The former Prime Minister has just come out of the closet, telling us he as a Christian thinks homosexuality and homosexual marriage are just peachy keen. He thus has shown us his true colours. They may be the colours of the homosexual rainbow, but they are not the colours of biblical Christianity.

His 2000-word defence of his change of heart is painful to read. His mental gymnastics, moral obfuscations, and theological sleight-of-hand tricks are appalling – certainly for anyone who claims to be some sort of Christian. We expect all this idiocy from pagans and homosexual militants, but not from those who try to pass themselves off as believers.

Indeed, reading through this, one finds the exact same arguments used for decades now by the homosexual activists and their secular buddies. All the old red herrings, straw men and tired chestnuts are repeated here. All the usual clichés, bloated rhetoric, and sham jargon are found here as well: “marriage equality,” “discrimination” and so forth.

It is all straight out of the homosexuals’ playbook. And Rudd still claims to be a Christian in all this! Sorry, but you are nothing of the sort – you are just a stooge for the militants. You are doing their bidding perfectly. Everything they want you are fully and foolishly advocating for.

With so much inanity contained in such a short piece, it is hard to know where to begin. And of course I have already spent 20 years rebutting all these lame arguments – so the case why Rudd is so dead wrong can be found in my book Strained Relations. But I don’t wish to repeat myself here.

Let’s examine a few of his whoppers. Consider this lulu: “I for one have never accepted the argument from some Christians that homosexuality is an abnormality. People do not choose to be gay.” Not abnormal? Not wrong? And you still claim to be a Christian? Sorry Kev, but you must choose here: we either agree with the Word of God, or we reject it.

And it looks like that is exactly what he has done: he has completely trampled on the biblical witness, and sided with the activists. And no choice in the matter? So you mean all those homosexuals who say there most certainly is choice in the matter are just liars? I quote many of these folks in my book of course.

He also deliberately deceives when he says “30 years of research has seen … that same sex families do not compromise children’s development.” Hogwash. There are 50 years of research showing how children are gravely disadvantaged when they are not raised by their own biological parents, cemented in marriage. My book also deals extensively with this issue.

And he seeks to make his case by saying he grew up without a dad, and suffered no ill-effects. That is about as helpful as saying he grew up without one leg but got by OK. Of course you can, but it is never ideal. Fatherlessness poses very real negative outcomes for children, as thousands of studies have documented. I just recently offered a very brief survey of this mountain of data:

www.billmuehlenberg.com/2013/05/17/the-facts-on-fatherlessness-part-one/

www.billmuehlenberg.com/2013/05/17/the-facts-on-fatherlessness-part-two/

Of course a large part of his piece is a very confused understanding of church-state relations. He wants the church basically to butt out here, and leave a redefined marriage as a secular state affair. And this from the same guy who claims to idolise Bonhoeffer. You remember him, the guy who felt that his faith and beliefs must directly impact on the State – and who paid for this with his life under Hitler’s regime.

But now Kev wants an altogether different approach, and he raises all the same baloney that atheists like Dawkins raise: the Bible also supports slavery, witch-hunts, etc, etc. Oh puh-leeese Kevin, your biblical knowledge and understanding is just as skewed and twisted as that of Dawkins. But at least he does not pretend to be a Christian.

The state has a very vital interest in the social institution of marriage. Strong healthy heterosexual marriages are good for children, good for societies, and good for nations. That is why the state has always had a keen interest in promoting heterosexual marriage, but not other forms of relationships. I discuss that more fully here:

www.billmuehlenberg.com/2012/04/04/libertarianism-and-marriage-part-one/

www.billmuehlenberg.com/2012/04/04/libertarianism-and-marriage-part-two/

He also foolishly, naively, or disingenuously informs us that churches should not be forced to restructure their beliefs when homosexual marriage comes in. Hate to break it to you Kev, but they are already being forced by the heavy hand of the law to abandon their beliefs and compromise their convictions.

I have offered heaps of examples of this on my site, and my new book will feature hundreds more. Whenever special rights for homosexuals are granted, including marriage rights, then of necessity the church suffers, freedoms are taken away, and Christian conscience is trampled upon. See here for just a sampling of this evidence:

www.billmuehlenberg.com/2010/12/10/same-sex-marriage-who-says-nothing-will-change/

Rudd also informs us that part of his change of heart was due to a homosexual Pentecostal staffer! Oh great, so if you have an adulterous Baptist staffer, or fornicating Catholic staffer, will you ditch the biblical position on those sins as well?

And he has the gall to tell us his change of heart and why he wrote his piece is because “it is the right thing to do”. No it is not at all the right thing to do: it is the politically correct thing to do, the men-pleasing thing to do, and the anti-biblical thing to do.

All of which is expected of atheists and homosexual militants. But when people try to cloak this deception and immorality under the guise of Christianity, then you know we simply have yet another wolf in sheep’s clothing. But given that this is always how I felt about the guy, I for one am not the least bit surprised.

www.kevinruddmp.com/2013/05/church-and-state-are-able-to-have.html?m=1

[1044 words]

But none of us can afford to go without the truth. Sometimes the most painful truth is the thing we most need. Consider medical truth. If you are afflicted with a deadly cancer, the number one thing you need to hear – regardless of how unpleasant it may be – is the truth about your condition.

No doctor worth his salt would ever withhold valuable information about a possibly fatal condition or illness for fear of upsetting a patient or making him feel bad. He will instead speak the truth about the cancer or whatever, and then offer steps to correct or heal things.

There would be nothing loving about denying medical truth to a patient if that truth can result in a life being saved or real healing taking place. The truth about cancer may never be pleasant, but it is always vital, and must be shared. Not to do so can have disastrous results.

Spiritually speaking this is also the case. We must always speak biblical truth, even when it seems unpalatable and unpleasant to do so. And many spiritual truths are not so nice or so pleasant. The truths about daily dying to self, crucifying our flesh, and carrying our cross are not exactly light and bubbly – but they are fundamental Christian truths nonetheless.

Telling a non-believer he is a sinner headed for future judgment unless he repents and turns from sin and self to Christ will not be seen as very pleasant either – but it is a core biblical truth which all believers are obligated to share. And fellow believers also need to be told the truth, even if it offends or stings.

Paul never shrunk away from telling the truth, even if it was costly to him. He may have lost friendships and alienated others, but truth was always something he never withheld or weakened or watered down. In fact, he got a lot of flak when he shared biblical truth.

In Galatians 4:16 for example Paul says this: “Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?” That always seems to be the case when we stand firm on the Word of God and biblical truth. It will alienate some. It will offend some. It will create enemies with some.

Jesus knew all about this. Wherever he went he stirred things up, caused controversy, made enemies, and got harsh reactions. Indeed, we are often told that the crowds were divided because of his words. It is the nature of truth to do that: either we come to the truth and embrace it, or we reject the truth and flee from it.

Yet today it seems most Christians would rather run a thousand miles away from the truth, than risk getting some opposition and flak for proclaiming it. We have a church full of invertebrates who think that not rocking the boat and not offending anyone is their highest calling.

They are terrified of getting anyone upset, so they will rather keep silent about the things that matter than boldly proclaim truth, regardless of the negative consequences. Jesus had a few things to say about those who refused to speak out.

It is not just the gospel of Jesus Christ that many believers are afraid to publicly express, but so too any words on the vital issues of the day. Our silence on things like the sanctity of life and God’s ideal of marriage and family has been deafening.

Indeed, I am fully convinced that if something like Facebook had been around 70 years ago, there would be plenty of Christians defriending you if you dared to speak out on what the Nazis were doing, or showed pictures of the Holocaust and the death camps – just as today they will defriend you for talking about abortion, and revealing its ugly face.

I know that many Christians do this all the time – they simply don’t like the controversy and big debates. They prefer to live a quiet and peaceful life, and will never deal with these massively important topics. Many will not even share the gospel for fear of offending people or ruffling feathers.

One day we will all stand before our Lord and give an account of our time here on earth. Jesus already warned us about this: “I tell you, whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God. But he who disowns me before men will be disowned before the angels of God” (Luke 12:8-9).

Of course having said all this, I do not for a moment mean to suggest that there is no need for tact, diplomacy, grace and sensitivity when presenting the truth. It goes without saying that we are to “speak the truth in love” as Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:15.

Sure, we must pray for wisdom and guidance as to if and when we speak out. Being careful and wise in how we share truth is of course important. But my point here is a different one: far too many people who call themselves followers of Christ seldom, if ever, speak forth truth.

And with people heading to a lost eternity, babies being slaughtered in the millions, and God’s provision for human sexuality taking a hammering – to name but a few important issues – such silence is morally reprehensible. We will be judged for our silence just as much as for anything we may have said or done.

The church of Jesus Christ needs some Holy Ghost boldness today, and must repent of the sin of men-pleasing and cowardice. Paul prayed for boldness to proclaim the truths of God – we must do so as well.

[1000 words]

They are always completely one-sided, with you as the sole token conservative, pitted against a secular lefty host, and 1, 2, 3, 4 or more secular lefty sparring partners. That is how the lamestream media thinks a “fair” debate ought to be conducted.

And our taxpayer-funded ABC and SBS are among the worst culprits here. I have written dozens of articles on these rogue broadcasters, and have pointed out plenty of such shocking miscarriages of intellectual justice. These folks are not in the slightest bit interested in fair debate.

They are interested in only one thing: ramming their radical agendas down everyone’s throats. The token conservative voice is there for only one reason: to give the ever so slight impression of balance and fairness. But there is nothing fair or balanced about these shows.

And the ABC show Q&A is among the worst of these shows. The host Tony Jones is an uber-secular lefty who never displays impartiality or fairness. He always sides with his lefty buddies over against any conservatives or Christians who might happen to be on.

We get another crystal clear example of all this coming up next Monday night on Q&A. On the May 27 panel we have the following line-up (as described on their website):
Lawrence Krauss – Theoretical Physicist & Cosmologist
Gene Robinson – America’s First Openly Gay Bishop
Fred Nile – Conservative Morals Campaigner
Amanda Vanstone – Former Howard Government Minister
Susan Ryan – Age Discrimination Commissioner

There you have it – another completely stacked ABC deck: one biblical Christian against a hardcore atheist, an apostate Bishop, and two other non-Christian non-conservatives. So it is Fred against Tony (another secular lefty) and four others.

For more on just one of these characters, see my write-up about this American apostate wolf in sheep’s clothing: www.billmuehlenberg.com/2013/04/17/wolves-endorsing-wolves/

And notice how Fred Nile is described: “Conservative Morals Campaigner”! Never mind that he is one of NSW’s longest standing politicians who has done so much good over the decades. Instead we have simply a pejorative, prejudicial description. Thus the deck is stacked against him already, an entire week before the program even goes to air.

Oh, and can I tell you already what topics will be covered? Homosexuality and homosexual marriage will take up a large part of the show – I guarantee it. And isn’t it interesting that every single person on that panel, along with the moderator – except for Fred – will be in favour of the homosexual agenda.

This is how the ABC operates. Pick a hot potato contentious issue and pretend that everyone in the world – except the token conservative – is in favour of it. Never mind that the community at large is quite divided over this, as is in fact even the homosexual community.

But here you will have everyone blasting away at Fred, seeking to make him look like a Neanderthal and a barbarian. This is what the ABC does deliberately. This has absolutely nothing to do with a genuine discussion of ideas. This is not at all a real and proper debate.

It is simply our taxpayer-funded leftist outfit using shows like this to push radical agendas – in this case the agenda of the radical homosexual lobby. That is the only reason for this program. Ideas are not there to be discussed and debated. Instead, ideologies and agendas are there to be pushed and promoted – all at our expense of course.

So please do pray like mad for Fred. He will need our prayers more than you can imagine. And I know – as I said, I have been on plenty of these sorts of shows, and they are the most unpleasant programs to be on. I do not envy Fred one bit. He has the entire diabolical intelligentsia up against him.

He not only needs a whole lot of prayer cover, but he needs other bits of practical help as well. For example, he needs supporters there with him in the audience. And we need to send in questions which can be helpful to Fred as the debate goes on.

So please stand up for Fred. This is a very tough assignment, and it can cause plenty of indigestion and grief. Our God is a great God, and will go with Fred. But he needs the prayers and help of his people as well. So please stand with him.

****

Oh, and just in case you think I overstate the leftist bias of the ABC in particular and the MSM in general, this just came in from Andrew Bolt:

“Folker Hanusch, senior lecturer in journalism at University of the Sunshine Coast, on new polling confirming the Leftist bias of the overwhelming majority of journalists: ‘Our survey was conducted by telephone with carefully selected journalists from newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations, online news sites and news agency AAP, as a sample of the 8000 to 10,000 journalists in Australia today.

“‘When asked about their voting intentions, less than two-thirds of the journalists we surveyed revealed their voting intention. Of those 372 people, 43.0% said they would give their first preference vote to Labor; 30.2% would vote for the Coalition; and 19.4% said they would choose the Greens – about twice the Australian average.’

“No bunch of journalist skews more violently left than the ABC: ‘However, 41.2% of the 34 ABC journalists who declared a voting intention said they would vote for the Greens, followed by 32.4% for Labor and 14.7% for the Coalition’.”

There you go folks. The ABC is one big wasteland when it comes to conservatism – and Christianity as well I might add.

www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/

blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/anything_but_conservative_survey_confirms_all_you_suspected_about_the_abc/

[981 words]

And that is exactly what is now happening. All sorts of groups are demanding that their perverse sexual preferences be fully recognised, supported and given government endorsement. I have documented this both in my book, Strained Relations, and on my website.

As these demands are never-ending, so my coverage of all this will have to be never-ending. So let me look again at another “love” which is quickly and proudly coming out of the closet. Sadly there are now many calling for the legalisation of bestiality, or zoophilia. Yes, there is even a “scientific” name now assigned to those who want to enjoy “equal love” with animals.

And these are not just a few cranks and misfits. Sadly we have academics, educational institutions, and plenty of other respectable type groups calling for this. Indeed, simply google the euphemistic term “zoophilia”. When I last did this some 1.2 million hits came up. There are all sorts of zoophilia sites, organisations, groups, societies and advocates out there seriously promoting all this.

In fact, there is far too much material here for me to do proper justice to it, so let me just select a few representative examples. Let’s begin with this headline: “Those Who Practice Bestiality Say They’re Part of the Next Sexual Rights Movement.” The headline alone says it all: If the homosexual lobby can get their way with full recognition and legalisation, then why can’t we?

The article speaks of a Cody Beck who is quite serous in seeing his “rights” recognised: “Being a ‘zoophile’ in modern American society, Beck says, is ‘like being gay in the 1950s. You feel like you have to hide, that if you say it out loud, people will look at you like a freak.’ Now Beck believes he and other members of this minority sexual orientation, who often call themselves ‘zoos,’ can follow the same path as the gay rights movement. Most researchers believe 2 to 8 percent of the population harbors forbidden desires toward animals, and Beck hopes this minority group can begin appealing to the open-minded for acceptance.”

I mentioned that universities and academics are even happy to run with this. Here is another headline to get your head around: “Yale hosts workshop teaching sensitivity to bestiality”. Yes, that would be Yale University. The entire article is so incredible that I am tempted to quote the whole piece. But let me offer this much:

“On Saturday afternoon, Yale hosted a ‘sensitivity training’ in which students were asked to consider topics such as bestiality, incest, and accepting money for sex. During the workshop, entitled, ‘Sex: Am I Normal,’ students anonymously asked and answered questions about sex using their cell phones, and viewed the responses in real time in the form of bar charts. The session was hosted by ‘sexologist’ Dr. Jill McDevitt, who owns a sex store called Feminique in West Chester, Pa. Survey responses revealed that nine percent of attendees had been paid for sex, 3 percent had engaged in bestiality, and 52 percent had participated in ‘consensual pain’ during sex, according to an article published in the Yale Daily News on Monday.

“Event director Giuliana Berry told Campus Reform in an interview on Monday that the workshop was brought to campus to teach students not to automatically judge people who may have engaged in these sorts of activities, but rather to respond with ‘understanding’ and ‘compassion.’ ‘People do engage in some of these activities that we believe only for example perverts engage in,’ she said. ‘What the goal is is to increase compassion for people who may engage in activities that are not what you would personally consider normal.’ McDevitt referred to the range of activities discussed in the workshop as ‘sexual diversity.’ ‘It tries to get people to be more sensitive … to sexual diversity,’ McDevitt told Campus Reform in an interview on Monday. ‘We’re not all heterosexual, able-bodied folks who have standard missionary sex’.”

There you go: we need to offer “understanding” and “compassion” to those who are into zoophilia, or incest, or whatever. And the last thing we should do is cast any moral judgment on any of this: “‘It’s sensitivity training,’ McDevitt told Campus Reform. ‘Don’t judge other people, because we all have something we are embarrassed about’.”

One well respected academic has been quite cavalier about bestiality for years now. I refer to Princeton University’s Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics, Peter Singer. He is rather infamous for a piece he penned back in 2001 called “Heavy Petting”. The online magazine Nerve, the site where it first appeared, seems to have pulled it, but one can still find the entire article elsewhere. He said this, in part:

“The existence of sexual contact between humans and animals, and the potency of the taboo against it, displays the ambivalence of our relationship with animals. On the one hand, especially in the Judeo-Christian tradition — less so in the East — we have always seen ourselves as distinct from animals, and imagined that a wide, unbridgeable gulf separates us from them. Humans alone are made in the image of God. Only human beings have an immortal soul….

“On the other hand there are many ways in which we cannot help behaving just as animals do — or mammals, anyway — and sex is one of the most obvious ones. We copulate, as they do. They have penises and vaginas, as we do, and the fact that the vagina of a calf can be sexually satisfying to a man shows how similar these organs are. The taboo on sex with animals may, as I have already suggested, have originated as part of a broader rejection of non-reproductive sex.

“But the vehemence with which this prohibition continues to be held, its persistence while other non-reproductive sexual acts have become acceptable, suggests that there is another powerful force at work: our desire to differentiate ourselves, erotically and in every other way, from animals….

“But sex with animals does not always involve cruelty. Who has not been at a social occasion disrupted by the household dog gripping the legs of a visitor and vigorously rubbing its penis against them? The host usually discourages such activities, but in private not everyone objects to being used by her or his dog in this way, and occasionally mutually satisfying activities may develop.”

This guy is actually saying all this with a straight face! And all this is not just theory or speculation. We have already had a number of cases of people “marrying” their beloved animals. As but one Australian example of this, consider this story:

“A young Toowoomba man yesterday tied the knot with his best friend – a five-year-old labrador. In perhaps a first for the Garden City, Laurel Bank Park hosted the wedding of Joseph Guiso and Honey, a labrador he adopted five years ago. Thirty of the couple’s closest friends and family were in attendance for the emotional ceremony, held at dusk.”

The news item continues: “Mr Guiso said as a ‘religious guy’, he could no longer take the guilt of living with Honey out of wedlock. ‘It’s not sexual,’ he assured the onlookers. ‘It’s just pure love.’ The couple is planning a short honeymoon to one of Toowoomba’s parks.”

And to give cat lovers equal space here, consider this story of a German man who married his own cat: “A German man has unofficially married his cat after the animal fell ill and vets told him it might not live much longer, Bild newspaper reports. It says Uwe Mitzscherlich, 39, paid an actress 300 euros (£260,$395) to officiate at the ceremony, as marrying an animal is illegal in Germany.

“Mr Mitzscherlich said he had wanted to tie the knot before his asthmatic cat Cecilia died. The cat and groom have lived together for 10 years. ‘Cecilia is such a trusting creature. We cuddle all the time and she has always slept in my bed,’ Mr Mitzscherlich, a postman from the eastern town of Possendorf, told Bild. Actress Christin-Maria Lohri, who officiated the ceremony, was quoted as saying: ‘At first I thought it was a joke. But for Mr Mitzscherlich it’s a dream come true’.”

Bestiality, zoophilia, and marriage rights with animals then is clearly the next step in the sexual revolution. Albert Camus once said, “A man without ethics is a wild beast loosed upon the world.” In this case it might be more accurate to say, “A man without ethics is a man loosed upon wild beasts.”

www.browardpalmbeach.com/2009-08-20/news/those-who-practice-bestiality-say-they-re-part-of-the-next-gay-rights-movement/

www.campusreform.org/blog/?ID=4646

www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/2001—-.htm

www.thechronicle.com.au/news/man-marrys-dog-city-first-toowoomba/710538/

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8658327.stm

[1465 words]

Started by American social commentator and family expert Dr Allan Carlson, the Congress was first held in Prague in 1997. Five other major events were held between that initial congress and the one just completed. Geneva, Mexico City, Warsaw, Amsterdam and Madrid were the venues, and a number of regional conferences have also been held.

In Sydney some 600 eager delegates were able to spend three full days listening to numerous authorities on family, marriage and related issues. Along with Dr Carlson were other international keynote speakers such as Patrick Fagan, Bradford Wilcox, Janice Shaw Crouse, Steve Mosher, Miriam Grossman, Ian Grant, Ted Baehr, and Bob McCoskrie.

Australian keynote speakers included Ian Harper, George Pell, Peter Elliot, John Anderson and Patrick Parkinson. Over 100 other speakers were on hand, including Sharon Slater, William May, Warwick Marsh, Rabbi Shimon Cowen, Paige Patterson, David Phillips, Miranda Devine, David van Gend, John Ballantyne and Bob Day.

The theme of this WCF was “Happy Families, Healthy Economy: A New Vision for National Prosperity and Social Progress.” One speaker after another demonstrated how the well-being of families leads directly to the well-being of nations. Healthy, functioning families make for healthy, functioning societies, while broken families result in broken economies and broken countries.

A wealth of data, fact and evidence was marshalled, along with inspiring stories and testimonials. Numerous other marriage and family topics were covered, including:
- The Causes and Cost of Family Breakdown
- What Families Are Best for the Economy?
- Philosophical Roots of the Cultural Revolution
- Secular Humanism and Family Values
- Demographic Winter
- The Impact on Children of Legalising “Same-Sex Marriage”
- Economic and Social Costs of Abortion
- Healing Post-Abortion Trauma
- Work of the Home: A True Profession
- AIDS Prevention through Strengthening Families
- Marriage as an Instrument of Human Development
- The Pornography Industry
- and Reaching the Next Generation with a Pro-Family Message

A conference dinner featured the world-renowned photographer Ken Duncan and his work. After these very full three days, the 600 present left revived, reinvigorated and enthused about standing tall in the defence of marriage and family.

Yet incredibly there were some who did not even want this conference to go ahead. For example, Alex Greenwich, NSW member for Sydney and Chairperson of Australian Marriage Equality, actually wanted the conference to be monitored for “hate speech”.

WCF Managing Director Lawrence Jacobs said, “Perhaps, it is Mr. Greenwich who should be monitored for possible human rights violations for imposing a radical, secular worldview that privileges a few adults at the expense of the natural family and the rights of children to be raised by a married mother and a father in their own home.

“The definition of the natural family derives from the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) adopted in 1948 and binding on all United Nations member states of the world. The UDHR states (Article 16:3), ‘the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the state.’

“This is the human rights basis and inspiration for our use of the term ‘natural family’ and the WCF mission to provide sound scholarship and effective strategies to affirm and defend the natural family, thus renewing a stable and free society.”

Jacobs also said of the history of WCF, “In all of that time, no elected official has ever been successful in censoring a Congress for our expression of support for the natural family and the presentation of research, ideas, and solutions to our modern-day economic and social problems. In Amsterdam on the third day of WCF V, left-wing newspapers which disagreed with us, actually defended our right to be in the city and present our research and ideas to help children and families.”

Nonetheless protestors did come to the Sydney conference, seeking to disrupt things, but the police did a good job of keeping them at bay. But just imagine: actually protesting the family. One might as well target a conference extolling the advantages of breathing, or eating. Just think if those topics were attacked as being intolerant, bigoted and judgmental.

The very fact that we have to put on international conferences to defend and promote marriage and family shows just how far we have degenerated as a society. Up until recently, everyone simply enjoyed and did family, as we simply eat and breathe.

But today we actually have to justify why we think family is good, and marriage an honourable estate. Our topsy-turvy world now celebrates and encourages attacks on marriage and family, while regarding the upholding of these historic social institutions as somehow being a bigoted and hateful thing.

As long as this climate of moral inversion and mental mushiness persists, then conferences such as this will always be needed. As G K Chesterton once wrote, “This triangle of truisms, of father, mother and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilisations which disregard it.”

Until sanity returns to the West, and family is once again regarded as the supreme good, and a blessing unequalled, we will have need for such conferences. Long may the World Congress of Families prosper. Thanks again Dr Carlson and others for bringing it about.

And the Australian team, led by Mary-Louise Fowler, which was responsible for putting on this invaluable conference, must also be heartily congratulated. It was an outstanding event, and the conference team did a superlative job.

However, if you are now feeling a bit let down because you missed out on the conference, you can always join us again next year. See you in Moscow, September 10-12, 2014.

www.christiannewswire.com/news/9794371997.html

www.news.com.au/national-news/australian-gay-rights-advocate-alex-greenwich-compared-to-stalin/story-fncynjr2-1226633250943

[990 words]

Fatherlessness is a growing problem in Australia and the Western world. Whether caused by divorce and broken families, or by deliberate single parenting, more and more children grow up without fathers. Indeed, 85 per cent of single parent families are fatherless families.

Writing about the situation in America in 1996, sociologist David Popenoe said this: “The decline of fatherhood is one of the most basic, unexpected, and extraordinary social trends of our time. Its dimensions can be captured in a single statistic: In just three decades, between 1960 and 1990, the percentage of U.S. children living apart from their biological fathers more than doubled, from 17 percent to 36 percent. By the turn of the century, nearly 50 percent of American children may be going to sleep each evening without being able to say good night to their dads.”

And these trends are not without negative consequences. Father absence has been shown to be a major disadvantage to the well-being of children. The following is a summary of the evidence for the importance of fathers and the need for two-parent families.

One expert from Harvard medical school who has studied over 40 years of research on the question of parental absence and children’s well-being said this: “What has been shown over and over again to contribute most to the emotional development of the child is a close, warm, sustained and continuous relationship with both parents.” Or as David Blankenhorn has stated in Fatherless America: “Fatherlessness is the most harmful demographic trend of this generation.”

Another expert puts it this way: “There exists today no greater single threat to the long-term well-being of children, our communities, or our nation, than the increasing number of children being raised without a committed, responsible, and loving father.”

Bryan Rodgers of the Australian National University has recently re-examined the Australian research. Says Rodgers: “Australian studies with adequate samples have shown parental divorce to be a risk factor for a wide range of social and psychological problems in adolescence and adulthood, including poor academic achievement, low self-esteem, psychological distress, delinquency and recidivism, substance use and abuse, sexual precocity, adult criminal offending, depression, and suicidal behaviour.” He concludes: “There is no scientific justification for disregarding the public health significance of marital dissolution in Australia, especially with respect to mental health.”

A New Zealand summary of the data based on national and international research conducted over the past two decades also found major positive outcomes for children when fathers are present, and negative outcomes when fathers are absent. The report states:

“The weight of the evidence is that fathers can make unique, direct contributions to their children’s well-being. These findings held true after controlling for a range of factors, including mothers’ involvement, children’s characteristics, children’s early behavioural problems, family income, socio-economic status over time, stepfather involvement and family structure.” It goes on to list the many specific ways in which fathers positively contribute to the well-being of children.

And the importance of fathers is neither a recent nor a merely Western truth. The need and importance of fathers is an historical and universal given. As anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski put it, “The most important moral and legal rule concerning the physiological side of kinship is that no child should be brought into the world without a man – and one man at that. . . . I think that this generalization amounts to a universal sociological law.” There may be cultural variations, yet “through all the variations there runs the rule that the father is indispensable for the full sociological status of the child as well as its mother, that the group consisting of a woman and her offspring is sociologically incomplete and illegitimate.”

Here then is a sampling of the evidence:

Economic difficulties

• In America, among families with dependent children, only 8.3 per cent of married couples were living below the poverty line, compared to 47.1 percent of female-headed households.
• Also in the US, a nationally representative sample found this: “In 2005, the median income for married couples was $66,067, which was $35,000 more than the median income for single mothers, $19,000 more than that of single fathers, $43,000 more than that of single women, and $24,000 more than that of single men. Married couples made up 79 percent of the highest quintile income and 17.9 percent of the lowest income quintile.”
• In Australia, a recent study of 500 divorcees with children five to eight years after the separation found that four in five divorced mothers were dependent on social security after their marriages dissolved.
• Figures from Monash University’s Centre for Population and Urban Research show that family break-up, rather than unemployment, is the main cause of the rise in poverty levels in Australia.
• A joint report from AMP Life and Canberra University’s National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling says that divorce leaves both partners worse off economically, but women tend to experience the biggest fall in disposable income.
• A recent US study “found that by far the ‘biggest factor’ associated with child poverty in a county is the proportion of households headed by unwed mothers with children under 18 years of age.” They established that every 1 percentage-point increase in these households correlates with a 1.2 percentage-point increase in the county’s child-poverty rate.

Educational performance

• American children from intact families have a 21 per cent chance of dropping out of high school whereas children from broken families have a 46 per cent chance.
• American school children who became father-absent early in life generally scored significantly lower on measures of IQ and achievement tests.
• A recent Concordia University found clear positive effects of a father’s influence on the behavioural and cognitive development of children. For example, “for both boys and girls, fathers’ positive parental control predicted higher Performance IQ and fewer internalizing problems over six years later.”
• A study of Australian primary school children from three family types (married heterosexual couples, cohabiting heterosexual couples and homosexual couples) found that in every area of educational endeavour (language; mathematics; social studies; sport; class work, sociability and popularity; and attitudes to learning), children from married heterosexual couples performed better than the other two groups. The study concludes with these words: “Married couples seem to offer the best environment for a child’s social and educational development”.
• A Melbourne University study of 212 children found that fathers, even more than mothers, had a major beneficial influence on children in their first year of school. The study found that kids with regular father involvement were more cooperative and self-reliant in school than kids who did not have father involvement. The more regular involvement the father has with the child, the study’s author said, the better the child does in his or her first year of school.

Criminal involvement

• A British study found a direct statistical link between single parenthood and virtually every major type of crime, including mugging, violence against strangers, car theft and burglary.
• Also in the UK, studies have shown that “children from broken homes are nine times more likely to commit crimes than those from stable families” and “seven out of 10 offenders come from broken homes”.
• One American study even arrived at this startling conclusion: the proportion of single-parent households in a community predicts its rates of violent crime and burglary, but the community’s poverty level does not. Neither poverty nor race seem to account very much for the crime rate, compared to the proportion of single parent families.
• In Australia, a recent book noted the connection between broken families and crime. In a discussion of rising crime rates in Western Australia, the book reported that “family breakdown in the form of divorce and separation is the main cause of the crime wave”.
• Maryland researchers found that bullying and aggressive behaviour are associated with family breakdown. This is especially the cause of girls’ aggressiveness: “the percentage of single men and mother-alone families rival neighborhood violence as providing the most explanatory power” for aggressiveness among girls.

Involvement with drugs and alcohol

• A UCLA study pointed out that inadequate family structure makes children more susceptible to drug use “as a coping mechanism to relieve depression and anxiety.”
• Another US study found that among the homes with strict fathers, only 18 per cent had children who used alcohol or drugs at all. In contrast, among mother-dominated homes, 35 per cent had children who used drugs frequently.
• A National Institutes of Health study showed a clear connection between non-intact families and child drug abuse: “Our analyses indicated that children from intact families used significantly less inhalants, marijuana, and amphetamines than children from single-parent families.”
• A New Zealand study of nearly 1000 children observed over a period of 15 years found that children who have watched their parents separate are more likely to use illegal drugs than those whose parents stay together.
• A South African study found that teens from single parent homes were more likely to consume alcohol and do so from an earlier age. Of those who ever drank, 81 per cent of the teens aged 16-18 lived with parents who were divorced compared to 51 per cent of students whose parents were married and living together.

Sexual problems

• Studies from many different cultures have found that girls raised without fathers are more likely to be sexually active, and to start early sexual activity. Father-deprived girls “show precocious sexual interest, derogation of masculinity and males, and poor ability to maintain sexual and emotional adjustment with one male”.
• A US study found that girls who grow up without fathers were “53 percent more likely to marry as teenagers, 111 percent more likely to have children as teenagers, 164 percent more likely to have a premarital birth, and 92 percent more likely to dissolve their own marriages.”
• Another US study made this conclusion: “youth who spend part of their childhood/youth living in a household that does not include their biological father are more likely to smoke regularly, become sexually active, and be convicted of a crime.”
• New Zealand research has found that the absence of a father is a major factor in the early onset of puberty and teenage pregnancy. Dr Bruce Ellis, Psychologist in Sexual Development at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch found that one of the most important factors in determining early menarche is the father: “There seems to be something special about the role of fathers in regulating daughters sexual development”.
• A British study found that girls brought up by lone parents were twice as likely to leave home by the age of 18 as the daughters of intact homes; were three times as likely to be cohabiting by the age of 20; and almost three times as likely to have a birth out of wedlock.

Part Two is here: www.billmuehlenberg.com/2013/05/17/the-facts-on-fatherlessness-part-two/

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• From nations as diverse as Finland and South Africa, a number of studies have reported that anywhere from 50 to 80 per cent of psychiatric patients come from broken homes.
• A Canadian study of teenagers discharged from psychiatric hospitals found that only 16 per cent were living with both parents when they were admitted.
• A study of nearly 14,000 Dutch adolescents between the ages of 12 to 19 found that, “In general, children from one parent and stepparent families reported lower self-esteem, more symptoms of anxiety and loneliness, more depressed mood and more suicidal thoughts than children from intact families.”
• A massive longitudinal study undertaken in Sweden involving over one million children found that children from single parents showed increased risks of psychiatric disease, suicide or suicide attempt, injury and addiction. The authors, writing in The Lancet, concluded that growing up in “a single-parent family has disadvantages to the health of the child”. Bear in mind that Sweden is one of the most highly advanced welfare states on earth. Thus even with a comprehensive welfare net, children still suffer when not in two-parent families.
• A US study of 2,733 adolescents found this: “The greater the fathers’ involvement was, the lower the level of adolescents’ behavioral problems, both in terms of aggression and antisocial behavior and negative feelings such as anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem.”
• Researchers at the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles have shown that fatherlessness is directly related to childhood obesity. Statistical analysis of the data established that “family structure was significantly associated with the obesity rate.” In each grade, children from single-mother families had higher rates of obesity than children from two-parent families.
• A researcher from the University of South Australia’s School of Health Sciences found that children from single families do less well than those from married families because they are less active and do not have as much opportunity for physical activity.
• A more recent Australian study showed that obesity among girls in single-parent households continues to be a major problem. Deakin University health researchers studied nearly 9000 children aged between four and nine and found higher rates of overweight and obesity in girls from single-parent families than those in two-parent families.
• A recent study from Rhode Island found that while “the incidence of mental-health problems ran particularly high (33 percent) among children living with parents reporting high levels of parental stress… the complete story involves not just parental stress. It involves family structure as well: the rate for mental-health problems came in significantly higher among children living with a single mother (25.7 percent) or in a stepfamily (26.6 percent) than it did among children living with two biological or adoptive parents (13.3 percent; p<.001).”

 Social costs

• In the UK the costs of family breakdown is astronomical: “The 2012 total cost of family breakdown to the UK was £44 billion (£43.94 billion), up from £42 billion last year. The annual cost per taxpayer is now £1,470.”
• An even newer UK study said this: “Family breakdown is costing taxpayers almost £50 billion a year and the bill is rising fast, a new analysis said yesterday. The costs generated by family breakdown -  including subsidised housing, crime, health and social care and disrupted education – have gone up by nearly a quarter in just four years.”
• Dr Bruce Robinson, University of Western Australia, and author of Fathering from the Fast Lane, has estimated the cost of fatherlessness in Australia to be over 13 billion dollars per year.
• In Australia it has been estimated that marriage breakdown costs $2.5 billion annually. Each separation is estimated to cost society some $12,000.
• Also, Australian industry is reported to lose production of more than $1 billion a year due to problems of family breakdown.
• Homelessness is also closely linked with family breakdown. A recent Australian study conducted at two Melbourne universities has found that children whose biological parents stay together are about three times less likely to become homeless than those from other family types.

Child abuse

• A 1994 study of 52,000 children found that those who are most at risk of being abused are those who are not living with both parents.
• A recent American review of the studies found that “fathers, especially married fathers who live with their children, play an important role in protecting their children from abuse and neglect”. It found that 15.5 children out of 1000 children were mistreated in married-parent families, whereas 27.3 children per 1000 were mistreated in single-parent families.
• A Finnish study of nearly 4,000 ninth-grade girls found that “stepfather-daughter incest was about 15 times as common as father-daughter incest”.
• A study examining 126 profiles of perpetrators of fatal assault in United States found that non-biological parents were 17 times more likely to commit a fatal assault toward a child than biological parents.
• In Australia, former Human Rights Commissioner Mr Brian Burdekin has reported a 500 to 600 per cent increase in sexual abuse of girls in families where the adult male was not the natural father.
• A recent study by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare found that “a relatively high proportion of substantiations [of child abuse] involved children living in female-headed one-parent families and in two-parent step or blended families.”
• And more recent Australian research continues to bear this out: “The data shows that almost half of all proven cases of child abuse and neglect involved ‘broken’ families in 2010-11, even though (according to the ABS Family Characteristics Survey) only 26 per cent of all Australian children lived in sole-parent and step or blended families.”

Conclusion

The evidence of the harmful effects of father absence could fill many pages. The above is just a small sampling of a very large body of research findings on the issue. The social science research on the need for children to be raised by both a biological mother and father, preferably cemented by marriage, is vast and growing.

Indeed, the evidence is so overwhelming that the reader is advised to look at recent summaries of the data. However, several recent academic studies can be mentioned here, which demonstrate the importance of children growing up with their married biological mother and father.

One American study of 19,000 young people conducted by the Bowling Green State University (Ohio) found that teens fare best when living with two married biological parents: “Adolescents in married, two-biological-parent families generally fare better than children in any of the family types examined here, including single-mother, cohabiting stepfather, and married stepfather families. The advantage of marriage appears to exist primarily when the child is the biological offspring of both parents. Our findings are consistent with previous work, which demonstrates children in cohabiting stepparent families fare worse than children living with two married, biological parents.”

Another large-scale American study found that there are “overall disadvantages” in not living with both biological parents. The author concludes, “My analyses have clearly demonstrated some overall disadvantages of living with neither parent. Among adolescents from all six family types, those in non-biological-parent appear to rank the lowest in academic performance, educational aspiration, and locus of control. Further, they appear to fare less well in the remaining outcome areas (self-esteem, behavior problems, and cigarette smoking).”

Cornell University Professor Urie Bronfenbrenner, a leading expert in developmental psychology, summarises the evidence in this fashion:

Controlling for associated factors such as low income, children growing up in [single-parent] households are at greater risk for experiencing a variety of behavioral and educational problems, including extremes of hyperactivity or withdrawal; lack of attentiveness in the classroom; difficulty in deferring gratification; impaired academic achievement; school misbehavior; absenteeism; dropping out; involvement in socially alienated peer groups; and, especially, the so-called ‘teenage syndrome’ of behaviors that tend to hang together – smoking, drinking, early and frequent sexual experience, a cynical attitude to work, adolescent pregnancy, and in the more extreme cases, drugs, suicide, vandalism, violence, and criminal acts.

Similar comments can be made about the situation in Britain. After amassing a wealth of data on the negative effects of fatherlessness in the UK, Rebecca O’Neil makes this concluding remark:

The weight of evidence indicates that the traditional family based upon a married father and mother is still the best environment for raising children, and it forms the soundest basis for the wider society. For many mothers, fathers and children, the ‘fatherless family’ has meant poverty, emotional heartache, ill health, lost opportunities, and a lack of stability. The social fabric – once considered flexible enough to incorporate all types of lifestyles – has been stretched and strained. Although a good society should tolerate people’s rights to live as they wish, it must also hold adults responsible for the consequences of their actions. To do this, society must not shrink from evaluation of the results of these actions. As J.S. Mill argued, a good society must share the lessons learnt from its experience and hold up ideals to which all can aspire.

Wade Horn, the head of the National Fatherhood Initiative in the USA offers this concluding word: “The news is not good when large numbers of children are growing up disconnected from their fathers. It’s not that every child who grows up in a fatherless household is going to have these kinds of difficulties. But it is true that there’s an increased risk of these negative outcomes when kids grow up without fathers.”

With the rise of fatherlessness Australia and the Western world has also experienced a marked rise in social problems. And the brunt of these problems has been borne by children. We owe it to our children to do better. We urgently need to address the twin problems of fatherlessness and family breakdown. Public policy must begin to address these crucial areas. Until we tackle these problems, our children and our societies will continue to suffer.

Part One is here: www.billmuehlenberg.com/2013/05/17/the-facts-on-fatherlessness-part-one/

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One group at least seems to argue against any such consolation. I refer to the word of faith teachers, or the positive confessionists. They basically claim that all “negative” experiences, such as sickness, suffering or poverty, are of the devil, and have no place in the believer’s life.

Consider the comments of just one representative figure here, Charles Capps. In his book, Why Tragedy Happens to Christians, he says: “We have heard many sermons about how God led the children of Israel in the wilderness: and most of these sermons seem to convey that the ‘wilderness experience’ was to perfect them or make them stronger. But it did not make them stronger. It did not perfect their faith. It was not the will of God that they be in the wilderness all those years. Their ‘wilderness experience’ was not God’s blessing – it was a curse!”

There are a number of biblical passages on this episode, and they seem to give a rather different slant to the story. The relevant texts speak of God leading Israel through the desert (Ex. 13:17,18; Deut. 8:2; Ps. 136:16); of blessing them (Deut. 2:7; Ps. 78: 24-25); of caring for them (Hos. 13:5); of giving his spirit to instruct them (Neh. 9:20), and so on.

Indeed, as Dale Allison notes, “despite the tradition of disobedience and murmuring in the desert and the fact that there is no nomadic or desert ideal in the OT, the time in the wilderness was sometimes described in glowing terms (e.g., Is 63:11-14).”

All this does not sound like a curse to me. Sure, it is true that Israel did snub God’s good provision and blessing, and tested God, for which Yahweh grew angry (Deut. 9:7; Ps. 78:40-41; Heb. 3:8-10). But the point remains: God did indeed lead them into the wilderness.

Take for example Deuteronomy 8:2 which reads, “Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.”

Here the concepts of God’s leading and the educational function of the wanderings are stressed. Eugene Merrill suggests that in the light of the verbs ‘humble’ and ‘test’, “it may be best to see the desert itinerary as a learning experience rather than a punishing one. . . . Thus this is discipline in the positive sense of education.”

Thus it is not all gloom and doom. Indeed, Raymond Brown puts a very positive spin on this period. God had “been good to them in the barren desert. They had learned lessons there which prosperity could never have taught them. Through those bleak wilderness years, he had been like a compassionate father who occasionally has to discipline his children for their own good. Some lessons can only be learnt in trouble.”

Now the thinking of Capps and others is not without some foundation in this regard. Passages like Numbers 14:32-34 speak of God’s judgment on Israel, stating that they would suffer and die for their sins in the wilderness. But this came after their disbelief of the spies’ report on Canaan (Numbers 13).

This period of 40 years judgment (38 years according to Deut. 2:14) began after over a year of wilderness wanderings. As Chris Wright perceptively remarks, “There is always more than one way of looking at history. . . . Like other events in biblical history (e.g., the story of Joseph, the rise of the monarchy, and ultimately, of course, the cross itself), the wilderness wandering is presented to us both as arising out of human sin and rebellion and as having a divine purpose.”

An important New Testament commentary on the Old Testament wilderness wanderings is the story of Jesus’ own wandering into the wilderness to experience temptations. Most careful scholars acknowledge that among other things, Jesus is here acting as the true Israel.

What Israel was called to do and failed, Jesus did successfully. As Schneider and Brown comment, “The temptations of Jesus recapitulate, in his individual life as the Son of God, the temptations of the nation of Israel in their corporate life as the son of God.”

David Hill remarks: “In his confrontation with Satan, Jesus triumphs over the temptations to which Israel succumbed in the desert, and takes upon himself the destiny of Israel to carry it to its fulfilment.” Or as N.T. Wright put it, “the story of God’s people is being encapsulated, recapitulated, in his own work”.

The interesting point is that we are clearly told that Jesus was “led by the Spirit” into the wilderness, being “full of the Holy Spirit” (Luke 4:1). No Satanic source here. God was fully behind it. Now if Jesus was indeed meant to be a kind of showcase of what the new or true Israel was meant to be, can we take the principles and extend them backwards?

That is, can we argue that Israel too was led by God into the wilderness, contrary to the claims of the faith teachers? It seems that the biblical texts already cited, plus the example of Christ, could result in an affirmative response. Thus the biblical imagery of the wilderness contains both positive and negative elements. It is not to be seen purely in terms of judgment or curses.

It is, as Ryken, Wilhoit, and Longman write, “an ambivalent image in the Bible. If it is a place of deprivation, danger, attack and punishment, it is also a place where God delivers his people, provides for them and reveals himself.” Thus there is a case to be made for God taking his people into ‘wilderness’ situations.

If we keep in mind that God is more concerned with our holiness than our happiness, then such periods of testings and hardship can in fact be welcomed and not shunned. As P. C. Craigie remarks, “The wilderness makes or breaks a man; it provides strength of will and character. The strength provided by the wilderness, however, was not the strength of self-sufficiency, but the strength that comes from a knowledge of the living God.”

So when you next find yourself in a ‘wilderness situation,’ allow God to do his work in your life. While all the why’s of the situation may not be apparent, the who’s are – God will be with you in the desert, just as he was with his son Jesus.

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Well then we have a place for you. The First Church of Sin believes we should welcome everyone and reject no one. We embrace all people and all lifestyles, so just come as you are and feel free to stay as you are. You won’t hear any negative sermons here.

If you are put off by all those intolerant words like sin, holiness, righteousness, repentance, judgment, and hell then you will just love our church – we never say those things here. All you will hear is how terrific you are. All you will hear is that you are just fine as you are, and no one should tell you any differently.

No questions asked. No conditions. No statement of beliefs. No moral policies. No membership rules. No church discipline. No excommunication. No Bibles in the pews. In fact, no pews. Just one big lovey-dovey place where we burn incense, chant eastern tunes, hug each other, and smile all the time.

Yes we are proudly the First Church of Sin. And we are so noted for our openness, our acceptance, and our tolerance, that a newspaper has just written up our story. The headline is this “Sinning faithful win church’s blessing”. The story begins this way:

“A Queenscliff church is standing up for equality with a special project designed to raise awareness of sinners’ rights…. [One member said], ‘Going to church I didn’t feel welcome because of people’s attitudes towards the sinners community, and I started self-harming because I didn’t want to live any more. I got the message that it wasn’t normal, that it wasn’t right, that I wasn’t right.’

“On leaving the church and then school at the start of Year 11, his mental health began to improve. A loving relationship has boosted his self-esteem even further. ‘I’m the happiest now I’ve ever been in my life,’ he said.”

Well there you go folks. If you are going to a church that claims you are sinful, and says you must stop sinful activity, then why waste your time there? Why let them drag you down? Why soak up all the negativity and intolerance? Come to our church. We sure won’t badger you about being a sinner.

We will welcome you with no questions asked. You can live just as you please. Then you too will experience how it is to “never be happier”. Yes, we are the church of acceptance and happiness. We just want you to be happy. That is all that matters. Why be burdened down with all this baloney about sin, repentance, the cross and other negative and unloving concepts.

Surely that can’t help your self-image. That won’t make you feel happy. So come to our place – we would love to have you. We are just one big happy church – just one big happy family. As one of our pastors has said, “We want to offer a sense of inclusion and openness to the community and to the wider church, because we know the church can have a reputation for not being that inclusive.”

So come one, come all. Leave all that guilt and shame behind. We won’t say a word about whatever lifestyle you prefer, or whatever activity you are involved in. Inclusion is the name of the game here. Tolerance, acceptance and inclusion – that is our statement of faith.

*****

OK, by now you might have gathered that this is a bit of a spoof. But sadly it is not at all far from the truth. Indeed, the stuff above in quotation marks is actually 100 per cent true. Simply change the word sin for homosexuality, and you have the actual story.

You can read all about it in the link below. Here we have another clear case of apostasy in our midst, and another prime example of wolves in sheep’s clothing. And it all sounds so good, doesn’t it? After all, who isn’t in favour of tolerance, acceptance and inclusion?

These are the new weasel words being used by the false shepherds to lead many into a lost eternity, and to keep them trapped in a deadly and dead-end lifestyle. Shame on them. They will stand before their Lord one day and face the music.

This denomination has been going down the tubes for decades now. It has long ago snubbed its nose at the Word of God and his authority. It is now simply a law unto itself. It just makes things up as it goes along.

Oh, and no prizes for guessing which denomination this is.

www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/article/2013/05/14/364969_news.html

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I have dealt with this teaching elsewhere, eg: www.billmuehlenberg.com/2010/09/29/problems-with-the-positive-confession-movement/

Here I want to focus more closely on the nature of God and the nature of prayer. It seems that the positive confession movement has a defective understanding of both. Indeed, it seems that for many evangelicals (not just the word of faith folks), prayer has become much more of a magic charm, a magic wand, or a type of amulet, instead of what it is intended to be – a means of communication and relationship with God.

Dennis Okholm warns about confusing prayer with magic: “Magic attempts to control or manipulate the divine will in order to induce it to grant one’s wishes, especially through the use of techniques such as charms, spells, rituals, or ceremonies. Christian prayer involves a struggle of wills in which the pray-er attempts to persuade God, all the time seeing prayer as a divinely given means whereby the pray-er can participate in God’s agenda.”

To argue that prayer should be understood in this sense is not to deny the element of petition and request. That is certainly there. But it seems to be a minor sub-point, not the main theme. W. Bingham Hunter in his 1986 book The God Who Hears develops this idea nicely:

“Most of us tend to view getting answers as the goal and prayer as the means to that end. But God views it differently. Given the perfection of his person, it is certain that God does not need us to talk to him because he’s lonely or insecure, nor does he depend on our advice or help in running the universe. Yet the commands in Scripture to pray suggest that he wants us to pray; he actually enjoys having us speak to him. Developing a relationship with us is God’s goal, and answers to prayer are a means he uses to foster self-disclosure, growth and understanding of both him and ourselves.”

Indeed, this idea of relationship is vital. It gets at the heart of the matter concerning the purpose of prayer. If prayer can simply be defined as talking to God, then prayer is, at its core, the means to relationship with God. We tend to see prayer in an instrumental sense – as a means to an end. But God desires prayer for the purpose of fellowship with himself – a love relationship. Augustine could go so far as saying that “true, whole prayer is nothing but love”. Many believers – and not just positive confessionists – miss this vital truth.

Jesus did not pray a lot to “get” things from his father. He prayed because of the love relationship found within the divine trinity. Michael Green and Paul Stevens put it this way: “Prayer for Jesus was not primarily a ‘discipline’ but the daily meat and drink of fellowship with the Father. Prayer is like fellowship. As in friendship, prayer is not for anything at all, even for ‘answers’. It is for the relationship. It is for communion. . . . Jesus reveals that what God wants from our prayers is not the substance but the relationship implied in our praying”.

A major problem with the idea of positive confession is that it treats God as some cosmic servant, waiting to do our every bidding. And prayer is simply the means by which we get the divine dispenser to dish out the goods. Such a view not only cheapens the concept of prayer, but turns our understanding of God into idolatry. As H. D. McDonald puts it, “that prayer is a sort of Aladdin’s lamp, which anyone can operate at will once he has learned the secret”.

Moreover, this view too highly stresses the role of the one who prays while minimising the role of the one who answers prayer. That is, all the emphasis is on having faith, being persistent in prayer, standing on the promises, and so on. It is as if whatever good comes to the believer is the result of his or her own efforts, instead of the goodness and grace of God. Again, prayer must be distinguished from magic.

In this regard David Crump has some incisive things to say about the nature of prayer. In his volume on Jesus and prayer in Luke-Acts, he notes that to speak to the efficacy of prayer is to misunderstand it. Prayer, he insists, is “a means by which individuals discover God’s will revealed to them so that they may become attuned to it and participate in its continuous unfolding”. Thus the issue does not lie in how much we pray or how fervently we pray or how often we pray:

“God enlists human prayer in the outworking of his plan, but the efficacy of prayer is not determined by anything which the pray-er brings, except agreement with the will of God. It would be difficult to find a more non-magical view of prayer than that presented in Luke-Acts. The distinctive feature of magical thought, wherein one seeks to control or compel divine forces to operate in a desired fashion through the careful use of specific techniques, is far removed from the attitudes expressed by Luke.”

The positive confession mindset also seems to render senseless the concept of unanswered prayer, and/or the silence of God. A theology that demands God’s instant response to our every hue and cry will certainly struggle with the idea that God might be silent, absent or distant. Yet this theme is found throughout Scripture, and has been the experience of many devout believers throughout the ages.

The moving words of C.S. Lewis, written soon after the death of his wife, are a classic example: “When you are happy … you will be – or so it feels – welcomed [by God] with opened arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the more emphatic the silence will become.”

And consider just a few of the passages which address this theme:

-Psalm 10:1: Why, O LORD, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?
-Psalm 13:1-2: How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?
-Psalm 22:1-2: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, and am not silent.
-Psalm 28:1: To you I call, O LORD my Rock; do not turn a deaf ear to me. For if you remain silent, I will be like those who have gone down to the pit.
-Psalm 83:1: O God, do not keep silent; be not quiet, O God, be not still.
-Isaiah 45:15: Truly you are a God who hides himself, O God and Savior of Israel.
-Habakkuk 1:2: How long, O LORD, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, “Violence!” but you do not save?

These and other passages make it clear that often God is silent, or at least appears to be. For reasons we may not understand, it is part of the walk of faith to experience this silence, this absence, this sense of God’s abandonment. As Winkey Pratney once put it: “Everyone who has set his heart on serving God will have this darkness come at some point”.

The question is not, ‘should I be experiencing this sense of forsakenness and darkness?’, but, ‘how will I respond to this temporary but painful chapter in my life?’ Or as Hunter remarks, “Truly victorious Christians are those who admit their humanness and who admit the emotional insult of God’s apparent silence when we suffer” (1986, 90).

Finally, we must acknowledge that a loving God will of necessity often say no to our prayers. It is a distorted picture of God, and a faulty understanding of Scripture, to assume that God should grant us our every request. No loving parent would do such foolishness. Neither does God.

Indeed, of necessity some of our prayers must go unanswered. As Lewis remarks, “anyone can see in general that this must be so. In our ignorance we ask what is not good for us or for others, or not even intrinsically possible. Or again, to grant one man’s prayer involves refusing another’s. There is much here which it is hard for our will to accept but nothing that is hard for our intellect to understand. The real problem is different; not why refusal is so frequent, but why the opposite result is so lavishly promised.”

The biblical accounts of the prayers of God’s people receiving a divine no are numerous and well known. One thinks of Job, David, Jesus and Paul, to name but a few. Thus we are in good company when a request is denied or a prayer not answered as we would like.

Leith Anderson devoted an entire volume to the dilemma of unanswered prayer. He provides many examples of the unanswered prayers of saints past and present and writes, “God doesn’t act the way we choose. He doesn’t always give the answer we want. No is a common word in the divine vocabulary with regard to prayer – even when answering the greatest of the saints”.

Thus we must have a fuller and a more biblical understanding of prayer than what we so often get from the positive confession camp. If not, we will see many more people shipwreck their faith.

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