Less known to many is the sinking of the RMS Lusitania, which was torpedoed by a German U-boat on May 7, 1915, taking 1,198 of 1,959 lives on board. The sinking of the Lusitania was a major factor in bringing the United States into war against the German Empire in World War I, but it plays a much less prominent role in the American imagination — largely thanks to Hollywood and its fascination with the Titanic.

But more is at play here, for the two sinkings were notably different in one crucial respect. The Titanic took hours to sink, leaving time for a remarkable human drama on board the sinking ship. The Lusitania sank in just eighteen minutes, leaving far less of a human trace in the imagination.

As it turns out, there was another crucial difference. A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences looks at the difference in the behavior of the men aboard the two sinking ships. The difference was remarkable. Aboard the Titanic, the men generally behaved with great concern for women and children, doing their best to get the women and children into the precious and insufficient seats in the lifeboats. Hundreds of men died with the Titanic, demonstrating a commitment to put the welfare and lives of women and children above their own.

Aboard the sinking Lusitania, the scene was very different. Women and children were less likely than men to survive that disaster, because the men used their natural strength and speed to take the spaces on the lifeboats, with women and children forced out of their way.

As The New York Times summarizes: “On the Titanic, the study found, children were 14.8 percent more likely to survive than adults, while on the Lusitania they were 5.3 percent less likely to do so. And women on the Titanic were 53 percent more likely to survive than men, while on the Lusitania they were 1.1 percent less likely to do so.”

TIME Magazine offers further detail:

The results told a revealing tale. Aboard the Titanic, children under 16 years old were nearly 31% likelier than the reference group to have survived, but those on the Lusitania were 0.7% less likely. Males ages 16 to 35 on the Titanic had a 6.5% poorer survival rate than the reference group but did 7.9% better on the Lusitania. For females in the 16-to-35 group, the gap was more dramatic: those on the Titanic enjoyed a whopping 48.3% edge; on the Lusitania it was a smaller but still significant 10.4%. The most striking survival disparity — no surprise, given the era — was determined by class. The Titanic’s first-class passengers had a 43.9% greater chance of making it off the ship and into a lifeboat than the reference group; the Lusitania’s, remarkably, were 11.5% less likely.

What accounts for the difference? The researchers looked at several factors, but settled on one that appeared more obvious as they considered the question — the length of time it took the ship to sink. As the report explains, on the Lusitania “the short-run flight impulse dominated behavior. On the slowly sinking Titanic, there was time for socially determined behavioral patterns to reemerge.”

Put plainly, on the Lusitania the male passengers demonstrated “selfish rationality.” As TIME explains, this is “a behavior that’s every bit as me-centered as it sounds and that provides an edge to strong, younger males in particular. On the Titanic, the rules concerning gender, class and the gentle treatment of children — in other words, good manners — had a chance to assert themselves.”

Note carefully the assumption here that “the rules concerning gender, class and the gentle treatment of children” are ascribed to “good manners” and “socially determined behavioral patterns.” In other words, the male decision to give priority to the welfare of women and children is just a learned behavior, a social convention.

Is that all there is to it? There is a huge question looming in this — is it right for men to act with care and concern toward women and children, or is this just an outmoded relic of Victorian morality?

What do modern feminists do with this? Those who stake their lives on the elimination of all meaningful gender distinctions must, if honest, take what they see on the Lusitania as the inevitable result of such a worldview. Are we really to believe that the moral call that makes men act against their own self-preservation is just a socially-constructed artifact of manners?

Aboard the Lusitania, young males acted out of a selfish survival instinct, and women and children were cast aside, left to the waves. Aboard the Titanic, there was time for men to consider what was at stake and to call themselves to a higher morality. There was time for conscience to raise its voice and authority, and for men, young and old, to know and to do their duty.

The Christian worldview based in Scripture explains this in terms of God’s revelation of moral order within the structures of creation, and especially in what we call conscience. Even in our fallen state, this moral knowledge speaks to us, and there is a moral knowledge within us that calls us to do what we otherwise would never do — even what is plainly not in our direct self-interest.

A secular worldview has little at its disposal to explain all this, and is left with some argument based in evolutionary survival behaviors or socially constructed morality. The feminists are in even worse shape in this. They call for a world like the Lusitania, but must hope against hope that the world is really more like the Titanic.

Women and children first. Civilization itself depends upon this kind of moral knowledge. Without it, the entire enterprise of human civilization is destined to sink beneath the waves.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Sindya Bhanoo, “How the Men Reacted as the Titanic and Lusitania Went Under,” The New York Times, Monday, March 1, 2010.

Jeffrey Kluger, “Titanic and Lusitania — How People Behave in a Disaster,” TIME Magazine, Wednesday, March 3, 2010.

Trey, Savage, and Torgler, “Interaction of Natural Survival Instincts and Internalized Social Norms: Exploring the Titanic and Lusitania Disasters,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, March 1, 2010. [Abstract only]

The Director of Minority Outreach for Georgia Right to Life, Davis is taking that message to the public, along with a massive public awareness campaign that has captured national and international attention. Drivers in the metro Atlanta area are seeing billboards that demand attention — and are changing minds.

Her argument is simple and the statistics are irrefutable. She accuses abortion providers in general, and Planned Parenthood in particular, of targeting blacks for abortion. She told The New York Times, “The impact of abortion has become so great that it has begun to impact our fertility rate.”

Consider the chilling facts documented in the data. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 57.4% of the abortions performed in Georgia in 2006 were performed on African-American women, but blacks make up only 30% of Georgia’s population. Nationwide, the pattern is similarly stacked against black babies — black women have approximately 37% of all abortions each year, while blacks make up only 13% of the national population.

You can see why Catherine Davis’ message demands attention. She points also to the fact that, in Georgia, every single abortion clinic is located in areas of black concentration. She argues, quite pointedly, that this amounts to an intentional effort to reduce the black population in the United States.

As she told the Los Angeles Times, “Let me put it this way . . . 18,870,000 black babies have been aborted since Roe v. Wade. If those babies had not been aborted, we would be 59 million strong — over 19% of the population.”

She is not only making the argument, however, she is reaching the African-American community with that argument.

As the Los Angeles Times reports, “An increasingly vocal segment of the antiabortion community has embraced the idea that black women are targeted for abortion in an effort to keep the black population down.”  Similarly, from The New York Times: “Abortion opponents say the number is so high because abortion clinics are deliberately located in black neighborhoods and prey upon black women. The evidence, they say, is everywhere: Planned Parenthood’s response to the anti-abortion ad that aired during the Super Bowl featured two black athletes, they note, and several women’s clinics offered free services — including abortions — to evacuees after Hurricane Katrina.”

“The more I dug into it, the more vast I found that the network was,” Catherine Davis told the paper. “And I realized that African-American women just did not know the truth, they did not understand the truth about the abortion industry.”

She also has an argument from history. The founder of what became Planned Parenthood was Margaret Sanger, who no one can deny was a proponent of eugenics — the effort to encourage the improvement of the human population by selective breeding. She advocated the forced sterilization of those deemed less fit to reproduce. As the Los Angeles Times noted, “That was often believed to include blacks.” Planned Parenthood was also involved in a recent controversy when some Planned Parenthood employees were taped encouraging donations targeted toward the abortion of black babies.

Catherine Davis is not alone in making the argument, either. The Rev. Clenard Childress, Jr. of New Jersey has described the womb as the most dangerous place for a black child. Another black pastor, Rev. Johnny M. Hunter of Fayetteville, North Carolina said, “What’s giving [this argument] momentum is blacks are finally figuring out what’s going down. . . . The game changes when blacks get involved. And in the pro-life movement, a lot of the groups that have been ignored for years, they’re now getting involved.”

The case is also being made with force and candor by Alveda King, a niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr: “I know for sure that the black community is being targeted by abortionists for the purpose of ethnic cleansing . . . . How can the dream survive if we are willing to sacrifice the futures of our children?”

The scandal of abortion is not limited to abortion, as these facts and patterns make clear. Catherine Davis and her colleagues are making a difference with this message — and mostly within the black community.

What about the rest of the nation? Is America content to be the land where every baby in the womb is endangered, and where black babies are at even greater risk? That question should haunt every single American.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Shaila Dewan, “Anti-Abortion Ads Split Atlanta,” The New York Times, Saturday, February 6, 2010.

Shaila Dewan, “To Court Blacks, Foes of Abortion Make Racial Case,” The New York Times, Friday, February 26, 2010.

Robin Abcarian, “Antiabortion Ads Claim Conspiracy Against Blacks,” Los Angeles Times, Tuesday, March 2, 2010.

See the Web site www.toomanyaborted.com and the resources at the site.

Catherine Davis was my guest for The Albert Mohler Program on Tuesday, March 2. Listen here.

That is what makes marriage what it is. The logic of marriage is easy to understand and difficult to subvert, which is one reason the institution has survived over so many millennia. Marriage lasts because of its fundamental status. It is literally what a healthy and functioning society cannot survive without.

And yet, modernity can be seen as one long attempt to subvert the permanent — including marriage. The modern age has brought the rise of individual autonomy, the collection of populations in cities, the weakening of family commitments, the waning of faith, the routinization of divorce, and a host of other developments that subvert marriage and the commitment it requires.

Added to this list is the phenomenon of cohabitation. The twentieth century saw the phenomenon of cohabitation become the expectation among many, if not most, young adults. But the end of the century, the progression of intimacy (including sexual intimacy) was likely to follow a line from “hooking up” to cohabiting.

A new study conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics suggests two very important findings: First, that cohabiting is now the norm for younger adults. Second, cohabiting makes divorce more likely after eventual marriage.

“Cohabitation is increasingly becoming the first co-residential union formed among young adults,” states the report. The facts seem daunting. The percentage of women in their 30s who report having cohabited is over 60 percent — doubled over the last fifteen years.

Reporting in The New York Times, Sam Roberts documents the rise of cohabitation among the young. He cites Pamela J. Smock of the University of Michigan’s Population Studies Center. “From the perspective of many young adults, marrying without living together first seems quite foolish,” she explains.

That perfectly captures the new logic — that it would be foolish to marry without first cohabiting. How can you know if you are really meant for each other? How can you measure compatibility without the experience of living together?

That logic makes perfect sense in a society that is increasingly sexualized, secularized, and “liberated” from the expectations of the past.

Reacting to the research findings, Professor Kelly A. Musick of Cornell University asserted, “The figures suggest to me that cohabitation is still a pathway to marriage for many college graduates, while it may be an end in itself for many less educated women.”  The study report affirmed her assessment: “Cohabitation is increasingly becoming the first co-residential union formed among young adults . . . . As a result of the growing prevalence of cohabitation, the number of children born to unmarried cohabiting parents has also increased.”

But, as this new report suggests, cohabiting before marriage does not lead to a stronger and more permanent union. Instead, the experience of cohabiting weakens the union. As Roberts reports: “The likelihood that a marriage would last for a decade or more decreased by six percentage points if the couple had cohabited first, the study found.”

Pamela Smock argues that the research will fall on deaf ears. “Just because some academic studies have shown that living together may increase the chance of divorce somewhat, young adults themselves don’t believe that.”

That may be true, and it surely captures the spirit of the age. The experience of cohabiting just makes sense to many young adults. Their logic is that marriage is what happens after a relationship becomes sexually intimate and is found to be adequately fulfilling — not before.

They do not know that what they are actually doing is undoing marriage. They miss the central logic of marriage as an institution of permanence. They miss the essential wisdom of marriage — that the commitment must come before the intimacy, that the vows must come before the shared living, that the wisdom of marriage is its permanence before its experience.

Cohabitation weakens marriage — even a cohabiting couple’s eventual marriage — because a temporary and transitory commitment always weakens a permanent commitment. Having lived together with the open possibility of parting, that possibility always remains, and never leaves.

This research might not alter the plans of many young couples, who are not likely to read, much less be advised by such research. But it does affirm what makes marriage what it is, and what weakens and destroys marriage as an institution.

From a Christian perspective there is more, of course. We are reminded of marriage as God’s gift and expectation, and of the divine goodness of it. We are also reminded that it is our Creator, and not we ourselves, who knows that we need permanence before experience. We need marriage.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Sam Roberts, “Living Together First Doesn’t Make Marriage Last, Study Finds,” The New York Times, Tuesday, March 2, 2010.

The Romeike’s tale is big news today, with both TIME Magazine and The New York Times devoting major stories to their plight, and to the fact that a federal immigration judge in Memphis granted them asylum — and homeschooling is the reason.

As Campbell Robertson reports in today’s edition of The New York Times, the Romeike’s determination to homeschool their children ran into direct collision with German laws banning the practice: “Among European countries, Germany is nearly alone in requiring, and enforcing, attendance of children at an officially recognized school. The school can be private or religious, but it must be a school. Exceptions can be made for health reasons but not for principled objections.”

The Romeikes are described in the paper as “devout Christians” who decided to homeschool their children after they became concerned about both behavioral and curricular issues in the German state schools. A fellow church member alerted them to the possibility of homeschooling, and the Romeikes determined that homeschooling is right for their children.

It was not long before they were threatened with prosecution, fines, and the possible removal of their children from the home. The couple was fined over $11,000 and threatened with losing custody of their children. At one point, the Romeike home was visited by the police, who took the Romeike children to school in a police van.

The Romeikes decided to act before losing their children, and after meeting an official from the Home School Defense Fund, based in Virginia, they moved their family to Morristown, Tennessee, where another German family had recently moved for the same reason.

Upon arriving in the United States, the Romeikes filed for asylum, claiming that they and their family were under threat of persecution due to their Christian convictions concerning homeschooling. Judge Lawrence O. Burman agreed with the couple, declaring them to be under threat of persecution in Germany due to their “principled opposition to government policy.”

Indeed, it is Judge Burman’s decision that has brought attention to the Romeike case. Most observers believe that this case may be the very first in which a judge has ruled for asylum on the basis of a determination to homeschool. Judge Burman also found that homeschooling parents are “members of a particular group” experiencing the threat of persecution in Germany.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has appealed the decision, and the Romeike’s case may not be over. Nevertheless, their plight has brought attention to the homeschooling issue and the rights of parents to determine the education of their children.

In Europe, homeschooling is not the mass movement it is in America, though numbers are rising. In the United States, the homeschooling movement was pioneered by parents who were both liberal and conservative in worldview, joined together in dissatisfaction with other educational alternatives — primarily the public schools. In Germany, it is now estimated that some 1,000 families may be homeschooling their children, and most of them are thought to be conservative Christians.

The German government schools date back to the era even before the unification of Germany under Bismark. The Prussians designed the German public schools as a means of raising children in a context of German patriotism and common knowledge. In more recent times, the schools have been seen as central to the German project of avoiding the development or encouragement of what some call “parallel societies.”
Tristana Moore of TIME reports:

In Germany, mandatory school attendance dates back to 1717, when it was introduced in Prussia, and the policy has traditionally been viewed as a social good. “This law protects children,” says Josef Kraus, president of the German Teachers’ Association. The European Court of Human Rights agrees with him. In 2006, the court threw out a homeschooling family’s case when it deemed Germany’s compulsory-schooling law as compatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, an international treaty drafted in 1950. Given this backdrop, it’s little wonder the Romeikes came up against a wall of opposition when they tried to talk to their school principal about the merits of homeschooling.

The plight of the Romeikes is a sign of the times. Many Americans are likely unaware that the public schools in this country were founded on a similar vision. This is especially true in the late nineteenth century and throughout the twentieth. Public school advocates preached a message of cultural disaster if children were not raised in a common culture. Concern over the assimilation of immigrant children fueled the sense of crisis, but more was at stake. John Dewey, one of the most influential figures in the development of the public school ideal, explicitly argued that children should be educated in public schools so that the schools could help them break with the traditions and perspectives of their parents.

That is exactly what propelled the rise of the homeschooling movement in America, and it is what drove the Romeikes to Morristown. Christians must recognize and contend for the right of parents to determine the education of their own children. Otherwise, we subvert both parental authority and parental responsibility. The Romeikes are determined to educate their children according to their Christian convictions, and to do so through homeschooling. Not all Christian parents will make the same choice, but all Christian parents do share the same responsibility to raise their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. On this ground, all Christians should contend for the right to make the decision the Romeikes made. Otherwise, we quietly accept conditions for the forced indoctrination of our own children.

Time will tell if Judge Burman’s decision stands. In the meantime, Uwe and Hannelore Romeike are busy living their lives and teaching their children in Morristown, Tennessee. May God bless them as they do.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Campbell Robertson, “Judge in Memphis Grants Asylum to German Home Schoolers,” The New York Times, Monday, March 1, 2010.

Tristana Moore, “Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses Yearning to Homeschool,” TIME Magazine, cover date March 8, 2010.

This was written at 33,000 feet over the southwestern United States. Cheers for wireless availability on passenger aircraft.

We know all this thanks to an article by Charlotte Hays, whose writings are always thoughtful and perceptive. She serves as editor of a very interesting journal, In Character, but this article was published in Friday’s edition of The Wall Street Journal. In “The Beginning of the Reformation’s End?,” she fires a salvo at mainline Protestantism.

She writes of a Washington gathering of “ex-Episcopalians, curious Catholics, and a smattering of earnest Episcopal priests in clerical collars” who were drawn to an Evensong and Benediction service sung according to the Book of Divine Worship, which Hays describes as “an Anglican use liturgical book still being prepared in Rome.” In the main, it follows the order and language set down by Thomas Cranmer almost 500 years ago.

Confused yet? The phrase “Anglican use” refers to a limited allowance for Roman Catholics to use a revised version of the Anglican liturgy in Catholic worship. The idea has taken on a new urgency with Pope Benedict XVI’s declaration of the Apostolic Constitution known as Anglicanorum coetibus, handed down back in November. As Hays rightly explains, this papal allowance “provides for former Anglicans to come into the Catholic Church as a group and retain certain of their traditions.”

Significantly, Anglican priests undergoing conversion to Catholicism under this constitution may retain their wives, but if their wife should subsequently die, the priest may not remarry. Priests who convert to Catholicism are “every bit as much priests as other Catholic priests,” she insists, even though married priests will not be eligible to serve as bishop. There will be an “ordinariate” (much like a diocese) that will oversee Episcopalian members, priests, and congregations that convert.

The Pope’s outreach to Anglicans did not go without protest from Anglican leaders, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. Nevertheless, there is more here than Catholic opportunism. The Pope is reaching out to Anglicans who are outraged by the liberalism within their communion. The election of an openly-homosexual bishop in 2003 was the last straw for many Episcopalians. The election of a second openly-gay bishop in recent weeks will add insult to injury.

Rev. Bergman sees even more. As Charlotte Hays reports:

But Father Bergman not only predicts a mass movement toward Rome. He believes Anglican Use may mark the beginning of the end of the Reformation. There will be “a flourishing of this throughout the world,” he says. “Wherever there are Anglicans, there will be people who want to enter Holy Mother Church.” As he told a rapt audience at St. Mary’s, “If we look at histories, heresies run themselves out after about 500 years. I believe we are seeing the last gasp of the Reformation in the mainline Protestant groups.”

The beginning of the end of the Reformation? Rev. Bergman sees the 60 people gathered for Evensong and Benediction as a sign that the Reformation is over. He describes the Reformation as a movement of “heresies” and then suggests, quite creatively, that “heresies run themselves out after about 500 years.” Thus, he now sees “the last gasp of the Reformation in the mainline Protestant groups.”

In all honesty, I have to give him his due on that last argument. A look around mainline Protestantism will provide ample evidence of “the last gasp of the Reformation” within many churches and denominations founded and grounded in the faith of the Reformers.

The Episcopal Church seems determined to commit ecclesiastical suicide, electing homosexual bishops, looking the other way when same-sex unions are blessed, and generally allowing just about any heresy to find a voice and a constituency — often among its bishops. Those looking for evidence of theological disaster need look no further than the Rt. Rev. John Shelby Spong, the retired bishop of Newark, New Jersey. Spong has denied every conceivable Christian doctrine, leaving Christianity itself beyond its “last gasp” in his reconstruction.

The mainline Lutheran denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America [ELCA] voted this past summer to distort Martin Luther’s affirmation of his conscience “bound by the Word of God” to allow for its ministers to deny clear teachings of Scripture and requirements of the creeds. The denomination now allows for the service of openly-homosexual and “partnered” clergy and same-sex blessings.

The largest Presbyterian denomination, the Presbyterian Church, USA [PCUSA] has debated the same issues for years now, even as it has discussed allowing its clergy to replace references to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit with metaphors like “Rainbow, Ark and Dove,” “Speaker, Word and Breath,” “Overflowing Font, Living Water and Flowing River,” “Compassionate Mother, Beloved Child and Life-Giving Womb,” “Sun, Light and Burning Ray,” “Giver, Gift and Giving,” “Lover, Beloved and Love,” “Rock, Cornerstone and Temple,” and “Fire that Consumes, Sword that Divides and Storm that Melts Mountains.”

Several other denominations with Reformation roots have followed similar courses or have merged within new denominational forms that allow for much the same. The bottom line is that there is no shortage of evidence to support Rev. Bergman’s argument that “the last gasp of the Reformation” can be seen in many quarters.

Nevertheless, it is hard to imagine liberal Lutherans, Presbyterians, or members of the United Church of Christ converting to Catholicism. The same holds true, of course, for liberal Episcopalians in the United States or liberal Anglicans worldwide. Rev. Bergman knows this, but he sees the promise of more conservative Protestants giving up on their churches, giving up their Reformation convictions, and coming home to Rome.

With the zeal of a convert, Rev. Bergman calls the convictions of the Reformation “heresies.” While I hold these doctrines to be the very Gospel of Christ, I do understand and appreciate Rev. Bergman’s honesty. Evidently, he has read the anathemas from the Council of Trent.

The central doctrine of the Reformation is this — justification by faith alone. Angry and disenchanted Episcopalians may seek refuge from their denomination’s apostasy, but if they “cross the Tiber” they deny the central doctrine of the Reformation and take the position that it is heresy.

In other words, the exodus of any number of Episcopalians — whether it be large or small — will not point to the end of the Reformation, or even to what Charlotte Hays describes as “the beginning of the end of the Reformation.” Instead, it will point to the urgent need for genuine reformation in the churches that once claimed Reformation faith.

The Reformation was fed and led by those who affirmed, with Luther, that justification by faith alone is “the article by which the church stands or falls.”  Thus, those who go “home to Rome” are repudiating the core of the Reformation. This is about far more than homosexual bishops and wacky metaphors for the Trinity.

The Reformation may be on its “last gasp” in the liberal churches of mainline Protestantism, but thankfully not everywhere. If Rev. Bergman gets out much he is more likely to find a generation of young evangelicals who are embracing with fervor and commitment the very doctrines he sees as heresies on their last gasp.

Short of a major act of God, mainline Protestantism will continue its slide into apostasy and irrelevance. Pope Benedict is likely to find more than a few Catholic-leaning Anglicans who are exhausted by Anglican travails and ready to cross over to Rome.

But is the Reformation on its last gasp? Not where the Gospel is prized and preached.  Not where a repudiation of justification by faith alone is known to be a repudiation of the Gospel itself — and to be a heresy that has lasted far more than 500 years.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Charlotte Hays, “The Beginning of the Reformation’s End?,” The Wall Street Journal, Friday, February 26, 2010.

The portrait of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer is by an unknown artist of the 16th century.

In the case of so-called “no-fault” divorce, however, legislators and governors should have been able to know a disaster when they saw one, but they didn’t. State after state began adopting “no-fault” measures in answer to demands that divorce be made “more humane.”

By the middle of the 1970s, the battle was largely over. States adopted no-fault divorce laws citing various rationales, including the unclogging of courts burdened with contested divorce proceedings. No-fault laws enabled one spouse to seek a divorce, acting unilaterally. These statutes only required that one spouse declare the marriage irretrievably broken.

Previous to this, divorce was considered a matter of far greater social importance and common concern. Marriage was considered the bedrock institution of society and divorce was seen as a subversion of society, as well as the breakup of a marriage. Under this system, divorces required legal cause — some ground recognized in law as constituting an adequate reason for the dissolution of a marriage. A spouse could fight the divorce and contest the grounds offered by the spouse who sued for divorce.

Under no-fault divorce, no ground is necessary. By definition, there is no fault ascribed to either spouse — fault is no longer considered to be of legal or societal importance.

Demanded by those who claimed that no-fault divorce would be more humane, the laws actually allowed two very different (but entirely foreseeable) results, and both are disastrous. The first is the fact that no-fault divorce has allowed millions of men to abandon their families and leave their children and former wives to poverty. The statistics are clear enough — men who divorce their wives and no longer live with their children generally improve their standard of living over the next few years. The family left behind generally has the opposite experience, with children and former wives living at significantly reduced income levels.

The second result is almost the opposite of the first. No-fault divorce has also allowed women to end the marriage unilaterally, usually retaining primary custodial authority over the children. In such situations, men — who are not even charged with any fault by their wives — can find themselves robbed of their own children. No state has yet remedied the unjust assault on fatherhood that no-fault divorce set loose.

In times past, contested divorces may have clogged the courts and entailed acrimony, but can anyone really justify the pain and emotional carnage caused by no-fault divorce laws? Add to these ills the continued cultural subversion of marriage aided and abetted by no-fault divorce. One other angle on this tragedy is often missed — an entire industry has grown up around divorce, with divorces proving very lucrative for many attorneys and legal professionals.

All that is what makes a legislative move in Michigan so interesting. State Senator Michelle McManus has emerged as the sole sponsor of a bill that would repeal no-fault divorce in that state.

As Eartha Jane Melzer of The Michigan Messenger explains, “Since 1972 Michigan’s ‘no fault’ divorce law has required only that one spouse say ‘there has been a breakdown of the marriage relationship to the extent that the objects of matrimony have been destroyed and there remains no reasonable likelihood that the marriage can be preserved.’”

Under McManus’s proposal, specific grounds would have to be both alleged and proved in order for a divorce to be granted.

As expected, many divorce lawyers adamantly oppose the move. Michael A. Robbins, president of the Michigan Chapter of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, said: “You can’t legislate morality and you can’t force people to stay together if they don’t want to stay together.” Of course, that statement ignores the fact that no-fault laws also “legislate morality” — just in the form of a moral undermining of marriage as an institution. As a matter of fact, most laws are passed for the expressed purpose of “legislating morality.”

Henry Gornbein, former chairperson of the Family Law Council of the State Bar of Michigan, told the paper that the McManus legislation “would be an unmitigated disaster,” adding: “If one party wants out there is a breakdown.”

No-fault divorce laws put the entire society at fault for weakening and injuring the most basic institution of human life and culture. There is plenty of fault to go around on this one.

Observers of Michigan politics argue that Michelle McManus’s bill has little hope of passage. She is running for the office of Michigan’s Secretary of State, and one defender of no-fault divorce simply charged her with pandering to voters.

That seems unlikely. There simply is not enough public opposition to no-fault statutes as yet. If anything, Michelle McManus’s proposed bill may be a sign that a public debate on the effects of no-fault divorce might be taking shape. If so, this can only be for good. Let’s hope that this bill sends the message that at least one state might muster the courage to rethink no-fault divorce.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Eartha Jane Melzer, “McManus Pushes to End No-Fault Divorce,” The Michigan Messenger, Monday, February 22, 2010.

Darrell Dawsey, “A War on Divorce?,” The Detroit Blog, Time.com, posted Wednesday, February 24, 2010.

She refers, of course, to Augustine, the great bishop of Hippo in Africa and greatest among the theologians of the early church. In his Confessions, Augustine (who had been involved in considerable sin and debauchery prior to his adult conversion to Christianity) set the stage and example for the public confession of wrongdoing. Remarkably, Augustine wrote not only of what wrongs he had done, but also of why he believed he had committed such sinful acts. Theology is mixed with psychology.

The public confession made by Tiger Woods and watched by millions of viewers last Friday was, in the main, much like the confessions made by others, ranging from former President Bill Clinton to evangelist Jimmy Swaggart. Woods was clear in making his public admission of wrongdoing, and he spoke directly and candidly of his personal responsibility.

“The issue involved here was my repeated irresponsible behavior,” he said. “I was unfaithful. I had affairs. I cheated. What I did is not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame.”

Those are not evasive statements. Woods was forthright and he used the right words. He did not speak of adultery, but he left no doubt about his numerous adulterous affairs.

He added:

I stopped living by the core values that I was taught to believe in. I knew my actions were wrong, but I convinced myself that normal rules didn’t apply. I never thought about who I was hurting. Instead, I thought only about myself. I ran straight through the boundaries that a married couple should live by. I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to. I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled. Thanks to money and fame, I didn’t have to go far to find them.

I was wrong. I was foolish. I don’t get to play by different rules. The same boundaries that apply to everyone apply to me. I brought this shame on myself. I hurt my wife, my kids, my mother, my wife’s family, my friends, my foundation, and kids all around the world who admired me.

This section of his statement takes a form familiar to anyone who knows recovery programs and the therapeutic language of the recovery movement. He takes responsibility and restates the rules he admits he has broken, along with the resultant pain and harm. Once again, the language is both clear and recognizable. He spoke of his time in “therapy” and of his return “for more treatment and more therapy.” Therapy, we are to understand, promises healing and recovery.

Then, Tiger Woods added these words:

I have a lot of work to do, and I intend to dedicate myself to doing it. Part of following this path for me is Buddhism, which my mother taught me at a young age. People probably don’t realize it, but I was raised a Buddhist, and I actively practiced my faith from childhood until I drifted away from it in recent years. Buddhism teaches that a craving for things outside ourselves causes an unhappy and pointless search for security. It teaches me to stop following every impulse and to learn restraint. Obviously I lost track of what I was taught.

With these words, Woods publicly reclaimed his Buddhist identity, having been raised in the philosophy of Thai Buddhism by his mother. The two key sentences are these: “Buddhism teaches that a craving for things outside ourselves causes an unhappy and pointless search for security. It teaches me to stop following every impulse and to learn restraint.”

As Professor Stephen Prothero of Boston University affirmed, this is an accurate distillation of Buddhist beliefs. In his words: “In an elegant distillation of the Buddha’s dharma (teaching), Woods said, “Buddhism teaches that a craving for things outside ourselves causes an unhappy and pointless search for security.” Here he is obviously describing his craving for sexual encounters with beautiful women. But he is also describing our collective obsession with the next new thing.”

Indeed, Buddhism teaches the aim of emptying the self of all desire. As Prothero observes, “Buddhists observe that suffering arises from a 12-fold chain of interlocking causes and effects. Among these causes is craving. We crave this woman or that car because we think that getting her or it will make us happy. But this craving only ties us into an unending cycle of misery, because even if we get what we want there is always something more to crave — another woman or another man, a faster car or a bigger house.”

Professor Prothero points to the statement by Tiger Woods as distinctive from previous apologies specifically because Woods cited a Buddhist rationale, rather than a Christian logic. Prothero sees this as evidence of America’s religious diversity and of the need for religious literacy in order to understand each other.

From an Evangelical perspective, the statement by Tiger Woods points to the radical distinction between Christianity and Buddhism — between the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the dharma of the Buddha.

Christianity speaks honestly of desire and affirms that wrongful desires can and do lead to sin, destruction, and death. Nevertheless, Christianity does not teach that all desire is wrong. Indeed, the Bible affirms that God made us to desire Him. Even in our sinful state, something within us cries out for our need — and desire — for divine forgiveness and redemption.

Christianity does not teach that we should (or could) empty ourselves of all desire, but rather that we should desire the salvation that Christ alone has accomplished for us — the salvation that leads to divine forgiveness and the restoration of relationship we should surely desire. Once we know that salvation, our desire for God is only increased and pointed to eternity.

Tiger Woods made a remarkable statement of confession. Even as it was couched in the language of the recovery movement and coached by public relation professionals, it should be taken at face value. But the most remarkable aspect of his confession is its Buddhist shape. American Christians should look at those words with care.

A Christian looking at those words sees just how distant they are from the Gospel. The distinction between the Christian and Buddhist worldviews is laid bare for all to see. Tiger Woods should be taken at his word when he grounds his apology and confession in Buddhism. Evangelical Christians should see this as further reason to pray for Tiger Woods. We should respect the integrity and honesty of his statement, but hope and pray that he will one day come to know the salvation and forgiveness of sin that comes only through faith in Christ. We believe that he will not find salvation in renouncing all desire. We would hope instead that he might hear the Gospel and desire Christ.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

“Transcript: Tiger Woods’ Statement,” USA Today, posted Friday, February 19, 2010. http://www.usatoday.com/sports/golf/pga/2010-02-19-tiger-woods-transcript_N.htm

Stephen Prothero, “A Buddhist Moment in America,” USA Today, Monday, February 22, 2010. http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2010/02/column-a-buddhist-moment-in-america.html#more

Susan Wise Bauer, The Art of the Public Grovel, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008).

]]> http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/02/22/newsnote-tiger-woods-buddhist-confession/feed/ Albert Mohler Americans are accustomed to a certain kind of public confession, argues Susan Wise Bauer — and that means a confession that is shaped by the Christian faith. Indeed, in her seminal book, The Art of the Public Grovel, Bauer argues that Americans are actually accustomed to a public confession that she describes as Augustinian. She refers, [...] 00:6:27 Blog,Audio http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/02/22/newsnote-tiger-woods-buddhist-confession/http://www.sbts.edu/media/audio/blog/20100222.mp3 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/AlbertMohlersBlog/~3/0E_FfdvTTqs/ http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/02/19/falling-on-deaf-ears-why-so-many-churches-hear-so-little-of-the-bible/#comments Fri, 19 Feb 2010 12:32:29 +0000 Albert Mohler http://www.albertmohler.com/?p=11632 “It is well and good for the preacher to base his sermon on the Bible, but he better get to something relevant pretty quickly, or we start mentally to check out.” That stunningly clear sentence reflects one of the most amazing, tragic, and lamentable characteristics of contemporary Christianity — an impatience with the Word of God.

The sentence above comes from Mark Galli, senior managing editor of Christianity Today in an essay entitled “Yawning at the Word.” In just a few hundred words, he captures the tragedy of a church increasingly impatient with and resistant to the reading and preaching of the Bible. We may wince when we read him relate his recent experiences, but we also recognize the ring of truth.

Galli was told to cut down on the biblical references in his sermon. “You’ll lose people,” the staff member warned. In a Bible study session on creation, the teacher was requested to come back the next Sunday prepared to take questions at the expense of reading the relevant scriptural texts on the doctrine. Cutting down on the number of Bible verses “would save time and, it was strongly implied, would better hold people’s interest.”

As Galli reflected, “Anyone who’s been in the preaching and teaching business knows these are not isolated examples but represent the larger reality.”

Indeed, in many churches there is very little reading of the Bible in worship, and sermons are marked by attention to the congregation’s concerns - not by an adequate attention to the biblical text. The exposition of the Bible has given way to the concerns, real or perceived, of the listeners. The authority of the Bible is swallowed up in the imposed authority of congregational concerns.

As Mark Galli notes:

It has been said to the point of boredom that we live in a narcissistic age, where we are wont to fixate on our needs, our wants, our wishes, and our hopes—at the expense of others and certainly at the expense of God. We do not like it when a teacher uses up the whole class time presenting her material, even if it is material from the Word of God. We want to be able to ask our questions about our concerns, otherwise we feel talked down to, or we feel the class is not relevant to our lives.

It is well and good for the preacher to base his sermon on the Bible, but he better get to something relevant pretty quickly, or we start mentally to check out. Don’t spend a lot of time in the Bible, we tell our preachers, but be sure to get to personal illustrations, examples from daily life, and most importantly, an application that we can use.

The fixation on our own sense of need and interest looms as the most significant factor in this marginalization and silencing of the Word. Individually, each human being in the room is an amalgam of wants, needs, intuitions, interests, and distractions. Corporately, the congregation is a mass of expectations, desperate hopes, consuming fears, and impatient urges. All of this adds up, unless countered by the authentic reading and preaching of the Word of God, to a form of group therapy, entertainment, and wasted time — if not worse.

Galli has this situation clearly in his sights when he asserts that many congregations expect the preacher to start from some text in the Bible, but then quickly move on “to things that really interest us.” Like . . . ourselves?

One of the earliest examples of what we would call the preaching of the Bible may well be found in Nehemiah 8:1-8:

And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel. So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they had made for the purpose. And beside him stood Mattithiah, Shema, Anaiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Maaseiah on his right hand, and Pedaiah, Mishael, Malchijah, Hashum, Hashbaddanah, Zechariah, and Meshullam on his left hand. And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it all the people stood. And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen, Amen,” lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord. Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading with their faces to the ground. [English Standard Version]

Ezra and his companions stood on a platform before the congregation. They read the scriptural text clearly, and then explained the meaning of the Scripture to the people. The congregation received the Word humbly, while standing. The pattern is profoundly easy to understand — the Bible was read and explained and received.

As Hughes Oliphant Old comments, “This account of the reading of the Law indicates that already at the time of the writing of this text there was a considerable amount of ceremonial framing of the public reading of Scripture. This ceremonial framing is a witness to the authority of the Bible.” The reading and exposition took place in a context of worship as the people listened to the Word of God. The point of the sermon was simple — “to make clear the reading of the Scriptures.”

In many churches, there is almost no public reading of the Word of God. Worship is filled with music, but congregations seem disinterested in listening to the reading of the Bible. We are called to sing in worship, but the congregation cannot live only on the portions of Scripture that are woven into songs and hymns. Christians need the ministry of the Word as the Bible is read before the congregation and God’s people — young and old, rich and poor, married and unmarried, sick and well — hear it together. The sermon is to consist of the exposition of the Word of God, powerfully and faithfully read, explained, and applied. It is not enough that the sermon take a biblical text as its starting point.

How can so many of today’s churches demonstrate what can only be described as an impatience with the Word of God? The biblical formula is clear — the neglect of the Word can only lead to disaster, disobedience, and death. God rescues his church from error, preserves his church in truth, and propels his church in witness only by his Word — not by congregational self-study.

In the end, an impatience with the Word of God can be explained only by an impatience with God. We — both individually and congregationally — neglect God’s Word to our own ruin.

As Jesus himself declared, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

__________________________________

Mark Galli, “Yawning at the Word,” Christianity Today [online edition], posted November 5, 2009. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/novemberweb-only/144-41.0.html

Hughes Oliphant Old, The Reading and Preaching of the Scriptures in the Worship of the Christian Church, vol. 1, “The Biblical Period” (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), pp. 98-99.

Thankfully, Amber’s father changed his mind. The couple is now happily married, and David has told the whole world about it in an op-ed column for The Wall Street Journal. In the column, he deals head-on with objections to young marriage.

He writes, “As college-educated, professionally aspiring young adults in New York, my wife and I were bucking the prevailing social script by marrying in our early 20s.” Indeed, the average age for first marriage for young men is now 28, and for women it is now 26. That reflects a significant change in the way Americans live, love, and marry. We now have the twin phenomena of delayed adulthood and extended adolescence. Young Americans, by and large, are not waiting for sex . . . but they are putting marriage off into a distant future.

As David Lapp reports, some social scientists argue that “early marriage” is a leading cause of marital breakup and divorce. Lapp puts that argument to flight with his point that the early marriages that fail are often teenage marriages.

In his words:

First, let’s take a closer look at that term “early marriage.” While it’s true that teenage marriages are a significant predictor of divorce, it turns out that marriages of people in their early to mid-20s are not nearly as much at risk. According to a 2002 report from the Centers for Disease Control, 48% of people who enter marriage when under age 18, and 40% of 18- and 19-year-olds, will eventually divorce. But only 29% of those who get married at age 20 to 24 will eventually divorce—very similar to the 24% of the 25-and-older cohort. In fact, Hispanics who marry between the ages of 20 and 24 actually have a greater likelihood of marital success (31% chance of divorce) than those who first marry at age 25 and older (36% chance of divorce).

Add to this the fact that other studies indicate that couples who marry between the ages of 22 and 25 “went on to experience the happiest marriages.” You don’t hear about that on “Oprah.”

Some parents object to early marriage because of financial concerns, but Lapp observes that marriage tends to produce thrift. As he explains, “Knowing that my spending and savings habits affect not just me but also my wife and future family, I’m more likely to set a budget, pack a lunch, and put some money in savings instead of buying that new iPhone. The upshot is that my wife and I are able to pay off our college debt more quickly than we could by ourselves.”

Among the young, the leading objection to early marriage is probably the fact that marriage, by definition, creates boundaries to individual autonomy. Lapp cites psychologist Jeffrey Jensen, who has argued that many young adults fear marriage because it will limit or inhibit their “identity exploration” and “self-focused development.”

Lapp is not opposed to exploration and fulfillment; he just thinks that marriage is a better way to get there and to enjoy the experience. “As focused as we young adults are on self-development, what if the path to that development is actually learning to live with and love another person?,” he asks. “We may be startled to find that the greatest adventure lies not in knowing oneself as much as in knowing and committing to another person.”

He adds, “Instead of trekking to Africa or exploring Rome alone, why not marry the person of your dreams and take him or her along?”

My wife, Mary, and I married young — just a year older than David and Amber Lapp. We built our adult lives together, “emerged” into the experience of adulthood together, and have never looked back. We started with very little money, but that was considered normal for young couples in our day. Our first home was a very small furnished apartment. I rented the apartment before Mary saw it. When she asked where the kitchen was I sheepishly opened two slender folding doors. That was it. We started our financial lives together, developed our adult friends together, studied abroad on a wing and a prayer (and student rail passes), and dreamed big dreams. Looking back, we would not trade those years for anything.

The delay of marriage is a huge problem, and Christians should be in the forefront of seeing and understanding the problem — and countering the arguments against early marriage. Churches and parents need to ask why we are not getting young adults ready for marriage. Abdication to the “hooking up” culture of young adulthood is just not an option.

David Lapp writes with heartwarming sincerity and eagerness. This is a young man who is glad to be married — and glad to tell us all about it. The conclusion to his essay is priceless:

Did I get married too young? I may not have the freedom to globetrot at my own leisure or to carouse at a bar late into the night. But when I step into our 500-square-foot one-bedroom apartment, warmly lighted and smelling of fresh flowers and baked bread, I do have the freedom to kiss my beautiful wife and best friend—the woman I pledged to always love and cherish, and to raise a family with. I have no regrets.

Best wishes to David and Amber Lapp. May they know all the joys of marriage, and keep themselves only to each other for the rest of their lives. Here’s hoping that their story is increasingly shared by a generation of young Christians ready to follow their example.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

David Lapp, “Did I Get Married Too Young?,” The Wall Street Journal, February 11, 2010.

Nevertheless, that opening sentence about it not taking “a degree from Harvard” to see all this is filled with intentional irony, for Lisa Miller is taking Harvard University to task for its “crisis of faith” — which amounts to a crisis in its curriculum for undergraduates. As Miller explains, “the Harvard faculty cannot cope with religion.”

As she looks around the globe, Miller sees religion as a driving force of world events. In her words:

The conflicts between the Israelis and the Palestinians; between Christians, Muslims, and animists in Africa; between religious conservatives and progressives at home over abortion and gay marriage—all these relate, if indirectly, to what rival groups believe about God and scripture. Any resolution of these conflicts will have to come from people who understand how religious belief and practice influence our world: why, in particular, believers see some things as worth fighting and dying for.

But a 2006 proposal to require Harvard undergraduates to take at least one course in religion was flattened by faculty opposition. In that year, Harvard was considering a revised curriculum for undergraduates. Louis Menand, an influential English professor, and Steven Pinker, a well-known evolutionary psychologist, locked horns in a battle that went public, but ended with no religion requirement. Pinker argued that the modern university should be a completely secular space, where reason, and not faith, was the only legitimate concern.

Miller explains:

In the end, Menand & Co. backed down, and the matter never made it to a vote. A more brutal fight was put off for another day. But that’s a pity—for Harvard, its students, and the rest of us who need leaders better informed about faith and the motivations of the faithful. Harvard may or may not be the pinnacle of higher learning in the world, but because it is Harvard, it reflects—for better or worse—the priorities of the nation’s intellectual set. To decline to grapple head-on with the role of religion in a liberal-arts education, even as debates over faith and reason rage on blogs, and as publishers churn out books defending and attacking religious belief, is at best timid and at worst self-defeating.

In the midst of that fight, Pinker wrote a column for The Harvard Crimson that roiled the waters at Harvard. In that column he chided Menand and other colleagues for even contemplating a “faith and reason” component of a Harvard undergraduate education. First, he suggested that “faith” is just a code-word for religion. Then, he added:

Second, the juxtaposition of the two words makes it sound like “faith” and “reason” are parallel and equivalent ways of knowing, and we have to help students navigate between them. But universities are about reason, pure and simple. Faith—believing something without good reasons to do so—has no place in anything but a religious institution, and our society has no shortage of these. Imagine if we had a requirement for “Astronomy and Astrology” or “Psychology and Parapsychology.” It may be true that more people are knowledgeable about astrology than about astronomy, and it may be true that astrology deserves study as a significant historical and sociological phenomenon. But it would be a terrible mistake to juxtapose it with astronomy, if only for the false appearance of symmetry.

In other words, even the use of “faith and reason” is illegitimate for Harvard (or for any other university) because faith has no place at all in the secular space of modern academia.

Miller recognizes the awkwardness of this claim, given Harvard’s history. “Harvard’s distaste for engaging with religion as an academic subject is particularly ironic, given that it was founded in 1636 as a training ground for Christian ministers,” Miller notes.  “According to the office of the president, Veritas was only officially adopted as its motto in 1843; until then it had been Christo et Ecclesiae (”For Christ and the Church”).”

She also notes that other major universities, including schools such as the University of Texas, Arizona State, and Indiana University, do include religion in the undergraduate curriculum and enroll a considerable number of majors.

Peter Gomes, Harvard’s chaplain, told Miller, “My colleagues fear that taking religion seriously would undermine everything a great university stands for . . . . I think that’s unfounded, but there it is.”

The secularization of the modern university is one of the most significant intellectual developments of the past century. The most elite institutions of higher education have, by and large, been the most ardent secularizers. Many of these, like Harvard, were established on explicitly Christian beliefs and for the purpose of educating future ministers. To professors like Steven Pinker, this is an embarrassment.

Pinker’s evolutionary psychology, well documented in his many writings, is one of the most reductionistic models of thought to be found. He reduces the human being and all human experience to the merely physical — everything experienced or imagined by the human being is nothing more than the work of biochemicals and physical entities that emerged out of the evolutionary process. Nevertheless, Pinker’s insistence on keeping Harvard free of any noteworthy study of religion at the undergraduate level prevailed.

Lisa Miller is perplexed by the Harvard faculty’s “anxiety about religion.” She is rightly distressed that students “can graduate from Harvard without having to grapple directly with questions about a world in which people define themselves and their histories according to their views of God.” Idolizing reason, the university has become unreasonable.

By now, evangelical Christians are well aware of the secularization of modern academia. Nevertheless, the secular extremism of faculty members like Steven Pinker — who won the battle at Harvard, after all — is unknown to many outside the modern university.

Lisa Miller is right to call this ideological secularism “unreasonable.” It is more than that, of course. It is a clear and undeniable example of what might best be described as secular fundamentalism.

___________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Lisa Miller, “Harvard’s Crisis of Faith,” Newsweek, February 11, 2010 (published in the February 22, 2010 edition of the magazine).

Steven Pinker, “Less Faith, More Reason,” The Harvard Crimson, October 27, 2006.

As a Religion Dispatches press release about the report explains, “While conservative pastors preach against homosexuality, pre-marital sex, and abortion, in the nation’s more progressive pulpits, church leaders offer little or no guidance regarding human sexuality, leaving their flock without spiritual guidance as they grapple with these often wrenching issues in their private lives.”

So, when this group calls for more talk and teaching about sex in the churches, it has in mind a very specific message. In 2000 the Religious Institute issued a “Religious Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing.” As the group explains, that document “urged religious leaders and faith communities to promote comprehensive sexuality education, sexual and reproductive health, and the full inclusion of women and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons in religious communities and society at large.”

Looking back over the last decade, the Institute marks gains. They point to a growing acceptance of homosexuality in the mainline Protestant denominations and count 3,300 churches as “welcoming congregations” that advocate the full inclusion of lesbian and gay persons. As evidence of how the sexuality issues have evolved in the larger society, this new report points to the fact that the 2000 declaration did not even call for same-sex marriage (just the blessing of same-sex unions) and did not use the word “transgender.” Both of these are now included in a revised edition of the declaration.

The approach taken by the Religious Institute reflects in good measure the status of these questions within many of the mainline Protestant denominations, which have for decades now been almost consumed with debates over sexuality. In recent months, both the Episcopal Church USA and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have adopted more liberal positions on the ordination of openly-homosexual ministers and the blessings of same-sex unions.

Liberal theologians and biblical scholars have offered assistance in this process, inventing new arguments that circumvent scriptural injunctions against homosexual acts and other prohibited forms of sexuality.

As the report states:

Ethicists, clergy and scholars across a range of faiths have challenged long-standing conventions and championed new religious teachings on sexuality that recognize the scientific insights and sociological realities of the modern world. Feminist, queer and liberation theologians have used the tools of historical criticism to develop new ways of reading and interpreting religious texts, and derived richer understandings of sexuality from the Bible and other sacred sources.

This is a rather candid and honest statement of what these liberal scholars have done. They have used what they claim as “scientific insights and sociological realities” to trump the clear teachings of the Bible on issues of sexual morality. Anyone familiar with contemporary biblical scholarship will know exactly what is going on when the report speaks of “feminist, queer and liberation theologians” using historical criticism in order to turn the Bible on its head — referred to here as developing “new ways of reading and interpreting religious texts.” What is called “historical criticism” can be used to undermine the meaning and authority of any text, but the issue here is the binding authority of the Bible within the church. While liberal scholars have done their best to subvert the Bible’s authority on these questions, most church members know better. They read the Bible and have absolutely no problem understanding its clear teachings on human sexuality.

The Religious Institute, following the lead of other advocacy movements, defines its work as seeking justice. They call for pastors to be “prophetic about the right of all adults to make responsible and ethical sexual decisions” based on a call to justice. They tie their notion of sexual justice to other social issues: “Because all injustice is rooted in oppression, religious leaders must seek to eradicate not only sexism and homophobia, but all forms of oppression that undermine equality and right relationship, including racism, poverty and economic injustice.”

The report celebrates gains made in liberal seminaries and theological schools, but calls for more intentional programs of sexuality education:

The problem is not that sexuality is not discussed. Feminist and queer theologies, coupled with social justice activism on behalf of women and sexual minorities in religious and secular life, have had a definite influence at many seminaries. Sexuality is often addressed within a framework of intersecting justice issues, such as economics, environmental concerns, racial/ethnic diversity and disability issues. But when it comes to preparing future clergy and religious professionals to deal with sexual abuse, infidelity, professional boundaries, sexual orientation and gender identity, sexual dysfunction and a host of other concerns, seminary education often is sorely lacking.

This paragraph is very revealing — offering a view into what drives so many liberal seminaries and consumes their attention. They have been influenced by “feminist and queer theologies” and by a host of other ideological perspectives. But as this report seems to admit, the people in the pews are not buying the argument — at least not in sufficient numbers.

Nevertheless, this report from the Religious Institute is directed specifically at pastors, calling for more teaching on sexuality from the pulpit. The report documents the concern that most liberal pastors, while holding to “progressive” understandings of human sexuality, just do not talk enough about sex.

Evangelical Christians will see this report as further evidence of the theological accommodationism and biblical revisionism that marks liberal Christianity — and that is an absolutely necessary judgment. This is indeed evidence of the continued subversion of biblical authority and confessional integrity that characterizes the revolt against orthodoxy in so many churches.

But evangelicals should consider our own responsibility in teaching about human sexuality. Far too many evangelical pastors teach virtually nothing about a biblical understanding of human sexuality. This leaves much of the Bible unpreached and a congregation woefully untaught. It is not enough to believe the right things about what the Bible teaches concerning sex and sexuality. It is necessary to affirm the Bible’s truthfulness and authority in every dimension it addresses, but this is not enough. Congregations are filled with people who need a word from the Lord on this matter that is so central to human identity and so ubiquitous in our culture.

Our pews are filled with people worried about their sexuality, wondering how to understand these things, struggling with same-sex attractions, tempted to stray from their marriages, enticed by internet pornography, and wondering how to bring their sexuality under submission to Christ.

The Religious Institute wants liberal preachers to talk more about sex. My guess is that they will. But what about evangelical pastors? Where is the teaching about God’s gift of sexuality and the glory of God in marriage? Where is the teaching about the Bible’s grace in telling us what is sin? Where is the acknowledgment of human brokenness? Where is the honesty about the struggle to bring all things under submission to Christ? Where is the preaching about how the Gospel lays claim on every dimension of our lives? Where is the teaching about how sex relates to sanctification and holiness?

Evangelical Christians will rightly reject just about everything found in this new report from the Religious Institute, but they should not avoid its urgency in calling pastors and Christian leaders to teach and preach about sex and sexuality. It is not enough to know the truth and believe the truth, we are called to preach and teach the whole counsel of God — and that includes all that God has to say about sex.

_________________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Jeanne Carstensen, “New Report: More Sex in the Pulpit,” Religion Dispatches, February 10, 2010.

Michelle Bearden, “Report Urges Clergy to Educate About Sex,” The Tampa Tribune, February 11, 2010.

Debra W. Haffner and Timothy Palmer, “Sexuality and Religion 2020: Goals for the Next Decade,” The Religious Institute, February 9, 2010. [pdf file]

“Religious Leaders Not Meeting Their Responsibility to Address Sexuality Needs of Congregants,” The Religious Institute, February 9, 2010.

The latest evidence for this pattern is found in a report just released by The Presbyterian Panel, a research group that serves the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) [PCUSA]. The panel’s report is presented as a “Religious and Demographic Profile of Presbyterians, 2008.” The report contains relatively few surprises, but it is filled with data about the beliefs of Presbyterian laypersons and clergy.

A majority of church members, pastors, elders, and specialized clergy describe themselves as moderate, liberal, or very liberal in theological outlook. Less than half of church members (44%) and elders (48%) report a conversion experience. Interestingly, ministers were not asked that question.

In general terms, elders were slightly more conservative in belief than other church members. Female pastors were significantly more likely (51%) than male pastors (23%) to identify themselves as liberal or very liberal. Among other ministers (identified as “specialized clergy”), 62% of females identified themselves as liberal or very liberal, compared to 45% of males.

Majorities of all groups indicated agreement with the statement, “There is life beyond death.” But the most significant theological question concerned the exclusivity of the Gospel and the necessity of belief in Jesus Christ for salvation. On that question there was great division, with over a third (36%) of PCUSA church members indicating that they “disagree” or “strongly disagree” with the statement that “only followers of Jesus Christ can be saved.”

Among ministers, the division is even more apparent, with 45% of pastors disagreeing with that statement and fully 60% of specialized clergy disagreeing. Roughly 20% of both pastors and specialized clergy reported themselves “neutral or unsure” about the question.

Only 43% of church members disagreed or strongly disagreed with the claim that “all the world’s religions are equally good ways of helping a person find ultimate truth.”

This is a church that has lost its confidence in the Gospel in terms of the clear biblical claim that salvation comes only through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. This latest report confirms the continued abandonment of the Gospel in an increasingly secularized denomination.

Liberal Protestantism — institutionalized in the old Protestant “mainline” denominations — has been following a path of theological accommodation for a century now, and there appears to be little hope for a major theological correction. Renewal groups have been working within these churches for decades, attempting to call the denominations back to biblical Christianity. To date, they have won only isolated battles in most of these churches.

As Reeves explains:

“And so the mainline churches wane — disheartened, aging, increasingly irrelevant, all too often satisfied to serve as a sort of sanctimonious echo of National Public Radio or the left wing of the Democratic Party. For a variety of reasons, many liberal Protestants, especially church leaders, have endorsed a view of reality and a way of life that have helped produce a society that is breaking up. And they have become part of the problem.”

But this report points to the most devastating reality among these churches — the loss of faith and doctrinal conviction among church members. Theological compromise appeared first among the pastors, theologians, church executives, and seminary professors. Denominational bureaucracies again and again prove themselves resistant to correction. For years, the hope had been that laypersons — the church members themselves — would force a correction and lead a return to evangelical conviction.

This report indicates just how distant that hope now appears, largely because the church members themselves have adopted liberal beliefs.

Back in 1994, a team of sociologists considered this phenomenon, looking particularly at the Baby Boomers in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Dean R. Hoge, Benton Johnson, and Donald A. Luidens published their findings in Vanishing Boundaries: The Religion of Protestant Baby Boomers. They identified the phenomenon of “lay liberalism” in the PCUSA and throughout liberal Protestantism.

As they explained, “This perspective is ‘liberal’ because its defining feature is a rejection of the orthodox teaching that Christianity is the only true religion. Lay liberals have a high regard for Jesus, but they do not affirm that He is God’s only son and that salvation is available only through Him.”

The title of their report points to the quandary of liberal Protestantism. As the boundaries between liberal Protestantism and the secular culture vanish, there is little reason for anyone to join one of these churches.

That report explained that “lay liberals who are active Presbyterians do not differ sharply in their religious views from the people who are not involved in a church but describe themselves as religious. There is, in short, no clear-cut ‘faith boundary’ separating active Presbyterians from those who no longer go to church.” The researchers also repeated their point that the defining mark of “lay liberalism” is “the rejection of the claim that Christianity, or any other faith, is the only true religion.”

This abandonment of biblical Christianity is a tragedy of the first order. Churches and denominations birthed in biblical orthodoxy have been ransacked and secularized. The crisis has migrated from the pulpits to the pews, and recovery is only a dim and distant hope.

Evangelicals should consider this tragedy with humility and theological perception. If similar trends are allowed to gain traction among evangelical churches and denominations, the same fate awaits. The larger issue here is not the continued vitality of any denomination as an end in itself, but the integrity of our witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Make no mistake — in the end, vanishing theological boundaries will amount to vanishing Christianity. This report makes that point with devastating clarity.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Dylan Lovan, “Some Presbyterians See Salvation in Non-Christian Faiths,” Associated Press, February 10, 2010.

“Religious and Demographic Profile of Presbyterians, 2008: Findings from the Initial Survey of the 2009-2011 Presbyterian Panel,” The Presbyterian Panel, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Louisville, Kentucky, 2010.

Dean R. Hoge, Benton Johnson, and Donald A. Luidens, Vanishing Boundaries: The Religion of Mainline Protestant Baby Boomers (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1994).

Thomas C. Reeves, The Empty Church: The Suicide of Liberal Christianity (New York: The Free Press, 1996).

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was formed in 1983 as the union of the Presbyterian Church in the United States and the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky. It is the largest Presbyterian denomination in the United States. More conservative Presbyterian bodies include the Evangelical Presbyterian Church [EPC] and the Presbyterian Church in America [PCA].

The report, recently released by the IPPF, gets right to the point: “Young people today have the right to be fully informed about sexuality and to have access to contraceptives and other services.” That statement, offered by Bert Koenders, Minister for Development Cooperation of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, is indicative of the “rights speech” that pervades the document. Citing international agreements and documents, the IPPF calls for children and teenagers, along with young adults, to be recognized as having a basic right to engage in sexual activity in virtually any form.

“Stand and Deliver: Sex, Health, and Young People in the 21st Century,” is a document that demands attention and deserves close scrutiny. Interestingly, the document estimates that the current population of young people in this age group now numbers more than 1.75 billion — the largest cohort of young people in human history. Thus, it suggests that comprehensive sexuality education must be offered to this generation immediately, or the opportunity will be lost forever. The “youth bulge” or “demographic bonus” is, the IPPF says, “a one-time opportunity.”

As the report states:

Sex and reproduction are central to our lives, this is a basic truth. Here is another: young people are sexual beings. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that sexuality education promotes individual well-being and the advancement of broader societal and public health goals. Comprehensive sexuality education is perhaps the single most important gift that parents can offer to their children — and to adolescents everywhere — as they approach the age at which they will begin to have sex.

That paragraph demands a careful analysis. No thoughtful person will deny that sex and reproduction are central to the human experience, nor that young people are sexual beings. But what this statement assumes, given the emphasis on “comprehensive sexuality education,” is that being a sexual being means having sex. The IPPC is frighteningly clear about the kind of “broader societal and public health goals” to which this document refers. These include universal access to government-funded abortion, contraceptive services, and the full acceptance of homosexuality.

“Comprehensive sexuality education” is about far more than sex and reproduction. It includes education about contraception and the entire range of human sexual possibilities. It also includes advice on how sexual intercourse and other sexual acts can be made more pleasurable. In other words, sex advice for young people ages 10 to 24.

Note also that the IPPF suggests that comprehensive sexuality education “is perhaps the single most important gift that parents can offer to their children” — a statement that says more about the authors of the document than the parents who may read it. But the statement does not just call for parents to offer comprehensive sexuality education to their own children, but “to adolescents everywhere.”

Thus, the document later asserts that “comprehensive sexuality education must be mandatory in school” and also delivered to those who do not attend school.

“Stand and Deliver” also offers direct criticism of religious opposition to the IPPF agenda. “Culture, religion, and traditions are some of the biggest obstacles in implementing sexual and reproductive health programs for young people,” it asserts. Further:

Young people’s sexuality is still contentious for many religious institutions. Fundamentalist and other religious groups — Catholic Church and madrasas (Islamic schools) for example — have imposed tremendous barriers that prevent young people, particularly, from obtaining information and services related to sex and reproduction. Currently, many religious teachings deny the pleasurable and positive aspects of sex and limited guidelines for sexual education often focus on abstinence before marriage (though evidence shows this strategy has been ineffective in many settings). The reality is, young people are sexual beings and many of them are religious we well. There is a need for pragmatism, to address life as it is and not as it might be in an ideal world.

In other words, any religious teachings that restrict sex to marriage must be abandoned in favor of a more pragmatic approach that simply assumes that young people will be sexually active. Parents — just deal with it.

So much is revealed in this document. The International Planned Parenthood Federation, like its American member association, is tied to the dark legacy of Margaret Sanger, the movement’s founder. Sanger was a radical advocate for abortion and eugenics — the movement to discourage or deny reproduction among population groups identified as “bad stock.” The Planned Parenthood movement is also a major abortion provider, making millions of dollars each year through the abortion industry.

The ideology of sexual liberation pervades this document and the group that produced it. The idea that teaching children and teenagers to save sex for marriage is treated as outdated, repressive, and unrealistic. Instead, parents are told that they must become sexual and moral pragmatists, hoping that their young offspring will enjoy sex to the fullest, while avoiding pregnancy or a sexually transmitted disease. In light of the fact that many, if not most parents refuse to follow this line, the IPPF calls for mandatory comprehensive sexuality education in the schools and wherever young people are to be found - including your children.

The International Planned Parenthood Federation does not have the institutional authority or power to make this happen unilaterally. Instead, it functions as a recognized non-governmental organization [NGO] that advises national and international governmental bodies. Do not discount that power and influence. International agreements and treaties increasingly threaten parental rights in this country and around the world.

Sexuality education is one of the most powerful tools in the arsenal of social revolution and transformation. Parents had better wake up fast and realize what is at stake. Is this the kind of sex education you want for your children? If not, we had better be ready to stand and deliver our own views on this subject, and counter the arguments found in Stand and Deliver.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

“Stand and Deliver: Sex, Health and Young People in the 21st Century,” International Planned Parenthood Federation. [pdf file]

Ed Barnes, “Planned Parenthood Pushes Intensive Sex Education for Kids as Young as 10,” Fox News, February 8, 2010.

We discussed this report on Tuesday’s edition of The Albert Mohler Program [listen here].

I discuss related issues in my recent book, Desire and Deceit: The Real Cost of the New Sexual Tolerance.

This gender gap has been growing for some time now, as successive generations of young women have entered the world of higher education. Yet, no one seemed to see a gap of this magnitude coming — until it had already happened.

The disparity of enrollment by gender varies by institution, but it is now estimated that almost 60% of all undergraduate students enrolled in American colleges and universities are women. This represents something altogether new in human experience since the rise of the university model as the dominant learning environment for young adults.  For the first time, a generation of young women will be markedly more educated than their male generational cohort.

Is this a bad thing . . . a negative development? Yes — and profoundly so. The problem is not the larger enrollment of young women in colleges and universities. The problem is the phenomenon of missing young men, whose absence spells big trouble for the future.

The numbers point to the problem, but do not explain it. Explanations for the phenomenon of missing young men point to the fact that girls outperform boys at every level in grades K-12, and are thus more ready for the college experience than the boys. Other factors include economic and cultural patterns. Among some ethnic groups, the disparity between men and women entering college is far greater than 60% to 40%. Many young men consider the educational environment to be frustrating, constricting, and overly feminized. Others have lost confidence that an undergraduate education will lead to a job with adequate income and stability. Whatever the reason, their absence makes a big difference on the college campus today — and will make an even bigger difference in the larger society in years ahead.

The New York Times offered an unusually candid portrait of this gender disparity in “The New Math on Campus,” published in its February 5, 2010 edition. Reporter Alex Williams described a radically transformed social scene on some of today’s largest and most historic state universities.

The University of North Carolina, for example:

North Carolina, with a student body that is nearly 60 percent female, is just one of many large universities that at times feel eerily like women’s colleges. Women have represented about 57 percent of enrollments at American colleges since at least 2000, according to a recent report by the American Council on Education. Researchers there cite several reasons: women tend to have higher grades; men tend to drop out in disproportionate numbers; and female enrollment skews higher among older students, low-income students, and black and Hispanic students.

Williams described a campus filled with young women who socialize with each other out of necessity — there are just not enough young men on campus. As Williams notes, this makes some college campuses resemble retirement communities, where women also generally outnumber men.

On the secular university campus, the gender imbalance has forced adjustments in the “hooking up” culture of sexual negotiation.  As Williams reports:

“If a guy is not getting what he wants, he can quickly and abruptly go to the next one, because there are so many of us,” said Katie Deray, a senior at the University of Georgia, who said that it is common to see six provocatively clad women hovering around one or two guys at a party or a bar.

This is a portrait of demographic disaster, and the imbalance is not limited to secular campuses or students. Even as women now outnumber men in baccalaureate programs, they also indicate a desire to marry a man with equal or greater educational attainments. As the numbers now make clear, many of these young women will be disappointed.

Christian parents and all concerned with the coming generation should look closely at this phenomenon and ask the hard question — why is it that so many young men are falling behind in educational attainment? What are we doing that allows or encourages boys to exit formal education at their earliest opportunity? Why do we accept at face value the fact that boys fall behind girls of the same age in maturity and educational level? Why is college now an aspiration for far more young women than young men?

These are hard questions, but the answers will be even harder. We have allowed the development of an elongated boyhood and delayed adulthood. We frustrate them in school and then wonder why they bolt at the first exit from the classroom. We allow boys and young men to forfeit their futures.

All this might be different if the missing young men on our college and university campuses were missing for some good reason — such as military service or similar deployment. But, even as young men are more likely to join the military, the numbers do not explain the differential on campus.

Biblical manhood requires that young men grow up, assume adult responsibilities, and prepare for leadership and service in the home, in the church, and in the larger society.

This much is clear — if this trend is not reversed, the college campus will not be the only place these young men are found missing.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Alex Williams, “The New Math on Campus,” The New York Times, Friday, February 5, 2010.

A crisis of fatherlessness marks the lives of millions of boys and young men, with boys growing up without fathers in the home now comprising a majority within some ethnic groups and urban populations. At almost every grade level, boys are performing below girls, and are often left behind as girls go on to more advanced levels of learning. Then, adding insult to injury, reports from scientists indicate that both sperm counts and testosterone levels are falling among some boys and men — blamed on anything from hormone supplements in the food chain to chemical contamination of ground water.

In many churches, young men and older boys are simply missing. The absence of young men ages 18 to 30 is just a fact of life in many congregations. Though this is especially acute in the mainline Protestant denominations, it is increasingly true of many evangelical churches as well.

One dimension of this problem is the difficulty of helping boys develop into manhood — a responsible, healthy, and meaningful manhood. Put simply, many of the most significant man-making institutions of our society are either gone or in big trouble. Military service is now both voluntary and no longer male-only. Organizations like the Boy Scouts attract more opposition and fewer boys. Even as the Boy Scouts of America marks the organization’s centennial this year, that proud American institution that shaped the lives of so many boys is marginalized and under attack.

Add the absence of fathers to all this and this society faces a challenge unprecedented in human history. A society cannot survive without a means of assisting boys to grow into responsible manhood. The same is true, of course, of the church — only in the church the stakes are even higher.

An enlightening (and oddly odorous) illustration of this social problem comes from The New York Times. Reporter Jan Hoffman tells of young boys now using “hypermasculine” products in order to demonstrate their masculinity and advertise their male identity — largely through the smells they put off.

Hoffman tells of Noah and Keenan Assaraf, age 13 and 14 respectively, who live near San Diego, where daily “they walk out the door in a cloud of spray-on macho,” according to their mom. The smell, she says, “drives me nuts.” Even as marketers insist the products are intended for young males ages 18 to 26, the products have now “reached into the turbulent, vulnerable world of their little brothers, ages 10 to 14.”

As Jan Hoffman explains:

Boys themselves, at a younger age, have also become increasingly self-conscious about their appearance and identity. They are trying to tame their twitching, maturing bodies, select from a growing smorgasbord of identities — goth, slacker, jock, emo — and position themselves with their texting, titillating, brand-savvy female peers, who are hitting puberty ever earlier.

And armies of researchers note that tween boys have modest disposable incomes, just fine for products that typically sell for less than $7.

“More insecurity equals more product need, equals more opportunity for marketers,” said Kit Yarrow, a professor of psychology and marketing at Golden Gate University.

Insecurity seems to be a major motivating factor. Jake Guttenberg, a New York seventh grader, told the paper he uses one of these “deodorants” because, “I feel confident when I wear it.”

Lyn Mikel Brown of Colby College was blunt in her assessment: “These are just one of many products that cultivate anxiety in boys at younger and younger ages about what it means to man up . . . to be the kind of boy they’re told girls will want and other boys will respect. They’re playing with the failure to be that kind of guy, to be heterosexual even.”

Interestingly, Hoffman reports that these products are often bought for boys by their mothers, “simply relieved that their sons are thinking about body odor.” Just about any mom will nod in agreement at this point — but where are the dads?

These boys are acting out what society is telling them — urging them to be hypermasculine, hypersexualized, hyperconsumers. You don’t have to consult with Karl Marx to be leery of the marketing of these products to preteen boys. You do not have to know these boys to be saddened that while they understandably and naturally desire to grow up into manhood, think that “masculinity in a can” is the way to get there. Their desire to identify as masculine is natural and healthy — even essential — but the lack of real support in getting there leads them into confusion.

The New York Times also offers evidence of the crisis of manhood in a second article, in which reporter R. M. Schneiderman takes readers into a world of “mixed martial arts” in some evangelical churches and ministries.

“The outreach is part of a larger and more longstanding effort on the part of some ministers who fear that their churches have become too feminized, promoting kindness and compassion at the expense of strength and responsibility,” he explains.

From his report:

In the back room of a theater on Beale Street [in Memphis], John Renken, 37, a pastor, recently led a group of young men in prayer.

“Father, we thank you for tonight,” he said. “We pray that we will be a representation of you.”

An hour later, a member of his flock who had bowed his head was now unleashing a torrent of blows on an opponent, and Mr. Renken was offering guidance that was not exactly prayerful.

“Hard punches!” he shouted from the sidelines of a martial arts event called Cage Assault. “Finish the fight! To the head! To the head!”

In order to reach young men, some churches are turning to mixed martial arts, defined as “a sport with a reputation for violence and blood that combines kickboxing, wrestling, and other fighting styles.”

The main issue here is not the legitimacy of martial arts, but the fact that these churches are making a self-conscious effort to reach young men and boys with some kind of proof that Christianity is not a feminized and testosterone-free faith that appeals only to women.

Of course, Christianity honors the man who fights “the good fight of faith,” and the most important fight to which a Christian man is called is the fight to grow up into godly manhood, to be true to wife and provide for his children, to make a real contribution in the home, in the church, and in the society, and to show the glory of God in faithfully living out all that God calls a man to be and to do. This means a fight for truth, for the Gospel, and for the virtues of the Christian life. The New Testament is filled with masculine — and even martial — images of Christian faithfulness. We must be unashamed of these, and help a rising generation of men and boys to understand what it means to be a man in Christ. The Christian man does not embrace brutality for the sake of proving his manhood.

This much is clear — we are living in strange times, getting stranger by the minute. Churches and parents are right to be concerned about the new challenges of helping boys to grow into manhood. The crisis is real, and this one demands urgent attention.

Boys will never find real masculinity in a can, but boys and young men should find respect for and examples of genuine manhood at church. What about your church?

____________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Jan Hoffman, “Masculinity in a Spray Can,” The New York Times, Saturday, January 29, 2010.

R. M. Schneiderman, “Flock is Now a Fight Team in Some Ministries,” The New York Times, Tuesday, February 2, 2010.

We had a lively discussion of these issues on Thursday’s edition of The Albert Mohler Program. Listen here.

See my resources, “From Boy to Man: The Marks of Manhood, Part One” and “From Boy to Man: The Marks of Manhood, Part Two.”

The boy had been given the penguin just after his birth. A Dutch couple was in the process of adopting him almost from the start of his life — they had been matched to him when he was only two months old. The penguin represented a promise.

The process of adoption took two years — the length of time considered adequate to determine that no living relatives might claim him. According to official estimates, there were over 50,000 parentless orphans in Haiti before the earthquake came and orphaned many thousands more.

Richard and Rowena Pet were the young Dutch couple who wanted so badly to be Arno’s mother and father. They had struggled with infertility for years before deciding to adopt. As they awaited the adoption of Arno, Rowena became pregnant. Last August she gave birth to Jim, who was left in the care of relatives as Richard and Rowena flew to Haiti in January to claim Arno and complete the adoption process.

The story of Arno’s adoption is movingly told by reporter David Charter of The Times [London]. As he reported, “Arno was shy at first but within 30 minutes of meeting his adoptive parents he reached for Rowena’s hand and took the Dutch couple on a tour of the orphanage in Port-au-Prince where he had spent most of his short life. He began to call them Mummy and Daddy.”

Richard had shared their joy with a friend in an e-mail:

“We got to the orphanage feeling a bit strange. We went around a corner and immediately saw Arno walking towards us. He was OK until he was about half a meter away, but then he panicked. The woman from the orphanage helped out and half an hour later he took Rowena’s hand for the first time. I’m sorry but I can’t help crying at the moment as I type this. Arno has been showing us everything in the orphanage. He showed us an old car they have for the children to play on. He was holding a birthday card we sent for his second birthday.”

According to Charter, adoptive parents often stay at the Hotel Villa Therese in the Pétionville district of Port-au-Prince. That is where Richard and Rowena took Arno. That is where they were when the earthquake came. And that is where they died together.

David Charter tells the story, with comments by Chris Spaansen, the friend to whom Richard had sent the e-mail:

Dutch TV cameras were on hand during the frantic search by an international rescue team with members from the Netherlands, Britain and Canada. . . . Lying there amid the rubble was the unmistakable blue and yellow toy bird, Mr Penguin, marked with the word “Love”, that went everywhere with Arno. “That toy helped them to make their first contact with the little boy. It had a really special place in the family. It was a very emotional moment for all of us,” Spaansen says.

Then this:

What the cameras did not show were the three bodies, found intertwined together, as if Rowena and Richard had tried to put protective arms around Arno as the masonry began to fall. The disaster cruelly destroyed the new family, creating its own orphan back in the Netherlands. Jim, just five months old, will be brought up by Rowena’s sister, who already has her own three-year-old boy.

The bodies of Richard and Rowena and Arno Pet were taken to the Netherlands together, just as they had been found together in the rubble of the Hotel Villa Therese. They had been a family for a few hours, but a family all the same. Arno had a tragically short life, but he ended that life in the arms of a mother and a father.

Who can read this account without heartbreak . . . and a heart warmed? Is there a heart so cold that it does not feel the pathos of this report, and sense the sentiment of this family’s tragedy? At the same time, this is not a tragedy in the classic sense. The love of Richard and Rowena and Arno Pet transcends tragedy. That is why The Times published this report, and why it stays with you so long after you read it.

Of course, for the Christian there is far more to this story. In the story of Arno Pet we find a picture of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As the Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatians:

But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a virgin, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying “Abba! Father!” Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God. [Galatians 4:4-7]

Adoption is perhaps the most powerful depiction of the Gospel found in the Bible. We are all orphans, born under the curse of sin. By the sheer grace and mercy of God, those who come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ are adopted as sons. Redeemed sinners are adopted as sons “through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise and glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.” [Ephesians 1:5-6]

Arno Pet began life as an orphan, but he ended life as a son. He was abandoned at his birth, but he died in the arms of his parents. He did not die as Arno, he died as Arno Pet.

In the rubble of the Hotel Villa Therese the film crew found the bodies of Richard and Rowena and Arno Pet. In that same rubble, we find a picture of the Gospel of Christ. He who has eyes to see, let him see.

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I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

David Charter, “Haiti Tragedy — The Couple Who Died with Their Newly-Adopted Child,” The Times [London], February 3, 2010.

Don’t miss the Adopting for Life conference at Southern Seminary, February 26-27, 2010.

You will also want to read Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families and Churches by Dr. Russell Moore. Here is my endorsement statement found on the book’s cover:

“Thankfully, there are good books on adoption and good books on the gospel. But until the arrival of Adopted for Life, there has never been a book that puts the adoption of children so clearly within the context of the gospel of Christ. Adopted for Life is one of the most compelling books I have ever read—both deeply touching and richly theological. You will never look at adoption or the gospel in quite the same way after reading this book. How could the church have been missing this for so long?”

By some estimations, the production and sale of explicit pornography now represents the seventh-largest industry in America. New videos and internet pages are produced each week, with the digital revolution bringing a host of new delivery systems. Every new digital platform becomes a marketing opportunity for the pornography industry.

To no one’s surprise, the vast majority of those who consume pornography are males. It is no trade secret that males are highly stimulated by visual images, whether still or video. That is not a new development, as ancient forms of pornography attest. What is new is all about access. Today’s men and boys are not looking at line pictures drawn on cave walls. They have almost instant access to countless forms of pornography in a myriad of formats.

But, even as technology has brought new avenues for the transmission of pornography, modern knowledge also brings a new understanding of how pornography works in the male brain. While this research does nothing to reduce the moral culpability of males who consume pornography, it does help to explain how the habit becomes so addictive.

As William M. Struthers of Wheaton College explains, “Men seem to be wired in such a way that pornography hijacks the proper functioning of their brains and has a long-lasting effect on their thoughts and lives.”

Struthers is a psychologist with a background in neuroscience and a teaching concentration in the biological bases of human behavior. In Wired for Intimacy: How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brain, Struthers presents key insights from neuroscience that go a long way toward explaining why pornography is such a temptation for the male mind.

“The simplest explanation for why men view pornography (or solicit prostitutes) is that they are driven to seek out sexual intimacy,” he explains. The urge for sexual intimacy is God-given and essential to the male, he acknowledges, but it is easily misdirected. Men are tempted to seek “a shortcut to sexual pleasure via pornography” and now find this shortcut easily accessed.

In a fallen world, pornography becomes more than a distraction and a distortion of God’s intention for human sexuality. It comes as an addictive poison.

Struthers explains:

Viewing pornography is not an emotionally or physiologically neutral experience. It is fundamentally different from looking at black and white photos of the Lincoln Memorial or taking in a color map of the provinces of Canada. Men are reflexively drawn to the content of pornographic material. As such, pornography has wide-reaching effects to energize a man toward intimacy. It is not a neutral stimulus. It draws us in. Porn is vicarious and voyeuristic at its core, but it is also something more. Porn is a whispered promise. It promises more sex, better sex, endless sex, sex on demand, more intense orgasms, experiences of transcendence.

Pornography “acts as a polydrug,” Struthers explains. As Dr. Patrick Carnes asserts, pornography is “a pathological relationship with a mood-altering experience.” Boredom and curiosity lead many boys and men into experiences that become more like drug addiction than is often admitted.

Why men rather than women? As Struthers explains, the male and female brains are wired differently. “A man’s brain is a sexual mosaic influenced by hormone levels in the womb and in puberty and molded by his psychological experience.” Over time, exposure to pornography takes a man or boy deeper along “a one-way neurological superhighway where a man’s mental life is over-sexualized and narrowed. This superhighway has countless on-ramps but very few off-ramps.

Pornography is “visually magnetic” to the male brain. Struthers presents a fascinating review of the neurobiology involved, with pleasure hormones becoming linked to and released by the experience of a male viewing pornographic images. These experiences with pornography and pleasure hormones create new patterns in the brain’s wiring, and repeated experiences formalize the rewiring.

And then, enough is never enough. “If I take the same dose of a drug over and over and my body begins to tolerate it, I will need to take a higher dose of the drug in order for it to have the same effect that it did with a lower dose the first time,” Struthers reminds us. So, the experience of viewing pornography and acting out on it creates a demand in the brain for more and more, just to achieve the same level of pleasure in the brain.

While men are stimulated by the ambient sexual images around them, explicit pornography increases the effect. Struthers compares this to the difference between traditional television and the new high definition technologies. Everything is more clear, more explicit, and more stimulating.

Struthers explains this with compelling force:

Something about pornography pulls and pushes at the male soul. The pull is easy to identify. The naked female form can be hypnotizing. A woman’s willingness to participate in a sexual act or expose her nakedness is alluring to men. The awareness of one’s own sexuality, the longing to know, to experience something as good wells up from deep within. An image begins to pick up steam the longer we look upon it. It gains momentum and can reach a point where it feels like a tractor-trailer rolling downhill with no brakes.

Wired for Intimacy is a timely and important book. Struthers offers keen and strategic insights from neurobiology and psychology. But what makes this book truly helpful is the fact that Struthers does not leave his argument to neuroscience, nor does he use the category of addiction to mitigate the sinfulness of viewing pornography.

Sinners naturally look for fig leaves to hide sin, and biological causation is often cited as a means of avoiding moral responsibility. Struthers does not allow this, and his view of pornography is both biblical and theologically grounded. He lays responsibility for the sin of viewing pornography at the feet of those who willingly consume explicit images. He knows his audience — after all, his classrooms are filled with young male college students. The addict is responsible for his addiction.

At the same time, any understanding of how sin works its deceitful evil is a help to us, and understanding how pornography works in the male mind is a powerful knowledge. Pornography is a sin that robs God of his glory in the gift of sex and sexuality. We have long known that sin takes hostages. We now know another dimension of how this sin hijacks the male brain. Knowledge, as they say, is power.

_________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

I interviewed Dr. Struthers on the January 11, 2010 edition of The Albert Mohler Program. Listen here.

As Lindenberger argues, the case has finally put the issue of same-sex marriage before the federal courts, setting the stage for a landmark decision, no matter how the judge rules and however the case is finally decided upon appeals. “Both sides see it as a crucial test of whether society can insist that heterosexual unions are worthy of the full sanction of the law in a way that other unions are not,” he reports.

Lindenberger also makes this assertion: “For decades, governments at every level have created one set of rules for heterosexuals in America, and another set for its gays and lesbians.” This is only partly true, for in reality governments have established “one set of rules” for married heterosexual couples and “another set” for everyone else. In other words, same-sex couples are not alone in having been denied a legal right to marry.

The unusual legal team of David Boies and Ted Olson — famous adversaries in the 2000 case, Bush v. Gore – made their case against California’s “Proposition 8″ amendment prohibiting same-sex marriage almost entirely on the argument that opposition to homosexuality is nothing but evidence of moral objections rooted in religious faith. This argument becomes crucial when understood in the context of the 2003 Supreme Court decision in the case Lawrence v. Texas, in which the nation’s high court ruled that mere “moral opprobrium” is no basis for a denial of any right to homosexuals.

Lindenberger then explains:

For his part, Boies told TIME that the trial has shown that legal discrimination against gays — in particular rules banning their marriage — starts with simple prejudice, in the form of religion-inspired views about the morality of homosexuality itself. “The Southern Baptist Convention describes homosexuality as an ‘abomination,’” Boies told TIME, as he prepared for what would be three days of sometimes blistering cross-examinations as the trial wound down. “The Catholic Church calls homosexual activity ‘gravely immoral.’ Who is kidding whom? These are sincerely held beliefs, to which they are certainly entitled. But no one ought to kid themselves that what is behind [efforts to ban gay marriage] is anything other than a majority imposing its beliefs on other people.”

In fact, Boies and Olson made this the central argument of their case against Proposition 8. As Mathew Staver, now dean of the Liberty University School of Law, commented, “What struck me is that the plaintiffs have tried to put Christianity on trial rather than Prop 8.”

Then Lindenberger reports this:

The Rev. Albert Mohler, a leading figure in the fight against gay marriage, says that in light of Lawrence, he understands Boies’ line of attack. But he told TIME that marriage is different. It is “the central institution of human society.” “The problem with that argument is that the current case has to do with marriage, not merely with the right to engage in certain sexual acts,” says Mohler, who is the longtime president of the flagship seminary of the Southern Baptist Convention in Louisville, Ky. “There are more than ample grounds to argue that the sustenance of marriage is necessary for the flourishing of human culture. Thus, anything that damages marriage or subverts its place in society is deleterious in its effects. Throughout history, societies have regulated marriage with this danger in mind, recognizing in marriage the privileged status granted to the heterosexual union as the best context for procreation and the raising of children — functions understood to be vital to the society’s well-being. The argument put forth by Boies would mean the effective deregulation of marriage, since his arguments already presented in court could be proposed by any number of others, including those representing polygamists.”

As this paragraph makes clear, Christians are put in a very strange position in today’s postmodern/post-Christian culture. We cannot be unclear or uncomfortable in acknowledging the Bible and the Christian faith as our moral authorities. To shrink from this — or in any sense to be unclear — would amount to treason against our convictions. My understanding of human sexuality, of morality, and of what it even means to be human is drawn from the Bible. As Martin Luther famously declared at the Diet of Worms, if I am convinced that the Bible teaches anything, I am under the glad obligation to receive it as true and obey it as a believer in Christ. In this sense, the historic Christian understanding of homosexual acts as sinful (and of same-sex marriage as inconceivable) is nothing less than faithfulness to the Bible as the Word of God.

At the same time, we also recognize ample reason to support the institution of marriage on other grounds as well. As I told Mr. Lindenberger, it is no accident that all societies throughout history have privileged marriage even as they have defined it as an exclusively heterosexual institution. This includes societies and cultures that are not even remotely Christian, and many that are not even based on a theistic worldview. Confucian cultures of the East, for example, have also defined marriage as inherently and exclusively heterosexual.

If we take Mr. Boies’ logic seriously, anyone who comes to any moral issue with any religious conviction is simply ruled unfit for public influence or consideration — no matter what argument he or she might bring. The problems with this are gargantuan and obvious — this would mean that the vast majority of Americans are excluded from any public debate over an institution as central as marriage.

Professor Marc Spindelman of Ohio State University told Lindenberger that, even as many Californians may have been motivated by religious conviction to vote in support of Proposition 8, “not everyone who voted for it did.” Will the federal courts now attempt a psychoanalysis of California voters and, eventually, of the American people?

Boies’ argument finds its roots in philosophies of public reason such as those proposed by Robert Audi and the late John Rawls. Rawls argued that a liberal society must require the exclusion of all “comprehensive doctrines,” by which he meant religious worldviews. Audi argues that public discussion — and certainly any legislative or judicial forum — must require all parties to come to the table with both a secular rationale and a secular motivation. In his words, all parties have an “obligation to abstain from advocacy or support of a law or public policy that restricts human conduct, unless in advocating or supporting it one is sufficiently motivated by . . . adequate secular reason.”

In other words, Audi argues that it is not enough that all parties come to the table with secular reasons for their proposals. They must also come with a normatively secular motivation. And who, we must ask, will be the judge of those motivations? Once again, on this ground the vast majority of Americans would be excluded from all public decision-making.

David Boies and Ted Olson made their case on just this argument — that the people of California were motivated, at least to some degree, by their religious convictions. Of course, if this logic holds, it would mean the establishment of secularism as the only acceptable faith in postmodern America. Only by denying any religious faith could a citizen “prove” his or her secular motivation.

By any measure, the decision in this case will be momentous — and for reasons that go far beyond the question of same-sex marriage and homosexuality. In this case, far more than marriage is on trial.

______________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Michael Lindenberger, “Gay Marriage: Prop 8 Trial Rests, and a Key Ruling Awaits,” TIME, Thursday, January 28, 2010. I appreciate Mr. Lindenberger’s careful reporting on this issue. Readers should review his other articles on the case, available here at www.time.com.

See also:
Robert Audi, Religious Commitment and Secular Reason (Cambridge University Press, 2000), page 96.

The same is true for an article that just recently appeared in The Weekly Standard. In “Mugged by Ultrasound,” David Daleiden and Jon A. Shields reveal a reality becoming more and more common — abortion workers turning pro-life.

Abortion activists, they note, are usually detached from the actual process of abortion. Thus, they can hide behind arguments about a woman’s “right to choose” or “reproductive freedom.” But, as Daleiden and Shields explain, those who are actually performing the abortions cannot hide from the horrible reality, and some of them cannot handle the horror. Eventually, “a noteworthy number have found the conflict unbearable and have defected to the pro-life cause.”

Daleiden and Shields trace some of these defections to two developments that changed the experience of providing abortions. First, the usual means of aborting second-trimester fetuses around the time of Roe v. Wade (1973) was saline injection. But, that is no longer the case. Those abortions are now done by “dilation and evacuation” (D&E), which involves the dismemberment of the fetus within the womb. For doctors and others involved in a D&E abortion, there is no way to escape the horrifying reality of that procedure.

They write:

Such studies are few. In general, abortion providers have censored their own emotional trauma out of concern to protect abortion rights. In 2008, however, abortionist Lisa Harris endeavored to begin “breaking the silence” in the pages of the journal Reproductive Health Matters. When she herself was 18 weeks pregnant, Dr. Harris performed a D&E abortion on an 18-week-old fetus. Harris felt her own child kick precisely at the moment that she ripped a fetal leg off with her forceps:

Instantly, tears were streaming from my eyes—without me—meaning my conscious brain—even being aware of what was going on. I felt as if my response had come entirely from my body, bypassing my usual cognitive processing completely. A message seemed to travel from my hand and my uterus to my tear ducts. It was an overwhelming feeling—a brutally visceral response—heartfelt and unmediated by my training or my feminist pro-choice politics. It was one of the more raw moments in my life.

Lisa Harris charged that the abortion industry had “not owned up to the reality of the fetus, or the reality of fetal parts.” Amazingly, Harris remained in the abortion business, but she could not deny what she knew about the killing of the unborn

Daleiden and Shields tell of Paul Jarrett, a doctor who did leave the business after performing 23 abortions. Jarrett explained why: “As I brought out the rib cage, I looked and saw a tiny, beating heart . . . and when I found the head of the baby, I looked squarely in the face of another human being—a human being that I just killed.”

The second development that has changed the moral landscape of abortion is the ultrasound image. Bernard Nathanson, who at one time was performing more abortions than anyone else in the Western world, famously converted to the pro-life cause, largely prompted by seeing ultrasound images of unborn babies. Nathanson, who once aborted one of his own children, could no longer deny the reality. Daleiden and Shields make clear that Nathanson has been followed in this defection by others:

The most recent example is Abby Johnson, the former director of Dallas-area Planned Parenthood. After watching, via ultrasound, an embryo “crumple” as it was suctioned out of its mother’s womb, Johnson reported a “conversion in my heart.” Likewise, Joan Appleton was the head nurse at a large abortion facility in Falls Church, Virginia, and a NOW activist. Appleton performed thousands of abortions with aplomb until a single ultrasound-assisted abortion rattled her. As Appleton remembers, “I was watching the screen. I saw the baby pull away. I saw the baby open his mouth. .  .  . After the procedure I was shaking, literally.”

David Daleiden and Jon Shields have done a masterful job of explaining why these two developments have altered the landscape of abortion in America. The defection of so many abortion providers and of those involved in that industry is a story that must be told. At a very important level, this is truly heartening news in the midst of tragedy.

We must also see clearly that the revulsion toward abortion that marks these defections is based in truth — the truth that the inhabitant of the womb is not a mere “fetus,” but a baby. Paul Jarrett looked into the face of “another human being—a human being that I just killed.” Joan Appleton “saw the baby open its mouth.”

Similarly, the ultrasound image reveals the undeniable humanity of the baby within the womb. This remarkable technology saves lives — just by revealing the baby in all of its humanity.

From a Christian perspective, the recognition of the baby’s humanity must be traced to common grace and general revelation. The womb is revealed to be inhabited by a human being who deserves nothing less than our full protection and respect. The heart and mind cannot deny what the eyes have seen.

The late Irving Kristol once explained his own intellectual conversion as having been “mugged by reality.” Daleiden and Shields get it just right when they describe these former abortion providers and workers as having been “mugged by ultrasound.” May those muggings be multiplied — and may they spread to the American public as well.

________________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

David Daleiden and Jon A. Shields, “Mugged by Ultrasound: Why So Many Abortion Workers Have Turned Pro-life,” The Weekly Standard, January 25, 2010.

According to Young, the book was originally written for his own children. In essence, it can be described as a narrative theodicy — an attempt to answer the question of evil and the character of God by means of a story. In this story, the main character is grieving the brutal kidnapping and murder of his seven-year-old daughter when he receives what turns out to be a summons from God to meet him in the very shack where the man’s daughter had been murdered.

In the shack, “Mack” meets the divine Trinity as “Papa,” an African-American woman; Jesus, a Jewish carpenter; and “Sarayu,” an Asian woman who is revealed to be the Holy Spirit. The book is mainly a series of dialogues between Mack, Papa, Jesus, and Sarayu. Those conversations reveal God to be very different than the God of the Bible. “Papa” is absolutely non-judgmental, and seems most determined to affirm that all humanity is already redeemed.

The theology of The Shack is not incidental to the story. Indeed, at most points the narrative seems mainly to serve as a structure for the dialogues. And the dialogues reveal a theology that is unconventional at best, and undoubtedly heretical in certain respects.

While the literary device of an unconventional “trinity” of divine persons is itself sub-biblical and dangerous, the theological explanations are worse. “Papa” tells Mack of the time when the three persons of the Trinity “spoke ourself into human existence as the Son of God.” Nowhere in the Bible is the Father or the Spirit described as taking on human existence. The Christology of the book is likewise confused. “Papa” tells Mack that, though Jesus is fully God, “he has never drawn upon his nature as God to do anything. He has only lived out of his relationship with me, living in the very same manner that I desire to be in relationship with every human being.” When Jesus healed the blind, “He did so only as a dependent, limited human being trusting in my life and power to be at work within him and through him. Jesus, as a human being, had no power within himself to heal anyone.”

While there is ample theological confusion to unpack there, suffice it to say that the Christian church has struggled for centuries to come to a faithful understanding of the Trinity in order to avoid just this kind of confusion — understanding that the Christian faith is itself at stake.

Jesus tells Mack that he is “the best way any human can relate to Papa or Sarayu.” Not the only way, but merely the best way.

In another chapter, “Papa” corrects Mack’s theology by asserting, “I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it.” Without doubt, God’s joy is in the atonement accomplished by the Son. Nevertheless, the Bible consistently reveals God to be the holy and righteous Judge, who will indeed punish sinners. The idea that sin is merely “its own punishment” fits the Eastern concept of karma, but not the Christian Gospel.

The relationship of the Father to the Son, revealed in a text like John 17, is rejected in favor of an absolute equality of authority among the persons of the Trinity. “Papa” explains that “we have no concept of final authority among us, only unity.” In one of the most bizarre paragraphs of the book, Jesus tells Mack: “Papa is as much submitted to me as I am to him, or Sarayu to me, or Papa to her. Submission is not about authority and it is not obedience; it is all about relationships of love and respect. In fact, we are submitted to you in the same way.”

The theorized submission of the Trinity to a human being — or to all human beings — is a theological innovation of the most extreme and dangerous sort. The essence of idolatry is self-worship, and this notion of the Trinity submitted (in any sense) to humanity is inescapably idolatrous.

The most controversial aspects of The Shack’s message have revolved around questions of universalism, universal redemption, and ultimate reconciliation. Jesus tells Mack: “Those who love me come from every system that exists. They were Buddhists or Mormons, Baptists or Muslims, Democrats, Republicans and many who don’t vote or are not part of any Sunday morning or religious institutions.” Jesus adds, “I have no desire to make them Christian, but I do want to join them in their transformation into sons and daughters of my Papa, into my brothers and sisters, my Beloved.”

Mack then asks the obvious question — do all roads lead to Christ? Jesus responds, “Most roads don’t lead anywhere. What it does mean is that I will travel any road to find you.”

Given the context, it is impossible not to draw essentially universalistic or inclusivistic conclusions about Young’s meaning. “Papa” chides Mack that he is now reconciled to the whole world. Mack retorts, “The whole world? You mean those who believe in you, right?” “Papa” responds, “The whole world, Mack.”

Put together, all this implies something very close to the doctrine of reconciliation proposed by Karl Barth. And, even as Young’s collaborator Wayne Jacobson has lamented the “self-appointed doctrine police” who have charged the book with teaching ultimate reconciliation, he acknowledges that the first editions of the manuscript were unduly influenced by Young’s “partiality at the time” to ultimate reconciliation — the belief that the cross and resurrection of Christ accomplished then and there a unilateral reconciliation of all sinners (and even all creation) to God.

James B. DeYoung of Western Theological Seminary, a New Testament scholar who has known William Young for years, documents Young’s embrace of a form of “Christian universalism.” The Shack, he concludes, “rests on the foundation of universal reconciliation.”

Even as Wayne Jacobson and others complain of those who identify heresy within The Shack, the fact is that the Christian church has explicitly identified these teachings as just that — heresy. The obvious question is this: How is it that so many evangelical Christians seem to be drawn not only to this story, but to the theology presented in the narrative — a theology at so many points in conflict with evangelical convictions?

Evangelical observers have not been alone in asking this question. Writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Professor Timothy Beal of Case Western University argues that the popularity of The Shack suggests that evangelicals might be shifting their theology. He cites the “nonbiblical metaphorical models of God” in the book, as well as its “nonhierarchical” model of the Trinity and, most importantly, “its theology of universal salvation.”

Beal asserts that none of this theology is part of “mainstream evangelical theology,” then explains: “In fact, all three are rooted in liberal and radical academic theological discourse from the 1970s and 80s — work that has profoundly influenced contemporary feminist and liberation theology but, until now, had very little impact on the theological imaginations of nonacademics, especially within the religious mainstream.”

He then asks: “What are these progressive theological ideas doing in this evangelical pulp-fiction phenomenon?” He answers: “Unbeknownst to most of us, they have been present on the liberal margins of evangelical thought for decades.” Now, he explains, The Shack has introduced and popularized these liberal concepts even among mainstream evangelicals.

Timothy Beal cannot be dismissed as a conservative “heresy-hunter.” He is thrilled that these “progressive theological ideas” are now “trickling into popular culture by way of The Shack.”

Similarly, writing at Books & Culture, Katherine Jeffrey concludes that The Shack “offers a postmodern, post-biblical theodicy.” While her main concern is the book’s place “in a Christian literary landscape,” she cannot avoid dealing with its theological message.

In evaluating the book, it must be kept in mind that The Shack is a work of fiction. But it is also a sustained theological argument, and this simply cannot be denied. Any number of notable novels and works of literature have contained aberrant theology, and even heresy. The crucial question is whether the aberrant doctrines are features of the story or the message of the work. When it comes to The Shack, the really troubling fact is that so many readers are drawn to the theological message of the book, and fail to see how it conflicts with the Bible at so many crucial points.

All this reveals a disastrous failure of evangelical discernment. It is hard not to conclude that theological discernment is now a lost art among American evangelicals — and this loss can only lead to theological catastrophe.

The answer is not to ban The Shack or yank it out of the hands of readers. We need not fear books — we must be ready to answer them. We desperately need a theological recovery that can only come from practicing biblical discernment. This will require us to identify the doctrinal dangers of The Shack, to be sure. But our real task is to reacquaint evangelicals with the Bible’s teachings on these very questions and to foster a doctrinal rearmament of Christian believers.

The Shack is a wake-up call for evangelical Christianity. An assessment like that offered by Timothy Beal is telling. The popularity of this book among evangelicals can only be explained by a lack of basic theological knowledge among us — a failure even to understand the Gospel of Christ. The tragedy that evangelicals have lost the art of biblical discernment must be traced to a disastrous loss of biblical knowledge. Discernment cannot survive without doctrine.

____________________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Timothy Beal, “Theology for Everyone,” The Chronicle of Higher Education (January 15, 2010), pages B16-17. [subscription required]

Katherine Jeffrey, “‘I Am Not Who You Think I Am’ — Situating The Shack in a Christian Literary Landscape,” Books & Culture (January/February 2010), pages 33-34.

An important and helpful review of The Shack is offered by Tim Challies, “A Reader’s Review of The Shack,” http://www.challies.com/archives/book-reviews/the-shack-by-william-p-young.php

For documentation, see also:

James B. DeYoung, “Book Review: The Shack by William Paul Young,” [pdf file].

Wayne Jacobson, “Is The Shack Heresy?,” http://www.windblownmedia.com/about-wbm/is-the-shack-heresy.html

I discussed The Shack on the April 11, 2008 edition of The Albert Mohler Program. [Listen here].

Liberalism: Saving Christianity From Itself

The classic liberals of the early twentieth century, often known as modernists, pointed to a vast intellectual change in the society and asserted that Christianity would have to change or die. As historian William R. Hutchison explains, “The hallmark of modernism is the insistence that theology must adopt a sympathetic attitude toward secular culture and must consciously strive to come to terms with it.”^[1]

This coming to terms with secular culture is deeply rooted in the sense of intellectual liberation that began in the Enlightenment. Protestant liberalism can be traced to European sources, but it arrived very early in America—far earlier than most of today’s evangelicals are probably aware. Liberal theology held sway where Unitarianism dominated and in many parts beyond.

Soon after the American Revolution, more organized forms of liberal theology emerged, fueled by a sense of revolution and intellectual liberty. Theologians and preachers began to question the doctrines of orthodox Christianity, claiming that doctrines such as original sin, total depravity, divine sovereignty, and substitutionary atonement violated the moral senses. William Ellery Channing, an influential Unitarian, spoke for many in his generation when he described “the shock given to my moral nature” by the teachings of orthodox Christianity.^[2]

Though any number of central beliefs and core doctrines were subjected to liberal revision or outright rejection, the doctrine of hell was often the object of greatest protest and denial.

Considering hell and its related doctrines, Congregationalist pastor Washington Gladden declared: “To teach such a doctrine as this about God is to inflict upon religion a terrible injury and to subvert the very foundations of morality.”^[3]

Though hell had been a fixture of Christian theology since the New Testament, it became an odium theologium—a doctrine considered repugnant by the larger culture and now retained and defended only by those who saw themselves as self-consciously orthodox in theological commitment.

Novelist David Lodge dated the final demise of hell to the decade of the 1960s. “At some point in the nineteen-sixties, Hell disappeared. No one could say for certain when this happened. First it was there, then it wasn’t.” University of Chicago historian Martin Marty saw the transition as simple and, by the time it actually occurred, hardly observed. “Hell disappeared. No one noticed,” he asserted.^[4]

The liberal theologians and preachers who so conveniently discarded hell did so without denying that the Bible clearly teaches the doctrine. They simply asserted the higher authority of the culture’s sense of morality. In order to save Christianity from the moral and intellectual damage done by the doctrine, hell simply had to go. Many rejected the doctrine with gusto, claiming the mandate to update the faith in a new intellectual age. Others simply let the doctrine go dormant, never to be mentioned in polite company.

What of today’s evangelicals? Though some lampoon the stereotypical “hell-fire and brimstone” preaching of an older evangelical generation, the fact is that most church members may never have heard a sermon on hell—even in an evangelical congregation. Has hell gone dormant among evangelicals as well?

Revising Hell: A Test Case for the Slide into Liberalism

Interestingly, the doctrine of hell serves very well as a test case for the slide into theological liberalism. The pattern of this slide looks something like this.

First, a doctrine simply falls from mention. Over time, it is simply never discussed or presented from the pulpit. Most congregants do not even miss the mention of the doctrine. Those who do become fewer over time. The doctrine is not so much denied as ignored and kept at a distance. Yes, it is admitted, that doctrine has been believed by Christians, but it is no longer a necessary matter of emphasis.

Second, a doctrine is revised and retained in reduced form. There must have been some good reason that Christians historically believed in hell. Some theologians and pastors will then affirm that there is a core affirmation of morality to be preserved, perhaps something like what C. S. Lewis affirmed as “The Tao.”[5] The doctrine is reduced.

Third, a doctrine is subjected to a form of ridicule. Robert Schuller of the Crystal Cathedral, known for his message of “Possibility Thinking,” once described his motivation for theological reformulation in terms of refocusing theology on “generating trust and positive hope.”^[6] His method is to point to salvation and the need “to become positive thinkers.”^[7] Positive thinking does not emphasize escape from hell, “whatever that means and wherever that is.”^[8]

That statement ridicules hell by dismissing it in terms of “whatever that means and wherever it is.” Just don’t worry about hell, Schuller suggests. Though few evangelicals are likely to join in the same form of ridicule, many will invent softer forms of marginalizing the doctrine.

Fourth, a doctrine is reformulated in order to remove its intellectual and moral offensiveness. Evangelicals have subjected the doctrine of hell to this strategy for many years now. Some deny that hell is everlasting, arguing for a form of annihilationism or conditional immortality. Others will deny hell as a state of actual torment. John Wenham simply states, “Unending torment speaks to me of sadism, not justice.”^[9] Some argue that God does not send anyone to hell, and that hell is simply the sum total of human decisions made during earthly lives. God is not really a judge who decides, but a referee who makes certain that rules are followed.

Tulsa pastor Ed Gungor recently wrote that “people are not sent to hell, they go there.”^[10] In other words, God just respects human freedom to the degree that he will reluctantly let humans determined to go to hell have their wish.

Apologizing for Hell: The New Evangelical Evasion

In recent years, a new pattern of evangelical evasion has surfaced. The Protestant liberals and modernists of the twentieth century simply dismissed the doctrine of hell, having already rejected the truthfulness of Scripture. Thus, they did not enter into elaborate attempts to argue that the Bible did not teach the doctrine—they simply dismissed it.

Though this pattern is found among some who would claim to be evangelicals, this is not the most common evangelical pattern of compromise. A new apologetic move is now evident among some theologians and preachers who do affirm the inerrancy of the Bible and the essential truthfulness of the New Testament doctrine of hell. This new move is more subtle, to be sure. In this move the preacher simply says something like this:

“I regret to tell you that the doctrine of hell is taught in the Bible. I believe it. I believe it because it is revealed in the Bible. It is not up for renegotiation. We just have to receive it and believe it. I do believe it. I wish it could be otherwise but it is not.”

Statements like this reveal a very great deal. The authority of the Bible is clearly affirmed. The speaker affirms what the Bible reveals and rejects accommodation. So far, so good. The problem is in how the affirmation is introduced and explained. In an apologetic gesture, the doctrine is essentially lamented.

What does this say about God? What does this imply about God’s truth? Can a truth clearly revealed in the Bible be anything less than good for us? The Bible presents the knowledge of hell just as it presents the knowledge of sin and judgment: these are things we had better know. God reveals these things to us for our good and for our redemption. In this light, the knowledge of these things is grace to us. Apologizing for a doctrine is tantamount to impugning the character of God.

Do we believe that hell is a part of the perfection of God’s justice? If not, we have far greater theological problems than those localized to hell.

Several years ago, someone wisely suggested that a good many modern Christians wanted to “air condition hell.”^[11] The effort continues.

Remember that the liberals and the modernists operated out of an apologetic motivation. They wanted to save Christianity as a relevant message in the modern world and to remove the odious obstacle of what were seen as repugnant and unnecessary doctrines. They wanted to save Christianity from itself.

Today, some in movements such as the emerging church commend the same agenda, and for the same reason. Are we embarrassed by the biblical doctrine of hell?

If so, this generation of evangelicals will face no shortage of embarrassments. The current intellectual context allows virtually no respect for Christian affirmations of the exclusivity of the gospel, the true nature of human sin, the Bible’s teachings regarding human sexuality, and any number of other doctrines revealed in the Bible. The lesson of theological liberalism is clear—embarrassment is the gateway drug for theological accommodation and denial.

Be sure of this: it will not stop with the air conditioning of hell.

_______________________________

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

This essay originally appeared in the January/February 2010 edition of the IX Marks Ministries eJournal.

Footnotes:
¹ William R. Hutchison, ed., American Protestant Thought in the Liberal Era (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1968), p. 4.
² Gary Dorrien, The Making of American Liberal Theology: Imagining Progressive Religion, 1805-1900 (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2001), p. 18.
³ Dorrien, p, 275.
⁴ Martin E. Marty, “Hell Disappeared. No One Noticed. A Civic Argument,” Harvard Theological Review, 78 (1985), 381-398.
⁵ See C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2001 [1948]).
⁶ Robert Schuller, My Journey (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2001), p. 127.
⁷ Schuller, p. 127-128.
⁸ Schuller, p. 127-128.
⁹ John Wenhan, Facing Hell: An Autobiography (London: Paternoster Press, 1998)., p. 254.
¹⁰ Ed Gungor, What Bothers Me Most About Christianity (New York: Howard Books, 2009), p. 196.
¹¹ See “Hell Air Conditioned,” New Oxford Review, 58 (June 3, 1998), p. 4.

Gilbert, you may recall, is author of the best-selling memoir of leaving marriage, Eat, Pray, Love. That book was a blockbuster, and Gilbert has been a fixture on shows such as Oprah, telling and retelling her story of finding true love after leaving marriage behind.

Now, in Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage, Gilbert explains her unexpected (and unconventional) road to marriage. By all accounts, Committed is likely to join Eat, Pray, Love atop the best-seller lists. In any event, the book reveals the vast redefinition of marriage taking place within Western cultures, right before our eyes.

Gilbert is an experienced writer, but until the publication of Eat, Pray, Love, she had been mainly known for writing articles for male-focused magazines. No more. Her two autobiographical books are clearly in the “chick lit” category, and women are devouring her writing. A movie version of Eat, Pray, Love is in the works, with Julia Roberts cast as Elizabeth Gilbert.

What makes these books so important for Christian consideration is the view of love and marriage the two books present with such unabashed passion. Over the last century, love and marriage have been driven apart in the modern secular mind. Marriage has been presented as a domestic prison camp for women, even as the divorce revolution has meant that every marriage is now, legally speaking, a tentative contract.

We are now in the age of personal expression and radical individualism. As Barbara Dafoe Whitehead has suggested, the invention of “expressive marriage,” by which the individuals made a statement of their self-expression through marriage, has now been joined by “expressive divorce,” in which the formerly-married explain that the divorce was how they liberated themselves to even more truthful self-expression.

Few have told their story of self-expression so successfully — or so candidly — as Elizabeth Gilbert. Eat, Pray, Love is nothing less than a complete rejection of the Christian conception of marriage. The applause she has gained from the public should tell us something.

In Eat, Pray, Love, Gilbert told of coming to the conclusion that she no longer wanted to be married to the man she had married at age 25, after living with him since age 23. She wrote:

My husband and I — who had been together for eight years, married for six — had built our entire life around the common expectation that, after passing the doddering old age of 30, I would want to settle down and have children. By then, we mutually anticipated, I would have grown weary of traveling and would be happy to live in a big, busy household full of children and homemade quilts, with a garden in the backyard and a cozy stew bubbling on the stovetop.

But Gilbert did not want to have a baby and, as she realized, she didn’t want to be married any more, either. So, having expressed herself by getting married, she then expressed herself by getting divorced. After her acrimonious divorce was final, she set off around the world once again — this time in search of love.

Gilbert describes herself as “culturally, though not theologically” Christian, but she rejects outright the limitation of sex to marriage.  “I got started early in life with the pursuit of sexual or romantic pleasure,” she writes. “I barely had an adolescence before I had my first boyfriend, and I have consistently had a boy or a man (or sometimes both) in my life ever since I was fifteen years old. That was — oh, let’s see — about nineteen years ago, now. That’s almost two solid decades I have been entwined in some kind of drama with some kind of guy. Each overlapping the next, with never so much as a week’s breather in between.”

Eat, Pray, Love is a memoir conjoined to a travel narrative. In the book, Gilbert traces her journey through Italy, Indonesia, and India. She is a skilled writer, and her travel writing is compelling. Nevertheless, it is Gilbert, and not the geography, that is front and center. By the end of Eat, Pray, Love, she has found love once again, in an affair with a Brazilian man known to her readers as Filipe. They decide to establish a live-in relationship, but are even more determined never to marry. Gilbert became a symbol of love without the constraints of marriage — a heroine to millions of women who watch Oprah and devoured her books.

Then she got married. As she explains in her new book, Committed, she married Filipe because it was the only way he could stay in the United States. She writes of being “sentenced” to marry by the Department of Homeland Security in order to continue her relationship with Filipe.

In Committed, Gilbert explains all this to the very readers to whom she had announced her determination never to marry again. She writes of “my efforts to make peace with the complicated institution of marriage,” once again in the context of a travel narrative.

Gilbert’s new view of marriage — the concept of marriage with which she has now “made peace” — is one that is fully in keeping with her affirmation of “me-ness.” This comes out in the context of an encounter she has with Hmong women, who do not seem to connect at all with her individualism. Writing of herself and her American friends, she says: “Whatever our religion, whatever our economic class, we all at least somewhat embraced the same dogma, which I would describe as being very historically recent and very definitely Western and which can effectively be summed up as: ‘You matter.’”

In her account, Gilbert inserts a lengthy and eccentric review of marriage in Western culture. Her angle is predictable — pointing to the liberation of marriage from traditional views to modern expressive views. She also understands what this transformation means: Marriage becomes tentative, conditional, provisional, and fragile.

Looking to the older women of her family, Gilbert understands that their commitment to marriage was very different. “This was their guiding verb and their defining principle in life: They gave.” This is not what Gilbert sees as her own principle.

Even as she is now (sentenced to be?) married, Elizabeth Gilbert has made her peace with marriage by affirming a very modern, very individualistic, very radical form of marriage — one that is the inevitable product of the replacement of obligation with liberation.

Sigmund Freud rejected the idea that he would write an autobiography or memoir as “quite an impossible suggestion.” To tell his own personal story would require “so much indiscretion.” Yet, as Daniel Mendelsohn recently noted, bookstores are now filled with a “tsunami” of memoirs, many of them extremely indiscrete.

Elizabeth Gilbert has written what will probably be another blockbuster, but discerning readers will soon discover that the conception of marriage with which she has made peace is revolutionary, and amounts to a deliberate rejection of marriage as a life-long covenant that implies children and generational obligations. The value of reading her memoirs is this — she shows where the revolution inevitably leads. The applause she is given by the public tells us how far the revolution has already progressed.

In the end, there just isn’t very much commitment in Committed.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

As Diana West explains:

When your average doting adult today murmurs the expression, “Out of the mouths of babes,” it is less an expression of wonder than a validation of the widely held assumption that children — babes, tweens, and teens — are innately wiser than their elders. They know better (sexual and fashion choices). They are discerning (music). They feel, therefore they understand (politics). Or so we have come to think due to a stunning if under-appreciated cultural reversal. Once upon a time, we believed wisdom was an expression of experience and maturity. Today, we believe the exact opposite.

Indeed, it is the exact opposite. Marketers target children because they know that the young drive many consumer choices. On the television screen, it is the kids on the sitcoms who are wise. The parents and other authority figures are routinely corrected by the wisdom of the young. The bumbling adults learn to laugh at their foolishness and follow the direction of the children and adolescents on screen.

Teachers and others who work with youth and children often receive the same message, not only from the kids but from their parents. “How dare you correct my child? His opinion is as valid as yours.”

West traces the development of this trend through the 1950s and 1960s. As long ago as 1958, Dwight Macdonald had noted the rise of the adolescent, with a flood of books on parenting teens emerging from a host of “experts.” As Macdonald saw, “The list goes on and on, and it includes many titles that would have been puzzling even in fairly recent times, because their subject matter is not the duty of children toward their parents, but precisely the opposite.”

The shift from the duty of children to parents to the duty of parents to children was not subtle. All of a sudden, the young became the instructors of the old, on everything from the morality of war and peace to the issues of sex and the meaning of life.

As West observes, “It is hard to overstate the significance of this change more than half a century ago. It is this fundamental rearrangement of life’s building blocks that put successive decades on an entirely new footing from all that had come before. To say the tide had turned is to imply a temporary, cyclical shift. What had occurred — replacing the child’s duty to his parent with the parent’s duty to his child — has so far turned out to be permanent.”

A quick review of contemporary entertainment, educational philosophies, and cultural influences would suggest that this shift is not only thus far permanent, but may be virtually irreversible. Diana West underscores the fact that this great shift was only possible because adults forfeited their authority and responsibility. The kids did not seize power in a coup. They were handed authority on a silver platter.

West has referred to this phenomenon as “the death of the grown-up.” Reaching adulthood ceased to be the great goal of the young. Instead, adults now attempt to present themselves as adolescents. The perpetual adolescent is the aspirational role model of today’s youth — and a tragic percentage of the nation’s adults.

From a Christian perspective, Diana West’s essay, as well as her book, The Death of the Grown-Up: How America’s Arrested Development is Bringing Down Western Civilization, serves to alert parents and others to the challenge of raising children in such a culture. The goal of Christian parents must be to raise children to adulthood — a genuine adulthood. The Bible honors children, but the biblical worldview establishes parents as the authority figures and adults as the figures of wisdom.

“Seen but not heard” is not the best model for parenting children. On the other hand, it is infinitely superior to the abdication of adult authority that marks the current age. Once again, Christian parents are reminded that raising godly children in this age requires the courage of a counter-revolutionary.

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Diana West, “Out of the Mouths of Babes,” In Character, Fall 2009.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

The Kaiser Family Foundation has just released a new study on the online lives of children and teenagers, and the statistics are simply astounding. America’s children and teenagers are now spending an average of more than 7 1/2 hours a day involved in electronic media.

As the report states:

As anyone who knows a teen or tween can attest, media are among the most powerful forces in young people’s lives today. Eight-to-eighteen-year-olds spend more time with media than in any other activity besides (maybe) sleeping — an average of more than 7 1/2 hours a day, seven days a week. The TV shows they watch, video games they play, songs they listen to, books they read and websites they visit are an enormous part of their lives, offering a constant stream of messages about families, peers, relationships, gender roles, sex, violence, food, values, clothes, an abundance of other topics too long to list.

Online, All the Time

The report is the third conducted and released by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Just five years ago, the foundation released a second study that indicated young Americans were spending an average of nearly 6 1/2 hours a day with media.  Now, young people have found a way to devote another hour to media use, catching the researchers by surprise. As Donald F. Roberts, a professor emeritus of communications at Stanford University, remarked: “This is a stunner.” He told The New York Times, “In the second report, I remember writing a paragraph saying we’ve hit a ceiling on media use, since there just aren’t enough hours in the day to increase the time children spend on media. But now it’s up an hour.”

And it’s not just that these kids are devoting 7 1/2 hours of their daily lives to media immersion — their multitasking means that they somehow consume nearly 11 hours of media content in that 7 1/2 hours of time. Over the last ten years, young people have increased their consumption and use of every type of media with one exception — reading. As the researchers make clear, the vast increase in the amount of time teenagers are able to access the media is due almost entirely to the fact that their mobile phones allow an online life that can be carried in the pocket (and in far too many cases, taken to bed). “The mobile and online media revolutions have arrived in the lives — and the pockets — of American youth,” notes the report. “Try waking a teenager in the morning, and the odds are good you’ll find a cell phone tucked under their pillow — the last thing they touch before falling asleep and the first thing they reach for upon waking.”

The report indicates that 66 percent of kids now own their own cell phone, while 76 percent own an iPod or other MP3 player. Interestingly, these kids are using cell phones as mobile media devices, rather than as telephones. Young people spend an average of only a half hour each day talking on their cell phones, but their use of these devices for the consumption of media consumes far more time.

The report also offers a portrait of the media-saturated character of the average American home. That home now contains an average of 3.8 televisions, 2.8 DVD or VCR players, at least one digital video recorder, two computers, 2.3 console video game players, and assorted other media devices ranging from CD players to radios. In an amazing percentage of these homes, the television is on virtually every waking hour.

Media in the Bedroom

Even as the family home is populated with various media devices, the bedrooms of America’s children and teenagers are virtually saturated with media. “More and more media are migrating to young people’s bedrooms, enabling them to spend even more time watching, listening or playing,” the researchers report. An amazing 71% of all children from age 8-18 have their own television in their bedroom, and half have a video game player and/or access to cable. These kids have computers, too. Almost a third own their own laptops and the majority have easy access to a computer, usually with broadband Internet connections.

In most homes, parents are setting few rules for media use — or no rules at all. The majority of teens and tweens reported that their parents have set no rules about the type of media content they can use or the amount of time they can devote to media consumption. When parents do set rules, they are far more likely to set rules about the type of content that can be accessed, rather than the amount of time that is devoted to media use. A good percentage of parents who do set rules, often leave them unenforced.

Parents should note this statement from the report: “Children who live in homes that limit media opportunities spend less time with media. For example, kids whose parents don’t put a TV in their bedroom, don’t leave the TV on during meals or in the background when no one is watching, or do impose some type of media-related rules spend substantially less time with media than do children with more media-lenient parents.”

Media Use, Grades, and Personal Contentment

Another important section of the report indicates that the young people who spend the greatest amount of time with media report lower grades and lower levels of personal happiness and contentment. The researchers stated that their study “cannot establish whether there is a cause and effect relationship between media use and grades, or between media use and personal contentment.” They added: “And if there are such relationships, they could well run in both directions simultaneously.”

All this should serve to awaken America’s parents — and all who care for America’s young people — to the level of media saturation that now characterizes the lives of American youth. As The New York Times declared in its headline, “If Your Kids are Awake, They’re Probably Online.”

There is no turning back from the digital revolution. It is not realistic for most families to declare a principled disconnection from electronic media and the digital world. Nevertheless, this important report serves as an undeniable warning that America’s young people are literally drowning in an ocean of media consumption. There is every reason for parents to be concerned about dangers ranging from the content of this media, to the way digital saturation changes the wiring of the brain, to the loss of literacy and the reading of books, to the fact that many teenagers are far more connected to their friends through social media than to their own families in their own homes. Teenagers are forfeiting sleep and other important investments of time because they experience panic when they are digitally disengaged for even a few moments.

What is the impact of all this media saturation on the soul? Of course, that is a question that must be posed to America’s adults, as well as to our children and adolescents. At the same time, parents bear a responsibility many are clearly forfeiting.

The Courage to Disconnect

Dr. Michael Rich, a pediatrician at Children’s Hospital Boston and director of the Center on Media and Child Health, told The New York Times that the media use of America’s young people is so pervasive, it is time to stop arguing over whether this is positive or negative. Instead, he suggested that we should simply accept media as a constant part of children’s environment, “like the air they breathe, the water they drink and the food they eat.”

This is advice Christian parents cannot follow. We cannot simply accept that constant media saturation is now a fact of nature and a matter of constant need. These technologies and devices have their places, but the role of parents is to establish rules that protect children and teenagers from being dominated by technology and an army of digital devices. At the end of the day, parents must find the courage and wisdom to know when to disconnect.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

As Ruth Gledhill of The Times [London] reports, “Sermons, history shows, can be among the most revolutionary forms of human speech. From John Calvin to Billy Graham, preaching has had the power to topple princes, to set nation against nation, to inspire campaigners to change the world and impel people to begin life anew.”

Indeed, preaching is the central act of Christian worship, but its great aim reaches far above merely changing the world. The preaching of the Word of God is the chief means by which God conforms Christians to the image of Christ. Rightly understood, true Christian preaching is not aimed only at this earthly life, but is the means whereby God prepares his people for eternity.

Yet, you wouldn’t know this if you judged the importance of preaching by its place in many of today’s congregations. Gledhill observes, “In many churches this most vibrant of moments has withered to little more than 20 minutes of tired droning that serves only to pad out the gap between hymns and lunch.”

The withering of preaching is not uniform in all congregations and denominations. Evangelicals were most enthusiastic about preaching, while others registered less appreciation for the preached Word. Interestingly, Gledhill reports that “Baptists and Catholics were also more enthusiastic about the Bible being mentioned in sermons than were Anglicans and Methodists.”

The Anglicans also expressed a desire to be entertained, rather then educated. The Rev. Kate Bruce, Fellow in Preaching and Communication at the CODEC center, said that “in a culture which values entertainment and likes stand-up, over a quarter [of respondents] said they want preaching to be entertaining, too.”

Well, they will have to be quick about the entertainment. Many Anglicans indicated that they wanted the sermon to be less than ten minutes long. As Gledhill remarks, they might be willing to allow up to twenty minutes “if there was no ‘waffle.’”

Perhaps the biggest question raised by the report is why so many British churchgoers (96.6%) said they “look forward” to the sermon. Ruth Gledhill comments:

In their report the Durham researchers admit to puzzlement that so many people looked forward to the sermons, and confess that more work was needed to find out why.

The report questions whether people look forward to the sermon so much for the content, the engagement, the entertainment, the theology or simply that it gives them time to switch off.

Time to switch off? According to the report, Britain has only 3.6 million “regular churchgoers” out of a population of over 60 million. That is, only about five percent of Britons even attend church services on any regular basis. Evidently, many of those who do attend “look forward” to a very short message from a preacher that entertains them.

England, of course, is the nation that once gave us preachers the likes of Charles Simeon, Charles Spurgeon, and Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Now, with the rare and blessed exception of some faithful evangelical churches, preaching has fallen on desperate times.

Some observers of British life now estimate that in any given week Muslim attendance at mosques outnumbers Christian attendance at churches. That means that there are probably now in Britain more people who listen to imams than to preachers.

This raises an interesting question: Is the marginalization of biblical preaching in so many churches a cause or a result of the nation’s retreat from Christianity? In truth, it must be both cause and effect. In any event, there is no hope for a recovery of biblical Christianity without a preceding recovery of biblical preaching. That means preaching that is expository, textual, evangelistic, and doctrinal. In other words, preaching that will take a lot longer than ten minutes and will not masquerade as a form of entertainment.

Time and time again, God’s people have been rescued by a recovery of biblical teaching and preaching. The right preaching of the Word of God is the first essential mark of the church. As the Reformers made clear, where that mark is absent, there is no church at all.

The study conducted for the College of Preachers is interesting, if also frightening. But little is gained from asking confused people what kind of preaching they want. The faithful preacher takes as his first and most sacred responsibility the charge to give the congregation the preaching it needs.

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Ruth Gledhill, “To Some, Sermonizing is a Sin, but Christians Still Value the Preacher,” The Times [London], January 19, 2010.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Those looking to learn more about biblical preaching may want to read my book, He is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World.

The earthquake that will forever change that nation came as subterranean plates shifted about six miles under the surface of the earth, along a fault line that had threatened trouble for centuries. But no one saw a quake of this magnitude coming. The 7.0 quake came like a nightmare, with the city of Port-au-Prince crumbling, entire villages collapsing, bodies flying in the air and crushed under mountains of debris. Orphanages, churches, markets, homes, and government buildings all collapsed. Civil government has virtually ceased to function. Without power, communication has been cut off and rescue efforts are seriously hampered. Bodies are piling up, hope is running out, and help, though on the way, will not arrive in time for many victims.

Even as boots are finally hitting the ground and relief efforts are reaching the island, estimates of the death toll range as high as 500,000. Given the mountainous terrain and densely populated villages that had been hanging along the fault line, entire villages may have disappeared. The Western Hemisphere’s most impoverished nation has experienced a catastrophe that appears almost apocalyptic.

In truth, it is hard not to describe the earthquake as a disaster of biblical proportions. It certainly looks as if the wrath of God has fallen upon the Caribbean nation. Add to this the fact that Haiti is well known for its history of religious syncretism — mixing elements of various faiths, including occult practices. The nation is known for voodoo, sorcery, and a Catholic tradition that has been greatly influenced by the occult.

Haiti’s history is a catalog of political disasters, one after the other. In one account of the nation’s fight for independence from the French in the late 18th century, representatives of the nation are said to have made a pact with the Devil to throw off the French. According to this account, the Haitians considered the French as Catholics and wanted to side with whomever would oppose the French. Thus, some would use that tradition to explain all that has marked the tragedy of Haitian history — including now the earthquake of January 12, 2010.

Does God hate Haiti? That is the conclusion reached by many, who point to the earthquake as a sign of God’s direct and observable judgment.

God does judge the nations — all of them — and God will judge the nations. His judgment is perfect and his justice is sure. He rules over all the nations and his sovereign will is demonstrated in the rising and falling of nations and empires and peoples. Every molecule of matter obeys his command, and the earthquakes reveal his reign — as do the tides of relief and assistance flowing into Haiti right now.

A faithful Christian cannot accept the claim that God is a bystander in world events. The Bible clearly claims the sovereign rule of God over all his creation, all of the time. We have no right to claim that God was surprised by the earthquake in Haiti, or to allow that God could not have prevented it from happening.

God’s rule over creation involves both direct and indirect acts, but his rule is constant. The universe, even after the consequences of the Fall, still demonstrates the character of God in all its dimensions, objects, and occurrences. And yet, we have no right to claim that we know why a disaster like the earthquake in Haiti happened at just that place and at just that moment.

The arrogance of human presumption is a real and present danger. We can trace the effects of a drunk driver to a car accident, but we cannot trace the effects of voodoo to an earthquake — at least not so directly. Will God judge Haiti for its spiritual darkness? Of course. Is the judgment of God something we can claim to understand in this sense — in the present? No, we are not given that knowledge. Jesus himself warned his disciples against this kind of presumption.

Why did no earthquake shake Nazi Germany? Why did no tsunami swallow up the killing fields of Cambodia? Why did Hurricane Katrina destroy far more evangelical churches than casinos? Why do so many murderous dictators live to old age while many missionaries die young?

Does God hate Haiti? God hates sin, and will punish both individual sinners and nations. But that means that every individual and every nation will be found guilty when measured by the standard of God’s perfect righteousness. God does hate sin, but if God merely hated Haiti, there would be no missionaries there; there would be no aid streaming to the nation; there would be no rescue efforts — there would be no hope.

The earthquake in Haiti, like every other earthly disaster, reminds us that creation groans under the weight of sin and the judgment of God. This is true for every cell in our bodies, even as it is for the crust of the earth at every point on the globe. The entire cosmos awaits the revelation of the glory of the coming Lord. Creation cries out for the hope of the New Creation.

In other words, the earthquake reminds us that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only real message of hope. The cross of Christ declares that Jesus loves Haiti — and the Haitian people are the objects of his love. Christ would have us show the Haitian nation his love, and share his Gospel. In the midst of this unspeakable tragedy, Christ would have us rush to aid the suffering people of Haiti, and rush to tell the Haitian people of his love, his cross, and salvation in his name alone.

Everything about the tragedy in Haiti points to our need for redemption. This tragedy may lead to a new openness to the Gospel among the Haitian people. That will be to the glory of God. In the meantime, Christ’s people must do everything we can to alleviate the suffering, bind up the wounded, and comfort the grieving. If Christ’s people are called to do this, how can we say that God hates Haiti?

If you have any doubts about this, take your Bible and turn to John 3:16. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. That is God’s message to Haiti.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

In giving assistance to the people, I recommend giving through the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. They have an excellent Haiti response in place through Baptist Global Response.

Photo credit, International Mission Board.

See also these two articles from the Katrina disaster:

God in the Storm — Part One

God in the Storm — Part Two

The article is breathtaking in its argument — that a man who abandoned the Christian faith was “no less devoted to Christ” than Southern Baptists’ most famous missionary.

In “Lottie Moon and Crawford Toy: Two Baptist Heroes,” Cartledge begins by noting the recent news that Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth has secured a large collection of memorabilia from the house of Lottie Moon in P’ingtu City, China. Included in the 35,000 pounds of material are remnants of what is believed to be Lottie Moon’s rented home.

Cartledge took issue with comments made by Southwestern Seminary President Paige Patterson, who noted that Lottie Moon was a defender of biblical orthodoxy. Patterson also cited Miss Moon’s breaking of her engagement with Crawford H. Toy over the issue of biblical authority. Indeed, there is ample evidence to suggest that Lottie Moon broke her engagement with Crawford Toy precisely over this question.

Nevertheless, Cartledge writes, “while there is evidence for a broken engagement, I’ve seen nothing to substantiate the motives Patterson attributes to Moon.” That statement seems especially odd given the fact that Cartledge cites an essay by the late Dan Gentry Kent of Southwestern Seminary — an essay that substantiates those motives.

The most troubling section of Cartledge’s article has little to do with Lottie Moon, however. After stating his admiration for Lottie Moon’s “willingness to suffer deprivation because of her devotion to Christ and to missions,” Cartledge then states, “Increasingly, I have also come to admire Crawford Toy, who was no less devoted to Christ, and was willing to suffer rejection by Southern Baptists rather than surrender to the narrow-minded demand that he forgo scholarship and limit his teaching to popularly accepted notions.”

The admiration of liberal Baptists for Crawford Howell Toy should be a matter of both amazement and genuine concern. It is also a telling indication of how many of those identified as “moderates” in the Southern Baptist Convention controversy actually view the Bible. To celebrate Toy is to celebrate his beliefs about the Bible. Those beliefs were not heroic.

Crawford Toy was a man of unquestioned brilliance. As a young man, he came to the attention of John A. Broadus during the time Broadus was pastor of the Charlottesville Baptist Church in Virginia. As a student in the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s first class, Toy established his reputation for scholarship. He joined the faculty of Southern Seminary in 1869 as Professor of Old Testament Interpretation and Oriental Languages. Prior to his election as Southern Seminary, Toy had studied at the University of Berlin for the years 1866-1868. As later became clear, Toy drank deeply from the wells of theological liberalism and Biblical criticism during his years in Germany.

In his inaugural address as a professor at Southern Seminary, Toy argued that the Bible has both a human and a divine element. As his theological pilgrimage revealed, Toy would use this hermeneutical distinction in order to argue that the Bible contains nothing but truth in its divine element, even as its human element shows all the marks of human fallibility. The human element contains both errors and myths, but the Bible’s “religious thought is independent of this outward form.”

Concerns about Toy’s teaching led to his eventual resignation from Southern Seminary — a resignation pressed upon him by the institution’s founding leaders and accepted by the vast majority of its trustees. Prior to his resignation, Toy had been warned by Broadus that his trajectory was headed toward serious theological error. Broadus also expressed his concern that Toy might eventually become a Unitarian. Eventually, Broadus’s worst fears were realized.

After his resignation from Southern Seminary, Crawford Toy accepted a professorship at Harvard University, where he taught for many years and established a reputation for scholarship. By all accounts, Toy was an esteemed member of the faculty. Nevertheless, Toy’s theological trajectory did indeed take him not only out of the Southern Baptist fellowship, but out of the Christian faith altogether. During his time at Harvard, Toy eventually became a Unitarian — a faith that denies the deity of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity. He also accepted an evolutionary understanding of religion which accepted religion as a purely natural phenomenon.

In other words, Toy became what Christians throughout all the centuries of church history and in all the major traditions of the Christian Church would rightly identify as a heretic. He abandoned faith in the deity of Christ and abandoned the Christian faith. Yet, moderates in the SBC controversy often celebrated Crawford Toy as a hero and as a theological martyr for academic scholarship. Tony Cartledge continues this tradition by expressing his admiration for Crawford Toy, going so far as to claim that he “was no less devoted to Christ” than Lottie Moon. “There’s more than one way to be a hero,” Cartledge concluded.

I can only hope that Tony Cartledge either does not understand or does not mean what he writes in this article. To declare Crawford Toy and Lottie Moon to be equally devoted to Christ defies both common sense and theological sanity.

As Old Testament scholar Paul House, now of the Beeson Divinity School, has argued, the roots of Toy’s later heresies were found in the presuppositions of his hermeneutic as he set forth his thought in his inaugural address at Southern Seminary. House does not question Toy’s personal integrity, noting his honesty in presenting his own beliefs. Toy himself recognized that his beliefs changed even during the years he taught at Southern Seminary. The key issue is that Toy’s understanding of the Bible left him completely vulnerable to every heresy and doctrinal aberration. Broadus rightly warned Toy of this danger at the time of his resignation.

We should grieve the example of Crawford Howell Toy and learn from it, even as we are inspired by the courageous and Gospel-centered witness of Lottie Moon. The story of Crawford Howell Toy contains a cautionary message for every Christian teacher, seminary, church, and denomination. The elevation of Crawford Toy to the status of a hero alongside one of Christianity’s most famous Gospel missionaries is both tragic and scandalous. Heresy is not heroic.

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For more on Crawford Howell Toy and the history of Southern Seminary, see Gregory A. Wills, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1859-2009 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009).

This article originally appeared this morning at ConventionalThinking.org. See here.

Even the most cursory look at the world’s cultures will indicate the religious fervor that characterizes humanity. The only observers who seem shocked by this universal phenomenon are the secularists and the prophets of secularization theory who were absolutely certain that religious faith and religious fervor would disappear in the modern world.

Needless to say, it hasn’t turned out that way. The theory of secularization is a shadow of its former self. Leading proponents like Peter Berger of Boston University now acknowledge that the secularization thesis was not an accurate predictor of the fate of religious belief in the modern world. The modern world is not secularized. Indeed, many of the most heated conflicts around the world today involve conflicting faiths. As Berger has commented, it turns out that a few European nations and the American intellectual elites are the exceptions, rather than the rule.

And yet, the intellectual elites are not so secular as they believe themselves to be. As it happens, their religion may not be theistic, but it is a religion all the same.

That fact is confirmed in a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education. Stephen T. Asma, a professor of philosophy at Columbia College Chicago, argues that the new religion of many secular folk is ecology. As Asma explains, many secular types suffer from “green guilt.”

In “Green Guilt,” he writes:

Now the secular world still has to make sense out of its own invisible, psychological drama—in particular, its feelings of guilt and indignation. Environmentalism, as a substitute for religion, has come to the rescue. Nietzsche’s argument about an ideal God and guilt can be replicated in a new form: We need a belief in a pristine environment because we need to be cruel to ourselves as inferior beings, and we need that because we have these aggressive instincts that cannot be let out.

Asma rightly notes that Friedrich Nietzsche, the nihilist who famously declared that God is dead, understood that religion was not dead at all. He “was the first to notice that religious emotions, like guilt and indignation, are still with us, even if we’re not religious.”

These “religious emotions,” including guilt, explain why so many people seek relief by therapy or treatment of some sort. Therapy replaces theology; the analyst replaces the minister; psychotropic drugs become the sacraments; and confessing one’s misdeeds on Oprah substitutes for the confession of sin. Some of the most obviously religious individuals on earth are those who genuinely insist that they are free from any religious beliefs at all.

Asma is not the first to note the deeply religious character of radical environmentalism, but his analysis of the structure of this religious system is truly insightful.

He explains:

Instead of religious sins plaguing our conscience, we now have the transgressions of leaving the water running, leaving the lights on, failing to recycle, and using plastic grocery bags instead of paper. In addition, the righteous pleasures of being more orthodox than your neighbor (in this case being more green) can still be had—the new heresies include failure to compost, or refusal to go organic. Vitriol that used to be reserved for Satan can now be discharged against evil corporate chief executives and drivers of gas-guzzling vehicles. Apocalyptic fear-mongering previously took the shape of repent or burn in hell, but now it is recycle or burn in the ozone hole. In fact, it is interesting the way environmentalism takes on the apocalyptic aspects of the traditional religious narrative. The idea that the end is nigh is quite central to traditional Christianity—it is a jolting wake-up call to get on the righteous path. And we find many environmentalists in a similarly earnest panic about climate change and global warming.

Interestingly, Asma begins his article with an anecdote about his six-year-old son, who scolded his father for letting the water run too long. The boy is clearly “stressed and anxious” about the “sins of environmentalism.” The boy had obviously been indoctrinated into the religious system of environmentalism — something common to many of today’s children and adolescents.

Stephen Asma’s essay is important for multiple reasons. It is an excellent analysis of the religious character of environmentalism, complete with a set of comprehensive doctrines and religious practices. It is also an excellent consideration of the religious nature of human beings. Asma understands the pretensions of the secular mind, and he also sees the religious impulse working its way to the surface in the modern obsessions with health, fitness, and an ever-expanding set of “secular” sins.

At the same time, he writes from an apparently secular perspective — at least warning that we do not need yet another “humorless religion.” He is also identified as the author of Why I am a Buddhist. He seems above all to desire a bit less religious fervor from the environmentalists. He writes, “Let us save the planet, by all means. But let’s also admit to ourselves that we have a natural propensity toward guilt and indignation, and let that fact temper our fervor to more reasonable levels.”

We are left without a clue about what Asma would see as “more reasonable levels,” but his essay offers a rare glimpse into the religious character of the rather new faith of environmentalism, complete with its “potential for dogmatic zeal and obsession.” His essay puts an intelligent spotlight on the new religion of green.

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Stephen T. Asma, “Green Guilt,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, January 10, 2010.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

In the first phase of her career she was known as a Roman Catholic, and she taught at Boston College for many years. Her tenure there could only be described as controversial. At the beginning her teaching career was marked by a fight over tenure. At the end she left Boston College after refusing to allow male students in some of her classes in feminist thought.

Her critique of the Roman Catholic Church as a bastion of patriarchy, expressed in her 1968 book, The Church and the Second Sex, was extended to the entire Christian tradition. She rejected Christianity’s focus on a monotheistic deity and what she attacked as its intrinsic patriarchy. She asserted that Christianity’s focus on Jesus Christ was just another dimension of its patriarchy — a Savior in a male body.

As Margaret Elizabeth Kostenberger explains, Daly’s “complete rejection of Scripture”  on the basis of its “irremediable patriarchal bias” took her far outside the Christian faith. While other feminists called for the adoption of female or gender-neutral language for God, Daly attacked those efforts as half-measures that fail to take the phallocentricity of theism seriously.

Her famous dictum, “if the God is male, then the male is God,” stood at the heart of her radical revision of religion. She accused Christianity of “gynocide” against women and suggested that all monotheistic religion — and Christianity in particular — is “phallocentric.”

She referred to feminists as “pirates in a phallocratic society” and preached her version of feminist liberation, describing herself as a “radical lesbian feminist.” She rejected the biblical notion of sin and called for a celebration of lust and the breaking of all sexual rules. She attacked heterosexuality as inherently patriarchal and championed lesbianism as a means of the liberation of women from the “phallocratic” power system of the culture.

In her later years, Mary Daly identified herself as a “post-Christian” — a term that was, if anything, an understatement.

In the end, Mary Daly will be remembered for the radical lesbian feminist that she was. She must be given credit for her honesty in accusing theological liberals of lacking the courage of their convictions. As she saw it, they were clinging to the furniture of Christianity long after rejecting its central beliefs. She saw the entire structure as hopelessly patriarchal and called for a complete break with Christianity and theism.

In the largest sense, she was undoubtedly right in arguing that the logic of radical feminism is diametrically opposed to the truth claims of Christianity. She was, as she claimed, taking ideological feminism to its logical conclusion.

Interestingly, Mary Daly also serves as a reminder that radicals are seldom so comprehensively radical as they consider themselves. Daly was criticized by transgender and transsexual activists for her failure to see transsexuals as anything other than “death-loving Frankenstein monsters.” Womanist author Audre Lorde complained that Daly, though a radical feminist, did not recognize the role of race in patriarchy. Even the most radical thinkers among us apparently have a hard time keeping up.

According to The New York Times, Mary Daly died of “declining health,” not “gynocide.” Her intellectual work lives on among the radical feminists, but her influence extends far beyond those who would identify themselves as “post-Christian.” Many of today’s liberal denominations and seminaries have absorbed and accepted her basic critique of Christianity, but lack her boldness and intellectual honesty.

In one of her later books, Daly said, “There are and will be those who think I have gone overboard. . . . Let them be assured that this assessment is correct, probably beyond their wildest imagination.” The story of Mary Daly is, by any Christian measure, a tragedy. And, we must add, a tragedy with lessons we dare not miss.

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Margalit Fox, “Mary Daly, a leader in Feminist Theology, Dies at 81,” The New York Times, Thursday, January 7, 2010.

Recommended Resource: Margaret Elizabeth Kostenberger, Jesus and the Feminists: Who Do They Say That He Is? (Crossway Books, 2008).

But, if my children were hungry and no other food could be obtained, I would feed them whale meat and keep them warm by burning whale oil.

Thankfully, it has never come to that, and I hope it never will. I support an end to all commercial whale fishing because it is no longer necessary and because these animals are or at some point have been threatened with extinction. My point is this — whales are magnificent creatures that I desire to protect and admire, but they are not human beings. Any confusion about this does not raise whales to a new status. Instead, confusion about the distinction between humans and animals serves to threaten human dignity.

This must be kept in mind in light of news that some scientists want to declare dolphins (porpoises) to be “non-human persons.”

According to The Times [London], researchers now claim that dolphins rank second to human beings in terms of intelligence, displacing chimps and apes from that ranking. Furthermore, some of these scientists want to declare dolphins to be “non-human persons” with specific rights.

As the paper reports, “The researchers argue that their work shows it is morally unacceptable to keep such intelligent animals in amusement parks or to kill them for food or by accident when fishing.”

Further:

Dolphins have long been recognized as among the most intelligent of animals but many researchers had placed them below chimps, which some studies have found can reach the intelligence levels of three-year-old children. Recently, however, a series of behavioral studies has suggested that dolphins, especially species such as the bottlenose, could be the brighter of the two. The studies show how dolphins have distinct personalities, a strong sense of self and can think about the future.

These claims of distinct personalities, “a strong sense of self,” and the ability to contemplate the future may well be valid. Measuring relative intelligence is hard enough among human beings, however, much less among various species. Nevertheless, no one should doubt the fact that dolphins and whales seem far more intelligent than dairy cattle. But is it reasonable to define them as persons?

Personhood and personality are not the same thing. Even house pets and farm animals have personality. This is part of their charm, after all. But much of what we consider personality is fueled by our own reflex to anthropomorphize — to read human states of mind and intelligence back onto our animals.

When scientists and animal rights activists call for an animal to be considered a person, they imply a status that invokes rights. It is highly problematic to suggest that any non-human species possesses rights in any sense analogous to those rightly claimed by human beings.

We are witnessing a massive shift in human consciousness at this point, with activists calling for non-human species to be classified as non-human persons. Legal activists are ready to argue that at least some animals deserve legal representation. There is no end to the confusion such moves would inevitable create.

A key moral principle comes down to this: We do not eat persons. While eating whales and dolphins is, at least for most of us, neither necessary or desirable, we must recognize that whales and dolphins — intelligent as they are — are still non-human animals, not non-human persons.

I fervently hope that I never have to eat a whale or a dolphin. But this is a matter of preference and need rather than immutable principle. The experience of watching those magnificent creatures off the coasts of Maui and Oahu was unforgettable. I support the maximum stewardship of sea life and the legal protection of whales from commercial fishing. But I do so because they are magnificent animals and part of the glory of God’s creation, not because they are persons.

The Christian worldview requires the careful making of the right distinctions, and one of the most important of these distinctions comes down to the crucial and categorical distinction between human beings — created in God’s own image — and the rest of the created order. We must reject the very notion of “non-human persons.”

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How will 2009 be remembered? Looking back over the year, ten major developments seem most important to me from this vantage point. A few years from now, 2009 might be remembered differently, but these markers stand out as 2010 begins

1. The Inauguration of Barack Obama as President of the United States

The inauguration of an American president is an act of solemnity and national purpose. The inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States came with all the usual fanfare and formality, but also with controversy and deep concerns. History was made as the nation inaugurated its first African-American president, and one of its youngest chief executives. The inaugural ceremony was marked by controversy over the ministers chosen for public prayer. The choice of Pastor Rick Warren of California’s Saddleback Church was hardly a surprise, given the prominence of the Saddleback Presidential Forum during the campaign. But Warren became unexpectedly controversial when homosexual activists complained about his support for California’s Proposition 8 — the measure that put an end to the state’s brief season of legalized same-sex marriage. Obama later chose Bishop Gene Robinson, the openly-homosexual Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire, to pray at the opening event on the Mall. Soon after taking office, the new President discovered what every newly-elected president learns — Congress has a mind of its own.

2. The Uprising in Iran

The year began as the thirtieth anniversary of the Iran Revolution that toppled the regime of the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and led to the establishment of Iran as an Islamic republic under the leadership of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It ended with big questions about the survival of the current regime under the rule of the ayatollahs and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The spark for the uprising came as Iran underwent a national election. Thousands of Iranians, including many students, took to the streets of Tehran and other major cities to protest electoral fraud and to support opposition candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi. Despite the protests, Ahmadinejad declared himself the winner and police eventually won back the streets. Nevertheless, the harshly repressive action seemed very reminiscent of the efforts of the Shah to hold back the anger of the Iranian people. At the same time, Iran continued to flaunt international efforts to end its pursuit of a nuclear weapons program.

3. The Travail of the Global Economy

The global economic recession was foremost on most minds as the year began and the Obama administration took office. Working in tandem with a Democratically-controlled Congress, the Obama administration undertook the most significant governmental take-over of the American economy since the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt, with massive Federal investments in virtually all sectors of the economy. The unthinkable became the actual as General Motors declared bankruptcy and American taxpayers became the company’s largest stockholders — and General Motors was just the tip of the economic iceberg. As the year ended, some declared the “Great Recession” officially over, but declining home values and rising unemployment underlined both hardship and the expected length of the economic recovery. Furthermore, the role of China as America’s creditor loomed as a long-term worry that had been largely unknown by most Americans.

4. The Death of Michael Jackson and the Nation’s Addiction to Celebrity

Notable deaths of 2009 included Senator Edward M. Kennedy and Evangelist Oral Roberts, but the most widely-covered death of the year was the unexpected demise of entertainer Michael Jackson. A digital search of the year’s headlines will reveal the international fascination with Jackson, a brilliant marketer and entertainer, but a tortured soul whose various presentations of himself made him a focus of endless speculation and concern. His death — presumably by a drug-induced cardiac arrest — came as the entertainer was working on a comeback tour. His sensational trial and acquittal on charges of child sexual abuse in 2005 failed to stem his international appeal, but financial sources argued that his net worth surged once again only after his death. His memorial service was broadcast around the world, drawing an estimated 1 billion viewers. Cable news networks and other channels fed a national mania for Jackson that continued weeks after his death, underlining the nation’s seemingly insatiable appetite for celebrity.

5. The Rise of Twitter and the Growing Domination of Social Media

Twitter, the micro-blogging sensation that took the year by storm, will soon register its 100 millionth user. “Tweets” of 140 characters or less became the communication medium of the year. At the same time, Facebook registered over 350 million members worldwide, with users spending 10 billion minutes there every day. By the end of 2009, Facebook had reached 54.7 percent of all Americans ages 12 to 17 — up from just 28.3 percent in 2008. The Age of Social Media had clearly arrived by 2009, changing the way Americans communicate and relate to each other. As one observer noted, even those in business who had dismissed social media as nothing more than notes about who was eating a doughnut with whom ended the year worried that their competition was eating their lunch.

6. The Battle over Health Care Reform

The President began 2009 with a focused determination to transform the nation’s health care system — a complex that includes no less than one-sixth of the nation’s economy. The President’s ambitious goals, articulated during the 2008 presidential campaign, gave way to political reality as the Obama administration discovered that its preference for a so-called “public option” was doomed in the U.S. Senate. The national debate over health care indicated that most Americans are not ready for a revolution in health-care delivery — much less for a major change in their own health insurance. As the year ended, the President had put the prestige of his administration clearly on the line, and the U.S. Senate barely passed a compromise bill on Christmas Eve. A much more liberal version adopted by the House of Representatives must now be reconciled with the Senate’s more gradualist approach. The biggest surprise of the health care debate was the so-called “Stupak Amendment” adopted by the House of Representatives that may well be the most significant pro-life legislation to pass either house of Congress since the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973. Americans gained a rare view of the kind of political shenanigans used by congressional leaders in order to negotiate much-needed votes. The year ended with the President declaring a major victory, but with huge concerns about abortion coverage and other issues looming.

7. The Leftward March of Liberal Protestantism

Though hardly surprising, the continued leftward march of liberal Protestantism meant further tragedy for several denominations. In particular, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) stood the Lutheran tradition on its head by legitimating “bound conscience” as a means of subverting biblical authority. That denomination officially sanctioned the service of partnered homosexual clergy during its church wide meeting in August. The Episcopal Church continued its headlong rush to flaunt its refusal to abide by biblical standards of sexuality by declaring an end to the moratorium on electing openly-homosexual bishops and blessing same-sex unions. As the year drew to a close, the church’s Los Angeles diocese elected an openly-lesbian priest as auxiliary bishop, setting the stage for in inevitable head-on collision with the worldwide Anglican Communion.

8. The Climate Summit in Copenhagen

The 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference was supposed to produce a binding legal agreement to limit international carbon emissions. Instead, the Copenhagen Summit ended without any such agreement and the failure of the global event appeared to signal the ineffectiveness of the United Nations in terms of addressing climate change. Of course, the event itself became the focus of intense controversy over the scientific arguments related to global warming and climate change — controversy fueled by leaked e-mails that demonstrated scientific malfeasance among some leading researchers. In the end, President Obama and other leaders claimed to have cobbled together a “meaningful agreement,” but harsh divisions between developed and developing nations led to an undeniable impasse. Nevertheless, the Copenhagen Summit may actually open the door to a far more reasonable approach to limiting carbon emissions — an approach that would rely on new technologies, market forces, and natural economic incentives. The unspoken conclusion of the process is the realization that the cost of limiting carbon emissions as called for by climate activists outweighs the potential threat in terms of immediate harm. In other words, when it comes to global warming, there is hope that cooler heads will prevail.

9.  The Swine Flu Epidemic and the New International Hygiene

If anything, 2009 was a boom year for manufacturers of hand sanitizer. Worries about an epidemic of the H1N1 flu virus led to panic in many contexts and to what may well prove to be permanent changes in personal habits. Hand sanitizer dispensers are now increasingly ubiquitous in schools, churches, shopping malls, and restaurants. Concerns about the spread of the highly infectious virus led to mass immunization campaigns, public health alerts, and a new hesitation about shaking hands. As the year drew to a close, it became increasingly clear that the virus was actually less deadly than the normal seasonal flu virus, and a major health catastrophe was averted. Nevertheless, the human race was reminded that we are vulnerable to microscopic viruses — a necessary and incredibly humbling knowledge.

10. The Spotlight on Private Scandals and Public Consequences

Every year seems to bring its own revelations and moral sensations, but the year 2009 seems particularly scarred by moral scandal. Sensational revelations of adultery were made by prominent leaders and celebrities including entertainer David Letterman, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, and golfer Tiger Woods. All three of these men found their lives open to public scrutiny in the aftermath of adultery. David Letterman made his admission in the opening segment of his comedy program, leaving a bewildered audience uncertain whether to laugh or cry. Mark Sanford, the Republican Governor of South Carolina, destroyed his political career and his marriage when he was caught in an adulterous affair with a woman in South America — an affair the Governor clearly did not want to end. The year concluded with golfer Tiger Woods facing devastating financial losses as sponsors pulled their support in light of the media spotlight on his own marital infidelity. These scandals, added to so many others, served as reminders that private acts bring public consequences, that character does matter, and that marital vows do indeed mean something — even in this confused age.

And now 2009 has passed into the history books, but we must not let it recede into memory without considering its lessons. The year to come will bring lessons of its own — can we see them coming?

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A closer look at the narratives in both Matthew and Luke reveals a richness that familiarity may hide from us. Matthew begins with the genealogy of Christ, demonstrating the sequence of generations as Israel anticipated the birth of David’s Son — the Messiah. Luke, intending to set forth “an orderly account” of the events concerning Jesus, begins with the anticipation of the birth of John the Baptist and then moves to tell of the virgin conception of Jesus.

A careful reading of Matthew and Luke reveals both the elegance of detail and the grand expanse of the story of Christ’s birth. Matthew gives particular attention to the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. The virgin birth, the birth of Christ in Bethlehem of Judea, the Herodian massacre of the innocents, the flight to Egypt, and the role of John the Baptist as forerunner are all presented as the fulfillment of specific Old Testament prophecies.

Every word of the Old Testament points to Christ. He is not only the fulfillment of all the Old Testament prophecies concerning him, he is the perfect fulfillment of the law and the prophets — the entirety of the Old Testament Scriptures. The Christmas story does not begin in Bethlehem, for Israel had been promised the Messiah. As Luke reveals, Simeon beheld the baby Jesus in the temple and understood this infant to be “the Lord’s Christ” — the Davidic Messiah.  Simeon understood this clearly — the Christmas story did not begin in Bethlehem, or even in Jerusalem.

So, where does the Christmas story begin? In the Gospel of John we read: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.” [John 1:1-3]

The prologue to John’s Gospel points to creation and to Christ, the divine Logos, as the agent of creation. Yet, with language drawn directly from Genesis, John begins his gospel “in the beginning.”

In other words, the Christmas story begins before the creation of the world. As we celebrate Christmas and contemplate the Christmas story, we must be very careful not to begin the story in Bethlehem, or even in Nazareth, where Mary was confronted by Gabriel with the message that she would be the mother of the Messiah.

We must not even begin with Moses and the prophets, and with the expectation of the coming Son of Man, the promised Suffering Servant, and the heralded Davidic Messiah. We must begin before the world was created and before humanity was formed, much less fallen.

Why is this so important? Put simply, if we get the Christmas story wrong, we get the Gospel wrong. Told carelessly, the Christmas story sounds like God’s “Plan B.” In other words, we can make the Christmas story sound like God turning to a new plan, rather than fulfilling all that he had promised.  We must be very careful to tell the Christmas story in such a way that we make the gospel clear.

Christmas is not God’s second plan. Before he created the world, God determined to save sinners through the blood of his own Son. The grand narrative of the Bible points to this essential truth — God determined to bring glory to himself through the salvation of a people redeemed and purchased by his own Son, the Christ. Bethlehem and Calvary were essential parts of God’s plan from the beginning, before the cosmos was brought into being as the Son obeyed the will of the Father in creation.

The Christmas story does not begin in Bethlehem, but we appropriately look to Bethlehem as the scene of the most decisive event in human history — the incarnation of the Son of God. Even as we turn our attention to Bethlehem, we must remember that the story of our salvation does not begin there. That story begins in the eternal purpose of God.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.” That is where the Christmas story begins, and John takes us right to the essence of what happened in Bethlehem: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” [John 1:14]

Let’s be sure to get the Christmas story right, start to finish.

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Goodman is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, whose observations are predictably liberal and feminist, but also marked by a keen eye for cultural detail. I still remember a column she wrote almost thirty years ago about an abandoned church being transformed into a condominium.

In “Whatever Happened to Shame?,” published in the December 18 edition of the Boston paper, Goodman reports that The New York Post has hired Ashley Dupre, the prostitute at the center of the controversy that brought down former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, as an advice columnist. Goodman does not welcome this news: “I may be a cynic, but somehow I don’t think the Post was motivated by a desire to reform a wayward (call) girl. Dupre’s second act isn’t reformation. It’s confirmation, if we needed it, that there’s no shame in the game.”

Ellen Goodman is not a scold. She tells us this, insisting that “Shame on you” is “not a phrase that trips off my lips.” But she does see a loss of shame as an ominous moral signal. She referred also to the “scandal of the moment” centering on Tiger Woods and the financial scandals of the last two years.

Her greatest concern is the absence of shame:

If, as anthropologists say, shame comes from a violation of cultural norms, it seems to have found its match in a newer cultural norm: fame. Notoriety isn’t so notorious anymore. If Hester Prynne were around, she wouldn’t be the subject of a novel, she’d be the author of a tell-all memoir with cellphone pictures of a buff Arthur Dimmesdale.

Goodman’s reference to The Scarlet Letter will, I fear, be familiar to a decreasing number of Americans each year. The story has less hold on a society that does not fear (or even understand) shame.

The problem with Ellen Goodman’s understanding of shame is in her paragraph above. If shame is rooted only in “a violation of cultural norms,” then shame disappears as cultural norms change and what was once condemned is now celebrated.

I share Ellen Goodman’s concern about the disappearance of shame, but I do not believe that a secular understanding of morality can sustain a stable structure of shame. Cultural norms are changing before our eyes. The shame that matters is the shame that led Adam and Eve to fashion aprons out of fig leaves and hide from God in the Garden. This is shame rooted in the knowledge of sin, not mere cultural norms. It is shame rooted in the knowledge that we have sinned against God, not merely that we have violated a cultural standard.

It is a good sign that Ellen Goodman is concerned about this. I share her concern and appreciate her candor. But my greater concern is that the absence of the category of sin leaves shame floating on an unstable platform of cultural norms.

The crying shame is the absence of the conviction of sin, and that absence is explained by the cultural disappearance of God as moral judge. The formula is simple: No sin, no shame. Just ask America’s newest advice columnist.

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Granville Oral Roberts was born into the home of a preacher and he married the daughter of a preacher. Soon after reaching adulthood he entered the ministry himself, holding tent meetings in the style of the evangelists of his day. Roberts began as a traditional holiness preacher, but he would later transform his ministry into a worldwide enterprise utilizing electronic media and extending a global reach through television and an institutional empire that would include the university named for him.

Writing in 1985, biographer David Edwin Harrell would describe Oral Roberts as “one of the most influential religious leaders in the world in the twentieth century.” In Oral Roberts: An American Life, Harrell, a professor of history at Auburn University, would lament the fact that mainstream academia had given so little attention to Roberts and to the Pentecostal and charismatic movements of which he was so famously a part. Harrell suggested three roles that led to Roberts’ preeminence.

First, Harrell credits Roberts with bringing leadership and publicity to the Pentecostal and charismatic movements. Though these movements began their legendary growth early in the twentieth century, most of the significant charismatic figures lacked the organizational and media ability that Roberts brought to his ministry. Roberts understood the institutional instability of the Pentecostal and charismatic movements. His vision of mainstreaming the movement led him at various points in his ministry to do what other holiness preachers would never have considered. He sought and obtained ministerial credentials with the United Methodist Church, a denomination with deep roots in the Wesleyan tradition that represented the kind of middle-class America Roberts so desperately wanted to reach. The establishment of Oral Roberts University required an intense investment of time, money, and energy. Nevertheless, Roberts understood that the university platform would allow him to reach a generation of young charismatics and would serve as an institutional platform for his larger work.

Second, Roberts was a pioneer in the use of modern electronic media. Early on, Roberts recognized the power of television. He understood that radio could reach untold thousands, but he saw television as the way of reaching hypermodern America. His slick television specials, often featuring Hollywood celebrities and national figures, were virtually unprecedented in American Christian life. David Harrell goes so far as to credit Oral Roberts as the founder of what became known as the “electronic church.” During the prime years of Oral Roberts’ ministry, television was the major means of reaching a mass public, and Roberts had an intuitive feel for the medium.

Third, Harrell points to Roberts’ emphasis on religious healing. “It was healing that launched his ministry in 1947, and it is healing that is the foundation of the controversial City of Faith complex rising high over the Tulsa skyline.” Those words were written in 1985. The City of Faith complex was to include three major towers, one reaching to 60 stories. Roberts saw the City of Faith as a great medical center that would, he hoped, find a cure for cancer. The hospital was built, but it was not financially viable. The complex is no longer controlled by Oral Roberts University and is now office space known as CityPlex Towers.

In reality, most Americans probably know of Oral Roberts through a combination of his intended and unintended media exposure. Roberts frequently attracted controversy. Most famously, he became known for claiming to receive a vision of a 900 foot Jesus instructing them to build the City of Faith and, when hard times hit his empire, telling his followers that if a sufficient amount of gifts was not received within a specified amount of time, God would end his life. In 1987, Roberts became the focus of intense scrutiny in light of claims made by his ministry that a dead person had been brought to life.

In the end, however, Oral Roberts should be measured by his message. Though his claims of visions and healings drew deserved attention, along with both scrutiny and embarrassment, it was the core of his message that is most problematic. In his prime years, Roberts was the most significant agent for prosperity theology.

Prosperity theology teaches that God promises his people financial gain and bodily health. It is a false Gospel that turns the Gospel of Christ upside-down. The true Gospel offers forgiveness of sins and leads to a life of discipleship. Following Christ demands poverty more often than wealth, and we are not promised relief from physical ills, injury, sickness, or death. Christians die along with all other mortals, but we are promised the gift of eternal life in Christ.

There is tragedy in the sight of the City of Faith turned from a hospital into an office complex. In recent years scandal has erupted at Oral Roberts University, though stability may have been recently regained. Most Americans probably remember Oral Roberts, if at all, through his television ministry of decades past. Others will associate him only with the bizarre — visions of a 900-ft Jesus and the rest.

But the greatest tragedy in all this is the perpetuation of prosperity theology, passed on by Oral Roberts to a new generation. I am thankful for every sinner who came to know the Gospel of Christ through the preaching of Oral Roberts, and I heard him preach about salvation in ways that were true and powerful. But I can only lament the prosperity theology that he leaves in his long shadow.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Tiger Woods’s fall from public favor happened with breathtaking speed. In a matter of days, a minor vehicle accident in the middle of the night mushroomed into both private and public catastrophe. Even as Woods and his famously protective handlers sought to avoid or limit the controversy, the golfer’s eventual admission of marital infidelity has forever changed the way the public looks at the world’s most highly compensated athlete.

This story is far from over. Even as Tiger Woods has announced that he is taking an “indefinite” leave from professional golf in order to give priority to his wife and family, his future as both professional athlete and public figure is very much in question. Some believe that Woods will return to his exalted position after a necessary period of contrition and public withdrawal. Others suggest that, given the mental demands of professional golf, Tiger Woods will have a very difficult time returning to top form. And, what about Tiger Woods the brand? On these questions time will have to tell. Nevertheless, the travail of Tiger Woods already provides lessons that are not to be missed.

Lesson One: Acts done in private can and will have public consequences.

Interestingly, the scandal surrounding Tiger Woods appeared to be of low voltage in its opening chapter. Indeed, some of the most interesting public debate of this first phase was over the question of whether the unfolding scandal was of any public consequence at all. A good number of observers, including Peggy Noonan, appearing on the “This Week” program on ABC News, argued that the scandal was a private matter, since Tiger Woods is a professional athlete and not a politician. Writing in Newsweek magazine, Julia Baird made a similar argument. “He is not a politician, priest, or morals crusader. He is an athlete,” Baird declared.

She continued:

Why do we even pretend that sportspeople are models of propriety? Or rather why do we need them to be? They are physically gifted, driven, and disciplined. That’s what you need to excel in sport. Not moral strength, courage, decency, or fidelity. These virtues are admirable, but are a bonus: they should not be an expectation. Yet we continue to project an irrational desire for the physically perfect to be spiritually strong.

That is a rather amazing argument. Moral strength, courage, decency, and fidelity are “admirable,” but not necessary for athletes? Clearly, the American public was not buying that argument — and for good reason.

Tiger Woods may not be a priest or a politician, but he has transformed himself into a public figure. Indeed, most of his income is derived from selling himself as a brand, an advertising symbol, and an image. The glare of publicity was not forced upon Tiger Woods — he has actively and quite successfully cultivated this publicity for his own purposes. There is no inherent fault in this, but the American people are not buying the argument that his adventures in serial marital infidelity, combined with two late-night 911 calls, are matters of purely private concern between Tiger Woods and his wife, Elin Nordegren.

Charles McGrath made this point clear in an essay published in The New York Times:

[Tiger] Woods has become a public figure not just in the way that most great athletes are public figures, but also in a way probably unparalleled in the history of publicity itself. He has made far more money from selling himself, or his image, then he has made from playing tournaments. That image, partly genuine and partly sculptured, has been one of decency, modesty, filial devotion and paternal responsibility, and not of mysterious car crashes and evasive explanations.

Private actions lead to public consequences. This is not true at the same scale for everyone. As Charles McGrath pointed out in his essay, if the accident that sparked this scandal had happened to most people, “it wouldn’t have merited more than a line or two in the local weekly.” But whatever the context, private sins never stay as private as sinners expect, and the consequences are never limited to those privately involved. While the greatest injury is to Tiger Woods’s wife and children, he has also done great damage to the sport he has represented for so long. The damage spreads far beyond the sports world.

Lesson Two: The public still believes that adultery is a big deal.

There is no question that America’s moral landscape has been transformed in recent decades. This is especially true when it comes to the morality of sex and sexuality. Our contemporary society is marked by a breathtaking pattern of moral renegotiation that has led to the virtual evaporation of many moral stigmas, a rebellion against all rules, and the increasing legitimation of any number of sexual practices, lifestyles, and forms of expression. A spirit of moral revolution and moral relativism when it comes to sex has been in the air at least since the 1960s.

At the same time, marriage has been increasingly marginalized as an institution, with no-fault divorce and any number of other assaults serving to undermine marital stability and the place of marriage in society. Our contemporary mores have shifted to permissive extremes when it comes to matters such as premarital sex, pornography, and the ubiquitous use of sex in entertainment and advertising.

Still, it appears that Americans draw the line at adultery. The scandal surrounding Tiger Woods is essentially a scandal about adultery. In their own way, Americans have made clear their instinct and assumption that adultery is objectively wrong, deserving of moral censure, and not to be taken lightly.

The force of public outrage directed at Tiger Woods’s admission of marital infidelity indicates that the American public conscience remains more deeply rooted in its biblical origins than many secular observers would expect or appreciate.

A fascinating angle on this issue is provided in an article by Roger Blitz published in The Financial Times. Blitz argues that Tiger Woods is likely to escape much damage to his reputation because “while Mr. Woods and his advisers have built his image around many values, such as his diversity, his connection with young people, … and his well-spoken demeanor, Christian morality is not one of them.”

In other words, Blitz asserts that those who are not publicly committed to Christian morality are not held to this standard by the public. Evidently, someone forgot to tell the American people. Virtually no public figure has come forth to argue that what Tiger Woods has done is of no significant moral consequence. No major figure has argued that marital infidelity is morally inconsequential. While Americans may be confused about any number of moral matters and questions about sexuality, marriage exists as a fundamental moral firewall, and the public outrage over this scandal is, in its own very important way, a testimonial to this fact.

Lesson Three: A fall from public favor can happen in an instant.

Just a matter of days ago, Tiger Woods was at the very top of his profession, one of the most admired public figures of the sports world, and a man known primarily for his exquisite discipline and absolute mental focus. All that has evaporated (for now, at least) in an almost instantaneous burst of scandal.

“What Tiger Woods has caused to happen to himself and his image over the past two weeks is the sports world’s most remarkable fall from grace, ever.” So wrote Christine Brennan in USA Today. She continued: “No athlete has ever held a perch so high in our culture — right up there with President and Mrs. Obama, and Oprah — and fallen so far so fast.” All that changed in a matter of mere days. “Today, that man is in disarray, his family life a shambles, his golf future a question mark, with much of what we thought we knew about him now laughed at and doubted.”

Of course, no one knows where the scandal will end. Tiger Woods must already deal with accusations of adultery, his own admission of guilt, and a growing swarm of salacious details, rumors, and speculations. He has added to his public challenge by attempting to script every admission for limited impact. Even as he has, to his credit, used words such as “transgressions” and “infidelity,” he has not come forth with a compelling account of his behavior. Add to this his refusal to appear in public to make any comment. While this strategy is understandable, he will eventually be required to say something in a public forum.

Tiger Woods now finds himself in a disastrous crisis of his own making. There is no one else he can blame for his trouble and there is no public account that can undo the past. In a truly breathtaking reversal, Tiger Woods has gone from being one of the most universally respected figures in sports to one of the most widely discussed subjects of scandal. Clearly, it does not take long to fall from a pedestal.

In one of his advertisements for Accenture, the image of Tiger Woods appears along with the words: “It’s what you do next that counts.” Much now depends on what Tiger Woods does next. If the American people are truly scandalized by his adultery, they must now hope and pray that this marriage and family can be rebuilt and sustained. Something of far greater consequence than an illustrious career in sports is at stake here. Tiger Woods the human being is of infinitely greater value than Tiger Woods the brand.

For Christians, there is an even deeper concern. The current travail of Tiger Woods points far beyond his need for marital recovery, career consultation, or brand management. Tiger Woods needs a Savior. I am praying that this devastating experience, caused so classically by his own sin, will lead Tiger Woods to understand that he is not so self-sufficient as he thinks. Tiger Woods now faces a problem that he cannot solve. Though he can do much to repair his marriage, his family, and his public image, he cannot atone for his own sins. My prayer is that there is someone who can reach Tiger Woods with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

In the end, all this must remind Christians of the universal need for the Gospel. We must remember our own sin and our utter dependence upon the grace and mercy of God made ours in Jesus Christ. Without question, this is the most important lesson drawn from the travail of Tiger Woods.

On his deathbed, Martin Luther offered these last words: “We are sinners, it is true.” Tiger Woods is one of us, after all.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Arrayed before us today is an assemblage of scholars decked out in all their glory. The regalia and ceremonial symbols will be recognizable throughout the world of scholarship and higher education. The completion of degree programs and courses of study deserves recognition. The investment of time — even blood, sweat, toil, and tears — is worthy of celebration. Furthermore, there is the very real sense that this institution of learning is setting loose a new generation to go out into the world. The least we can do is to organize an orderly launch.

Of course, there is actually far more here than meets the eye. Even as the regalia and ceremony will be recognizable throughout the world of education, this is no mere commencement ceremony. Then again, this institution is no mere school. This ceremony is a service of Christian worship and this institution serves no less than the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our calling is to educate and prepare a new generation of Christian pastors, missionaries, evangelists, and ministers in order that the church may be faithfully fed and competently led.

The process of education is more than the transmission of knowledge from one mind to another. This is especially true in a Christian institution, where teachers and students are learners together, where committed teachers invest not only their minds but their hearts in the inculcation of Christian conviction and knowledge, and where bonds of friendship and affection inevitably arise. In other words, we have come to love these students and it is no easy thing to let them go.

At such a moment, it seems appropriate that we consider this commencement event in light of Christian wisdom drawn from the Word of God — a wisdom that is, more often than not, counter-intuitive and distinctively different from that wisdom shaped by secular presuppositions. Indeed, a correct understanding of the Christian ministry will often require us to reject what the world is absolutely certain is true. And this applies even to the wisdom gained from the most trustworthy of human sources — even our grandmothers.

As a boy, I recall hearing my maternal grandmother’s admonishment that I should always be certain to finish whatever I start. In most dimensions of life, this remains good advice; the kind of advice a good and godly grandmother would pass along to her grandson. It is the sort of wisdom that passes the test of conventional acceptance. We should not be satisfied to leave our work unfinished.

In some cases, an unfinished project is a matter of mild embarrassment. Projects begin with great energy and intentionality — to trace a genealogy, restore a vintage automobile, renovate a room, write the Great American novel, or simply clean the attic. Nevertheless, so many of these aims are never accomplished.

In other cases, an unfinished project appears more tragic than embarrassing. Mozart did not live to complete his famed Requiem. Franklin Delano Roosevelt did not live to see final victory in World War II. The landscape of Europe is dotted with both castles and cathedrals begun but not finished. Each of these has become a monument to the frailty of humankind and the fragility of human plans.

Nevertheless, the biblical conception of the Christian ministry is, as we should not be surprised to find, radically at odds with worldly wisdom. According to the New Testament, one of the most important insights about the Christian ministry is this: We will not finish what we begin. This is not to say that we will never set goals and reach them or that we will never complete plans and programs. It does mean that the Christian ministry must be seen in the context of faithfulness extended from generation to generation until Christ returns to claim his Bride.

This truth is made clear in this well-known passage from First Corinthians, chapter 3:

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not being merely human?

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

The background of this passage is Paul’s utter frustration brought about by the fact that the Corinthian church was so deeply divided into factions. Repeatedly, Paul expresses his grief, frustration, and heartbreaking concern over the tendency of the Corinthians to insult the Gospel and to divide the church by factionalism and a party spirit. As this passage begins, Paul admonishes the Corinthians for their spiritual immaturity. Spiritually, they are satisfied to be nursing infants rather than to grow into the fullness of Christ. They should be eating meat, but they must be fed with milk. When one claims to follow Paul and the other to follow Apollos, they demonstrate their mutual immaturity and fleshly ambitions.

The exasperated apostle sets the record straight by making clear that both he and Apollos are merely servants of Christ who have been assigned by the Lord to be agents of bringing the Gospel and feeding the flock of the Church at Corinth. Using an agricultural metaphor, Paul simply states: “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” Paul was commissioned to bring the gospel to Corinth and he planted the good seed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He was followed by Apollos, a man of eloquence, who taught the Word of God and watered what Paul had planted.

Shifting to an architectural metaphor, Paul speaks of his role, by the grace of God, to act as a skilled master builder laying a foundation. He understands that others will come to build on that foundation. Ultimately the true foundation of the Church is none other than Jesus Christ.

In framing his admonitions, Paul reminded the Corinthians that “he who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.” Ministers of the Gospel are “God’s fellow workers.” The congregation is God’s field and God’s building. Every minister must take care to build faithfully upon the foundation. The one who plants and the one who waters are nothing in themselves. The agent of all true Gospel ministry is God himself. As the remainder of chapter three makes clear, the worthiness of our work will be fully disclosed on the day of judgment and tested by fire.

A commencement ceremony takes a quick view backward in order to aim at the long view of the future. This day is far more about beginnings than endings. The completion of these monumentally important programs of study is appropriately marked and celebrated, but our hearts are drawn to the future as we imagine what God will do by his grace and for his glory in these graduates arrayed before us. And so our focus is on the start of new ministries, missionary journeys, and opportunities to serve the church for whom Christ died.

But, in light of Paul’s words to the Corinthians, it seems necessary for us to set loose these graduates with the exhortation that they must start what they will themselves never finish. As a matter of fact, we really do not start what is altogether new. We will all build on the foundation someone else has laid. Even as the Lord grants opportunity to sow seed, we will spend much of our lives and ministries watering. The Christian ministry is not a career. It is a calling that originates in the sovereign majesty of God and is concluded only by the coming of the kingdom of the Lord, and of his Christ.

In the church age, ministry is handed from generation to generation. Our humble determination and our heart’s desire must be to receive this charge and to serve faithfully — planting and watering in the fields of ministry and taking care how we build upon the foundation laid before us.

The Lord God spoke through his prophet Joel to promise that older men will dream dreams and young men shall see visions. Powerful, faithful, and compelling dreams and visions animate these graduates. They were brought here to this seminary as they were called to ministry, these visions and dreams have kept them here through years of dedicated study, and these dreams and visions propel them onward as they go out into a world of ministry and mission.

But as they go, they join a line of faithfulness that reaches back to Moses and Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, John the Baptist and John the evangelist, Peter and Philip, Paul and Apollos. It extends through generations punctuated by names such as Athanasius and Augustine, Luther and Calvin, Whitfield and Wesley, Owens and Edwards, Spurgeon and Moody . . . and so it goes.

Graduates of the Southern Seminary class of December 2009, if you aim to finish what you start in ministry, you will aim too low or finish what is not Christ’s. Go out to plant, but also to water. Sow the good seed of the Gospel, even as you cultivate and irrigate. Build faithfully upon the foundation laid by Christ and the apostles. Receive the stewardship of ministry that is passed on to you and give your all to this calling so long as you live. Then, pass this ministry to a generation yet unseen and unborn to continue this ministry and extend the reach of the Gospel until Jesus comes.

Start something you cannot finish and give yourself to it for the length of your days, with the strength of your life, to the glory of God. Dream dreams and see visions, and take up this calling as you plant and water in the fields of Christ. Build carefully upon the foundation laid for you. The hopes and prayers of God’s faithful people go with you.

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This is a commencement address and charge to graduates of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, delivered December 11, 2009 by R. Albert Mohler, Jr., President.

The magazine recently featured a major article on abortion, and it just might be the most important article on this issue in recent history.

In “The Abortion Distortion — Just How Pro-choice is America, Really?,” writer Jennifer Senior offers an incredibly insightful and important essay on the moral status of abortion in the American mind. Senior is clearly writing to a New York readership — expected to be overwhelmingly pro-choice and settled in a posture of abortion advocacy. Given the passage of the so-called “Stupak amendment” to the health-care reform bill adopted by the House of Representatives, many in the pro-choice movement responded with amazement that a pro-life minority has been able to muster such support. Jennifer Senior posed the most awkward question for her readers: Is America really pro-choice?

Consider this:

According to a Gallup poll from July, 60 percent of Americans think abortion should be either illegal or “legal only in a few circumstances.” Only seventeen states pay for the procedure for poor women beyond the standards of the 1977 Hyde Amendment—meaning if the woman’s life is in danger or she’s been the victim of rape or incest. Just two months before the health-care bill’s passage in the House, a Rasmussen poll found that 48 percent of the public didn’t want abortion covered in any government-subsidized health plan, while just 13 percent did. (Thirty-two percent believed in a “neutral” approach—though what on Earth that means is hard to say.)

As a matter of fact, Senior went all the way back to 1973 in order to document her assessment that America was never as pro-choice as many liberals had assumed. The legal impact of Roe v. Wade could not overcome the fact that, as Jeffrey Rosen of George Washington University noted, the decision “was one of the few Supreme Court decisions that was out of step with mainstream public opinion.”

Senior suggests that America is “a very ambivalent pro-choice nation.” She acknowledges the numerical data that indicates an increasing pro-life direction for the American people and, speaking to a pro-choice readership, laments that “it sometimes gets lost how truly numerically challenged we are.”

So, just how did the Stupak amendment pass?

The idea that a bunch of pro-life rogue wingnuts have hijacked the agenda and thwarted the national will is a convenient, but fanciful, belief. Even with an 81-person margin in the House, and even with a passionately committed female, pro-choice Speaker, it was the Democrats who managed to pass a bill that, arguably, would restrict access to abortion more aggressively than any state measure or legal case since the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade.

Along the way, Jennifer Senior makes some fascinating observations. In terms of the motivation to be engaged in the issue of abortion, she quotes Harrison Hickman, a former NARAL pollster, as saying: “If you believe that choosing the wrong side of the issue means spending eternal life in Hades, of course you’re going to be more focused on it.” That is a very powerful affirmation of the fact that one’s worldview really does matter.

She also understands the great generational shift taking place on the issue. She recognizes that the current generation of younger voters “is the most pro-life to come along since the generation born during the Great Depression.” Why? This same generation is the first to grow up with ultrasound images taped to the refrigerator door. Their understanding of the fetus is dramatically different from those who never had to face those images.  Furthermore, Senior also raises the fascinating insight that the big technological advance experienced by this generation was IVF — a technology that allowed having babies rather than not having them. This generation understands the issue in terms of infant human life. They do not see a mere fetus. They recognize a baby. Nancy Keenan of NARAL is cited as saying that the biggest defenders of abortion are now a “menopausal militia.”

Senior also deals with the troubled moral conscience of the pro-choice movement and abortion providers with remarkable candor. She reports that abortion counselors “will also tell you that the stigma attached to the procedure is worse than it’s been in years.” She cites Charlotte Taft, operator of a Dallas abortion clinic, who acknowledged to a reporter that women know “abortion is a kind of killing.” Jeannie Ludlow is cited for her uncomfortable experience in seeing repeat-abortion patients. The horror and reality of late-term abortions is documented — even as the continued “right” to such procedures is advocated.

By any measure, Jennifer Senior has written one of the most honest, revealing, insightful, and important articles on abortion to appear in recent history. At the same time, it is one of the most troubling.  Once again, we are reminded that the American conscience is not settled on the issue of abortion. We should be thankful that recent events and cultural developments — aided and abetted by technology — have made a real difference, helping and forcing Americans to understand that abortion is the killing of a human life.

In a very real sense, we should be thankful that the American conscience remains unsettled on this issue. A good and honest conversation about the reality of abortion is one of the best means of serving the cause of life. Jennifer Senior’s honest article can serve as an incredibly potent catalyst for such a conversation.

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Jennifer Senior, “The Abortion Distortion — Just How Pro-Choice is America, Really?,” New York Magazine, November 29, 2009. [Partial nudity in cover photo.]

Ms. Glasspool was elected on the seventh ballot, winning 153 clergy votes and 203 lay votes. Her election followed the election of another woman as a fellow assistant bishop for the diocese. More significantly, her election followed the seismic events of 2003, when the Reverend V. Gene Robinson was elected bishop of New Hampshire — the first openly-homosexual bishop in the entire Anglican world.

Bishop Robinson’s election set off a cataclysm in the Anglican Communion. That worldwide body of Anglicans appealed to its American church, the Episcopal Church, to respect the concerns of other churches and to establish a moratorium on the election of openly homosexual persons as bishops and the blessing of same-sex unions.

Anglican churches in the so-called “Global South” responded to the election of Bishop Robinson with outrage and conservatives in the Episcopal Church withdrew, forming the new Anglican Church in North America [ACNA]. Over the past two years, a significant number of churches and dioceses have withdrawn from the Episcopal Church to join the new ACNA or another conservative Anglican body.

The election of Rev. Glasspool as bishop — an action that must be affirmed by the church — sets the stage for a global confrontation. The man at the center of that conflict is the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. Williams clearly sees his role as that of keeping the Anglican Communion together — at least as together as possible — at all costs. Ruth Gledhill of The Times [London] reports that Williams was chosen as Archbishop of Canterbury precisely because of his well-documented liberal views on homosexuality. As she reports, Williams “was the favored choice of Tony Blair’s Government and the mostly liberal Church of England bishops because of what they believed to be his fearless advocacy for gay rights.”

Conservatives, on the other hand, have been frustrated by the Archbishop’s refusal to define the actions of the Episcopal Church as unbiblical and objectively wrong. Given the Archbishop’s published comments on homosexuality, most observers have come to the conclusion that he is indeed an advocate for gay rights, but one who feels that the time has not come to take such radical steps as the election of openly-homosexual bishops.

In a statement released after the election of Rev. Glasspool as bishop, Archbishop Williams stated that her election “raises very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion, but for the Communion as a whole.” He concluded by stating: “The bishops of the Communion have collectively acknowledged that a period of gracious restraint in respect of actions which are contrary to the mind of the Communion is necessary if our bonds of mutual affection are to hold.”

That is the language of a man who — judging by his words — is far more committed to affection than to truth. His continuing calls for “gracious restraint” have only earned him the anger of both liberals and conservatives. The liberals are frustrated, to say the least, that Williams appears to lack the courage of his own convictions. Conservatives see his continual refusal to act against the rebellious Episcopal Church as evidence that he does hold those convictions, but is simply biding his time.

Here is a great lesson: We cannot reduce a question of truth to a question of process. The real question that confronts the Anglican Communion is whether their churches will bless homosexuality. Liberals see this as the necessary liberation of oppressed human beings from prejudice. Conservatives see the blessing of homosexuality as a direct rejection of Scripture, a violation of Christian tradition, and an act of rebellion against God.

“Gracious restraint” will not hold back strong conviction, as the actions in Los Angeles make clear. The conservatives and the liberals agree on this much — “gracious restraint” is no excuse for violating conviction on a matter of this significance.

The conservatives are profoundly right. The blessing of homosexuality is an affront to Scripture and an act of rebellion against God. They are also correct in understanding that the Archbishop of Canterbury knows that a lack of decisive action on the part of the Anglican Communion will lead to the eventual normalization of homosexuality. But the liberals show their public disrespect for the Archbishop by flaunting their disregard for his calls for “gracious restraint.”

When truth is at stake, denominational etiquette is no basis for courageous leadership. A call for “gracious restraint” is no leadership at all.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Collins is one of the most influential scientists in America today. He previously headed the Human Genome Project — the massive federal project to decode the genetic structure of human life. President Barack Obama nominated Collins as director of the National Institutes of Health on July 8, 2009, and he was unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate just a month later. At the time, several leading scientists voiced their opposition to his nomination, citing concerns about Collins’s identification as an evangelical Christian. Several critics expressed particular concern about his position on the use of cells drawn from human embryos in stem cell research — an enterprise that falls under NIH supervision.

This question is particularly pressing given the fact that President Obama had pledged to lift restrictions President George W. Bush had placed on federal funding for such research. President Obama did that on March 9, effectively changing the federal government’s position on the moral status of the human embryo.

There should have been no surprise when proponents of human embryonic stem cell experimentation raised questions about where Francis Collins stands on the question. A look at his published comments raised more questions than were resolved. In his book The Language of God, he wrote:

Many observers who are otherwise opposed to human embryo research have argued, however, that despite the likely ultimate destruction of excess embryos after IVF, the desire of a couple to have a child is such a strong moral good that it justifies the procedure. That may well be a defensible position, but if so, it challenges the principle that the inevitable destruction of human embryos should be avoided at all costs, no matter what the potential benefits.

The language Dr. Collins employed here, such as “may well be a defensible position,” is anything but clear, but he was clear in questioning “the principle that the inevitable destruction of human embryos should be avoided at all costs.”

In a 2006 interview, Dr. Collins said, “I would be opposed to the idea of creating embryos by mixing sperm and eggs together and then experimenting on the outcome of that, purely to understand research questions.” He went on to raise, “on the other hand,” his concern that “there are hundreds of thousands of such embryos in freezers at in vitro fertilization clinics.” He continued:

In the process of in vitro fertilization, you almost invariably end up with more embryos than you can reimplant safely. The plausibility of those ever being reimplanted in the future - more than a few of them - is extremely low. Is it more ethical to leave them in those freezers forever or throw them away? Or is it more ethical to come up with some sort of use for those embryos that could help people? I think that’s not been widely discussed.

In 2001, he told Christianity Today:

It is a classic example of a collision between two very important principles. One is the sanctity of human life and the other is our strong mandate as human beings to alleviate suffering and to treat terrible diseases like diabetes, Parkinson’s, and spinal-cord injury. The very promising embryonic stem-cell research might potentially provide remarkable cures for those disorders. We don’t know that, but it might. And at the same time, many people feel, I think justifiably, this type of research is taking liberties with the notion of the sanctity of human life, by manipulating cells derived from a human embryo.

Once again, Dr. Collins employed language that offers moral angst without even a glimmer of clarity. Does he or does he not believe that the moral status of the human embryo precludes its destruction for medical research? What now becomes clear is that Dr. Collins is explicitly unwilling to affirm that it does.

Throughout the confirmation process, Collins appeared to reassure scientists that he would support the President’s policy. That assurance was made clear on December 2, when Dr. Collins announced the NIH approval of the first 13 additional stem cell lines for federally funded research. Collins said:

“I am happy to say that we now have human embryonic stem cell lines eligible for use by our research community under our new stem cell policy. . . . In accordance with the guidelines, these stem cell lines were derived from embryos that were donated under ethically sound informed consent processes. More lines are under review now, and we anticipate continuing to expand this list of responsibly derived lines eligible for NIH funding.”

In making his statement about the new cell lines for federally funded research, Collins defended his policy with very strange language. As The Washington Post reported, Collins said, “I think that there is an argument to be made that what is being done is ethically acceptable, even if you believe in the inherent sanctity of the human embryo.”

An argument can be made? Arguing that “an argument can be made” is no substitute for making the argument. Dr. Collins must now take personal responsibility for the use of additional stem cell lines that required the destruction of human embryos. When he says that such research is conducted according to “ethical” guidelines he is repeating the pattern of President Obama, who limits the “ethical” concern to the fact that the human embryos were derived with donor consent. In another evasion, the NIH is prevented by congressional action from funding the actual destruction of the embryo, so it allows other entities to fund that process, taking over after the embryo is destroyed.

Writing at The Public Discourse, Union University philosophy professor Justin D. Barnard sets the issue with refreshing clarity:

Collins needs to come clean. Either he upholds the dignity of human life or he doesn’t. If he does, and he accepts the nomination to head the NIH, then it seems that he is deeply compromised as a professing evangelical Christian. If he does not, then the evangelical community needs to know. For his appointment to this position has the potential to cause great harm in the way of moral confusion to many unsuspecting evangelicals as long as his views on nascent human life remain veiled behind a cloud of sophistical rhetoric.

Ethical responsibility demands that we never take refuge behind arguments about human dignity that are parsed with language such as “an argument can be made” and “may well be a defensible position.” The argument must be made that any destruction of a human embryo is morally indefensible as it subverts the dignity of every single human being. Arguing that such a subversion of human dignity “may well be a defensible position” is itself indefensible. Dr. Collins does need to come clean.

Then again, actions often do speak louder than words. The action of the National Institutes of Health announced yesterday by Dr. Collins is tragically clear.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

See also:

“Where Does Dr. Collins Stand on Stem-Cell Research?,” her.meneutics, July 13, 2009.

Cathy Lynn Grossman, “Francis Collins Confronts Ethics of Embryo Research,” USA Today, “Faith & Reason,” December 3, 2009.

Photo courtesy of the National Institutes of Health.

The fact that the referendum passed was news in itself. Nevertheless, the most significant aspect of the vote was the margin of victory. As The Wall Street Journal reported, “The Swiss voted strongly for the ban, with 58% of votes in favor of the initiative and 42% against. Until about a month ago, polls had predicted voters would solidly reject the ban, though support for the ban had been edging up in recent weeks.” In the end, the measure was approved by voters in 22 of Switzerland’s 26 cantons — an overwhelming victory for a very controversial proposal.

According to press reports, Switzerland now has 150 mosques serving about 400,000 Muslims in a population of 7.5 million Swiss. Only four of the mosques have minarets, but none are used for the Muslim call to prayer. This is due to the fact that Switzerland operates under strict noise-pollution rules that prohibit the practice.

The conservative Swiss People’s Party (SVP) has long warned of a creeping “Islamisation” of Switzerland, pointing to new mosques, Muslim immigration patterns, and high Muslim birthrates. The party convinced a sufficient number of the Swiss that minarets represent a sign of Islamic extremism and the threat of sharia law.

From a distance, the measure appears to be more symbolic than substantial. In effect, the Swiss voted to ban the most visible evidence of Muslims in their midst, while doing nothing to restrict Muslim immigration or worship. Thus, the voters sent a signal of their anxiety even as they acted in defiance of their country’s historic commitment to religious liberty. Oddly, the measure appears to be little more than a highly controversial effort to put the question of Muslim influence out of sight and out of mind.

Understandably, government authorities in Switzerland downplayed the vote and its meaning. Equally understandable were efforts by Muslims to explain why they were offended that minarets were singled out for exclusion in this ban. Can anyone be surprised?

Europe faces a looming crisis of Muslim influence and the spread of Islamic culture throughout the continent. This crisis is one of the most significant questions now facing Europe, and it comes as European cultures seem increasingly uncertain of their own identity and cultural commitments. The crisis is exacerbated by falling birthrates in many European nations. As a matter of fact, the birthrate in most European countries has now fallen beneath the basic replacement level. The severe reduction in the number of babies is a clear sign of a worldview crisis in those countries.

These trends must be matched to unexpectedly high levels of Muslim immigration and the high birth rates, and to Muslim populations. Put simply, the handwriting is on the wall as European citizens look to future population patterns. Though political correctness limits open discussion, citizens clearly fear the growing influence of the Muslim populations in their countries.

Nevertheless, the banning of minarets appears to be a cowardly move that contradicts Swiss commitments to religious freedom and tolerance. Singling out minarets in this ban is tantamount to isolating Islam and relegating it to second-class status — all protests to the contrary notwithstanding. The Muslim minaret is the central architectural symbol of Islam, as recognizably Muslim as steeples with crosses are recognizably Christian. Any nation that is truly committed to religious liberty cannot sustain a ban on one religiously significant architectural symbol or structure in this manner.

The receding influence of Christianity in Switzerland can be traced directly to theological liberalism in its churches and the increasing secularity of Swiss culture. Islam now enters the void created by the decline of Christianity and Christian culture in Switzerland, and throughout much of the continent as well.

Banning the minaret may serve to hide Muslim influence from view, but it does not address the underlying issues at stake. Surely the Swiss can do better than this. With this measure they have managed to violate religious liberty, anger Muslims, and avoid dealing with reality — all in one simultaneous act. “Out of sight, out of mind” is not a respectable or sustainable policy.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

This column is in answer to this question, posed by the editors of The Washington Post and Newsweek magazine for the “On Faith” feature: “What’s your reaction to Sunday’s decision by voters in Switzerland to ban construction of minarets, the slender towers from which Muslims are called to daily prayers?”

A haunting question is this:  How do atheists observe Thanksgiving? I can easily understand that an atheist or agnostic would think of fellow human beings and feel led to express thankfulness and gratitude to all those who, both directly and indirectly, have contributed to their lives. But what about the blessings that cannot be ascribed to human agency? Those are both more numerous and more significant, ranging from the universe we experience to the gift of life itself.

Can one really be thankful without being thankful to someone? It makes no sense to express thankfulness to a purely naturalistic system. The late Stephen Jay Gould, an atheist and one of the foremost paleontologists and evolutionists of his day, described human life as “but a tiny, late-arising twig on life’s enormously arborescent bush.” Gould was a clear-headed evolutionist who took the theory of evolution to its ultimate conclusion — human life is merely an accident, though a very happy accident for us. Within that worldview, how does thankfulness work?

The Apostle Paul points to a central insight about thankfulness when he instructs the Christians in Rome about the reality and consequences of unbelief. After making clear that God has revealed himself to all humanity through the created order, Paul asserts that we are all without excuse when it comes to our responsibility to know and worship the Creator.

He wrote:

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. . .  [Romans 1:20-22].

This remarkable passage has at its center an indictment of thanklessness. They did not honor Him as God or give thanks. Paul wants us to understand that the refusal to honor God and give thanks is a raw form of the primal sin. Theologians have long debated the foundational sin — and answers have ranged from lust to pride. Nevertheless, it would seem that being unthankful, refusing to recognize God as the source of all good things, is very close to the essence of the primal sin. What explains the rebellion of Adam and Eve in the Garden? A lack of proper thankfulness was at the core of their sin. God gave them unspeakable riches and abundance, but forbade them the fruit of one tree. A proper thankfulness would have led our first parents to avoid that fruit at all costs, and to obey the Lord’s command. Taken further, this first sin was also a lack of thankfulness in that the decision to eat the forbidden fruit indicated a lack of thankfulness that took the form of an assertion that we creatures — not the Creator — know what is best for us and intend the best for us.

They did not honor Him as God or give thanks. Clearly, honoring God as God leads us naturally into thankfulness. To honor Him as God is to honor His limitless love, His benevolence and care, His provision and uncountable gifts. To fail in thankfulness is to fail to honor God — and this is the biblical description of fallen and sinful humanity. We are a thankless lot.

Sinners saved by the grace and mercy of God know a thankfulness that exceeds any merely human thankfulness. How do we express thankfulness for the provision the Father has made for us in Christ, the riches that are made ours in Him, and the unspeakable gift of the surpassing grace of God? As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift” [2 Corinthians 9:15].

So, observe a wonderful Thanksgiving — but realize that a proper Christian Thanksgiving is a deeply theological act that requires an active mind as well as a thankful heart. We need to think deeply, widely, carefully, and faithfully about the countless reasons for our thankfulness to God.

It is humbling to see that Paul so explicitly links a lack of thankfulness to sin, foolishness, and idolatry. A lack of proper thankfulness to God is a clear sign of a basic godlessness. Millions of Americans will celebrate Thanksgiving with little consciousness of this truth. Their impulse to express gratitude is a sign of their spiritual need that can be met only in Christ.

So have a very Happy Thanksgiving — and remember that giving thanks is one of the most explicitly theological acts any human can contemplate. O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His lovingkindness is everlasting [1 Chronicles 16:34]. Give thanks.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

But I signed The Manhattan Declaration. Indeed, I am among the original signatories to that statement, released to the public at the National Press Club last Friday. Why?

There are several reasons, but they all come down to this — I believe we are facing an inevitable and culture-determining decision on the three issues centrally identified in this statement. I also believe that we will experience a significant loss of Christian churches, denominations, and institutions in this process. There is every good reason to believe that the freedom to conduct Christian ministry according to Christian conviction is being subverted and denied before our eyes. I believe that the sanctity of human life, the integrity of marriage, and religious liberty are very much in danger at this very moment.

The signatories to The Manhattan Declaration include evangelical leaders, as well as leaders from the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches. The statement establishes the priority of the issues addressed:

While the whole scope of Christian moral concern, including a special concern for the poor and vulnerable, claims our attention, we are especially troubled that in our nation today the lives of the unborn, the disabled, and the elderly are severely threatened; that the institution of marriage, already buffeted by promiscuity, infidelity and divorce, is in jeopardy of being redefined to accommodate fashionable ideologies; that freedom of religion and the rights of conscience are gravely jeopardized by those who would use the instruments of coercion to compel persons of faith to compromise their deepest convictions.

Further:

Because the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife, and the freedom of conscience and religion are foundational principles of justice and the common good, we are compelled by our Christian faith to speak and act in their defense. In this declaration we affirm: 1) the profound, inherent, and equal dignity of every human being as a creature fashioned in the very image of God, possessing inherent rights of equal dignity and life; 2) marriage as a conjugal union of man and woman, ordained by God from the creation, and historically understood by believers and non­believers alike, to be the most basic institution in society and; 3) religious liberty, which is grounded in the character of God, the example of Christ, and the inherent freedom and dignity of human beings created in the divine image.

The Culture of Death looms over our civilization, threatening every human being and the very right of our fellow citizens to experience life and to be respected at every stage of development. The statement calls for all Christians to “be united and untiring in our efforts to roll back the license to kill that began with the abandonment of the unborn to abortion.” But the issue of the sanctity of human life reaches far beyond abortion, to the threats of genocide, “ethnic cleansing,” euthanasia, assisted suicide, and the destruction of human embryos for medical experimentation.

On marriage, the statement includes a humble admission of our own Christian complicity in its subversion: “We confess with sadness that Christians and our institutions have too often scandalously failed to uphold the institution of marriage and to model for the world the true meaning of marriage.” The declaration goes on to state:

The impulse to redefine marriage in order to recognize same­-sex and multiple partner relationships is a symptom, rather than the cause, of the erosion of the marriage culture. It reflects a loss of understanding of the meaning of marriage as embodied in our civil and religious law and in the philosophical tradition that contributed to shaping the law. Yet it is critical that the impulse be resisted, for yielding to it would mean abandoning the possibility of restoring a sound understanding of marriage and, with it, the hope of rebuilding a healthy marriage culture. It would lock into place the false and destructive belief that marriage is all about romance and other adult satisfactions, and not, in any intrinsic way, about procreation and the unique character and value of acts and relationships whose meaning is shaped by their aptness for the generation, promotion and protection of life.

The declaration includes a pledge “to labor ceaselessly to preserve the legal definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman and to rebuild the marriage culture.” Why? “The Bible teaches us that marriage is a central part of God’s creation covenant. Indeed, the union of husband and wife mirrors the bond between Christ and his church.”

The threat to religious liberty is a clear and present danger — not a remote danger on a far horizon. As the statement rightly reminds us:

We see this, for example, in the effort to weaken or eliminate conscience clauses, and therefore to compel pro­-life institutions (including religiously affiliated hospitals and clinics), and pro­-life physicians, surgeons, nurses, and other health care professionals, to refer for abortions and, in certain cases, even to perform or participate in abortions. We see it in the use of anti­ discrimination statutes to force religious institutions, businesses, and service providers of various sorts to comply with activities they judge to be deeply immoral or go out of business. After the judicial imposition of “same­-sex marriage” in Massachusetts, for example, Catholic Charities chose with great reluctance to end its century­ long work of helping to place orphaned children in good homes rather than comply with a legal mandate that it place children in same­-sex households in violation of Catholic moral teaching. In New Jersey, after the establishment of a quasi­marital “civil unions” scheme, a Methodist institution was stripped of its tax exempt status when it declined, as a matter of religious conscience, to permit a facility it owned and operated to be used for ceremonies blessing homosexual unions. In Canada and some European nations, Christian clergy have been prosecuted for preaching Biblical norms against the practice of homosexuality. New hate­ crime laws in America raise the specter of the same practice here.

Further:

In recent decades a growing body of case law has paralleled the decline in respect for religious values in the media, the academy and political leadership, resulting in restrictions on the free exercise of religion. We view this as an ominous development, not only because of its threat to the individual liberty guaranteed to every person, regardless of his or her faith, but because the trend also threatens the common welfare and the culture of freedom on which our system of republican government is founded.

Finally, The Manhattan Declaration ends with a statement of public conscience and conviction. These words are meant to send a very clear message — we cannot and will not abandon or compromise our Christian convictions:

Because we honor justice and the common good, we will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo­-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other anti-­life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family. We will fully and ungrudgingly render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. But under no circumstances will we render to Caesar what is God’s.

I signed The Manhattan Declaration because I believe it is an historic statement of conviction and courage that is both timely and urgent. Over the course of the next few months and years, these issues will be reset in our culture and its laws. These are matters on which the Christian conscience cannot be silent. There are, of course, other issues that demand Christian attention as well. The focus on these three issues is forced by the circumstances of current threats as well as the awareness that the time of decision on these questions has come. Though Christians struggle to understand the extent to which our convictions should be incorporated in the law, we must now recognize that the very respect for these convictions — and the freedom to follow and obey these convictions in our own lives, families, and ministries is now at stake.

I signed The Manhattan Declaration because I lead a theological seminary and college, serve as a teaching pastor in a church, and am engaged in Christian leadership in the public square. Thus I see the threats to Christian liberties that now stare us in the face. The freedom not to perform a same-sex marriage is one thing, but what about the freedom to hire employees according to our Christian convictions? What about the right of Christian ministries to conduct their work according to Christian beliefs? What about the freedom to preach and teach against the grain of the nation’s laws (for example, after the legalization of same-sex marriage)? When do hate crimes laws slide into definitions of “hate speech?” The threats to our religious liberties are immediate and urgent.

I signed The Manhattan Declaration because it is a limited statement of Christian conviction on these three crucial issues, and not a wide-ranging theological document that subverts confessional integrity. I cannot and do not sign documents such as Evangelicals and Catholics Together that attempt to establish common ground on vast theological terrain. I could not sign a statement that purports, for example, to bridge the divide between Roman Catholics and evangelicals on the doctrine of justification. The Manhattan Declaration is not a manifesto for united action. It is a statement of urgent concern and common conscience on these three issues — the sanctity of human life, the integrity of marriage, and the defense of religious liberty.

My beliefs concerning the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches have not changed. The Roman Catholic Church teaches doctrines that I find both unbiblical and abhorrent — and these doctrines define nothing less than the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But The Manhattan Declaration does not attempt to establish common ground on these doctrines. We remain who we are, and we concede no doctrinal ground.

But when Catholic Charities in Massachusetts chose to end its historic ministry of placing orphaned children in good homes because the State of Massachusetts required it to place children with same-sex couples, this is not just a Catholic issue. The orphanage could have easily been Baptist. When Belmont Abbey college in North Carolina is told by federal authorities that it must offer abortion services in its insurance plans for employees, this is no longer just a Catholic issue. The next institution to be under attack might well be Presbyterian. We are in this together, and we had better be thankful that, in this case, we are not alone.

Finally, I signed The Manhattan Declaration because I want to put my name on its final pledge — that we will not bend the knee to Caesar. We will not participate in any subversion of life. We will not be forced to accept any other relationship as equal in status or rights to heterosexual marriage. We will not refrain from proclaiming the truth — and we will order our churches and institutions and ministries by Christian conviction.

There will be Christian leaders, pastors, seminaries, colleges, universities, denominations, churches, and organizations that will abandon the faith on these issues. They will bend the knee to Caesar. Far too many already have. The signatories to The Manhattan Declaration pledge that we will not be among them.

I want my name on that list. I surrendered no conviction or confessional integrity to sign that statement. No one asked me to compromise in any manner. I was encouraged that we could stand together to make clear that to come for one of us on these issues is to come for all. At the end of the day, I did not want my name missing from that list when folks look to see just who was willing to be listed.

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I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

On November 8, the paper ran an article, “Can a Boy Wear a Skirt to School?,” that described cross-dressing among teenagers as a growing phenomenon. Reporter Jan Hoffman explained that “a growing number of teenagers have been dressing to articulate — or to confound — gender identity and sexual orientation.” Hoffman’s article focused on the challenge these teens present to public school officials, who must now deal with boys who want to wear makeup and skirts and girls who want to dress like male gang members.

Hoffman quoted Oakland, California psychologist Diane Ehrensaft, who said: “This generation is really challenging the gender norms we grew up with. . . . A lot of youths say they won’t be bound by boys having to wear this or girls wearing that. For them, gender is a creative playing field.”

Then, in the November 19 edition of the paper, reporter Ruth La Ferla brought a similar story, this time focusing on a slightly older age group and the marketing opportunity their new gender experimentation affords. Her article, “It’s All a Blur to Them,” is accompanied by a photograph of three rather androgynous young adults and the statement, “Crossing between the men’s and women’s aisles feels right to young customers today.”

And Diane Ehrensaft is back, explaining that this is all a part of the new “gender fluidity.” In her words, “younger people no longer accept the standard boxes. They won’t be bound by boys having to wear this or girls wearing that. I think there is a peer culture in which that kind of gender blurring is not only acceptable but cool.” That statement is virtually identical to her statement reported in the November 8 article about teenagers.

Is anyone editing the “Style” section? It appears safe to assume that The New York Times is trying to make a point.

Ruth La Ferla begins her article with a description of Chuong Pham, a 28-year-old engineer in Manhattan who wears “stalk-thin jeans” and borrows his mom’s “sexily sheared” sweatshirt. “There is a whole transition of men getting into women’s wear,” Pham explains. “It used to be that the people who did it were just the edgier ones. Now it’s much more common.”

Brandon Dailey, a 26-year-old hairstylist in Manhattan has not yet worn a skirt, but he expresses his experimentation by wearing “a long drapey shirt with really tight pants.” “My generation is more outside the box than the generation before me,” he advises.

Audrey Reynolds, age 25, alerted the world of fashion that a gender revolution is at hand. “Every line should be unisex,” she suggested. “A good piece of clothing is a good piece of clothing no matter who was meant to wear it in the first place.”

Ruth La Ferla suggests that these three young adults represent a “forward-thinking cohort” of the population who are “revising standard notions of gender-appropriate dressing, tweaking codes, upending conventions, and making hash of ancient norms.”  This “artfully calibrated ambiguity” about gender is fast becoming mainstream, she reports.

Evidently, at least some in the fashion industry are paying attention:

So entrenched are the latest forms of gender blending that mainstream purveyors of hip, including Urban Outfitters and American Apparel, are offering clothing and jewelry meant to be worn by either sex. American Apparel has no fewer than 724 unisex items — hoodies, cardigans, blazers and bow ties, among them — on its Web site, simply because, as Marsha Brady, the company’s creative director, put it, “that’s the way people wear clothes.”

Ms. La Ferla observes that some fashion lines “have been quick to interpret that sort of ambiguity.” One industry insider told La Ferla that “the more successful designers are the ones that try to bridge the gap between the sexes.”

Not all are buying into this as a broadening trend. Harold Koda, costume curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art advised that “you need to be young to do it well,” adding: “To carry it off, you need the physique of an adolescent boy. As long as the young are the primary audience, it’s not going to be economically sustained.”

Psychologist Ehrensaft admits that “androgyny may not play in Peoria,” but she also insists that “norms are shifting.” She then said this: “Kids, even little kids, are experimenting across gender lines. Boys are wearing My Little Pony T-shirts, just because they like them. Sometimes they like to dress in the girls’ section because the shirts are cooler.”

Well, my guess is that little boys wearing “My Little Pony” T-shirts will indeed not play in Peoria — especially if their dads ever see it. Yet there is something to these reports. There is a lot of experimentation with gender going on among young adults and teenagers. The paper seems to celebrate these young people as the vanguard of a new cultural future. The New York Times appears to be telling America to get ready. What are we to make of the paper running two stories with this much similarity on the front page of the same section within the span of less than two weeks?

The gender confusion and experimentation almost celebrated in these articles is a symptom of a larger and deeper confusion found throughout the culture. Androgynous young people are trying to get our attention. To them, male and female are fluid categories without objective meaning. They are also crossing more than aisles in clothing stores — they are intentionally confusing sexual identity and the very concepts of male and female.

Recovering sexual sanity and a proper appreciation for gender as a part of the goodness of God’s creation will not come easily. Just take a look at the clothing marketed to teenagers and young adults in trendy stores at your local mall. We have a lot of work to do.

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Ruth La Ferla, “It’s All a Blur to Them,” The New York Times, Thursday, November 19, 2009.

Jan Hoffman, “Can a Boy Wear a Skirt to School?,” The New York Times, Sunday, November 8, 2009.

R. Albert Mohler, Jr., “Boys Wearing Skirts to School — What’s Going On?,” Thursday, November 12, 2009. http://www.albertmohler.com/2009/11/12/newsnote-boys-wearing-skirts-to-school-whats-going-on/

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Over the past several decades, that framework has been under sustained attack by ideological opponents, subverted by a secular shift among the elites, and increasingly forgotten by the masses. In its place, the moral reasoning mustered by many Americans amounts to a mixture of moral intuitions, ideological threads, and cultural assumptions. In the main, these all add up to what Philip Rieff called the “triumph of the therapeutic.” When morality collapses, all that remains is therapy.

This has been brought to our attention in the aftermath of the massacre at Fort Hood, Texas. Major Nidal Malik Hasan, arrested for the shootings that killed 13 and wounded scores of others, is now known to have yelled “Allahu Akbar” (God is Great) as he was shooting, to have links to Islamic extremists in Yemen, and to have visited a mosque frequented by the September 11, 2001 terrorists. More details of his background and motivation have been revealed over the last few days. There is ample evidence that Major Hasan, a physician and psychiatrist, provided much evidence of his motivation.

The role his Muslim faith played in the shootings will require more time to unpack. There will be plenty of time for that consideration as his trial is conducted. In the meantime, we should note the extent to which some observers are doing their best to absolve Major Hasan, whatever the deepest sources of his motivation, of moral responsibility for the massacre.

Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Dorothy Rabinowitz described the kind of moral evasion that the agents of therapy now substitute for any serious moral argument:

The quality and thrust of this argument was best captured by the impassioned Dr. Phil, who asked us to consider, “how far out of touch with reality do you have to be to kill your fellow Americans . . . this is not a well act.” And how far out of touch with reality is such a question, one asks in return—not only of Dr. Phil, but of the legions of commentators like him immersed in the labyrinths of motive hunting even as the details of Maj. Hasan’s proclivities became ever clearer and more ominous.

To kill your fellow Americans—as many as possible, unarmed and in the most helpless of circumstances, while shouting “Allahu Akbar” (God is great), requires, of course, only murderous hatred—the sort of mindset that regularly eludes the Dr. Phils of our world as the motive for mass murder of this kind.

This was not a well act? Would the killing of even one person in cold blood be a “well act,” Dr. Phil? Is our moral discourse now limited to distinguishing between what some psychologist or psychiatrist considers as well acts and unwell acts? That is all we have to say in light of a mass murder?

Columnist Charles Krauthammer described the same phenomenon in The Washington Post. Krauthammer, who is himself a psychiatrist, was outraged when so many commentators and national leaders responded to the massacre by suggesting that Major Hasan is a victim of some traumatic stress disorder brought on by his treatment of returning troops fresh from Iraq and Afghanistan.

He wrote:

Really? What about the doctors and nurses, the counselors and physical therapists at Walter Reed Army Medical Center who every day hear and live with the pain and the suffering of returning soldiers? How many of them then picked up a gun and shot 51 innocents?

And what about civilian psychiatrists — not the Upper West Side therapist treating Woody Allen neurotics, but the thousands of doctors working with hospitalized psychotics — who every day hear not just tales but cries of the most excruciating anguish, of the most unimaginable torment? How many of those doctors commit mass murder?

Rejecting this evasion, Krauthammer wrote with exasperation: “It’s been decades since I practiced psychiatry. Perhaps I missed the epidemic.”

The medicalization of mass murder is a great moral evasion. Substituting the therapeutic worldview for morality will not work. Krauthammer explains:

Medicalizing mass murder not only exonerates. It turns the murderer into a victim, indeed a sympathetic one. After all, secondary PTSD, for those who believe in it (you won’t find it in DSM-IV-TR, psychiatry’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual), is known as “compassion fatigue.” The poor man — pushed over the edge by an excess of sensitivity.

We must listen carefully to the conversations all around us — and particularly to those among the opinion-makers. Krauthammer and Rabinowitz offer much-needed words of warning. We ignore this at our peril.

The therapeutic mentality is all that remains when a moral framework is abandoned. No civilization can survive this evasion of moral responsibility. Sick is no adequate substitute for evil. Medicalizing morality means the end of right and wrong as meaningful categories.

We are just left with Dr. Phil, and his concern that a massacre is “not a well act.” If that is all we can say — even the first thing that we say — we are not a well society.

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Dorothy Rabinowitz, “Dr. Phil and the Fort Hood Killer, The Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, November 10, 2009.

Charles Krauthammer, “Medicalizing Mass Murder,” The Washington Post, Friday, November 13, 2009.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

The Book of Genesis Illustrated is by famed cartoonist R. Crumb. Famous among cartoonists for his work as far back as the 1960s, Crumb has always combined cartoons and a social/political agenda. As David Colton of USA Today explains, Crumb is known for “subversive, turn-of-the-century linework, untamed libido, and obsessive social commentary.”

Indeed, Crumb personally attributes aspects of his style to experiences with LSD in his younger years. He became known for his “Keep on Truckin’” and “Fritz the Cat” cartoons. Disillusioned with the United States, Crumb took his family to France, where they now live.

Somewhere along the way, Crumb decided to take on the Bible, starting with Genesis. That is no small ambition. But why?

Crumb seems attracted to the book of Genesis as a collection of narratives with deep influence in Western culture. “I’m a spiritual guy,” he told USA Today. “I’m not an atheist, more an agnostic. I don’t doubt the existence of God. I just don’t know quite what God is. It’s a question that will challenge me until the day I die.”

As for the Bible, Crumb does not take it as the Word of God. He said, “I don’t believe it’s the Word of God. I believe it’s the words of men.” He added, “I’m just another human interpreting the story.”

In other comments about the project, Crumb has been a bit more forceful. He told Peter Aspden of the Financial Times that working on the Genesis project “nearly killed me.” Working through Genesis “ruined my health. I’m in recovery.”

He also spoke straightforwardly about his view of the Bible:

“I am completely sick of the Bible. I began to hate it as I worked on it. I’ve had my fill. The idea that millions of people have taken it so seriously — it is totally nuts. The human race is crazy.”

His Genesis project did not lead him to admire the Bible. “It had the opposite effect on me. . . .  I saw what a primitive, backward morality I had to deal with. It was a good way of exorcising the power of the Bible.”

Crumb’s distinctive cartoon style plays out across the Genesis narratives. The front cover of the book promises “nothing left out.” Very little is. Readers will find cartoon depictions of everything from Creation and the Fall to the curse of Onan. Reading The Book of Genesis Illustrated does reveal the power of this artistic expression (as in the sacrifice of Isaac), but mostly its severe limitations.

Christians coming across the Crumb project may wonder what to think. After all, this is a project that is attracting significant attention. Millions of Americans buy comics and pay close attention to the world of cartooning. Crumb’s new work has gained the attention of the nation’s major newspapers and the digital world.

For one thing, Crumb’s work reminds us that God gave us words, not images, as His means of revelation. The prohibition against images is not just a divine preference, it is a command. Looking at Crumb’s work makes the force of this prohibition all the more clear. Crumb interprets (or misinterprets) with every image and characterization. His style dominates the narrative — which is precisely the danger. And Crumb insists that he tried his best to restrain himself. “I’m not ridiculing it, just illustrating the exact words that are there.”

Another key insight from the project is this: The Bible always demands a judgment of the reader. The Bible cannot be read simply as literature of historical importance. Any reader sees it as far more than that. In fact, the Bible presents such straightforward claims about both God and humanity that it is either loved or hated, seen as the Word of God or as a poisonous chronicle of the human religious imagination.

In that respect, Crumb’s declarations about the Bible make more sense. His experience of drawing the narratives from Genesis led him to hate the Bible. He is offended that so many millions have taken it seriously. “To take this as a sacred text, or Word of God or something to live by, is kind of crazy,” he told David Colton. “So much of it makes no sense. To think of all the fighting and killing that’s gone on over this book, it just became to me a colossal absurdity. That’s probably the most profound moment I’ve had — the absurdity of it all.”

R. Crumb reveals a great deal about himself in this project. His project also reveals once again why God gave us words, and not images. Crumb’s newest work may be described as a triumph of the human imagination — and that is precisely the problem.

The Bible always lays claim upon the reader. The Book of Genesis demands a decision. The God who reveals himself in these words is not only the Creator of the cosmos, but the judge of every human soul. Genesis not only begins the Bible, it reminds us of our need for Christ. Every single narrative Crumb depicts finds its ultimate meaning in the atonement accomplished by Jesus Christ.

But that great fact cannot be reduced to a cartoon. It was never meant to be.

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David Colton, “Illustrator R. Crumb is Drawn to God with His Latest Project,” USA Today, October 19, 2009.

Peter Aspden, “A Bad Boy and the Good Book,” Financial Times, October 4, 2009.

I am always glad to hear from readers. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

I was honored to take part in this event, and to engage in a really productive question and answer session with the audience. I was especially pleased that some atheists attended and participated in the dialogue. The New Atheism demands Christian attention and a Christian response. This was a first-class event, organized by students under the direction of Dan Dewitt, campus pastor of The Campus Church. You can listen to the event here. Video should be available very shortly.

Let me know what you are thinking. Write me at mail@albertmohler.com. Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

The story, reported by Gillian Flaccus, begins with Rev. Tom Eggebeen of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles. Faced with an aging and declining congregation, the pastor decided to do something innovative — he started a service for both people and dogs, “Canines at Covenant.”

Gillian Flaccus described Eggebeen’s idea: “He would turn God’s house into a doghouse by offering a 30-minute service complete with individual doggie beds, canine prayers and an offering of dog treats. He hopes it will reinvigorate the church’s connection with the community, provide solace to elderly members and, possibly, attract new worshippers who are as crazy about God as they are about their four-legged friends.”

Flaccus also cited Laura Hobgood-Oster, a religion professor at Southwestern University in Texas, who recently conducted a survey that revealed more than 500 churches that conduct blessing services for pets and six that go so far as to offer pet worship services like the “Canines at Covenant” service. One church near Boston offers a “Woof ‘n Worship” service. The professor sees “pet-centric” services as a growing trend.

The reason she offers is especially interesting: “It’s the changing family structure, where pets are really central and religious communities are starting to recognize that people need various kinds of rituals that include their pets . . . . More and more people in mainline Christianity are considering them to have some kind of soul.”

The report goes on to explain that the dogs at the “Canines at Covenant” service showed little evidence of interest. Nevertheless, the service was very pleasing to the human participants who brought their dogs. One woman brought two dogs, a black Lab and a Dachshund-terrier mix. She told the reporter, “I don’t have any kids, so my pets have always been my children, so it does mean a lot . . . . I haven’t been to church in a long time and this may push me into it. I’m getting older and I’ve been thinking about those things again.”

Gillian Flaccus offers a very interesting report on the “Canines at Covenant” service and the larger phenomenon of “pet-centric” services. Her report also points to a deep theological confusion that these services bring to light. There are several dimensions to this confusion.

First, the Bible clearly presents animals as part of the goodness of God’s creation. As Christians, we are to see the glory of God in the diversity and wonders of the animal kingdom. We are to respect all animals as intentional creations of God and to acknowledge the gifts that these creatures represent. God created animals for his own glory, and humans are to see the glory of the Creator in each animal species and individual.

Second, God made human beings as the only creatures made in his image. As the image-bearers of God, humans alone have the capacity to know and to worship the Creator. Animals reflect the glory of God, but only human beings can see the glory of God and know the Creator.  Animals may possess consciousness, but they do not have souls. They lack the capacity to know the Creator.

Third, God assigned human beings dominion over the animal kingdom and clearly marked a separation between humans and animals. This separation is clear, ranging from the dominion theme to the prohibition of bestiality. To compromise that separation is to disobey God. Some part of our contemporary confusion over this distinction is due to emotionalism and sentiment, but much of it is driven by an ideology that reduces the status of humanity to that of the animals.

Fourth, while we recognize and celebrate the consciousness of many animals, we recognize that their consciousness is different from our own. We must also be aware that we tend to read features of human consciousness onto animals. We enjoy stories and movies that feature talking animals and endearing animal characters, but this is fiction, not fact. Many animals do enjoy forms of community and relatedness, but they are not humans. We must always be aware of the temptation to read human abilities and states of mind onto animals.

Fifth, to put the matter simply, animals do not worship God. Jesus told the woman at the well [John 4] that the Father seeks worshippers who worship him in spirit and in truth. The biblical concept of worship is not limited to attendance at a service, but involves the conscious and active knowledge of himself through Jesus Christ. Dogs do not worship. As Gillian Flaccus reported, the dogs at the “Canines at Covenant” service “didn’t seem very interested in dogma.” That observation is cute, but profoundly understated.

Sixth, the Bible says a great deal about animals. From Genesis to Revelation animals are keys to understanding God’s revelation. Genesis shows us the indescribable wonder of the animals in creation. The Bible reveals the catastrophic impact of the Fall on animals, leading to predation and violence. At the end of the Bible, we are given the picture of the new creation and the reversal of the curse of sin as the lion and the lamb lay together. But, amazingly enough, even as the Bible mentions animals as beasts of burden and agents of violence, it gives virtually no attention to animals as pets.

Seventh, America is a pet-centric culture, and this reveals much about us. We have the wealth to spend billions of dollars on pets. The ownership and enjoyment of pets is a sign of wealth and plenty. We are also a society that is trading human relationships for the companionship of pets. We cut off our elderly from extended family and leave them alone with their pets. We see increasing numbers of younger people who decide not to have children, but instead to pour themselves into relationships with their pets. Restaurants, malls, and hotels are asked to allow pets even as they allow children. Professor Hobgood-Oster points to the pet-centricity of our society as evidence of “the changing family structure, where pets are really central.” The woman who brought her two dogs to the “Canines at Covenant” service said, “I don’t have any kids, so my pets have always been my children.” Postmodern Americans see these statements as evidence of new lifestyle choices. Christians should see these statements as tragic.

Eighth, the churches that offer these services are concentrated in the liberal wing of American Protestantism. The declining membership of liberal churches is matched to a loss of theological focus. Churches concerned with the preaching of the Gospel, committed to authentic evangelism and biblical preaching, are not going to demonstrate the confusion that leads to “Canines at Covenant.” It is not surprising that Covenant Presbyterian Church lists its support for same-sex marriage and opposition to California’s “Proposition 8″ defending traditional marriage on the front page of its Web site.

I am thankful for dogs. My own family cherishes a friendly and inquisitive Beagle who reveals the glory of God in just being a Beagle. But Baxter does not go to church. I am absolutely convinced that animals will be a part of the New Creation we are promised in Christ. But it is believers in Christ — redeemed humanity — that yearn for this New Creation. To blur the distinction between humans and animals is to confuse the Gospel itself.

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Gillian Flaccus, “Gone to the Dogs: LA Church Starts Pet Service.” Associated Press (AP), November 4, 2009.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.

Tonight I spent a really encouraging few hours with a group of younger pastors — men who are being greatly used of God to reach their own generation and far beyond. That experience made me really thankful, and also led me to think about why Southern Baptists should be especially thankful for the rising generation of young pastors. [Read more]

The article, right on the front of the “Sunday Styles” section of the paper, announced, “When gender bends the dress code, high schools struggle to respond.” The story reveals a confusion over gender that goes far beyond the dress code.

As Jan Hoffman reports, high schools generally have very specific rules about clothing these days. Boys are forbidden to wear muscle shirts and saggy pants, and girls cannot wear midriff-exposing tops or skirts that are too short. But what happens when a boy wants to wear a skirt?

“In recent years, a growing number of teenagers have been dressing to articulate — or confound — gender identity and sexual orientation,” Hoffman reports. “Certainly they have been confounding school officials, whose responses have ranged from indifference to applause to bans.”

This is no longer an issue limited to isolated examples. Districts across the country have reported teens who have attempted to cross the gender line in dress. Many of these cases have captured media attention, with highly publicized controversies. In other cases, the challenges have been more quiet.

The cases are, to say the least, both interesting and troubling. Boys are making news for wearing skinny jeans, makeup, wigs, and skirts. Girls are bending gender in their own way by, for example, wearing a tuxedo for the school picture or to a school event.

Jan Hoffman does a good job of setting the issue in perspective:

Dress is always code, particularly for teenagers eager to telegraph evolving identities. Each year, schools hope to quell disruption by prohibiting the latest styles that signify a gang affiliation, a sexual act or drug use.

But when officials want to discipline a student whose wardrobe expresses sexual orientation or gender variance, they must consider antidiscrimination policies, mental health factors, community standards and classroom distractions.

Well, that certainly presents a very complicated challenge. Diane Ehrensaft, an Oakland psychologist cited in the article, states the obvious: “This generation is really challenging the gender norms we grew up with. . . . A lot of youths say they won’t be bound by boys having to wear this or girls wearing that. For them, gender is a creative playing field.”  She added that adults then “become the gender police through dress codes.”

As Hoffman makes clear, these challenges to dress codes can quickly become legal skirmishes pitting students (and often their parents) against school administrators. Kay Hymowitz of the Manhattan Institute argues that this is one reason that so many schools have shifted to students wearing uniforms.

“It’s hard enough to get students to concentrate on an algorithm,” she reminds, “even without Jimmy sitting there in lipstick and fake eyelashes.”

That sets the issue in a very clear instructional perspective. Schools are about teaching and learning, and both teachers and administrators face daunting challenges. The last thing they need is the added distraction of gender-bending teenagers on parade.

And the issues can be far more troubling than classroom distractions. Hoffman reports that some schools have faced boys wearing “pink frilly scarves” and makeup and girls trying to dress like male gang members. In Columbus, Ohio a boy wore girl’s clothing but used the boys’ bathroom. Jeff Grace, faculty advisor for the school’s gay-straight alliance club told Hoffman, “One day I heard a student say, ‘Man, there was a girl in the guy’s restroom, standing up using the urinal! What’s up with that?’” Another student then quipped, “That wasn’t a girl. That’s just Jack.”

These adolescents represent the younger face of a society that is giving itself over to a confusion about gender and dress that reveals a much deeper confusion about gender, sexuality, and the limits of self-expression. The controversy also reveals an even deeper cultural and moral divide over the same issues.

Should a boy who shows up at school dressed as a girl be celebrated for self-expression and transgressing the boundaries of gender roles, or should he be seen as signaling a need for help and adult-imposed rules? The widely divergent answers to that question reveal the great worldview divide in postmodern America. This controversy cannot be isolated from the movement to normalize homosexuality, and that movement cannot be separated from an effort to remove all notions of fixed gender roles and sexual identity.

The controversy over boys wearing skirts to school is a symptom of our loss of sexual sanity and the will to preserve any reasonable and healthy understanding of gender. These teenagers are telling us something important — we are losing our sexual sanity.

For Christians, the issue is a matter of biblical concern. The Bible reveals a concern for respecting and honoring gender as God’s gift. In the Old Testament, the Law taught respect for these distinctions and roles. In the New Testament, we find similar expectations. As the Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11: 7-15:

For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man. For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. That is why a wife ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels.Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman;for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God.Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a wife to pray to God with her head uncovered?Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair it is a disgrace for him, but if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her for a covering.

While addressed to the specific concerns of a church setting, this text also generalizes the point by making a specific reference to what nature teaches concerning the recognition of the difference between males and females. The Creator is honored and glorified when men and boys dress and present themselves as males and when women and girls dress and present themselves as females. Culture by culture and generation by generation the specific form of this distinction may change, but the point remains.

God made human beings to show His glory, and an essential part of that glory is the visible difference between males and females that is reflected even in the public presentation of dress. We should be able to tell the difference between a boy and a girl by the way they dress and present themselves in public.

As James Laver reminded, clothes always tell us something. This article from the “Sunday Styles” section of The New York Times tells us something as well — something we need to hear.

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Jan Hoffman, “Can a Boy Wear a Skirt to School?,” The New York Times, Sunday, November 8, 2009.

I am always glad to hear from readers and listeners.  Write me at mail@albertmohler.com.  Follow regular updates on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AlbertMohler.