Sojourn in a nation under judgment: Anne Kennedy's epic takedown of Rachel Held Evans

Any article critiquing Rachel Held Evans ought to be required reading. This morning, Anne Kennedy scored an epic takedown of the sniveling, neo-Pharisaical, proto-millennial blogger, who never seems to tire of pointing an accusing finger at Christians who actually believe Jesus is who he said he is and the Bible is what the church has always said it was.

First off, I wish she would desist calling me, and others who love the Bible and the Jesus revealed in the bible her “fellow Christians”. We are not fellows together. We believe contradictory opposite gospels. She is not curious enough about the gospel I embrace to know what it says, to understand that love is at the center of this issue, that Christians like me are horrified to find that the culture, and self identified “Christians” like her, have created a new definition of love that lets a person sexually tie himself or herself to a person of the same gender, regardless of God’s clear, explicit hatred of such an act. Love demands, love implores, love does everything it can to warn of the peril right ahead. So yes to fear, this is a perilous place we inhabit, now. But from whence cometh the entitlement? Christians have rightly perceived the rejection of their world view and are retreating in sorrow and grief. As for the charge that we are obscuring the gospel, I think the church has already been complicit in that confusion, and I think now Jesus himself is making the gospel more than abundantly clear. One of the ways (only one way, there are so many) gay “marriage” is so hateful to God is because it obscures the central relationship between Christ and the Church. Marriage isn’t about individuals. Each and every marriage paints a picture of Jesus’ sacrificial love for his bride, who is not the same as him. Gay “marriage” paints a lying idolatrous picture of this reality and is one reason why, I think, the winners are so angry. Because living in a horrible lie is actually not that comfortable and pleasant. Look in the defiant, tragic gaze of a child who is lying and who doesn’t know how to get out, and you have an expression of the anger we are seeing everywhere. Why, pray tell, in this moment of great joy, Rachel Held Evans, do you pause to take a wack at bible loving Christians? I’ll tell you why, because the lie is ugly and hurtful, and so there must be lots of shouting and anger to cover up the great wound that leads to death. But moving on.

Kennedy's concluding observations are most insightful.

God’s judgement is pouring out. His burning anger is already here. If you feel angry, I long for you to look in his face, and not flinch when you see his abiding, perfect wrath. Really, my Christian identity has never been clearer than at this precise moment.

Hardly a day goes by now that I don't see some Facebook post or meme issuing the dire warning that "God is going to judge America" for all of the abominations it is now condoning. But, as Kennedy implies, the judgment is already happening. In Romans 1:18-32, Paul speaks about "men behaving indecently with men," etc. precisely in terms of judgment. The prevalence of such abominable acts is not a sign that God's wrath is about to be poured out but, indeed, that it is already being poured out. It's not the popular caricature of lightning striking, but the more subtle judgment of God giving a rebellious people over to their "dishonorable passions." God may not judge a nation because it celebrates sexual deviancy. Rather, the celebration of deviancy may very well be evidence that God's judgment has already come.

If that is the case, it presents us with a very crucial question. What is the church's responsibility as it sojourns in the midst of a nation under judgment? Most assuredly, it has a more significant role to play than the complacent compromising suggested by the likes of Rachel Held Evans. In his commentary on Revelation (unfortunately, long out of print), M. Robert Mulholland, Jr. offers this sacramentally saturated observation on the church's mission in the midst of a rebellious order.

For the church in John's day, as well as today, the vision reveals the profoundly deep reality of what it means to be a citizen of New Jerusalem. To be part of the eucharistic community of God's people is to become part of God's response to the rebellion. To partake of the Eucharist is to be drawn into the very being and nature of God so as to be shaped in the image and likeness of God. To partake of the Eucharist is to be thrust out into the midst of Fallen Babylon to participate in God's costly, redemptive response to the rebellion. The vision images this in the bowls [Revelation 15:6-16:21], which, on the one hand, are the prayers of the saints that open them to the shaping presence of God and that, on the other hand, being filled with the presence of God, are then poured out into the life of the world.

The outpouring of God's wrath is never an arbitrary act. Its purpose, like all the purposes of God revealed in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, is ultimately redemptive. The church, as an active participant in God's response to the fallen order's rebellion, is called to be an agent of what Mulholland calls redemptive wrath.

Anne Kennedy: What's wrong with Andy Stanley

Andy Stanley and others of his ilk (basically, propagators of the "seeker driven" movement) do not preach the Gospel or anything close to it. The essence of their message is, "Be nice people, welcome everyone, and work hard on being even nicer and even more welcoming."

This, as Anne Kennedy so adeptly points out, is utterly impossible.

And so here's what's wrong with Andy Stanley, and everybody else really, because I know you're longing for my summation of three minutes of TV preaching. Here it is, ready? I Can't Do It. I can't do the work you're telling me to do. I can't be welcoming enough. I can't be happy enough. I can't be positive enough. I can't be good enough. I can't be sinless enough. I can't pray enough. I can't rest enough. I can't do it. I'll just repeat that, as if I were actually saying this to Andy Stanley, I Can't Do It. And you telling me to work harder actually just makes me angry and slightly hating of God. Stop piling work on me. I can't do it.

Rather than that, how bout cracking open that electronic bible of yours and talking about God, just for a few minutes. I really don't care about what you think I should do, or who you think God is, or what God's purpose is for my life. I'm not turning on the tv to find out what you think I should do and be. This is why, if you can't make it to church, don't turn on the tv. Read the bible, out loud, and then go work in the garden or something. Don't watch this garbage. The shiny screen, the polo shirt, the gesturing, it doesn't make the preacher into a real preacher. A real preacher opens up the bible and tries to understand what the bible itself is saying about God. A real preacher doesn't need power point. A real preacher doesn't need to read a study about what people most regret in their lives. A real preacher doesn't need to lower the voice soothingly when saying something satanic like this, to paraphrase Andy Stanley, “the number one regret people name is not letting themselves be who they really are.” Not only is the grammar terrible, that particular sentiment is from the pit of hell.

It's not about you. Church isn't about you. It's not about the work you can do. It's not about how to get more out of life. It's not about making you feel good. It's not about you. It's about God. And any preacher that says anything otherwise is lying to you and you should get out of there.

Ebola and Israel? A new low, even for John Hagee

It's hardly surprising that fear-monger John Hagee would weave the Ebola crisis into his apocalyptic narrative, but the manner in which he has done so is shameless even by his low standards.

Ebola may be part of God's judgment for President Barack Obama's alleged attempts to "divide Jerusalem," said John Hagee, a San Antonio-based pastor and founder of Christians United For Israel.

Citing the Book of Joel, the televangelist took to Tuesday's broadcast of the "Hagee Hotline" to tell listeners that "our president is dead set on dividing Jerusalem. God is watching and he will bring America into judgment," according to the left-leaning Right Wing Watch.

"There are grounds to say that judgment has already begun, because he, the president, has been fighting to divide Jerusalem for years now," Hagee said in a YouTube video posted by Right Wing Watch.

"We are now experiencing the crisis of Ebola," he said.

Hagee, who heads Cornerstone Church, added that threats from Islamic radicals and ongoing unrest in Ferguson, Missouri are all part of God's judgment on the United States in response to Obama's policies.

David Fischler at Stand Firm observes:

To say that people like Hagee bring disrepute upon the Christian faith when they make pronouncements like this is being generous. People who claim to know exactly what God’s specific actions are in response to specific human events are at least borderline blasphemous, and definitely Gnostic, by claiming that they know the mind of God in a way that the rest of us can’t. For them, the Scripture is just window-dressing for their politics, and God is simply their political consultant as they pursue their agendas. It’s as bad when done by conservatives as it is when its done by liberals, if not worse, since conservatives should know better.

Of course, calling Hagee a "conservative" is also being generous.

No comment department

If this is the future of "progressive" Christianity. . .

. . . then I am not worried at all. We traditionalists have a much deeper bench.

Liberty University's "World Vision problem"

You can file this one under "You can't make this stuff up (but you wish it were)." Apparently, Liberty University has entered into a partnership with known spiritual charlatan Benny Hinn.

Liberty University has a World Vision problem.

Until World Vision announced and quickly reversed its policy on same-gender marriage, most of its donors probably thought they were giving money to help feed and evangelize poor children and families all around the world. While World Vision lost donors because of its betrayal of orthodox Christian doctrine, the furor created by the decision focused attention on what World Vision actually did–and didn’t do–with its donors’ money. Donors learned that their money didn’t actually go to the child pictured on the refrigerator (but to the child’s village), nor did World Vision always share the gospel as a part of its outreach. While people have been grieving the fact that thousands of children have lost sponsorships, we don’t know how much of that has been offset by donors redirecting their philanthropy to denominationally based efforts that promise to more effectively take the gospel to the people who need to hear it.

The World Vision public relations crisis had three related components:

We discovered that World Vision was willing to reject clear biblical teaching. 

We discovered that World Vision isn’t actually a gospel-preaching missions organization. 

We discovered that our own churches and denominations do a better job than we thought. 

Last week, we learned that Liberty University, America’s largest Christian college, had engaged in a partnership with Benny Hinn that would permit students to watch 10 hours of video, take an easy quiz, and qualify for ordination through Hinn’s World Healing Fellowship. The news spread quickly through blogs and Twitter, and Liberty, realizing they had an unfolding public relations disaster on its hands, released a statement that asserted that they and Hinn were not in partnership.

Not only does the statement appear to be false (keep reading), but the attention that this story is bound to create is going to cling to Liberty in unflattering ways as parents of college-aged teens start to discover just what has been happening at the nice little Baptist school tucked away in the Virginia mountains. It’s not just the Benny Hinn affiliation that will damage Liberty, it’s the discovery that Liberty has made something of a habit of consorting with cultists and charlatans over the last few decades. We’ll return to the interesting histories of Hinn’s Liberty friends, but first we’ll examine Liberty’s denial that it is in a partnership with Hinn.

Keep reading, and weep.

Greg Boyd debunks John Hagee "blood moon" nonsense

I would have to say I'm not always on the same theological page with Greg Boyd (and I certainly think he could use a refresher course on proper worship attire), but this impassioned refutation of John Hagee's "blood moon" nonsense is simply brilliant.

Mohler: Fred Phelps preached a false gospel

Timely words from Albert Mohler, upon the death of cult leader Fred Phelps:

Fred Phelps became infamous due to one central fact — he was a world-class hater. He brought great discredit to the Gospel of Christ because his message was undiluted hatred packaged as the beliefs of a church. Even Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center referred to Westboro Baptist Church as “this so-called church.” The damage was due to the fact that his platform for hatred was called a church. That provided the watching and listening world with a ready target and case study for the accusation that Christian conviction on questions of sexual morality is nothing more than disguised hatred for homosexuals. And, like radioactivity, Fred Phelps’ hatred will survive in lasting half-lives of animus.

The media made Fred Phelps into a public image, but they could hardly ignore a prophet of antipathy who showed up with his followers in public demonstrations and took his case for public protest all the way to the U. S. Supreme Court. Phelps and the media needed each other and fed each other. The New York Times described Phelps as “a loathed figure at the fringe of the American religious scene,” but he was not a fringe figure in terms of media attention. I have done my best not to add to his publicity, but as calls from the media in recent days made clear, the time has come for a necessary word.

Fred Phelps claimed to preach against homosexuality, calling out sin as sin. “The way to prove you love your neighbor is to warn them that they’re committing sin,” he said in 2004. That is the full lie of a half truth. The way you prove you love your neighbor is to be honest about sin — including our own sin — in order to tell the good news of the forgiveness of sin and salvation in Christ.

Phelps knew exactly what he was doing. As The Washington Post reported yesterday: “He found comfort in being a pariah. ‘If I had nobody mad at me, what right would I have to claim that I was preaching the gospel?’”

But that raises the most emphatic point — it was not the gospel that Fred Phelps was preaching. The gospel is the declaration of the good news that God saves sinners. It is the declaration of the fact that there is forgiveness of sins and life everlasting to be found in Christ and in belief in Him, and that is not the message for which Fred Phelps was known and hated.

Steve Chalke: Move along, nothing to see here

I must admit I'm not all that familiar with the work of Steve Chalke. I've come across his name once or twice, but I haven't been particularly impressed enough to research his teachings. It turns out that Chalke is a British Baptist, not an Anglican, but he apparently fashions himself somewhat in the mold of legend-in-his-own-mind John Shelby Spong, making provocative statements intended to challenge orthodox belief. I was only intrigued by this article about his latest "bold claim" because it fits rather well with the theme of this week's lectionary readings, particularly the Old Testament text.

Any claim that the Bible is "without error or contradiction – that it's 'infallible' or even 'inerrant'... is extremely misleading," he asserts. The Word of God is a person – Jesus – "not a manuscript", and Scripture is "a dynamic conversation which, rather than ending with the finalisation of the canon of the Bible, continues beyond it".

The "result of all this is that... we may sometimes come to a developed, or even different, view from some of those contained in the canon of Scripture."

Ho hum! How many times have we heard this tired old argument? If Jesus is the Word of God, the same claim cannot be made for Scripture. It is a false dichotomy which undermines the authority of both Jesus and Scripture.

To set Jesus against Scripture is an exercise in self-contradiction. How would we know that Jesus is the Word of God if the Scriptures did not say, "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us?" The incarnate Word does not override the written Word. Rather, the incarnate Word provides the definitive means through which the written Word is to be understood and interpreted.

Chalke is merely the latest version of the self-assured provocateur who has convinced himself that he has learned some "new truth" not previously revealed to the benighted souls who came before him. It is neither "new" nor "truth," of course. Move along, nothing to see here.

Homosexuality, idolatry, and the "Unbelievable!" cluelessness of Rob Bell

In the course of his disastrous performance on the radio program Unbelievable! recently, Rob Bell attempted to justify homosexual relationships by claiming the Apostle Paul, as a product of his ancient culture, had no frame of reference for understanding such relationships outside of his conception of idolatry.

I think Paul had his answer to that question tied up in worship of all sorts of other deities--I think it was all one giant hairball in Paul's day, and that, for him, there was the temple, and there was the temple of other gods who were opposed to the God of Israel, and that went on in there. So I think when Paul was talking about this issue, for him it's tied up in all sorts of idolatry, it's all sorts of rejection of God, so I would wanna like--pull the various issues apart, and I don't think they had a cultural conception.

The biblical, historical, and spiritual cluelessness expressed in such a statement is, literally, unbelievable! In a lengthy piece for The Christian Post today, Lutheran pastor Dan Delzell explains why there can be no separation of homosexuality from idolatry. The former is a natural consequence of the latter.

In the first chapter of Romans, the apostle Paul describes the sequence of events which brought about the same-sex revolution. Notice the progression. First, God revealed His "eternal power" and "divine nature" to man through Creation. Next, man chose not to glorify or give thanks to God. Instead, he "exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles." (Romans 1:23) As a result of this idol worship, "God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual immorality." (Romans 1:24) Man began to burn with this particular passion and desire only after he "exchanged the truth of God a lie." (Romans 1:25)

Did you catch that? Due to their rebellion and idol worship, God allowed their souls to enter an unprotected area. In that spiritual realm, the demons caused them to start burning with homosexual lust. The devil will always pervert God's design with a counterfeit approach. 

Since they chose to worship a counterfeit god, the Lord "gave them over" to the counterfeit desires of same-sex lust. They became inflamed with these passions only after they persisted in deliberately disobeying God and engaging in idol worship. That worship of false gods is what spawned the same-sex revolution, and people have suffered greatly from it ever since.

Remember that God had given man the honor of being created in God's image. So how did man show his thanks to God? By crafting false gods made in man's image. No wonder this caused the Lord to burn with anger. And so God let them experience what life is like when Satan has control of your sexual appetite. "Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural desires for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another." (Romans 1:26,27)

A particular Greek word is used three times by St. Paul in Romans 1:24-28 to describe how God "handed them over" to homosexual desires. Interestingly, it is the same Greek word which St. Matthew uses in his Gospel to describe what Pilate did with Christ. Pilate "handed him over to be crucified." (Matthew 27:26)

What a contrast! Jesus, the innocent One, was "handed over" by man to be executed. Whereas sinful man, after creating images of men and animals to worship, was "handed over" by God to even greater depravity. Since they chose to reject God, He allowed them to be overtaken by the demons that entered their life through their idol worship.

As for the current fascination with same sex relationships, the same idolatrous rebellion lies at its core.

What about today? Why do a significant number of people today, including teenagers, experience same-sex attraction? That "spirit" and those desires have been with us ever since the idol worship from centuries ago opened a "pandora's box" of sexual immorality upon the world. Once out of the box, sexual counterfeits tend to take on a life all their own. And there have always been plenty of people lining up to try out the latest sexual experiment, even if it's just out of a spirit of rebellion. Like many drugs, a sexual experiment will easily become an addiction.

If you are someone who experiences same-sex attraction, you can thank in part the "founders" of your orientation who decided to worship false gods many centuries ago. They of course had no idea at the time how their demons would "birth a movement" so to speak and instill this spirit in our world. There is a strong spiritual dynamic connected to sexual immorality. There is no getting around it. In fact, demons instantly begin oppressing anyone who engages in sexual immorality, be it fornication, adultery, homosexual behavior, etc.

Demons were certainly involved when male temple prostitutes and the false worship of gods like Baal and Molech provided a lethal injection of demonic possession. The demons were given a tremendous foothold through this wicked behavior, and it launched a global attack upon God's design for marriage. Since that time, the evil spirits have stirred up same-sex lust from one generation to the next, and the demonic attachments have continued to enslave those who choose to give their bodies over to these carnal lusts and affections.

By the way, evil angels are always heavily involved whenever a false religion is being introduced, or a counterfeit form of sexuality is being launched. How do you think these profane beliefs and unclean behaviors get planted so firmly in our world? These are a couple of Satan's biggest weapons against humanity in his losing battle against the truth.

Many Christians today are unsure how to speak about these issues in a culture where God's plan for sexuality is often mocked by those enslaved to false ideas. You are not being judgmental by believing that the sexual alternatives listed above are just as sinful today as they have always been. On the other hand, you are being judgmental if you look down on someone because of his or her lifestyle. Remember that we are all sinners. And we all need God's grace in Christ

There is a very simple reason why the first commandment is, "You shall have no other gods before me" (Exodus 20:3). Every other transgression of the law follows from the first.

It's official: Rob Bell is a false teacher

The Ugley Vicar rightly calls this a train wreck. Rob Bell has officially transitioned from a slightly quirky post-modernist to a full blown false teacher who must be shunned and repudiated. Note the look in his eyes. Rather eery, if not downright scary.



James White offers this brilliant refutation.

From the "They think we still care" file

In one of the more memorable scenes from the movie Major League, aging catcher Jake Taylor (Tom Berenger) walks in on a dinner party hosted by his ex-girlfriend and her fiance. Urged to stay despite the awkwardness of the situation, Jake introduces himself and says he is a player for the Indians. "In Cleveland?" asks one of the dinner guests. "I didn't know they still had a team."

I recall that scene every time I come across some stray piece of news about some entity that long ago ceased to have any relevance and was not particularly significant even in its heyday. Such an entity is the Jesus Seminar, a consortium of "biblical scholars" so obscure that those of us who, upon reading this article by Jeff Walton, have been duly notified of its continued existence had, first, to be reminded that it had ever existed at all. 

Yes, I do recall that marvelous little book, The Five Gospels, in which this esteemed collection of biblical brainiacs presented their scholarly "findings" based on the cutting edge research and hermeneutical methodologies of the late nineteenth century. That was two, maybe three, decades ago (the late twentieth century) and it provided ample fodder for late night conversations among insomniac seminary students at the time. Most of us, however, have long since forgotten about these luminaries of the literati. The real world of parish life is a far more edifying pursuit.

Unfortunately, so it seems, the Jesus Seminar is forgotten, but not gone. Their message today is as fresh as yesterday's mildew on the water-stained pages of a first edition printing of Schleiermacher's Reden über die Religion.

Early Christianity was an oral culture launched by an illiterate Jesus Christ, according to two liberal New Testament scholars who spoke recently at a Jesus Seminar event in Washington, D.C.

The claim was one of several bold assertions made during a recent March workshop in which the prevalence of Evangelical Christianity was bemoaned and scripture was “reimagined” from a feminist perspective. The Salem, Oregon-based Jesus Seminar dismisses scripture’s historicity and draws from sources outside of the Biblical canon in order to produce what they claim to be a more authentic view of Jesus than the church teaches.

Bernard Brandon Scott of Phillips Theological Seminary in Tulsa, Oklahoma and Joanna Dewey, a professor emerita of Biblical Studies at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, argued that a later move into manuscripts minimalized the role of women in the early church.

“Early Christianity was an oral culture based on oral authority,” Dewey claimed, adding that manuscripts were “inherently male” and eliminated women, while oral story kept them in.

Reimagining Mark

During one session of her presentation, Dewey donned a head covering and dramatically sought to “re-imagine” a female-centered telling of Mark’s gospel, performing as an imaginary late first century woman.

“I think something like this could have happened,” Dewey proposed, titling her performance “the Gospel of Ruth.”

The Episcopal seminary professor described such a “reimagining” of Mark’s gospel as an important step in countering alleged sexist distortion of Biblical history. Women, Dewey argued, would be at center, rather than periphery, of any actual gospel events.

Scott agreed, asserting that “These days, unless you are a right-wing conservative, a feminist reading of the Bible is typical.”

An Illiterate Christ

Dewey was firm in her assertion that Jesus was illiterate. Refuting the Luke chapter 4 account of Christ reading in the synagogue as an invention of the gospel writer, Dewey claimed it was “because he couldn’t imagine Jesus as illiterate.”

The seminary professor claimed that a scroll of Isaiah would have been too expensive for the Nazareth synagogue, and the story manufactured. Dewey did not address Jesus writing on the ground in John chapter 8, or other examples of his literacy.

“Jesus did not know how to read and write, there was no reason to,” Dewey flatly declared, adding that while modern people take literacy for granted, “this was not true in antiquity.” Dewey offered that the only group among whom literacy was the norm at the time was the elite, with letters orally dictated and then performed before community.

Scott mostly agreed, stating that no more than 10 percent of the urban population was literate during the time period, and that only 2-3 percent of the rural population was literate. The two speakers differed on whether or not Jesus spoke Greek, with Dewey arguing it was less likely, while Scott countered his observation that lower classes quickly learned the language of dominant culture, and Jesus’ peers would have been no different.

Imperial Images

While Scott and Dewey agreed on Jesus’ alleged illiteracy, Scott argued that widely understood images pervaded early Christian society. Citing early images of Christ portrayed as Roman Centurion, Praetorian Guard and lastly in the clothing of an Emperor, his hand lifted in imperial gesture, Scott stated that early Christianity was juxtaposed with imperial image.

Pointing to a recurring image in some Roman tombs of a woman praying, Scott identified those tombs as Christian, and the woman as a pre-Constantinian Christian image paired with Christ as a shepherd youth. While this female praying form was not mentioned in writing, Scott asserted it was “all over artwork” and the images would later be displaced with Christ portrayed as an emperor.

Sweeping claims by Scott and Dewey, including an assertion that monastics rejected episcopal authority, went mostly unchallenged during the workshop at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church on Capitol Hill. Scott at one point suggested to the audience of 40 mostly elderly participants to “make up your own canon” of scripture.

“I would trade the book of Revelation for Hamlet any day,” Scott announced, adding that he would swap the Pastoral Epistles for any two Emily Dickinson poems. “We’d be way better off.”

The United Church of Christ layperson also categorized Revelation as the book of “a left-wing bomb thrower” violently reacting against the violence of Rome.

No Love Lost on Evangelicals

Both Scott and Dewey shared their dismay at the continued worldwide spread of Evangelical Christianity and the failure of liberal religious thought to gain widespread traction. Both of the Jesus Seminar speakers complained that the prevalence of evangelicalism led to assumptions that it is the only viewpoint of Christianity, resulting in either adherence to evangelical belief or a rejection of Christianity altogether.

Mainline Protestants also earned Dewey’s scorn, as the retired Episcopal seminary professor expressed frustration at “pressure still there to preach [Bible] stories as true.”

“We’re not just talking about Evangelicals – but liberal, east coast Episcopalians,” Dewey fumed. Scott agreed, sharing that he no longer revealed to fellow airplane passengers that he was a New Testament scholar out of frustration with preconceived notions he encountered.

“We have lost the public battle for what it [scripture] means, and that’s unfortunate,” appraised Scott, with Dewey adding that the church was going through a “profoundly anti-intellectual” period.

The über stupidity of these "scholars" is eclipsed only by their slavish adherence to a feminized pseudo-hermeneutic which makes the "colored bead" voting system of the Seminar's early years seem almost respectable. David Fischer eviscerates the arguments of Scott and Dewey with a few simple facts of history.

1) Christianity grew directly out of Judaism. Judaism was, indisputably, a “manuscript culture,” one that took great pains to pass down the revelation of God and its rabbinic interpretation in written form. That doesn’t mean there weren’t oral elements, of course (that’s where most if not all of the Talmud comes from), but that by Jesus’s day Judaism was based on the written word. So how could Jesus have been taken seriously as a teacher and preacher if He wasn’t familiar with the written tradition of His faith?

2) Given the extraordinary care that was taken to insure that the written tradition was properly maintained, why should we think that there was some kind of opposition between the two in the early church?

3) Why was writing “inherently male,” other than because it happens to fit the presuppositions and ideology of the academic?

His whole critique is well worth your time.

Ragsdale: Counterfeit Christianity or authentic paganism?

Catholic lawyer and deacon Keith Fournier takes Katharine Ragsdale to task for her aggressive propagation of a "counterfeit Ideology claiming to be Christian."

In her testimony before Congress on Thursday she boasted of taking a 15 year old girl whom she had never met before for an abortion. She cited her vows as an Episcopal priest as authority for the act. She pledged that she would openly break such a law in the future if it was enacted.

She further attempted to clothe such a brazen act as noble and courageous. This woman regularly reminds me of these words from the Old Testament prophet Isaiah "Ah! Those who call evil good, and good evil, who change darkness to light, and light into darkness, who change bitter to sweet, and sweet into bitter." (Is. 5:20)

Last year she gave an address at a fundraiser for the "Jane Fund" of Central Massachusetts which proclaims on its web site, "CHOICE should not be limited to WOMEN who have MONEY... Our mission is to help women who cannot afford abortion services." This group offers her entire speech online for those who want a fuller example of her horrid rhetoric. It is an example of evil masquerading as good, espoused by one who claims to be a Christian and a member of the Clergy.

Here are some examples, "When a woman gets pregnant against her will and wants an abortion -- it's the violence that is the tragedy; the abortion is a blessing. When a woman might want to bear and raise a child but fears she can't afford to because she doesn't have access to healthcare or daycare or enough income to provide a home -- it's the lack of justice that is the tragedy; the abortion is a blessing. ."

"And, here's one that really gets me in trouble, when a woman simply gets pregnant unintentionally and decides this is not a good time for her to bear and care for a child -- there is no tragedy. The ability to enjoy healthy sexuality without risking a pregnancy that could derail her education or career, the development or exercise of the gifts God has given her, is a blessing."

In her speech at the Jane Fund fundraiser she signaled where she is leading the opponents of the fundamental Human Right to Life in her final charge: "Our words matter. Our strategies matter -- not only in their short-term efficacy but in their long term consequences. We have to play hard and play smart. We need to think farther down the road than the next bill in front of us.

"We must create a climate where abortion is not only a legal, safe, accessible, affordable option for every woman but where she can take advantage of that option without risking socially imposed guilt.It's time to be angry -- be fed up -- to refuse to be nice. To eschew conciliation."

I would disagree, slightly, with Fournier's characterization of Ragsdale's ideology as "counterfeit" Christianity. The Prosperity Gospel of Kenneth Copeland, Joel Osteen, et al. is a counterfeit form of Christianity which leads astray the weak-minded masses desperate to hear their life is somehow worth something. At least, those pretenders put up a good front about the value of human life. What Ragsdale promotes is not a counterfeit form of Christianity but an authentic form of pagansim akin to the ancient cult of Molech, the abominable god of the Ammonites who demanded the sacrifice of children by fire.

The Old Testament rightly condemned wayward Israelites who defiled themselves by engaging in the unspeakably evil practices of the surrounding nations. The present-day teachings and practices of Katharine Ragsdale are equally abominable and equally worthy of unequivocal condemnation.

When a collar becomes a millstone

This article from Anglican Ink requires little explanation for those familiar with the track record of Katharine Hancock Ragsdale. It is, nevertheless, a chilling reminder of how deeply the culture of death has become embedded in mainline American Protestantism. The sectarian fringe represented by Ms. Ragsdale can no longer be considered -- in any way, shape, or form -- a valid expression of the Christian faith.

The ordination vows of the Episcopal Church provide a moral mandate for helping minors procure abortions, the dean of the Episcopal Divinity School told Congress last week.

Appearing as a witness called by the Democrat members of the U.S. House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution, Dr. Katharine Hancock Ragsdale shared an account of her having taking a 15 year old girl to an abortionist without informing the girl’s parent’s.

Her remarks came as Congress debated the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act (H.R. 2299). The proposed bill would criminalize attempts to “circumvent parental consent laws in a state by, without the parents’ knowledge, taking a minor girl across state lines for an abortion.”

While “New Hampshire was closer to that girl’s home than Boston, as it happened, I did not take her across state lines,” Dr. Ragsdale said, adding “Nor did I, to my knowledge, break any laws.”

But “if either of those things had been necessary in order to help her, I would have done them,” she said.

“If helping young women like her should be made illegal I will, nonetheless, continue to do it,” Dr. Ragsdale said, citing the promises made at her ordination as leaving her “no choice” but to break the law to help young girls procure abortions.

The vocal activist for gay rights and abortion views have elicited criticism. In a 2007 speech given in Birmingham, Ala., Dr. Ragsdale stated that abortion was a “blessing” for women.

Among the most imperative of the church's biblical and historical mandates is to care for "the least of these" with a particular concern for "widows and orphans," that is, the most vulnerable of women and children who are so often neglected by the wider society. What does it say when women like Katharine Ragsdale are given positions of authority in the church and proceed to treat children with such disregard and hold the weakest and most innocent among them, the unborn, in utter contempt?

Jesus said, "Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and be drowned in the depth of the sea" (Matthew 18:5-6).

May God have mercy on Katharine Ragsdale. Her clerical collar has become a millstone.

No comment department

(CNN) - Joel Osteen, who leads the largest church in the United States and reaches millions of Americans through his televised Sunday sermons, is developing a reality show with the producer of “Survivor,” the televangelist said Tuesday.

Osteen has signed a deal with famed reality TV producer Mark Burnett to develop the show, a spokeswoman for Joel Osteen Ministries said.

"Victoria (Osteen's wife) and I are looking forward to working with Mark Burnett on this project,” Osteen said in a statement Tuesday.

“We have great respect for Mark and we know that the finished product will not only entertain but will illustrate the generosity and selflessness that is a hallmark of the American people," he said.

Osteen said the yet-to-be-named series would not resemble a typical reality show.

“In my mind, when I think of ‘reality’ (show), I think of cameras following you doing nothing,” Osteen said, according to CNN Houston affiliate KHOU. “But this is more ‘Extreme (Makeover: Home Edition).’ We’re going with a purpose – with a mission.”

Osteen said the show would feature members of his Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas – the country’s largest congregation – helping others.

“We would take a group of 300-500 people from this auditorium, from our ministry and go somewhere in the world – probably in the U.S. to start - but just to help a place in need,” Osteen said, according to KHOU. “A place hit by a tornado. Maybe a run-down neighborhood.”

The show is in early stages of development and hasn’t yet been picked up by a network, said Andrea Davis, a spokeswoman for Joel Osteen Ministries.

“(Osteen) had been approached for a number of years by different networks with ideas along the same kind of lines but it just didn’t come together,” she said.

Joel and Victoria Osteen befriended Burnett and his wife, Roma Downey, about a year ago, Davis said. The Burnetts have visited Lakewood to worship and the Osteens have visited Burnett and Downey in Los Angeles.

“But their friendship developed and it seemed to really gel – the idea that Mark had and what was on Joel’s heart,” Davis said. “(Osteen) had a desire to do something like this ... that’s reflective of Joel’s core message of hope and inspiration.”

Osteen’s 16,000-seat church is located in the former Compaq Center in Houston.

Miller: Make every day a Sunday instead

Joel J. Miller adds his voice to the growing chorus against the false gospel of Joel Osteen, emphasizing a point I made earlier about the ridiculous title of the prosperity preacher's new book.

“My purpose in writing this book is to help you arrange your mind so that you choose happiness each and every day,” says Osteen in chapter one, after which he mentions “a recent study that found happiness increases 10 percent on Fridays.” On this point hangs the central hope of the book. Some hope: Read my book and you can make your life 10 percent happier every day, not just the usual uptick you experience at the end of your workweek. I don’t think that’s is going to cut the mustard.

Osteen parades himself around as a minister of the gospel. Let’s be frank: The guy should be writing copy for Hallmark (best case scenario), not preaching the gospel. Is feeling 10 percent better about your life the good news promised in the Bible? Is a marginal increase in your mood the best life God has to offer?

Like I said, I’m cranky, but stay with me. Even the title of his book is offensive. Mohler chides Osteen for being negligent in the theology department. Nothing says that so simply and shouts it so loudly as the phrase “Every Day a Friday.”

The good news isn’t about Friday. It’s about Sunday. Christians gather to celebrate the eucharist on Sunday, the Lord’s Day, because it’s the day that Jesus rose from the grave. Jesus isn’t interested in boosting your mood a meager 10 percent. Jesus went to the grave on Friday, experienced the agony of execution on Friday, endured the passion of the cross on Friday, suffered and died on Friday so that he could set us free, redeem us, remake us, rejoin us to communion with the Father and each other on Sunday when he defeated sin, the devil, and death itself in the resurrection. Osteen’s elevation of the lightly elevated mood is absurd and silly by comparison. How about we make every day a Sunday instead?

In his talk with the Times Osteen said that he saw faith at an all-time high in America today. Super. But it doesn’t mean much if it’s a misdirected faith in good vibes and not the real hope of the good news.

"Not one of us" is being far more charitable than you might think

Mark Galli tries to be whimsically philosophical about the recent Camping caper.

I once had an aunt with a serious case of schizophrenia. She thought one of her daughters came to her on a beam of light from the moon. She also had rages of temper and threatened to kill her children. Things got so bad, she had to be hospitalized for a time, and then medicated for years.

One day I was driving through the community where she lived, Bryte (just over the river from Sacramento), because my mother spent a large part of her childhood there. I was with my wife and my father; I had asked my dad to explain everything he knew about my late mother's life there—where she lived, the gas station she was born in, and other such lore. We were hoping to do a drive by, wanting to avoid my Aunt Julie at all costs. But as we drove down her street, we spotted a man shouting for help from a rooftop. It appeared his ladder had fallen over. So my dad got out of the car and propped the ladder up against his house.

As fate would have it, this man's house stood next to my aunt's house, and before my dad could make a safe escape, out popped Aunt Julie, "Bob? Bob Galli!? What are you doing here? What a wonderful surprise!"

And before you know it, we were in Aunt Julie's house, sipping coffee and soft drinks, listening to her strange and wonderful stories.

We have a fair number of Aunt Julies in the church, don't we? People who tell strange and wonderful stories about the end of the world. Those who in a crazy burst of [Islamophobia] burn the Koran. Those who are sincerely confused about what type of prosperity the gospel promises. Those on the left and the right who equate their politics with divine politics. Those who are in love with their self-righteousness more than God. Maybe some readers think this author and Christianity Today are crazy aunts!

In any event, each of us has to put up with crazy aunts in the family called the church. Just when we think we can pass them by on the other side of the road (like the priest and the Levite tried to pass by the mugged victim), they come running toward us with a smile and a warm greeting. Or they drop in unexpectedly at our church. Or they make headlines—and this just after we've pulled off a program that's done a pretty good job of making God or the church look cool again.

We're tempted at such moments to distance ourselves from them. To push them away. To lock them out. We're likely to mock them so that others will know we're not like them. In short, we disown them. We say, "They're not one of us."

The problem is that they very much are one of us. They are naming the name of Jesus, proclaiming loyalty to him first and foremost. Often they are making substantial sacrifices of fame or fortune to do what they feel God is calling them to do. And they don't care, because they believe they are doing it for Jesus.

I don't want to be as harsh on Mark as some in the comment section at Christianity Today have been. But I do believe, in this instance, he is stretching the limits of charity and failing to use proper discernment. Harold Camping is not merely a crazy "Aunt Julie" with whom we, the church, must learn to live. He is a self-appointed teacher of false doctrines who has placed himself outside the discipline and accountability of the church. He has gone so far as to claim the church has been under the rule of Satan since 1988 and that all of its ministers are servants of Satan. This is going a little further off the reservation than the average, run of the mill heretic. It is on a par with the Pharisees who said Jesus was casting out demons "by the prince of demons." Jesus responded to such scoffing with a stern rebuke which included a warning about being "guilty of an eternal sin" (Mark 3.22-30).

There is no need for false humility in restraining oneself from stating forthrightly that Camping is "not one of us." He chose himself to disown the church and refuse the discipline of those in authority. No such person can be "doing it for Jesus," no matter how convinced he is in his own deluded mind. To say the church is of Satan is to say Christ is of Satan.

Upon the Harold Camping's of the world, the Word of God has already pronounced sentence.

They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. (1 John 2.19)

Moreover, the term used for those who "went out from us" is . . . antichrist (1 John 2.18)! Given the choice, it is far more charitable simply to say Harold Camping is "not one of us." When a man has placed himself outside the authority of the church, there is really nothing else we can say about him to the world upon which has inflicted himself.

No comment department, severe weather edition

Hopefully, the citizens of Joplin will take a cue from the folks in Brandon, Mississippi.

The Westboro Baptist Church — known for its protests at the funerals of soldiers and people with HIV/AIDS — plans to picket in Joplin on Sunday, where at least 125 people have died in a tornado.

On its website, the church says “Thank God for 125 dead,” an echo of its common refrain crediting God with having people killed in retribution for the United States’ tolerance of homosexuality.

Members plan to be in Joplin on Sunday when President Barack Obama is to visit and may attend at a memorial service for storm victims.

H/T MCJ

No comment department, Monday night prophecy pimp edition

You just can't make this stuff up. On second thought, maybe the whole thing is just being made up as this pitiful false prophet goes along.

California preacher Harold Camping said Monday his prophecy that the world would end was off by five months because Judgment Day actually will come on October 21.

Camping, who predicted that 200 million Christians would be taken to heaven Saturday before the Earth was destroyed, said he felt so terrible when his doomsday prediction did not come true that he left home and took refuge in a motel with his wife. His independent ministry, Family Radio International, spent millions - some of it from donations made by followers - on more than 5,000 billboards and 20 RVs plastered with the Judgment Day message.

But Camping said that he's now realized the apocalypse will come five months after May 21, the original date he predicted. He had earlier said Oct. 21 was when the globe would be consumed by a fireball.

Osama bin Laden (deceased): A typical mass murderer with typical mass murderous tendencies

GetReligion's Terry Mattingly explores the curious angles taken by the media in reporting about the porn stash found among the personal effects of Osama bin Laden (deceased). Of particular interest is this snippet from a Washington Post report:

Three other U.S. officials familiar with evidence gathered during investigations of other Islamist militants said the discovery of pornography is not uncommon in such cases.

To which Mattingly surmises:

So, the assumption — at least in my head — is that they are thinking this is similar to the jihadists hitting the strip clubs to ogle evil Western women in the days or weeks before dying martyr’s deaths, knowing that in their version of Islam they were about to have their tickets punched for direct entry into heaven.

I see things a little bit differently. For all the infamy and notoriety he garnered over the last decade, Osama bin Laden was nothing more or less than a deranged mass murderer who found pleasure in the death of innocent people. It should come as no surprise that such an unregenerate soul would also find pleasure in the sensual fantasy world of pornography. Read the gory details in just about any case involving a mass murderer (see two examples here and here) and an obsessive addiction to pornography is almost always an integral  part of the story.

So, not to belittle the significance of the demise of this particular mass murderer, but why should the discovery of a stash of pornography be considered such earth-shaking news? Osama bin Laden was merely a typical mass murderer with typical mass murderous tendencies; tendencies which, because of the fallen nature of humanity, make no distinction between ethnicity or religion.