two or three . net

GUIDE: Books on Christianity and Science

Here's my list of resources for those interested in the history of religion and science, both pro and anti-religious.

THEIST

For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery by Rodney Stark

Stark argues that faith in God encouraged Christians to invent science. Having read other books making the same claim, I think Stark's approach to this question is one of the best. Not only does he go over the development of technology in the so-called "Dark Ages," and show how the "Enlightenment" picture of Copernican era science is a myth, he studies 52 key early scientists, and shows that more than 60 % were "devout," while only 2 were skeptics. The critic below who asks why Christianity did not produce science in Russia did not read attentively: Stark argues that faith in God was a necessary, but not sufficient, cause of the rise of science. Other factors were also involved. ~ From this excellent review

Reflections on my 10 Day Silent Vipassana Retreat

I wrote this essay back in 2001 during my period of away from Christianity, while I was exploring Vipassana Buddhist Meditation.

-------------------------------------------------------

Although it has been a few weeks since I did the 10 day course, it is still worthwhile to try and remember. In retrospect, I find Vipassana a premium tool for self-knowledge and control, though not comprehensive as a spiritual/emotional tool for healing and growth. In addition to yoga, devotional study, and prayer, it fills out (almost) a complete set of inner spiritual disciplines (don’t forget the outer ones of service, etc.)

Objectivists, subjectivists, and realists

A good friend of mine has wandered full force into the positive thinking, humanistic, Dale Carnegie type of success training that is popular in professional circles these days.  Now, I don't necessarily disparage it, and there is a lot of good stuff to learn.  But sometimes, the overly simplistic, boiled down talking points lack sophistication, and give an unbalanced idea of what is good and bad.

Case in point? Change Your Questions, Change Your Life: 10 Powerful Tools for Life and Work, which lists the characteristics of Judgers (bad) vs. Learners (good). Now granted, I only skimmed the book, but the charts below reveal what I think is our culture's buy-in into subjectivism, and our rejection of any objective morals or truths.

An Anti-theist reading list

I just discovered (via the Secular Nation podcast, one of the many atheist/anti-theist/secularist podcasts I follow) Margaret Downey's answer to the Christmas Tree, the Tree of Knowledge - that is, an atheists' substitute for the religious celebration of Christ. 

Downey has a long reading list that represents perhaps the best (?) that skeptics of faith have to offer.  I have reproduced the list below. 

Downey is a true despiser of religion - she even hates when people exclaim "Oh God!" but you can bet she's not concerned about taking God's name in vain.

Why are Jews predominantly liberal?

One of the most annoying voices on conservative talk radio is Mark Levin, author of the bestselling Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto.  However, it's all I've got some days, and once in a while, he has an interesting guest rather than the lowbrow callers that frequent the more rant-ridden types of shows. 

Today, he had Norman Podhoretz, author of the controversial new book Why Are Jews Liberals?

You can listen to the 10 minute interview I've excerpted from the Levin archive. But the main interesting points I got from the interview were:

1. In the mid 19th century, it was liberalism that defended Judaism from the threats of fascism.
2. In 1967, a great shift occurred in American politics.  The left became increasingly anti-Zionist to the point of being anti-Semitic, while the right, esp. the Christian right, began seriously taking up the cause of Israel.
3. However, Jews did not become conservative because

(a) Converting or turning to conservatism in Jewish culture is as objectionable as converting to Christianity, and most Jews abhor both.

(b) Liberalism has replaced the values of the Torah for most Jews - where the two disagree, most Jews now side with liberalism and NOT the Torah.  That is, liberalism is now the predominant religious stance of most Jews.

There's much more great content in the interview, including Jews' support for Obama.  Enjoy.

Podhoretz interview on Mark Levin

The Age of Reason = The Age of Infidelity

Atheists and secularists are fond of quoting the articulate Thomas Paine, author of the free-thinkers creed Age of Reason.  Few know, however, that a founding father wrote a rebuttal in 1801, which American Vision has reprinted. Elias Boudinot's book The Age of Revelation was seen as a powerful rebuttal.  And now you can read it too.  Below is the blurb about the book from American Vision.

How many times have you heard some skeptic claim that this or that non-Christian was a Founding Father of America? Thomas Jefferson is one of their patron saints, and yet he wasn’t even present during the drafting of the Constitution. Of course, Jefferson was the primary author of the Declaration of Independence which states emphatically that God is the Creator and the Judge of the world. The ACLU plays down these words. Benjamin Franklin is another one skeptics love to trot out as an anti-religious Founding Father. But it was Franklin who stood up at the Constitutional Convention and quoted Psalm 127:1 as a warning to the delegates: “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.” Not much is said about these remarks by Franklin.

The Darwin Myth: The Life and Lies of Charles Darwin

What is it in us that likes to poke at the monkey in the cage?  Insecurity, playfulness, original sin?  The monkey I love to torment is the evolutionary believer - why?  Because I once was one.  As a trained Biochemist, I found creationists maddeningly ignorant - until I started reading up on the facts (or lack thereof) and realized that it was *I* who had been brainwashed (See On Leaving Evolution and Conned by Evolution or even Mass Delusion)

Books like this new one, The Darwin Myth: The Life and Lies of Charles Darwin, are aimed squarely at uncritical believers, evaluating Darwinism not only from the scientific perspective, but the sociological and historical as well.  Here's a little of the description from the publishers, American Vision:

In The Darwin Myth, Wiker reveals:

• Why Darwin didn't "discover" evolution
• How Darwin set out to create a godless version of evolution
• Why many of his best friends and allies criticized Darwin's theory, and how he never refuted their objections
• How "social Darwinism" is not a misapplication of Darwinism, but is Darwinism
• Why Darwin's theory supported natural slavery, an institution he abhorred
• How much of what we know about Darwin comes from his Autobiography--which at key points is downright misleading
• How Darwin helped make ideological atheism the battle cry of science

Instructive and illuminating, The Darwin Myth casts aside Darwinism's politically correct veneer and offers a critical, scientific analysis of Darwin's life and his history-changing theory.

Analyzing the 6 C's of Atheism - Part III: The 7 C's of Christianity

The Seven C's of the Christian WorldView of History

These Seven C's are nicely described at The Seven C’s.

I won't go into detail, and you can purchase the book at right, but here they are:

• Creation - the creation of the universe by God
• Corruption - the sin of Adam and Eve
• Catastrophe - the flood of Noah
• Confusion - the confusion of languages at Babel
• Christ - the birth of Christ
• Crucifixion - the substitutionary death of Christ
• Consummation - the return of Christ

This doesn't really contrast with the 6 C's of Atheism, since this is a historical outline, not a list of the virtues of the Christian world view.  But I thought that another list of C's was interesting.

Why do some Christians become atheists?

I am exploring the mystery of why people leave faith for my upcoming book, and am also doing some great research by reading the following:

• Walking Away from Faith: Unraveling the Mystery of Belief and Unbelief
• Quitting Church: Why the Faithful are Fleeing and What to Do about It
• unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about Christianity... and Why It Matters
• They Like Jesus but Not the Church: Insights from Emerging Generations

However, in response to a pretty good atheist podcast at Reasonable Doubts (Explicit), I was asked to consider this question:  "When a Christian becomes an 'apostate,' (unbeliever), how do Christians explain it?"  

CAIR - Lying for Allah

Takeyya (noun) - the Islamic principle of lying for the greater good of the progress of Islam.  Or as Mohammed wrote:

He is not a false person who through al-tekeyya settles conciliation among people, supports good or says what is good.

While lying to the Nazis to protect the Jews your are hiding might fall into this category, unfortunately, in this case, the Nazi-like aggressors are the followers of Islam, and they lie to gain the trust of unsuspecting multicuturalists so that we can all live under Sharia Law and convert, pay the jizzya, or die.

And no one does it better than the Council for American Islamic Relations (CAIR).  Good thing that brave people are infiltrating corrupt organizations like Acorn, Planned Parenthood, and now, CAIR.  Chris Gaubat, after working for six months inside of CAIR's Washington D.C. office, contributed to Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld that's Conspiring to Islamize America.

You can read a review at jewkey.com.  And as a bonus, there's some bonus CAIR video after the jump.

Living it out rather than getting out

One of the topics I am interested in, for personal and academic reasons, is the Biblical view of homosexuality, as well as the potential for recovery FROM homosexuality.  Of course, pro-gay commenters make all kinds of accusations about my interest, suggesting that I am a closet homo, or am supressing my homosexual or pedophile thoughts or actions, or that I have some other disingenuous, hateful or self-hateful motive.  I guess you'll have to take my word that such is not the case, or wait until I am exposed by some investigative reporter.

ANYWAY, you may be aware that there are quite a few who basically consider themselves gay Christians or Evangelical and Gay.  In this same vein, there is a new book out entitled Living it Out, with a descriptive subtitle of a survival guide written by lesbian, gay and bisexual Christians, our families, friends and allies.

Anyway, for those of us interested in not only securing right doctrine on homosexuality, but developing a heart and methods for reaching them with transforming, liberating truth (and helping them heal from their 'dysfunction'), this book, basically a compilation of their stories and journeys in trying to be gay and Christian, might be instructive in seeking first to understand.  Enjoy.

The dog ate my global warming data

Ever wonder how the whole global warming scare all came about?  As it turns out, the original data used to get us all alarmed is MISSING, and the scientists that first massaged it to 'prove' global warming don't have the original data anymore.  What a convenient loss of truth!

You can read the entire story in The Dog Ate Global Warming, written by Patrick J. Michaels, author of Climate of Extremes: Global Warming Science They Don't Want You to Know.  Here's a money quote from the article:

Now begins the fun. Warwick Hughes, an Australian scientist, wondered where that “+/–” came from, so he politely wrote Phil Jones in early 2005, asking for the original data. Jones’s response to a fellow scientist attempting to replicate his work was, “We have 25 years or so invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?”

Reread that statement, for it is breathtaking in its anti-scientific thrust. In fact, the entire purpose of replication is to “try and find something wrong.” The ultimate objective of science is to do things so well that, indeed, nothing is wrong....

Roger Pielke Jr., an esteemed professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado, then requested the raw data from Jones. Jones responded:

Since the 1980s, we have merged the data we have received into existing series or begun new ones, so it is impossible to say if all stations within a particular country or if all of an individual record should be freely available. Data storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites, only the station series after adjustment for homogeneity issues. We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (i.e., quality controlled and homogenized) data.

Global Warming Alarmism is just one of the manufactured crises of modern day liberal politics.  What about the 4000 unborn children killed daily?  What about the fact that half of all black American pregnancies end in abortion?  Not a crisis?

The Complete Infidel's Guide to the Koran

Add one more book to my Amazon wishlist - The Complete Infidel's Guide to the Koran.  From the description:

The Complete Infidel’s Guide to the Koran reveals:

• The true meaning of celebrated and seemingly benign verses, such as “Strive in the way of Allah” and “Persecution is worse than slaughter”
• How the Koran sanctions domestic abuse, honor killing, and murder
• How the Koran not only discourages Infidels from reading it, but mandates that they don’t even touch it
• Why President Obama is dangerously close to supporting a multiculturalism based on an ideology that aims to destroy the principles America holds dear

Stripping out the obsolete debates, Spencer focuses on the Koran’s decrees toward Jews, Christians, and other Infidels, explaining how they were viewed in Muhammad’s time, what they’ve supposedly done wrong, and most important, what the Koran has in store for them.

Robert Spencer is one of the foremost experts and critics of Islam, and his site Jihad Watch is one of the best sites of its kind today.  I have no doubt this book will be very good.

Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design

In my two part Atheist philosopher supports Intelligent Design as scientific, I introduced people to Dr. Bradley Monton, a well spoken atheist who supports ID, not because he believes it, but because he thinks that it is a legitimate scientific approach to explaining complexity.  In those posts, you can listen to a really interesting interview with Monton, plus get info on 'The great debate' he was involved in. 

Monton has finally released his book Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design. 

Some related resources:

• Series of five interviews w/ Monton (ID the Future)
• ID's Unlikely Defender (Breakpoint)
• Atheist defends Intelligent Design (San Francisco Examiner)
• Is Intelligent Design Science? Dissecting the Dover Decision (Monton's paper criticizing the Dover decision)

Quitting Church: Why the Faithful are Fleeing and What to Do about It

Quitting Church is on sale at CBD for $2.99, get your copy! 

Here are some reviews:

• Sunday Morning, Staying Home (WSJ)
• Quitting Church? Yes, No, and Maybe (Al Mohler)
• Quitting Church- Review (Clergy Spirit)
• Busted Review: Quitting Church (Busted Halo)
• Exiting the thriving evangelical pews? (Get Religion)
• Amazon Customer Reviews (Amazon)

Green brings it all full circle

Ted Dekker has a way with words or better yet, Ted Dekker's words have a way.

A way of grabbing your mind and taking it on a whiplash inducing roller coaster. A way of keeping you up late at night pondering life's biggest questions and hoping that shadow at your window didn't just move.

Dekker's latest heart-pounding fantasy, Green, completes (and begins) the Circle series. The color-coded series (Black, Red, White, Green) follows Thomas Hunter through two realities and countless adventures battling evil, seen and unseen.

The mythology of the Circle has weaved through 15 different novels with everything culminating (and beginning) in Green.

Porn, Masturbation, and the Christian

Mark Driscoll, controversial preacher and pastor of the very successful Mars Hill Church, has written a great book on sex and the Christian entitled Porn Again Christian: A Frank Discussion on Pornography and Masturbation. You can actually read the book online or download a free PDF copy here.  As you might expect, such a subject is handled with both seriousness and humor - here's one of my favorite humorous remarks:

Question: My wife wants sex more than I do, what should I do?

Answer: Don’t tell your buddies or they will mock you incessantly for the rest of your life after staring at you blankly without blinking for about an hour in total silence. Do have sex with your wife as often as she likes and thank God.

Light in the Desert depicts horror of Islamic 'Honor' Killing

Europe's Dark Ages and Islam's Golden Age - two historic fictions?

Jihad Watch has a good article entitled Europe’s Dark Age and Islam’s Golden Age: Two Facets of The Same Fiction?, which discusses the content of the book on the same subject, entitled Holy Warriors.

In the twentieth century, a whole new body of evidence became available to historians; evidence unavailable to previous generations of scholars: The evidence of archaeology. And what archaeology tells us has been devastating to the traditional view.....

On the word of the written histories, then, archaeologists expected to find, from Spain to eastern Iran, a flourishing and vibrant culture. An Islamic world of enormous cities endowed with all the wealth of antiquity and the plunder gathered in the Muslim wars of conquest. They hoped to find palaces, public baths, universities and mosques; all richly decorated with marble, ceramic and carved stone.

In fact, they found nothing of the sort.

For a more accurate rendition of history that isn't colored by the anti-Catholic enlightenment historians or the Muslims trying to pretend that their faith has contributed to humanity, see How Christianity changed the world and The biblical origins of science.

America's 200 year history of war with Islam

American Vision offers this excellent 30 page PDF entitled America's 200-Year-War With Islamic Terrorism (PDF).  In it, author Gary DeMar discusses the conflict of the early 1800's with the Barbary Coast Pirates (Muslims), and explains many misunderstandings around the phrase in the Treaty of Tripoli, which states:

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

Many have mistaken this for a denial of our Christian heritage, history, and ideological roots, and have also misattributed it to George Washington.  However, as DeMar quotes from Boller's They Never Said It: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, and Misleading Attributions:

The statement was not Washington’s, and diplomats had used that particular phraseology because they were eager to make it clear that Christianity was not an American state religion, and that therefore the U.S. government bore no official hostility toward Islam.

QED.

Crazy Love Campaign and Catalyst Podcast focus on Adoption of Orphans

The Bible says that true spirituality involves caring for orphans and widows.  But how much do we actually take this seriously?

James 1:27 (New International Version)
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

LongHollow Church, a multi-site church in Tennessee, has decided on a Crazy Love fund-raising campaign that aims to, among other things, raise $200K for a Haiti orphanage, and $10K to create means for helping people adopt orphans (doesn't that sound backwards? - Shouldn't they spend MORE money on the means to make them ex-orphans?).

Also, the Catalyst Podcast is focusing on adoption, trying to get American churches to really pursue adoption of orphans - they're pushing Orphans and the Church, a Rick Warren/Saddleback effort.  Here's an interview with Kay Warren talking about it.  She discusses how she became passionate about it as she was researching how to help HIV victims in Africa.  Really interesting. 

You can also check out Kay Warren's book Dangerous Surrender: What Happens When You Say Yes to God.  You can also check out my interesting afterthought after the break.

G12 Churches: cults or discipleship with a plan? Part III

In Part I, I discussed what I'd heard about the G12 model, and the possible cult-like abuses that may or may not be occurring in G12 churches.  In Part II, I outlined our very positive experience visiting Mercy Church, a G12 church in SLO.

In this part, I discuss the G12 model in detail, discussing the various roles and stages that a person can progress through in the G12 system.

Most of what I have documented below is from The Ladder of Success, written by G12 founder Cesar Castellanos.

As you will see, the G12 model is a complex, well-developed and thoughtful model on how to create and reproduce mature believers.  But there may be a dark side.

Part II: How Christianity changed the world - Life, Sex, Marriage & Status of Women

Dr. Alvin Schmidt was interviewed in a series on the excellent Lutheran podcast Issues Etc regarding his new book, How Christianity Changed the World.  I am blogging through the interviews because I think their content are a great introduction to what appears to be a great book that re-revises history in an effort to fix the errors of modern anti-theists, as well as the dominance of anti-Catholic and anti-theist spin among the enlightenment historians.  

Just imagine if all of these evils done away with PRIMARILY by Christianity were still prevalent.  Oh sure, "Christianity is evil."  Wake up from ignorance of history. The evils of the Catholic Church and such misrepresented events such as the Crusades and the Inquisition, while important, pale in comparison to the substantial, if not critical impact of Chrsitianity on the west.  Advances which paganism, humanism, and atheism had naught to do with, except sometimes as OPPONENTS to such advances.

Here's the audio, and I have brought out some points below.

Part I: How Christianity changed the world by Alvin Schmidt - Introduction

Alvin Schmidt has written what may be one of the definitive books on the positive influence of Christianity in history, entitled How Christianity Changed the World.

Others, like Rodney Stark, have written similar 'revisions' of history, needed to correct the anti-Christian and anti-Catholic misinformation of enlightenment and liberal historians.  While us Protestants are glad to discuss the historic errors of Catholicism, and to a lesser extend our own, liberals tend to overblow these mistakes and misrepresent them in their retelling of history. 

For example, they refer to the Crusades as a religious pogrom against Islam and Judaism, rather than a response to 400 years of Muslim aggression and brutality, which unfortunately digressed in some cases to antisemitic behaviors due to an "if you are not with us you are against us" mentality which was condemned by the Church.

However, I just came upon a fantastic multi-part interview with Schmidt regarding his book on Issues Etc, the great Lutheran podcast (see Best Podcasts for Christians).  And so I'm gonna do a series explaining the amazingly positive impact of Christianity on history.

Growing anti-gay environment in the UK due to mutlicultural slumber regarding Islam

One of my favorite humorous cultural podcasts, Shire Network News ("Protecting the Anglosphere through satire"), has created a great show this week, including an interview with Bruce Bawer, the Oslo-based US author of While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within and Surrender: Appeasing Islam, Sacrificing Freedom.

Bower talks about his experiences as a gay man in what he thought would be a more tolerant European society, and what happened when he ran into radical Islam on the streets of Amsterdam one night.

Why Us?: How Science Rediscovered the Mystery of Ourselves

ID the Future has a nice two part interview with Dr. James Le Fanu, author of Why Us?: How Science Rediscovered the Mystery of Ourselves. Le Fanu, a scientist and science writer, discusses the inability of evolution to even come close to explaining the complexity of humanity.  He doesn't reject evolution, he only explains that its explanatory power is vastly inferior to the problems presented.

This book appears as much science as philosophy of science, but another thoughtful book considering the limitations, perhaps even the fallibility of evolutionary origins. 

Book Review: Dred Scott's Revenge by Judge Andrew Napolitano

America has had a difficult history when it comes to racial issues and often the government has done more harm than good according to an excellent new book by Judge Andrew Napolitano entitled Dred Scott's Revenge. Click here to read my review of the book.

Dred Scott's Revenge: A Legal History of Race and Freedom in America By Andrew Napolitano / Thomas Nelson

Looking at the New Deal with Amity Shlaes

One of the most fascinating books I have read over the last few months is The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. Actually, in reading the book I was amazed at how much President Barack Obama's economic policies are like that of FDR. Needless to say, that was not comforting. Recently I had the opportunity to talk with Amity Shlaes, author of the book. Click here to read more about our conversation and what she had to say about the current economic crisis.

Bible Study Magazine Giveaway

Bible Study Magazine and Mars Hill are giving away 20 copies of Mark Driscoll’s new book, Vintage Church. Not only that, but they are also giving away five subscriptions to Bible Study Magazine and a copy of their Bible Study Library software! Enter to win on the Bible Study Magazine Mark Driscoll page, then take a look at the cool tools they have!

Society without God - are we better off without faith?

Today on Forum with Michael Krasney (NPR), the author of Society without God: What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell Us About Contentment was interviewed. Very interesting. Listen to it here.

The author, who interviewed 250 people, discusses

• Measuring religiosity by both stated beliefs and participation
• That the least religious nations are the most humane and safe
• That when human needs are met through social welfare, the need for religion may be decreased
• That atheism does not lead to chaos, and does not inhibit societal health
• There are a lot of explanations for the peace of such countries that perhaps make them more successful, including racial homogeneity, the welfare state, and their smallness

The book has an endorsement from village atheist Sam Harris.

The psychology of atheism and unbelief - the defective father

I just finished listening to this excellent lecture by Dr. Paul Vitz, a professor of psychology at NYU, and author of Faith of the Fatherless.  In it, he explores the psychological reasons for unbelief.

What is really interesting, and missed by many listeners (you should hear the Q&A), is his purpose in giving this lecture.  It is not, paradoxically, to attack atheism or atheists, but rather, to show that:

• just as psychology has often trained itself on the psychology of belief, it can also be used to explore the psychology behind unbelief, including showing correlation with formative emotional events
• just as the propensity for belief might be explained by emotional needs and experiences, so can the propensity for unbelief
• just because someone has a psychological need for belief or unbelief does not mean that such beliefs are wrong OR right, so we should stop attacking ideological opponents by accusing them of mental illness - not that such accusations are untrue, but that they can be leveled from both sides, so it's a draw
• there is a very strong correlation between unbelief and the breakdown of the family authority structure, the safety of the family, and esp. the experience of a failed father. He proposes that this is also a causative factor as well.

His lecture contains some other VERY interesting perspectives, including a Freudian analysis of unbelief - that of an unresolved Oedipal complex.  Not that he believes this, but that, if one did, that is how Freudian psychology might explain unbelief.

Summary of his interesting points below.

You Can Lead an Atheist to Evidence, But You Can't Make Him Think

I have been listening to more and more debates between William Lane Craig, probably one of the best living Christian apologists, and a variety of atheists (links to debate audio below).  With the exception of Jonathan Shook, even their best efforts are easily destroyed by Craig - most of them rely on polemics and often really poor attacks on the fidelity of scripture, rather than logic and reason.

With that in mind, Ray Comfort's new book You Can Lead an Atheist to Evidence, But You Can't Make Him Think: Answers to Questions from Angry Skeptics seems more than a pejorative stab, but rather, an astute observation of the narrow atheist view of reality, their unwillingness to concede science and reason's limitations, and other means of epistemology other than material empiricism.  Add one more to my already overburdened Amazon wishlist!

Comfort also answers an interesting question about atheist hecklers at challies.com, and refers to his site Atheist Central.

William Lane Craig v. Atheists Debates

• William Lane Craig debate transcripts
• WILLIAM LANE CRAIG COMPREHENSIVE DEBATE LIST
• WLC v. Christopher Hitchens - Does God Exist?
• WLC v. John R. Shook - Does God Exist?

Slaughter of the Dissidents further documents persecution of Darwin dissenters

American Vision has come out with a new 477 page book that they claim "picks up where the movie "Expelled" leaves off".  Slaughter of the Dissidents (nice title!) looks interesting, I'll put it on my list.  Here's an excerpt from their promo page:

You won't believe some of the reasons many educators have lost their jobs, or why some students failed to get an otherwise earned degree, and how they often get blackballed from academia. This pernicious form of discrimination is not only widespread in the U.S. but is also nauseating to most Americans. Slaughter of the Dissidents goes into great detail about how and why it occurs, and provides you with scores of actual case studies. As you read this book you'll discover that one of the most precious things we own is at risk, right here in America. What is that? In a word, FREEDOM.

Related Posts:

• Expelled - well done, thought provoking, too true for insecure evolutionists to see
• FreeGonazlez.com - Darwinian persecution in the University
• Top 10 Darwin and Design News Stories for 2008

god is not Great: Selective Examples

One of the most persistent cracks in Hitchen's reasoning was his penchant for selective examples.  Laughably, he writes of his desire to be "fair and open-minded," yet he constantly rifles through religions to pull the most absurd examples out.

Quote of the Day #019 - Atheism eliminated by natural selection?

I am immensely enjoying Dinesh D'Souza's What's So Great About Christianity.  Here's just one of inumerable choice passages (p. 19):

My conclusion is that it is not religion but atheism that requires a Darwinian explanation.  Atheism is a bit like homosexuality; one is not sure where it fits into a doctrine of natural selection.  Why would nature select people who mate with others of the same sex, a process with no reproductive advantage at all?  It seem equally perplexing why nature would breed a group of people who see no higher purpose in life or the universe.

god is not Great: Review pt. 1

For my philosophy class this semester we had to do a critical book review. One of the options was Christopher Hitchen's god is not Great - you know I had to pick that one. I will be posting my review (plus some information that I had to cut out) here in eight or nine segments. Part one, which follows, is my introduction to the book.

The failure of the abstinence model - what should be done?

Critics of biblical sexual mores love to mock ("fools mock at sin" Proverbs 14:9) the abstinence movement, and were wildly pointing fingers at the pregnancy of Sarah Palin's pregnant daughter as more evidence that the abstinence movement fails in the real world.  Unfortunately, they are correct, and the New Yorker's article Red Sex, Blue Sex spells it out in spades.

Proponents of abstinence-only sex education and stern moralizing about sexual purity are finding that their own children become more unchaste than many of their secular peers.  Why is this happening?  What are we doing wrong?  What *should* be done?  Should we capitulate to the sexualized culture?  Admit that sex before marriage is just part of life, even healthy, if we take the right precautions? 

There ARE BIG problems with our implementation, even if we want to hold to our contention that sex belongs within the bonds of marriage.

Christian life goal setting

This sermon is the followup to Get Up! An exposition of John 5:1-9. The outline of this sermon includes the major themes from Covey's First Things First, and Shook's One Month to Live: Thirty Days to a No-Regrets Life. In this sermon, I cover the areas of life in which we are to:

• Set goals
• Live openheartedly and passionately
• Obey timeless principle

If we do this, we will live a 'no-regrets' life.  The major areas I cover are:

• To live
• To love
• To learn
• To leave a legacy

Download Goal Setting.mp3

Defeating Eurabia

Fjordman, the venerable critic of Islam and the Islamization of Europe, has just self-published Defeating Eurabia. 

This compilation of Fjordman articles from Gates of Vienna, Jihad Watch, Atlas Shrugs, The Brussels Journal and Fjordman's own (now defunct) blog has been updated and finetuned to reflect his current views on the islamization of Europe.

It provides a thorough analysis of the causes and circumstances of the islamization process, a country-by-country survey and an optimistic concluding chapter with suggestions for the future.

The tyranny of nice: how Canada crushes freedom in the name of human rights

Pajamas Media has a nice interview with the authors of The Tyranny of Nice: How Canada Crushes Freedom in the Name of Human Rights (and why it matters to Americans).

Co-author Pete Vere remarked

It's really a variation of the Huxlian dream in Brave New World.  Too often we thinks in terms of Orwell, of oppression, of being forced through fear into government controlled society, but Huxley had a better [idea which applies to Canada].  We're being forced into it through nice...through not being able to hurt others' feelings, not being able to express unhappy or sarcastic thoughts. 

It is a culmination of multiculturalism run amok...what we are seeing in Canada, various cultures take precedence over individual rights.

What Christians can learn from the blues and secular music

Al Mohler had a good program (Russel Moore hosting), in which he interviewed the author of Getting the Blues: What Blues Music Teaches Us about Suffering and Salvation.  Moore made a nice comment which I appreciated:

One of the reasons why so many people are listening to what we call 'secular' music is because so much of our Christian music is so anemic.  And I don't simply mean our contemporary Christian music on the radio, but a lot of what we sing in our churches doesn't really get at the depths of the human experience in the way, for instance, the Psalms do, or the Lamentations of Jeremiah do. 

Sometimes we have got a very superficial view of what life ought to be like as those who follow Christ, and we could learn something by listening to some of the things the outside world is listening to and singing and writing.  How could we as Christians learn to sing better by listening to our non-Christian neighbors.

Related Posts:

• Favorite Christian Artists
• What is Christian Music?

The Shack - feminizing God to a fault

James MacDonald has written a really good review of the runaway 'Christian fiction' best seller called The Shack.  Worth a read, and I particularly appreciate his level of theological acumen:

Young, in casting God in female terms, attempts to distance God  from a sense of tyranny and dominance—a sense more often associated with males than females. Young’s agenda is not unique. Those toward the theological left (and our postmodern milieu in general) tend to be suspicious of power, viewing it as oppressive and brutalizing....

There are two fundamental difficulties I have with Young’s “anti-power” motif. First, Young’s portrayal of God is out of step with much of the way God is portrayed in Scripture. It’s difficult to square Young’s pacifistic Trinitarian portrayal with the God of Genesis 6, the Christ of Revelation 19, and the Holy Spirit of Acts 5. And it’s at this point that Young’s theodicy falls short. The Scripture doesn’t allow us to distance God from violence and coercion. The deeper question of theodicy is not simply how a good God can allow death and destruction, but how a good God can cause death and destruction.

Indeed.  Put *that* in your feminized God motif.  Not only do we assert that such views of God are unbiblical, but that when God kills, it is holy and just, and that these qualities are not incompatible with God's mercy. Ahh, how the paradoxes of reality confound and insult mortal reason.

The Grand New Party - the future of the GOP

This past week on Fresh Air, Terry Gross interviewed the authors of Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream.  The interview was really interesting and thought provoking, as these 20-somethings, who are editors at The Atlantic, discussed

• their drift from blue-state liberalism to neo-conservatism, and how disillusionment with liberal ideals and their poor fit to reality brought them around (confirming the adage 'a neo-con is a liberal who's been mugged by reality')
• their disappointment with the emphases of the GOP
• what they think the GOP needs to look like in the future (and it's not McCain)
• why a loss in November could be good for the party
• how special-interest politics can get you a 51% majority, but not a united party on issues that matter

FDR's Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression

The Backwater Report has an excellent article discussing the Hoover /Roosevelt administrations' attempts to socialize our economy, how they fell short, and how that informs our view of Obama's proposed tax policies. 

I've summarized below, but needless to say, it's not favorable, and I've now got yet another book to add to my Amazon wishlist - Jim Powell's FDR's Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression.

The point is, whether or not you object to labeling Obama's plans as 'socialist' matters less than the fact that his policies have already failed in recent American history, and we should not take his rhetoric of 'reducing taxes' at face value because they are impossible to logically reconcile with the current economy and the rest of his economic policies.

America and Religion on NPR

Yesterday's Fresh Air interviews were really fantastic, for both God haters and lovers, and those inbetween.  Terry Gross' first interview was with Bill Maher, discussing his new pseudo-documentary movie Religulous. 

The second, and for me, more satisfying interview, was with Steven Waldman, founder of beliefnet, who discussed Maher's film.  Waldman is also the author of an interesting book on the role of faith in the founding of the US entitled Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in America.  As you can see from the blurb below, he takes an interesting position that denies both extremes.  Not that the middle is more correct, but that perhaps both secularists and religionists are only half right, which is kind of where I stand on the founding of America.

Various American evangelicals have claimed the founding fathers as believing and practicing Protestants who intended America to be a Christian nation. Secularists, on the other hand, see in the same historical record evidence that the founders were often Deists at best. Both views are grossly oversimplified, argues Waldman....

Waldman focuses on the five founding fathers who had the most influence on religion's role in the state—Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Adams and Madison—and untangles their complex legacy....All, however, were committed to the creation of religious freedom in the new nation. Waldman deserves kudos for systematically debunking popular myths: America was not primarily settled by people seeking religious freedom; the separation of church and state did not result from the activism of secularists, but, paradoxically, from the efforts of 18th-century evangelicals; and the American Revolution was as much a reaction against European theocracy as a struggle for economic or political freedom. Waldman produces a thoughtful and remarkably balanced account of religion in early America.

Interview: Kevin McCullough, Author of The Kind of Man Every Man Should Be

The Kind of Man Every Man Should Be: Taking a Stand for True Masculinity By Kevin McCullough / Harvest House Publishers * From radio commentator, syndicated columnist, and MuscleHead Revolution author comes a bold message for 21st-century men! McCullough probes the undermining of manhood over recent decades and speculates why both sexes are reluctant to address the problem. Citing God's blueprint in Scripture, he challenges Christian men to behave with dignity, act with clarity, and lead with conviction! 224 pages, softcover from Harvest.

This morning I had the opportunity to chat with Kevin McCullough. His book is a wake up call to men (and women) everywhere that it's time for men to start living the way that God has designed them. It's both a very personal and immensely practical book and one that I heartily recommend to everyone. I'll have a more complete review here soon. Click this link to hear the entire interview.

FREE author interviews: McClaren and Willard

ChristianAudio.com offers a free audio book every month, which is cool (this month:  In His Steps).  But also, they have free author interviews with Brian McLaren and Dallas Willard (which they hope will get you to purchase audio versions of their books - NOTE:  It works, I'm gonna buy one of McLaren's books).  Check out interviews with these authors as they discuss their books.

How scientific materialism undermines science and reason

Intelligent Design The Future has a nice two part interview with Dr. Angus Menuge, former professor of computer programming, current professor of philosophy at Concordia University Wisconsin and author of Agents Under Fire, Materialism and the Rationality of Science (2004).

Design is more of a scientific research program [than a scientific theory], a very broad idea.  Within that, you can propose lots of different scientific theories by generating more specific, testable models.  Scientific materialism is not a scientific theory, but a research program [paradigm], and ID is a competing scientific program [paradigm]....

Obama Nation = Abomination - get it?!? Buahaha!

The latest anti-candidate screed to hit the stores is Corsi's The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality.  Want to know how such books can premiere at the top of a NYT bestseller list?  Listen to NPR's Candidate's Campaign Rebuts 'The Obama Nation'.

What's really interesting is the description of the 'conseravtive propaganda machine' that somehow dupes the liberal media into promoting it's ideas.  While I believe there is a huge network of conservative power brokers trying to influence us, the liberal guy in the interview talks as if the New York Times is somehow helpless and too dumb to counter such efforts.  The truth is, both sides play the game this way.   While some of it may be untethical and manipulative (which is bad ;),it is part of the game of politics, and if you don't like the game, maybe you shouldn't play.  Play hard, play fair.

Science's blind spot

IDtheFuture.com has a nice interview with Cornelius Hunter, author of Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism. 

One of the important distinctions between the experimental and historic sciences is...when you have a problem in historical sciences, you can draw upon one-time contingencies (like a comet or ice age)...with experimental science...scientists don't make up contingencies to explain results.

Evolution has been problematic since Darwin proposed the theory...things have not gotten better since then.  It is not the case that evolution does well in most areas, and there are a few problems around the edges - evolution has problems across the board (example follows).

The universal claim of evolution [being as sure as gravity]...should be a red flag that something [wrong] is going on here...but all of the reasons given in evolutionary literature are philosophical and metaphysical...as in Darwin's book...and evolutionists are quite honest with themselves on this.

Another interesting book to wait on my Amazon wishlist.  Sigh.