Reporting on an Evening with Atheists

On Friday, March 24, I received an email from Justin Bosch, who was sponsoring a screening of the film, “The God Who Wasn’t There” at the historic Oriental Theater in Northwest Denver. Mr. Bosch screens films related to media reform and social ethics, but he was venturing into the religious deep. Since the film is very critical of Christianity—claiming that Jesus never existed and that Christians are dangerous simpletons—he wanted to give some response time to a Christian, as well as to an atheist. So, at the last minute it was arranged that Will Providence, a local atheist of the Objectivist stripe (a follower of Ayn Rand’s philosophy), and I would make some brief comments after the film and then answer questions.

Although I seldom participate in highly-charged public forums with little notice, I was interested in doing this because without me there would have been no Christian response. Further, I was familiar with the basic arguments of the film and was able to mine quite a bit of material on it and the producer on line.

The event nearly filled the theater. The first half hour or so was taken up by an audio presentation of a comedian who recounted her loss of Catholic faith and her turn to atheism. It was the most uncharitable presentation of the teaching of the Bible I had ever heard in one sitting. The Old Testament is nothing more an amoral mess. Jesus isn’t as nice as he thought. After all, he was impatient with his disciples, and so on. The Catholic priest who taught her the Bible was a fideist, who said she had to have faith and that he would pray she had faith. That was not good enough, and eventually “God disappeared” for this poor soul. Then came the film. The best thing about it was that it was mercifully short: sixty-two minutes. The film advances the solidly refuted claim that Christianity was started by Paul, who invented a Jesus out of whole cloth—the cloth of mystery religions. There are so many inaccuracies that I don’t know where to begin, so I won’t. However, Mike Lacona has written a long and thorough piece on the movie. Christians were presented as rapture-bedazzled nincompoops who wanted to take over America and persecute as many infidels as possible.

After this torment was over, Will and I took the stage before about 125 people. I made an opening statement that focused on the films three basic arguments (if I can so dignify such propaganda): (1) the claim mystery religions influenced, (2) that Christianity leads to persecution, and (3) that Christianity is intrinsically irrational. Will spoke for just a few minutes on what atheism meant to him. He did not address the film at all. We then took questions from the audience for about 45 minutes. Most of the questions were aimed at me. The audience was largely made up atheists, it seemed; although a few Christian friends attended. I infer this because when Will or a questioner made a point against Christianity or God, people tended to applaud. I would sometimes interact directly with Will—a young and presentable Iranian man in law school—but he didn’t have too much of substance to say except that he based his philosophy on reason and not faith. He also made positive allusions to Saint Ayn Rand. The questions—or sometimes just accusations against Christianity—related to issues such as the concept of truth, the supposed sexism of the Bible, hell, and so on. They really started piling on about hell at the end. In some cases, people would yell things from the audience instead of going to the microphone. When I presented an egalitarian account of gender relations (with ample reference to Rebecca Merrill Groothuis’s books), someone yelled, “Read Paul!” I have, amazingly enough, and he was no sexist.

This was easily the most hostile group I have ever addressed in twenty-seven years of public speaking. I spoke after an hour and half of anti-Christian propaganda and was on stage with an atheist before an audience of many atheists. Nevertheless, I think my opening comments refuted important claims in the film—I needed several hours to respond to all the errors, many of which were absolute howlers—and attempted to fairly and calmly respond to all the questioners. I was not stumped by any of the questions or comments, but I always wanted to say more. (I am a professor, after all.) I tried to give Will ample time to respond, but he often wanted to move on to the next questioner. He seemed quite nervous. At several points, I was able to present the essential gospel message, once in response to a question on hell: Jesus came to save us from that fate.

I hope that people who attended this event will post comments. You are better judges of me than I am, and you may be able to add your own observations of the event as a whole. Nevertheless, I offer a few reflections. I solicited widespread prayer for this, which is my custom (and was the Apostle Paul’s custom as well). This makes a tremendous difference. Despite the antagonistic crowd, I did not feel threatened or panicked. Several questioners wanted to back me into a fideist corner, but I never said that Christianity was without reason or evidence. I provided arguments and no subjective testimony or “I just know in my knower.” The caricature was applied because most Christians do not give reasons for their faith, even though they are commanded to do so in the Bible (1 Peter 3:15). A philosopher defending Christianity as rational probably blew some of their materialist circuits. It was also heartening to talk with several people afterward who seemed to be genuinely interested in Christianity. One of the co-owners of the theater was every enthusiastic about having me there and complimented me on my ability to respond reasonably to questions. He had probably never seen such a thing before. I hope to follow up with him. I also received an email from a man who is an agnostic who would like to interact with me.

My final blast is this (although I’ve said it a thousand times): We need more thoughtful and well-informed Christians in the market place of ideas, even in the hot spots. As Os Guinness as stated, most of American Christian evangelism in America is aimed at those already very interested in Christianity, but don’t know how to become Christians. This leaves out a vast number of souls who are hostile to Christianity or have no interest in it at all. We are called by Jesus Christ to engage these people as well.

Discussion after "The God Who Wasn't There"

Susan Arnold has a post on the event I spoke at Sunday night. It is very insightful, I think. My link function isn't working (!), so here it is: http://deut64.blogspot.com/2006/03/still-there.html#links

"The God Who Wasn't There"

I will be speaking (along with an atheist named Will Providence) at the end listed below. We will both make brief comments after the film and then respond to questions and comments from the audience. This came together at the last minute, which is why I am only now posting it.

The God Who Wasn't There

Sunday, March 26

7:00 PM

Oriental Theater

4335 W. 44th Ave, Denver

(44th & Tennyson)

Tickets: $8 available at the door


Holding modern Christianity up to a bright spotlight, this bold and often hilarious new film asks the questions few dare to ask.



Your guide through the world of Christendom is former fundamentalist Brian Flemming, joined by such luminaries as Jesus Seminar fellow Robert M. Price, professor Richard Dawkins, author Sam Harris and historian Richard Carrier.



Hold on to your faith. It's in for a bumpy ride. In this provocative, critically acclaimed documentary, you will discover:



• The early founders of Christianity seem wholly unaware of the idea of a human Jesus



• The Jesus of the Gospels bears a striking resemblance to other ancient heroes and the figureheads of pagan savior cults



• Contemporary Christians are largely ignorant of the origins of their religion



• Fundamentalism is as strong today as it ever has been, with an alarming 44% of Americans believing Jesus will return to earth in their lifetimes





www.argusfest.org

Frank Flunked: Francis Beckwith Denied Tenure at Baylor

Prolific author and professor Francis Beckwith has been denied tenure at Baylor University, where he has taught for three years. Despite Professor Beckwith's prodigious achievements in publishing and lecturing, Baylor has refused to grant him tenure. Beckwith will be challenging this decision according to his schools appeals policy.

My only conclusion is that this is a purely political move, and one that sadly fits a pattern at Baylor. The leadership at Baylor had been attempting to move it toward a solidly evangelical identity in which the Christian worldview would be at the center of the curriculum. This was called the Baylor 2012 program, instituted by then President William Sloane. (For a marvelous statement of the vision of a truly Christian college by Wheaton College's president, see "Conceving the Christian College" by Duane Litfin.) In recent years, Baylor courted and won many notable evangelical scholars, such as C. Stephen Evans, Beckwith, and William Dembski. Dembski's contract was not renewed after a three-year research (no teaching) position. With the departure of the President and Provost who led this vision, the school seems to be reverting to its provincial and traditional Southern Baptist ethos, which tends to separate faith and scholarship in unhealthy ways.

This is tragic for many reasons, but one looms large. There is no major evangelical research university in America, as Mark Noll pointed out in "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind" in 1994. We spend our money elsewhere. Our theology does not make room for it. Neither will Baylor support this grand vision, apparently.

Against Personality Stereotyping

Every once in awhile (and always too often) I hear someone or oneself described in a serious of four letters. This is from a personality test, the Myers-Briggs, which is Jungian in its assumptions. Jung's psychology is not to be trusted for many reasons (first and foremost because he was a gnostic), but I absolutely rebel against personality typecasting. We are individuals, not abstractions, which are created by so-called experts who have never met us. This personality stereotyping goes very deep in American culture: ministries use these tests, as do many other organizations. It is but another attempt to quantify the unquantifiable, to make the qualitative and unique into a faceless category to be manipulated and processed by pundits.

Yes, there are broad generalizations that can be made about people, but often they are constricting. For years, I viewed myself as an introvert. That is, until someone challenged that view after noting my behavior in a group. It turns out that he (Jim Howard, thank you) was right. I enjoy the presence of people, or at least the right kind of people, although I also need time alone, especially to study. I don't fear being alone; but I don't dislike certain social settings either. So hang the "introvert" and "extrovert" categories--as well as strings of letters to describe individuals made in the divine image. This labeling another sad case of a technology usurping the need for spiritual discernment--testing the character of oneself and others--which comes through conversations, prayer, and just being-with another qua another, not the other as the instantiation of an abstract category dreamed up by a psychologist or psychiatrist. I am a human being. Do not label me--or anyone else, especially in psychological categories. Think up your adjectives after divining the character of your neighbor (if you can). If not, hold your peace.

"I am the Slime"

I'm The Slime
by Frank Zappa
I am gross and perverted
I'm obsessed 'n deranged
I have existed for years
But very little had changed
I am the tool of the Government
And industry too
For I am destined to rule
And regulate you

I may be vile and pernicious
But you can't look away
I make you think I'm delicious
With the stuff that I say
I am the best you can get
Have you guessed me yet?
I am the slime oozin' out
From your TV set

You will obey me while I lead you
And eat the garbage that I feed you
Until the day that we don't need you
Don't got for help...no one will heed you
Your mind is totally controlled
It has been stuffed into my mold
And you will do as you are told
Until the rights to you are sold

That's right, folks..
Don't touch that dial

Well, I am the slime from your video
Oozin' along on your livin'room floor

I am the slime from your video
Can't stop the slime, people, lookit me go

TV Turn Off Week

TV-Turnoff Week 2006 will take place April 24-30, 2006 - and it's not too soon to get ready! See: http://www.tvturnoff.org. (The link function is not working on this blog right now.)

Letter to the White House

[I sent this letter to the White House home page. Please pray about this terrible situation.]

Dear White House:

What is the Bush Administration doing about the man sentenced to death in Afghanistan because he converted to Christianity? America supposedly liberated this country from oppression in the hopes that it would be democratic and honor freedom of religion and speech. Yet an innocent man faces death for his faith. This is very wrong.

I encourage the White House to do everything possible to put pressure on Afghanistan to free this man and to reform its unjust laws.

Sincerely,
Douglas Groothuis

A Bad Poem About a Tough Class

Dread.
Hume,
Kant,
their epistemology...
for the uninitiated,
the community college.

Years of my study,
Three hours of our pain.

Is anyone home?

1. Matter of fact.
2. Relations of ideas.

What is the difference?
Does anyone know?

Kant, the intrepid revolutionary:
Synthetic a priori knowledge.
What is it?
Why think about it?
Who cares about it?
Is it possible?

Engaging ideas, raging teaching.
Blank stares.

And yet...
That ring-in-lip young women venturing answers to my many questions.
Sometime right, sometimes wrong, but sometimes!
Her expressions show concern.
Her pen is active.

Hume is wrong, I aver. Internal inconsistency.
Kant is wrong, I plead. Internal inconsistency!

Do they fathom "internal inconsistency" at all?
Have they made the law of noncontradiction their friend,
or is it an enemy or a stranger?

There is another way of knowledge, I suggest:
It is God-bestowed; it avoids skepticism;
it transcends transcendental idealism (Kantianism).

I offer "divine preformation" quickly as an alternative,
--with a reference to a book not required--just before the quiz.

Is anyone home, anyone here

--besides that frowning, nodding, and writing young woman?

Tribute to my Father, Harold Fred Groothuis

[This is the revised version of my November 21, 2005 essay. I tried to update the essay on my blog for that date, but the changes are somehow not registering. So, I am reposting this essay here.]


What can I say about my father—so long gone, so impossible to forget? Harold Fred Groothuis was born on December 28, 1927 in New York. He died in a small plane crash near Point Barrow, Alaska on this day in 1968. Walter Cronkite ended the evening news that day with a short comment to the effect that "Alaska labor leader, Harold Groothuis, was killed in a plane crash in Alaska today along with several others who were serving on a government commission to investigate labor abuses." I watched that in my bedroom on that dreadful, world-changing day. I was not quite twelve years old.

Dad was leaving Point Barrow, Alaska along with other volunteers who were part of the Governor’s Employment Advisory Commission, created by then Governor Walter J. Hickel. They where investigating charges of the mistreatment of Alaska native workers there. Only one of passengers of the propeller plane survived. Not long ago my mother sent me a letter from Alaska native leaders in Point Barrow, which expressed their sorrow and thanks for my father's commitment to their people. At Dad's funeral, a Presbyterian minister eulogized Harold Groothuis as a man who represented "people who worked with their hands." So he did. Many of these people were African-American, Native Alaskans, and Hispanics. First Presbyterian Church of Anchorage, Alaska was filled and overflowing with mourners.

Dad came to the territory of Alaska in the mid-1950s (it became the forty-ninth state on my second birthday—January 3—in 1959), worked as a laborer, and lived in a packing crate with a few other men. He then went back East for a visit to friends and family. There he met a young Italian woman named Lillian Cominetto, who would become my mother. It was love at first sight for both. He returned to Alaska, but wrote Mom love letters. They married in New York 1955 and then traveled back to the frozen north, leaving behind all their relatives.

Why write of my father now, thirty seven years after his tragic, unexpected, and unforgettable death? I am a man of many written words—too many, perhaps—but I have never written of my father in anything but personal letters. I want to pay a short tribute to his short life of forty years, without becoming maudlin or sentimental.

Dad was a big man—big in size (six feet, four inches and well over two hundred pounds) and big in personality. Many were drawn to his love of life, his strong opinions, and his commitment to causes and friends. As my mother said today on the phone, "He would do anything for his friends." He was a union man all the way, and a staunch Democrat. This, to my mind, was the right thing to do at that time. The Democratic party of that day—the party of Hubert Humphrey, for example—was a far cry of what we see now. Dad campaigned for Humphrey's candidacy for President in 1968 by delivering two speeches on Anchorage, Alaska television, which were broadcast live. I remember that Dad mentioned that Nixon refused to debate Humphrey. This was a character defect in Dad's eyes. I agree. Well, HHH (as Hubert Horatio Humphrey was called) lost, and Dad was killed a few weeks later. "There is a time for every purpose under heaven," as Ecclesiastes reminds us.

Dad had a fierce love for his family, for his job, for his friends, for Alaska, for food, and for life. He was an avid sportsman (hunting and fishing) and camper. He once shot a huge Kodiak Black Bear that was charging him. That bear (or part of it) ended up on our living room floor. (For those who don't like hunting—and I don't—this can be construed as self-defense; although they were on a hunting trip.) He was an intense man who neither suffered fools gladly nor could be accused of being low key or nonchalant. Because of his strong opinions, he had a few enemies. One of his enemies (a union malcontent) once threatened to blow up our house. We spent the night elsewhere. Dad had a temper that could get the better of him. He had attended a Presbyterian church as a child, but only attended sporadically as an adult. I was sent to Presbyterian Sunday School for a few years. However, Dad believed in God and had deep moral convictions. As a Christian, I can only hope he made his peace with God before that small plane hit the ground. Dad was a faithful husband, a good provider, and a loving—if sometimes imperious—father. I loved him deeply and I miss him every day of my life in one way or another. He wasn't there for the turning points in his only child's life: the graduations, the wedding, the achievements (such as they are). My dear mother says—and she is the expert, of course—that he would have approved. In any event, I can claim the truth of Romans 8:28 for my life no matter what.

This is my tribute to Harold Fred Groothuis, who died on this day in 1968, serving the laborers of Alaska and loving his small family. I will never forget him, nor will anyone else who knew him well.

Revised Tribute to Harold Fred Groothuis, My Father

On November 21, 2005 (the day of my father's death in 1968), I posted a short essay in tribute to Harold Groothuis. I sent this to my mother, who alerted me to a few small errors of fact. So, I have revised this essay somewhat. It can be found on this blog at November 21, 2005.

Last week in a class I responded to a few of my students who held that all whites were part of "the oppressive class" against minorities. I harked back to Dad, who, while both white and male, was an advocate for the manual laborers in Alaska, many of whom were Native Americans, African Americans, and Hispanics. He was no part or member of an oppressive class. He was an individual who fought (and ultimately died) for the working man (of every race). I am proud of him for that.

Dr. Ronald Nash has died

Evangelical philosopher and prolific author, Ronald Nash, has died. Just a few days ago I read several chapters in his excellent introduction to philosophy, Life's Ultimate Questions, and thought of contacting him to thank him for such clarity and wit in writing philosophy. (I am teaching an Introduction to Philosophy class for the first time.) Now it is too late. I was accepted into the MA in philosophy at Western Kentucky University in 1984, where he was then head of the department and where he served for many years. However, since the school did not grant a Ph.D. in philosophy, I decided to attend a school that did: The University of Wisconsin-Madison. Over the years, I have read many of Dr. Nash's books on subjects ranging from Augustine, to epistemology, to economics, to philosophy of religion, to social issues. Here are some I recommend: God and the Greeks (formerly titled Christianity and Hellenistic Culture), The Word of God and the Mind of Man, Social Justice and the Christian Church, Life's Ultimate Questions, Is Jesus the Only Savior? and Faith and Reason. Dr. Nash was a crystal clear writer who advocated a Christian worldview that was Reformed, rational, and engaged in the great ideas of the ages and today. His criticisms of leftism and empiricism were especially telling. Let us mourn his death, thank God for his life, and emulate his intellectual dedication to his Lord and Savior.

What is Truth?

I wrote this essay about ten years ago, but I believe it is still pertinent and true. Let me know what you think.

Over 500 Scientists Who Question Darwinism

Discovery Institute News1511 3rd Ave Suite 808 - Seattle, WA 98101 - (206) 292-0401 x107

Over 500 Scientists Proclaim Their Doubts About Darwin’s Theory

By: StaffDiscovery Institute February 20, 2006

The Scientific Dissent From Darwinism list is now located at a new webpage, http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/.

SEATTLE — Over 500 doctoral scientists have now signed a statement publicly expressing their skepticism about the contemporary theory of Darwinian evolution.The statement reads: “We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged.” The list of 514 signatories includes member scientists from the prestigious US and Russian National Academy of Sciences. Signers include 154 biologists, the largest single scientific discipline represented on the list, as well as 76 chemists and 63 physicists. Signers hold doctorates in biological sciences, physics, chemistry, mathematics, medicine, computer science, and related disciplines. Many are professors or researchers at major universities and research institutions such as MIT, The Smithsonian, Cambridge University, UCLA, UC Berkeley, Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, the Ohio State University, the University of Georgia, and the University of Washington.Discovery Institute first published its Scientific Dissent From Darwinism list in 2001 to challenge false statements about Darwinian evolution made in promoting PBS’s “Evolution” series. At the time it was claimed that “virtually every scientist in the world believes the theory to be true.”“Darwinists continue to claim that no serious scientists doubt the theory and yet here are 500 scientists who are willing to make public their skepticism about the theory,” said Dr. John G. West, associate director of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture. “Darwinist efforts to use the courts, the media and academic tenure committees to suppress dissent and stifle discussion are in fact fueling even more dissent and inspiring more scientists to ask to be added to the list.”According to West, it was the fast growing number of scientific dissenters which encouraged the Institute to launch a website -- www.dissentfromdarwin.org -- to give the list a permanent home. The website is the Institute’s response to the demand for information and access to the list both by the public, and by scientists who want to add their name to list. “Darwin’s theory of evolution is the great white elephant of contemporary thought,” said Dr. David Berlinski, one of the original signers, a mathematician and philosopher of science with Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture (CSC). “It is large, almost completely useless, and the object of superstitious awe.”Other prominent signatories include U.S. National Academy of Sciences member Philip Skell; American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellow Lyle Jensen; evolutionary biologist and textbook author Stanley Salthe; Smithsonian Institution evolutionary biologist and a researcher at the National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Biotechnology Information Richard von Sternberg; Editor of Rivista di Biologia / Biology Forum --the oldest still published biology journal in the world-- Giuseppe Sermonti; and Russian Academy of Natural Sciences embryologist Lev Beloussov.

Bitter-sweet

From "The Temple" (1633), by George Herbert:

¶ Bitter-sweet.
AH my deare angrie Lord,
Since thou dost love, yet strike;
Cast down, yet help afford;
Sure I will do the like.

I will complain, yet praise;
I will bewail, approve:
And all my sowre-sweet dayes
I will lament, and love.

Richard Lewontin, "Billions and Billions of Demons," The New York Review, January 1997, p. 31.

"We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. The eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen."

Poetry Reading by Constructive Curmudgeon

Denver Seminary is having an "Open Mic" night from 7-10 PM in the Student Union area Friday, March 10. I will be reading my poem, "Subwoofer" sometime during these three hours. The better reason to attend is the talent to be shown by students and other faculty.

Movie review of "Whatever Happened to Kerouac?"

“What Ever Happened to Kerouac?” is a 1985 documentary now available on DVD about sporadic creativity enshrouded in decadence, degeneracy, and decay. It impressionistically recounts the adult life of Jack Kerouac (1922-1969), the literary beat of the “beat generation.”

The “Beats” (circa 1948-1960?) are sometimes cast as proto-hippies: Bohemian; anti-establishment; aflame with the exotic and taboo; worshippers at the Dionysian fount of creativity; nonconformists—now nihilist, now visionary; poets of the absurd and the profound; idolizers of Charlie Parker’s jazz. Theirs was gut-existentialism and “Beat Zen,” Hindu cosmology and nuclear eschatology. “To be Beat,” wrote Kerouac, “was to be at the bottom of your personality looking up.” Beat was birthed by the misfits, the downbeat, the offbeat—not by the poor urchins who could manage no more than sleeping in parks and begging money, but by the artistic urchins who gave a voice to their rebellion and (somehow) got published.

Kerouac was arguably magnificent at times—churning out rambling, but poetic prose—despite the fact that he was dubbed by one of the literati as “a Neanderthal with a typewriter.” The film is appropriate punctuated by Kerouac reading chunks of prose on “The Steve Allen Show.” Kerouac’s work was impassioned and original; he invented a genre of continuous, spontaneous narrative seen in novels such as The Dharma Bums and On the Road which was written at high speed on a continuous sheet of paper a hundred feet long. Beat poet Allen Ginsburg called it “a magnificent single paragraph several blocks long.”

But Kerouac burned bright but briefly, then burned out rapidly, because being Beat meant being a rogue. As the interviews with family, friends, and acquaintances make plain, Kerouac was a drunk (who drank himself to death), an adulterer, a drug user, and a buddy of more of the same kind of misfits of the day such as William Burroughs (homosexual and junkie), Allen Ginsberg (homosexual and sometimes psychotic), and other assorted thieves, dopers, and thrill-seekers.

But decadence was heralded as transcendence and orgies as oracular. Cultural critic Carl Raschke notes that “Kerouac was self-consciously attempting to depict the whirl of sensation as the key to cosmic understanding, as a vehicle of liberation: though he left little distinction between the liberation of the mind and libertinism of the youthful rake and rebel.”

Decadence was avant-garde, and was touted as the engine of artistry. But the gaunt, sour, bitter faces of many of his now aged or recently deceased compatriots reveal that debauchery indeed debauches—even debauches the Beats, and especially Kerouac. Handsome, lithe, and vigorous as a young man, middle age found him to be bloated and beaten beat.

Particularly pathetic are short clips of William F. Buckley’s “Firing Line” in 1969. Buckley presided over the intellectual debris of a quasi-incoherent Kerouac who was asked to consider the relationship between Beats and Hippies. An unflappable Buckley gracefully withstood Kerouac’s juvenile ramblings, seeking to bring coherence out of chaos. Buckley smiled knowingly. Kerouac smirked contemptuously—an appropriate Beat response, perhaps. A rummied out rebel without a cause met a conservative rebel with a cause. The juxtaposition was telling, almost painful.

Kerouac at his best may have unmasked some of the pretensions of a complacent, self-righteous, post-war America; he may have celebrated elements of life—such as bebop jazz—that were unjustly ignored by others. But he exacted too high a price. By going “on the road” he deserted the Protestant work ethic that undergirds a productive and healthy culture, exchanging postponed gratification for immediate gratification (and addiction), exchanging hard work for protracted play—and encouraged others to follow suit. His promiscuity denied the sanctity of the family. (We see several clips of his abandoned daughter reflecting on her father’s life.) But Kerouac and friends corrupted more than themselves; they inspired a whole counterculture—as William Burroughs notes in the film—that both amplified and refined the Beat spirit of nonconformity, hedonism, and Eastern religious intrigue. And don’t we even hear something of “the beat” in the punks?

The film reports that Kerouac said that because he was a Catholic he couldn’t commit suicide, so he decided to drink himself to death (which is really gradual suicide). Although his prose drew inspiration eclectically from Buddhism, Hinduism, and just about anywhere—Beat was nothing if not unsystematic—several friends and his priest tell us that Kerouac was entranced by the crucifix, and painted pictures of Christ and cardinals toward the end. Yet no conversion was evident—only an alcoholic’s eroded body, mind, and soul. It seemed he never caught the spirit of the one he could not forget. Jesus said “seek and you shall find.” Jack Kerouac must have been looking in all the wrong places.

Groothuis ID article translated into Finnish

My editorial defending Intelligent Design, which first ran in The Rocky Mountain News, is now available in a Finnish translation.

New essay on the supremacy of Jesus

My essay, "Why Believe Jesus is the Only Way?" is now posted here. Please search the cite, TrueU, for other apologetics articles by me, J.P. Moreland, Robert Velarde, and others.

Blue Like Jazz: Deliver Us from Glibness

[Several months ago, I posted an earlier version of the essay that follows. It generated considerable controversy and rancor against me. Given the essay’s excessive vituperation (Miller really exasperated me), I pulled it. Nevertheless, I believe my basic critique was correct, so I now post a somewhat revised version.]

One of my students called to my attention a paragraph in the best-selling book Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. The first paragraph (page 103) of his chapter called "Belief" is remarkable for its illogic and glibness. In it—a marvel of confusion, contradiction, and distortion—Miller claims that his struggle with Christianity is not intellectual. He doesn't "do that" anymore. "Smart guys" can prove God exits and other "smart guys" can prove God doesn't exist. The arguments aren't about God anymore, but only about who is smarter, and our knowing writer tells us he doesn't care. Moreover, "Who knows anything anyway"? And if our writer ever walks away from God it would not be for intellectual reasons, but "for social reasons, identity reasons, deep emotional reasons, the same reasons that any of us do anything."

Where does one begin to assess (best-selling) glibness? After thirty years of intellectually and existentially engaging the Christian worldview in relation to the truth-claims of other religions and philosophies, I know that the arguments for and against God's existence are not just ego games or "head trips." There are good and sufficient arguments for the existence of God as the creator, designer, and moral lawgiver of the universe—not to mention arguments the rest of Christian apologetics. Further, the notion that person A can "prove that God exists" and person B can "prove God does not exist" is impossible. To prove something means (roughly) to rationally establish a truth claims as far superior to any contrary claim. Therefore, one could not prove that Bill Clinton was the greatest American president while another person proves that he was not. Miller's language is sloppy and unserious. Maybe he meant something else, but we cannot be sure. The writing evinces an autobiographical and unbuttoned casualness that pollutes so many memoirs today.

Perhaps we should bring into question the recent proliferation of memoirs. Unless you are a saint or a genius or an otherwise historically significant person, why should anyone be interested in a book about your personal life? The writer of a memoir should ask himself a probing and potentially embarrassing question, "Is my life worth inflicting on others in book form?"

"Why knows anything anyway?" writes Miller. What are we to make of this? Does it mean that no truth claims are justified? If so, so much for Miller's own statements. He doesn't know they are true, so why should anyone believe him? If he knows nothing, then how does he know that arguments and counter-arguments concerning God's existence are just ego trips in disguise? Further, the claim is absurd on many levels. Think of the counterexamples. Miller knows that torturing the innocent for pleasure is always wrong. He also knows that he wrote the book called Blue Like Jazz. (The way he misrepresents that transcendently lovely art form called jazz cannot be addressed here.) Miller makes some stupendous knowledge claims in the same paragraph in which he rejects the possibility of knowledge. He claims to know that the only reason anyone does anything is rooted in "social reasons, identity reasons [what does that mean?], deep emotional reasons." It is the case that no one does anything on the basis of settled convictions based on rational reflections? On what basis does Miller claim to know this? He gives none. It is simply his life speaking, his feelings being ferreted out. Autobiography trumps rational discourse once again.

In light of Miller’s intellectual recklessness, we should remember that Christianity is a knowledge claim. It claims that God can be known through certain ways. Christian belief should not be a lucky guess or a reaction like an instinct (as Miller claims in his equally indefensible chapter on faith in which he likens belief in Christianity to a penguin's mating instinct...) To know that P is a special kind of belief; it means that there is some reason, warrant, or justification for P. We are called in Scripture to know God in Christ. Further, we are instructed to make the gospel known through proclamation, defense, and godly living.

One could go on, but what Miller’s abysmal paragraph reveals is another outbreak of the epidemic of postmodern glibness. Miller addresses titanic issues with a smirk and a shrug and a pose. He finds no need to be serious intellectually or to pursue subtleties. After all, he has his "story" to tell. This reminds one of Frankfurt's little book on bovine excrement (On Bullshit)—reviewed elsewhere on this web log. People feel obliged to state opinions on matters of which they know nothing. Moreover, they trouble the air and page with words with no concern for accuracy about the facts; they are more concerned to be sincere about themselves. Indeed. But why should anyone listen to them?

I have two suggestions for Donald Miller—and his myriad fans. First, read a good introduction to philosophy text such as Questions That Matter by Ed Miller and Jon Jensen. This may inculcate a better sense of the power of reason and the history of ideas. Second, read a substantial book of Christian apologetics, such as Scaling the Secular City by J.P. Moreland. This may spark a more intellectually respectful treatment of the rationality of Christian faith.

Doug Groothuis on Cyberspace from JETS

The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society (JETS) has also put my article, "Christian Scholarship and the Philosophical Analysis of Cyberspace Technologies," 41/4 (December 1998): 631-40, on line as a PDF file. This paper is related to my thinking in The Soul in Cyberspace, but it developed in more philosophical depth.

Pascal on Human Nature

My article from The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, "Deposed Royalty: Pascal's Anthropological Argument" (June 1998) is now on line in a PDF file. If I may say so myself, this is probably my most original piece of apologetics writing. Of course, I am merely expanding on the master's work.

Review of "Breaking the Spell" by Daniel Dennett

The New York Times has rightly skewered Daniel Dennett's new book as screed of irrational and question-begging scientistm. The book attempts to debunk religion on the basis of Darwinian explanations.

"Pride and Humility" by Rebecca Merrill Groothuis

Humility is much to be preferred over pride. Pride is a noxious, toxic, nerve-wracking affair—always having to defend a tenuous turf that you know isn’t really yours.

Humility allows you to be comfortable inside your own skin. You realize that it simply is not about you, so you do not require the incessant approval of people. There is no need either to prove yourself or to conceal yourself. You live in response to God—his word, his will, and his everlasting love.

Humility is the only path to lasting freedom from all the anxieties that enslave and terrify the proud in heart.

The US and the UN: What You Won't Hear on NPR

Journalist Mark Steyn has an acerbic, but enlightening essay on the United Nations in the most recent issue of Imprimus, which I recommend you read. I know from Liberian friends that the UN "peace-keeping troops" in Liberia are deeply corrupt and rapidly spreading AIDs.

Madness and Madness

"Men are so inevitably mad that not to be mad would be to give a mad twist to madness."

Blaise Pascal. Pensées. Trans. A. J. Krailsheimer. New York: Penguin Books, 1966, #412/414 , p. 148.

He said to them, "You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God's sight"--Jesus Christ, Luke 16:15 (TNIV).

Letter submitted to The Daily Camera on Internet Addiction

Thanks to Elizabeth Mattern Clark for her good article on Internet addiction. Humans are prone to excess, obsession, and addiction--with or without technological assistance. And whatever overcomes us becomes our master and we its slaves. Part of the problem the Internet is that many do not realize that the very form or nature of the medium has intrinsic limits and dangers. Living too much in a disembodied world saturated by images and high speed information transfer may disorient our consciousness and remove us from the given goodness of the unplugged and the unmediated world. Thus we forget to attend to our souls in silence, converse with friends, and enjoy creation for what it is.

The Westminster Confession, Chapter Three

Of God's Eternal Decree
1. God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass: yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.
2. Although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass upon all supposed conditions, yet hath he not decreed anything because he foresaw it as future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions.
3. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of his glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life; and others foreordained to everlasting death.
4. These angels and men, thus predestinated, and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed, and their number so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished.
5. Those of mankind that are predestinated unto life, God, before the foundation of the world was laid, according to his eternal and immutable purpose, and the secret counsel and good pleasure of his will, hath chosen, in Christ, unto everlasting glory, out of his mere free grace and love, without any foresight of faith, or good works, or perseverance in either of them, or any other thing in the creature, as conditions, or causes moving him thereunto; and all to the praise of his glorious grace.
6. As God hath appointed the elect unto glory, so hath he, by the eternal and most free purpose of his will, foreordained all the means thereunto. Wherefore, they who are elected, being fallen in Adam, are redeemed by Christ, are effectually called unto faith in Christ by his Spirit working in due season, are justified, adopted, sanctified, and kept by his power, through faith, unto salvation. Neither are any other redeemed by Christ, effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved, but the elect only.
7. The rest of mankind God was pleased, according to the unsearchable counsel of his own will, whereby he extendeth or withholdeth mercy, as he pleaseth, for the glory of his sovereign power over his creatures, to pass by; and to ordain them to dishonor and wrath for their sin, to the praise of his glorious justice.
8. The doctrine of this high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care, that men, attending the will of God revealed in his Word, and yielding obedience thereunto, may, from the certainty of their effectual vocation, be assured of their eternal election. So shall this doctrine afford matter of praise, reverence, and admiration of God; and of humility, diligence, and abundant consolation to all that sincerely obey the gospel.

Saying No.

Take up another challenge: Spend a 24-hour period with no entertainment whatsoever. That means: no TV, no recorded music, no movies, no video games, no internet surfing. Can you divide your life into the entertaining and non-entertaining? There would be more silence, for example. Think about it, then unplug. Enter another world within this world (and above it). Then, please converse about your discoveries with others--or even on this blog if you'd like. Selah.

Super Bowl Boycott

I call on all those reading to boycott the Super Bowl. Have nothing to do with it. It is a debauched institution, although part of the liturgical year of most evangelical churches. Try going to a church service that day that doesn't mention it. (I'm preaching tomorrow and won't mention it, but the worship team probably will...) The Super Bowl is punctuated obscene and juvenile commercials (featuring mega-bimbos everywhere) that appeal to the seven deadly sins. Parents: do not expose yourself or your children to this! Moreover, it is a colossal waste of about three hours. Instead: read a book, pray, worship the King of Kings, call a lonely friend, take a nap (it is Sunday after all). Do something else that counts for eternity. As Thoreau said, "You cannot kill time without wounding eternity." See Psalm 90:12 as well.

Ghost-Preaching: Sermon-Stealing and Sermon-Buying

Sermon-stealing and sermon-buying are particularly egregious forms of plagiarism that effect and infect the church more than we might like to believe. Like ghost-writing, these forms of deception are quite popular. One nationally known pastor makes his sermon outline available for $4 a pop. I met with a group of pastors about two years ago who complained that they were tired of the retread sermons they heard in their pulpit by various pulpiteers who were filling in after the loss of their beloved pastor. I assured them that if they wanted me as an interim preaching pastor that the sermons would be my own, for better or worse. I would not be relying on a ghost preacher.

Titus 2:7-8 instructs teachers to have integrity and be serious about their teaching. 1 Peter 4:11 exhorts those who speak to speak "as the oracles of God." That probably eliminates sermon-stealing and sermon-buying. Teachers will be judged more strictly, says James 3:1-2--and not on a curve. As Phillip Brooks said in Lectures on Preaching, preaching is "truth through personality." One refracts God's truth in preaching through the diligence of one's own efforts. This requires grappling with the sacred text through one's own study and prayer--complimented by the prayers of others. It cannot be done on the cheap. While some on-line sermon outlines are hawked as "road tested" (because a famous preacher preached them before a big crowd), a biblical sermon is soul tested in the fires of study, reflection, and prayer. Fire in the bones cannot be downloaded (Jeremiah 20:9). One climbs into the pulpit alone--but before God as the audience of One.

Ghostbusting the Ghostwriters

A new blogger has a short and to the point essay on ghostwriting. I respond in a comment as well. This has been a long-time concern of mine. It is rampant in "Christian" publishing, sadly.

"Why Truth Matters Most" on line

I found a pdf file of my article from the September, 2004 issue of The Journal of The Evangelical Theological Society, "Why Truth Matters Most: An Apologetic for Truth-Seeking in Postmodern Times." This, Lord willing, will be a chapter in my forthcoming apologetics textbook. It can be found here. Feel free to use it as you wish.

Cell Freeze

It's hard. I forget to take the cell phone with me. Then I take it with me and forget to turn it on. Then I forget to call when I'm supposed to. My wife wrote out 2/3 of a page of detailed instructions for the thing; bless her, but I'd rather read other literature. I hope I don't accidently flush it down the toilet, drop it in the dishwater or the soup, or use it as a drum stick on my electronic drums.

My Cell Phone, Myself: Philosophy of a Technology

To the utter shock of some of my students, I have purchased a cellular telephone. My wife has done all the work in selecting the best plan, figuring the thing out (a complicated mess of technological decoding and conversing with ignoramuses), and laying out the conditions of use. I am so old that I remember when telephones were simple. They rang; you answered: no choice of ringtones, no voice mail, and they were tethered to the earth by a cord.

Our cell company offers these ring tones: "screams" and "moaning" and much more. Don't ask. Everything is customized (even in a perverted sense); the self is endlessly flattered; choices explode; it gets old, and we want none of it. Here are our rules (so far).

1. We have a very minimal minutes plan. The cell is only for exigencies when my wife and I cannot use a land line.

2. We are not giving the number to anyone else, not even Paris Hilton.

3. I am not going to wear it. It is not a piece of clothing. The full armor of God is enough (Ephesians 6)--along with the standard sartorial arrangements.

4. I am not going to use it in public--meaning no "cell yelling" or "cell stalking."

5. I am not going to use it while driving (or biking or swimming).

6. I will never say, "I don't know how I got along without it," because it will not become an integrated feature of my life.

Another Aphorism on Postmodern Times

"Never have so many been so certain of so much about which they know so little"--Rebecca Merrill Groothuis.

Abortion: Reflection and Prayer

From The New York Times:

"ON THIS DAY -On Jan. 22, 1973, in its Roe vs. Wade decision, the Supreme Court legalized abortions, using a trimester approach. "

Thirty-three years later, perhaps forty million abortions later, we stand as a nation guilty before a holy and Almighty God. We are guilty of neglecting and even killing "the least of these," the most vulnerable among us. May God have mercy on us and may God bring restorative justice to the land. May Christians, the people who are taught to believe that all humans bear the image of God (Genesis 1:26), rise to the challenge by teaching and preaching the truth about abortion. May we rise to the challenge to pray that Judge Samuel Alito may be confirmed to the Supreme Court, since his philosophy of law (is constitutional and) would thus likely turn back Roe vs. Wade if given a chance. May be counsel people to honor and protect unborn life. May be give our time and money to that great end. And may we offer forgiveness through our loving Savior for those who have performed and had unnecessary abortion performed on them. May they repent, be forgiven, and be restored to newness of life in Jesus Christ. Amen

Football, Baseball, and the Culture of Violence

My counter-cultural premise is that cultural forms are not neutral. Whether we are addressing communication technologies, art-forms, or sports, all must be exegeted and analyzed according to their form, nature, and structure. Television, for instance, is neither intrinsically good, intrinsically evil, nor neutral. It has a nature as a medium that makes is suitable for entertainment and generally unsuitable for edification and instruction. It tends to foster intellectual impatience, a sense of unreality, and an image-orientation to life that “humiliates the Word” (Jacques Ellul). Goth music and culture is inextricably rooted in the symbolism of death, decay, and destruction, however skillful the musicians may be. It celebrates and generates darkness and despair. Therefore, the notion of “Christian Goth” is oxymoronic in the extreme. The cultural form is not redeemable. It must be condemned and replaced with something better.

Cultural forms shape our sensibilities and our mindsets in countless and typically covert ways. As a culture riven with senseless violence and mayhem, as evidenced at Columbine High School, we need to discern the cultural forces that pull people away from God’s shalom and toward the abyss of rage, revenge, and the devaluing of human life made in God’s image. Sin lies in the heart, but it also becomes institutionalized and systemic in many cultural forms. These must be exegeted and exposed to the light of truth.

Now on to sports, a topic that is virtually never discussed in terms of cultural form, whether moral or aesthetic. Whatever features unite all instances of sport, each sports differs from every other sport in some distinctive ways. Rather than give an detailed ontology and ethical assessment of the major team sports, I want to draw from comparisons between football and baseball in relation to cultural violence and entertainment.

I will not be discussing the ethical character of players, managers, owners, and fans. This is incidental to a formal or structural analysis of these two sports. We find “good Christians” playing baseball and football and “good Christians” watching both sports. This is a trivial point, however, if we endeavor to discern the nature of these two sports.

The argument is brief, sharp, and probably unpopular. Baseball is both aesthetically and morally superior to football as a cultural form. Moreover, football is not only inferior to baseball, but possesses deficits that should cause Christians to consider their participation in the sport—whether as players, managers, owners, or fans—in principle. As an ideal, a team sport should evince aesthetic beauty, moral virtue, and intellectual value. Now consider baseball and football.

1. Football is intrinsically violent. It cannot be played without heavy padding and physical punishment. Professional players typically undergo multiple surgeries for repeated injuries. Many of these injuries are permanently debilitating. The nature of the sport encourages a toleration for, and even promotion of, violence. Players attempt to injure each other to take them out of the game.

Many young men are seriously injured while playing football. Why risk the damage to a growing body? If the body is “fearfully and wonderfully made” and the temple of the Holy Spirit for the Christian, why should anyone treat one’s own body and other’s bodies to so much physical abuse? We were not designed for this kind of punishment.

2. Baseball is not intrinsically violent, but only contingently violent; it much less violent than football overall. No physical contact of a brutal nature is required of the sport. No pitcher must bean (intentionally hit) a batter, although there is a risk of this happening accidentally. No batter tries to injure a fielder with a hit. No fielder intentionally throws the baseball into a runner, although this may happen by accident. And so on. Yes, there is physical contact between offense and defense. A runner barreling home from second base on a single to the outfield may need to collide with the catcher in order to attempt to score. However, his is not necessitated by the game as such, and the catcher is well-protected by his pads and mask. Many games are played where this kind of contact never occurs. Further, many runners will try to avoid the catcher entirely with a hook slide.

3. Baseball is intellectually superior to football, because of the degree of strategy, finesse, and intelligence required to play it well. Football knows of many plays and patterns, but most of them reduce to speed, strength, and coordination--as opposed to intelligence. In baseball, a pitcher with less than a cannon arm (such as Greg Maddox) can be one of the best pitchers in baseball in light of his intelligence in pitch selection, control, knowledge of batters, and fielding ability. Nothing analogous is the case with football, to my knowledge.

Historically, intellectuals have been drawn to write and reflect on baseball. A recent example is columnist and author, George Will. I doubt there is anything of this nature to be said of football. (This, of course, does not imply that no intellectuals like football or than only unintelligent people do.)

4. Aesthetically, baseball is superior because of its unique sense of time. There is no clock in baseball. Time never runs out, only opportunities do. When Yogi Berra famously said, “It ain’t over till it’s over,” he was not uttering a tautology. Since the game is not terminated until the final out is made, it is always possible to come back or to blow a huge lead. In football, the game is often over (determined) before it is over (temporally), rendering the final minutes meaningless and pointless. In baseball, as in the Christian world view, a measure of hope is always alive until the game is over. Near-miraculous comebacks are possible. When they occur, there is no greater drama in all of sports.

5. The pace of baseball is far more deliberate and delicate than football, given that there is no time clock. It is thus more conducive to patience and reflection. This assumes that you are not watching on an evil television network where commercials are now jammed in between batters; thus violating the ontology of the game itself.

6. Both baseball and football require athletic skill for their performance, but I venture to say that an expertly turned double-play, a diving catch in the outfield, or a deftly stolen base (particularly of home) demonstrates more athletic and aesthetic excellence than anything in football. Moreover, nothing in any sport has the dramatic effect of a grand slam homerun, especially in a close game.

7. No one can hog the ball or exclude other players from play in baseball. This is largely because baseball is the only team sport where the defense controls the ball. The defense never knows where the ball will end up after the next pitch. This adds an element suspense and intrigue that is lacking in football. The batter or baserunner has no possession of the ball. The ball must be outsmarted by being hit (by the batter) or avoided (by the runner).

8. In baseball, apart from the aberration of the designated hitter (a recent perversion only used in one league), all the players must function on both defense and offense. Pitchers are not expected to be excellent hitters, but they can contribute in this way and also need to know how to bunt and run the bases. This adds depth to the athletic performance. Football players play either defense or offense, but not both (with possible rare exceptions).

More could be said, but if these reflections are correct, baseball is superior to football as a cultural form. It is much less violent, more artful, and more intellectually stimulating. The intrinsically and inextricably violent nature of football makes it suspect morally, especially for Christians who ought to prize gentleness and peace as fruits of the Spirit. Despite my apologetic for baseball, I can find no moral imperative to be involved at any level of baseball. Any goodness or excellence found therein can be found, at least analogously, in other areas of life.

Nevertheless, the moral implications of the argument are as follows:

1. If one participates in a team sport, baseball is a worthy choice, as is softball for similar reasons. One may play well or poorly, with good motives or bad motives, but the nature of the game is itself good.

2. Given the formal deficiencies and defects of football, one ought not play it or coach it or watch it or own it or support it (through stadium taxes, etc.). (This does not exclude touch or flag football, which are not intrinsically violent, though still aesthetically and intellectually inferior to baseball.) Football reinforces and perpetuates the culture of violence, which must be resisted in every form if we are to regain a measure of sanity and civility in our increasingly violent world.

One may wonder, then, if I am very involved in watching baseball. I am not. Television has nearly destroyed the sport (as it destroyed just about everything). I will did not watch the World Series last year, nor did I watch a single game. My argument is not a justification for any habit or addiction I may have; it addresses objective properties related to form. Attending an organic form of baseball, such as youth league, is another matter. That would be blessedly unmediated.

The Ersatz Religion of Football

Susan Arnold has an astute commentary on the liturgical year and devotional practices of football on her web log. I highly recommend this. The Denver Post should have some of my comments in a similar vein in Sunday's paper.

A Dead-on Commentary by Charles Colson

Pandora's Box: What Roe Has Wrought

January 20, 2006

This Sunday marks the thirty-third anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision—a day Americans should mark with sadness and shame. Forty million babies have been sacrificed on the altar of personal choice and autonomy.

When Roe came down, many of us argued that it was the beginning of a slippery slope, that once we devalued life in the womb we would devalue life—and endanger life—at all stages. After all, we had just established, as a matter of law and social priority, that individual choice trumps even the right to life.

Tragically, we have been proven right. The so-called "right to choose" has led to Supreme Court decisions like the Lawrence case that held that it is discriminatory for states to legislate against sodomy. As Justice Scalia put it in his dissent, "This opens the flood gates for gay marriage and makes it impossible for any morals legislation to be enacted." He is right. Who can say the common good demands the preservation of traditional marriage when personal choice is exalted to the summum bonum of society and is constitutionally protected?

The worst post-Roe decision was Casey v. Planned Parenthood, in which Justice Kennedy wrote: "At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life." Now, if you take those words literally, it makes it impossible to legislate any determination of the common good, because inevitably, the individual then has the right to say that does not conform to his idea about the meaning of life.

This is individualism run amok.

And this week more damage was done. By invoking federal drug laws, John Ashcroft, when he was U.S. Attorney General, tried to stop Oregon from allowing doctors to assist in patient suicide. This week the Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision, held that the federal government cannot bar the dispensing of controlled substances for assisted suicide in the face of a state provision permitting it.

Thankfully, it is a limited decision. The Court did not rule on the constitutionality of the assisted suicide—except by implication. But it does suggest that six justices are sympathetic to it. If assisted suicide is ever permitted, it will soon become involuntary euthanasia, as it has in Holland.

I don't like to be an alarmist, but unless we do something—such as getting more justices like Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas on the Court—we will soon have Dutch-style euthanasia in America.

Some good news this week from the Court: On Thursday it unanimously ruled that a New Hampshire law requiring parental notification if a teenager is seeking an abortion can stand. An exception must be added for medical emergencies, but on principle, parental notification still passes constitutional muster. This vindicates the incremental strategy: Chip away at Roe.
On this anniversary, Christians must resolve to go on fighting, not only on behalf of the unborn, but addressing a broader question: Does our society have the capacity to rule itself according to what is the common good, adhering to its founding principles of the protection of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Or will it be swept up in the notion that the only thing that matters is that individuals can choose for themselves whatever they want?

Don't give up this struggle. We must resolve to fight smarter and harder—for as long as it takes. Get links to further information on today's topic
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The Cost of 'Choice': Women Evaluate the Impact of Abortion by Erika Bachiochi, ed.

Human Dignity in the Biotech Century by Charles Colson and Nigel Cameron, eds.

BreakPoint WorldView: "The Power of Poetry: What We Can Learn" by T. M. Moore

"Civil Disunion: Seeking Happily Ever After for Marriage in America" by Glen Lavy

"BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a daily commentary on news and trends from a Christian perspective. Heard on more than 1000 radio outlets nationwide, BreakPoint transcripts are also available on the Internet. BreakPoint is a production of The Wilberforce Forum, a division of Prison Fellowship: 44180 Riverside Parkway, Lansdowne, VA 20176.

Logic

"Logic has fallen into severe disfavor and people are quite startled when they are confronted with it." - Rebecca Merrill Groothuis

Tricked by "Truthiness"

It is bad enough that author James Frey’s best-selling and Oprah-propelled “memoir,” A Million Little Pieces as been outed as largely fictional by Smoking Gun's piece, "A Million Little Lies." (No one I’ve read is denying that Frey’s book is riddled with fiction posing as fact.) Oprah now says she still stands by the book. Frey has issued no real apologies. Rather, “truthiness” (it would be nice if it were true) is good enough, so long as it inspires people. One benighted blogger even defended Frey by saying that memoirs in postmodern times don’t have to be truthful. (To his credit, he later recanted and pulled the post.)

What we don’t find in Frey or Oprah is repentance: the humble stance that admits wrong, apologizes, and promises to do better. Instead, we get spin and the redefinition of terms (shades of Clinton and “is”). Oprah says it was the publisher’s responsibility to label the genre; but it doesn’t matter since it has helped people with addictions. But it has been pointed out in The New York Times that Frey’s book would not likely have become a best-seller as a novel. The lie of authenticity was essential to its illicit ascent. And one spunky reader is suing the publisher for fraud. She bought a “memoir” and she got a novel. Good for her.

Amidst all the dizzying spin and excuse-making, Christians should rejoice the ultimate story of redemption—the life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and session of Jesus Christ—is factual, verifiable, authentic, and incomparable. As Os Guinness wrote years ago, “Christianity isn’t true because it works. It works because it’s true.”

Buddhism and Nonbeing

While paging through Dostoyevsky's "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man," which I read a ridiculously long time ago, I happened upon this description of Buddhism, although it is not specifically named. Despite all the rosey descriptions of Buddhism to the contrary (and despite the beautiful photographs in the American Buddhist magazines), Dostoyevsky is dead on in his assessment of a deadening religion:

"Religions appeared worshipping the nonbeing and self-annihilation for the sake of an eternal repose in nothing ness."

Christianity: In the beginning was the Word. John, chapter one, verse one.

Buddhism: In the beginning was the Void.

On Being a Curmudgeon

"Being a curmudgeon is a dirty job, but somebody has to do it. Someone has to hoist the warning flags and raise some issues that the fast-track proselytizers might overlook." (Sven Birkerts, The Gutenberg Elegies, p. 136)

This book is highly recommended for its critique of the effect of the digital world on literacy. Thanks to Josh Sowin for reminding me of this quote (which I first read soon after the book's release in 1994).

Truthiness is nuttiness

Linguists Vote 'Truthiness' Word of 2005

By HEATHER CLARK
The Associated Press
Friday, January 6, 2006; 10:47 PM
ALBUQUERQUE

A panel of linguists has decided the word that best reflects 2005 is "truthiness," defined as the quality of stating concepts one wishes or believes to be true, rather than the facts. More.

[The article goes on to quote someone who says that unless we get truth and facts together "we're not going to make much progress." Quite so. Facts are what make statements true. That is, a declarative or indicative statement needs a "truth-maker" or state of affairs to which it corresponds in order for that statement to be true. If there is no truth-maker, the statement is false. Truth is not a quality of gender, skin pigment, consensus, power, or expert opinion. It is a quality of statements that reflect or represent reality.

Years ago, Charles Fair wrote a book called The New Nonsense (1974) in which he lamented the rise of "willful personal belief." This, in essence, is "truthiness"--one takes something to be true simply because one chooses or wants it to be true. It is "true for me." That makes truth mighty easy--and terribly cheap. Let's apply it: I am the greatest living philosopher, or so I wish. And it is thus true. What a relief. What a crock!

For more on what truth is, see my book, Truth Decay, especially chapters three and four.]

Unpublished Letter to The Rocky Mountain News by Rebecca Merrill Groothuis

[It appears that they will not published the following letter, which nails the point in a sizzling and logical manner.]

Dear Editor:

Lisa Jones’s response (12-29-05) to Paul Campos’s editorial about intelligent design (ID) is so tiresomely typical of the non-arguments reflexively intoned in the attempt to discredit ID. Those who have concluded that ID is purely religious and utterly unscientific waste no time employing this conclusion as an unstated premise. From there, they are off and running—questions begging and insults flying. And after all the rabid rhetoric has been emitted, do we see any semblance of a logical argument as to why ID should be deemed unscientific? No. But this is precisely the point at issue in this debate, is it not?

Sincerely,
Rebecca Merrill Groothuis

Alaska Statehood, 1959

On January 3, 1959, the President of the United States signed the following statement, using several pens.

"The procedural requirements imposed by the Congress on the State of Alaska to entitle that state to admission into the Union have been complied with in all respects, and that admission of the State of Alaska into the Union on an equal footing with the other States of the Union is accomplished."

Alaska thus became the 49th state of the United States and a new flag was unveiled, soon to become obsolete when Hawaii became a state a few years a later. This occured on my second birthday. I was born in the territory of Anchorage, Alaska in 1957.

Posing, Not Impressing

Contemporary America is flooded with people posing and mugging for cameras. Everyone now poses; it is almost a reflex. You have big ticket, poster posers: Bill and Melinda Gates along with the omnipresent Bono posing page after page after page in Time magazine in a story about their philanthropic activities (all of which, according to Jesus, should be done in secret and certainly not posed for). Many of my students—none of which are celebrities, to my knowledge—pose for their photos on the class web page. Photos of most Christian “personalities” are highly posed, some even with a rather ungodly “come hither” look about them. Few ever look humble. Television “personalities” are probably the best posers of all, God help them.

But everyone now thinks he or she has the right to be a celebrity—or at least to look like one. So, they strike their poses: trying to radiate confidence or beauty or intelligence or hipness or sensuality. As Thomas De Zengotita says in Mediated, we are all method actors now.

Compare this with a mall and humble photograph of the Christian devotional writer, Andrew Murray (d. 1917), found in a book of his on holiness. We see his profile, his eyes closed, his head tilted down. He seems to be at prayer or perhaps in meditation. He is not posing. He is not saying, “Look at me, aren’t I________.” He is simply being before God, the Audience of One. No pose will impress the Almighty, who sees to the marrow of our being.

"A Few Tips on Restoring Civility"

[This was published in The Rocky Mountain News in August of 2005.]

A lot of people in America are ticked off. We are frustrated, bugged, and hassled for myriad reasons. Much of our discontent has plagued humanity almost from the beginning. But much of our contemporary agitation stems from technologies that corrode common decency and invite incivility. While humans cannot delete death or abolish taxes, we can recover some civility by disciplining our technologies. The following recommendations won’t shake the world, but they might make life more civil and less agitating. The motivation is simply the Golden Rule, as articulated by Jesus: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Noise. Americans are awash in unwanted noise. Much of this is beyond our control, but some is not. When unwanted decibels rise, our hearts pounds and our heads hurt. We may even become ill. (The American military blasts heavy metal music into enemy territory in order to disorientate before attacking.) Unwelcome and unavoidable music from other automobiles accosts us at stoplights and in parking lots. Subwoofers assail us while in our homes and cars, and while on walks. Cell phone yelling invades our consciousness just about everywhere, including on bike trails and in bathrooms. Cell phone rings (with their annoying customized ring tones) resonate everywhere: at concerts, church services, funerals, and in classrooms.

Still, noise can be controlled. When playing music in the car, one can turn down the volume and/or close the windows when in earshot of others. Subwoofers, however, are another story. Rendering them civil is on the order of making Attila the Hun a pacifist. Subwoofers embody incivility. Perhaps legal restrictions are the only hope. Nevertheless, subwoofer users could moderate the roar when they come in range of others. Cell phone users could refrain from calls when they are interacting with others face-to-face and not broadcast their comments to everyone in range. (I once heard a woman on a cell phone loudly discussing her grieving process while she bought books at The Tattered Cover.) Ringers can be turned off or put on throb when they would disturb others. After all, we once lived without them.

Speed. Americans are always in a hurry—and often for no reason. “Time is money,” said Ben Franklin. So we rush about all the time—at work and at play—frightened of losing any time. Other cars drive too slowly. Checkers are too leisurely, talking to customers! Even the automatic checkers (with their annoying robotic “voices”) are not efficient enough for us.
Since most moral philosophers consider patience a virtue, we might try practicing it for a change. Surely one can wait a few seconds without losing a fortune or having a conniption. What if the person ahead of you says a few personal words to the checker? Maybe the checker needs encouragement. If the driver ahead has a pathological disorder that doesn’t allow her to break the speed limit, you don’t have to flash your lights, honk, tailgate, or make obscene gestures. You might try out the pathology yourself and observe life at a legal speed. Or (more likely) you can pass in due time and take your chances with the law. Perhaps the snail-paced driver is at an age where driving any faster would endanger everyone.

Television: Television is the great dynamo of incivility. It destroys conversations by bombarding us with distracting images and sounds. And TV is nearly omnipresent, showing up in restaurants and even emergency rooms—places where unmediated conversations were once considered a priority.

What to do? Turn off as many TVs as possible and see what happens. When associating with others, don’t depend on the TV for stimulation. (What’s on TV is usually pretty uncivil anyway.) Instead, enter into the lost art of conversation that honors the thoughts and feelings of others. Eat at restaurants with no TVs. Purchase a TV-B-Gone, a universal remote control that turns off many TVs. I once zapped nine public and unneeded screens in one triumphant weekend. Some civility was restored, and the beast, while not disarmed, was incapacitated for a season. By the way, there are far better sources for find out what is going on in the world than TV, such as magazines, newspapers, and the Internet.

This only scratches the surface of civility. But think on this. If you apply the Golden Rule to matters of noise, speed, and television, your life and the lives of those around will surely change—and change for the better.

· Douglas Groothuis is Professor of Philosophy at Denver Seminary and the author of Truth Decay.

Letter in the January 1, 2006 Denver Post

Facts about Jesus Christ

Re: The birth of a 'mad sect,"' Dec. 25 John Aloysius Farrell column.

John Aloysius Farrell discredited Christianity as historically uncertain. This is incorrect. Farrell dismisses Pliny's and Josephus' references to Christ; yet they in fact corroborate the existence of Christ and certain significant facts about him. Other ancient historians, such as Thallus, Tacititus and Suetonius, mention Christ and his followers as well. These references alone put the lie to Farrell's claim that there is little proof of Jesus' existence. Farrell demeans the Apostle Paul's letters by saying that he "paints no portrait of Christ, the man from Nazareth." But Paul had no need to repeat facts about the earthly life of Christ, since these were already known to his readers. However, Paul does refer to several facts about Jesus' life and teaching, particularly his Jewish ancestry, crucifixion and resurrection. Although Farrell downplays the Gospels, they were written only a few decades after the events they describe by eyewitnesses or those
who consulted eyewitness - impressive credentials for ancient literature. "The Da Vinci Code" to the contrary, the four Gospels were not selected for merely political reasons, but because of their connection to reliable witnesses, the agreement of their teachings, and their early use in the church.

• Douglas Groothuis, Littleton The writer is a professor of philosophy at Denver Seminary.
  

An American Irony: Yoga, Yes; Design, No

A few years ago, the Aspen, Colorado, public schools implemented a program in their elementary schools to teach yoga. A local pastor led a fight against this and argued very wisely. He claimed that yoga is intrinsically and inextricably religious. That religion, of course, is Hinduism. The teaching of a religious practice—such as yoga or Christian prayer—in a state school is unconstitutional. Of course, the yoga proponents typically labeled him as a fearful fundamentalist who was against peaceful practices that were merely for relaxation and cultivating good health. Sadly, yoga is now a tax-supported part of elementary education in Aspen, Colorado, thus flagrantly providing state support for the religion of Hinduism. (Yoga has become so mainstream in American culture that a good number of Christians practice it, thinking they can separate the religion from the exercise. They are wrong, as I was quoted as saying in a The New York Times story this summer. See also my Christianity Today essay on this.)

Now consider the controversy over intelligent design (ID). While the theory appeals to empirical evidence and proven principles of design detection used in sciences such as archaeology, cryptography, and SETI, the critics claim that it is inherently religious and, thus, unscientific. This, of course, begs the question as to whether a religious belief might have some scientific support. Moreover, critics of ID inflate the claims of ID far beyond what ID claims for itself: namely, that some features of the natural world are better explained on the basis of intelligent causes as opposed to unintelligent causes (chance and necessity in tandem and without assistance). That is a minimal, modest, and retiring sort of claim metaphysically, since it does not specify who or what the design or designers might be. (That debate can be carried out philosophically.) Nevertheless, opponents of ID claim this violated the establishment clause of the Constitution by “establishing religion.” This is Nonsense. It attempts to disestablish the de facto religion of naturalism.

Anyway, back to yoga. Why is it that something so deeply rooted in Hinduism can be accepted in the public schools (and unopposed by the ACLU, who should have supported the pastor), while ID is considered an offense to the very marrow of the American system of law? Why this egregious double standard? Whether or not a belief is designated “religious” depends entirely on whose interests are being served by it. Yoga, it is believed, confers benefits to anyone who practices it. It can help the atheist or agnostic become relaxed and healthier. There is the payoff. And why not let the children in state schools share in yoga’s benefit? ID, however, does not serve any interest of secular people. On the contrary, it brings the secularist worldview (philosophical materialism) into question on the basis of empirical evidence. It directly challenges the stranglehold that materialism has over established science. Of course, it does serve the interests of the First Amendment (freedom of speech: in this case, the speech of those who would challenge Darwinism in tax-supported schools) and it in no way establishes any religion, since it leaves open who or what the designer might be and makes its argument not from any sacred scripture, but from nature. That is hardly an altar call. Nevertheless, ID is a direct assault on the citadel of materialism: the premise that unintelligent causes can exhaustively explain biological systems.

Now, in light of the above let us think of a new strategy. Maybe we can claim that yoga is really based on the idea of a designing intelligence that instructs us on how to use our designed bodies better. Yoga could only work if the sages who intuited it knew how to open the body to optimal function by perfecting it according to a design plan and that design plan is yoga. Then, the ACLU might come running! And perhaps we can present ID as a mental exercise that helps calm the nerves—an emotional tonic that relieves the stress of thinking that humans only happen to emerge after eons of purposeless and unguided evolution. Students could chant, “I am designed. I am designed,” over and over again—or just chant “I am D I am D” until a higher level of consciousness is achieved. No, I think the ACLU would still smell blood.

• Douglas Groothuis

Letter on Intelligent Design in the December 30, 2005, Rocky Mountain News

'Design' does make testable hypotheses

Dr. Andrew Ross' letter of Dec. 22, "Intelligent design can't meet scientific criteria," says that intelligent design does not conform to the scientific method, particularly concerning testable predictions and the modification of hypotheses according to evidence.
First, there is no iron-clad scientific method. Scientific enterprise is more untidy than Ross apparently thinks, as many philosophers of science, such as Thomas Kuhn, have noted. Second, intelligent design does predict that certain organisms will display certain empirically detectable signs of design, such as irreducible complexity, where all the component parts must be present at once in order for the organism to have the necessary function.

Moreover, intelligent design predicts that biological features deemed vestigial will be found to have function. Consider "junk DNA." Darwinism predicts that DNA will contain large areas of useless material left over from previous organisms. Intelligent design predicts that if DNA is designed there would be very little or no "junk." Scientists have now found that there is no "junk" in DNA.

Furthermore, intelligent design theorists such as biochemist Michael Behe, are attuned to the evidence and are quite willing to revise their hypotheses on that basis.

• Douglas Groothuis Professor of philosophy, Denver Seminary Littleton

He is Back At It

Today while looking around at an electronics store (not common for me), I remembered that I had my partially rehabilitated TV-Be-Gone in my pocket. Well, well… I had followed some advice on line on how to replace the batteries and put a larger than standard battery on top and only one of two smaller batteries on the bottom (because I ran out of the smaller ones and had not yet bought another one). Nevertheless, my newly equipped device performed well in an unnamed store. I lost count, but I must have zapped about twenty sets! Someone at Amazon.com mentioned that Sony’s go off almost immediately, and I found that this is true. Oh joy, Oh bliss! One of my well-aimed shots turned off about ten intelligence-reducers at once, all of which were perched a hellish wall of TVs. That felt so good. It was probably a personal best for single zap result. The performance of this subversive device will probably only improve when I get that other battery.

After a long and sad hiatus from TV zapping (due to battery failure), I am back. TV world beware. You never know when or where the public TV screen may go blank—so that minds may not go blank.

TV-B-Gone May Not Be Gone!

A techno-savvy friend of mine emailed and alerted me to the fact that there are two more batteries underneath the top battery (the only one visible when you take off the cover) that need to be replaced as well. So, I should be back in the TV-zapping business. The saga continues.

Telling Editorial on the Dover Decision

Here is an editorial from The Seattle Times by David Klinghoffer on the egregious Dover intelligent design decision. It is well worth reading.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

[The following is by the famous Transcendentalist. While I don't share this overall worldview, this quote deserves curmudgeonly approval.]

"...but truth is handsomer than the affectation of love. Your goodness must have some edge to it---else it is none."--from "Self-Reliance."

Clarification on ID Letter

My letter to The Philosopher Magazine lacked an important nuance. The Discovery Institute folks (whom I generally endorse on the ID issue) only want the public schools to allow ID as a challenge to Darwinism. They do not want to mandate that both be taught, partially because ID is not an full-fledged theory as yet. This was one of the problems in the Dover case, which would have made a statement about ID mandatory in the classroom. That statement also refered to a book that may have not been the best for the public schools. The Discovery Institute was not behind the strategy used in the Dover case.

Letter on ID in "The Philosophers Magazine"

[This was published in most recent issue of The Philosophers Magazine. I corrected one typo in the first sentence.]

Dear Editor:

I must both commend and correct comments in the same issue and on the same subject. In his column “Provocations” (Issue 30) Michael LaBossiere rightly claims that Intelligent Design (ID) theory is a legitimate scientific competitor with Darwinism. Darwinism claims that life shows no signs of designing intelligence, and ID advances the opposite thesis on the basis of empirical evidence and principles of scientific explanation.

However, in a news story on Flew’s rejection of atheism, we are told that ID theorists are “leading a partially successful campaign to stop the theory of evolution being taught as fact in the schools.” This isn’t quite right. It makes it sound like ID advocates want to censor Darwinism. Rather, ID theorists argue that Darwinism should be presented as a scientific explanation for the development of the biosphere—but only along with ID as an alternative scientific theory. Both theories claim to best explain the facts of the matter. ID proponents believe that they should both be taught as claimants to fact and judged by their explanatory virtues. Neither should be taught alone as dogma.

Sincerely,
Douglas Groothuis
Professor of Philosophy
Denver Seminary

Debate over Intelligent Design Theory

[This is a story from the December 21, 2005 Rocky Mountain News called "Debate Over Intelligent Design." I am quoted at the end, and quoted correctly.]

Fallacy Finders Dream

[This letter was published in The Rocky Mountain News today as as response to my Dec. 10, 2005 article, which is posted on this blog. Please identify the logical fallacies in this diatribe and share this with the blogosphere.]

'Design' column shows we're getting dumber

Douglas Groothuis' Speakout column of Dec. 10 on intelligent design, " 'Design' critics often employ straw men," is further evidence of the dumbing down of America. Remember the last time religion intruded itself into science, when the church condemned Galileo for teaching that the Earth revolved around the sun? How did that turn out?

Five hundred years ago the Muslim countries were the scientific leaders of the world. Why did this change so drastically? Because the Western world began the scientific revolution when it rejected supernatural explanations and sought natural causes that would be amenable to testing and verification, the essence of science. This tradition has served us so well, why would we want to abandon it now?

If people like Groothuis insist that schools teach nonscientific alternatives in science classes, then why stop at intelligent design? Why not teach the flat Earth theory in geography class? How about astrology as an alternative to astronomy, and shouldn't alchemy be taught in chemistry classes? Maybe Groot- huis and others would prefer seeing a doctor trained in voodoo as an alternative to traditional medicine?

When we allow the possibility of supernatural agents, anything goes and nothing can be logically disputed or verified by others, so scientific progress stops.
If we start mixing science and religion in the public schools, then we had better make sure that our children and grandchildren start learning Chinese. Because America will have unilaterally disarmed itself in the future battle for scientific and technological supremacy.

James J. Amato Woodland Park

More on Christmas Loneliness

[This is not written by me, Doug Groothuis; it is written by someone who wanted to remain unnamed. It worth pondering.]

It’s all well and good for healthy families that churches close so all can stay home this year on a Christmas Sunday. But many do not realize the sense of normalcy and essential fellowship Sundays provide for many single parents. Many do not realize the chaos and heartache single parents live with, which is exacerbated by the Christmas holiday season. Yes, we have children but they are torn between two worlds, often worlds that are threatening to them or which try to work alienation from us into their hearts. When this heart-alienation is successful, even having them with us on a Christmas can be very difficult to bear. When they are not with us, we worry and cannot enjoy a family gathering, or worse, we sit at home alone.

I have gone home alone after almost every Christmas Eve service in the past 20 years since my family celebrates on Christmas Day. At times I wished the service were 3 hours long. I can say I have learned to love that quiet time at home though; it has become a necessary time in the presence of God, a healthy ritual release of sorrows built up over the year. These days, even if I get an invitation I turn it down for that reason. I need that sacred space that comes only once a year. Now that the children are grown and gone, a different kind of heartache sets in; one of years that cannot be regained and dreams of happy intact family life that will never be experienced. As they marry, they are again divided between two more worlds, spending time with in-laws. Family gatherings become triggers for painful memories, year after year accumulated, and creating a lump in the throat as I watch other family members with their children happily hugging both mom and dad, and mom and dad kissing and showing off gifts and exchanging knowing glances. I look away. I should be happy! And I am, really, for them. I have a wonderful, large family. I get by quite well, I tell myself. It could be far worse, I say. And tomorrow, this will all be over, for another year. It’s like a recurring dream from which I awaken grateful, December 26th morn.

If you know someone who is a single parent, and you find out they will not be alone on Christmas don’t assume everything is fine: let them know you understand that they have struggles and give them a hug and pray for their hearts and tell them they are loved –and show them! Sorrow can be very serious business this time of year.

Christmas Loneliness

Christmas time is here,
Happy time of year.

Or so the song goes... But for many among us—more than some might imagine—Christmastime is a season of extended and burning unhappiness called loneliness. Happiness is not triggered by the beginning of the marketing blitz for Christmas shopping. Nor are those with small or sad or nonexistent families especially heartened by all the riot of required family festivities and family feeling. The lonely are asked what their Christmas plans are. The reply is in so many words, “There are no special plans. We will just hunker down at home—alone, again; and wait for it to end.” That’s a bit lacking in holiday cheer, is it not? And some do not even have a house in which to sulk. Others have houses, but no homes, but rather prisons. Many languish in prisons of other kinds.

For many, loneliness is intensified at just the time when a culture (supposedly) celebrates the Great Visitation, “God with us.” But are we with each other? Do we know each other? Can we see past the surface into the inner pain of our brothers and sisters? Loneliness is the great secret of postmodernity, and it deepens during times when we pretend mightily otherwise. As many critics have noted, community is breaking down in contemporary America. Community means (in part) civic participation: attending PTA meetings, voting, knowing your neighbors, volunteering, reading and grading student papers (instead of relying on machines to grade multi-guess charades), and much more. (See the revealing book, Bowling Alone.) Instead, we tend to cocoon: people whirl about in their iPod worlds, charge around in huge metal behemoths within a cacophonous cauldron of loud, rude, over-amplified sounds, stalk about in public muttering into the air (that is, to a distant cellular phone recipient), stare into video screens, playing video games with no one.

That is enough, or more than enough. Is there a solution? No, there is no grand solution—this side of the Eschaton. But there are small, simple steps to break up the glaciers of loneliness in our midst.

I leave it to you to tell this web log what these small acts of kindness might be. I further bid you divulge a few sentences of loneliness this holiday. It’s a poor excuse for the richly-textured realities of embodied community, but it might help. Or perhaps not.

Doug Groothuis comments in article about Christmas controversy

The Rocky Mountain News of December 10 ran a story on controversies over the religious nature of Christmas, in which I am (accurately) quoted.

Review of a new book on manners

The New York Times has reviewed Lynn Truss's insightful and humorous new book about the decline in manner called, Talk to the Hand. I recommend this book for all curmudgeons.

Groothuis on Intelligent Design

Speakout: 'Design' critics often employ straw men

By Douglas Groothuis, Special to The Rocky Mountain News December 10, 2005

Ever since President Bush advocated that the intelligent design critique of Darwinism be allowed in public schools, a riot of public pronouncements has condemned the design perspective as retrograde, unscientific and downright ominous.

A number of logical fallacies are routinely employed in efforts to debunk intelligent design. In such cases, intelligent design is criticized and dismissed on the basis of an argument that is illogical and therefore false. One need not be an expert in Darwinian biology to sniff out these basic blunders. In this brief space I will note just one: the straw man argument.

In the straw man argument a position is made to look ridiculous and then the caricature is knocked down. Intelligent design is repeatedly presented as a plan to institute religious and unscientific dogma in the public schools. The facts, however, speak otherwise. Intelligent design's think tank, The Discovery Institute, says this: "The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." The controlling premise is the effort to discern the best explanation for a natural phenomenon, given the available empirical evidence: a fundamental precept of scientific investigation. Unlike creationism, intelligent design makes no appeal to religious texts, but invokes empirical evidence, as well as the principles of design detection, which are already used in sciences such as cryptography, archaeology, forensics, and in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

Mathematician and philosopher William Dembski argues that certain features of the natural world exhibit patterns that are best explained on the basis of design (or intelligent causes), rather than on the basis of mindless nature (or unintelligent causes).

For example, even if we didn't know from history that an eccentric artist was responsible, we would identify the presidential faces carved into Mount Rushmore as designed because natural patterns of erosion cannot explain them. The complexity of the phenomenon fits a specifiable pattern: the faces of the presidents, which we recognize from other sources. Similarly, archaeologists distinguish ancient artifacts from naturally occurring objects on the basis of design detection. The complexity discovered in certain objects fits a specifiable pattern indicating that intelligent causation was at work.

Intelligent design proponents argue that some organisms indicate specified complexity, and that these organisms are better explained by intelligent causes than by natural law and chance alone. The DNA code is an example of specified complexity. It contains a language that is not reducible to the laws of chemistry and physics, which do not specify its content. The odds against all the factors required for DNA to come together through the operations of mere matter and chance are vanishingly small.

Similarly, biochemist Michael Behe argues in Darwin's Black Box that certain molecular machines are irreducibly complex, which means that all of its basic parts are required for its function, as with a mousetrap. The bacterial flagellum, for example, is a highly complex outboard motor attached to a bacterium. A gradual process of mere chance and natural law is insufficient to explain this irreducible complexity, Behe argues, since the motor function could not exist in evolutionary predecessors that lacked any of the many necessary parts.

However, Darwinists insist that intelligent design invokes God to cover ignorance of natural processes. This is exactly wrong. The design inference is not based on ignorance, but on increased knowledge of the microscopic realm and on the well-established principles of design detection. When Darwinists refuse to admit intelligent cause as a possible explanation for specified complexity, this only reveals that they define science such that intelligent causes are disallowed in principle. But this approach is not a discovery of science itself. It is rather a philosophical commitment to materialism (the belief that reality is reducible to impersonal physical laws).

May these few considerations spur readers to assess rationally intelligent design's actual arguments and to avoid the logical fallacies so often employed in place of intelligent thought about life's origins.

Douglas Groothuis is professor of philosophy at Denver Seminary.
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Discussion of propositions, philosophers, postmodernism

Susan Arnold gives some reflections on metaphysics on her blog. The responses address propositions, the worth of philosophy, postmodernism. and more. I posted a fairly long response to this (mostly about propositions), which can be found at: www.deut64.blogspot.com.