One Wedding and a Funeral: Family Update

My wife has reflected on two recent moments in our family lives: our third wedding anniversary and the death of our cat, Gloria.

My thoughts (in order of importance).

Gloria was a great cat. She was very pretty and sweet and peaceful, contributing a wonderful presence in our home. When ever I was home alone, she'd sleep in the bed. When I stayed up all night writing a paper, Gloria was just as exhausted as I was the next day, having sat next to me through every paragraph. If I read in a certain chair she'd sit on my lap. She was our first pet and I'll remember her for a long time -- especially since I'll be finding her long hair in my books for decades.

Maggie is a great wife. She is very pretty and sweet and peaceful, contributing a wonderful presence to our home.... wait a minute?

Seriously, I love my wife and am so thankful for her. She is the Lord's greatest earthly gift to me. We watched our wedding on home video last night for the first time since only a few weeks after our marriage began. I was so encouraged and thankful as I listened to the vows we exchanged. She has kept every one, which is no easy task when you're married to a sinner like me. Her faithfulness and loveliness is not dependent on my actions. I have no worries about our marriage, because her near-perfect love for me has cast out all my fear. In this, she daily exhibits to me the powerful, sanctifying love of God my Father.

Thank you, baby. May I love you so well.

Everyone Lives in a Ghetto

Or so says this week's edition of The Economist. In "The Big Sort" (June 19th 2008, The Economist), the authors observe that Americans tend to surround themselves with like-minded people. Conservatives with conservatives; liberals with liberals.

Check out these stats:

In 1976 Jimmy Carter won the presidency with 50.1% of the popular vote. Though the race was close, some 26.8% of Americans were in "landslide counties" that year, where Mr. Carter either won or lost by 20 percentage points or more. The proportion of Americans who live in such landslide counties has nearly doubled since then. In the dead-heat election of 2000, it was 45.3%. When George Bush narrowly won re-election in 2004, it was a whopping 48.3%.

This isn't just gerrymandering, either. Americans are very mobile. While we usually move for practical reasons (e.g., new job), once we decide to move we normally have lots of choices on neighborhoods. And house income (itself a poor predictor of political affiliation in America) is not the only factor -- in most cities, there are several neighborhoods that share the same price range but are culturally very different.

How does this affect the national conversation? Basically, it eliminates it altogether.

Because Americans are so mobile, even a mild preference for living with like-minded neighbors leads over time to severe segregation. An accountant in Texas, for example, can live anywhere she wants, so the liberal ones move to the funky bits of Austin while the more conservative ones prefer the exurbs of Dallas... Over time, this means Americans are ever less exposed to contrary views. In a book called "Hearing the Other Side," Diana Mutz of the University of Pennsylvania crunched survey data from 12 countries and found that Americans were the least likely of all to talk about politics with those who disagreed with them. Intriguingly, the more educated Americans become, the more insular they are. Better-educated people tend to be richer, so they have more choice about where they live. And they are more mobile.

This doesn't bode well for a healthy democracy. Democracies depend on more than just majority-rule. They hope for national consensus through freedom of thought and speech and civil discourse. The lack of a national conversation makes such discourse highly unlikely.

There is a danger in this. Studies suggest that when a group is ideologically homogeneous, its members tend to grow more extreme... Voters in landslide districts tend to elect more extreme members of Congress. Moderates who might otherwise run for office decide not to. Debates turn into shouting matches. Bitterly partisan lawmakers cannot reach the necessary consensus to fix long-term problems such as the tottering pensions and health-care systems. America, says Mr. [Bill] Bishop [author of "The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America is Tearing Us Apart"], is splitting into "balkanised communities whose inhabitants find other Americans to be culturally incomprehensible."

These dangers are intensified by trends beside residential segregation: for instance, cable channels which only reinforce prejudices (right or wrong) and home-schooling movements which are motivated by sheltering rather than equipping the next generation of Americans. "We now live in a giant feedback loop," says Mr. Bishop, "hearing our own thoughts about what's right and wrong bounced back to us by the television shows we watch, the newspapaers and books we read, the blogs we visit online, the sermons we hear and the neighbourhoods we live in."

People within and without conservative American evangelicalism criticize the existence of a Christian subculture, rightfully so. Christians avoid non-Christian books, music, artists, pundits. They workout at their church's gym. They watch Fox News and listen to Janet Parshall or James Dobson or Rush Limbaugh exclusively.

This article shows that such "clustering" might be a natural tendency. But Christians must resist this temptation. Circling the wagons (physically or mentally) and refusing to engage alternate ideas is hazardous. Some may call it wise and safe, but it's lazy and dangerous.

Raising Taxes and Informed Morality

Here is a helpful walk-through on some of the reasoning behind conservative views on raising taxes, illustrating why conservatives believe such actions usually negatively affect the economy and the taxpayer while only marginally helping the government.

Here's a line to raise the eyebrows: "It is shocking to think that we have a presidential candidate who would make the private sector $5 poorer in order to make the government $1 richer." ("Obama Turns FDR Upside Down," by Lawrence Lindsey, The Wall Street Journal) That's right, persons are taxed in such a way as to lose $5 while the government gains $1. You might wonder how that could be? Read the article to find out.

But you also might wonder, why read it? The minutiae of tax policy is only for policy wonks and professionals, right? Voters are only to consider matters of principle when casting their votes.

Campaigns are built off this misconception. Presidential candidates and political professionals are well aware of voters' aversion to detail. So they cast their tax policy claims in terms of "fairness" -- the conservatives claim that the government has no right to take more money than they need (which is less than the liberals think) and the liberals claim that the wealthy are not putting in their fair share (which is more than the conservatives think).

Now, I suspect both campaigns and many voters are often disingenuous when appealing to "fairness." Notice, for instance, how the appeal in speeches is always to the suffering middle class, never the 12.5% of Americans living below the poverty line. That aside, there are ethical concerns worthy of discussion in these questions. They center on two issues: how much does the government need and who's going to pay for it.

What people miss (and what politicians and media often hide) is that there are pragmatic considerations as well, considerations which must inform the ethical issues. In these sorts of gray areas, you can't begin to make an ethical decision without knowing the facts. So, move past the rhetoric and take some time to understand the boring details. In a democracy, we are all the ruling class. Rule well.

Taking Back Heaven (Part 2)

Yesterday, I considered the frequent abuse of Christian truth in times of death. What can a pastor do to counter this abuse within the church and within the wider culture? Here are some thoughts. Again, follow-up with yours.

1. Prepare your church. We must prepare our people for suffering, for their own sake and for the sake of a watching world. If we wait until tragedy strikes, people will not have the theological and practical reserves to endure it faithfully. As a result, they will search for comfort elsewhere, in alcohol or fantasies or atheism. Preach and teach about suffering and death, heaven and hell. Teach salvation history, which culminates in Christ glorified. Sing about the River Jordan.

Two resources: John Piper and CCEF. John Piper seems to have made it his mission to esteem suffering these past years. Desiring God has an incredible amount of powerful resources relating to suffering, including a helpful compendium of talks, Suffering and the Sovereignty of God. As well, CCEF (David Powlison, Paul Tripp, Ed Welch, et al.) helps to give a gospel vision of the everyday, tragic and mundane. By practicing trusting God daily, the Lord is preparing us to face the promised affliction.

2. Watch and listen critically (ahead of time). Not only must we provide positive instruction, we must listen for times when correction is needed. The funeral of the anorexic mother of three or the fallen American soldier is not the ideal time for theological correction. Listen critically to your flock's thoughts and expressions during casual times. When a pet dies and parents comfort their children with All Dogs Go to Heaven, make it a priority to find an appropriate time to engage them on eternity.

3. Be willing to correct even in the hard times. Again, deaths and funerals are not the ideal time to correct someone, but consider that we taught them this error. They are responding poorly partly because the church has failed to speak clearly on eternity. It's not as if they are appealing to Buddha for comfort -- they are using Christian truth to anesthetize. At some point, the church needs to own up to our failings and speak against error. I should own it if given the chance.

4. Preach funerals. I have not had the privilege of preaching a funeral. The thought of officiating an unbeliever's funeral frightens me. I think I'd do it in a heartbeat, though, because of the opportunity to teach people to interpret death in a way that is faithful to Scripture and to the gospel, to provide hurting loved ones the chance to own their hurt fully and unashamedly, but without either total despair or religious dishonesty.

5. Respond to tragedy. As a pastor, be the first to respond to tragedy. Model Christian suffering by owning your own heartache, both in personal affairs and public, in a self-controlled, biblically-comforted, gospel-centered, sovereignty-trusting, God-glorifying way. This requires that we also be prepared.

A wonderful example is an NPR interview with John Piper responding to the 2004 Tsunami which killed more than 225,000 people. It is phenomenal. Piper, fully aware that he is speaking to a non-believer, talks with a boldness matched only by his compassion. I am struck most by her interest in the Christian theodicy -- it's clear Piper is providing an answer she has never heard from anywhere else.

May the Lord provide more such opportunities to take back heaven and more faithful ministers to take them.

Taking Back Heaven (Part 1)

Likely, you already know that Tim Russert died last Friday suddenly of a heart attack. For nearly twenty years, he has been the host of Meet the Press. From that post, he made an indelible mark on the press and political happenings of America with his inimitable interviewing style. He combined respect, intensity, fairness and friendliness. I often lamented to myself that such an excellent news show aired live Sunday mornings while I was at church, forcing me to only catch snippets later in headline news.

While death is nearly always sobering, especially one as sudden as Russert's (he was 58), it's often a good opportunity to learn about someone's life and influence. I have enjoyed reading reflections on Russert by fellow journalists, pundits, and politicians.

However, eulogies of public personas are frequently accompanied by platitudes. These range from empty appeals to transcendence to gross misrepresentations of Christian glory. Heaven is painted in all its humanist glory, in this case, an American political scientist's paradise, with Jefferson and Hamilton and Roosevelt and Kennedy and McGovern all having a grand time reflecting on their own greatness, with the deceased at the center of it all. In the next case, maybe it would be Hollywood's greatest. There are as many manifestations of heaven as there are eulogies, with one thing in common -- there is no Christ. There is no Creator God. There is no cherubim chanting, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." Plainly, there is no resemblance to the biblical portrait of Heaven.

It's hard to listen to these, even harder to call them into question, without feeling insensitive to the truly great experience of loss, even if that loss is not truly communicated. Yet, while it's meant to assuage my hurt, it intensifies my sadness.

This is the price we are paying for merely innoculating people with the truth of the gospel. This is empty Christianity. They understand it enough to pacify themselves when suffering comes, yet not enough to tremble. With Neitzsche and Marx, we can agree that religion, at least in these cases, is merely an opiate for the masses.

Please know, I am not speaking against the confessed faith of Tim Russert. I pray that he was a believer; I cannot know myself. I am speaking about those left to mourn, who grasp at the transcendence nearest to them, which is usually Christianity.

What are we, as Christian pastors, to do when the gospel is corrupted by truly mourning people? Does "mourning with those who mourn" include ignoring heresy? Think with me about these questions. I'll post some thoughts in the next post. You post yours.

(EDIT: Newsweek has an article about Tim Russert's devout Catholic faith. HT: Denny Burk)

Fruits of our Labor

I have been encouraged and challenged in my study of the biblical languages and I thought I'd pass said encouragement around.

For an upcoming class, I've been reading a doctoral dissertation by Richard M. Davidson entitled Typology In Scripture: A study of hermeneutical "typos" structures (in the Andrews University Seminary Doctoral Dissertation Series). It is very helpful -- slowly walking through each hermeneutical use of typology by the NT authors, which happen to be some of the most difficult and consequential passages in Scripture.

While the book could be understood without access to Greek by a persistent reader, many of his supporting arguments would be lost without a minimal knowledge. Also, a critical reading of his findings would be very difficult, forcing the reader to agree with the author only for lack of adequate faculties with which to engage the argument. Overall, the book would not be as helpful to the one without any language experience.

We are blessed to have access to a wealth of good English translations, commentaries, studies, and other resources which do not require a knowledge of the original languages. I am so thankful for scholars who are committed to serving the church within its language context. But we are also blessed to have access to many more resources which do require such knowledge, like Davidson's Typology in Scripture. In just a few semesters of Greek completed by an average student, I have found opportunity to be thankful for these scholars as well. I expect greater opportunities with further study.

Such blessings are not available to every gospel minister. All the more reason to avail myself of them while I can.

Maggie Extraordinaire

My wife has a sexy intellect. I love watching her read big history books, listen to NPR and get A's on her term papers. Now, I have additional opportunity to be infatuated. She started blogging at The Ainsworth Abode. While wisdom would have you avoid any infatuation, I'm certain that reading her musings will prove edifying for you and others.

Recently, in commenting on a TIME article, she offered a Christian response to childhood obesity, one of countless contemporary expressions of American idolatry. It is indeed an epidemic and will have disastrous results in individual lives, families and the larger society, much farther than the epidemiologists suggest. Sure, there will be greater disease, death and economic hardship but what will be the spiritual cost of hundreds of thousands serving the god in their belly?

Too Much Faith in Faith

That is the title of a Wall Street Journal piece by Alan Jacobs, a professor at Wheaton College. He wonders if people put too much stock in the role of religion in current events. While many commentators differ if faith brings a net benefit or net loss to humanity, they all claim religion has a tremendous impact.

Is it, though?... I have my doubts, and they begin with personal experience. I am by most measures a pretty deeply committed Christian. I am quite active in my church; I teach at a Christian college; I have written extensively in support of Christian ideas and belief. Yet when I ask myself how much of what I do and think is driven by my religious beliefs, the honest answer is "not so much." The books I read, the food I eat, the music I listen to, my hobbies and interests, the thoughts that occupy my mind throughout the greater part of every day -- these are, if truth be told, far less indebted to my Christianity than to my status as a middle-aged, middle-class American man.

This is a striking confession, one in many ways I need to join in on. But is this lifestyle true to Scripture, which famously instructs us, "Seek first the kingdom of God" and "Whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all things to the glory of God" and "Take up your cross and follow me"?

That aside, Jacobs does a great job of illustrating the inconsistency in the new atheists' grumble. They are far more trusting of confessed religious sentiments than they are of other claims to altruistic motivations.

When people say that they are acting out of religious conviction, I tend to be skeptical; I tend to wonder whether they're not acting as I usually do, out of motives and impulses over which I could paint a thin religious veneer but which are really not religious at all... Most of today's leading critics of religion are remarkably trusting in these matters. Card-carrying members of the intelligentsia like Mr. Hitchens, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris would surely be doubtful, even incredulous, if a politician who had illegally seized power claimed that his motives for doing so were purely patriotic; or if a CEO of a drug company explained a sudden drop in prices by professing her undying compassion for those unable to afford her company's products. Discerning a difference between people's professed aims and their real aims is just what intellectuals do.

A number of times, I have been faced with the task of reconciling Crusaders or Conquistadors with my Christian faith. It is one of the most frustrating ploys used by unbelievers, a magic "Get Out of Argument" free card. Jacob's argument is helpful at stripping this backhanded-complimenting ad hominem argument. And he concludes with a call to look beyond the religious claims to the deeper problem that needs answering.

Is religion powerful? I suppose it often is. After all, if people were not religious -- or, to take a Gibbonesque view of the matter, if people did not want to be thought of as so -- no one would use religious language to promote political or social or ethnic goals. That those seeking to acquire or keep power do use such language, and regularly, indicates that religion has influence. But the idea that without religion people would stop seeking power, stop manipulating, stop deceiving, is just wishful thinking of the silliest kind. Though it may seem ironic for a Christian to be saying this, it's time to talk less about the power of religion and remember instead the dark forces in all human lives that religious language is too often used to hide.

Who are we celebrating?

Okay. Imagine yourself beginning to read an article about an event in the Christian music scence. The first line of the article reads,

The night was about him.

Jesus, right? Wrong. Cue next line.

Everything from the red carpet to the ice sculpture celebrated TobyMac, the artist behind the recent Christian hits Burn for You, Made to Love and Lose My Soul.

I'm not the only one who noticed the irony. The reporter from Houston's Chronicle wondered how the limosuine, red carpet, house-size posters of self, and ice sculpture of same connects with a line from a recent song, "I don't want to gain the whole world and lose my soul."

Toby Mac credited his friends from keeping him in check and reminding him who his "first love" is. I am glad for that. But I wonder whether, after this self-celebration, his fans and the city of Houston might also need some reminding.

"He must increase, but I must decrease," John 3:30

Theodicy and the Unbeliever

The New Yorker has a well-written article by James Wood on the problem of evil and the felt inadeqaucy of many theodicies. Take some time to read through it and consider an unbeliever's response to what my philosophy professor, Ted Cabal, says is the greatest problem faced by all religions. What strikes you about his reflections? How would you counsel him?

What struck me was how I could feel my heart agreeing with him. "Yeah, life is really awful. How can such unexplainable, gratuitous evil happen? God is big -- why doesn't he just do something?" On reflection, though, Wood's perspective is fundamentally man-centered. Romans 9 clearly presents such a viewpoint as entirely flawed. It is our Creator God's sovereign prerogative to do what we wills. He will show mercy on whom he will show mercy. Period. Job ends similarly, with God asking Job "Where were you when I created the foundations of the world?"

Our pride more than our reason often finds such an answer inadequate. You can hear it in the atheists hatred for religion. It's especially palpable, as Wood points out, in the writing of former-Christians. From discussing Bart Erham's latest book God's Problem: Why We Suffer, he reflects on the incessant questioning of God, Why?!:

There is something adolescent about such complaint; I can hear it like a boy’s breaking voice in my own prose. For anti-theodicy is permanent rebellion. It is not quite atheism but wounded theism, condemned to argue ceaselessly against a God it is supposed not to believe in.

This ought to cue both reader and writer that such a complaint is not as grounded in reason as they would like.

Read the essay here.

On the Sadness of Higher Education

When I graduated with an undergraduate degree from the University of Florida, the officiator announced to us that we had now entered the "educated" class.

A few years out, I realize that I am far from earning such a title. Often, I feel like I'm playing catchup in history, philosophy, science and even English, my declared major. My English degree consisted of just 10 advanced English classes of my choosing. No survey requirements. No theory requirements. No seminars. As well, those classes available were so narrow in their focus that I left without a broad understanding of literature, but with a minor knowledge of 10 niches. Could prove useful if I ever find myself in a discussion about postcolonial or creole literature, but I'm still waiting for that cocktail party.

"On the Sadness of Higher Education" by Alan Charles Kors is an excellent essay about the present state of university education (published in The New Criterion; HT: The Wall Street Journal). He describes the transition from universities teaching critical thinking skills and broad understanding which would render such skills useful, to the university in loco parentis, indoctrinating political and social beliefs while neglecting critical thinking to support or deny those beliefs. If you have experience with large universities and colleges, they'll be much to smirk at. Here are some great lines to encourage you to read it in full:

"Those often kindly [liberal] teachers, however, do have a sense of urgent mission. Even if we put them on truth-serum, the academics who dominate the humanities and social sciences on our campuses today would state that K-12 education essentially has been one long celebration of America and the West, as if our students were intimately familiar with the Federalist Papers and had never heard of slavery or empire. Having convinced themselves that the students whom they inherit have been immersed in American and Western traditions without critical perspective—they do believe that—contemporary academics see themselves as having merely four brief years in which to demystify students, and somehow to get them to look up from their Madison and Hamilton long enough to gaze upon the darker side of American and Western life. In their view, our K-12 students know all about Aristotle, John Milton and Adam Smith, have studied for twelve years how America created bounty and integrated score after score of millions of immigrants, but have never heard of the Great Depression or segregation.

Academics, in their own minds, face an almost insoluble problem of time. How, in only four years, can they disabuse students of the notion that the capital, risk, productivity and military sacrifice of others have contributed to human dignity and to the prospects of a decent society? How can they make them understand, with only four years to do so, that capitalism and individual- ism have created cultures that are cruel, inefficient, racist, sexist and homophobic, with oppressive caste systems, mental and behavioral? How, in such a brief period, can they enlighten "minorities," including women (the majority of students), about the "internalization" of their oppression (today's equivalent of false consciousness)? How, in only eight semesters, might they use the classroom, curriculum and university in loco parentis to create a radical leadership among what they see as the victim groups of our society, and to make the heirs of successful families uneasy in the moral right of their possessions and opportunities? Given those constraints, why in the world should they complicate their awesome task by hiring anyone who disagrees with them?"

"In my fantasies, I try to imagine a way to force these academic enterprises to engage in the truth in advertising they claim to value. Let colleges and universities have the courage, if they truly believe what they say privately to themselves and to me, to put it on page one of their catalogues, fundraising letters and appeals to the state assembly: "This University believes that your sons and daughters are the racist, sexist, homophobic, Eurocentric progeny or victims of an oppressive society from which most of them receive unjust privilege. In return for tuition and massive taxpayer subsidy, we shall assign rights on a compensatory basis and undertake by coercion their moral and political enlightenment.""

And last, "The power of universities comes from their monopoly of credentials. As Richard Vedder so deeply understands in his "Going Broke by Degree," they are the only institutions allowed to separate young individuals by IQ and by the ability to complete complex tasks. They do not add value to that, except in technical fields. Recruiters do not pay premiums because of what the Ivy League or the flagship state universities teach in English, history, political science, or sociology. They hire there despite, not because of, that. Recruiters do not pay premiums because our children have been sent to multicultural centers for sensitivity training. Recruiters pay premiums for the value already there, which universities merely identify. So long as recruiters pay premiums, however, it is rational for parents who wish to gain the most options for their children to send them to the university with the most prestigious degree.