the Apostolic Age right up to the Reformation and even much of that was misguided... with the implications of your distrust: centuries of modern reasoning regarding human rights and medical ethics, the explosion of modern science that saves millions of lives (living people and potential people), thousands of careers dedicate to taking on the task of thinking about and shaping morally every new technological innovation that either can benefit humanity or become very destructive depending on how we frame use of such technologies with respect to human freedom... all this beautiful, humane, caring and compassionate energy together with misuses and greedy abuses addresses and imperfectly corrected... all this natural and rational and spiritual energy - the capacities of our creative and moral talents, you distrust?
Radical protest, is what it looks like.
Speaking of what they would do if a baby survived an attempted abortion under their new law, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam said, "The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that's what the mother and the family desired. And then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother." (He went on to say that the discussion that would ensue would be about whether or not to terminate the baby's life.)
And, no. I don't.
Regarding the Chick-Fil-A nonsense from the LEFT:
1. Chick-Fil-A as a business has NEVER discriminated against anything to do with LGBTQRXYZ. The PRESIDENT/CEO/OWNER, or whatever title he goes by, has merely professed his belief in REAL marriage and he provides funding to organizations which are of the same beliefs.
2. The LEFT are hypocrites. Where is there outrage and boycotts of Marriott Hotels/Motels? After all, the owners of that chain are Mormons, and teach the very same beliefs when it comes to marriage.
Northam spoke like an idiot.
And you’re not examine the law.
HB 2491 would not actually change the time limit for receiving an abortion in Virginia. It would change the number of physicians required for approval from 3 to 1, which is what it should be. And broaden the health circumstances under which an abortion would be allowed.
Yes, Glenn, indeed. When you don't have a solid place to stand, you'll find all sorts of double standards and contradicting "facts."
Feodor, who gets to define "the health of the mother"? Obviously not the baby. You won't even call it that. While me ... I'm not even clear on how one can be a "non-person human being" while you're perfectly comfortable with it.
Stan, I could not be more sorry for you than I am right now.
When speaking with pro-life folks, is it really helpful to state that increasing the chances and reasons for murdering the unborn is a good thing? You may be trying to be accurate in your explanation of the law, but adding your opinion about the morality of it doesn't further the point.
Also, I've never bought the argument that abortions are primarily for women's health. Most abortions are done not to save the life or health of the mother, but to reduce her inconvenience. They don't want the responsibility of being a parent, or they don't want a child interfering with their education/career. Most abortions are preventable. We have made leaps and bounds in pregnancy preventers. The biggest reason abortion is even considered a positive thing, the sexual revolution. Have all the sex you want, with whoever you want, without responsibility. God created the family unit for a reason. Remove the life long stability of a marriage and you make abortion "necessary" because fun is more important than responsibility. In a previous News Weakly, Stan mentioned a Scottish?/Irish? protestor stating that "Ho's need abortions!" And what would be the reason for that? A pregnancy would interfere with their career. Not because they feared for their health.
It always bothers me when people try to say that we need to keep abortion open for health reasons, or in the case of incest or rape, as if those are the primary reasons women have. I imagine abortion was invented because of health reasons for the mother. But it has proliferated because of the rampant explosion of sexual promiscuity/"freedom". I don't believe sex outside of marriage is icky, or just immoral because the Bible says so. It is wrong because the Designer of our species has a plan for the best, healthiest, safest way of continuing the species, the only species that has any reference to morality. Any deviation from the rules set forth in Scripture is not only an assault against God (which is the worst part of it), it is going against the operating instructions given by the One who designed everything. You can't put metal in your microwave and then complain that the designer of the microwave had no right to warn you about the safest way to operate it, and that you should be free to operate it any way you wish without any consequence. There are good ways and bad ways to use things. There are good ways and bad ways to live our lives, and sin hurts us.
A baby has a mother and father, not expecting parents, parents-to-be, people who have buns in the oven, people who wait weeks to tell family and friends that they are “expecting” because everyone knows that the viable ways of nature have not yet solidified.
This common sense, natural understanding of existential and biological differences has been conquered by malicious intentions, whether conscious or unconscious, to control the uncontrollable way in which time requires constant reformation of the concepts and language of belief. It is tragic irony that radical Protestants are the least prepared and most brutal in resistance.
The health of the woman is almost unilaterally the determiner of her health in consultation with practitioners of a profession thoroughly regulated by ethical concerns for millennia and governed by the same.
Oh! Until viability, Stan. Then society does have an interest.
If you ask any mother-to-be who is not unhappy about being pregnant, she will unilaterally declare that she is carrying a baby. Apparently "baby" is defined as "one I want."
Women who get abortions "almost unilaterally" get them on the basis of health concerns? If that is what you actually meant or what you actually believe, you should probably read up on it. Surveys vary, but in most of them "don't want children right now" leads the pack by a large margin with "can't afford it" right behind. Issues like "rape" and "incest" and "physical health" are under 10% combined. Better than 85% of all abortions are elective, not due to actual health concerns. Not "almost unilaterally" health. That is, until you redefine "health" to include "financial, emotional, or educational" health (neither of which are a physician's purview). (A large number of school-age -- up through college -- women who opt for abortion do so to pursue education.) Which is what I was saying. Starting with "the health of the woman" and then shifting "health" to mean "perceived comfort" and so on is a bait-and-switch. "We're primarily concerned about women's health ... by which we mean whatever they might mean by it at the moment ... by which we define if it's a baby -- a person -- or not." That's arbitrary.
"Viability" keeps moving as medical science progresses. Current age of viability is 24 weeks, but that is edging down. (I remember when it was 28 weeks.) But, given your claim that society has an interest above viability (24 weeks on most books), why are we still defining "health of the mother" in such broad, self-serving terms? That's my point with the current spate of abortion laws. "Health of the mother" is defined vaguely so that if a physician agrees that she'll be emotionally or even financially distressed, her "health" is in jeopardy, and it is purely the equivalent of "abortion on demand" ... which, if you ask them, is the intent.
"Apparently "baby" is defined as "one I want."
THAT'S! very good, Stan. A great analytical conclusion to what is inferred.
First, let me say that here you have provided a much more divesting critique of Marshall's definition of the human person than I have. Marshall proposes that "It is a person by virtue of the fact that it took two persons of the opposite sex to unite their procreative donations for the purpose of bringing forth a new person."
You have put your finger on the gulf of logic in this statement: if one or both of the sexual partners do NOT have the purpose of bringing forth ("into the world", i.e. birth is what the phrase intends) then their "product" cannot be considered a human person under Marshall's definition.
[btw, Marshall is here because I told him and Craig that enjoying your blog because you are far more honest in thought and self-possessed, morally speaking, than they are. They have become enslaved to the current milieu of willful reliance on the dodge, diversion, denials, prevarications, reliance on myth, and outright lies and even reversing what one says. E.g. Marshall says at his own blog that he never reads my comments that the blocks. And, yet, here he because he read what I sent. They'll get over that when the Trump fervor is gone.]
Second, don't we both wish that 99% of the time expectant mothers want their babies? I know I do. It makes for so much better health for the adult, the child, the fetus, the community, our society.
And so, because your peeping out the inferences is right on, this is EXACTLY why compassionate peoples argue so hard for comprehensive health care, comprehensive fetal healthcare that includes local universal access to sex education, prophylactics, contraception measures, etc. In this way, abortion numbers decrease dramatically and, given time to educate and provide for more than one generation, a habit of avoiding unwanted pregnancies takes customary hold.
Babies wanted are the outcome we all want from gestation.
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Indeed, viability does move based on technological innovations. Even the womb is becoming replaceable from technological innovations.
Self-serving terms? Because one's health is one's own. It is simply where we have gotten to on human rights through the horrors of the 20th century. One should have rights over one's body, one's health.
Just for clarity, are you saying, "Yes! 'Baby' is defined as 'one I/we want'" as opposed to "No! 'Baby' is the first stage of a human being"? (I'm pretty sure Marshal wouldn't agree that a human life in the womb is defined by the mother/parents.)
"You have put your finger on the gulf of logic in this statement: if one or both of the sexual partners do NOT have the purpose of bringing forth ("into the world", i.e. birth is what the phrase intends) then their "product" cannot be considered a human person under Marshall's definition."
That definition is absolutely false based on the mainstream excuse for abortion. You say if one or both don't want it makes it not human. But, if the father does want it, and the mother doesn't, then she has the determining decision. And we humans are horrible at determining harmful. I had a person tell me to my face that vaping was good for him. My mother decided to be gay for a time because "men have hurt me too many times". She then proceeded to get hurt by numerous women. We are poor definers of health and harm. We can't even decide if coffee or chocolate are good or bad for us.
And your definition of "viable is human" is clearly not the mainstream definition, because they are pushing for later and later allowances for aborting. To push that date further means that viable can't mean human. The only allowed definition today is does the mother want it. Health doesn't matter. Viability doesn't matter. Plus, they can also play with the definition of viable. If viable means it can survive on it's own, then that doesn't actually happen until many years after birth. So, if the vague definition of viable is your definition of human, and a woman's desire to be a parent is the other part of the definition, then who's to say that a woman who is tired of being a mom of a 3-year-old can't abort her non-human lifeform? A 3-year-old certainly couldn't keep itself alive, so it's not viable, and the mother doesn't want it, so it meets both criteria for being non-human. You may argue that that is a slippery-slope fallacy, except we're already on the way. We already have people pushing for the ability to abort during labor, or even soon after. When you give life such a vague definition to sinful humans, we are going to push it as far as we can. We are going to stretch it to fit our desires, not reality, and certainly not what God says. We have plenty of non-murdery ways to prevent pregnancy. If you were not responsible enough to not use them, then it's time to cowboy up and accept the consequences, not commit murder. I have been married for more than 11 years, and we haven't even had so much as a pregnancy scare, because we're responsible every time. If someone doesn't want a child, they simply need to take the steps necessary to prevent it, because once you're pregnant, that is a human life in you, the most defenseless of human life that requires the most protection. We need laws that value life, not comfort or desire.
So, if the biological parents don’t “want” the product of conception, but choose adoption, the product of conception isn’t a child by this absurd definition.
What does Jesus say about the clay telling the potter what to do?
Marshall says the human person is only the product of sex that people want to bring forth. The failure of his logic is that such a statement destroys what he wants to say, because his statement cannot answer the inferential conclusion that, therefore, if the sexual partners don't want to bring the product forth, then the product is not a human being.
What I am saying is that you and I want the same thing: every expectant mother and father to want this gestation to happen smoothly and healthily and that a baby is, in Marshall's word, produced with ten fingers and ten toes and terrifically healthy brain.
One strategy to get that done is to educate and provide the knowledge and means to make sure that 99.9% of pregnancies are wanted. This is, of course, the way our nation has shown greatness: knowledge and means to come together in a relatively free democracy where individual rights, expression, and opportunities for intellectual and artistic and physical gifts are available.
The other strategy is for one group to impose religious values that are not shared across a diverse, polyglot, ecumenical and democracy take away the rights of a certain class of people (women) in order to save the concept of a revealed, cultic truth about a few other, only potential groups of not-yet-living people.
Which course do you think represents the best of American style democracy?
You are correct, Stan. I wouldn't.
How long do you suppose I've been coming here? Almost daily for close to ten years, I'd say given how long I've been doing this blog thing. I read what I read, respond when I respond totally as it pleases me to do so, just like most people, sometimes motivated by the most vile and detestable trolls...such as feo...who may suffer from some wholly unjustified high opinion of themselves, and are generally avoided as one tries to avoid a pile left on the sidewalk by some negligent dog owner. Yet, sometimes we do indeed step in it, and a response is required, and thus any response of mine to one like is is akin to scraping that accident off the bottom of my shoe. And that's the last I'll sully your comments section with references to an unfortunate and unnecessary conflict in which I'm confident you have no interest. I'm sure you'll soon see fit to add him to the same list upon which Dan's name was placed.
But to re-iterate, what makes that fertilized egg a person is the fact that two people of the opposite sex engaged in the very act designed by God to bring that new person into existence. This is true even of those who, like nazis and klansmen, regard some people as less than human based on arbitrary and subjective criteria that has no basis in science, but in their own craven minds.
"The other strategy is for one group to impose religious values that are not shared ..."
This assumes that either there is no objective truth on the subject or that it cannot be known. If the religious values in question are actually, objectively true, what would "not shared" matter? Truth doesn't depend on whether or not everyone agrees. In fact, wouldn't it be important that the truth be transmitted to those who don't share it? It appears that your underlying superior course is the "American style democracy" and mine is what God has to say. (And, please, if you've seen me anywhere suggesting or attempting to "impose" my beliefs on those who don't share them, point it out. I don't believe I can force Christianity on anyone. I don't believe that I can impose a living relationship on Christ with anybody. I don't believe that the force of law will bring about "good people." You may certainly know Christians who disagree with me, but don't lump me with them.)
Your "not-yet-living people" (surely you can see the self-contradiction in that phrase) are not of the same value as the women who, primarily unwilling to be inconvenienced by responsibility, expense, or "disruption of dreams," wish to terminate those people (your word). That, you understand, is "American style democracy." If "American style democracy" means "We get to vote who we will kill and who we won't," I think your version is a lot different than mine.
While it could be argued that more “sex education” could achieve the 99.9% of babies being “wanted”, I’m not sure our current situation bears that out. After years if “you and me baby ain’t nothing but mammals” and a popular culture that encourages sex at younger and younger ages, I’m think that more values free sex ed, isn’t going to cut it.
I agree with Stan that the issue isn’t whether the values are “religious”, but rather do those values represent Truth. If the values in question (responsibility, respect, chastity, etc) represent a better option for society, then who cares where they come from. As Stan pointed out, no one is trying to force their religion on anyone, I know it’s easier to move one’s agenda forward if there’s s group to fear. That’s all this is, sowing fear.
Marshall has now dropped his earlier definition that included the intention of the sex couple. Now, in this 5th version of his thinking in two months, the human person is just as sex act that conceives. He's erased what he before: their intentions, their conscious selves have completely disappeared. Which seems to parallel his understanding of the human person is just a physical reality. No place for feelings or awareness. A one celled organism is a human person.
And if Marshall thinks God intended the sex act as just the pathway for the "product" [Marshall's word choice] of procreation, then I guess he thinks old people do not want or enjoy sex. Or that married couples don't engage in sex for reasons of bonding in love about a thousand times more than they have children. It seems to me that God has given us a great gift that actually, just by numbers, very seldom has anything to do with bearing children.
__________
Religious truths are known:
A day of rest is terrific for you.
Honor your father and mother. (The whole nation knows what today is.)
Don't kill.
Don't be taking other people's partners.
Don't steal.
Don't lie.
Don't waste you life being jealous of what other's do.
Other religious truths turn out to be corrupt:
Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in Rome for saying the earth circled the sun.
You're going to hell if you dance or play cards.
God will destroy America if it doesn't give up alcohol.
Faith must seek understanding. (Anselm) Belief must be engaged in reasoning out what it true. Other folks just use their noggin. You and I tend to believe that faithfulness in devotion to God and the living Christ sharpens the focus of the noggin toward loving others. Although you're fond of limits on that goal for various reasons.
"I don't believe that the force of law will bring about "good people.'"
Seat belt laws have saved a lot of lives. Child seat laws, both in putting them in, and how they are made, have saved a lot of laws. Because people were convinced to be good about that. Taxes paved the nation. Goods and medicines and food flow so much better when bridges spanned the country. Quality of life skyrocketed from 1920 to 1970. Tax laws created not just good people but good life.
Anything that is potential - even a life the only has potential love and care to give others - cannot be held as high in esteem as the actual thing - a person in a network of relationships that depend upon and is depended upon.
Just a simple philosophical truism.
The angels mourned the drowned Epyptians. God turned away from flooding punishment. Jesus rebukes the community because they think the dead on whom the Tower of Siloam fell must have been sinners.
Your characterization of women makes me sad. Your hard heart reminds me of John 8.
"Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
"Your "not-yet-living people" (surely you can see the self-contradiction in that phrase)..."
It's called parallel prose: not-living-yet-people whom you privilege in contradistinction to fullyl living people you disparage. It wasn't meant to be technical. Just rhetorical.
My wife and I will be godparents to or friends' baby when they have it. No one knows the sex yet.
It's not self-contradictory for you, invested as I am sure you are in gender specificity, to call the fetus a human baby when no one knows what sex it will be? When there is no
.
I understand, Feodor, that you are operating on a longstanding feud with Marshal (whose name, apparently, you refuse to spell correctly) and that anything he might say will be taken in the worst possible light. That's too bad. It would be nice if people would work toward understanding rather than merely denying. Nothing I can do about that. It's impossible to converse when the other person takes what you say, turns it into something you didn't say, then tells you why it's wrong. We have a word for that, I think. "Strawman." Too often we (I'm not immune) don't take the time to understand what is being said and simply react rather than figure it out.
"Other religious truths turn out to be corrupt."
You are, I suppose, using "truths" in a largely arbitrary, even post-modern way, where "truth" is "whatever I say it is" (or, perhaps, "truth claim"). Since nothing in my Bible requires "the earth circles the sun," "dancing and playing cards are cardinal sins," or even "alcohol is a sin," I'm going to have to disagree that those "religious truths" turned out to be corrupt. They turned out to be man-made falsehoods. (You might be surprised to learn that I do not find smoking, moderate use of alcohol, dancing, or rock and roll music to be sinful in my Bible. Go figure, eh?)
You set off to prove to me that good laws make good people. You didn't, of course, and I don't deny that it's good to have good laws. I'm in favor of them. If they were to finally decide, for instance, that it is the right thing to do to protect the lives of the most vulnerable children -- the unborn ones -- I'd be pleased. But I would still argue that good laws do not make good (moral) people. They might make people behave differently (your examples weren't moral questions at all), but won't change the inner being from sinful to godly. No one is going to heaven because they had good laws in their country and they followed them.
And you decided to accuse me of characterizing women when I did not. I spoke of abortions and the reasons for them. Since most women haven't had abortions in their lifetime (Guttmacher estimates about 25%), I'm not talking about them, am I? If I say "Guys who torture young children are beasts," have I characterized guys, or have I characterized a particular group? Beyond that, I know plenty of women who did have abortions, repented of it, and are in good standing. No long term judging there, either. I dislike sin, not sinners. Even in myself. And you're neglecting Jesus's words to the woman. "Go and sin no more." He wasn't unconcerned about sin, just false judgment. (Note that they brought a woman "caught in the act," but the law required both he and she be brought and they brought only her. Something was not right.)
http://marshallart.blogspot.com
Two lls. In all these years, I've never noticed that used Marshal Art. Is this new? I was going by the web address for some instinctual reason.
"you refuse to spell correctly"
"anything he might say will be taken in the worst possible light. That's too bad. It would be nice if people would work toward understanding rather than merely denying. Nothing I can do about that. It's impossible to converse when the other person takes what you say, turns it into something you didn't say"
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Doesn't change the fact that Marshal's definition of a human person cannot hold together what he wants it to. I've demonstrated this a number to times for each definition he's tried out. Pointing out where someone wants to make a point but can't is simply what happens in discourse. Needs to happen. Otherwise, without correction, absolutely no communication can keep going.
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I am thinking that your "Since nothing in my Bible requires 'the earth circles the sun,'" is meant to read, sun circles the earth?
Calvin claimed the bible teaches Earth is the center of the universe. He used:
Joshua 10: “Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; And thou, Moon, in the valley of Aijalon”
Psalm 93: "Surely the world is established, so that it cannot be moved."
Psalm 19: "In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom from his wedding canopy, and like a strong man runs its course with joy. Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them..."
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You who are without sin cast the first stone. Only takes harassing one person for what you perceive to be theirs. Or rather, rigging the situation to try to trap others in agreeing with your judgment.
You should probably choose more careful parallel prose when it is your position that "not-yet-living" defines non-person.
Yes, Marshal corrected it everywhere except in the address (like my blog, which was originally called "Birds of the Air" but changed to "Winging It" even though I couldn't change the address).
You appear to believe I am a follower of ... what ... Luther, Calvin, someone like that? I've read nearly zero of either of their works. And those texts don't require a geocentric universe and, so, don't cast a shadow on Scripture, only fallible humans.
I suppose, then, that you would disagree wholly with Paul who said, "Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness" (Gal 6:1) because he was encouraging what you would term "harassment" and, I suppose, Jesus who coldly warned that poor woman, "Go and sin no more." What you term "harassment" I term concern for their spiritual well-being. (Indeed, I've never said anything negative to a single woman who had an abortion. I suspect your preconceptions are driving your responses.)
His point wasn't that he believes the Bible says the sun circles the Earth, but that the Bible is mute on the science of the movement of heavenly bodies. If you want to point to those passages as proof that the sun circles the Earth, then you have to admit that all humans believe the sun orbits the Earth because we all speak of sunrise and sunset. Everyone, everywhere. Even the most devout of heliocentrists will describe the movement of the sun in relation to our perspective, not from a galactic perception.
While it is good that we use others to modify our definitions to more clearly explain our position, that doesn't mean that person "a" meant what person "b" expected it to mean. Marshal modifying his definition is not proof that his definition is wrong, but that it wasn't clear and could be twisted by someone with ulterior motives.
David, your argument is with a Jean Calvin, the author of how you read the Bible.
And he got it wrong. And imposed it on Geneva and other places that followed his Sharia-like reforms.
My point stands that churches and Christian movements have enforced truths that were corrupt. Your argument against Calvin reiterates my point, over and against Stan’s objection.
I don't believe I've EVER mentioned the intention of the couple having sex in order to define what a person is. Perhaps it was the intention of the couple to engage in the sex act, which is designed for procreation. Regardless of their reason for having sex...pleasure or procreation...or both...the intended to have sex and that's about as far as intent has any relevance. The point is they engaged in the procreative act, and as such the product of that act can't be anything other than another person should conception take place. I hope this clears up the obvious misunderstanding.
"My point stands that churches and Christian movements have enforced truths that were corrupt."
Then they aren't truths, are they? The question is not about "corrupt," but about truth.
When men and women engage in sex where there is no possibility of fertilization, the sex act is entirely distinct from the possibility of procreation. And when men and women engage in the sex act where fertility is intentionally ruled out by appropriate actions, the sex act is entirely distinct from the possibility of procreation. I don't know what anyone's life is like but I'm married and sex has resulted in only one child. And then more recently, fertilization is 99.9% impossible due to natural aging. So, again, a thousandfold acts of sex; one child. The sex act cannot stand as the definition of the human person. God's designs can hold more than one intention at a time.
Plus, IVF results in hundreds of thousands of human persons. Without the sex act. They are not monsters. They are persons.
Here is Marshal's next to last definition, as I've already quoted above: "It is a person by virtue of the fact that it took two persons of the opposite sex to unite their procreative donations *for *the *purpose *of bringing forth a new person."
* denotes intention.
Stan, as I understand it, you believe in reading the Bible 1) literally, and 2) infallibly.
Wonder where you got these ideas from? Neither the apostolic age nor late antiquity nor medieval Christians nor Renaissance Christians read the Bible literally. Paul used typology and allegory. Jesus used parables and typology. Etc.
So, scripture doesn't even read itself literally.
The literal reading of the Bible as infallible begins in the early modern age. With one scholar. You may not be aware that you follow him. Just as I am not aware who designed the phone I'm using. But you do use his theology to read the Bible.
And he got things wrong. People were burned at the stake because he got things wrong but was slavishly followed.
Belief in the literal truth of infallible scripture, as held by those in Geneva or Rome or London or many other places, got people killed.
It is a warning that none of us can grasp literal truth. But some practice as if they do.
That is a grave danger, and a powerful threat to modern humane democracy.
Wouldn’t “corrupt truths” be an oxymoron?
News flash, humans get things wrong.
"Stan, as I understand it, you believe in reading the Bible 1) literally, and 2) infallibly."
You understand correctly ... but not. By "literally" you mean "in a woodenly literal sense" and I mean "as it was intended to be understood." We do this all the time. We understand that "sunrise" is phenomenological language not intended to express a geocentric perspective, but a phenomenon as it appears. We understand that poetry and parable and various modes of communication like metaphor, hyperbole, etc. all have their place in the communication process and require individual handling. I understand that the Bible has various types of writing in it -- historical narrative, prophecy (apocalyptic literature), doctrine, poetry, etc. -- which all require the reader pay attention and see what is being relayed beyond the simple, wooden use of words. No, sola Scriptura doesn't mean that the Bible is alone any more than we are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. (You can't have multiple "alones" that would, if taken at face value, exclude each other.) Each is an elimination of competing concepts, where "grace" precludes merit and "faith" precludes works, and "Christ" precludes any other name. Sola Scriptura precludes other authorities and holds that Scripture is sufficient to complete the man of God, equipped for every good work (2 Tim 3:16-17).
As for your assertion that someone "recently" (relatively speaking) came up with the whole inerrancy thing, you should probably do a little more homework. Irenaeus believed Scriptures to be perfect as the Word of God. Early Church fathers expressed the same thing. While you are correct that the term "inerrancy" wasn't expressed until more recently, that's not because it wasn't believed. That's because it was understood until the 19th century higher criticism that sought to question the reliability of the Bible. Since the Bible itself assumes that God spoke it (e.g., 2 Tim 3:16-17; 2 Peter 3:16; Heb 4:3-8).
If it is true what you claim (notice the difficulty here) -- "It is a warning that none of us can grasp literal truth" -- then it would seem incumbent upon you to stop trying to push what you believe to be true because "none of us can grasp literal truth." If you actually believed that, you'd stop trying to change people's minds to your understanding.
When Iranaeus writes that the Adam and Eve story is an allegory for human history, the eastern church believed him. Created from good earth and clay but short of perfection, the two of them, like little children grew in understanding, toward perfection. Thus, the Fall, in the eastern church is not the ontological stamp of sin that the western church understands it to be. In Orthodoxy (I bet you hate they took that name first), the casting out of Paradise was a normal step in immature missteps, course correction, and then proceeding on toward perfection. The Fall, then is an event of spiritual education, not disaster. For Iranaeus and the eastern tradition of Christianity, God intends this to be a roadmap for the Christian life. Our sins and peccadilloes are to be expected, normal, and helpful in reinforcing from time to time a commitment to keep venturing with boldness into that participation within divine nature that we are capable. Though never without falling out again even in the course of a day.
If this is what you mean by literal, then I'm with you. Though, you'll have to forgive if I feel your understanding of "literal" takes its place on our terrifically liberal side.
I fear though that, withstanding a hundred years or more of having it pointed out to evangelicals that infallible literal approaches is a thoroughly early modern manufacture of protestantism, evangelicals have spent the last thirty years re-baptizing the ancients in some Mormon re-do in order to take away a source of disturbance. I understand why you'd rather not be painted with the brush of Calvin's actual fashioning of your tradition. But I see it as a gross, intentionally repressed awareness of prevarication when one says that reading allegorically and typologically is a literal reading.
The concept of literal reading in discussion the Radical Reformation in no way means identifying rightly the kind of text one is reading. It entirely signifies that the reader believes the text is rationally describing all events and all characters rendered as true to life. That there is no loosening of a reference to the sun moving from the sun actually moving.
Evangelicals are outrageously and duplicitously fudging in order to cover a wound in thinking.
Humans do get things wrong, Craig. Thinking that a sanction against weaving a shirt from two kinds of material or sowing a field with two kinds of seed or an intimate relationship between two people of the same sex or touching a woman during her period or that the sun revolves around the earth is to be kept up for three thousand years is wrong.
Thankfully, most of these truths have lost their truthfulness. It's corrupt to keep the others as true. Those who hold corrupt truths are oxymorons.
It's my suspicion that you're exhibiting confirmation bias -- "accept as fact the data I find that agrees with me and reject the data that doesn't" -- and the fact that you just suggested I'm a liar didn't get by me. (Okay, that I have an "intentionally repressed awareness" of being a liar.)
If "literal" means "taking the words in their usual sense" and words in their usual sense can be used to express different things, depending on context, phrasing, etc., you call it prevarication and I call it normal reading. You would demand that anyone who takes the Word literally would have to conclude that Jesus taught He was a swinging or sliding barrier by which an entry is closed and opened when He said, "I am the door" and if they didn't, they were lying. That requires a serious bias ... on your part.
And I also didn't miss the accusation that evangelicals are liars because they can't think straight. You understand that these kinds of accusations make further friendly discussion more difficult, I hope.
Excellent example to Craig of a strawman argument. Note, by the way, that sex between two people of the same sex is covered in both the Old and New Testaments. Note also that if "these truths have lost their truthfulness," they aren't actually truths. You don't actually believe in objective truth, do you?
Love others as Christ loves us.
The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.
The Pharisees had your kind of conviction re divinely objective truth. But the living god living as a (*full) human surprised them.
Notice how the gospels have nothing much to say about the Jesus fetus? Nothing. Mary they praise. Nothing about the fetus. When Christ was born! Boy, then we got something!
It is interesting that the New Testament records that Jesus's cousin, John, leapt in the womb when Jesus's mother walked in the room. Not bad for a fetus, eh?
Like the other comment, I've posted this so others can see your view, but this is the last. You've decided to not keep it friendly. Name calling, false accusations, refusal to dialog or even try to understand. It makes conversation impossible and comments like this are at an end.
And that is why I was so sorry for you, Stan. Now even more. Note how he played his game with my comments. Yet, despite whether or not a man and woman sets out to procreate, whether or not a man and woman actually participate in intercourse with each other, the bottom line is still the same: a man and a woman each contributed to bringing about a new person. What results from the union of their respective reproductive "materials" is another person.
All feo has done here is what he's done since the first moment he made himself known to us, which is to attempt to "win". He hasn't yet.
I know he's not going to be able to respond, but really? Because Scripture doesn't talk about His activities as a fetus, He was never a fetus? It never talks about Him eating, or pooping, did He not do those either? The point of the first four books in the New Testament was His work on earth, not a scientific discourse or a journal of His daily life. Of course it doesn't talk about His actions as a fetus, they weren't part of His Gospel work. It also says that He did so much more than could even be contained in books. He wasn't a baby in a manger and then jumped straight to adulthood with a brief stop in childhood to confound the rabbis. His conception and birth are talked about because of their significance to His origins in fulfilling Old Testament prophecy.
Please, Feodor, if you're going to deny the foundations of Christianity, find yourself another religion, one that actually aligns with your beliefs. Don't try to hammer ours into whatever little box you want it to fit in. There are plenty of other religions you can try, or even just do what most of America is doing and be a None, or a Unitarian, or an agnostic, or anything but Christian. Taking the name of a follower of Christ and then denying the very source of His teachings doesn't make you a Christian. Like Dan T, you claim to believe Scripture, but also that nobody can know what Scripture means. If our religion is too "irrational" for you, find another, or found another. Nothing says you can't make your own religion. Just please, stop identifying as Christian when you're clearly not.
David,
Great point. We don’t hear much about Jesus as a fetus, but we do hear quite a bit about His conception. I think the fact that people cling so tightly to the labels of things they deny, is that they perceive that identifying as X gives them credibility they wouldn’t have otherwise.
Stan,
Clearly Jesus as a fetus had something inherent in Him that caused John to jump in his mother’s womb. It seems safe to say the Jesus in the womb was the same Jesus who amazed people with His authority.
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