What Is Patience?

Not merely endurance of the inevitable, for Christ could have relieved himself of his sufferings (Heb. 12:2, 3; compare Matt. 26:53); but the heroic, brave patience with which a Christian not only bears but contends. Speaking of Christ’s patience, Barrow
remarks, “...it was not out of stupid...or stubborn resolution that he...behaved himself; for he had a most vigorous sense of all those grievances, and a strong (natural) aversation from under going them; … but from a perfect submission to the divine will, and entire command over his passions, a great love toward mankind....” The same writer defines patience as follows: “That virtue which enables us to bear all circumstances and all events, by God’s power working in us, both mentally and emotionally, as God requres and good reason guides." (Sermon XLII., “On Patience”). Vincent, Marvin Richardson: Word Studies in the New Testament

Biblical patience is a God-exercised, or God-given, restraint in face of opposition or oppression. It is not passivity. The initiative lies with God’s love, or the Christian’s, in meeting wrong in this way. In the OT, the concept is denoted by Heb. ’ārēḵ, meaning ‘long’. God is said to be ‘long’ or ‘slow’ to anger ’erek ’appayim- (see Ex. 34:6; Nu. 14:18; Ne. 9:17; Pss. 86:15; 103:8; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jon. 4:2). This idea is exactly represented in the Gk. makrothymia, often translated as longsuffering’, and defined by Trench as ‘a long holding out of the mind’ before it gives room to anger. Wood, D. R. W. ; Marshall, I. Howard: New Bible Dictionary. 3rd ed. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, Ill. : InterVarsity Press, 1996, S. 873

In Proverbs the practical value of patience is stressed; it avoids strife, and
promotes the wise ordering of human affairs especially where provocation is
involved.

The patience of God is a ‘purposeful concession of space and
time’ (Barth). Wood, D. R. W. ; Marshall, I. Howard: New Bible Dictionary. 3rd d. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, Ill. : InterVarsity Press, 1996, S. 873

Islam's First Hundred Years of Violence

When Edward Gibbon introduced the prophet Muhammad in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, he observed that the rise of Islam was “one of the most memorable revolutions, which have impressed a new and lasting character on the nations of the globe.” Gibbon saw that Islam did not just inaugurate a religious revolution. Its unparalleled expansion changed the course of history by altering the map of the world.

No event was as consequential to Christianity in the 600-700's as the rise of Islam. Islam rose with great swiftness and disruption. In the span of less than a hundred years after its founding, Arab commanders made their way from the edge of Egypt along the North Africa until they reached the Atlantic Ocean. From the Arabian Peninsula they also advanced northeast through Persia and across the Asian steppes to India.

Within the space of a century, the movement inaugurated by the prophet Muhammad had planted a permanent political and religious rival to Christianity in historic Christian lands. Its advance both to the West and to the East meant that a large part of the globe was claimed for Islam, fulfilling the words of the Qur’an: “We appointed you successors on the earth after them.”
By the year 750, a hundred years after the conquest of Jerusalem, at least 50 percent of the world’s Christians found themselves under Muslim hegemony. In some regions, most notably North Africa, Christianity went into precipitous decline. At the time of the Arab conquest there were more than three hundred bishops in the area, but by the tenth century Pope Benedict VII could not find three bishops to consecrate a new bishop. Today there is no indigenous Christianity in the region, no communities of Christians whose history can be traced to antiquity. Though originally conquered by the sword, most of the subject peoples eventually embraced the religion of their conquerors.

By the eleventh century, however, Christianity had begun a long demographic decline in its eastern homeland, and, carried by the militancy of the Turks, Islam resumed its relentless drive westward. The end of the eleventh century also marked the beginning of the First Crusade.

Consider some statistics. In the eleventh century, the population of Asia Minor was almost wholly Christian. By the sixteenth century, Muslims constituted 92 percent of the population. During those centuries, the Church lost most of its property, its ecclesiastical structures were dismantled, and its bishops prohibited from caring for their dioceses. At the beginning of the period, there were four hundred bishops; by the end, 97 percent had been eliminated.

Most of the territories that were Christian in the year 700 are now Muslim. Nothing similar has happened to Islam. Christianity seems like a rain shower that soaks the earth and then moves on, whereas Islam appears more like a great lake that constantly overflows its banks to inundate new territory. When Islam arrives, it comes to stay—unless displaced by force, as it was in Spain.

Nothing from its earliest years has changed. Islam is still a religion bent on conquest.

Marriage Overcomes Paganism

In ancient religion sex was the height of "spiritual" experience. Dennis Prager explains...

The gods of virtually all civilizations engaged in sexual relations. In the Near East, the Babylonian god Ishtar seduced a man, Gilgamesh, the Babylonian hero. In Egyptian religion, the god Osiris had sexual relations with his sister, the goddess Isis, and she conceived the god Horus. In Canaan, El, the chief god, had sex with Asherah. In Hindu belief, the god Krishna was sexually active, having had many wives and pursuing Radha; the god Samba, son of Krishna, seduced mortal women and men.

Because sexuality was the essence of god and worship ancient cultures, near and far, there was no special status given to the unique sexual relationship of one man and one woman. Prostitution and homosexuality were on an equal or superior status with any other form of sexuality. The only important difference lay in between "the one who was penetrated and the one who did the penetrating." Then came Moses like a towering light in chaotic darkness. Alone in the midst of all of the cultures of the world he taught monogamous covenental marriage. Sexual energy was to be channeled through marriage, alone. Out of this direction came two consequences: 1) Women achieved equality with men in marriage. They became partners. No longer was a man to have a house maid who primary purpose was to fulfill his sexual gratifications. A woman is to be an equal marriage partner. 2) The ideal social unit became centered in the family. Life then becomes more directed by real and objective love. Not love as we wish it would be for "me" but love as it really needs to be--for the "benefit of the other." Further men and women, though equal, are not identical. Their very differences are important to the very nature of what love is to be. (The great English journalist G.K. Chesterton once marveled during his first long stay in America, that Americans can seek divorce “on the grounds of incompatibility.” “I would have thought,” he commented dryly, “that incompatibility is the reason for marriage.”)

Michael Novak sums up the importance of this Mosaic standard and difference...

Thus, the complementarity between a man and a woman in
covenantal marriage—a privileged image of God—is designed to increase the best of all forms of happiness among human beings: growth in the ennobling habits of the heart, in virtue, in honesty, and
in mutual caring, “until death do them part.” This complementarity is also designed to generate productive, creative, and ever-advancing societies, driven by dreams of perfection yet to come (and never
to be fully realized).

Faith in God or the Faith in the Outcome

It is a major mistake we often make in our walk with God when we put our faith in an outcome rather than in the Lord. We do this because we set our hearts on a thing rather than on God Himself. If we trust in the Lord, we also need to trust Him that the outcome of a matter will be what best advances His cause, what will be “His triumph,” not just ours. In many cases, the greatest triumph would be the growth of our faith, which has greater value than any earthly outcome.

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. James 1:2-4

The Intolerance of Liberalism

It is a horrible thing when abstract principles become objects of devotion. This is what modern liberalism is. (gay marriage, no exclusive status for Christian holidays, economic socialism, radical feminism, animal rights, etc.) It is a devotion to ideals which have never been been realized. Nothing is so selfish as to attack reality out of devotion to one's ideas. To displace an existing cultural order one must slay the inward moral and religious sentiments long established in a society in order to destroy the outward forms to which they give life. (This is at the heart of our cultural war which will probably be on the increase.) The liberal loves broad and expansive ideals at the expense of social realities.
For liberal progressivism to be established there needs to be a culture of critique to replace a culture of loyalty. (Away with patriotism and up with revisionist history!) If you oppose liberal initiatives, you are called a hate monger. (Look at what Rick Warren has been subjected to even though he has raised millions of dollars to fight AIDS.) Liberalism has no room to be tolerant. It cannot be if it hopes to fundamentally remake culture.

Obama's New Deal or Ordeal???

I have been relieved at the "broad tent" administration of the president-elect's administration. I am also encouraged by Obama's choice of Rick Warren to do the prayer of invocation at his much anticipated inaugural address. This at least shows that Obama does not have an open hostility to evangelicals.

I still remain concerned about a number of issues. There are three in particualar. 1) Future federal court picks. 2) Overturning pro-life policies. 3) A 1 trillion dollar stimulus package.

The 1 trillion dollar stimulus package will be Franklin Roosovelt's New Deal on steroids. What we know about the New Deal is that it did not work in the 1930's. If anything it prolonged the Great Depression. The Great Depression was broken because industry was revitalized out of the need created by the Second World War.

What makes us believe that another New Deal will nor worsen our financial Ordeal??? Our nation has come so far economically. Let's help our economy, not overhaul it.

Persons or Individuals??? (Lewis Weighs In)

I read a story of C. S. Lewis where he once heard of parents who were teaching their children to call them and their adult friends by their first names. Lewis said he understood what they were trying to do. They wanted to show their children "we are all fellow citizens of the human race, equal partners in the race of life." But Lewis said it was a perverse thing.

The strength of the family isn't that each person is counted equal. Persons aren't equal. That's precisely the meaning of being a person. We're each unique and not equal. The strength of the family is in its ability to affirm the uniqueness of each person. Families don't foster equality. They foster a community of persons, each of whom is unlike the others but invaluably belongs to the rest.

Lewis likens this radical democratization to prisoners in jail cells. Each one of them becomes equal to all of the others: everybody calls everyone by their first name. No titles of personal relationship or respect are given.

Lewis' warning helps us to guard against the secular drift of our culture which has an anthropology of individual and masses, but not communities of persons created after the Trinitarian image.

Gay Marriage and Islamic Polygamy

One can only tolerate that which with we disagree.

We may disagree with another person's religious beliefs, e.g., Islam. Yet, we should tolerate their beliefs on the civil or social level. If, however, a Muslim man wants to acquire another wife, this will entail him changing the laws of the land which would make polygamy legal. At this point it would require a political and social debate. The Islamic community would need to show that polygamy would serve as a public good.

There would be considerable opposition to this legal change, especially from the Christian community. But democracy is open to exchange and competition of ideas.

This is the same with gay marriage. It is an issue of civil debate. The Christian community is tolerant of homosexuals. But we don't believe that homosexual marriage is in the interest of the public good. So, it is not because of bigotry we oppose it. It is because we don't believe it serves in the interest of the public good.

Importance of Understanding Culture

A Christianity that is indifferent to its cultural environment is captive to its culture. A faith that is not aware of its culture reinforces the cultural definitions which so easily dupe the believers who live in it. Nowhere is this so evident as in the ready Christian acceptance of the cultural ideology that religion is essentially a private matter of spiritual experience, that religion is a matter of private choice rather than a universal obligation. Against that assumption, we must insist that Christian faith is intensely personal but never private. The Christian gospel is an emphatically public proposal about the nature of the world and our place in it. It is a public way of life obliged to the truth. --adapted thoughts from Richard John Neuhaus

President Bush is the "Dark Knight"

I watched "The Dark Knight" last night. Even my wife thought it was an incredible...amazing movie. That says a lot! This alone should make it worthy of several Oscar nods.

Aside from being an incredible watch...it is a pro-Bush movie. Maybe/probably not intentionally. But I can't help but think of our current president as I watched it.

1) Batman is hated by the people he protects...so is President Bush.

2) Batman temporarily extends the limits of his authority to do what is necessary in the most extreme and dangerous of circumstances...so has President Bush.

3) Batman is willing to be hated to do what is necessary and right. He is not moved from his mission by opinion polls...So is President Bush.

4) Batman understands he is dealing with pure evil that just loves "to see things burn"...So is President Bush.

5) Batman made some errors of judgment (...to err is human)...You guessed it...So has President Bush.

How appropriate the movie has come out as our President ends his controversial and very consequential 2 terms.

Better seen and not heard??? (Again)

The reason Paul says a woman is not to have authority over men is because...

For Adam was formed first, then Eve. (1 Timothy 2:13)

Paul is showing that the order in the church is patterned after the order of creation. God chose to create them in a particular order, it was not arbitrary.

And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived... (1 Timothy 2:14)

Paul, then, makes this statement addressing the problem which occurs when men allow their authority to be usurped. Eve was deceived in her sin. Adam sinned knowingly. In allowing women to usurp the role of overseer (see Monday, December 8 blog), they step into the trap that plunged our first parents into sin.

Finding Yourself

"You find yourself in community, not in the woods." --John Piper in conversation with John Macarthur

It is essential to be in the church to discover your identity. Piper is right.

Bible and Geology: the Mantle

Food is grown on the earth above, but down below, the earth is melted as by fire.
New Living Translation. Job 28:5

The Earth’s crust is only about 3–25 miles in thickness. Under the crust are several thousand miles of molten matter—like a plastic which glows red hot. It is interesting that Job appears to allude to this geological reality.

The Flood and the Formation of Coal Beds

This week a person at my church asked me how the fossil beds could have formed from the Flood. This person's question was prompted after he had spoke to a biologist who informed him that it would take millions of years to form the world's existing fossil beds.

In fact some geologists have claimed that even if all the vegetation on earth was suddenly converted to coal this would make a coal deposit only 1-3% of the known coal reserves on earth. That means it would take around 33 Noah’s Floods, staggered in time, to generate our known coal beds.

Consider this...

1) Biologists have overestimated how much vegetation is required to make coal. Originally it was believed to take to 12:1 ratio. It is believed by many to be much less. By some accounts it can be a 2:1 or less. Whatever the case may be it is probable that we can reduce the vegetation to coal transition ratio.

2) Also consider that 60% of today’s land surface is covered by deserts or only sparse vegetation. Only 40% of today's land contain fuller vegetation.

3) In the world before the Flood it would appear that all of the land was filled with abundant vegetation. For instance, beneath the vast icy wastes of Antarctica there are rock layers containing thick coal beds. So at one time Antarctica contained an environment of lush vegetation. Consider today's desserts where a great amount of our oil comes. (Keep in mind that the world under the influence of a global sub-tropical greenhouse effect before Noah’s Flood—implied by the Bible’s description of the ‘waters above’--the so-called water vapour canopy-- and the mist that watered the ground daily--instead of today’s unreliable intermittent rain--would have created a much better and more consistent environment for vegetation.

4) It is most likely that there was a much greater amount of land before the Flood than what exists today. Much of the water that now covers the globe was added at the Flood with the burst and down pour of the canopy and the release of water from below the earth's crust.
(10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth. 11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights. Gen 7:10-12)

5) The fossil evidence indicates that ancient plant and animal life was much greater than it is now. (We had a family at the church who just got back from New Zealand and said that the plants are twice as large as the ones in the U.S. Imagine what they would have been like before the Flood.)

6) But there is another way of comparing vegetation growth and volume with the known coal beds, a way that is probably far more reliable, and that is by comparing the stored energy in vegetation with that in coal. International authority on solar energy, Mary Archer, has stated that the amount of solar energy falling on the earth’s surface in 14 days is equal to the known energy of the world’s supply of fossil fuels. She also said that only . 03 % of the solar energy arriving at the earth’s surface is stored as chemical energy in vegetation through photosynthetic processes. From this information we can estimate how many years of today’s plant growth would be required to produce the stored energy equivalent in today’s known coal reserves:

Divide 14 days by .03%i.e. (14 x 100)/.03 days equals 46,667 days or 128 years of solar input via photosynthesis. So we can conclude that only 128 years of plant growth at today’s rate and volume is all that is required to provide the energy equivalent stored in today’s known coal beds! There was, of course, ample time between Creation and Noah’s Flood for such plant growth to occur—1600 years, in fact.

Summary...

1) With less vegetation to coal transition ratio than often suggested...

2) With a more plentiful vegetation to land mass ratio than currently exists...

3) With a much greater land mass than exists today...

4) With much greater vegetation than exists today...

5) With a more realistic assessment of the time needed to store energy into coal...

You have a plausible framework of how the Flood produced existing coal beds.

Second Amendment and Original Intent

Let Madison weigh in on this discussion....

Those who are best acquainted with the last successful resistance of this country against the British arms, will be most inclined to deny the possibility of it. Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.

Redwoods and the Flood

The giant redwoods never die of old age. Why, then, are the oldest living specimens only about 3,500 years old? Could it be that the redwoods can help us date the Flood and discover the extent of the Flood. These giant trees are very resistant to insects, diseases and fire. They never die of old age, but only suffer injuries caused by accidents such as freak windstorms. In fact, never has a redwood tree been found dead from old age. So why aren’t there living specimens much older than approximately 3,500 years? From the fossil record it is known that they existed much earlier; sequoia leaves, cones and trunks have been found buried and fossilized in the layers of the Earth. Could it be that there was a worldwide catastrophic event like the Flood as recorded in Genesis, which accounts for the sudden and complete destruction of trees?

Saxby Shows How Influential Obama Is

On November 4, 2008, Saxby Chambliss received 49.8% of the vote, while Democratic challenger Jim Martin received 46.8% and Liberatarian Allen Buckley received 3.4% of the vote.
Since no candidate exceeded 50% of the vote, a runoff election between Chambliss and Martin was held on December 2, 2008.Chambliss defeated Martin 57.4% to 42.6% in the runoff election. What is telling is that on Nov. 4th Barack Obama gave Jim Martin approximately 12% points.

Nov.4th Chambliss won by about 3%.

Dec. 2nd Chambliss won by about 15 %.

Barack Obama gave Chambliss' opponent approximately 12% on Nov.4th.

Hamiliton and the Second Amendment

According to one site I have read the intention of the second amendment was not to make gun ownership contingent upon a "well regulated militia." The militia clause was added simply to ensure that the U.S. government would have a militia. The second amendment guarantees gun ownership, period.

On another note, following up from yesterday...

There certainly appears to be merit to the idea that the Founding Fathers were concerned that the people of the colonies were armed to protect themselves against tyranny. Here are the words of Alexander Hamilton from the Federalist Paper No.28:

If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no recourse left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual State. In a single State, if the persons intrusted with supreme power become usurpers, the different parcels, subdivisions, or districts of which it consists, having no distinct government in each, can take no regular measures for defense. The citizens must rush tumultuously to arms, without concert, without system, without resource; except in their courage and despair.

Way To Go Chris Wallace

Last night’s special screening of the new movie “Frost/Nixon” in Washington, D.C., film producer Ron Howard paralleled the abuse of power of the Nixon administration with the abuses of power of our current President. Chris Wallace (man in picture), a news anchor for Fox News would have none of it. Below is his response to Ron Howard when the microphone was passed around to the screening audience and landed in Wallace's hands...

"Richard Nixon's crimes were committed purely in the interest of his own political gain...I think to compare what Nixon hat Nixon did, and the abuses of power for pure political self-preservation, to George W. Bush trying to protect this country -- even if you disagree with rendition or waterboarding -- it seems to me is both a gross misreading of history both then and now," Mr. Wallace said. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/dec/02/fox-news-journalist-defends-bush/

Ron Howard had no reply.

How Obama Will Help the Church

Rick Joyner (that's the guy in the photo) has some important insights on how we are to understand ourselves as Christians with the upcoming Obama administration.

Joyner tells us that the church can no longer rely on the government to do the job that we ourselves are supposed to do. He speaks to the area of abortion...

Joyner states that Obama wants to turn the abortion laws back to the states. Below he lists some important measures states need to pass...

1) The need for a minor to notify their parents before getting an abortion or to get their permission for an abortion. This is quite shocking, since an abortion is a serious medical procedure that can be dangerous. This brings the issue down to the ridiculous place of nurses needing parental permission to give a child an aspirin, but not an abortion! This is also a direct attack and intrusion on the fundamental authority of parents and guardians. Even the pro-abortion people should be alarmed at this.
2) The second major issue that is under pressure are the laws in some states that require one to receive basic instruction about what an abortion is, what it does to the baby, and potentially to the mother. It has been demonstrated that a high percentage of mothers who receive this basic education decide to have the baby.

Joyner then writes...

I have never met a person who understood abortion procedures and what they do to the baby and the mother who did not become pro-life. Most people who are pro-abortion would not be if they had some basic education about it. They would quickly understand that it is one of the most horrible and dehumanizing acts taking place in our times. It they just understood the procedures used, most would be in shock.

It has to be up to the church to communicate this message. We need to do a better job of shining the light so that people will become more pro-life out of a conviction and knowledge. We also need to be vigilant in educating people about law which leftist groups will try to sneak by congress which would undermine the authority of parents and freedom of speech, especially in the areas of expressing biblical conviction.

The church will need to be more dependent on God, and we will have to appeal to the ultimate authorities in our government--God and the voting population ("we the people").

"A well regulated militia.."

"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." --Second Ammendment to the Constitution

The second ammendment guarantees the right to "keep and bear arms." True! But isn't this for the purpose of national defense..."security of a free state?" Or was it also originally for the purposes of the original 13 states to protect themselves against the tyranny of a nationalized government? What were the original intentions?

Obviously, now, we do not have a militia or citizen army. Those who promote strict gun control laws do so on the basis that the second ammendment was given for the purpose of a militia. Now that we have a professional army, this ammendment no longer secures the right of citizens to "keep and bear arms."

Barack Obama's Premise on Gun Control

My sons' in Generation Joshua will be debating this issue of gun control. For this reason I will study the topic myself. I would welcome comments from anyone who has thought or would like to think through this issue.

Obama believes that the Constitution confers an individual right to bear arms. Yet, he qualifies his acceptance of the Second Ammendment as follows: But just because you have an individual right does not mean that the state or local government can't constrain the exercise of that right, in the same way that we have a right to private property but local governments can establish zoning ordinances that determine how you can use it. http://www.ontheissues.org/domestic/Barack_Obama_Gun_Control.htm

I'm not an Obama fan, but the President-elect's quote seems like a reasonable premise on which to think through this issue. Is there something I'm missing?

Evolution's Key Argument: Attack Opponent

In late September I spoke with a Christian biologist who believes in macro evolution. This is a man who loves God and is a godly leader in his church. (Of this I have little doubt.) However, I was surprised at how quickly he dismissed the ideas of either creationism or intelligent design as bunk. He said to me that he knew of only one credible scientist who is a "creationist."

Without having much scientific training in the academic sense, I posed to him the questions posed by "intelligent design." The argument from "irreducible complexity" came quickly to mind. He assured me that the questions of irreducible complexity (such as the formation of the eye) are answerable by the method of macro evolution. Yet, surprisingly or not so surprisingly enough he could not explain "scientifically" how the eye could be form by "blind" (ha, ha) and random causes. But that evolution had explained it there was no doubt.

I found that discussion to be disappointing and less than satisfactory. I am still on a quest to find someone who can help me to make sense of how evolutionists justify--logically and scientifically--their position, if they can give any real justification at all.

Can the evolutionists give us more than condescension???

P.Z. Myers is a biologists and an atheists who teaches at the University of Minnesota. He expressed outrage that Ken Ham (founder of Answers In Genesis) led a prayer meeting at our nation's Pentagon this past year. He then went on to do a "little" name calling of the Answers In Genesis founder....

Millions of people, including some of the most knowledgeable biologists in the world, think just about every day that you are an airhead, an ###, a birdbrain, a blockhead, a bonehead, a boob, a bozo, a charlatan, a cheat, a chowderhead, a chump, a clod, a con artist, a crackpot, a crank, a crazy, a cretin, a dimwit, a dingbat, a dingleberry, a dipstick, a ditz, a dolt, a doofus, a dork, a dum-dum, a dumb-###, a dumbo, a dummy, a dunce, a dunderhead, a fake, a fathead, a fraud, a fruitcake, a gonif, a halfwit, an idiot, an ignoramus, an imbecile, a jack###, a jerk, a jughead, a knucklehead, a kook, a lamebrain, a loon, a loony, a lummox, a meatball, a meathead, a moron, a mountebank, a nincompoop, a ninny, a nitwit, a ##########, a numbskull, a nut, a nutcase, a peabrain, a pinhead, a racketeer, a sap, a scam artist, a screwball, a sham, a simpleton, a snake oil salesman, a thickhead, a turkey, a twerp, a twit, a wacko, a woodenhead, and much, much worse. You're a clueless schmuck who knows nothing about science and has arrogantly built a big fat fake museum to promote medieval bullshit...http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/06/in_which_i_have_hurt_ken_hams.php

These types of attacks by the evolutionists have been fairly typical. There is a general rule in law that if you cannot attack your opponent's ideas, then attack your opponent. Evolutionists, it seems to me, have been very adept in doing that.

Obama Goes to the Middle

Obama has been moving to the middle on economic and military issues. His military appointments (reappointment of Gates) and his economic appointments (pro-trade and pro-market economists) have certainly been surprisingly and positively out of step with his campaign promises. This is making his left wing supporters irrate. What is most shocking is that he is starting to look like George Bush.

Physical Healing and Jesus' Pattern of Ministry

When God does heal it is a foretaste of the complete healing we will receive in the future. This healing was purchased on the cross. --idea from Wayne Grudem (theologian)

The story of Lazarus confirms this idea. (John 11) One cannot look at the healings done by Jesus and then conclude that "physical healings" will be a regularity of ministry. Throughout my Christian journey I have heard several say (maily Pentecostal and Charasmatic, but not exclusively) that Jesus' miraculous ministry of healing should be the regular pattern of how ministry is done today in the church. Since Jesus made the blind to see and the lame to walk and the diseased healed, we should too. The reason that there isn't is because we don't have enough faith.

But is this really so? It would, then, appear that since Jesus made the dead to rise, we should too. However, I have not heard anyone advocate as part of a funeral ceremony to have a section for the "raising of the deceased." By using the logic that Jesus did and we should too, should then the models of Lazarus or Jarius' daughter be the pattern that we should aim to follow? Should we go to funerals and aim to see people whose lives were "tragically" taken at a young age (the child who died of lukemia, the young father who in an auto wreck leaves a grieving widow and fear struck children) raised from the casket? Or should we understand the story of Lazarus as a triumphant illustration where Jesus demonstrates:

“I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; 26 and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Jn 11:25-26

As Grudem says, when God physically heals or even raises from the dead, it is a foretaste of the healing and victory of life which God has secured for us through the cross and will be completely realized in the future.

For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. 1 Cor. 15:22-23

Do not follow your heart. Lead your heart. --Fireproof

Obama and the New Evangelicals:"DeJa Vu" All Over Again

There are a new breed of evangelicals which are embracing key platforms of the Democratic party and the cultural left. They are proudly distancing themselves from the "narrow minded and partisan voices" of the "religious right," like Dobson and Robertson. They are represented in part by groups like the Matthew 25 Network and some from the emerging church movement leaders, who are greatly enthused over the presidential victory of Barack Obama. "Climate change" is, now, one of the biggest issues they embrace.

These evangelicals want to move beyond the partisan issues which have "divided" our nation, like abortion and gay marriage. They want to be done with the culture wars. The way they do that is to capitulate to key issues on the Left. These evangelicals, for example, do not like abortion but they no longer believe that it is the job of government "to force mothers to give birth to their children."

This is supposedly a new and fresh approach to help Christians think and act on social issues. But is it really new or fresh? Can anyone remember in 1976 when a "born again" evangelical Southern Baptist Sunday School teacher came to the White House? Anybody up for another round of Jimmy Carter?

Change In the Wrong Direction

With Obama picking such a large number of cabinet and department leaders from the former Clinton administration it is very hard to justify that we are going to see a revolution in government that has been promised. Obama ran not simply on a change from the last eight years, but on a change with the very way government itself runs. It does look like we are seeing "change," it is just change in the wrong direction.

Above Obama's Paygrade

Barack Obama has picked Tom Daschle to be the secretary of the health and human services, the department that deals most closely with abortion and human life issues. Tom Daschle is radically pro-abortion.

After three decades of intense public debate on the issue of abortion, Obama declared that any declaration of moral judgment of when life begins to be "above my paygrade."

So much for "healing" the moral divisions in our culture.

Secular Bigots

The atheist Richard Dawkins has sold over one million copies of his book, The God Delusion. In his writing he belittles Anthony Flew (professor at Oxford and Harvard) who has been one of the most prominent philosophical atheists of the last century, who converted in 2004 to the position that the universe has a divine creator. Flew, amazingly, converted! Flew has contended that Dawkins is a "secular bigot" because when he critiques theism (the belief in God), he attacks not the strongest arguments, but ones that are more easily challenged and dismissed. Flew writes...

The fault of Dawkins as an academic was his scandalous and apparently deliberate refusal to present the doctrine that he appears to think he has refuted in its strongest form.

Business and "Lifestyle Choices"

Business cannot manufacture hardworking and morally virtuous people. Yet, these qualities in the workforce are essential to a strong business and work environments. So, how are they produced? They are produced through strong families. Families are the primary moral educators of children. It is at the root of where our moral values and character training are first instilled and reinforced. For this reason it is vital to our nation's economic policy that strong families are preserved and the institution of marriage is not reduced to a "lifestyle choice," which is simply equal to other "lifestyle choices" available. To do so is to undercut the foundation of the family. The results will be increasingly catastrophic.

Obama the Moderate??? (Part 2)

In August, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) weighed in with a proposed regulation to extend and solidify existing legal conscience protections for healthcare providers who are opposed to abortion. On the surface, the HHS efforts would seem innocent enough, as it largely clarifies how existing conscience-protection laws will be implemented. But the abortion industry was very threatened by this proposed regulation. Their fear is that a clear statement on conscience would enable the majority of practitioners to divorce themselves entirely from the abortion culture. For this reason, abortion’s defenders came out swinging. In September, twenty-seven Democratic U.S. senators and one independent sent a letter to HHS secretary Mike Leavitt that claimed the regulation would damage “the healthcare needs of women.” (Incidentally, senators Barack Obama and Joe Biden were among the signatories.)

Obama the Moderate???

Though Obama promises to run the national administration from the middle, he has promised to pass the Freedom of Choice Act which would over turn all of the state's modest restrictions on abortion. It would also provide federal funds for abortion, and penalize hospitals that do not commit abotions.

A New Day for Pro Lifers

One week after settling into the realization of the now unstoppable fact of an Obama presidency, it is clear that the pro-life movement will face much greater obstacles to the legislation of sanctity of life issues.

It is more apparent now than perhaps ever that the pro life community will have to work on changing hearts--changing the culture.

John Jay Hughes makes the following observation...

In a notable pre-election speech in St. Louis, former governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee spoke about three legal innovations which he had witnessed in his adult lifetime: limitations on smoking, requirement of access to public places for the handicapped, and requirement of seat belts for drivers and passengers of automobiles. In each case, Huckabee pointed out, people were first persuaded that the proposed change was beneficial. Then, laws were enacted to mandate the change. Pro-lifers need to heed this lesson. For too long we have been demanding the passage of laws which, though happily supported by a growing number of our fellow citizens, still fall short of the acceptance needed to make them effective.

No Argument Against Death

Last Tuesday Washington voters legalized assisted suicide with a 58-42 majority. Why have they done this at such a time that when medicine has made such great advances to deal with the pain and discomfort that comes from terminal or debilitating illness.

Perhpas it reflects a growing nihilism in our culture. Perhaps we have no argument against death.

Executive Orders???

As Barack Obama has become our new president, the news tells us that he will immediately, upon innaugaration, use "executive orders" to enact his policy priorities. (e.g., more funding for embryonic stem cell research) My question is...where does the president receive the authority to write executuve orders??? I thought he was limited by the powers of the legislative branch.

These, of course, have come from the evolution of American history, stemming in the tradition of Lincoln's Emmancipation Proclamation and Roosovelt's New Deal policies. The president has been granted through changes in the government far more "imperial" powers that the Constitution grants.

Sally Thomas says that young adults from ages 18-24 are not buying what is offered from our "cultural cany shop" which offers access through iphones classic films to ancient texts. But few are turning on to it.

Literary reader rates, Thomas informs us, have declined by 17 percentage points since 1982. This does not represent a temporary cultual shift, but an avalanche of social change. This would be easy to dismiss, except...

...were not already so evident...interviewees, from the “Jaywalking” segment of The Tonight Show, who don’t know where the pope lives (“England?”) or the tenure of a Supreme Court justice (“I’m guessing four years?”), or the title of any classic work of literature.

For Capitalism

R.R. Reno argues that there is still important that we put forward the moral argument for capitalism. This is especially true now that we have elected a president who will emphasize the failures and limitations of capitalism.



Reno goes back to John Locke who argued from British common law that property ownership is a sacred and ancient right. Property creates a "zone of freedom" for the individual. The political will of the state finds its limits outside the boundaries of the property owner. Property gives us the arena for status and power seperate from political encroachment and control.

Well said...

Islam’s Way to Freedom

Thomas Farr says radical Islam poses a threar to America. Well...this is not really news, at least to me. He further says that military power with good intelligence, efficient laws, and sound diplomacy will not be enough to adequately curb the threat of Islam. This idea is not completely new either, though it is spoken less often.


What he does say that is less often spoken is...our foreign diplomacy needs a "new religious realism."


He adds the George Bush's foreign diplomacy was devoid of this realism and treated the religion like it is a peripheral to the activity of governming. Farr admits that the U.S. policy may well find and remove radical Islamist leaders and their communication cadres. Yet, it will not be sufficient because radical Islam is driven by a deeply rooted and practiced theology which believes Allah wants to violently overthrow the inidels.


Then he insightfully adds...


Unfortunately, policymakers in the United States remain tempted by the argument that radical ideas and movements can be suppressed by our authoritarian allies in the region. But when despots like Egypt’s Mubarak or Saudi Arabia’s Abdullah crack down on extremists, usually by arbitrary arrest, torture, and execution, they are in fact encouraging extremism, ensuring its survival and its export. Decades of American support for tyrants in the Middle East have helped retard the growth of moderate political Islam. History strongly suggests that political and religious repression, while not the root cause of Islamist extremism, blocks its most effective remedy—the development of liberal democratic political theologies.


He points out that to President Bush's credit he has understood how democratic policies pave the way to a more moderate understanding of religion. But what the President has failed to understand is that democratic structures alone will not bring this moderation about unless it is accompanied with economic progress is economic progress and the embrace of law and culture in human right and civil liberties.


Then Farr gets to the central point...


And here’s what the Bush strategists never fully understood: In highly religious societies—which is to say, in most countries in the world—the linchpin of liberties is religious liberty. Without it, democracy withers or implodes.


What we must then do is encourage Muslim groups toward a theology of religion freedom. But this is a tall, in fact daunting, order. For this reason some political thinkers believe the way out of the problem is to encourage Islamic regimes to take on secularist's governments. But this is unrealistic to think that of the hundreds of millions of Muslims in the world that they will simply allow their beliefs to be marginalized. It is vital, according to Farr, that we engage the religion of Islam in this struggle for freedom.


How do we do this??? Farr answers...


First, by adopting an overarching principle: Religion is normative, not epiphenomenal, in human affairs. Policymakers should approach it much as they do economics and politics—as something that drives the behavior of people and governments in important ways. Like political and economic motives, religion can act as a multiplier of both destructive and constructive behaviors, often with more-intense results.



He goes on to give a practical suggestion...



American diplomacy, accordingly, should work to empower such religious leaders as the influential Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and his Sunni counterparts.



He further suggests that Iran has strong elements of democracy that can be encouraged with Iranian jurists. Pakistan has strong religious elements that tend toward moderation, and Egypt has the strongest elements. Also, "the Catholic University of America’s Interdisciplinary Program in Law and Religion has held substantive exchanges with Iranian jurists on topics from family law to weapons of mass destruction. By judicious support for such efforts, the United States can encourage internal reform that rejects both theocracy and terrorism as inimical to Shiism."

Farr lays out a number of possibilities and options for American diplomacy. Yet, he drives back to the thesis of his article that the heart of radical Islam comes from the voice of its religious belief system, and it is there that its influence must be greatly curbed if there is to be any long lasting change.

Then he adds...

Training at the Foreign Service Institute should be revamped. The self-defeating instruction to U.S. diplomats in the 2007 Public Diplomacy strategy—“avoid using religious language”—should be reversed. Washington should support the development of Islamist feminism, a potentially fruitful skirmish in the Muslim war of ideas. A privately funded Islamic Institute of American Studies on U.S. soil could bring the best jurists and religious leaders from across the Muslim world to study United States history, society, politics, and—most important—religion.


Then he tellingly quotes the Economist...

“The strange thing is that when America has tried to tackle religious politics abroad—especially jihadist violence—it has drawn no lessons from its domestic success. Why has a country so rooted in pluralism made so little of religious freedom?”

In my own modest assessment, this seems like a long range goal that is worth pursuing, if we hope to drive a stake into the heart of this great evil. Yet, I'm sure there are many forceful arguments as to why Farr's suggestions would not work. Here are some questions:

1) Is religious theology the heart of Islamic radicalism?
2) How do we change the heart of Islamic theology?

Babies Perfect and Imperfect

Still in view of Proposition 2 in Michigan, I'd like to write about Amy Julia Becker's article, Babies Perfect and Imperfect, in the November 2008 edition of First Things.

She writes that she gave birth to a Down syndrome baby--Penny. She reports that on the day of the birth the emotionally troubling experience upon finding out that she had a Down syndrome child...

As this news began to make its way into my consciousness, we heard shouts from the room next door. Another child had been born. “She’s perfect!” someone exclaimed about that other baby. “She’s perfect!” Once we found out that Penny had Down syndrome, we had a hard time celebrating her birth. We didn’t open the bottle of champagne perched by my bedside. We were afraid to call our friends and family. We didn’t shout, “She’s perfect.”

She describes with transparency that she felt her child was a "defective piece of machinery" that had been turned off--"subhuman," "abnormal," "retarded," "stupid" were all of the connotations that had swirled through her mind. Theologically she said the only way she could frame the extra chromosome that ran through every cell of Penny's body was that this happened because she was the victim of the results of sin in the world. She could not help but think of Penny as "defective" and a "mistake."

But she began to wonder what it meant for Penny to be created in the image of God. She asks some interesting questions on the nature of Adam and Eve's dependence in the Garden of Eden. But then she relates the disability of Down Syndrome to Christology. Quoting two theological authors who address this topic...

Jesus experienced bodily disfigurement on the cross, “this Christologically defined imago Dei would thus be inclusive rather than exclusive of the human experience of disability.”
Reynolds makes a similar point: “His resurrected body continues to bear his scars as a sign of God’s solidarity with humanity. . . . It suggests that disability indicates not a flawed humanity but a full humanity.”

She then began to conceive of her child's disability as a gift...

to that enable each of us to admit our creatureliness, our need for one another, our need for God’s grace.

She then adds this story...

Early on, I had asked my mother whether she thought Down syndrome happened because of sin in the world. She responded gently, “The only evidence of sin I see is in how the world reacts to Penny.”

Then she ends the article recording the realizations she has come to two and a half years after her daughters birth...

Two and a half years after Penny was born, I don’t think of her as defective, or retarded, or abnormal. I think back to that first evening of her life, when I cringed at the words about the baby next door: “She’s perfect!” I still wouldn’t call Penny perfect. I wouldn’t call any human being, besides Jesus, perfect. I am well aware that Penny needs healing and redemption through Christ, as do I. And Penny’s nature, I hope and pray, will be redeemed through Christ as she becomes the whole person she was created to be. I suspect Penny’s whole person will include three twenty-first chromosomes, but only because any aspect of that extra chromosome causing separation—physical, emotional, relational—will be overcome.
Just recently, we started reading a book about Jesus together. We read the story of Jesus blessing the little children. Penny was fascinated. At the end, I told her that Jesus loves her just like he loves the little children in the story. And I asked her if she knows that she can talk to Jesus. Without hesitation, she nodded her head, folded her hands, and said, “Pray.” Now that I know what to look for, I glimpse perfection in Penny’s life nearly every day.

Rick Joyner is a man who has spoken strategically into my life on more occasions than I can begin to remember. No one person has done more to equip me and shape my understanding of the function of God's kingdom than he. In saying that, I do have certain reservations about some of his teachings. However, those reservations reflect issues in which I'm sure Rick Joyner is maturing, and they do not touch on essential or orthodox issues of the faith. Nonetheless, that he has spoken decisively into my life on a multitude of times is undeniable.

This morning I was reading his Word Of The Week...I found it to be extremely profound both historically and practically.

Joyner has noted that historically there have been great advances for the gospel. There have been great movements in the working of God's Spirit to spread the advance of God's kingdom.
Then he writes...

Each one also brought about a separation in the church between those who were going forward and those who wanted to remain where they were.

If this is true it is certainly a sobering reality for which spiritual leaders need to be prepared.

He then writes about how he visted Geneva Switzerland where John Calvin and John Knox preached while in exile. He adds...

These two men were of such prophetic authority that they could preach in a small setting yet impact the whole world. They did this without the Internet or television, and their impact continues hundreds of years after their deaths. They were a part of a small group who blew a great spiritual trumpet that not only changed the course of church history but also human history. Their message not only reformed the church but also resulted in the birth of democracy, higher forms of justice and law, and some of the basic principles of science that have released a great increase of knowledge. It is always a marvel to me when I stand in the little chapel where they preached. The chapel was located in what was at the time, an obscure little village far from the mainstreams of civilization, and yet it had held a power to change the whole world. The only way this can be explained is they preached a truth which time had come.

Joyner makes the conclusion that our focus should not be on doing great things, but rather to the Lord's will--then great things will happen. Addressing Calvin's great contribuion he, then, provides...

It is fitting that one of Calvin’s most important contributions to the march of truth throughout the ages was his doctrine of original sources being required to validate a message. Of course, Calvin’s goal of establishing original sources as the basis of truth was to get Christians to see past the dogma and traditions of the church and to hold the Scriptures as the only basis of true doctrine in the church.

He then adds that the Reformers like Calvin and Knox always desired to reform the whole church, but they were resisted and even violently persecuted by the ecclesiastical powers. This addsbrings the dilemma that those who lead in a new move of God's Spirit in the church will typically face opposition by those who were part of previous moves of God's Spirit. Why does this occur??? Jealousy. So what then is a person to do to help preserve unity in the Body of Christ and move forward with a new wave of God's Spirit??? Joyner's answer is very insightful...

The Apostle Paul wrote in his most important Epistle, The Book of Romans, that even though the Jews had become hardened so that they resisted the gospel and persecuted its messengers, they were beloved for the sake of the fathers because they had been custodians of the oracles of God. Paul, therefore, warned the Gentiles who were marching forward with the New Covenant not to become arrogant toward the “natural branches,” or they, too, would be cut off (see Romans 11:21). Becoming arrogant toward those who may not see or hear what we do is a trap, which causes many to be cut off from further advancement.The only commandment with a promise is to “honor our fathers and mothers,” and the promise is “so that it may be well with you, and that you may live long on the earth…” (see Ephesians 6:2). Nowhere does it say we should only honor great fathers and mothers or even good ones, but simply the ones we have been given, good or bad. Almost all will be both good and bad, just as some of the greatest heroes in the Bible also made some of the greatest mistakes.

Then he closes with this insight...

Unity is important and is one of the primary desires of the Lord for His people. However, our “love of the truth” must sometimes trump our desire for unity if we are not going to be deceived and are going to be a part of the present purposes of the Lord. Once we see the truth we are responsible to obey it, and sometimes this means that we will be driven out and persecuted by our predecessors, even by the very ones who gave birth to us in the Lord. Not many of those who have gone forward have done so without reacting to their persecutors with retaliation. However, for those who can maintain David’s attitude toward Saul and the Apostle Paul’s attitude toward his worse persecutors, the Jews, who he loved so much that he said he would even give up his own salvation to see them saved, they will bear fruit that remains like David and Paul, which is continually increasing to this day.

Principled Immigration

This Saturday my son Andrew will be engaged in a debate on illegal immigration. In light of this I am wanting to study and reflect on this issue. Toward this end I would like to turn to Mary Ann Glendon's article on Principled Immigration in the June/July 2006 edition of First Things.

Glendon speaks to the fact that we are in an age of mass migrations and wide movements of population groups all over the world. The United States is not exempt. It is a time of exceptional stress.

In the United States alone, about a million new immigrants have entered every year since 1990, bringing the total immigrant population to more than 35 million, the largest number in the nation’s history.

Glendon then goes on to tell us that there is and will be an increasingly great need for immigration in the United States. She writes...

Despite what population-control advocates had predicted in the 1960s and 1970s, the chief demographic problem facing most countries today is not overpopulation but its opposite. All over the world, even in developing countries, populations are aging. In the wealthier nations, where the process is most advanced, declining birth rates and increased longevity mean that our populations now include a much smaller proportion of children and a much larger proportion of disabled and elderly persons than ever before.

Social-welfare systems were originally constructed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries on the basis of a proportion of seven to nine active workers for every pensioner. That is simply not going to be the case if we rely on our current replacement population. As baby boomers retire with increased life spands, over the next 25 years the U.S. as a whole will increasingly look like Florida with one retiree for every five workers. She quotes our President...

President Bush stressed the urgency of the situation in his 2006 State of the Union Address, warning that “the retirement of the baby-boom generation will put unprecedented strains on the federal government. By 2030, spending for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid alone will be almost 60 percent of the entire federal budget. And that will present future Congresses with impossible choices—staggering tax increases, immense deficits, or deep cuts in every category of spending.”

The cause of declining birth rates and consequently inadequate population replacement has been the break down of the family. Glendon then presents the heart of the problem as she decries the lack of clear discussion about this issue among policy leaders....

Consequently, there has been little discussion of what should be obvious: An affluent society that, for whatever reason, does not welcome babies is going to have to learn to welcome immigrants if it hopes to maintain its economic vigor and its commitments to the health and welfare of its population. The issue is not who will do jobs that Americans don’t want. The issue is who will fill the ranks of a labor force that the retiring generation failed to replenish.

So, we come to the important question...Why aren't Americans happy about immigration if immigrants are in fact a key factor to saving our nation from future collapse??? Here are some reasons...
1) Immigration somewhat reduces the wage earned by some existing Americans.
2) Immigration (in the illegal sense) increases the tax burden on American citizens. There are 12 million illegals in our nation.
3) Immigration has raised concerns about terrorists coming into our nation.
4) Immigration forces us to have to open up to more people who are "different" from us.

Herein is where the tension lies. There is a need for population replacement in the United States that can only come from immigration. However, this replacement comes with an immediate financial costs and the fear of fracturing our cultural cohesion.

What is the solution??? Glendon uses principles from the 2003 Joint Pastoral Letter issued by the Mexican and U.S. bishops, Strangers No Longer: Together on the Journey of Hope. She writes...

The letter asserts that (1) persons have the right to find opportunities in their homeland; (2) when opportunities are not available at home, persons have the right to migrate to find work to support themselves and their families; (3) sovereign nations have the right to control their boundaries, but economically stronger nations have a stronger obligation to accommodate migration flows; (4) refugees and asylum seekers fleeing wars and persecutions should be protected; and (5) the human dignity and rights of undocumented migrants should be respected.

What is clear is that we need to be open to aggressive immigration, but it needs to be balanced with the legality and sensitivity to the needs of its current citizen. This requires policy makers who can be guided by "principled immigration."

Stem Cells: A Political History

In view of Proposal 2 in Michigan to lift current restriction on embryonic stem cell research, I want to review Joseph Bottum's excellent article on the political history of stem cells.

Joseph Bottum begins...

It was a season of small demagogueries, a time of the easy lie and the useful exaggeration. A little shading of truth, a little twisting of facts—it was a political moment, in other words, and hardly anyone is naive enough to forget that partisan politics always has partisan purposes.

Bottum hits the nail on the head of what has happened over the last seven years as politics and science have have been fused together on embryonic stem cell research. He further comments...

Perhaps the recipe looks like this: Take the always-present human hunger for magic—for medicine as a kind of witchcraft, delivering thaumaturgical cures. Add the vague sense, shared by most people, that ever since the discovery of DNA’s double helix in 1953 we have been living in something like a golden age of biology. Include the strong sense, among political liberals, that religious believers must be discredited before they undo the abortion license. Now, wrap the whole thing up in money, the competition for trillions of dollars in research grants and the biotech companies’ stock dividends.

Who could forget this...

Research with embryonic stem cells would lead to “the greatest breakthrough in our or any lifetime,” Ronald Reagan’s son announced at the 2004 Democratic convention. “How’d you like to have your own personal biological repair kit standing by at the hospital? Sound like magic? Welcome to the future of medicine.” On and on, it went: speaker after speaker denouncing the heartless Republicans who were trying to block the path of medical magic, until, at last, the vice-presidential candidate John Edwards stood up in 2004, pointed down at the paralyzed actor Christopher Reeve, and proclaimed that a vote for the Democrats would mean that people like Reeve “are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk again.”

Edwards managed to combine the moods of faith healing, tent revivals, and partisan politics.

As late as January 2007, Pennsylvania’s liberal Republican senator Arlen Specter was declaring, “It is scandalous that eight years have passed since we have known about stem-cell research and the potential to conquer all known maladies, and federal funds have not been available for the research.”

Another example from Specter of the lethal mixture of Millennial expectations and partisan manipulation.

Even scientists were allowing political pandering to be injected in the scientific process...
In the summer before the 2004 presidential election, Ron McKay, from the National Institutes of Health, admitted that he and his fellow scientists had generally failed to correct the media’s false reports about the promise of stem cells—but that was all right, he told the Washington Post, since ordinary people “need a fairy tale.” They require, he said, “a story line that’s relatively simple to understand.”

For more examples, Bottum writes...

In a 2002 article in Nature, for example, Roger Pielke Jr. pointed to false stories—like one about the disabled rat in Australia that regained the ability to walk via tissues from aborted human fetuses—and declared that scientists’ ventures into the stem-cell debates “have given a black eye to the broader scientific enterprise.”

Or...

That same year, the researcher Alan Trounson added, “There are at least three or four other alternatives [to cloning and destroying embryos for pluripotent stem cells] that are more attractive already. . . . I can’t see why, then, you would argue for therapeutic cloning in the long term because it is so difficult to get eggs and you’ve got this issue of embryos as well.”

Or...

In January 2003, a science writer for the New York Times admitted: “For all the handwringing by scientists, you might think that therapeutic cloning is on the verge of curing a disease or two. . . . Almost all researchers, when questioned, confess that such accomplishments are more dream than reality.” Even Thomas Okarma, president of the Geron Institute, expressed some doubts: “The efficiency of making a stem-cell line from an embryo made by nuclear transfer [the technical name for cloning] is vanishingly small, and you’re going back to the case-by-case, individualized-therapy story again, with enormous costs.

Yet all the while John Kerry exalted...

“At this very moment, some of the most pioneering cures and treatments are right at our fingertips, but because of the stem-cell ban, they remain beyond our reach,” said Kerry. “To those who pray each day for cures that are now beyond our reach—I want you to know that help is on the way. I want you to hold on, and keep faith, because come next January, when John Edwards and I are sworn into office . . . we’re going to lift the ban on stem-cell research.”

Then a real scientific breakthrough....

Even at the time, however, the Japanese scientist Shinya Yamanaka was working with mice to show that fully pluripotent stem cells (cells having the qualities of those produced by destroying embryos) could be created directly from adult cells. Within a year, his study was significantly expanded by research groups. And on November 20, 2007, two independent teams published papers—one in the journal Cell, and the other in the journal Science—about the production of pluripotent human stem cells without using embryos or eggs or cloning. And with a silent thump, the topic suddenly fell off the front pages of the nation’s newspapers.

Embryo destruction became not only unnecessary but also less efficient than alternative methods. This breakthrough should have put the issue of embryonic stem cells off the political table. Now that human embryos are not needed the tone has sherply dropped from its utopian enthusiasms. James Thomson a well known stem-cell researcher announced shortly after the breakthrough discovery...

“A decade from now, this will be just a funny historical footnote...”

Bottum adds...

He may be right, but he shouldn’t be. We need to remember the events from 2001 to 2007, for the history of the stem-cell debate forms a classic study of what happens when politics and science find each other useful.

Sadly, in the politics of 2008, Michigan has a ballot to lift the state's current restrictions on embryonic stem cell reserach, and Obama has accused McCain of being against stem cell research. It appears that we are not quite over the strategy of abortion politics denial of real and useful science.