I will be on the road to Athens, Rome, and London with thirty Torrey chums for the next three weeks.
I am hoping to blog the trip along the way at handy internet cafes. I shall also be trying a live radio hook up in the middle of Homer’s wine dark sea with the Frank Pastore Show this Friday.
Pray for us!
Does any publisher out there want a book?
Does anyone want to read the rest of this story?
Chapter One: Messages
Wind. Blowing, tearing wind was the main memory he had of the Dream. He called it the Dream, because it came so often and was almost always the same. It would be dark, the kind of dark that only happens when you are asleep and afraid. And then he would see a circle, spinning like the outside rim of a wagon wheel. The sounds began as he watched the wheel spin, faster and faster. It was the howling, sobbing of a gale passing through a space too narrow for the force of its despair.
The spinning wheel, joined by second inner wheel turning in the opposite direction, would begin to madden him. He would shout in his sleep, and usually awake. But not always. On the bad nights, he would pass right through the center of the spinning circles. His body would burn and then as he reached the center begin to feel heavy. It was like being buried alive, but with no coffin, only mud and matter pressing down on his face and soul. Alive. Buried. Buried alive. Until he was there again, and the real dread began.
His body pressed against the rough stone of the basement wall. Or was he in the wall, part of it? It was not clear to him. Nothing was clear to him, though at the start he could see some things. The angry men would come in and make a family obey. A papa, gone very grey, with a feeble mamma. Four daughters, some grown up people, an invalid boy, all told to stand against the wall. The voices of the angry men would fill the room, but he could not quite understand all that they said. Orders. Shouts. A mist would begin to cross his mind. One of the family would press against him, not feeling him, as if he were just part of the wall. Her old fashioned dress, with what felt like an iron corset, would tremble. He could feel her fear, and then it was as if his body were no longer there. He was simply the matter of the wall. Buried in it, holding up her shape. And she would scratch with one finger, symbols into the wall, into him. It was this he could feel, that scratching, desperate shaping, attempt at writing. What was it? The feeling as she gouged the plaster with splitting nails drove him further from the room. It was growing harder to see. In the whole scene he could soon make out only a few things: the yellow stripes on the basement wall paper. The cap on the chief of the angry men. Her face, turned to the side, pressed against his face and covering him with tears. Any sound was being drowned out again by the rising of the terrible wind. He could only make out a single word. The father would say it, the same syllable every time, and fire, smoke, sharp pain and ruin would rain down on his mind until he could stand no more.
Waking up, he would lay for a long while staring. His body feeling massive, as if he had eaten too much and then eaten again. He could not will to move. And then he could hardly move. Finally, he would sleep.
Peter Rupert Alexis opened the flip tab of his morning diet cola. He was stocky, in his mid-forties, with a sedentary job, and could not afford the calories of a glass of orange juice. It would take ten minutes of riding on his stationary bike to work off even one glass. He glanced through the days appointments. A few papers to grade. A seminar on Plato’s view of the human soul. Accountability meeting in the evening. An easy day in the secure life of a tenured philosopher in a small Christian college.
He carried his cereal bowl over to the counter. He began to swish it clean with the sponge. His mind was elsewhere. Blue eyes, a bit near sighted now, gazed blankly out of the little half-window over the stainless steel sink. The window of his apartment looked out on the window of someone else apartment. It was raining. Of course, it was usually raining in
He grabbed a stiff dish towel off of the stove door handle. Swiping the water off the bowl, he put it back in the white metal cupboard that were the norm in his one bed room flat. The towel curved back over the stove handle neatly. He did not even have to think to do these things. He
moved about the apartment efficiently. There was little in it to get in his way. A very good audio and visual system in one corner. In another the best computer he could afford. One fraying couch. His indoor bicycle for exercise dominated on entire side of the room. A few folding chairs for the meeting of the group tonight. Books piled about, but few shelves. The major part of his collection was in his office, his real home, at the college.
He was getting very worried about the Dream. It was becoming too frequent, last night was the second night in a month it had destroyed his rest. Some of the imagery was clear enough, drawn from twenty years of reading Plato. It was the intensity and repetition that were beginning to frighten him. He decided he would bring it up when the fellows gathered that night.
The first to arrive was always Arthur. His wild red hair, combed back, but still sprouting in all directions was the first thing one noticed about the distinguished Arthur Maximos. The second thing to capture the attention were his eyes, unsteady of late, but still the most student destroying pair of blinkers ever born to woman. Once you had seen the Eye of Maximos, the saying went, nothing else was important.
Professor of literature at
It had been Maximos who had gathered the little group. They were scholars from different area colleges, interested in their faith, big ideas, and each other. Together, and under the spiritual guidance of their leader, they held each other to the high spiritual standards of the Church. Despite the Spartan conditions, they always met at Peter’s house. He was the only bachelor of the group. And as Maximos was fond of pointing out, there was nothing of any value or beauty to distract them in their quest for Ideas. When they watched a film or listened to music, Peter had the best equipment. No children around to disturb them, or wife to worry about wine stains on the carpet, it was in the words of Arthur Maximos, “As close to a monastic cell for contemplation as this group is likely to find.”
“Good evening, Peter.” Peter noted with alarm that in his rush about this morning that he had left his cola can prominently in the middle of his little table. The kitchen and the living room were all one room. He knew what was coming next. The all seeing eye missed nothing. It seized the coke can in its gaze and held it there.
“I see that you are keeping your usual dietary and household standards. Meaning, of course, no standards at all. . . As I reminded Maggie last night, you are in dire need. . .”
But Peter was delivered from the shame of his cola can, by the arrival of Bartholomew White. The youngest member of the group, in his early thirties, he still had the look of the distance runner. His undergraduate days had mixed physics and track. “A natural combination,” he had once explained to everyone’s astonishment , and his explanation had become sufficiently mathematical to stun the rest of them into silence. He worked in Maximos’ university, in the huge, lavishly funded government projects that no one ever talked about, but that formed the basis of the school’s survival. He had purchased the exercise bike for Peter, and made sure he used it. It was the one piece of furniture in the apartment that could never appear dusty.
“Max, leave Peter alone. His free radical status is bad enough without your running on and on about it.”
Peter looked at Barth gratefully. Maximos snorted, “Then why,” the old professor was warming to his task, ” why. . . Doesn’t he do anything about it? It is not as if Maggie and I have not tried. . . It is not as if. . .”
“As if what?” came the clipped and precise words of the last member of their fraternity.
“Don’t interrupt me, Jack.”
“I would never think of it. I am changing the subject altogether.” John Warren Smith was tall, much taller than even the lanky Maximos. He flopped down on the couch, dripping coat and all. He was the only member of the group to work most of the time in the “real world.” A psychologist with unconventional habits, he taught part time at the local community college, toyed with obscure ideas, and published in all the best journals. His income was fantastic, almost a legend in the group, from a thriving practice that he supervised from a distance. He tossed a fedora to the opposite corner of the room, snagging it expertly on the handle of the cycle. Jack turned to Peter and said, “It is your night to pick the topic. What shall we discuss?”
“I have begun work on Boethius,” Peter replied, “and his notion of Divine time.”
Barth looked thoughtfully at Peter. “Time. Interesting topic. Some of the lab types at the College are messing about with that on a theoretical level.”
The board room of
down on them like wraiths. She spoke very quietly, her fingers never stopping their tense cadence.
“Yes.”
“We will not get the funding.”
“What?” The tiny man looked even smaller as the College vice-president stood up. She was a very big woman.
“The political situation simply does not favor such esoteric projects. . .”
“Do not tell me about the political situation. Get me the money.”
“It can’t be done.”
“Then quit. . .” And she looked at him now, sitting back down. This made the small man twist his hands. She somehow looked larger in the high back chair.
“I will see what I can do.”
“Yes.” The door shut again. One of the red nails moved to a small pin on her collar, a double headed eagle. She began to tap on it. A smile, tiny at first, jerked her face into motion. Her breathing became more rhythmic. She began to hear the sound of the Wind again. It was coming: the Message.
By this time the conversation had reached high water mark of the evening. The wine had lubricated them nicely. The preliminary banter was out of the way.
“But what can it mean, for God to be outside of time. . .” Jack looked disgusted. His analytic training was offended by anything that could not be quantified.
Maximos turned, “Of course, it may be a Mystery. Like the Holy Trinity. Perfectly possible, but super-rational.”
“Bother that!” Barth said. “What does it mean?”
Peter grunted, “But isn’t that the point, Barth? It has meaning only from within. . .”
“You mean we would have to experience timelessness to understand it fully?” Jack moaned.
“But not to see that the idea is coherent. . . There is a related discussion in Saint John of Damascus, blast it Peter you have spilled the wine! And it was good stuff too. . . Maggie bought. . . Peter?”
Peter gazed forward. His near sighted eyes were too focussed, but not on anyone in the room. His mouth was open. The wine from his glass dribbled over his trouser knee on to the flour. He was hearing the wind again.
The large motor roared to life in the basement. Men and women in white jackets scurried about like so many white rats in a maze. The experiment, the last if they got no more money, was beginning. Switches were pulled. More noises. The turbine began to whirl more and more loudly.
The woman sat alone still. Her mouth was open. Saliva pooled in the lip gloss in one corner of her mouth, cherry red. Her eyes were closed, but twitching. She began to laugh.
Beltway Buzz on National Review Online: “On his own standing with Republicans, McCain says, ‘I am the most sought-after of all Republicans … Particularly since the 2004 campaign, there has been a great softening of this dislike for me.’ McCain aides are even discussing the possibility of Karl Rove supporting his candidacy. McCain 2000 supporter and GOP lobbyist Ken Duberstein adds, ‘John has continued to be one of Bush’s strongest supporters. I think he’s been quite careful. He’s making all the right moves.’”
This is very, very funny.
John McCain is the most delusional man in the Senate. (Lincoln Chafee does not count since one must have an idea about which to be deluded.) McCain is insulated by his staff from the anger he generates in the party.
Many on the religious right dislike him, because they know he dislikes them. He votes to placate not on principle.
Many conservatives dislike him from the 2000 primaries. We were feeling better about him, but now he has betrayed the President on judges. Why? Everyone senses that McCain loves to be loved by the people “who count.” Conservative activists don’t hang out at the right parties and work for the mainstream media. McCain was a brave man, like John Kerry, who did one big, great thing as a young man and has been trading on it ever since. I respect him for his heroism and courage as a young man.
I cannot admire the old man that the hero became. He has a sense of entitlement. He has lost touch with the base of the party and does not care.
We will not forget. McCain is too old, looks older, and has had health issues. He is a dreadful public speaker and was given to gaffes in his only national run. McCain simply has too many foes to get the nomination. Now he has even more.
FOXNews.com - U.S. & World - Pa. Man Arrested on Terror Charges: “Grecula was angry at the government over losing custody of his children, with whom he fled to Malta. “
I would suggest that this proves the judge made the right call on the kids. A good rule of thumb is that a dad willing to sell bombs to terrorists is a bad dad.
You heard it here first.
Evangelicals rethink their public face - U.S. News - MSNBC.com
Here is one of those wishful thinking articles that you get from the Main Stream Media every so often. Anyone who lived during the eighties can easily recall the exact same articles being written at the time. As I argued during the election, Evangelicals, like all traditional Christians, cannot accept the institutionalization of what they view as murder or the state sanction of unnatural relationships. There is a place for an Evangelical “left” and a natural voting block of voters for it. However, it is severely hampered by being forced to associate with a secularist minority that controls the Democrat Party and extreme social engineering from that group. Until the Democrats give control to their religious majority, they will not win national elections except in fluke situations (paging Perot).
My comments in italics below:
Evangelical leaders are re-examining whether American evangelicalism has suffered from its portrayal as a conservative political movement rather than as a broad religious philosophy rooted in a literal reading of the Bible.
This is a factually true description of the Evangelical movement, but written in a way that is calculated to be misunderstood by most American readers. What is meant by “literal?” Do we mean the complex theology found in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrency? I think most people think “wooden” or “anti-intellectual” when they hear “literal.” In fact, my experience with students says that most evangelicals would reject what most people think is the “literal” reading of Scriptures. In short, this is the least sympathetic way of saying what is true about Evangelicals. A better way of wording this statement would be:
. . . rather than as a broad religious philosophy rooted in a traditional Protestant reading of the Bible.”
The double-talk begins here. Most of the article is centered on the white Evangelical community. This statistic seems (one cannot be sure) to measure the entire population of Evangelicals which would include a large plurality of African-Americans.
African-Americans number millions of Evangelical voters who for historical reasons over-whelmingly vote Democrat. This voting pattern by African-Americans is not new, may be declining, and is not a valid statistic to generate a story on white Evangelicals and traditional Catholics (the historic religious right) moving away from their traditional voting patterns.
In fact, the best poll, an actual election, conducted in November of last year showed white and Hispanic Evangelicals going overwhelmingly for President Bush.
It appears that this story assumes that in the last six months something new has happened to change this. However, it cites not a SINGLE post-election fact that would change the solid support Bush received.
In fact, his pro-life stands for Schaivo and for judges that value life may have cemented support for the President.
But two recent declarations by evangelical and conservative religious thinkers suggest that evangelicals have become too closely identified with conservative political activism, at the expense of attracting new followers. The declarations are likely to be hot topics of conversation when the Southern Baptist Convention holds its annual meeting next month in Nashville, Tenn.
Notice that one of these was done before (or in the context) of the election. The other has nothing to do with politics.
Because evangelicals have been portrayed as being very, very limited in their range of societal concerns, there is an element of challenge in the evangelical community to say, Lets not get caught up in narrow partisan concerns, said Mark L. Sargent, provost of Gordon College, a nondenominational Christian institution in Wenham, Mass. Many evangelicals say they feel very alienated with the partisan rhetoric in the nation.
I have written about the academic divide between many Evangelical academics and Evangelicals. Safe to say Mark L. Sargent was no fan of the religious right before the last election and is not one now. Gordon College does not represent the “right” of Evangelical colleges.
Evangelicals seek broader focus
The declarations a statement of principles by the National Association of Evangelicals and a study of growth in Southern Baptist congregations serve to crystallize discontent among many evangelical and conservative Christians with their public perception in recent years.
Notice that the statement by the NAE came just before George W. Bush got an overwhelming number of white Evangelical votes. The other study being cited describes the results of conservative/liberal theological struggle for the soul of the Southern Baptist denomination . It is just wrong to confuse this with concerns about conservative/liberal politics.
The NAE document, For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility, was the product of three years of work. It was created by two dozen scholars who bridged the spectrum of conservative to liberal evangelical thought encompassed by the organizations 45,000 churches, which represent 52 U.S. denominations. It was released in March for general distribution with a book of essays that expanded on its seven main points.
It may have represented a spectrum of “Evangelical thought” but did the group represent the consensus of Evangelicals. In other words, if liberals and conservatives were equally represented on the group, then liberals (one quarter of white Evangelicals) were grossly over-represented.
The statement is a diplomatically worded synthesis that reaffirms evangelicals traditional opposition to abortion, embryonic stem cell research, pornography and sexual libertinism. And it urges evangelicals to remain deeply engaged on those issues.
But evangelicals have failed to engage with the breadth, depth, and consistency to which we are called, says the statement. It was signed by nearly 100 of the nations most prominent evangelical leaders, among them James Dobson, chairman of Focus on the Family; Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention; David Neff, editor of Christianity Today; Charles Colson, president of the Prison Fellowship ministry; and the Rev. Rick Warren, author of the best-seller The Purpose-Driven Life.
In other words, it is only “news” if one had assumed that Evangelicals were in lock step on every issue. This story also hides the fact that this statement (see my earlier blog comments on it at the time) was first released before the election. It had no impact if it was intended to lesson the President’s vote.
Also note that older leaders of the religious right signed it. This suggests it is simply a restatement of traditional Evangelical concerns pressed into service by this writer to make a point the statement must not make. Otherwise we have to assume Dobson and Colson (to cite two examples) did not know what they were signing.
Are millions of white Evangelicals political liberals? Of course.
The Evangelical movement is so big that the quarter of the population that Bush lost still amounts to millions of citizens. There is a left-right spectrum in the Evangelical church, but as the last election proves almost all the flock is on the right end of the bell curve. The discovery of the Evangelical left by the press only shows how out of touch they are with one quarter of the American population.
Southern Baptists examine evangelism
The NAE statement is being debated simultaneously with a study published this month by theologian Thom S. Rainer, which concluded that the Southern Baptist Convention, the nations largest Protestant denomination, has fallen into an evangelistic crisis.
Who is debating both? Nobody is cited. Or is it that both are coming out at the same time and the reporter is linking them? If so, what justifies the linkage?
Evangelism is the heart of the traditional Baptist message. That has never changed. A cvil war over doctrine may have harmed evangelism, but that has nothing to do with Baptist political opinions.
The Southern Baptist Convention is not a member of the NAE, but it has become predominantly evangelical since 1979.
Rainer, dean of the Billy Graham School at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., argues that while the conservative resurgence of the last quarter-century has effectively transformed the convention into a theologically purer body, it has failed to attract new followers.
The Southern Baptist Convention is less evangelistic today than it was in the years preceding the conservative resurgence, writes Rainer, who found that the denominations number of annual baptisms has remained virtually unchanged since the 1950s. We must conclude that the evangelistic growth of the denomination is stagnant, and that the onset of the conservative resurgence has done nothing to improve this trend.
Of course unlike liberal groups, the Baptists have not been shrinking. This also fails to take into account that the Baptists fought a major theological civil war and did not lose numbers. That is amazing good news! There is a more pure Baptist church which can now start to build numbers! Of course, none of this has much of anything to do with American politics.
Rainers article supports the campaign for a renewal of broad evangelistic fervor in the denomination by the Rev. Bobby Welch, who was elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention last year partly on the strength of his promise to baptize 1 million new Southern Baptists.
What is the world does this have to do with the rest of the story? Only by confusing two uses of conservative can this be done.
Evangelical environmentalism
The NAE document, meanwhile, calls for social action on issues that, while of great concern to many evangelicals, have been overshadowed in the public arena by hot-button topics like abortion and same-sex marriage. More attention must be paid to employment, labor, housing, health care, education, human rights, racial equality and the environment, it says.
Sargent, of Gordon College, said in an interview that while the NAE statement brings no surprises, some of its principles could be difficult to accept for some on the conservative side of the spectrum.
Some of this statement is to challenge the larger evangelical community to have a broader perspective, he said, and leaders of conservative congregations, especially, might have to give reasons for why they chose to sign it.
Of course, that they did sign it may mean that it does not mean what an out of touch aging Evangelical academic hopefully tries to twist it into saying. Sargent and his ilk represent about one quarter of Evangelicals. The rest of us are still for ending racism, being good stewards of creation, but like conservative solutions to those problems. Hating racism is not a liberal monopoly and to imply that it is simply demonstrates the bias of the writer.
Most controversially, the NAE statement explicitly throws its weight behind the growing creation care environmental movement, which asserts that Christians are stewards of Gods creation. It is led by the Evangelical Environmental Network, best known for its What Would Jesus Drive? campaign.
As evangelical leaders, we need to step up to our responsibilities to be leaders in the fight for clean air and water, to stop the burning of rain forests, cruelty to animals, overuse of pesticides, and the countless other issues that result from our consumer-oriented lifestyles, R. Scott Rodin, former president of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, wrote in the book of essays that accompanied the report.
More Evangelical leaders nobody has heard of who publish books nobody reads. Rodin will not determine how Evangelicals vote since almost nobody has heard of Rodin. The quarter of Evangelicals that voted for Kerry will go on yelling that Evangelicals are not all Republicans which everyone admits.
Meanwhile groups like the Evangelical Environment Network, which I had never heard of until today (I work at one of the world’s largest Evangelical colleges), will go on getting noticed only by the Mainstream Media in man-bites-dog stories like this one. They often appear content to be useful idiots for the dominant secular leadership of the left. I trust this is not so, but it is sometimes hard to see.
Conservative Evangelicals are players in the Republican Party. The President is one of our own. Denny Hastert, the Speaker of the House, is a conservative who is a graduate of Wheaton College. John Thune, an up and coming Senator, is a card carrying member of the traditional right and a Biola graduate. What white, liberal Evangelical sits in any real power position in the Democrat party?
Conservative resistance
Many conservative evangelicals have traditionally rejected the environmental movement, both because of its liberal heritage and because of the biblical injunction that Christians should worship the creator, not his creation. Already, the statement has put the NAE at odds with allies of conservative evangelicals in Congress and the Bush administration.
This is just a lie. The late Francis Schaeffer, the intellectual architect of much of the religious right, was a strong supporter of the environment. All conservative Christians (basically) are.
Stewardship of creation is a subject I remember learning in my very conservative Christian school. The main stream media confuses resistance to statist solutions to these problems with indifference to the problems.
We want to have a spiritual country, and I would hate to think that we give in, and particularly organizations like the NAE, to a bunch of far-left-wing environmentalists, Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, said last month in an interview on The 700 Club, which airs on the Rev. Pat Robertsons Christian Broadcasting Network.
That is a worry, but only if we let the Main Stream Media and the minority of Evangelicals define what “concern for the environment” is. Socialism is bad for nature. Opposition to socialism is good for creation.
The trade journals Inside Fuels & Vehicles and Energy Washington Week, meanwhile, reported that NAE leaders were coming under pressure from the White House, which has pursued increasing drilling for oil and natural gas in previously protected areas.
But Sargent said conservative evangelicals were likely to lose ground in that battle.
What is Sargent’s track record as a political pundit? How does being provost of Gordon qualify him to opine on this topic? Of course, I am just a philosopher, but then I am not predicting that Evangelicals are about to do the opposite of what they did six months ago.
Part of the resistance to creation care has been because of the strong support for capitalism in the Cold War era, he said.
Sargent is historically ignorant if he believes this. The brilliant co-founder of Biola Lyman Stewart was an oil man and capitalist. He paired up with R.A. Torrey to develop the school. As D.L. Moody also demonstrates a linkage between free markets and Evangelicals decades before communism took power in Russia.
I think, in an era where the Cold War has faded and capitalism is not pitted so strongly against social issues, there is much less of a desire to embrace capitalism with all of its imperfections and more of a desire to have a responsible capitalism much more alert to the ways in which it can damage things that are important.
Sargent presents no data supporting this thesis. What is “responsible capitalism?” What are the imperfections of capitalism? Is Sargent confusing the imperfections of men with the imperfections of free markets? Perhaps responsible capitalism is compassionate conservatism?
Of course, we saw last week that many Christian academics at schools like Calvin hate capitalism. Sargent hangs out with those folk and may be influenced to view the movement as larger than it is.
The good news is the average pew sitter is not an academic. He or she works out in the real world and is not likely to start thinking that his or her job is less important than socialistic schemes to “save nature” that do nothing but enrich government workers.
We all want to conserve the beauty of God’s creation for our children. Most of us just don’t trust the government to do it.
Centrists compromise, averting filibuster faceoff - Politics - MSNBC.com
It is hard not to feel betrayed.
The seven Republicans who bought this deal were not friends to traditionalists, the unborn, or their own base.
I await the sane judgement of wiser political heads than mine, but this feels like sell out. Politics is not about feelings or the heart, and I know with my head that a deal may have been rational, but I cannot help hating it tonight.
My passion for the Republican Senate is much less tonight than yesterday. Do they care?
I. The Senate goes on talking about not talking as much. “Moderate” (see spineless) Republican and Democrat Senators are now meeting to preserve the right to go to more meetings. I feel thankful for this bit of news. Heaven knows the Republic could not stand it if Senators voted on issues instead of talking about voting. One can only hope that this leads to more Lincoln Chafee speeches. We all eagerly anticipate the collection of his speeches “The Conscience of a Something or Another: Why America Needs More Bloviating and Less Leadership.”
II. Torture is wrong. Sadaam is a wicked man, but a Christian polity cannot just act against him in any way.
However, it seems to me that the present fuss over a photo of Sadaam in his underpants is more about the speed of cameras and technology. They are now small, mixed into harmless technology, and essentially impossible to regulate.
I know that at any talk I give a student blogger is now placing notes, my voice, and soon my image live on his web site.
It appears that someone in the prison took unauthorized photos of Sadaam doing what prisoners have to do. That was wrong and it goes against prison policy. The fact that it could happen does not seem shocking given present technology. One hopes the photographer will be caught and punished.
But isn’t the Brit paper that ran the story really guilty of hypocrisy? Aren’t they the ones who have really exploited the situation? They could have run a story on the photos. . . but they did not have to publish the worst on the front page. “Just look at what those bad Americans are doing! No, really, really LOOK! Taking pictures LIKE THIS ONE is wrong.”
III. MSNBC writes about stem cells here. Ethical opposition is not mentioned until the second page after breathless “dreams” about benefits. Will we do anything to try to live forever? Note as well that the writer is stuck in the “only religion” mantra of the secular press. Religion does not contain knowledge. Victor Davis Hanson (one of my favorite writers) also gets stuck in this fifties stereotype proving that this lie is still believed by a few on the right. Hanson manages to generalize about the Middle Ages, Islam, holy books, and the Enlightenment all in a few paragraphs in a way that is false, but widely believed.
Everyone should slowly put down their copy of an Isaac Asimov sci-fi book and read some history of the philosophy of science. Proper religious knowledge advances science. It does not detract from it.
IV. I saw Star Wars last night. It is much better than the first two moves of this last trilogy, but that is like saying that Bill Clinton was a better president than Jimmy Carter. It would have been hard to be worse. In my theater the romance scenes (!) actually drew loud laughter from the hard core fans. They are that absurd.
The special effects are too busy. Basically the trailer for Narnia got as much applause in the theater as this film. It looked really, really good.
Like National Treasure, Star Wars is a good guilty pleasure. It is rotten, but fun. Why be a snob? However, as a fan I had hoped for more
V. Phillip E. Johnson is making rumblings about another book. Thoughtful people everywhere rejoice!
VI. Go read the Pepsi Code of Conduct. Who writes these things? Much of it is boiler plate corporate speak that is for what it for and against anything that everyone is against. The rest is leftist pap put out (one assumes) in the hope that Calvin College professors and other left of center folks will not stop protesting the President and turn on them.
My favorite page is this one.
Here the company hopes all employees will feel “comfortable and respected” regardless of individual. . . talents! Is this how they developed the Presidential Speech calling America the “middle finger?” Did the highly skilled President decide to speak like a nervous junior high lefty in order to make the less talented in the company feel respected? Or what?
Is anyone allowed to take a firm stand for the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in these things?
PepsiCo Community Affairs - HomePage: “The mission of the PepsiCo Community Affairs Department is:
To develop and maintain effective liaison with key national community organizations; to advise and assist divisions on key issues that potentially impact our image and business interest, especially in the African, Hispanic and Asian American communities; to effectively marshal the synergies of divisions towards a positive public image of the PepsiCo corporate name among our key consumer groups.”
“However, if used inappropriately -just like the U.S. itself- the middle finger can convey a negative message and get us in trouble. You know what I’m talking about. In fact, I suspect you’re hoping that I’ll demonstrate what I mean. And trust me; I’m not looking for volunteers to model.”
Thanks to Hugh Hewitt for reporting (via Power Line) what the President of PepsiCO thinks of the USA. In a speech to the Columbia Business School she said:
Power Line: The Raspberry Statement: “This analogy of the five fingers as the five major continents leaves the long, middle finger for North America, and, in particular, The United States. As the longest of the fingers, it really stands out. The middle finger anchors every function that the hand performs and is the key to all of the fingers working together efficiently and effectively. This is a really good thing, and has given the U.S. a leg-up in global business since the end of World War I.
However, if used inappropriately -just like the U.S. itself- the middle finger can convey a negative message and get us in trouble. You know what I’m talking about. In fact, I suspect you’re hoping that I’ll demonstrate what I mean. And trust me; I’m not looking for volunteers to model.
Discretion being the better part of valor…I think I’ll pass.
What is most crucial to my analogy of the five fingers as the five major continents is that each of us in the U.S. - the long middle finger- must be careful that when we extend our arm in either a business or political sense, we take pains to assure we are giving a hand…not the finger. Sometimes this is very difficult. Because the U.S. -the middle finger- sticks out so much, we can send the wrong message unintentionally.
Unfortunately, I think this is how the rest of the world looks at the U.S. right now. Not as part of the hand -giving strength and purpose to the rest of the fingers- but, instead, scratching our nose and sending a far different signal.”
I asked my favorite parody activist the Rev. Dale Owens to respond:
Now you might anticipate that I would think this speech inappropriate. Some dull, red state voters (you know who you are) might find this offensive. A few narrow minded members of the religious right (you too know who you are) might find it offensive. There might even be a few million Pepsi drinkers who might stop drinking this soda until this woman finds a new line of work. In fact, I suspect tens of millions of flag saluting, Bush voting, pick up driving rubes will select a new soda. I have been told another is available.
You might be one of those thinking of boycotting PepsiCo until they do something about this outrage.
This would be sad.
First, don’t you realize that this President has a right to speak her mind? What CEO would dare to tell such a powerful President to be quiet?
Is this America or a dictatorship? Some conservatives may be thinking, “Well, she has a right to speak her mind, but I don’t have to buy her product!” Don’t you see how chilling this is to free speech? Speech is only free when all of us are willing to pay someone to make it. This woman has bravely attacked the US policies at a university. Where else will university students hear hatred of George Bush’s policies if not from the head of PepsiCo? Do you believe college professors, a conservative lot, will do so? The more the President of PepsiCo offends people the greater the duty Pepsi has to pay her. In fact, as an act of free speech solidarity, they should increase her salary.
Some would suggest that if this business leader had compared a minority group to the middle finger she would and should be fired. And of course all good Americans agree. For you see, some speech educes freedom in the audience and some destroys it. Conservative hate speech destroys my happiness, while this sort of speech increases it. The pursuit of happiness is basic to the welfare of our nation. So PepsiCo does not just have a duty to let their President offend millions of customers and attack this nation . . . they have a duty to do so.
If conservatives really believed in our nation, they would ask PepsiCo to let this woman loose to say even more liberating things. What does she think of apple pie? Is motherhood slavery? Is the Roman Catholic Church un-American?
Telling the truth about the troubling nature of apple pie (oppressive to farm workers who pick apples), motherhood (need I say), and Rome (Benedict XVI) may drive away customers, but I am confident from this action that PepsiCO does not care. They are brave and not centered in profit! PepsiCo stock holders should rejoice as they place politics over profit!
Second, think how subtle this analogy of the hand really is. One thinks of Plato’s analogy of the three fingers in Republic. Who knows if this classical reference may not have informed her speech? Giving the finger to the system is the authentic voice of the people. It is the modern equivalent to the Sistine Chapel. Clueless right-wingers may not see it, but in giving American the finger she salutes real America. True America knows Bush and his polices are a mess. They know that to be juvenile in response to his crimes is real maturity.
Can’t the rightwing radio critics understand? Not Hugh Hewitt. He believes in the unsubtle and non-academic thesis that one loves a nation best by loving it. Not Frank Pastore who goes on quoting, reasoning, and arguing as if that was the best way to think. Instead the President of PepsiCo has shown that she is not thinking at all, but following her heart. What better person is there to run a company?
What better place than at a commencement to give the nation the finger? What better time than wartime? Does no right wing reader recognize the tragic irony of the “discretion is the better part of valor” quotation? Does nobody see the hours that must have been spent; the PepsiCo products consumed while this leader thought of how to give the nation the finger and decided to do so by literally giving it the finger?
It is Shakespearian and so much more.
Isn’t true patriotism found in the person who is willing to admit that she loathes the nation making her rich?
Whatever, the President of PepsiCo said George W. Bush has said worse. You must realize that any behavior must be justified in the light of the times in which we live. Newsweek lied and people died, but George Bush is president! Americans should not bother with Newsweek and must continue to be critical of the President! He is after all, God/Nature/Myself help us a Republican! Terrorists are killing are people in Iraq, but George Bush is President. He is doing Republican things EVERY DAY! He must remain our focus! The economy is booming, but the George Bush is President so we must not let prosperity and “winning” a war to distract us. George Bush must be removed, because he is George Bush!
Finally, Pepsi does not need Red State, patriotic soda drinkers. Pepsi can be confident that there exists a large pool of latte sipping Blue Staters waiting to make a statement by switching to Pepsi. No more Starbucks for these folk. In their hundreds they will clog man/woman/person/fully to the grocery/whole foods/farmers market and purchase PepsiCo products.
PepsiCo would be wise to ignore the so-called New Media. Watch ABC tonight. Will the story make the major networks? Will Dan Rather report it? If he does not, then it must be news. I myself have been shocked at how little news there is . . . since Dan Rather has reported so little of late, but there you have it. PepsiCo must play by the rules of media engagement that wise men have followed since the 1950’s.
END OF REV. OWENS.
Points to any readers who can send me email from some Old Media figures using a form of the Rev. Dale’s arguments.
Here is the PR puffery. Are you placated yet? My suggested additions for PepsiCo in italics.
HughHewitt.com: “‘Following my remarks to the graduating class of Columbia University’s Business School in New York City, I have come to realize that my words and examples about America unintentionally depicted our country negatively and hurt people.
Just because I lack the judgment to realize that giving America the finger would hurt some people does not mean I should not be trusted to make multi-million dollar decisions. Just because I spoke as if in a junior high locker room with the depth of a first year speech student does not mean that I should not be paid millions of dollars to speak for a major company.
I appreciate the honest comments that have been shared with me since then, and am deeply sorry for offending anyone.
I am not sorry for what I said, but sorry that America has so many rubes that it is offended when I am offensive.
I love America unshakably - without hesitation - and am extremely grateful for the opportunities and support our great nation has always provided me.
Though when I think of America and am given five options, America most reminds me of the middle finger of the hand.
‘Over the years I’ve witnessed and advised others how a thoughtless gesture or comment can hurt good, caring people.
Read: Many good, caring people are too silly to know that present Administration policy is evil. I should have realized that.
Regrettably, I’ve proven my own point. I made a mistake and, again, I’m very sorry.’
Of course, I still think exactly the same thing and evidently PepsiCo agrees with me since I do not have to repudiate anything I said. Nobody at the company is saying I was wrong, just that they are sorry you are offended. So there Hugh Hewitt!
As promised, we are beginning to put up movie and media reviews done by some of my students. Right now the main reviewer is Nate Bell. . . one of the real gems of the program and a great writer.
His reviews are here. Soon we hope to have other reviews as well as a more interactive format.
Enjoy!
Touchstone Magazine - Mere Comments: “Unlike John Eldredge and the Wild at Heart phenomenon, Chanski doesn’t attempt to baptize Iron John or any other men’s movement. Instead, he just offers a plainspoken biblical picture of how a man is to train himself in self-control to make decisions and to make sacrifices.
The book resonated so much with me because it identifies the precise problem several of my friends and I have noticed in a new generation of evangelical men, most of whom have grown up in the soft therapeutic ethos of our contemporary church life. After reading this book, my friend Randy Stinson, executive director of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, challenged an audience of evangelical college student men to consider that the Scripture created them to rule creation and yet ’some of you don’t even have dominion over your hair.’”
The best religious blog (of the best religious magazine) nails a big problem in our culture. Anyone who has every labored to get a college guy to finally work up the passion to simply propose to the woman he claims he loves knows the truth of this observation.
Hugh Hewitt’s comments on the LA Times and the mayor’s race are as good as anything you will read today.
A new feature of this blog. . . a quick hit on everything that matters in the news.
I. In news political, Hugh Hewitt will be the place to watch for breaking news on the fight to free pro-life judges from the tyranny of the minority. Are you a traditional Christian? Next election just remember that only one part would let you or your children serve on the courts.
II. Star Wars fever is upon us, Aslan. And that is the problem for Lucas. The nation has discovered fun movies with an actual plot (think Lord of the Rings) and now is panting for the Chronicles of Narnia.
Lucas cannot develop a plot, but he is good at filming one. Too bad he is not directing someone else’s story.
The last two films are so bad that I have never really been able to watch them on DVD. Natalie Portman by herself could kill any film, but Natalie Portman (soon to be famous for having been cute) reading the worst love lines ever written for film is unbearable. Natalie Portman is in this film which means there will be bits of it to make everyone cringe.
Only the true fan boys care about this film amongst the college set. Like Star Trek after the eighties, Star Wars is a fetish of the old or the Sci-Fi fanatic. (I fit both camps.)
So the aging true believers and the Star Wars Club on campus (for which I am faculty advisor) will be there today and I will go as well. Why? Star Wars was fun when I was a kid. It wasn’t Citizen Kane, thank the Emperor over the Sea, and it also wasn’t Klute. Lucas wins eternal movie-going gratitude for helping kill off the sort of self-centered vanity projects so ugly and so self-centered that they looked like an Oscar acceptance speech with a plot. Back then he was first to spear the Great White Fonda and end dull, sermonizing movies.
Now he is describing his film in politically correct, dull, sermonizing tones at places like Cannes!
The rest of us may go, but we are really waiting to love the film of the year: Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
III. The New York Yankees are playing good baseball again. This is proof of the eternal depravity of the human condition. It is also the strongest argument for the non-existence of a good God.
IV. LA has a new mayor. Nobody is sure who he is. Nobody would know anything informative from the worst “live” blog in the history of the universe. The Corner posts more quickly on a minor Senate hearing. There was no banter at the Times, no rapid response, just essays without any soul. Boiler plate newspaper copy in small chunks is not the new media, folks.
I am offering a free ticket to GODBLOG 2005 at Biola to anyone at the LA Times who wants to learn about the new media. They can contact us here.
V. The new fireworks show at Disneyland is the best ever. If you do not see it, then you will have missed the most remarkable deployment of resources in the service of entertainment and lighting up the sky since Walt first thought to have Tinkerbell fly over the castle at the start of The Wonderful World of Disney.
VI. See a mainstream journalist jump the shark! See a serious man become a clown before your very eyes! Keith Olbermann says of our President and his administration:
