Raskolnikov, Lost in the Cosmos

The falling post count

2012-01-10T11:35:00.001Z

If you’ve been paying attention then you’ll have noticed this already:

If this trend continues for another year then I will close the blog down officially. It’s not guaranteed that that will happen, but it seems to be the way that things are going. I still often get ideas for substantial posts, but no longer have the time to follow up on them.

Theology, essays and theology essays

2011-12-09T21:32:00.001Z

Michael Jensen, Lecturer in Doctrine and Church History at Moore College in Sydney, has recently completed a series of blog posts on writing theology essays. I think what he has written is relevant for anyone doing theology for him/herself (which should be every Christian), and for everyone who writes essays in the humanities. People who actually write theology essays will, of course, find the advice particularly useful.

Introduction

How not to lose heart before you start
What is ‘theology’ in any case?
What is a theology essay?
The responsibility of theology
Choosing the question
Analysing the question:
1. The Verb
2. The Question Word
Beginning to think about it
Brainstorming
How to read theology for essays, and what to read

Using the Bible in theology essays

How to treat your opponents
Some advice on quoting
Types of argument for your essay
The classic introduction
Why presentation matters, and how to make it work for you
How to write well in an essay

Polygamous lunch

2011-10-05T21:33:00.001+01:00

The following quotation from Liz Feldman is doing the rounds on Facebook at the moment:

Personally, I am very excited about “gay marriage”, or as I like to call it, “marriage”. Because I had lunch this afternoon, I didn’t have “gay lunch”. And I parked my car, I didn’t “gay park” it.

This is inexpressibly stupid. Do you want to change the law so that you can be married to more than one person at a time? Try this argument:

Personally, I am very excited about “polygamous marriage”, or as I like to call it, “marriage”. Because I had lunch this afternoon, I didn’t have “polygamous lunch”. And I parked my car, I didn’t “polygamous park” it.

Or maybe you want to go ancient Egyptian and marry your sibling?

Personally, I am very excited about “incestuous marriage”, or as I like to call it, “marriage”. Because I had lunch this afternoon, I didn’t have “incestuous lunch”. And I parked my car, I didn’t “incestuous park” it.

Just in case it really needs to be said: I am not equating homosexuality with polygamy or incest. I am showing the stupidity of one very stupid argument by pointing out what else it would justify.

Question for 11 September: ‘Is it our fault?’

2011-09-11T20:32:00.000+01:00

The 10-year anniversary of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center just brings up an enormous number of emotions and questions. One is addressed in this excerpt from Andrew Marr’s interview with Tony Blair about his memoirs last year (the discussion of nine eleven starts at 10:00 in):

Am I the only one who thinks that Tony Blair’s eyes are a bit scary?

At 11:40 we hear the following:

Blair: This movement [that was behind the attacks] is still there. It is, I’m afraid, still strong. It has a narrative that reaches into a far larger part of the population that is to do with the West and Islam and so on…

Marr: But is it partly strong because of the nature of our response? Because we went in so heavy, we went in so hard…

Blair: That’s the debate, Andrew, that is absolutely the heart of the debate. And the West has got to resolve this debate: is the reason why they’re like that because of us, or is it actually because of them? Now, my view in the end is, we should stop being in a situation where we think we’ve caused this. We haven’t caused this!

Thoughts?

Dawkins’ ‘unanswerable’ argument: intellect and imagination

2011-09-09T12:05:00.000+01:00

The noise about the question of whether or not Richard Dawkins will debate William Lane Craig this autumn has gotten me thinking about what sort of arguments Dawkins might use if he does show up. Will he repeat his Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit from The God Delusion? If so, he had better have taken notice of the many criticisms of this argument – which Dawkins himself called ‘unanswerable’ at the time – since The God Delusion was published. The following comes from Thomas Nagel’s review of the book, which is very balanced and well worth reading in its entirety even if its formatting has somehow gone haywire on the New Republic website.

Let me first say something about this negative argument. It depends, I believe, on a misunderstanding of the conclusion of the argument from design, in its traditional sense as an argument for the existence of God. If the argument is supposed to show that a supremely adept and intelligent natural being, with a super-body and a super-brain, is responsible for the design and the creation of life on earth, then of course this "explanation" is no advance on the phenomenon to be explained: if the existence of plants, animals, and people requires explanation, then the existence of such a super-being would require explanation for exactly the same reason. But if we consider what that reason is, we will see that it does not apply to the God hypothesis.

The reason that we are led to the hypothesis of a designer by considering both the watch and the eye is that these are complex physical structures that carry out a complex function, and we cannot see how they could have come into existence out of unorganized matter purely on the basis of the purposeless laws of physics. For the elements of which they are composed to have come together in just this finely tuned way purely as a result of physical and chemical laws would have been such an improbable fluke that we can regard it in effect as impossible: the hypothesis of chance can be ruled out. But God, whatever he may be, is not a complex physical inhabitant of the natural world. The explanation of his existence as a chance concatenation of atoms is not a possibility for which we must find an alternative, because that is not what anybody means by God. If the God hypothesis makes sense at all, it offers a different kind of explanation from those of physical science: purpose or intention of a mind without a body, capable nevertheless of creating and forming the entire physical world. The point of the hypothesis is to claim that not all explanation is physical, and that there is a mental, purposive, or intentional explanation more fundamental than the basic laws of physics, because it explains even them.

All explanations come to an end somewhere. The real opposition between Dawkins's physicalist naturalism and the God hypothesis is a disagreement over whether this end point is physical, extensional, and purposeless, or mental, intentional, and purposive. On either view, the ultimate explanation is not itself explained. The God hypothesis does not explain the existence of God, and naturalistic physicalism does not explain the laws of physics. [...]

I agree with Dawkins that the issue of design versus purely physical causation is a scientific question. He is correct to dismiss Stephen Jay Gould's position that science and religion are "non-overlapping magisteria." The conflict is real. But although I am as much of an outsider to religion as he is, I believe it is much more difficult to settle the question than he thinks.

My feeling is that Nagel has definitely hit on something here. Dawkins really seems to think that when Christians (for example) talk about God they mean a ‘supremely adept and intelligent natural being, with a super-body and a super-brain’, rather than ‘a mental, purposive, or intentional explanation more fundamental than the basic laws of physics, because it explains even them’. Perhaps he doesn’t even understand the latter, and can’t bring himself to imagine how it could be that ‘not all explanation is physical’. This reflects something that a former pastor of mine has said:

unbelief too often arises not from an informed awareness of the evidence, but from a completely closed imagination that cannot conceive of the universe having the added Godward dimension, and so is incapable of giving the matter serious consideration

Pete Lowman’s article is an exploration of how C.S. Lewis sought to combat this by giving his reader a ‘baptism of the imagination’.

Reeves on glorifying God

2011-07-29T11:20:00.001+01:00

As part of this talk, the second of a three-part series on the love of God, Mike Reeves explains what it means to talk about God’s glory.

Christians use this sort of language a lot, I find. People talk about ‘glorifying God’ and wanting to ‘bring glory to him’ in what they do. That sort of language is used a lot, and quite often I’m not entirely sure what is meant by that. I know we all sort of nod along and say ‘Yes, yes, we want to glorify God’, but what do we mean by that, exactly? Is it pious blather? Well, it is if you don’t understand it, anyway. And so I’m not sure what people do mean, quite often. Usually, and especially when we’re in thinking of God as a law-giver mode, we tend to associate glory with ‘power’ words, words like ‘fame’ and ‘honour’, as if that’s what God is really interested in. Now, when that happens, when you think that’s what glory is, then God’s concern for his glory – which is a biblical theme – does start sounding rather selfish. What is God concerned with? ‘His own power and status’.

Well, what is glory, biblically? That’s what I want us to see now. Well, the word ‘glory’ literally means ‘heaviness’ or ‘weight’ – which is something I love because it means I’m more glorious than you. The glory of something is its mass, its substance, its bulk, its essence, it’s what makes it up, it’s its main thing. So God’s glory, then, is his essence, what he’s most essentially like, what he is. Which means that glorifying God is not about bigging him up, because you can’t! Glorifying God: when you give God the glory, you simply ascribe to God what is already his. In other words, you proclaim and make known and declare him to be as he truly is, in all his beauty. That is to glorify him.

He then cites the following passages that talk about God’s glory in terms of brilliant light:
Ezekiel 1:28
Ezekiel 10:4
Ezekiel 43:2
Isaiah 60:1-2
Luke 2:8
Revelation 21:23

So, the glory of God is like light shining out, and that is what God in his innermost being is like. He is a sun of light, warmth, life, always shining out. In other words, in his innermost being God is, beautifully, love.

Grudem on the role of maturity in understanding the Bible

2011-07-27T20:52:00.001+01:00

In a recent, helpful and accessible article on the perspicuity (clarity) of Scripture, Wayne Grudem writes the following under the heading ‘Scripture affirms that it is able to be understood but not all at once’:

A useful analogy, then, might be to picture the clarity of Scripture as a journey to a distant mountain that we see clearly from afar but see in more detail—and understand more of what we see—as we journey toward the mountain over many months and years. We can see it from the beginning of our Christian lives, and we truly see and understand something about it, but a lifetime of seeking deeper understanding will be repaid with a lifetime of growth in knowledge and wisdom.

We might even imagine various signs on the mountain. Some, like “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31), are written in huge font that can be seen from a great distance. Other signs become visible shortly after the journey has begun, and teach us to trust God and obey him daily. Yet other signs appear in small font, not visible at first, and when we come close enough to read them, they announce topics such as “predestination” and “millennium” and “the future of Israel” and “preaching to the spirits in prison” and “the relationship between God and evil.”

And even when we can read those topics on the signs, we find that a partial explanation is in yet smaller print, and a fuller explanation is in tiny print. And then at the end of that tiny print we find statements that say, “But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, ‘Why have you made me like this?’” (Rom 9:20). “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law” (Deut 29:29). “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding” (Job 38:2–4). And then we say with Job, “Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth. I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but I will proceed no further” (Job 40:4–5).

HT: Robert Slowley, a.k.a. RobHu, whose blog I’m sad to see has been deleted.

The upcoming WLC tour

2011-07-23T10:01:00.001+01:00

William Lane Craig will be coming to the UK this October for a speaking and debating tour. The last time he was here I went to one of the debates. The programme for the upcoming tour can be seen here. Looking at it, the Bethinking conference looks particularly interesting. I don’t think I’ll be going to any of the debates, mainly because I’m all debated out. I can think of at least one person who will definitely want to, though, if only to have something to write about!.

Two people whom Craig apparently won’t be debating are A.C. Grayling and Richard Dawkins, both of whom have written aggressive anti-God books in the last five yeas and both of whom come off the worse for refusing to debate Craig and defend their arguments. Reading their feeble excuses for not taking part, I am reminded of what Quentin Smith has written about what justification there is for ‘the typical attitude of the contemporary naturalist’:

If each naturalist who does not specialize in the philosophy of religion (i.e., over ninety-nine percent of naturalists) were locked in a room with theists who do specialize in the philosophy of religion, and if the ensuing debates were refereed by a naturalist who had a specialization in the philosophy of religion, the naturalist referee could at most hope the outcome would be that “no definite conclusion can be drawn regarding the rationality of faith,” although I expect the most probable outcome is that the naturalist, wanting to be a fair and objective referee, would have to conclude that the theists definitely had the upper hand in every single argument or debate.

That was certainly my experience of the Craig/Wolpert debate. For what Craig himself thinks about the whole thing, go here.

Rubbish arguments in the AV referendum

2011-04-25T23:52:00.001+01:00

In the UK, we are about to have a referendum on the voting system on May 5. I vote by post, so I have received my ballot paper already. The question on it is

At present, the UK uses ‘first past the post’ system [sic!] to elect MPs to the House of Commons. Should the ‘alternative vote’ system be used instead?

Let’s just take a deep breath and pass over the question of how on Earth there can be a grammatical mistake on a ballot paper. Here is a video explaining the differences between FPTP and AV, from the Electoral Commission:

Just ignore the instructions to click things. I’m not sure why the tone of voice used appears to be addressing children when children can’t vote.

I have seen a lot of the arguments for and against a change, a great number of which are rubbish. Below I have listed a sample, along with an explanation of the rubbishness of that argument. Credit to Full Fact for doing a lot of the legwork.

Rubbish arguments for AV (the ‘yes’ campaign)

AV would require the winning candidate in a given constituency to win the support of 50% of the electorate there
As the video above shows, to win under AV a candidate has to win 50% of the votes in a single round of voting. But to claim that this means that the candidate has the ‘support’ of 50% of the electorate is misleading. If I rank candidates Ed and Fred 5th and 6th out of 6 respectively (because I hate them both, but Fred slightly more), and the vote comes down to a runoff between Ed and Fred and Ed wins, he does not do so with my ‘support’, even though I prefer him to Fred and my vote counted towards his getting elected. There were four candidates I would have preferred! (Thanks to DB for this example).

AV would mean an end to safe seats
Paddy Ashdown claimed that changing the electoral system to AV would mean ‘no more safe seats, ever’. This goof must result from some delusionally wishful thinking. Under AV, some seats would get less safe, while other seats would actually get safer. Overall it wouldn’t make much of a difference. My local MP got over 50% of the vote last time despite having dodged £180000 worth of capital gains tax by telling HMRC one thing and the Parliamentary Fees Office another.

AV would mean that politicians have to appeal more to voters for other parties
Mortal enemies Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg have both banged this drum. This is a rubbish argument not because what it claims is untrue, but because this consequence is actually undesirable. A lot of people complain (rightly, I think) that politicians all sound the same at the moment. Can you think of a better way to get them to sound even more the same than to force them to canvass not only for first preference but also second- and third-preference (etc.) votes as well? No, neither can I.

Rubbish arguments against AV (the ‘no’ campaign)

AV would mean an end to ‘one person, one vote’
The front page of the ‘NO2AV’ leaflet that came through my door this week urges me to ‘keep one person one vote’. This is a fair enough demand, but it is irrelevant in the AV debate. Under AV, if your first-choice candidate is eliminated, then your vote transfers to your second-choice candidate (unless he/she has already been eliminated, in which case it transfers to the third choice etc.) in the next round of voting. This means that in each round of voting, everyone has one vote, under the reasonable assumption that if your first-preference candidate has not been eliminated then you are still voting for him/her.

AV would help extremist parties, or policies of extremist parties
That’s what Baroness Warsi thinks. The idea is that mainstream parties would, in seeking second(etc.)-preference votes from people voting for an extremist party as their first choice, extremetise some of their own policies. But since extremist parties have relatively few first-choice supporters (being, y’know, extreme and all), this kind of policy extremetisation would surely backfire as it would be more likely to lose the mainstream parties second-preference votes from non-extremist voters backing other parties with their first choice. FYI, the BNP is against AV.

AV would give all the power to those cackling Liberal Democrats and their evil leader
The back page of the ‘NO2AV’ flyer that came through my door this week carried ← this bizarre claim, which is close to being the stupidest statement I have ever seen on a political leaflet. Still, let’s try to reconstruct a coherent argument out of it. The idea is that AV would benefit the Liberal Democrats, leading to more hung parliaments and consequently the chances of the Lib Dems (as the third-largest party) remaining in coalition government for perpetuity. Their leader (Clegg or otherwise) would therefore wield a disproportionate amount of power. This argument is rubbish for several reasons. Firstly, we’re probably set for more coalition governments in future whatever happens in this referendum. Secondly, the assumption that the Lib Dems would gain massively under AV is based on people having listed them as second-preference in the past, but since they hadn’t been in government in the past this was a lot easier to do than it will be in the future – expect a collapse in their support in the local elections next month. Thirdly, who exactly thinks that Clegg is wielding a disproportionate amount of power in government at the moment? The Lib Dems are very much junior partners in the coalition; as Alan Johnson said, ‘This is a Tory government with the Lib Dems strapped on as ballast’.

Whichever way you vote, let it be for reasons other than the above.

Follow

2011-04-24T22:29:00.001+01:00

This is a clever and interesting way of telling the Easter story (HT: Jen Smith):

Will you follow?

Happy Easter everyone!

Theatre review: The Bible at Shakespeare’s Globe

2011-04-23T11:54:00.001+01:00

Yesterday I headed down to the Globe Theatre to see part of the commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the King James Translation of the Bible which began on Good Friday and finishes on Easter Monday.

Perhaps the first thing to note is that I didn’t see quite the portion of the Bible that I had planned to. I arrived at 4:30 pm expecting the beginning of Ezekiel after a short break. I quickly realised, however, that we were in Jeremiah 33. I don’t know how things got so far behind but Ezekiel didn’t begin until after 6:30. I had to leave at 11:30 to be sure of getting home, at which point Hosea had just been completed. Goodness knows what time they reached the end of Malachi, and how many people were left in the audience.

But that’s by the by. This commemoration is a good idea, and I was not disappointed with the execution of it. There were four speakers ~~reading~~ ~~reciting~~ speaking a chapter each in turn, and all four were changed every so often – I saw three sets in total, one which finished at the end of Lamentations, a second which went through Ezekiel and Daniel and a third which began at the start of Hosea. The crossing out above is because, as I hope can be seen from the video below, the speakers were not reading but not reciting either – they were being prompted by headphones. For the most part this worked very well, although there were occasions on which the speaker misheard the beginning of a word or tripped over a barrage of numbers in ancient measuring systems, but these are very minor complaints.

Ezekiel 47:1-6, performed by Andrew Havill

This set-up of rotating speakers had its advantages and disadvantages. It was great to see the words of the Bible performed in different ways: RP accents and regional ones, declamatory styles and emotive ones, gesticulating and wandering around the stage (and even, in one case, into the audience), male and female voices. This meant that, if one style of performance didn’t get you, another certainly would (although all the speakers were good, even if I naturally had my preferences). However, at some points this lead to a degree of unwelcome unevenness as speaker would switch mid-passage.

It was also great to be able to take in so much Scripture at once, as in doing so I caught onto parallels I perhaps hadn’t before, or only slightly: hearing Daniel refer to Jeremiah having just heard Jeremiah a couple of hours beforehand, the shifting attitudes from pre- to mid-exile, the sheer obstinate persistence of Israel’s idolatry, and the reoccurrence of evocative phrases like ‘the day of your visitation’ and references to heifers. Of course, those last two parallels depend on the KJV translation, which was the point of the occasion! I found it easy enough to keep up with the Jacobean English for the most part, particularly sections I know well, although of course some passages were easier to follow than others. The whole audience was particularly captivated by the performance of chapters 1-6 of Daniel.

If I hadn’t had to leave because of transportation issues, I would have stayed to the end; the seven hours I was there seemed to fly by. If you have the time to go tomorrow or on Friday then I recommend it.

The curtain of the temple was torn in two

2011-04-22T09:20:00.002+01:00

Now the first covenant had regulations for worship and also an earthly sanctuary. A tabernacle was set up. In its first room were the lampstand and the table with its consecrated bread; this was called the Holy Place. Behind the second curtain was a room called the Most Holy Place, which had the golden altar of incense and the gold-covered ark of the covenant. This ark contained the gold jar of manna, Aaron’s staff that had budded, and the stone tablets of the covenant. Above the ark were the cherubim of the Glory, overshadowing the atonement cover. But we cannot discuss these things in detail now.

When everything had been arranged like this, the priests entered regularly into the outer room to carry on their ministry. But only the high priest entered the inner room, and that only once a year, and never without blood, which he offered for himself and for the sins the people had committed in ignorance. The Holy Spirit was showing by this that the way into the Most Holy Place had not yet been disclosed as long as the first tabernacle was still functioning. This is an illustration for the present time, indicating that the gifts and sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the conscience of the worshiper.

Hebrews 9:1-9

And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split

Matthew 27:50-51

Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.

Hebrews 10:19-20

Painful but necessary cuts

2011-04-21T22:21:00.001+01:00

No, not that. In order to do something about the lethargic speed at which this page sometimes loads and scrolls down, I’ve made the following changes to the layout:

Cut the number of posts per page from 10 to 7 (and may yet cut it further)
Cut the number of ‘popular posts’ displayed on the sidebar from 7 to 5
Cut the ‘blogs I read’ feed from all to the 10 most recently updated
Removed the sitemeter and visitors map
Cut a number of links from ‘podcasts to which I listen’ and ‘other links’.

So far there has only been a small change in speed, but then I may well have hindered things by uploading three embedded videos into a recent post. Ah well. All suggestions as to how I can speed things up will be welcome.

Rod Liddle on BBC bias

2011-04-11T08:50:00.001+01:00

Writing in The Sunday Times Magazine yesterday on the upcoming BBC part-relocation from London to Salford:

It is often said, by its critics, that the BBC has an inherently left-wing bias across its output. I don’t think this is correct. It is certainly biased, but it is not, to my mind, a left-wing bias: it is a metropolitan liberal bias. It is not noticeably biased on issues such as the minimum wage, or redundancies, for example, or the need for the government to invest in industry, which you might expect if its bias was truly from the left. Its bias is that of London: a sort of mimsy faux-leftism based on economic self-interest. We are ruled by the ideas of London – or, to be more accurate, a certain affluent and arrogant part of it. […] From within this place emanate all the shibboleths of Politically Correct Britain, and its epic sense of rectitude that no person in public life dare challenge. Evangelistically secular, socially ultra-liberal and unwilling to allow even the mildest challenge to its political hegemony.

Flagrant scientism alert

2011-04-07T10:18:00.001+01:00

Martin Rees’ decision to accept this year’s Templeton Prize has dismayed Harry Kroto. Writing in The Times today, he says

Martin Rees is a brilliant astrophysicist and a personal friend, but I believe he has made a mistake in accepting £1 million from the Templeton Foundation. In doing so, he supports its primary aim, which is to undermine the most precious tenet of science: that it is the only philosophical construct we have to determine truth with any reliability.

Kroto had better hope he’s wrong about what I’ve emphasised; if he were right, then since ‘science is the only philosophical construct we have to determine truth with any reliability’ is not itself a claim of science, it cannot be deemed to be true with any reliability, and therefore ‘the most precious tenet of science’ would be self-refuting. The incoherence of scientism needs to be constantly restated, it seems (and is science really the sort of thing that has ‘tenets’?).

Experts’ evidence for Easter

2011-04-05T21:34:00.004+01:00

From Tyndale House in Cambridge, three very short videos giving some evidence for the reliability of the Easter story:

Evidence for Jesus’ Trial (Dirk Jongkind)

Evidence for Jesus’ Crucifixion (Peter Williams and David Instone)

Evidence for Jesus’ Resurrection (Peter Williams)

See also the following Easter-related posts:
Christ is risen! (2009)
Happy Easter (2008)

Album review: The King of Limbs by Radiohead

2011-03-31T15:17:00.002+01:00

Radiohead, The King of Limbs (Ticker Tape, 2011). ASIN: B004SRQ2W6.

Once again, Radiohead have done something unconventional with their manner of releasing an album: this time it’s not being given away for free, only with next-to-no publicity and only having been announced about a week before the release date. Once again, I’m not going to have anything else to say about that, although I will have something to say about the unconventional shortness of this record.

I thought that, rather than do a track-by-track review, I’d do a listen-by-listen review. This is partly because Radiohead albums tend to be growers on me, and partly because it’s almost an album of moods rather than an album of songs.

First listen: Bland and slightly nightmarish.
My overall impression is of the morning after a night of bad dreams. I feel ill-at-ease but nothing really sticks in the memory. There’s barely any guitar presence on this album – maybe even less than on Kid A or Amnesiac.
Second listen: Trippy and menacing.
The songs do still tend to blur together beneath the typically intricately layered soundscape. This time, though, the chorus of ‘Lotus Flower’ is definitely stuck in my head. Heck, it’s almost catchy. I’ve also begun to notice the lyrics rather than just hearing Thom Yorke’s melancholy intonations as part of the background. ‘Little By Little’ sounds like the interior monologue of a stalker (and not just lyrically). He repeats ‘don’t hurt me’ all the way through ‘Give Up The Ghost’ and ‘if you think this is over then you’re wrong’ intermittently throughout ‘Separator’.
Third listen: Contrasts emerge.
Parts of this record – on ‘Bloom’, ‘Morning Mr. Magpie’, ‘Lotus Flower’ and ‘Separator’ – are now sounding almost groovy, albeit in a downbeat way. ‘Codex’ is a desperately sad and beautiful song of the kind we’ve come to expect from Radiohead (other reviewers have made a variety of comparisons; it reminds me most of ‘Pyramid Song’ off Amneisac), but it’s so understated that its effect is almost suffocated by its own intro and outro.
Fourth listen: Music for the head.
They really are being tricky (Tricky?) with the sound effects and samples (and possibly use of unusual instruments, I’m not sure). ‘Feral’ is the epitome of this, as the track has plenty of cleverness but very little else. If this were a genius record, though, in total contrast to my initial reaction, then I’d expect to have noticed it by now.
Fifth listen: The final listen for now.
This may sound like the ultimate case of stating the obvious, given what I’ve written above, but there really is nothing to sing along with here. Otherwise I have nothing new to report, and so conclude that I now have the information I need to write up my review.

So a mixed review, then. Subtlety is a virtue, and this is certainly a subtle album. However, I would have preferred it to have been less subtle, for there to have been more variation. Maybe that’s asking too much of an album this short, but then maybe for that reason alone this album is just too short; on at least the first three listens I was surprised at how quickly the album was finished, half expecting everything I’d heard to have been a build up to a dramatic final third which just doesn’t materialise. As it is, this release just isn’t heavyweight enough to demand that you buy it. At the same time, I don’t regret that I did.

Track listing:

Bloom
Morning Mr. Magpie
Little By Little
Feral
Lotus Flower
Codex
Give Up The Ghost
Separator

Book review: The Journey to Truth by George Garlick

2011-03-28T15:37:00.006+01:00

Garlick, George F. (2009) The Journey to Truth: How scientific discovery provides insights into spiritual truths (Sisters, Oregon: VMI Publications). ISBN: 978-1-933204-89-5. RRP: $14.99/£9.26

There are a number of ‘God and science’ books on the market at the moment, of which this is one. Beyond that, however, this book is relatively difficult to categorise. Garlick certainly aims to show that there is no inconsistency in being a scientist and a Bible-believing Christian. But his concern is not, as in so many other cases, merely to disarm the ‘scientific’ arguments of sceptics (although there is some of that), and if there was any positive argument for God in this book then I missed it. Rather, he also and most importantly appears to feel a burden to enthuse fellow Christians about science (or at least, some particular areas of science) and to encourage us to integrate our scientific and theological thinking. For these reasons, although perhaps not only these reasons, The Journey to Truth is an interesting if sometimes uneven mixture of autobiography, apologetics, popular science, devotion, natural theology and theology of nature, to name but a few themes. In his own words: ‘My goal is to present my understanding of scientific facts and new scientific theories as honestly as possible and them demonstrate how they can help us interpret the truths of challenging passages in Scripture’ (p 11). Some of those understandings and interpretations are a little unconventional, on both the scientific and theological sides. I will try to give a flavour of this in what follows.

Garlick endorses a version of (super)string theory, according to which all matter is fundamentally made up of ‘strings of energy’ of approximately 10^-35m long each. He identifies the Big Bang as the creation event, when an infinite quantity of energy began to be converted into matter of this kind. The reason that there isn’t an infinite amount of matter/energy in the observable universe is that most of it exists in higher dimensions. On Garlick’s view, God inhabits the the totality of the fifth dimension (and all higher), through which he is able to act anywhere on our more familiar four-dimensional (including time) world. The fifth dimension, unlike the four below it, is unaffected by sin.

Garlick draws a parallel between the notion of infinite energy and God’s omnipotence. I wasn’t quite able to tell just how close this parallel was supposed to be, except that it seems to be stronger than the assertion that God created infinite energy ex nihilo, but weaker than the claim that God just is this infinite energy, out of which creation comes (which would be a form of panentheism). A similar situation affects the discussion of the nature of light later on in the book. God and light are compared at length in chapter VIII, as summarised in the following:

Both God and light are constants
Not of the World
Invisible yet Visible
Paradoxical
Eternal.
----------------------------------------------------
Both God and light are constants (p 103)

Garlick says that the assertion ‘God is light’ (1 John 1:5) ‘has far more meaning and revelation of the nature of God than a metaphor’ (p 103), including the derivation that ‘any time in the fifth dimension would be an infinite time in our earthly existence’ (p 123), since all velocity on earth is relative to the speed of light and light itself ‘is a vibration in the fifth dimension’ (p 84).

I won’t pretend that I fully (or even mostly) understand all (or even most) of that. Garlick does his best to explain it, including with the aid of many diagrams, drawings, tables and equations, but at certain points I got the impression that his reverence and enthusiasm were getting the better of his clarity of expression. Not that that is such a bad thing overall, and not that I blame him for my not getting to grips with these complex and often counterintuitive concepts. I only think that perhaps he tried to cover too much ground in a short book, and that this situation could have been helped if he had dedicated less space to autobiography (which, I’m afraid, I didn’t find all that interesting). Still, this short book certainly does cover an awful lot of thoroughly interesting ground, for which we can be grateful.

2011: no predictions, no resolutions

2011-01-02T14:45:00.001Z

Let’s see how I did with my predictions and resolutions from this time last year:

Resolution:

I resolved to arrest the decline in post frequency on this blog.
2007: 63 posts
2008: 49
2009: 23
2010: 21

Predictions:

Argentina will win the Football World Cup (controversial…).
The result of the UK general election will be a hung parliament with the Conservatives the biggest party (not so controversial).
Absolutely nothing will be done about banking regulation, remuneration or anything else that will prevent global recessions in the future.
(meaning I actually don’t know – to judge this one would be to make another prediction, which I won’t do)
Tiger Woods will not appear in public at all if he can help it, never mind play in a major golf tournament.
Cadbury’s will be bought out by Kraft after all.
The Nobel Peace Prize will not be won by an American liberal, for once.

For 2011, I resolve to make no predictions (except for the one I’m about to make), and predict that I will make no resolutions (except for the one I just made).

Happy New Year!

‘Persecution’ or not, injustice should be opposed–in a way that counts

2010-12-30T19:59:00.001Z

I thought I’d said everything I wanted to back in April about conflicts between Bible-believing Christians and various power structures in the UK, but I was wrong: since then we have had the launch of the Not Ashamed campaign and various responses to it, including a dismissive one from sometime visitor to this blog, Paul Wright, and so I once again find myself with the nagging feeling that something is being missed.

When I first blogged about Not Ashamed I remarked that, while I agreed with the substance of the declaration itself, the choice of examples for the campaign I found ‘odd’. In the end I never signed the declaration for this reason, since I wasn’t certain I could support everything that these Christians had been trying to do in their jobs. Paul, predictably, goes further, endorsing the view that the individuals in question ‘probably should be ashamed’.

At the same time, I don’t want anyone to get the impression that I think that all the noise about Christians having been unfairly treated in this country is as unfounded as all that. To that end, here is a list of the cases to which I have drawn attention in the last couple of years:

Caroline Petrie, the nurse who was suspended after offering to pray for a patient (later reinstated)
Jennie Cain, the school receptionist whose daughter was sent home for evangelising at school, and whose private e-mail asking for prayer about this somehow ended up in the hands of her boss
The foster mother who was struck off the register after a 16-year-old in her care converted to Christianity

And a new one:

Christian health worker Margaret Forrester faces sack over anti-abortion booklet (The Telegraph) – NB the booklet in question was shown to colleagues, not patients. These developments should be opposed because they are unjust, and the impression that they are part of a general trend of intolerance towards beliefs that deviate from a rather narrow secular liberalism should not be dismissed out of hand.

Still, I have mixed feelings about the whole Not Ashamed approach to these issues. While there is a lot of truth in the contention that, in terms of the foundations for its institutions and laws, this is a ‘Christian country’, it isn’t clear to me what arguing on this basis is supposed to achieve. As any Christian who has spent a modicum of time outside the holy huddle trying to reach those around them with the gospel knows, in terms of personal loyalties this country is predominantly not Christian at all but pagan – no amount of census box-ticking obscures the fact – and we should therefore not be surprised that people seek to order society in dehumanising ways and call it good. Sin does that to people, and sin will not be defeated with court cases.

Last year I blogged some points from a seminar that Michael Jensen had given on the subject of martyrdom, which included the following:

Martyrdom is a sign of a distinctively Christian mode of speech: we love people to death. The way we speak means we run risks, ranging all the way from ridicule to death. But we don't (or shouldn't) bang on about our rights; rather, we should be concerned about what is right. […]

Jensen was keen that the church shouldn't be making itself into just another special interest pressure group, trying to carve out its own space within which to operate.

The more we talk about how discriminated against we are, about how hard it is for Christians in Britain, probably the less inclined people will be to believe us when we tell them that we care about them. Only with a massive changing of hearts brought about by the Spirit will Britain again be a Christian nation in the sense that matters. It has happened before in many a pagan country, but as a result of Christians witnessing to their fellow citizens, never from coercion. The reason that my feelings about Not Ashamed are mixed is because this fact seems also to have been acknowledged there at some level, for example in Michael Nazir-Ali’s contribution to the website. After having spent some time discussing court cases and parliamentary debates, he says:

But it is at the local level that the rubber will really hit the road, when people manifest their beliefs, express their faith in their home, in the neighbourhood, in the shops when they go to them, at their place of work, at recreation, wherever they may be. That is very important because Christians need to be visible in the localities where they live.

This sense of being not ashamed of the gospel (Romans 1:16) is definitely one which I support.

Christmas Countdown

2010-12-08T14:20:00.002Z

The video below will update every day between now and Christmas Day.

Your browser does not support iframes.

Template experimentation

2010-11-25T23:16:00.001Z

My long-time readers (if there still are any!) will have noticed that the blog has changed look recently. I’m experimenting with a new template and layout settings. All comments welcome.

I hope to have a more substantive post for you soon!

What would you say is ‘the defining struggle in the world’ today?

2010-10-14T19:28:00.002+01:00

I have just gotten around to reading a letter that my alma mater sent me, asking for money. The opening paragraph reads as follows:

Today, the defining struggle in the world is between relentless growth and the potential for collaboration. The borders that separate our societies from each other are blurring, as are the barriers that distinguish the sciences from arts and humanities. We are becoming one world. Our world. The University of Oxford is a leader in thinking, envisaging and shaping this world through academic endeavour, interdisciplinary excellence and distinctive teaching.

I don’t know whether to laugh, yawn or retch.

I write like…

2010-10-06T20:50:00.001+01:00

I’ve just spent a while messing around with the I Write Like text analyzer (HT: Digest of Worms). I’ve had all kinds of results from it, but one author was particularly prominent:

I write like
H. P. Lovecraft

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

This was the result for the vast majority of my reviews, both of albums (The Incident by Porcupine Tree, The Resistance by Muse) and books (William Wilberforce by William Hague; Darwinian Fairytales by David Stove; God, Gays and the Church by Lisa Nolland et al.), as well as The Nobel Peace Prize committee has surpassed itself, Human values and the value of humans and It’s not the economy, and don't call me stupid. In second place:

I write like
David Foster Wallace

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

The was the result for such disparate pieces of writing as A helpful warning from your friendly PC publisher and my reviews of The Testings of Devotion by Cheryl Dellasega and of In Rainbows by Radiohead.

Other than this I had somewhat varied results: Mary Shelly for Christian faith and modern British politics, a layman’s view and Some reflections on the elections, Edgar Allan Poe for my review of God’s Undertaker by John Lennox, Vladimir Nabokov for my review of Death Magnetic by Metallica, Douglas Adams for my review of Radiohead in Victoria Park, Arthur C. Clarke for my review of The Edge of Evolution by Michael Behe, Margaret Attwood for Carniphobia: a dialogue, Dan Brown for 01/01/10 and Jonathan Swift for Getting the crystal ball out. I’m not sure how I feel about getting so many results comparing my writing to that of horror or sci-fi authors.

The results can be displayed graphically as follows:

(Sample size: 20).

So, who out there thinks this blog reads primarily like a deranged horror story?

Another declaration to sign

2010-09-27T15:08:00.001+01:00

The Not Ashamed Campaign:

A DECLARATION OF CHRISTIAN HOPE FOR OUR NATION

WE BELIEVE that Jesus Christ is good news for our nation. He is the only true hope and solid foundation for our society.

WE CALL on government, employers and other leaders in our country to protect the freedom of Christians to participate in public life without compromising biblical teaching and to promote in our society the values that are revealed through Jesus Christ and that have so shaped our nation, for the good of all.

I agree with the declaration and may well sign it. But I find the examples they’ve chosen for their campaign video a little bit odd. I thought the Westminster 2010 Declaration was better, but I suppose that’s all over now. Thoughts?

John Richardson on causes of disunity in Evangelicalism

2010-07-21T00:14:00.002+01:00

Here

To put it another way, would the ‘you’ you are today be interested in, and capable of, being instrumental in the conversion experienced by the ‘you’ you were when you became a Christian? I very much hope the answer is yes, but I very much fear that the answer for my own generation is often no.

Discuss

Book review: The Testings of Devotion by Cheryl Dellasega

2010-06-20T18:36:00.004+01:00

Dellasega, C. (2009) The Heavenly Host, Book I: The Testings of Devotion (Sisters, Oregon: VMI Publishers). ISBN: 978-1-933204-70-3. RRP: $14.99/£9.72.
Have you noticed that I haven’t reviewed a book on here since December 2008? No? Well, I have. Time to put that right, with a look at a novel about spiritual warfare. The Heavenly Host trilogy, of which this is the first part, apparently aims to take an angel’s-eye view of the history of the universe. The universe as imagined in this novel looks like this:
Heaven is divided into three levels: the 3^rd level is where ‘The Almighty Divine’ resides (that’s God to you and me), the 2^nd level is inhabited by the archangels, plus a special council of dead humans, and the 3^rd level is occupied by the angels the other dead people. After the initial event of rebellion by Lucifer and his followers (more on which below), each of these angles is assigned a particular role such as prayer, praise or welcoming newcomers into the ‘community of resting mortals’. The angels watch what’s happening on earth on big screens, controlled by dials and buttons. If all this gives you the impression that the angels all have bodies a bit like our own, then you got the same impression that I did, although they don’t eat, drink or sleep, but ‘refresh’ in armchairs.
Our heroine is Sophia, a prayer angel who is quickly and somewhat surprisingly promoted to ‘Senior Servant’, i.e. the one in charge of all the angels and overall operations on the first level. In that position she is supported (albeit often grudgingly) by two ‘Selected Servants’: Miriam and Faras, her deputies. The relationship between these three is one of the most important sub-plots of the novel. Sophia is often visited, encouraged and instructed by Gabriel, the archangel, the messenger. Gabriel passes on all God’s instructions, since ‘The Almighty Divine’ apparently doesn’t do that kind of thing himself – to the point where Miriam at one point expresses her devotion by saying ‘I’ll do whatever the Almighty Divine tells Gabriel to ask of me’ (p 126). If all that sounds a bit Muslim to you, then you got the same impression that I did.
The battle between Lucifer and Michael the archangel is described as occurring after the former has already tempted Adam and Eve to sin. So, in that case, what prompted Lucifer to tempt Adam and Eve? Apparently he thought it was the best thing to do to protect ‘The Almighty Divine’ against the evil that humans would later do. If that confuses you, then your reaction is the same as mine.
Perhaps this will make things clearer: the best place to start when analysing this book is on the back cover, where we read the following:

What The Shack did for the Trinity, The Testings of Devotion does for the heavenly realms, shedding light on the spiritual battle waging continually around us.

To summarise my review right now: that comparison is valid – perhaps, I suspect, more valid than the author would like. Like The Shack, The Testings of Devotion is a well-written page-turner of a story. But also like The Shack, it is theologically dubious – to the point where I can’t honestly describe this novel as a Christian book with integrity. The real point of conflict between the devil and his cohort one the one hand, and the angels who instead choose to serve ‘The Almighty Divine’ on the other (apart from, y’know, the whole thinking they know better than God thing), is that only the former believe humans to be intrinsically evil. The latter believe the reverse:

‘You think that they [humans] come up with evil ideas on their own? I assure you they do not.’ (Gabriel to Sophia, p 52).
‘I’ve always been a champion of the inherent goodness in mortals’ (Sophia, p 169).
‘Like you [Sophia], I believe mortals are basically good’ (Hector (another angel, sort of the Sergeant Major of the first level), p 215).
I won’t spoil the ending, except to say that the argument in the face-off in the final scene is mainly about this very point.

To which I say:

I assure you that they (we) do: Romans 1:30, Mark 7:20-23.
I have not: Romans 7:18.
In what sense are we ‘basically’ good, though we are evil? (Matthew 7:11).
By the standards of this book, it seems that, on this point, I am on the side of the evil one.

And yes, that makes me uncomfortable. In this book, human sins are attributed to anything other than human sinfulness – most often to some combination of demonic activity and our short attention span. A prime example of this is the continuing suggestion that the ‘bad’ people you know might be the issue of a demon/human liaison (see Genesis 6):

The Nephilim exist, and they’re the cause of the worst and most unexplainable suffering on earth – as you just saw. Any time there’s a senseless tragedy and mortals wonder how one of their own can be so completely evil, it’s likely the Nephilim are involved. (p 90)

Maybe some of my readers can see a pattern emerging from the problems I’ve already described: firstly that God is portrayed as distant, and secondly that no account is taken of human sinfulness. However, big as these problems are in a book from a Christian publishing house with an orthodox statement of faith, they are small next to the near-total disregard shown to the truth about Jesus Christ, a disregard which is at the centre of the plot.
The ‘testings of devotion’ of the title is a tactic used by the heavenly forces in their battle with the forces of hell for human souls, whereby potential spiritual warriors are put through setbacks and suffering in order to force them to depend on God. So far so good. The thing is, in order to make this plan work the angels apparently have to recruit a woman named Ruth from out of the ‘community of resting mortals’ in order to help them understand human psychology from the point of view of someone who remained faithful despite enduring terrible suffering. Sophia justifies this move to Miriam as follows:

“So, if we’re in such high favor,” Miriam protested, “why do we need her? It’s not that I mind extra help, but we’ve never had a mortal on the first level before.”
“You are in high favor,” Sophia reassured her. “But you have no idea what it’s like to be a mortal.” (p 124)

The thing is, our Lord has every idea what it’s like to be a mortal (Philippians 2:5-8; Hebrews 2:18; 4:14-15), and so the idea that angels would have to recruit some other human to explain to them how it all works is most charitably interpreted as bizarre. A single mention of ‘the Saviour Son’ is not going to rescue the situation, particularly since the novel also implicitly denies the exclusivity of salvation in Christ: at one point Gabriel illustrates how bad things have gotten on Earth by explaining that

“There are many who have strayed from their faith […] Look at how few places of worship remain, even at the holiest of sites.”
He touched a button and she [Sophia] saw the ruins of churches in Rome, collapsed temples in India, and abandoned mosques and synagogues in the Americas.

The implication that Christians, Hindus, Muslims and Jews are all worshipping the same ‘Almighty Divine’ is most charitably interpreted as disastrously mistaken. So, I’m afraid, those theological problems rather spoiled the book for me. It does no-one any favours to imagine God as distant and to deny human sinfulness, the incarnation and the exclusivity of salvation in Christ.

Get out and vote

2010-05-06T00:20:00.001+01:00

It’s a general election in the UK today. If you don’t vote, you can’t complain!

The perils of basing your decisions on website quizzes

2010-04-27T09:25:00.001+01:00

Exhibit 1:

Exhibit 2:

Take the Who Should You Vote For? England quiz

Liberal Democrat		40
Green		30
Conservative		6
Labour		2
UK Independence	-11

Your recommendation: Liberal Democrat

Click here for more details about these results

?????

The rights and wrongs of human rights

2010-04-11T23:43:00.001+01:00

In my last post, I drew attention to the distinction between just and unjust forms of discrimination:

Suppose I am taking casting auditions for a film I am directing. The film is a biopic of Devon Malcolm, and Mr. White is auditioning for the main role. But Mr. White is white. If I refuse to cast Mr. White as Malcolm, since whoever plays Malcolm has to be black, am I in the right?

Not all discrimination is unjust. It’s generally taken as a rebuke against a person to tell him that he does something requiring precision ‘indiscriminately’. Discrimination on the grounds of race, sex, religion, sexual orientation, age or whatever is unjust to the extent that those factors are irrelevant to someone’s ability to do the job in question or entitlement to the benefit in question. So, while it would not be unjust discrimination to refuse to cast Mr. White as Devon Malcolm merely because he’s white, it would be unjust to refuse to pick Devon Malcolm in your cricket team merely because he is black, since his being black has no bearing on his ability to play cricket well. That kind of discrimination has no place in a just society.

Ilíon disagreed:

This position is not exactly right. This particular discrimination is immoral ... but it is the sort of personal immorality which must be allowed by government precisely because we wish to live in just societies. For, governmental suppression if this particular immorality creates more injustice, and ultimately more immorality, than is solved by the suppression.

This is an interesting perspective that I have heard before and against which it’s not that easy to argue. What I think it highlights is the fact that the more that rights and freedoms are enshrined in law, the greater the probability that these will come into conflict. For example, has the right to freedom of association in this country been compromised when the British National Party is legally disbarred from having a whites-only membership policy?

Should any clarification be needed (I hope not), I do not support the BNP. I just think this is a genuinely interesting case, since freedom of association has historically been a very important liberty, and surely must include the freedom to disassociate as well (otherwise it’s pretty meaningless) – and yet here we have an example of a situation where that freedom is denied. Denied for good and well-meaning reasons, I’m sure, but denied all the same.

Tough questions here, with no easy answers. I think the position one takes on questions like this depends largely on what one’s idea of the ideal society is; I mean, in terms of structure rather than of citizens (people are unpredictable, after all). Someone who thinks that freedom is the ultimate good in a society will presumably support e.g. the BNP’s right to freely associate in a racist manner, while someone who think that equality is more important presumably won’t.

In my last post, I also said that Bible-believing Christians ‘want to work with you for the common good’ (and I meant it). But what is the common good?

Christian faith and modern British politics, a layman’s view

2010-04-09T11:05:00.004+01:00

This is the post where I attempt to draw together the lines of thought behind my other posts highlighting the myriad of recent petitions and declarations regarding Christianity in the public sphere in modern Britain. It has been prompted by watching the programme Are Christians Being Persecuted? on BBC One on Sunday night, and by following some responses to the recent Westminster 2010 Declaration of Christian Conscience, which was the subject of my last post. I am going to begin by looking at two recent political/legislative controversies concerning matters of Christian conscience, and then step back to see what generalisations can be made.

Hate and other thought crimes
My own view is that it is extremely puzzling for a government to legislate in such a way as to make ‘incitement to x’ illegal, when ‘x’ itself isn’t illegal. Take incitement to murder (right). Murder is illegal, and so for incitement to murder to be illegal makes sense, since it amounts to encouraging someone else to break the law – presumably on your behalf. However, since ‘hatred’ isn't illegal, how can ‘incitement to hatred’ be illegal?

Our present government takes the view that it can, and hence as part of its Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 created the offence of ‘incitement to hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation’. On the face of it, I personally find this no better or worse motivated and justified than similar legislation that has been introduced to criminalise incitement to hatred on the grounds of race or religious belief. Anyone hating anyone else is a bad thing (Galatians 5:19-21), and so anyone inciting anyone else to hate anyone else is likewise a bad thing. But hatred as such is not illegal, and so I don’t see why incitement to hatred should be illegal.

Suppose, however, that I’m wrong about this. Very well. What remains as a concern in the minds of many Christians and others is just what is going to count as ‘incitement to hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation’ under this law. For this reason, it seems, the bill had real problems making it through both Houses of Parliament, and only did so after certain amendments were made, a fact about which our Prime Minister is not happy:

I’m proud that thanks to Labour, incitement to homophobic hate will now be a crime. But the law we recently passed was watered down through the so-called Waddington amendment, which provides a ‘freedom of speech’ opt-out from laws designed to stop incitement.
The amendment was defeated by Labour MPs in the Commons four times - but Tory Lords conspired to force it through Parliament. That’s simply not acceptable, so the next Labour manifesto will contain a commitment to reversing Waddington, and we will invoke the Parliament Act to overturn the Tory Lords if we have to.

So, I hear my readers asking, what exactly is the substance of this nefarious-sounding Waddington amendment, painted by Gordon Brown as a licence to incitement? The answer:

For the avoidance of doubt, the discussion or criticism of sexual conduct or practices or the urging of persons to refrain from or modify such conduct or practices shall not be taken of itself to be threatening or intended to stir up hatred.

That’s it. Suppose I say, ‘When God calls us into his Kingdom, he also calls all of us to a radically changed way of life. The Bible teaches that sexual intercourse between people of the same sex is a sin. If you find that you struggle with this sin, I encourage you to seek out one of the dedicated ministries out there that are designed to help and support you’. As far as I can tell, that’s the kind of statement someone in a free society should be at liberty to make. That liberty seems to be precisely the one that the amendment in question is designed to preserve. So what’s the problem with the Waddington amendment? I can only conclude that to oppose the amendment, one has to be in the firm grip of an ideology, one that insists on silencing voices that dissent from it. And that ideology is insistent: a second attempt was made to repeal the amendment in the Coroners and Justice Bill 2008-09, although thankfully again defeated.

What’s wrong with discrimination?
Suppose I am taking casting auditions for a film I am directing. The film is a biopic of Devon Malcolm, and Mr. White is auditioning for the main role. But Mr. White is white. If I refuse to cast Mr. White as Malcolm, since whoever plays Malcolm has to be black, am I in the right?

Not all discrimination is unjust. It’s generally taken as a rebuke against a person to tell him that he does something requiring precision ‘indiscriminately’. Discrimination on the grounds of race, sex, religion, sexual orientation, age or whatever is unjust to the extent that those factors are irrelevant to someone’s ability to do the job in question or entitlement to the benefit in question. So, while it would not be unjust discrimination to refuse to cast Mr. White as Devon Malcolm merely because he’s white, it would be unjust to refuse to pick Devon Malcolm in your cricket team merely because he is black, since his being black has no bearing on his ability to play cricket well. That kind of discrimination has no place in a just society.

Interpreted charitably, it was a desire to prevent unjust discrimination so defined that was the motivation behind the government’s consolidation of existing equality legislation in the Equality Bill 2008-09 to 2009-10. However, there have been legitimate concerns that this bill actually goes beyond those bounds.

To be able to work for a church properly, you have to commit yourself to that church’s vision. If that church’s vision includes (as it should) a commitment to strive for holiness, defined as adherence to God’s moral law as revealed in Scripture, then someone unapologetically living a life in contravention of that law is not cut out to work there. It is, therefore, a travesty that a church could be prosecuted for refusing to employ someone engaged in a lifestyle, such as a sexual relationship outside of marriage, that is incompatible with that church’s teaching. However, this was exactly what was threatened by measures in the bill. Happily, these were later dropped, but pressure can still be felt from all sides.

So much for those two examples. I can’t begin to address the rights and wrongs of all the cases of conflict coming up between orthodox Christians and the power structures that exist in this country.

Where is all this leading?
^The question applies both to the political trends, and this post!
Reading the stream of vitriol directed at the Westminster Declaration and those who support it (as well as the article, check the comments there and here), I was placed in that familiar dilemma of how to respond. As usual, I see three options:

Ignore.
Argue.
Proclaim.

Most of the post above has been argument, and there’s a fair bit I’m ignoring, too. It seems to be time for some proclamation. First,

To my fellow British citizens who sympathise with the stream of vitriol
We love you. We want to work with you for the common good. We want to live at peace with everyone as much as we possibly can (Romans 12:18). Yes, we want you to believe in Jesus, but not as a result of coercion, and not as the precondition for us loving you, working with you and living at peace with you.

I also have a newsflash for you: Biblical Christianity is not secular liberalism. Bible-believing Christians are not closet secular liberals. We are not, in your words, waiting to be freed from religion. We are not, in our words, about to exchange our God for yours, ever. We are not like this because we lack education or exposure to the real world. We are like this because we have had an encounter with the living God, and we know that following his plan for our lives is infinitely better than drifting along with what society expects and/or being pushed along by our own instincts and urges. I submit that, when it comes down to it, that is what you are doing. Second,

To my brothers and sisters in Christ
Egypt seemed big to the Israelites. Babylon seemed big to the exiles. Rome seemed big to the early Church. Communism seemed big to nearly everyone very recently. Secular liberalism seems big to me right now.

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
- ‘Ozymandias’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Christ is bigger than all of this. What the effort of writing this mammoth post has made me want to do more than anything is stop arguing about this and get back to the business of witness, serving the community, prayer and worshipping the Lord.

The Westminster 2010 Declaration of Christian Conscience

2010-04-05T18:59:00.001+01:00

In the run-up to this year’s general election (expected on 6 May) in the UK, British Christians are being encouraged to sign the following declaration as a message to their parliamentary candidates:

Our beliefs and values

As Christians we reaffirm historic belief in God the Father (who created us and gave us the blueprint for our lives together); in God the Son Jesus Christ our Saviour (accepting his incarnation, teaching, claims, miracles, death, resurrection and return in judgment); and in God the Holy Spirit (who lives within us, guides us and gives us strength). We commit ourselves to worship, honour and obey God.

As UK citizens we affirm our Christian commitment both to exercise social responsibility in working for the common good and also to be subject to all governing authorities and obey them except when they require us to act unjustly.

Human life

We believe that being made in the image of God, all human life has intrinsic and equal dignity and worth and that it is the duty of the state to protect the vulnerable. We will support, protect, and be advocates for such people – including children born and unborn, and all those who are sick, disabled, addicted, elderly, in single parent families, poor, exploited, trafficked, appropriately seeking asylum, threatened by environmental change, or exploited by unjust trade, aid or debt policies. We pledge to work to protect the life of every human being from conception to its natural end and we refuse to comply with any directive that compels us to participate in or facilitate abortion, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide, euthanasia, or any other act that involves intentionally taking innocent human life. We will support those who take the same stand.

Marriage

We pledge to support marriage – the lifelong covenantal union of one man and one woman as husband and wife. We believe it is divinely ordained, the only context for sexual intercourse, and the most important unit for sustaining the health, education, and welfare of all. We call on government to honour, promote and protect marriage and we refuse to submit to any edict forcing us to equate any other form of sexual partnership with marriage. We commit ourselves to continue affirming what we believe as Christians about sexual morality, marriage, and the family.

Conscience

We count it a special privilege to live in a democratic society where all citizens have the right to participate in the political process. We pledge to do what we can to ensure our laws are just and fair, particularly in protecting vulnerable people. We will seek to ensure that religious liberty and freedom of conscience are unequivocally protected against interference by the state and other threats, not only to individuals but also to institutions including families, charities, schools and religious communities. We will not be intimidated by any cultural or political power into silence or acquiescence and we will reject measures that seek to over-rule our Christian consciences or to restrict our freedoms to express Christian beliefs, or to worship and obey God.

Commitment

We call upon all those in UK positions of leadership, responsibility and influence to pledge to respect, uphold and protect the right of Christians to hold these beliefs and to act according to Christian conscience.

I have signed it and, if you want to, you can do so here.

Hmmm…

2010-03-10T22:02:00.001Z

<- Is this a good idea? Or is it too cringe-makingly an instance of this to be taken seriously, particularly if, like me, you (*gasp*) don’t actually like Delirious? that much?

I like Rage Against The Machine, and I don’t like The X Factor, but all the same I didn’t take part in the campaign that is being ripped off here. Still, I could be convinced to take part, I suppose. What do my readers think?

Is there something we should know about Gordon Brown?

2010-02-19T09:16:00.001Z

The Beyonder is the sum total of a parallel reality called the Beyond-Realm or simply "Beyond", hence the name "Beyonder" […] Intrigued by what he has witnessed during the first Secret Wars, [In Secret Wars II] the Beyonder comes to Earth to walk among humans and study them and learn of human desire firsthand. He creates a human body for himself; originally, this body resembles an amalgam of parts of various super-beings […] At first, the Beyonder has a complete lack of understanding of human biology and society, which leads to numerous difficult situations, some serious and some humorous. (Wikipedia)

Images hyperlinked to where I got them.

Promise to vote

2010-02-04T11:57:00.001Z

I have just made a Promise to Vote in the upcoming 2010 General Election using my Christian conscience to decide which party to support. I would like you to stand with me and make the same promise to help our Christian voice be heard.

Keynes vs Hayek

2010-01-28T22:41:00.001Z

HT: Edward Feser

I just signed another petition

2010-01-11T14:20:00.001Z

This one:

Petition to remove the provisions set out in the Equality Bill relating to sex, marriage and sexual orientation for the purposes of organised religion

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Remove the current employment provisions set out in Schedule 9, Paragraph 2, subsection 8 of the Equality Bill (the occupational requirements relating to sex, marriage and sexual orientation for the purposes of organised religion). These restrict the rights of religious bodies to employ personnel who conform to their teachings only if their duties are confined to worship activities or the explanation of doctrine. More details

Submitted by david skinnner – Deadline to sign up by: 05 April 2010

HT: The Ugley Vicar.

Five interesting testimonies

2010-01-03T23:24:00.000Z

I am always fascinated to hear about the ways in which God has worked in people’s lives to draw them to himself. Every such story is interesting (and, moreover, a cause for rejoicing), and so perhaps the title of this post is badly chosen. But I choose to retain it because these are all testimonies with which I particularly identify in some way or other. I hope that many of my readers will feel the same way.

1) Escape from nihilism by J. Budziszewski

J. Budziszewski is a professor of Philosophy and Government at the University of Texas at Austin.

When some people flee from God they rob and kill. When others flee from God they do a lot of drugs and have a lot of sex. When I fled from God I didn't do any of those things; my way of fleeing was to get stupid. Though it always comes as a surprise to intellectuals, there are some forms of stupidity that one must be highly intelligent and educated to commit. God keeps them in his arsenal to pull down mulish pride, and I discovered them all. That is how I ended up doing a doctoral dissertation to prove that we make up the difference between good and evil and that we aren't responsible for what we do. I remember now that I even taught these things to students; now that's sin.

It was also agony. You cannot imagine what a person has to do to himself--well, if you are like I was, maybe you can--what a person has to do to himself to go on believing such nonsense. […]

Visualize a man opening up the access panels of his mind and pulling out all the components that have God's image stamped on them. The problem is that they all have God's image stamped on them, so the man can never stop. No matter how much he pulls out, there's still more to pull. I was that man. Because I pulled out more and more, there was less and less that I could think about. But because there was less and less that I could think about, I thought I was becoming more and more focussed. Because I believed things that filled me with dread, I thought I was smarter and braver than the people who didn't believe them. I thought I saw an emptiness at the heart of the universe that was hidden from their foolish eyes. Of course I was the fool.

2) How I came to faith by William Lane Craig

William Lane Craig is Research Professor of Philosophy at Talbot School of Theology in La Mirada, California.

I became very bitter toward the institutional church because of the phoniness that I thought it represented […] I began to read the New Testament […] and as I did so I was absolutely captivated by the person of Jesus of Nazareth. There was a wisdom about his teaching that I had never encountered before, and there was an authenticity about his life that wasn’t characteristic of [some of] his followers […] I realised at that point that I couldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

3) Quam dilecta by Peter van Inwagen

Peter van Inwagen is John Cardinal O'Hara Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame.

There is, I believe, an identifiable and cohesive historical phenomenon that named itself the Enlightenment in the eighteenth century, and which, although it long ago abandoned the name, still exists. Like the Church, it does not speak with one voice. Like the Church, it has no central government. Like the Church, it is made up of many groups some of which heartily detest many of the others--some of which, indeed, regard themselves as its sole true representatives and all others who claim to be its representatives as wolves in sheep's clothing. Like the Church, it has a creed, although, unlike the Church's creeds, its creed has never received an official formulation. […]

The Enlightenment has had its chance with me and I have found it wanting. I was once one of its adherents, and now I am an apostate. On the level of intellectual argument and evidence, it leaves a lot to be desired. And its social consequences have been horrible.

I am going to compare the attractiveness of the Church and the Enlightenment. I will group my comparisons into three parts. First, it seems to me, the teachings of the Church are, as I shall say, "congruent" with the facts of science and history in a way that the "creed" of the Enlightenment is not, and I shall discuss this. Secondly, I shall compare the "fruits" of the Church with the fruits of the Enlightenment. Thirdly, I shall compare the effects of adherence to the Church and to the Enlightenment in the lives of individuals.

4) A surprising discovery by Anne Rice

Anne Rice is the author of the hugely successful Vampire Chronicles and many other books.

I had taken in a lot of fashionable notions about Jesus—that he’d been oversold, that the Gospels were “late” documents, that we really didn’t know anything about him, that violence and quarrelling marked the movement of Christianity from its start. I’d acquired many books on Jesus, and the filled the shelves of my office. […]

What gradually came clear to me was that many of the skeptical arguments—arguments that insisted most of the Gospels were suspect, for instance, or written too late to be eyewitness accounts—lacked coherence. They were not elegant. Arguments about Jesus himself were full of conjecture. Some books were no more than assumptions piled upon assumptions. Absurd conclusions were reached on the basis of little or no data at all.

In sum, the whole case for the nondivine Jesus who stumbled into Jerusalem and somehow got crucified by nobody and had nothing to do with the founding of Christianity and would be horrified by it if he knew about it—that the whole picture which has floated in the liberal circles I frequented as an atheist for thirty years—that case was not made. Not only was it not made. I discovered in this field some of the worst and most biased scholarship I’d ever read.

5) I am second by Brian ‘Head’ Welch

Brian Welch was formerly the guitarist for (and a founding member of) the multiplatinum nu-metal band KoRn, and is now a solo artist.

I felt so much fatherly love from heaven, and it was like ‘I don’t condemn you; I love you’. It was just love. And instantly that love from God came into me. […] It changed me – my heart was changed like that.

My dream came true way more than I dreamt about. […] I tried everything to try to get pleasure out of this life, and I thought that I could fulfil my life with all this stuff, having my dream come true. It came true, but it didn’t fulfil it. And Christ came in, that feeling he gives you: the gift of understanding life, which is that everything was created for Christ and by him, and we’re created to be with him. And it’s the most incredible feeling because you’re where you belong.

When all you have is a book on fallacies…

2010-01-02T01:12:00.002Z

A dear friend gave me How to win every argument: The use and abuse of logic (London: Continuum, 2007) by Madsen Pirie as a Christmas gift. It is possible that the friend in question will read this blog post (hi D!), so I should begin by stressing that I am very pleased with the gift and that I will certainly continue to read it despite the infuriating flaw in it that I am about to describe. In fact, I am touched by the gesture, since, according to a ‘publisher’s warning’ on the back cover, ‘In the wrong hands this book is very dangerous […] Only buy this book as a gift if you are sure that you can trust the recipient’. It is good to be trusted.

The aim of the book is to provide a list of formal and informal logical fallacies often seen in argument, with descriptions and examples. One of the fallacies listed is the ‘conclusion which denies premises’, about which Pirie has the following to say:

The conclusion which denies its premises constantly slips uninvited into religious arguments. People are so used to thinking of divine beings as exceptions to every rule that they tend to use the word ‘everything’ when they mean ‘everything except God’.

Everything must have a cause. That, in turn, must have a previous cause. Since it cannot go back forever, we know that there must be an uncaused causer to start the process.

(But if everything must have a cause, how can there be such a thing as an uncaused causer?)

The fallacy has a most distinguished history, being used (although not identified as such) by Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas among many others. It has many faces. The ‘uncaused causer’ can be a ‘first cause’ or even a ‘first mover’. It can be reworded in many ways, but never without fallacy. (p 36)

Here’s a task for my readers: find a point in either Aristotle or Aquinas where either makes anything like as boneheaded an argument as is attributed to him here. Collaboration is allowed, although I wouldn’t expect much help from Dr. Pirie himself. One area in which he is helpful, though, is in his exposition of the straw man fallacy:

The straw man is, in short, a misrepresentation of your opponent’s position […] Like the ignorati elenchi society he belongs to, he is totally beside the point. His function is to elicit, by the ease of his demolition, a scorn which can be directed at the real figure he represents. (pp 155-6)

That is what is going on in the utter travesty of the philosopher and the angelic doctor quoted above. The sad thing is that Pirie is by no means alone in this tendency, as Edward Feser points out in a highly recommended blog post:

There are surely hundreds or even thousands of philosophers who think Aquinas is guilty of various fallacies because they simply don’t understand what his arguments are really about. […]

Take what everyone “knows” to be the “basic” Cosmological Argument for God’s existence: Everything has a cause; so the universe has a cause, namely God. This argument is notoriously bad: If everything has a cause, then what caused God? And if God needn’t have had a cause, why must the universe have one? Etc. The thing is, not one of the best-known defenders of the Cosmological Argument in the history of philosophy ever gave this stupid argument. Not Plato, not Aristotle, not al-Ghazali, not Maimonides, not Aquinas, not Duns Scotus, not Leibniz, not Samuel Clarke, not Garrigou-Lagrange, not Mortimer Adler, not William Lane Craig, not Richard Swinburne. And, for that matter, not anyone else either, as far as I know. (My emphasis)

Don’t believe me (and Feser)? Then go to the relevant page of the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy and see for yourself.

01/01/10

2010-01-01T23:37:00.001Z

A few scattered thoughts for the first day of the decade.

2010 and the 2010s

(In speech,) I will be referring to this year as ‘twenty ten’, not ‘two thousand ten’ or ‘two thousand and ten’, and this decade as the ‘tens’ or ‘twenty tens’, not the ‘teens’ or ‘teenies’ or whatever. The decade with the silly name is over, and in these times of austerity is behoves us to keep things simple. It will also help non-native English speakers no end if the system for talking about years gets back to what it was until 1999.

The falling post count: a resolution

2007: 63 posts
2008: 49
2009: 23
2010: ?

This is a cause for concern, no doubt. I hope that the reduction in post frequency is due to my holding higher standards with regards to what I allow to appear here, although that would probably be wishful thinking. With this in mind, I am making a new year’s resolution to blog more this year than last. Given that I gave up blogging and blogs for Lent last year, this marks something of a turnaround. Also: anyone who was waiting for the long-promised follow-up to my post on Jackendoff and conceptualist semantics shouldn’t lose hope just yet (although that may not appear for another few months).

Predictions

Argentina will win the Football World Cup (controversial…).
The result of the UK general election will be a hung parliament with the Conservatives the biggest party (not so controversial).
Absolutely nothing will be done about banking regulation, remuneration or anything else that will prevent global recessions in the future.
Tiger Woods will not appear in public at all if he can help it, never mind play in a major golf tournament.
Cadbury’s will be bought out by Kraft after all.
The Nobel Peace Prize will not be won by an American liberal, for once.

Final greetings

May God pour out all his blessings on you this year, this decade, and always. Happy New Year!

Calling all Europeans

2009-12-04T18:41:00.004Z

From the ProLife Alliance:

Across the European Union pro-lifers in member countries are collecting signatures for this petition in defence of the right to life of the human embryo, to coincide with the 60th Anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. It is vital that the United Kingdom supports this initiative.
The European Union is the only vehicle for receiving such a petition from European citizens and this is primarily addressed to the President of the EU, but it is intended to send copies to the Council and Commission as well.

We ask you to participate either by signing online (see form below) or by downloading and printing the petition here to collect the signatures of your friends.

Please only sign the petition if you are a UK resident and if you haven’t already signed this petition. Please send completed signature pages to:

ProLife Alliance
PO Box 13395
London SW3 6XE

The ProLife Alliance will ensure that all online and paper signatures are forwarded to the President of the European Union. We must act immediately as it is intended to present all signatures after the forthcoming European Elections.

The petition itself can be found here.

A public service announcement

2009-11-20T22:19:00.001Z

from Pastor Justin Cox of P4CM:

New comments settings

2009-11-20T10:51:00.002Z

I've had to introduce a word verification step for comments on this blog following a spam attack from ‘freefun0616’. I suppose everyone else had this already but I perhaps foolishly thought I could get away without it. Sorry for the extra inconvenience this will cause.

The Nobel Peace Prize committee has surpassed itself

2009-10-10T19:34:00.003+01:00

Having complained two years ago when the prize was given to Al Gore, I could hardly let this year’s awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama pass without comment. When the deadline for nominations came around (February 1), Mr. Obama had been in office for two weeks. By then, of course, he hadn’t done a whole lot for world peace. Subsequently he hasn’t done a whole lot more.

In 2007 I said that ‘The judges appear, for some reason, to have been motivated to make some kind of political point beyond their remit’. This time there’s no ‘appears’ about it. According to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, the award is justified because

Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play.

In other words, Obama gets the award for not being George W. Bush. OK, so we can be clear, the members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee are:
Thorbjørn Jagland
Kaci Kullmann Five
Sissel Marie Rønbeck
Inger-Marie Ytterhorn
Ågot Valle

I make the list as a name-and-shame exercise because, frankly, Europeans like this are an embarrassment to the continent (and yes, I consider myself a European). The tireless Bush-baiting was tedious enough while Dubya was still American President; the fact that it’s continuing now is, as I say, embarrassing (and I was never a fan of Dubya). Moreover, it cheapens the efforts of Nobel Laureates who have actually done something for their awards. For what it’s worth, I would have given this year’s prize to Morgan Tsvangirai.

Go here for an excellently-worded response to the fiasco by The Times.

Album review: The Incident by Porcupine Tree

2009-09-15T21:49:00.003+01:00

Porcupine Tree, The Incident (Roadrunner: 2009)

In the run-up to the release of this album I had two conflicting emotions. The first was great anticipation, because I’m a big fan of Porcupine Tree and their last album (2007’s Fear of a Blank Planet) was of very high quality. The second was a degree of trepidation when I heard that the new release would actually be a single 55-minute song split up into 14 tracks. That led me to expect a spaced-out affair like The Sky Moved Sideways, and I have more than enough albums like that already.

I needn’t have worried. While this (concept) album definitely sounds like an album, a single piece of work, it also contains a great deal of variety. So, for example, there are downtuned riffs liberally spread throughout, but also haunting synth-glockenspiel on ‘Drawing the Line’, Nine Inch Nails-esque robotic menace on the title track, a soaring guitar solo on ‘Time Flies’ and acoustic guitar atmospherics on that track, ‘Great Expectations’ (also featuring calming piano and vocal harmonies) and album-closer ‘I Drive the Hearse’, which sums the mood of the whole up beautifully with the genius simplicity of its chorus lyrics ‘And silence is another way of saying what I want to say / And lying is another way of hoping it will go away’. At the same time, the unity of the record is shown by the fact that the riff on the album opener ‘Occam’s Razor’ keeps popping up in different places without sounding incongruous, and by the recurrent lyrical themes. When the same few lines unexpectedly turned up on ‘The Séance’ as had on ‘Octane Twisted’ I nearly punched the air. This unity is such that first single ‘Time Flies’ sounds much better in the context of the album than it does on its own; although I should point out that the album version is also considerably longer.

In fact, I can truly say that on this album Porcupine Tree have perfectly married the soft prog (and sometimes spaced out) sounds of their 90s albums with the heavier metal of this decade that got them signed to Roadrunner. You can tell that the band have worked really hard on this piece of work, without falling into attendant traps like over-production. This is the best album that Porcupine Tree have ever released and I can’t see how they will ever be able to top it; but I would love to be proved wrong.

All the above is about CD1. CD2 isn’t up to the same standard, or even, really, that of the Nil Recurring EP, to which it is quite similar in spirit. But, frankly, you can treat CD2 as a bonus. CD1, The Incident, is the album of the year.

Track list: CD1 – The Incident

Occam’s Razor
The Blind House
Great Expectations
Kneel and Disconnect
Drawing the Line
The Incident
Your Unpleasant Family
The Yellow Windows of the Evening Train
Time Flies
Degree Zero of Liberty
Octane Twisted
The Séance
Circle of Manias
I Drive the Hearse

CD2

Flicker
Bonnie the Cat
Black Dahlia
Remember Me Lover

Album review: The Resistance by Muse

2009-09-14T21:27:00.003+01:00

Muse, The Resistance (Helium 3: 2009)

There are probably at least two types of Muse fan out there. If you thought Black Holes and Revelations was their best release to date, and genuinely deserved a Mercury Prize nomination, you’ll probably enjoy this album quite a lot. If, however, like me, you felt let down by BHaR, thought that it was mostly filler, and suspected that Muse were halfway to becoming a pop group (and didn’t like the idea of that), you’ll want to give The Resistance a miss. Maybe I’m the only one. Anyway…

Uprising: You’ve almost certainly heard this already. Prominent bassline and sci-fi sounds seemingly straight out of the Doctor Who theme tune. Pretty funky.
Resistance: The intro reminds me of ‘Interlude’ from Absolution. Overall, it is really rather bland, despite some interesting twiddles in the final section. ‘Love is our resistance’. Ahhh.
Undisclosed Desires: Ugh. This is a straightforwardly corny pop song that spends a while threatening to do something interesting, but never does.
United States of Eurasia / Collateral Damage: The other song you’ve almost certainly heard already. The piano work is good, but I think Muse’s Queen fascination has been taken to unhealthy levels. I don’t mind admitting that I don’t like Queen.
Guiding Light: There’s an 80s synth-pop beat going on here. At 1:00 a riff kicks in, then at 2:06 a guitar solo. I’m not sure at what point exactly, but somewhere between the two it becomes obvious that this is a power ballad. Skip.
Unnatural Selection: Finally the album gets somewhere near heavy. Pretty cool riffs; a good, threatening middle section with slowish guitar solo and vocal harmonies that actually remind me of System of a Down (maybe I’m going mad). The standout track so far.
MK Ultra: Some more good riffs on both synth and guitar, but a bit of a rubbish chorus. There’s more to like than to dislike here, just.
I Belong To You / Mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix: Quite funky in parts, although not in a way that I think would bear much re-listening before it gets annoying. Not sure about the production, but meh. Terrible lyrics: ‘Then she attacks me like a Leo, / When my heart is split like Rio, / But, I assure you my debts are real’.
Exogenesis: Symphony, Part 1 (Overture)
Exogenesis: Symphony, Part 2 (Cross-Pollination)
Exogenesis: Symphony, Part 3 (Redemption): The band and orchestra merge perfectly. If this three-part ‘symphony’ were being released on its own, say as an EP or single, I’d give it full marks and recommend everyone go out and buy it; but it’s not, and these three tracks can’t save the album from being average.

So there you have it. In keeping with the title, a whole load of songs on this record complain about a mysterious ‘they’. I can understand why a lot of people will like this album, and they’re welcome to it, but I’m not among them.

Getting the crystal ball out

2009-07-22T13:00:00.002+01:00

In a comment on the comments on my last post, Blue Devil Knight complained that

It is hilarious that people would liken homosexual lovin' to incest and cannibalism. In 100 years it will be funny to look back at these types of arguments, the kooky old days.

Firstly, I should point out that I didn’t ‘liken homosexual lovin' to incest and cannibalism’; what I did was to cite incest and cannibalism as counterexamples to a certain sexual ethic used to justify ‘homosexual lovin’ (and much else), according to which anything that consenting adults do to each other in private is OK. But I took care of this at the time. What I want to do now is to focus on the second of BDK’s contentions, starting with an argumentum ad dinosaur comics:

HT: robhu

The point should be obvious: neither I, BDK nor anyone else has any idea of what people will find acceptable, unacceptable or ‘kooky’ in 100 years’ time, and so trying to argue on that basis is ridiculous on its face. I also found the specific topic of the dinosaurs’ discussion particularly relevant to the discussion in my blog post. Maybe if our culture does ‘end up swinging towards rampant fleshotarianism’ in the future, then campaigners for vegetarianism will be accused of ‘carniphobia’ – which would be about as brainless as accusing campaigners for traditional morality now of ‘homophobia’.

Carniphobia: a dialogue

2009-07-07T12:57:00.002+01:00

The scene is a university canteen. Adam is affixing a poster bearing the slogan ‘Meat is Murder’ to the student noticeboard. Bob, a coursemate of his, approaches Adam.

Bob: What are you doing?
Adam: Organising a vegetarianism meeting. Are you interested?
B: Furrows his brow No. And I didn’t have you down as a carniphobe, either.
A: What?
B: You’re campaigning against people eating meat?
A: Yes.
B: You’re a carniphobe. You’re bigoted and prejudiced against people like me who eat meat.
A: Puzzled No I’m not. I just think eating meat is immoral. I mean, don’t you think that…
B: If you don’t like eating meat, then don’t do it. What business of yours is it what grown adults put in their own bodies?
A: Well, I suppose there’s a sense in which it’s not ‘my business’. If someone stole from someone else on the other side of the world today, there’s a sense in which that’s not my business; but that doesn’t mean I’m not entitled to a moral opinion about it, or to campaign against it. Same here.
B: Eating meat is part of who I am!
A: Well, I’m not entirely sure that people are born carnivorous…
B: I WAS!
A: …but even if they are, that doesn’t mean that going along with that is OK. The fact that you, I or anyone has a tendency, inclination or urge or do something doesn’t make it OK to do that thing, even if the urge or whatever is innate. Wouldn’t you agree that animals…
B: Eating meat is almost completely accepted in society these days, except by wackos like you.
A: Uh, have you considered the possibility that ‘society’ is wrong about this?

Clive, a representative of the Student Union, approaches Adam and Bob.

Clive: What’s going on?
B: This bigot…
Adam shows one of his posters to Clive
C: No, no, no, you can’t use a university room for a meeting like this!
A: Why not?
C: You’re in contravention of Student Union Equality and Diversity policy. We can’t condone discriminatory events like this.
B: Thank you.
A: Discriminatory?
C: Yes. This event discriminates against carnivores, so you can’t hold it on campus.
A: Has the world gone mad?

(This dialogue was inspired by an old blog post from William Vallicella).

‘There is no magic’, part 1: conceptualist semantics

2009-06-23T10:00:00.012+01:00

I often hear the complaint that involving God in an explanation for anything that happens in the world is an appeal to ‘magic’ and therefore Not Allowed. In fact, this charge is levelled against any explanation which does not assume metaphysical naturalism. Ray Jackendoff makes this exact move in his 2002 book Foundations of Language: Meaning, Brain, Grammar, Evolution (Oxford: OUP), in the course of giving an outline of what he thinks a semantics of natural language should be like:

I propose to begin from the following surely uncontroversial postulate:

People find sentences (and other entities) meaningful because of something going on in their brains.

That is, we are ultimately interested not in the question: What is meaning? but rather: what makes things meaningful to people? This anchors the enterprise both in the theory of psychology and in ordinary human experience.
A second postulate is:

There is no magic.

That is, we seek a thoroughly naturalistic explanation that ultimately can be embedded in our understanding of the physical world.
Such an explanation comes at a heavy price. (p268)

Now, I could say something about Jackendoff’s first postulate, but for present purposes I want simply to take it as an introduction to the second. Of course, Jackendoff isn’t talking about God – the ‘magic’ charge is one he will come to level at rival theorists in semantics. I want to take a brief look at whether, by his own lights, Jackendoff’s own theory avoids being magical. I hope this will cast some light on the question of whether or not ‘a thoroughly naturalistic explanation that ultimately can be embedded in our understanding of the physical world’ is what we really should be after, or indeed what it would look like. This will take two or three posts; I haven’t decided yet.

Jackendoff thinks that realist views of language end up relying on ‘magic’:

Frege and much of the tradition following him take language to be independent of its human users: it relates directly to the world […] language is indeed “out in the world” and it refers to “objects in the world”; but people use language by virtue of their grasp of it, where “grasp” is a transparent metaphor for the “the mind holding/understanding/making contact with” something in the world. […]

One might interpret Katz’s program this way. he is personally interested only in the part of language that is an abstract object “in the world” […] But an abstract object by definition has no physical manifestations that can impinge on the nervous system. So how does the nervous system “grasp” them? Without a careful exegesis of the term – which no-one provides – we are ineluctably led toward a quasi-mystical interpretation of “grasping,” a scientific dead end. (pp296-9)

So much for those thinkers. Anyway, this is Jackendoff’s own view of word meaning:

Linguistic semantics per se is the study of the interface between conceptualization and linguistic form (phonology and syntax) […] In particular, lexical semantics studies the organizations of conceptualization that can be bundled up in a single word (or to be clearer, in an interface rule whose other end is a morpheme). (p293)

I’ll unpack that a bit. The idea is that a word has a particular meaning – for an individual, remember – by virtue of the fact that the word groups together particular concepts in the individual’s mind. So, what is a concept? This is a fraught question, but I’ll try to give as untendentious a characterisation as possible. Very roughly, a concept is a way of dividing up experience. That is to say, it’s because I have the concept BOOK¹ that I’m able to categorise items around me into books and non-books, and because I have the concept READ that I’m able to categorise actions into those of reading and those of not-reading (or, more accurately, that I’m able to categorise anything into an action of reading or not-an-action-of-reading), and so on. Which is not to say that the concepts themselves just are abilities. Some people say this, but I think that Jackendoff has in mind, rather, that concepts are parts of thoughts. This should become clearer as we go on.

OK, but what is it that gives concepts meaning, then? How can a concept be about books, or reading, or Ray Jackendoff, or natural language semantics? Concepts are in the mind, and these things are out in the world. What is the nature of the connection between them? Jackendoff doesn’t think much of Jerry Fodor’s suggestions for dealing with the problem:

For [Fodor], language is a mental faculty that accesses concepts […] In turn, concepts have a semantics; they are connected to the world by virtue of being “intentional.” The trouble […] is that one cannot make naturalistic sense of intentionality. If suffers from precisely the same difficulty as “grasping” language […]: there is no physically reliable causal connection between concepts and objects. (p300)²

So much the worse for naturalism, you might say. But Jackendoff doesn’t. Instead, he proceeds by ‘pushing “the world” down into the mind of the language-user too, right along with language’ (p303). His solution is that, actually, not only concepts, but also what concepts are about, are in the mind. In fact, concepts just are what they are about:

We must explicitly deny that conceptual structures are symbols or representations of anything in the world, that they mean anything. Rather, we want to say that they are meaning […] Language is meaningful, then, because it connects to conceptual structures. (p306)

Such an explanation comes at a heavy price, all right. What Jackendoff is saying is that the concept BOOK can be about books because books are in the mind – because the book I see ‘in front of me’ is, in fact, a set of sense impressions that are entirely mental. But without some additional qualification this looks like idealism, which I hardly think comports with ‘our understanding of the physical world’, which I’m quite sure Jackendoff takes to be, well, physicalist. Idealism, by his lights, would be ‘magic’.

Jackendoff doesn’t quite go down this route, although at points he seems to be toying with it³. Instead, the trick is to be found in the construction of concepts. That’s what I’ll focus on next time.

Notes
1 It's conventional to give the names of concepts in capital letters. I'm going to follow this convention.
2 The disagreements between Jackendoff and Fodor as to the nature of concepts, and their relation to word meaning, go much deeper than I have time, space or energy for here, although I may return to this issue in the next post. See for example Fodor’s 1998 book Concepts: Where Cognitive Science Went Wrong (Oxford: OUP), pp49-56.
3 See the remarks on Berkeley on p305, and on reality ‘independent of human cognition’ on p309.

Life & Liberty Petition against measures in the Coroners and Justice Bill

2009-06-16T14:51:00.003+01:00

From the Christian Legal Centre:

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Abandon the Government's opposition to the free speech protection clause in the Coroners and Justice Bill.
Preserving the sanctity of life and freedom of speech are vitally important to the preservation of liberty and good governance under the rule of law in the United Kingdom. These are under immediate threat by measures in the Coroners and Justice Bill. We the undersigned, therefore, petition HM the Queen, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House of Lords to:

1. Protect the value of human life in the UK by opposing proposed amendments authorizing state-sanctioned assisted suicide; and

2. Protect freedom of speech by abandoning its opposition to the free speech protection clause currently within the sexual orientation hatred offence which preserves the right to, discuss, criticise and urge to refrain from certain forms of sexual conduct or practices.

Go here to sign the petition. HT: Anglican Mainstream and Christian Today, where you can go for further details. The right to ‘discuss, criticise and urge to refrain from certain forms of sexual conduct or practices’, currently under threat, is something I think reasonable non-Christians will also want to see preserved.

Go Iranians!

2009-06-16T14:28:00.001+01:00

Riot after Iranian election - police run away from crowd:

I’ve subscribed to Mousavi1388’s YouTube channel for updates on the situation in Iran.

It’s not the economy, and don't call me stupid

2009-06-02T16:56:00.002+01:00

<rant>A quick note to all the Labour politicians I keep hearing and seeing on the radio and the TV, who are quick to explain in advance their party’s upcoming shockingly bad performance in the local and European elections as the result of a ‘global economic crisis which began in America’: stop treating the electorate as if we are stupid. If Labour gets a thumping tomorrow it’s not because the voters can’t tell the difference between problems which are the government’s fault and those which aren’t. It’s because the public is fed up with ZaNu Labour in charge. In my case, it’s partly because I’m fed up with being patronised.

To Harriet Harman in particular, whose performance on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this lunchtime was particularly irritating: the expenses scandal has not made me lose my faith in democracy (as if anyone thought a totalitarian regime would be less corrupt); rather, it has made me lose any last shred of faith in the people we have elected. Praising to the skies people who are about to resign because of the scandal, and blaming the media for their treatment, is sadly just what I have learned to expect from a government that has completely forgotten (if they every knew) that they work for us. Get ‘em out.</rant>

The porpoise-driven life

2009-04-20T16:42:00.001+01:00

‘Original fin’. Chuckle.

Christ is risen!

2009-04-12T18:52:00.003+01:00

He is risen indeed, Hallelujah!

I hope you all have a wonderful Easter. For the occasion, I recommend Ralph Wilson’s ‘Emmaus Road Story’ on Ben Witherington’s blog, along with the following video (added 21/04/2009):

I gave up blogs and blogging for Lent (without announcing that here), which is why this space has been quiet and I haven’t read anyone’s posts for the last six weeks. But I’m back now, and hope to have some observations to share soon.

How not to do evangelism

2009-02-23T11:15:00.002Z

Michael Jensen on martyrdom

2009-02-16T13:47:00.007Z

Going through some old notebooks over the weekend, I found the following notes (in antique white) on the subject of martyrdom and the Christian "way of being a self", from a seminar given by Michael Jensen on a church retreat back in 2007. Jensen has subsequently finished his PhD on this very subject. I don't know how much of what follows was revised for that, as I haven't been able to find out where his dissertation was published, but I've reproduced my notes here becaue I thought parts of some of them would be relevant to the series of posts I've been doing about Christians facing persecution in the UK at the moment. I've also expanded them slightly to make them into full sentences, and filled in some sub-points from memory as well.

12 proposals about martyrdom:

Martyrdom is the external enactment, or representation, of the internal reality of the Christian life: that is, death to self (Mark 8:35) from the very beginning of our walk with God (Romans 6:3-4). Like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, himself martyred in Nazi Germany, said, "When Christ calls a man, he bid him come and die".
Etymologically, martyrdom means witness, and this is the New Testament use of the word. Suffering will be involved in witness (Matthew 10:17-20) as a result of the gospel proclamation that Jesus is Lord.
Martyrdom is an imitation, and an amplification (Acts 7:59-60), of Jesus in his passion and death.
Martyrdom is completely different to suicide because
Martyrdom affirms life by renouncing it. Life is very valuable, in fact, it is the most valuable gift we can give; and it also comes from the best thing there is, namely God. Nevertheless, some Christians are called to give it up, as some are called to give up other possessions for the sake of the gospel (Matthew 19:16-30). What's important is that we "sit loose" to these things.
As evidence that people are willing to die for Christ, martyrdom is a sign of the ongoing power of Jesus in the world.
As Augustine said, "It is the cause, not the punishment, that makes the martyr", so e.g. Gandhi wasn't a martyr, because he didn't testify to the truth.
Martyrdom is an act of God, not human beings, so one can't self-designate as a martyr. Martyrs don't pursue their own death (1 Peter 3:13-17).
Martyrdom is a sign of a distinctively Christian mode of speech: we love people to death. The way we speak means we run risks, ranging all the way from ridicule to death. But we don't (or shouldn't) bang on about our rights; rather, we should be concerned about what is right.
Martyrdom is a sign of the impermanence of earthly power compared with God's eternal reign. The book of Daniel gives a good series of examples of this.
Martyrdom is not merely a stand of dissidence, but a witness to the rule of God in Christ. Therefore, a (carefully-considered) truce is possible with the government or other power structures if they listen.
Martyrdom is a sign that our way of being a self is completely at odds with the secular one(s): we renounce pleasure and security if need be. Knowing this will help us to explore and perhaps understand the "mutual incomprehension" that often exists between Christians and non-Christians.

Points 4-5 about martyrdom vs. suicide remind me of G.K. Chesterton's remarks on that subject (the paragraph beginning "About the same time"). This is particularly relevant at the moment because I suppose (as Jensen supposed) then when people hear "martyrdom" today, the first thing they think of is suicide bombing. See also point 8.

As I recall, what provoked the most discussion at the time was point 9, particularly the insistence that we don't "bang on about our rights". Jensen was keen that the church shouldn't be making itself into just another special interest pressure group, trying to carve out its own space within which to operate. As I agreed with Alex Fear about the Nadia Eweida affair, I agreed (and agree) with Jensen about this. Something that emerged from the discussion is that one natural outworking of the point that we should, rather, be concerned about what is right is that we should be as concerned for other people's rights as our own. This means holding the state to account in terms of the justice it promises to provide.

Still more petition material

2009-02-14T13:37:00.002Z

I'm in a mood to keep digging these up.

Christian foster mother struck off after Muslim girl converts (Telegraph)

Foster parents are supposed to "respect and preserve" the faith of those in their care. However, in this case, the girl in question was 16 years old and the interest in Christianity was all her own, according to the article. Mike Judge of the Christian Institute said:

I cannot imagine that an atheist foster carer would be struck off if a Christian child in her care stopped believing in God.

Good point. Now the girl is back with her parents, who are apparently unaware of her conversion, I wonder if we could be facing another case similar to that of "Hannah".

What does St. Valentine's Day have to with St. Valentine?

2009-02-14T11:22:00.001Z

Not much. But I hope you have a good one.

John Sentamu on the Petrie and Cain controversies

2009-02-13T10:10:00.003Z

The intolerance towards Christians in the public sector is an affront (Daily Mail)

Asking someone to leave their belief in God at the door of their workplace is akin to asking them to remove their skin colour before coming into the office. Faith in God is not an add-on or optional extra.

For me, my trust in God is part of my DNA; it is central to who I am and defines my place in the world. It informs my whole life, not just a weekly service on a Sunday.

It is the failure to grasp this basic understanding of what it is to be a follower of Jesus Christ that lies at the heart of the problem of which these two cases are just symptoms.

More petition material, and musings on the senses of "secular"

2009-02-12T21:10:00.005Z

Teacher scolds girl, 5, for talking about Jesus (The Christian Institute)

Summary:

On 22 January, Jasmine Cain was told off by her teacher at Landscore Primary School in Crediton, Devon for "discussing heaven and God with a friend".
The next day her mother, Jennie Cain, who works part-time at the school, was told by the headmaster that "he wasn’t happy about [Jasmine] making statements about her faith".
That weekend Mrs. Cain e-mailed ten friends from church, asking them to pray for her daughter and for the school.
The head, Gary Read, called Mrs. Cain back into his office a few days later with a copy of the e-mail in his hand, and told her that she would be investigated for professional misconduct for "making allegations about the school and staff to members of the public".

The title of the article doesn't tell you the most disturbing part of the story. The most disturbing part of the story is that Mrs. Cain's private e-mail should end up in her boss' hands.

I have a theory about these controversies that periodically come up between Bible-believing Christians and various power structures in the UK recently (not wholly unlike John Richardson's): People are naturally worried about unfair discrimination, so they take measures to make sure that (for example) some people don't get an unfair advantage over others because of their religious beliefs. This push towards what we might call religious neutrality is sometimes known as secularism.

At the same time, there are people pushing to have any mention of anything religious-sounding removed from the public sphere. This is also known as secularism, but it's not the same thing as religious neutrality. In fact, it's de facto atheism, and hence just as unfair as any other kind of establishment. These two senses of "secular" are often confused, by Christians and non-Christians alike.

I just signed a petition in support of Caroline Petrie,

2009-02-05T10:44:00.006Z

the nurse facing disciplinary action for offering to pray for a patient, here. Terry Sanderson of the NatSecSoc has thrown all his toys out of the pram over this. My comment on the Telegraph piece was:

I'd like to register my support for Caroline Petrie. An offer to pray is just that, an offer - and a kind offer at that. How does this amount to an attempt to impose her beliefs on others?

But then, I would say that.

Update (22:53): For some reason my comment didn't make it past the mods, but that doesn't matter because now Mrs. Petrie has been reinstated. Hooray.

Rated R (for Raskolnikov?)

2009-01-16T14:15:00.005Z

I don't think this is a fair rating, though. It's based on the occurrence of certain words on this blog, but that includes words in the sidebar feed to blogs I read, including my friend Simon's travel blog. But then I shouldn't complain, given that in the past I've benefitted from such quirkiness.

HT: Ken Brown.

New link: John Lennox

2009-01-08T10:03:00.004Z

Prof. John Lennox, whose book God's Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? (Oxford: Lion, 2007) I reviewed just over a year ago, now has a website containing a selection of resources on a variety of subjects including Christianity, science, philosophy and ethics. Lennox is Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford and Fellow in Mathematics and Philosophy of Science, and Pastoral Advisor at Green Templeton College. HT: Peter S. Williams

Parris old and new: some differences Christianity makes

2008-12-28T15:30:00.007Z

This will be quite a long and roundabout post taking in Christianity, sexuality and international development, mostly through the eyes of someone I have previously described as "one of those commentators I enjoy reading largely because I disagree with him about nearly everything" (nearly). Please stick with it.

Among the many boneheaded responses to the Pope's address to the Curia in Rome last week was a leading article in The Times, asserting that Benny is wrong to think that homosexuality is wrong, because actually it's "part of the natural order" and "according to nature". This reveals a serious confusion about the relevant meaning of "natural". If whatever happens in nature is "natural", then yes, same-sex attraction is "natural", but so is sexual attraction to children. Ditto if "according to nature" covers any inclination which someone just finds him/herself having. If these terms are supposed to mean something else, then what? This point is well known to Matthew Parris, another Times columnist and himself an atheist and a homosexual, who wrote back in 2003:

I found myself as an undergraduate powerfully drawn towards the sermons and writings of Joseph Butler. The persuasive, quiet sense of this early- 18th-century Bishop of Durham makes (as our college dean, Mark Santer, later to become Bishop of Birmingham, put it gently to me) “the best case one can” for the theory of natural religion.

By induction alone, Butler seems to suggest, we can draw from what we know of ourselves, of science, and of our world, a picture of the mind of God. He was suspicious of revelation. [...]

At university I tried very hard to convince myself (as one senses Butler was trying to convince himself) that this appeal to sense will do. I was wrestling with my own sexual leanings at the time (I was 19) and the idea that anything we find within ourselves must be put there for a purpose appealed. Interestingly, it is the Butlerian slant we get today from those Anglicans who advocate the ordination of gay bishops: God cannot reject any loving impulse He has implanted in men, they say. “Really?” I asked the shade of Joseph Butler at 19, and ask the modernists now: how about child- molesting?

He went on to say:

So this, in summary, is my charge against the Anglican modernists. Can they point to biblical authority for what, on any estimate, amounts to a disturbing challenge to the values assumed in both Testaments? No. Can they point to any divinely inspired religious leader since to whom has been revealed God’s benevolent intentions towards homosexuals? I know of no such saint or holy man. Most have taught the opposite.

Can they honestly say that they would have drawn from Christ’s teachings the same lessons of sexual tolerance in 1000, or 1590, or indeed 1950? Surely not, for almost no such voices were heard then.

In which case, to what does this “reform” amount? Like the changes to Church teaching on divorce or Sunday observance, the new tolerance gains its force within the Anglican Communion from a fear of becoming isolated from changing public morals. Is that a reason for a Christian to modify his own morality? I cannot recall that Moses took this view of golden calf worship. Whispering beneath the modernisers’ soft aspirational language of love and tolerance, I hear an insistent “when in Rome, we must do as the Romans do. Times have changed.” Gays in particular should be very wary of that message; some of us remember when it was used against us, and such a time may come again.

This makes the point better than I have. It's not really coherent to say to a Christian that it's fine to believe in God, provided it's not a God who could actually tell us anything. The time may come again when people like the leader writer are actually grateful that "natural law" is considered "immutable", because mutable cultural mores can drift in disturbing directions, as witnessed in recent history. I wonder if they talk to each other in the Times offices.

Indeed, it is not necessary to go back in time to find disturbing or depressing cultural mores, as Parris has written more recently:

There's long been a fashion among Western academic sociologists for placing tribal value systems within a ring fence, beyond critiques founded in our own culture: “theirs” and therefore best for “them”; authentic and of intrinsically equal worth to ours.

I don't follow this. I observe that tribal belief is no more peaceable than ours; and that it suppresses individuality. People think collectively; first in terms of the community, extended family and tribe. This rural-traditional mindset feeds into the “big man” and gangster politics of the African city: the exaggerated respect for a swaggering leader, and the (literal) inability to understand the whole idea of loyal opposition.

Anxiety - fear of evil spirits, of ancestors, of nature and the wild, of a tribal hierarchy, of quite everyday things - strikes deep into the whole structure of rural African thought. Every man has his place and, call it fear or respect, a great weight grinds down the individual spirit, stunting curiosity. People won't take the initiative, won't take things into their own hands or on their own shoulders.

So, what can be done about this situation? Parris' answer: Christianity. He is an atheist, but he believes that Christianity is the solution to Africa's problems.

Now a confirmed atheist, I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people's hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good. [...]

Christianity, post-Reformation and post-Luther, with its teaching of a direct, personal, two-way link between the individual and God, unmediated by the collective, and unsubordinate to any other human being, smashes straight through the philosphical/spiritual framework I've just described. It offers something to hold on to to those anxious to cast off a crushing tribal groupthink. That is why and how it liberates.

Over at Anglican Mainstream, Stephen Noll has written an unnecessarily aggressive response to Parris, who is to be commended for his honesty and whose article is emphatically recommended as he says more than I have addressed here. One important point which Noll does make, however, is that as Christians we do not hold the view that the west is the best. There are deep problems in British society, too, and we need Christ here just as much as in Africa. I think I'll pray for that now.

Related posts:
Parris on miracles and progress - Not all my responses to Parris' writings are the same
Henry Orombi on Anglicanism - Another post taking in sexuality and the effects of evangelism in Africa (in this case, Uganda)

Book review: William Wilberforce by William Hague

2008-12-27T15:21:00.001Z

Hague, William, William Wilberforce: The Life of the Great Anti-Slave Trade Campaigner (London: Harper Collins, 2007)

Relased to mark the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade in the British Empire in 1807, this detailed and engaging biography really makes clear the moral conviction, determination and no small degree of political skill that enabled Wilberforce (1759 - 1833) to lead the campaign against first the slave trade, and then slavery itself, for so many years. In so doing, it provides well-reasoned answers to questions like: Why did Wilberforce first campaign against the slave trade, and not slavery itself? Was abolition inevitable for purely economic factors? How strong was his influence in advancing the cause of abolition outside of the British Empire?

This book also shows how the aforementioned qualities combined to make Wilberforce perhaps the last and greatest truly independent British politician, from his election to the House of Commons in 1780 to his retirement in 1826. A close friend of William Pitt (the younger) from a young age, and often instinctively socially conservative, Wilberforce nevertheless was not afraid to oppose Pitt and his Tory government on issues as serious as war with France. When there was a constitutional crisis over the divorce of Prince George (the future George IV) and Caroline of Brunswick, Wilberforce's political independence made him the ideal mediator in many people's eyes at the time.

Hague makes no attempt to play down the importance of a profound (Evangelical) Christian faith to Wilberforce's work. After a time spent with a Methodist aunt and uncle as a teenager, and conversations with Isaac Milner later, Wilberforce gave his life to Christ in 1785. Pitt was surprised, but convinced his friend that his Christian convictions would be best served by continuing in public life. After meeting leading abolitisionists in 1787, and encouraged by John Newton and John Wesley, Wilberforce took up the leadership of the parliamentary campaign for abolition. His Christian faith also led him to support a myriad of charities and to campaign for the opening up of India to missionaries.

Overall, this is a sympathetic but not sycophantic account of a truly remarkable life from a very able author who on the one hand obviously admires his subject's politcal abilities, and on the other understands his Yorkshire roots. If Hague is nevertheless occasionally bemused by Wilberforce's Evangelical Christianity, that is to his loss, but not the reader's. Recommended.

A belated Christmas message

2008-12-27T15:15:00.001Z

Happy Christmas!

Great

2008-12-22T12:08:00.000Z

Nativity story animation

2008-12-12T19:43:00.003Z

From here. Based on a true story.

Human rights and the value of humans

2008-11-28T22:39:00.002Z

A while ago, in a post to which I link rather often, I argued that atheism can't make sense of human rights. At the time, however, I didn't offer a positive alternative as to how I think Christianity can do just that. Well, recently Jason Pratt of the Christian CADRE blog (bookmark it now) opened a discussion on just this subject, so I commented:

I suggest, tentatively, that human beings have the property "value" in a similar way to how e.g. material bodies have "mass" or certain subatomic particles have "charge". As a Christian, I understand this as following from the fact that human beings are made in God's image.

Then, in response to a request for clarification, I said (lightly edited):

The idea is that God is the being of maximal value (along with power, knowledge and goodness), and we ourselves have some value by virtue of those aspects of God's nature which we share (i.e. have in common) – sharing aspects of God's nature is what I understand by being made "in his image" (exactly which aspects and to what degree is a question which will have to be partially postponed). Further questioning as to how we have this property is probably going to draw a blank from me, I'm afraid. How is it that electrons have negative charge? Er, it belongs to their nature.

There are a couple of important problems with the mass/charge analogy, though. Firstly, value can't be detected in the same way that those properties can. Secondly, treating (e.g.) massive bodies as if they aren’t massive will get you into practical difficulties, while treating beings of intrinsic value as if they’re valueless will get you into normative difficulties*. That’s how I understand "rights": as a set of descriptions of the ways in which human beings must be treated in order to recognise their intrinsic value. To violate someone's rights is therefore to treat someone as if they didn’t have the value they, in fact, have. These rights are inalienable because human beings possess them just by virtue of being human beings – it's no more possible to remove a human being’s human rights than it is to remove an electron's negative charge. An "electron without charge" just isn't an electron, and my proposal is that the same applies for "human being without value" - both descriptions are contradictions in terms.

As conceived here, value is a(n intrinsic) property of human beings - and God. This value is the same for all human beings by virtue of their humanity, and so the rights I'm thinking of are the same for all human beings at all times in history and at all stages of their lives, in the same way that all electrons anywhere and ever have the same charge.

* If God will ultimately judge everyone, then this could get you into practical difficulties as well, of course.

I know some people feel embarrassed about reproducing on their own blog comments they've made elsewhere. Well, not me :). What I would do well to bear in mind, however, is what Ken reminded me of in his response to another post of mine about this issue.

Marcus du Sautoy named new Oxford Public Understanding of Science Professor

2008-11-06T10:36:00.006Z

New Simonyi Chair appointed (Oxford University Press Office):

Professor Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford, has been appointed to the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science. [...] The new appointment will take effect from 1 December 2008. The aim of the professorship is to communicate science to the public, with elements of scholarship that bring true understanding.

I haven't read any of Prof. du Sautoy's books, but I did see his Royal Society lectures the year before last and was quite impressed with them. Let's hope he proves to be more dedicated to his post, and less to ideological crusadeds, than his predecessor.

Barack Obama elected world US President

2008-11-05T11:25:00.004Z

Time to start making good on that promise to "change [his] country and change the world".

Seriously, though, congratulations to the man. Let's all pray he does a good job and governs justly once he gets into office.

Recent items of interest

2008-11-03T23:22:00.001Z

Two things making noise on the internet and getting my attention recently:

Firstly, it appears that Richard Dawkins has, shockingly, started softening his anti-theistic line recently. My attention was first drawn to this possibility when I saw Peter S. Williams' piece in the Evangelical Philosophical Society blog about Dawkins' "search for a grander truth". But that was just the tip of the iceberg: according to Spectator writer Melanie Phillips' report on the second Dawkins/Lennox debate a couple of weeks ago, he now accepts that "a serious case could be made for a deistic God". This from the man previously set on attacking "God in all his forms"! Bjørn Are's and William Lane Craig's responses to Phillips' article are also worth your attention.

I wonder if Dawkins' neo-atheist fellow-travellers Dennett, Harris and Hitchens are going to have to have an intervention with him? First Antony Flew, and now this...

Meanwhile, popular science journalism hasn't gotten any less scientistic while I wasn't looking. According to this hatchet job in New Scientist, non-materialist philosophy of mind is part of a "war on science" led by the ever-evil Discovery Institute. Joe Gorra does the job of presenting a response on behalf of the EPS, many of whose members are mentioned in the NS article. Tom Gilson also counted to ten before writing anything about it. For some idea of just what a piece of hackery this article was, though, you should see Merlijn de Smit's blog post about the fiasco, which also gives some of his views on popular science journalism more generally. Reasonable discussion can be found on Dangerous Idea, where Blue Devil Knight plays the role of the naturalist not stricken with chronic dogmatism (leaving that, as usual, to Doctor Logic). I've stuck my oar in in the comments to this post by Paul Wright. Go there (or here) for my views.

Yes, that was really just a collection of links. I hope to be back shortly with something more substantial. Until then, good night and God bless.

Congratulations to Lewis Hamilton

2008-11-02T21:52:00.003Z

I won't pretend to be a real Formula One fan, but still I have been caught up in the hype surrounding Hamilton this year and I was a very tense person most of this afternoon watching the Brazilian Grand Prix—particularly the final lap! It all came good in the end, though. A thoroughly deserved victory, as everyone is saying.

British Government statement on Orissa violence

2008-10-30T23:56:00.004Z

The Prime Minister's office just put this up on the Number 10 website in response to a petition (which I signed) for "the Prime Minister to issue a statement of concern regarding the violence against Christians in Orissa, India":

The Government condemns the violent attacks on innocent individuals in Orissa state, India that have led to deaths, injuries and wide-scale displacements. Our sincere sympathies go out to those affected by this violence.

We therefore welcome the Indian Prime Minister’s unequivocal statement condemning these attacks on 13 October, calling for urgent measures to tackle religious violence, the deployment of additional police in Orissa to restore law and order, and the offer of compensation to victims.

We have raised our concerns directly with the Indian Government, in Delhi and in London. Lord Malloch-Brown, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister for Asia, also officially conveyed our concern at the current situation to the Indian High Commissioner on 1 October. Our High Commission in Delhi, with European and other partners, will continue to monitor the situation in Orissa and in neighbouring states.

Keep praying, guys.

Related post: A report from Orissa

A report from Orissa

2008-10-27T10:49:00.003Z

The following report came to me in a forwarded e-mail, signed by "Chip & Sandy Wanner, Team Facilitators to YWAM frontlines".

We have never seen anything like this. We knew that Orissa was the most resistant and hostile State in India as far as the Gospel is concerned. And we brushed off the continuous threats and harassment we faced as we went about His work. But none of our staff imagined that they would see this kind of carnage.... And it seems to be totally under the radar of the Western Media ....

Let me explain.... A militant Hindu priest and 4 of his attendants, who were zealously going around the villages of Orissa and 'reconverting' people back to Hinduism, were gunned down by unknown assailants in Central Orissa [...]

Immediately the Christians were blamed.. The cry rose up...'Kill the Christians!' And the horror began.... In the past 4 days, we have first hand witness to hundreds of churches being blown up or burned and many, many dozens of Christian tribals have been slaughtered. For no other reason than they bear the name of Christ.

Night and day I have been in touch with our Good News India Directors spread across 14 Dream Centers in Orissa... they are right in the middle of all this chaos. In Tihidi, just after the police came to offer protection, a group of 70 blood-thirsty militants came to kill our staff and destroy the home. They were not allowed to get in, but they did a lot of damage to our Dream Center by throwing rocks and bricks and smashing our gate, etc.

They have promised to come back and 'finish the job.' Our kids and staff are locked inside and have stayed that way with doors and windows shut for the past 3 days. It has been a time of desperately calling on the Lord in prayer.

More police have come to offer protection. In Kalahandi, the police and some local sympathizers got to our dream center and gave our staff and kids about 3 minutes notice to vacate. No one had time to even grab a change of clothes or any personal belonging. As they fled, the blood thirsty mob came to kill everyone in the building. We would have had a mass funeral there, but for His grace. In Phulbani, the mob came looking for Christian homes and missions. The local Hindu people, our neighbors turned them away by saying that there were no Christians in this area. So they left.. We had favor. The same thing happened in Balasore.

All our dream centers are under lock down with the kids and staff huddled inside and police outside. The fanatics are circling outside waiting for a chance to kill. Others were not so fortunate. In a nearby Catholic orphanage, the mob allowed the kids to leave and locked up a Priest and a computer teacher in house and burned them to death. Many believers have been killed and hacked into pieces and left on the road.... even women and children. At another orphanage run by another organization, when this began, the Director and his wife jumped on their motorbike and simply fled, leaving all the children and staff behind. Every one of our GNI directors that I have spoken to said: 'We stay with our kids.... we live together or die together, but we will never abandon what God has called us to do.' More than 5000 Christian families have had their homes burned or destroyed. They have fled into the jungles and are living in great fear waiting for the authorities to bring about peace. But so far, no peace is foreseen. [...]

The Federal government is trying to restore order and perhaps things will calm down. We ask for your prayers. Only the Hand of God can calm this storm. None of us know the meaning of persecution. But now our kids and staff know what that means. So many of our kids coming from Hindu backgrounds are confused and totally bewildered at what is happening around them. So many of their guardians have fled into the jungles and are unable to come and get them during these trying times.

Through all this, I am more determined than ever to continue with our goal: the transformation of a community by transforming its children. Orissa will be saved... that is our heart's cry. If we can take these thousands of throw-away children and help them to become disciples of Jesus, they will transform an entire region. It is a long term goal, but it is strategic thinking in terms of the Great Commission.

What can you do? First, please uphold all this in fervent prayer. Second, pass this e-mail on to as many friends as you can. We must get the word out and increase our prayer base for this is spiritual warfare at its most basic meaning. We are literally fighting the devil in order to live for His Kingdom. The next 10 days are crucial. We pray for peace and calm to pervade across Orissa.

I understand this message has probably been around the blogosphere a few times by now but I still thought it should be shared.

Link: YWAM website

Religious instruction and child abuse: a novel take on the accusation

2008-10-17T21:24:00.002+01:00

I recently read Dissent Over Descent by Warwick University sociologist and philosopher of science Steve Fuller. At some point I may review this book, although that would probably be quite a long task. Anyway, for the meantime I'd like to draw attention to what Fuller says, in an endnote, about "such academically certified luminaries as Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett calling famliy-and-church-based (as opposed to academically licensed) religious instruction 'child abuse'." (my emphasis):

The concept of the 'meme', a (pseudo?) Darwinian attempt to explain the spread of ideas, has been most developed in this context—that is, one that treats the spread of religious ideas as a disease to be prevented, if not cured. See Daniel Dennett, Breaking the Spell [...] and Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion [...]. Here a clever psychoanalyst might suspect the sublimation of Neo-Darwinism's eugenicist impulses at play in a world that prohibits their direct expression: rather than sterilise religious people, Neo-Darwinists would instead sterilise their minds.

At the very least, this shows just how democratic a game Bulverism is. Against the accusation that he believes in God purely because of "memes" and/or upbringing, the theist could legitimately respond that the memetician only believes in memes because of a desire to psychologically castrate. See the second half of this post for more about "Neo-Darwinism's eugenicist impulses".

J. Ivy: Never Let Me Down

2008-10-14T00:01:00.003+01:00

I just found out J. Ivy is a poet and so it's possible to hear his amazing contribution to Kanye West's College Dropout album without having to skip past the uninspiring first verse from Jay-Z. Enjoy.

Kaletsky on government intervention in free market economies

2008-10-09T14:11:00.005+01:00

Once a financial panic starts, government intervention is always required. Financial markets do not deal in physical commodities but in paper contracts that represent promises of future payments. Once faith in those promises is broken, only governments, with the right to print money and levy taxes, can offer truly credible financial guarantees.

- Anatole Kaletsky writing in The Times today

Horse or scorpion? What they're saying about Mandelson's return to the cabinet

2008-10-05T14:37:00.005+01:00

'Proud' Mandelson back in cabinet (BBC) - this is the place to go for the background story, if you're not up on contemporary British politics.

Peter Mandelson himself has insisted that any antipathy between himself and Gordon Brown is in the past, saying that "from here on in we're joined at the hip".
Many have reacted with incredulity to those remarks. On today's Politics Show on BBC 1, for instance, David Cameron said, "that's the problem with Peter Mandelson: he says things which are difficult to believe".
In the same interview with Jon Sopel, Cameron also admitted that within the Conservative Party, "one Mandelson" is defined as "the time it takes between meeting Peter Mandelson and hearing him say something rude about Gordon Brown".
That seems to tally with a report in today's Sunday Times that "Peter Mandelson 'dripped pure poison' about Gordon Brown into the ear of a senior Conservative just weeks before his extraordinary cabinet comeback".
Nor is it only Conservatives making those remarks: Peter Kilfoyle called it "a thoroughly retrograde step",
John McDonnell described the move as "an extraordinary step backwards into the worst elements of the Blair era, to reinstate possibly the most divisive figure in Labour's recent history",
an unnamed MP acknowledged that "Gordon says he is bringing Peter back because of his great experience of business," but asked "what about his experience of stitching people up and dividing the party?"
and Michael Meacher, another socialist member of the parliamentary Labour Party and a former minister, described the Prime Minister's decision as "the most bizarre political appointment since Caligula made his horse consul".
Referring also to the sacking of Metropolitan Police commisioner Sir Ian Blair, Rod Liddle shares with us his "Quantity Theory of Awful People; one goes, another comes to fill his place [...] No matter what happens there will never, ever, be fewer of them in public life [...] Blair bows out, here's Mandelson back, grinning from ear to ear, unable to believe his luck, pledging his utmost support to a man we suspect he stil can't abide and whom he will undermine".
Matthew Parris wonders whether Mandelson's return to government is actually "The return of the scorpion", asking "Do you need to be reminded of the fable of the scorpion and the frog - the story of a stinging insect desirous of crossing a river, and hitching a ride on the back of a frog? “But you're a scorpion,” says the frog, “you sting”.
“Normally, yes,” replies the scorpion with both apparent and perhaps real sincerity, “but why would I do that when it would sink us both, drowning me too?”
Compelled by this logic the frog obliges. Halfway over the water, the scorpion stings. The frog's last words are: “In the name of God, why?” The scorpion's last words are: “Because it is in my nature.”"

And me? On Friday I changed my Facebook status to "Matthew is now definitely not voting Labour. Mandelson!?!"

Album review: Death Magnetic by Metallica

2008-09-19T17:30:00.003+01:00

Metallica, Death Magnetic (Vertigo, 2008)

Metallica didn't have to do this. After their last album—the hugely disappointing St. Anger (2003), which was itself far less noteworthy than the Spinal Tap-esque making-of documentary Some Kind of Monster accompanying it—they could have happily called it a day and lived off the proceeds of the many tens of millions of album sales to date stretching back to before I was born, and the rock kudos of, well, every album except St. Anger.

Not a bit of it. After a five-year gap they are back, with an album that is being hyped as "a throwback to the band's pre-1990s style" (Amazon). While the term "throwback" might imply disapproval, more sympathetic sources were also indicating that this effort would be more thrash than anything for quite a while. So, in order to prepare myself to be able to accurately judge that claim, I listened to Ride The Lightning (1984) and Master of Puppets (1986) before buying this disk, all the while mildly concerned at the new album having a name only slightly less silly than the previous one.

I really can't give Death Magnetic any higher praise than to say that it holds its own next to the two aforementioned masterpieces. Not that it's an album quite like those, mind. There are thrash moments throughout, particularly on the opening track That Was Just Your Life and the closing track My Apocalypse (which has a galloping riff which rather reminds me of The Four Horsemen off Kill 'Em All), and it is overall fast and heavy, but these aspects are well mixed with the kind of funky licks more redolent of Metallica's 1990s albums, particularly on the tracks The End of The Line (my favourite) and The Unforgiven III. Also, ironically, while Ride The Lightning had its Fade To Black and Master of Puppets its Welcome Home (Sanitarium), this release doesn't afford the listener the space to catch breath with a quieter track. The closest we come to that is the first half of the first single The Day That Never Comes, but then the track builds to a furious crescendo with some killer guitar work. And does Kirk Hammett ever shread. Wow. I'm not one of the people who was overly bothered at St. Anger not containing any guitar solos, but still their return is welcome with Kirk playing like this.

Just one quibble, though: the lyrics. One of the most memorable parts of the Some Kind of Monster documentary (rockumentary?) , for me, was the scene of the band members laughing derisively at some truly awful proposed lyrics... which later ended up on the St. Anger album! While the lyrics here aren't quite at that level of corniness, I do wonder if there were any meetings like that during the making of this record, too. Maybe it's personal taste, but I find it surprising that a band with such pedigree at writing anti-war lyrics would pass those up, given the state of the world today, for songs which are positive about suicide and demons. I won't do a detailed analysis like I did in my last album review because I simply don't think they mean it.

All that said, this album comes recommended, at least for all heavy metal fans. And maybe not only them: Metallica's performance on Later With Jools Holland (BBC2) this week made all the other acts look stupid.

Track list:

That Was Just Your Life
The End of The Line
Broken, Beat & Scarred
The Day That Never Comes
All Nightmare Long
Cyanide
The Unforgiven III
The Judas Kiss
Suicide And Redemption
My Apocalypse

Palin's ex-pastor's prophecy

2008-09-11T14:01:00.004+01:00

So, Ed Kalnin reckons he knows that the world will end soon:

Scripture specifically mentions oil instability as a sign of the Rapture. We’re seeing more and more oil wars. The contractions of the fulfilment of prophecies are getting tighter and tighter. [...] I’m looking out the window and I can see it’s going to rain [...] I’m just looking at the turmoil of the world, Iraq, other places – everywhere people are fighting against Christ.

Well, in all my Bible reading I haven't found the bit where "Scripture specifically mentions oil instability as a sign of the Rapture". However, I did find the following passages, recording the words of Jesus:

No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It's like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping.

(Mark 13:32-36),

It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority.

(Acts 1:7) and

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.

(Matthew 24:6). Look, for all I know Pastor Kalnins might be right, but he can't know that he's right, not according to the above verses. I'll just do my best to be ready whenever Jesus returns. That's what I advise everyone else to do, too.

For those about to go to university

2008-09-08T16:49:00.004+01:00

I write this because the beginning of the academic year is around now, and many people find leaving home and going to university a time of strain for their faith. This can be for a variety of reasons which I won't go into now. What I will do is repeat the advice given to the character Alyosha by Father Paisy on the former's leaving his monastery aged 18, in Dostoyevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov:

‘Remember, young one, untiringly’ – thus did Father Paisy begin, directly and without any preamble – ‘that secular learning, having united itself into a great power, has studied all the celestial things that were bequeathed to us in the Holy Books, and after the cruel analysis of the scholars of this world there remains of all the earlier holiness absolutely nothing at all. But their study was conducted piecemeal, and they missed the whole; indeed, such blindness is positively worth of marvel. Whereas the whole stands right before their eyes immovably as ever, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Has it not lived for nineteen centuries, does it not live even now in the movements of individual souls and the movements of the popular masses? Even in the souls of those very atheists who have destroyed everything it lives, as ever, immovably! For even the disavowers of Christianity and those in mutiny against it are in their essence of the same Christian mould, and such they have remained, for to this day neither their wisdom, nor the fervour of their hearts has been vigorous enough to create a higher image of man and his dignity than the one indicated of old by Christ. Such attempts as there have been to do so have resulted only in monstrosities. Make particular note of that, young one, for into the world you are appointed by your departing Elder. It may be that in remembering this great day, you will not forget my words either, words given you in cordial parting, for you are young, and the world’s temptations are heavy and it is not in your power to bear them. Well go now, orphan.’

The part I've highlighted is the part I agree the most with, and marvel that Dostoyevsky wrote it before the Russian revolution. Go, take on the world. But remember you creator.

Large Hadron Rap

2008-09-01T00:59:00.001+01:00

Gotta love it.

A question my boss asked

2008-08-14T12:43:00.001+01:00

How many more civil servants do we have now than when we were running two thirds of the world's population?

Answers on a postcard—or, if you prefer, in the form of comments to this post. Follow-up question: why do we need them?

Yet another Christian music plug

2008-08-14T12:41:00.005+01:00

I've just added a link to Sounds of Salvation's website after their show on Saturday. The call themselves "the UK's biggest Christian ska band". I know the bassist. Check 'em out.

Related posts:
Another Christian music plug
Jesus loves hip-hop

Henry Orombi does it again

2008-08-01T16:00:00.006+01:00

The Church cannot heal this crisis of betrayal (The Times)

In this article, Henry Orombi, the Archbishop of Uganda, explains why he and his bishops are not attending the Lambeth Conference this year. The areas of serious public disagreement within the Anglican communion are well known, but nevertheless I had expected more bishops like Orombi to go to the conference precisely in order to make themselves heard in this dispute. That said, Orombi had previously explained that he and the other Ugandan bishops would "definitely not attend any Lambeth Conference to which the violators of the Lambeth Resolution [1.10] are also invited as participants or observers", and in this article the Archbishop makes clear that he feels the best way to make his voice heard is precisely not to be there, as many bishops have, frankly, been treating him dishonestly,

[I]t is now hard to believe that the leadership in the American Church means what it says. They say that they are not authorising blessings of same-sex unions, yet we read newspaper reports of them. Two American bishops have even presided at such services of blessings. Bishops have written diocesan policies on the blessings of same-sex unions. It is simply untrue to say they have not been authorised.

That such blessings continue and seem to be increasing hardly demonstrates “regret”, let alone repentance, on the part of the American Church.

and the Archbishop of Canterbury is not the man to sort this mess out,

The peculiar thing is that this one man, who is at the centre of the communion's structures, is not even elected by his peers. Even the Pope is elected by his peers, but what Anglicans have is a man appointed by a secular government. Over the past five years, we have come to see this as a remnant of British colonialism, and it is not serving us well. The spiritual leadership of a global communion of independent and autonomous provinces should not be reduced to one man appointed by a secular government.

Sobering words indeed. Personally, I've been umm-ing and ahh-ing over whether or not to sign the GAFCON petition, but this might be enough to convince me in the long run. I'll wait until the end of the Lambeth Conference, though.

(Possible updates to follow as I think about this some more)

Related posts:
Henry Orombi on Anglicanism
Book review: God, Gays and the Church by Lisa Nolland et. al

The sub-prime crisis explained

2008-07-07T13:18:00.006+01:00

(Contains some swearing)

| View | Upload your own

HT: w_ockham

Another Christian music plug

2008-07-04T20:55:00.004+01:00

I'd like to draw your attention to the music of my friend Daniel Shiells, whose debut album, A Taste of Things To Come, is out now. He has a real passion for sharing Jesus through his music—and for writing good songs! I can testify that the second of those ambitions has been achieved, and am praying about the first. The writer of this review of Dan's performance at this year's H3 Festival agrees.

The album was produced by Tre Sheppard of Onehundredhours and is being toured around the UK as we speak.

Related post: Jesus loves hip-hop

No tobacco in the joint

2008-07-02T13:50:00.003+01:00

Dutch ban smoking tobacco — but rules on marijuana are still hazy (The Times)

The article is about the current situation in The Netherlands, which has recently followed the rest of Europe in banning smoking in enclosed public places. Smoking tobacco, that is: smoking pure cannabis in Amsterdam's (in)famous coffee shops is still legal.

Obviously, this is absolutely crazy. As one bemused Dutchman put it, "In other countries they look for the marijuana in the cigarette. Here they look for the cigarette in the marijuana". Also, presumably the rationale behind banning smoking cigarettes indoors is to eliminate the associated health risks. But what difference will that make in a room where everyone is smoking something else? Just another occasion where the law is an ass.

My Wordle

2008-06-28T11:42:00.006+01:00

HT: Ken Brown

Concert review: Radiohead in Victoria Park, 25/06/2008

2008-06-27T22:53:00.014+01:00

I used to play football in Vicky Park as a kid. That was a lot of fun. But I had way more fun there on Wednesday night.

This was huge in a few different ways. First, the number of people. My friend commented on entering that "this is more like a festival", and I had to agree. Second, the set. They were on for two hours, comprising two encores, and so there was time to play the whole of latest relese In Rainbows and a bunch of older favourites, too. A fair number of people were screaming for "Just" and had to leave disappointed in that respect, although the cheer was so loud when the band kicked into "The Bends" that everyone seemed to forget about it, and the finish with "Paranoid Android" was masterful.

Third, the sound. You could really tell these guys had been rehearsing. Song followed song played extremely tight. And with enthusiasm, too: the rehearsing, recording and touring didn't seem to have gotten in the way of that. Jonny Greenwood waved his arms around as if being attacked by the notes he was playing, while Ed O'Brien strode about the stage being a rockstar (Jonny didn't want to play face-on-close-up with him, though) and Thom Yorke alternately danced like a demented nerd and engaged in ironic audience manipulation: collapsing in laughter after getting cheers from different parts of the crowd by pointing, and successfully encouraging people to wave their arms while singing

They were smiling and waving,
Smilling and waving, twitching and salivating
Like with myxamatosis.

Of course, one major reason they were able to play so many songs was because not a lot of talking went on. One of the few comments to be made was "soon the sun will go down, and then we'll be able to use the lights... properly". That was an understatement. The light show was intricate and impressive. In short, it was the complete package. Everyone went home very happy indeed, from the people who came in their work clothes, nodding their heads, to the moshers in all the merchandise gear.

(I didn't get there in time to see the support act, Bats For Lashes, which was a shame. If anyone has any comments about their set I'd be interested).

Set list:
Reckoner
15 Step
There There
All I Need
Lucky
Nude
Weird Fishes / Arpeggi
Myxamatosis
The National Anthem
Faust Arp
No Surprises
Jigsaw Falling Into Place
Optimistic
Videotape
Everything In Its Right Place
Idioteque
Bodysnatchers
------
House of Cards
The Bends
Bangers 'n' Mash
My Iron Lung
Karma Police
-----
Go Slowly
2+2=5
Paranoid Android

Related post: Album review: In Rainbows by Radiohead

Book review: God, Gays and the Church by Lisa Nolland et al.

2008-06-19T23:36:00.014+01:00

Nolland, Lisa Severine, Sudgen, Chris and Finch, Sarah (eds.), God, Gays and the Church: Human Sexuality and Experience in Christian Thinking (London: The Latimer Trust, 2008)

The purpose of this book is summed up succinctly on the cover:

In contemporary discussions about human sexuality, great prominence is given to personal stories from gay people. This emphasis can also be seen in recent Christian debates, such as those in the General Synod of the Church of England in February 2007. But there it was a one-sided testimony, and this book is intended to redress the balance.

That may make this book sound quite Anglican-centric, and parts of it are, slightly (and, of course, the timing of the release is not accidental), but the denominational affiliations of the contributors range from Presbyterian to Roman Catholic, so all Christians will find it useful. Indeed, what has been the historic and unanimous teaching of all Christian denominations until very recently is under increasing pressure from many angles. What is offered here by way of a redress is a collection of articles which have been grouped together under the headings "Narratives", "Genetics", "Psychology and Psychotherapy", "Biblical Theology", "Pastoral Care and Advice" and "Cultural Analysis and Social Ethics", which together aim to show that this historic and unanimous teaching is not only still credible but commendable, and in fact indispensable for anyone who takes orthodoxy remotely seriously. I have previously written some of my thoughts on this topic in this post.

As might be expected from a collection of essays, this book is a mixed bag. The sections on personal testimony and Biblical Theology are very good, in particular the dialogues by J. Budziszewski (which are really a bit of both). Robert Gagnon's article is solid, too, although it is a response to a paper by John Thorp, which isn't reprinted here (although details of where to find it are given). This gives some indication of the bittiness of the collection and seems a bit strange: why not make your own positive case first and then respond to opposing views and objections? Also, I am sceptical of the details of the chapters on psychology and psychotherapy—which won't come as a surprise to anyone who knows me—although the overall message is clear enough: very many people have dealt with unwanted same-sex attraction and found the experience to be liberating. So much was confirmed by the personal testimonies of change.

Some parts of this will be more controversial than others, and for different people. For instance, Peter Ould, one of the contributors (who has an uplifting testimony of healing), is not happy with Ronald Lee's essay arguing (from his own experience) that gay culture is predominantly narcissistic, promiscuous and destructive. I agree with Rev. Ould inasmuch as Dr. Lee's argument is not strictly relevant to the main thrust of the book, and in any case there is (sadly) plenty of narcissistic, promiscuous and destructive heterosexual behaviour to worry about as well. The other socio-political chapters—on civil partnerships, the redefinition of marriage, the sexualisation of youth, what makes a stable family unit and the culture wars over "discrimination"—will doubtless prove to be just as controversial in many quarters but are backed up with much more evidence and are, in the end, far more interesting.

Overall, this book could have been better. It obviously came out in a rush: there's even a typo on the back cover. That said, it's still a good, overall convincing book, and a valuable resource. Over at Stand Firm someone was wondering how much longer this sort of publication will remain legal. If those worries are well-founded (which is a subject for another day), then this book could be worth getting now for that reason alone.

Table of contents
Narratives
1. Post-Gay: The transforming Power of God The Revd Peter Ould and James Parker
2. Post-Lesbian: My Testimony anon
3. Post-Gay: Thank you for offending me Michael Goeke
4. Homophobia: An Unfinished Story and The Seeker Professor J. Budziszewski
5. The Books, the Porn, the Truth Dr Ronald G. Lee
Genetics
6. Same Sex Attraction (SSA): Is it innate, and immutable? Dr Neil Whitehead
Psychology and Psychotherapy
7. How Might Homosexuality Develop? Putting the Pieces Together Dr Jeffrey Satinover
8. Post-Gay: The Primacy Of Affect: A Psychotherapeutic Approach Dr Joseph Nicolosi
9. Post-Gay: Understanding SSA As A 'Signal' Dr Joseph Nicolosi
10. What If I Don't Change? Dr Joseph Nicolosi
Biblical Theology
11. A Faithful Church: The Bible and Same-Sex Sex Professor Robert A.J. Gagnon
12. 'One of These Things is Not Like the Others': Women's Ordination, Homoeroticism and Faithfulness Professor Edith M. Humphrey
Pastoral Care and Advice
13. Pastoral Considerations For Homosexuality The Revd Mario Bergner
14. Civil Partnerships – Advice to UK Parishes and Clergy The Revd Paul Perkin and Mrs Christine Perkin
Cultural Analysis and Social Ethics
15. Gay Wednesday's 'Gay Pain' Dr Lisa Severine Nolland
16. Unexpected Consequences: The Sexualisation of Youth Dr Lisa Severine Nolland

(I've left out the multiple prefaces and appendices)

A helpful warning from your friendly PC publisher

2008-05-31T17:09:00.005+01:00

I have just collected two books I ordered over the internet from Wilder Publications (via Waterstones.com). Both books carry the following notice on the inside of the front cover:

This book is a product of its time and does not reflect the same values as it would if it were written today. Parents might wish to discuss with their children how views on race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity and interpersonal relations have changed since this book was written before allowing them to read this classic work.

Just so no-one thinks I've gone and picked out the most racist, sexist etc. texts I could find, I should point out that the books in question are Sickness Unto Death and Purity of Heart Is To Will One Thing by Søren Kierkegaard*. Kierkegaard is not generally known for his bigotry. Therefore, I assume they put this warning on the inside of every book they publish that was written before, well, "today", whenever that is for the purposes of "views on race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity and interpersonal relations".

There are two questions I would like to pose about the substance of this warning:

How on Earth can Wilder pretend to know what values these books would reflect if they were written today?
Is fitting in to the contemporary climate of opinon virtuous in itself?

And here are my answers:

They can't
If so, then surely these book's being "products of [their] time" makes them virtuous. If not, then it cannot be right to protect children from opinions outside our own climate of opinion.

Thoughts?

* It's bad enough that they spelled his name "Sören Kierkegaard" on the front cover. I can't read Danish, but still I consider it very unlikely indeed that the letters "ø" and "ö" are interchangeable in that language.

Mirrors for the divine light

2008-05-17T00:47:00.006+01:00

The following passage comes from the final chapter of C.S. Lewis' The Four Loves, entitled "Charity" (Glasgow: Fount, 1979), pp 119-120:

All those expressions of unworthiness which Christian practice puts into the believer's mouth seem to the outer world like the degraded and insincere grovellings of a sycophant before a tyrant, or at best a façon de parler like the self-depreciation of a Chinese gentleman when he calls himself "this course and illiterate person". In reality, however, they express the continually renewed, because continually necessary, attempt to negate that misconception of ourselves and of our relation to God which nature, even while we pray, is always recommending to us. No sooner do we believe that God loves us than there is an impulse to believe that He does so, not because He is Love, but because we are intrinsically lovable. The Pagans obeyed this impulse unabashed; a good man was "dear to the gods" because he was good. We, being better taught, resort to subterfuge. Far be it from us to think that we have virtues for which God could love us. But then, how magnificantly we have repented! As Bunyan says, describing his first and illusory conversion, "I thought there was no man in England that pleased God better than I." Beaten out of this, we next offer our own humility to God's admiration. Surely He'll like that? Or if not that, our clear-sighted and humble recognition that we still lack humility. Thus, depth beneath depth and subtlety within subtlety, there remains some lingering idea of our own, our very own, attractiveness. It is easy to acknowledge, but almost impossible to realise for long, that we are mirrors whose brightness, if we are bright, is wholly derived from the sun that shines upon us. Surely we must have a little—however little—native luminosity? Surely we can't be quite creatures?

I hardly think this point can be stressed enough. The temptation to spiritual pride is always there, and unbelievers are right to condemn the sin when we act upon this temptation. N.B. in the above, where Lewis speaks of "nature", he means sarx, generally translated as "the sinful nature" or, in older Bibles, "the flesh". It's what we are without God's grace.

News on the campaign against abortion in the UK

2008-05-13T23:44:00.003+01:00

I received the following e-mail this morning from The Alive & Kicking Campaign:

Dear [mattghg],

The first abortion vote in Parliament since 1990 is now just ten days away (20 May) and the time is very short. The media debate is understandably intensifying.

You recently very kindly signed the Alive and Kicking petition on abortion which now has over 25,000 signatures and will be formally presented to Parliament very shortly.

Would you be willing to take two minutes to sign a new petition to lower the upper limit for abortion for normal babies from 24 weeks to 20 weeks or below?

Petition

If you can spare a bit more time you could also

1. Watch the launch of the 20 weeks campaign (5 minutes)
2. Send an e-postcard to your MP or a friend (2 minutes)
3. Order free postcards to distribute to friends (3 minutes)
4. Get up to date with the 20 weeks campaign (as long as you like)

Please forward this to others

Many thanks for your time

Alive and Kicking

If (you're a British citizen and) you agree with the above, then please take some time to look into this and sign one or both of the petitions.

Some reflections on the elections

2008-05-03T10:29:00.010+01:00

In 2000, Ken Livingstone (left, admitting defeat) was expelled from the Labour Party for running against party candidate Frank Dobson in the London mayoral election — which he won, running as an independent. He was readmitted to the party in 2004 when it couldn't face the prospect of losing a second election in a row to an outcast. How ironic that he should now be booted out of office at least in part as a result of the general malaise affecting Labour. That's not to minimise the effect of his accusing a Jewish journalist of acting like a Nazi, or of the stench of corruption coming from the London Development Agency, or of simple public boredom with the incumbent. But I do wonder who would be mayor today if Livingtone had remained independent — although, to his credit, he apparently doesn't.

I don't share the gloomy expectations of some regarding what Boris Johnson (right, with David Cameron) will do to the capital: he decided a couple of years ago to stop being a journalist and start being a politician. Not that I'm overjoyed at his being mayor, either. But politics is always a choice between the lesser of various evils. On that score, I'm rather sickened that the BNP now has a seat on the London Assembly.

In Reading, where I live, the council slipped out of Labour's control (to NOC) for the first time in eleven years. It's been one of those elections. If you want to know how I feel about that, well, it's a secret ballot :)

Praying for revival

2008-05-03T00:01:00.006+01:00

Do you think that the Church of England, or, more broadly, the church in England, is in a bad state at the moment? Not nearly as bad as it was in the early eighteenth century, ‘a period of place-seeking, money-grabbing and moral irrelevance’, according to William Hague’s biography of William Wilberforce, The Life of The Great Anti-Slave Trade Campaigner (London: Harper Collins, 2007), pp 9-11:

Many observers considered that Christianity was largely absent from much of the Church’s preaching. The renowned lawyer Sir William Blackstone did the rounds of the best preachers in London before declaring that ‘Not one of the sermons contained more Christianity than the writings of Cicero’. The vicar Henry Venn considered, after listening to sermons in York, that ‘excepting a single phrase of two, they might be preached in a synagogue or mosque without offence’. It was common for apathetic clergy simply to buy sermons from each other [...] This was not surprising in an age when many of the clergy ceased to perform religious duties at all. Having been appointed to a lucrative parish, it was common practice for clergymen to become absentees, keeping the living obtained from the parish and delegating curates to carry out their duties at a much lower rate of pay. [...] Hard drinking was common, Wesley writing from St. Ives in 1747 that two clergymen were led home at one or two in the morning in such a condition as I care not to describe’.
Above all, it was the ruthless competition for the most lucrative parishes and dioceses that made the eighteenth-century Church a place of touting and toadying ambition [...] With such rewards available, the Church was converted into a branch of the aristocracy. To cap it all, political patronage was decisive in most of the senior appointments. [...] By 1750 Manchester had a population of twenty thousand, but only one parish church.

And yet, from such an inauspicious situation there arose a great revival. Jonathan Fletcher over at Reform has used this information as part of his case for British Evangelical Anglicans to stay within the CoE (HT: Anglican Mainstream). I plan to refrain from posting on that question until we’ve had the full post-Lambeth shakedown. But what I will say is that reading these words of Hague’s has served to remind me, amid all I hear about the ‘decline of Christianity in the West’, of just how timeless the call to ‘Save yourselves from this corrupt generation’ (Acts 2:40) is. And prevailing reactions to this call remain the same, too. Jürgen Spieß has said as much regarding the comparison between the responses he gets to his talks and those the Apostle Paul got to his speech at the Areopagus; and Hague also cites (p16) these words of the Duchess of Buckingham:

It is monstrous to be told that you have a heart as sinful as the common wretches that crawl on the earth. This is highly offensive and insulting and at variance with high rank and good breeding.

Quite so. The gospel is offensive. I well remember being offended by it. But it’s true. Of course, the danger with taking this tone is that we become judgemental of the surrounding culture without actually trying to help, or even acknowledging that, but for the grace of God, we would be under the same judgement. Adam Groza has recently made this point well while expounding Chesterton: the Christian believes

Not that sin is a problem in general, but that my sin causes pain and suffering in the world [my emphasis, heh]

But that said, we shouldn’t accept spiritual stagnation or backsliding in ourselves, individually, and we shouldn’t accept it on a social level, either. Time to pray – and work, under God – for revival.

Irreverent stats

2008-04-21T21:15:00.005+01:00

I love statistics. Torture numbers and they will confess to anything.
- 'Galapagos Finch'

Some wisdom from the world of hip-hop

2008-04-20T17:30:00.004+01:00

Life is fragile, we take it for granted,
I’m thankful for the life I was handed.
Christ stretched out his arms on the cross,
Offered me freedom at a tremendous cost.
I can’t accept the gift without repentance.
I talked to God with expectancy,
He said: “Ask for anything in the name of my Son,
If it’s my will then it will be done”.
I’m not praying for material possessions,
Being close to God is the greatest blessing.
- Braille, ‘Blessed Man’, The IV Edition (Syntax, 2008)

Dembski on sin and redemption

2008-04-19T14:24:00.000+01:00

From William Dembski's Christian Theodicy in the Light of Genesis and Modern Science:

It is vital here to have a correct picture of Christ’s redemption and our role in it. In allowing evil and then redeeming us from it, God is not an arsonist who starts a fire, let’s things heat up for us, and then, at the last moment, steps in so that he can be the big hero. Nor is God a casual bystander, who sees a fire start spontaneously and then lets it get out of control so that he can be the big hero to rescue us. We are the arsonists. We started the fire. God wants to rescue us not only from the fire we started but also, and more importantly, from our disposition to start fires, that is, from our life of arson. [...]

Sin has rendered us insane. Granted, most of us don’t see it that way and take offense at the very suggestion. But if God is all that Christian theology teaches that he is, then it is nothing short of insanity for us to be constantly constructing idols that divert us from finding ultimate satisfaction in the God who is the source of our being and is willing to give himself so totally to us that he enables us to call his life ours (see Galatians 2:20 and Colossians 3:1–4).

The central ideas of Dembski's theodicy are that evils, both personal and natural, exist because God wants us to learn gravity of sin - "to rescue us from a life of arson requires that we know the seriousness of what arson can do [...] so that we can rightly understand the human condition and come to our senses" - and that their origin is to be traced to the fall. In response to the question of how natural evils can be due to the fall when they preceded it by a few million years, Dembski answers that while they are indeed chronologically prior to the fall, they are logically and "kairologically" posterior to it (not being phased by Newcomb's paradox).

The theodicy itself is interesting and definitely worthy of discussion, and I will be grateful for comments on it. To my mind, it has a lot going for it, although it does sound a bit much like backward causation, and backward causation sounds weird. But this is not the point of the post as such. What I wanted to do was draw attention to the noetic effects of sin (Romans 1:21; 1 Corinthians 1:20; Ephesians 4:18) and its destructiveness. Apologies to anyone who saw "Dembski" in the title line and is disappointed to find that this post has nothing to do with ID.