Saturday, October 31, 2009

Culture wars:
Jared Wilson Enhanced

I mentioned how much I liked Jared Wilson's "Funny, I don't Feel Neoconnish" posted at Evangel. His ten points about why the "culture wars" are going to hell --

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Romans 7:1-6 --
"Free From Law to Live By the Spirit"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Christian Carnival CCC (300) - Silver Denarii Edition

As Jeremy said when he assigned me this Carnival - the 300th is a big edition. So, wanting some kind of theme - I put "three hundred" into a Bible search. Other than "mighty men" and shields in the Old Testament, I came up with this passage:

John 12:1-8 Then, six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom he had raised from the dead. So they prepared a dinner for Jesus there. Martha was serving, and Lazarus was among those present at the table with him. Then Mary took three quarters of a pound of expensive aromatic oil from pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus. She then wiped his feet dry with her hair. (Now the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfumed oil.) But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was going to betray him) said, “Why wasn’t this oil sold for three hundred silver coins and the money given to the poor?” (Now Judas said this not because he was concerned about the poor, but because he was a thief. As keeper of the money box, he used to steal what was put into it.) So Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She has kept it for the day of my burial. For you will always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me!”

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Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Romans 6:15-23 --
"Free - and a Slave"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Sunday, October 25, 2009

The Problem of Evil:
Free Will and the Quantity of Evil

Luke at Common Sense Atheism is continuing his series Arguing about Evil with the post "Plantinga’s Free Will Defense". Go read that.

This was started as a comment there, and then got to long-winded to keep as a comment.

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Saturday, October 24, 2009

Romans 6:12-14
"Sin Shall Not Be Your Master"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Thursday, October 22, 2009

Theistic Arguments:
Reasonable Expectations

The "straw that broke the camel's back" for this post was this comment over at Common Sense Atheism:

Hey don’t you know Bill Craig and Plantinga have proven Christian theism?
Now, I love those guys; and I fashion myself as a Christian apologist. However, do I think I can prove Christian theism?

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Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Romans 5:21-6:14
"A New Identity "

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Tuesday, October 20, 2009

"The Trilemma":
An Invitation to a Shredding

The headline quote on my blog is called "The Trilemma": fool, demon, or God. Now, personally, I think most folks fall into one of those or the fourth which Lewis says is not open: great moral teacher. I was over participating in a thread at Common Sense Atheism and someone said

“By and large, [C.S. Lewis's] theology, like his apologetics, is embarrassingly incoherent, unsound, incomplete, and generally bad” I agree. I created a thread on freeratio about and it generated some good discussion. It can be found here:
and pointed to this other thread and his opening quote there:
Theres the trilemma, which has been shredded to pieces, even though it was self evidently stupid to being with, . . .
Now, I have heard Christians say the same about the Trilemma, but since it is still my banner quote - obviously no one has convinced me yet it is "shredded" or "self-evidently stupid" (I think more of myself than that). So, I invited folks over to shred it for me and perhaps make me change my banner quote

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Monday, October 19, 2009

Vox Day vs Luke:
My Comments on the Exchange

I am not going to continue blogging on the exchange as it continues. I will continue to post the links to the new letters on the original post as I see them. I was fascinated by the discussion, which is why I condensed the first 6 letters into one post. I had originally peppered that post with my own editorial comments, but then deleted them all. There are some things I want to say about the discussion and the topics raised:

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Vox Day vs Luke:
Nosing into a Discussion

I have quoted The Irrational Atheist by Vox Day in three major posts:

I added Vox Popoli -- Vox Day's blog -- to my reading list and, lo and behold, ran into the 6th letter (3 from each side) in a dialogue between Day and Luke Muehlhauser at Common Sense Atheism. Apparently, Luke requested this dialogue and kicked it off with his first letter at his blog

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Saturday, October 17, 2009

Romans 6:8-11
"Identity: What Paul and Clark Kent Have to Say"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Thursday, October 15, 2009

Atheism, Utopianism, and Totalitarianism

[Attention: This posts is not about all atheists, or what all atheists believe, or even (necessarily) all utopianism - please read carefully]

I will begin with a comment I made in a discussion of Bill Maher's "enabling" of the "Religious Right" (all the scare quotes there are because I do not think any of that terminology is very good).

Suffice it to say, that the view of Marx on the philosophical side was the same as Dawkins: progress will only occur in solving the world's problems if the metaphysical, non-naturalist ideologies and theologies standing in the way of that progress (and they always stand in the way of that progress) are isolated from the culture so they can no longer stand in the way of that progress.

In either case, both Marxism and Dawkins stated, or seriously implied, that religion must be removed as an influence in society in order for humanity to solve its real problems and evolve to a higher order of human social relationship. In the case of Marxism in power, that led in every case to atrocities against the religious and holders of other "bourgeois philosophies" in order to move that evolution on.

There is no doubt that the modern history of totalitarianism is primarily anchored with expressly atheist ideology (Communism) or non-Christian ideology (Hitler). The slaughter has been enormous - far, far outweighing the closest of Christian kings or rulers since the beginning of Christendom around 400 AD. Religious, but non-Christian, kings have not been as bloodthirsty either by several orders of magnitude. Why is this?

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Romans 6:5-7
"No Longer Slaves to Sin"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Monday, October 12, 2009

Blog Tour: 10/4 - 10/10

Wherein I look around the web - hopefully once a week - and draw some attention to things I see there that interest me.

If you want to know where I go, look at the links on the left of my blog under "Places I Frequent". From there, I will go places those places may point me. Typically, I will also list up to three of my favorite posts from the current Christian Carnival - and may go somewhere those blogs take me.

Sometimes they will be topically organized, and sometimes just in order of the links I visited. Enjoy:

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Sunday, October 11, 2009

Romans 6:1-4
"A New Life"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Friday, October 09, 2009

The Nobel Prize:
An Act of Grace

President Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize

“The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.” [full text of announcement]
Obviously, lots of folks are talking about this; and I am sure someone will be able to explain why President Obama was deserving [here it is] - despite the nominations closing on February 1, just 11 days after President Obama took office.

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Tuesday, October 06, 2009

Romans 5:12-21
"The Reign of Grace"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Sunday, October 04, 2009

Blog Tour: 9/27 - 10/3

Wherein I look around the web - hopefully once a week - and draw some attention to things I see there that interest me.

If you want to know where I go, look at the links on the left of my blog under "Places I Frequent". From there, I will go places those places may point me. Typically, I will also list up to three of my favorite posts from the current Christian Carnival - and may go somewhere those blogs take me.

Sometimes they will be topically organized, and sometimes just in order of the links I visited. Enjoy:

Read more!

Saturday, October 03, 2009

Romans 5:6-11
"We Rejoice in God"

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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Friday, October 02, 2009

Abortion:
". . . and Our Work is not Done"

When chatting about abortion in the public arena - the pro-life and pro-choice folks have typical things they say. Now, I am not particularly "typical" on the pro-life side - I am not in favor of focusing on making abortion illegal - I am in favor of making it unchosen. To put that positively, I want folks to Choose Life.

While technically pro-choice, I am not typical either - I believe that abortion is (prima facie - not always) immoral: the fetus is a type of life whose life it is seriously wrong to end. There are reasons why it may be moral - but the assumption for me is that abortion must be justified. Suffice it to say here (you can see much longer argument from me starting here), that I believe that the unborn child is a rights bearer from (essentially) conception and therefore falls within this view from David Gushee:

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Thursday, October 01, 2009

Romans 5:3-5
"Loving and Longsuffering "

[The index for the series is here.]

I am using the Pastor's titles for these posts. The appropriate links are:

The text:

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