Shepherds and AntiChrist.

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The boys and I have been to Kirk and then for a three hour hike in the autumnal forests. In the Silver Peaks, where you need to keep your ears open and eyes scanning the clouds: it can turn from lovely to dangerously windy in 30 minutes.

John 10:11-18

11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away — and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. 17For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. 18No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”

At Kirk the issue raised was not as much that Christ is our shepherd, but that there are others who need to be bought in. Barry talked about how he stands outside before the service to greet us — and invites those who talk in. At the recent synod, he said he would rather we were on the school committees than church committees. He’s correct.

But to the readings for today.

1 John 2:18-25

18Children, it is the last hour! As you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. From this we know that it is the last hour. 19They went out from us, but they did not belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us. But by going out they made it plain that none of them belongs to us. 20But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and all of you have knowledge. 21I write to you, not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and you know that no lie comes from the truth. 22Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. 23No one who denies the Son has the Father; everyone who confesses the Son has the Father also. 24Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you will abide in the Son and in the Father. 25And this is what he has promised us, eternal life

Now, there are many people who concentrate on the Anti Christ, who has a number, and who will control much… John wrote more about him in Revelations. He will be obvious. However, our issue is the apostate.

For we step out of Kirk, into the marketplace, because our Lord says there are others of his there. People who need succor, protection, guidance, God. But within this universal concern there are those within the fellowship who deny God.

And this is where my seeker friendly, welcoming congregation is weak. We let almost anyone in. But ww need to then teach correctly. And those who deny that Jesus is the Messiah… are not of us. Some say that they should leave. They cetainly should not be allowed to teach: and this need for correction has always existed, in every congregation, and for evergy congregation.

The world hates this. They look at the Pope disciplining Catholic Nuns and do not understand that these women have stopped worshipping Christ, but instead worship the singularity. AMong the Prots, this leads to schims after schism.

When schism is wrong… we have to allow freedom on the non essential, and Christ calls us to unity.

Here basic theology helps. Christ is the head of the church, and all who are of him abide with him. Christ owns the church, and Christ sent the Spirit to guide and preserve the church. In short, it does not rely on us… our job is to abide, to stand. Christ will preserve the Kirk, and Christ will refine the Church.

For… the shepherd has a crook to rescue, and a rod to correct. Christ is not afraid to use both.

Common Grace.

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This really is a series of notes and qutoes. Let’s start with with Phil Johnson.

The distinction between common grace and special grace closely parallels the distinction between the general call and the effectual call. Common grace is extended to everyone. It is God’s goodness to humanity in general whereby God graciously restrains the full expression of sin and mitigates sin’s destructive effects in human society. Common grace imposes moral constraints on people’s behavior, maintains a semblance of order in human affairs, enforces a sense of right and wrong through conscience and civil government, enables men and women to appreciate beauty and goodness, and imparts blessings of all kinds to elect and non-elect alike. God “causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matt. 5:45). That is common grace.

Phil, like me, is Calvinist. The general call is the gospel… which should be preached to all. There is a need for the missionary endeavour — so all may hear. But not all hear. Not all are able to hear. The Calvinist theologians talk about how the Spirit allows the gospel to be heard… the effectual call.

In the same manner, all people live in a lawful world. This is part of Jewish and Christian theology, but as Spengler notes, this is not the case in Islam: for in Islam there is no doctrine of the love of God, nor of common grace.

A God of love is also a God of laws. For man to survive and prosper in the natural world, he must be able to understand enough of the laws of nature to plant crops and smelt iron and split atoms. This is not only a statement about nature but about the rightly constituted state. The biblical God places limits on his own powers by granting to man what the politicians later called inalienable rights. No one in a position of power, from kings and presidents down to the cop on the beat, may act arbitrarily, for the Covenant establishes a bond between God and every individual, whose rights are protected by laws that no earthly authority can disregard.

Allah is not a God of laws because he is not a God of love. It is possible for Muslims to love Allah, but nonsensical to imagine that God loves Muslims, declared Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111), still the dominant authority in normative Islam. A leading Western historian of Islam calls him the most influential figure in Islam since the Prophet Mohammed, and such putative updaters of Islam as Tariq Ramadan still base their theology on al-Ghazali. “When there is love, there must be in the lover a sense of incompleteness; a recognition that the beloved is needed for complete realization of the self,” al-Ghazali wrote. But since Allah is perfect and complete, this notion of love is nonsensical. “There is no reaching out on the part of God… there can be no change in him; no development in him; no supplying of a lack in Himself.

Allah is beyond love and has therefore has no need to favor humankind with laws of nature. As al-Ghazali argues, The connection between what is habitually believe to be a cause and what is habitually believe to be an effect is not necessary, according to us. For example, there is no causal connection between the quenching of thirst and drinking, satiety and eating, burning and contact with fire. Light and the appearance of the sun, death and decapitation, healing and the drinking of medicine…and so on to include all that is observable in connected things in medicine, astronomy, arts and crafts. Their connection is due to the prior decree of God, who creates them side by side, not to it being necessary in itself, incapable of separation… the philosophers offer no other proof than the observation of the occurrence of the burning, when there is contact with fire, but observation proves only simultaneity, not causation, and, in reality, there is no other cause but God.

In this mainstream Muslim view of things, Allah personally and immediately controls the motion of every molecule by his ineffable and incomprehensible will, directly and without the mediation of any laws of nature. This philosophy is called occasionalism — all things happen merely because Allah decides that they should happen on each separate occasion. Unlike the biblical God of covenants, who is bound forever to his pledge to humankind, Allah may do whatever he pleases. As Pope Benedict XVI observed in his September 2006 address at Regensburg University, the eleventh-century Muslim theologian Ahmad Ibn Said Ibn Hazm taught that Allah was not bound even by his own word, and should Allah desire it, we must become idolaters.

The Judeo-Christian notion of divine love is what makes possible the rational ordering of human existence: as an act of love towards humankind, God made nature sufficiently intelligible for us to cope with it. For Jews and Christians, the rationality of everyday life proceeds from the biblical concept of covenant. Islam eschews reason. Muslim life is arbitrary because it rejects the concept of divine love as expressed in the covenant between God and man.

The doctrine of Common Grace allows us to use deduction, observation, experiment and induction to understand the laws of the universe, to work with techniology, to develop, to learn. We lose this sense at our peril: we move to a position worse than the Muslim. For the Muslim rightly fears Allah and acknowledges him. The post modern instead worships himself. And we are not worthy objects of worship. Now, among the Christians, the byper-calvinists also share the Islamic error: they over emphasize the sovereignty of God, not allowing for a place in the cosmos for humanity.

But the credal position is not so. From the Catholic catechism

The natural law, present in the heart of each man and established by reason, is universal in its precepts and its authority extends to all men. It expresses the dignity of the person and determines the basis for his fundamental rights and duties:
For there is a true law: right reason. It is in conformity with nature, is diffused among all men, and is immutable and eternal; its orders summon to duty; its prohibitions turn away from offense …. To replace it with a contrary law is a sacrilege; failure to apply even one of its provisions is forbidden; no one can abrogate it entirely.

Application of the natural law varies greatly; it can demand reflection that takes account of various conditions of life according to places, times, and circumstances. Nevertheless, in the diversity of cultures, the natural law remains as a rule that binds men among themselves and imposes on them, beyond the inevitable differences, common principles.

The natural law is immutable and permanent throughout the variations of history; it subsists under the flux of ideas and customs and supports their progress. The rules that express it remain substantially valid. Even when it is rejected in its very principles, it cannot be destroyed or removed from the heart of man. It always rises again in the life of individuals and societies:
Theft is surely punished by your law, O Lord, and by the law that is written in the human heart, the law that iniquity itself does not efface.

The natural law, the Creator’s very good work, provides the solid foundation on which man can build the structure of moral rules to guide his choices. It also provides the indispensable moral foundation for building the human community. Finally, it provides the necessary basis for the civil law with which it is connected, whether by a reflection that draws conclusions from its principles, or by additions of a positive and juridical nature.

Now, the old divines did not exactly use more recent formulations, but the Westminster and Baptist confessions, both 17th Century, argued in a similar manner to the Catholics, as Barcellos notes

There are three key texts in both confessions which speak to the relationship between the Natural Law and the Ten Commandments: 4:2; 19:2; and 19:5. It must be granted that neither confession uses the phrase Natural Law, however, this does not mean that the phrase as understood in this essay does not adequately apply to the theology of these confessions. Both confessions do you the phrase “law of nature” (WCF 21:7 and BCF 22:7). The phrase Moral Law in the confession and the phrase Natural Law as understood in this essay are functionally synonymous. We will look at the three key texts in order.

In chapter 4, Of Creation, both confessions teach that Adam and Eve had “the law of God written in their hearts.” The full text of The Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689 4:2 reads:

After God had made all other creatures, he created man, male and female, with reasonable and immortal souls, rendering them fit unto that life to God for which they were created; being made after the image of God, in knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness; having the law of God written in their hearts, and power to fulfil it, and yet under a possibility of transgressing, being justify to the liberty of their own will, which was subject to change.

The Westminster Confession is slightly different in its wording, though not in doctrine. Both confessions reference Romans 2:14 and 15 for biblical support. Neither of them defines what is meant by the law of God written on the heart in this chapter. However, we do get help elsewhere in both confessions.

In chapter 19, Of the Law of God, both confessions define what they mean by “the law of God written in their hearts.” The Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689 in 19:2 says,

The same law that was first written in the heart of man continued to be a perfect rule of righteousness after the fall, and was delivered by God upon Mount Sinai, in ten commandments, and written in two tables, the four first containing our duty towards God, and the other six, our duty to man.

Romans 2:14 and 15 is referenced for biblical support. Commenting on this statement, Samuel E. Waldron says, “The major assertion of paragraphs 1 and 2 is that the same law written in the heart of Adam was reiterated in the Ten Commandments.” (Samuel E. Waldron, A Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, [Darlington, England, Evangelical Press, 1995 edition], 235.) In the very next section of both confessions, the Ten Commandments are identified as Moral Law. It is important to remember that neither confession teaches that the Decalogue exhausts Moral Law. Instead, they teach that the Decalogue summarily contains Moral Law. This indicates that both confessions teach that the Ten Commandments are Moral Law based on creation. This puts them squarely in the tradition of Calvin on this issue.

The final text in the confessions is found in chapter 19:5. The texts are identical and read as follows:

The moral law [Decalogue in context] doth for ever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof, and that not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it; neither doth Christ in the Gospel any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation.

It is very clear that both confessions teach that all men are obliged to obey the Ten Commandments. “The moral law doth for ever bind all …” The obligation to keep the Ten Commandments for man in general is based on the nature or content of the commandments and God’s authority as Creator. The obligation for Christians to keep the Ten Commandments is based on their nature or content, God’s authority as Creator, and the gospel or redemption.

We now are left with a deep irony. On the side of natural law and common grace (which presumes natural law) are the creeds, the confessing and orthodox churches, and most Calvinists. Against this are the post-moderns (for queer studies argues explicitly that things against nature are legitimate), the Islamics, and the hyper-Calvinists. And, as a consequence, the serious Protestants and Serious Catholics find themselves allied. As a fellow Prot said to a Catholic sister but yesterday

No, not at all. I was simply trying to get you to understand the Evangelical perspective. I do appreciate the fact that sacraments are an important aspect of the Catholic connection to God, indeed Protestants do baptisms and a symbolic communion. If anything sacramentalism is one of the arguments FOR Catholicism that occasionally raises itself in my head.

I was only trying to get you to understand why the Bible is so important to Evangelicals. Because that, for us, is our primary mode of connection, as sacraments are for you. For example: you’re reading your Bible, and something LEAPS OFF THE PAGE at you, and a few hours later you find yourself in a situation where you really need to apply that truth IRL. That sort of thing. God really does speak through the Scripture. Indeed, it was the Bible that lead me to faith.

Common Grace, and the natural law, thus matter.

God and Empire?

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The idea of a holy war, or jihad. predates the Islamists by a couple of thousand years. But we then have to ask ourselves what this means. For today’s text is as much about revolution and aggression., and it is as much about us as our enemies.

Psalm 149

5   Let the faithful exult in glory;
let them sing for joy on their couches.
6   Let the high praises of God be in their throats
and two-edged swords in their hands,
7   to execute vengeance on the nations
and punishment on the peoples,
8   to bind their kings with fetters
and their nobles with chains of iron,
9   to execute on them the judgment decreed.
This is glory for all his faithful ones.
Praise the Lord!

As an aside, when people talk about Christians and Jews being weak and easily defeated… they do not like it when I start muttering decisive battles. From Lepanto to the Yom Kippur war. Well, if all you hear is ideology and no history, you will repeat the mistakes of your forefathers.   For war is a human affliction, and as a subject of Her Majesty, I live in a country from an empire, that has fought for God and Empire.

We were good at it. We are good at it.

But that is not what the real war is. The real war is a series of choices. Our true loyalty is to God alone, not to Queen, our country.

Colossians 3:1-17

1So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, 3 for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory. 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. 7 These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. 8 But now you must get rid of all such things – anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices 10 and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. 11 In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

We spend a lot of time in this life arguing about fornication, divorce and children. Now, given the state of the current mating environment, this is appropriate. But that is not the full teaching. We are not to be greedy, abusive, malicious, slanderous.

Here we have to watch ourselves. You are faithful? You do not look past the beauty of your wife? Excellent. But. like Captain Mal from Serenity, is your sin of Choice Wrath? Or Greed? Or are you a slanderous, gossiping troll? We all have our favourite ways to err.

These are considered the things of the flesh. And in Christ, we should do the works of Christ. With arms or without.

 


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False spirituality

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I’ve realized that my post about epidemiology has a flaw in it. The first illustration is behind a pay wall. If I use other sites graphics, I link to that site, not download the graphic and insert it myself. As a result, I see the illustration when at the university (where the institution allows me to see the journal) and not at home. This is an inadvertant consequence of our copyright law and lack of open access.

The good news is that most of the theology stuff I quote is easily available.

I could wax about today’s topic, but those issues have been well canvassed overnight.

Colossians 2:8-23

8See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ. 9For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, 10and you have come to fullness in him, who is the head of every ruler and authority. 11In him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by putting off the body of the flesh in the circumcision of Christ; 12when you were buried with him in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead. 13And when you were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive together with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses, 14erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set this aside, nailing it to the cross. 15He disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them, triumphing over them in it.

16Therefore do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing festivals, new moons, or sabbaths. 17These are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. 18Do not let anyone disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels, dwelling on visions, puffed up without cause by a human way of thinking, 19and not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows with a growth that is from God.

Now, there is a tendency to see spirituality in the supernatural superstitions… ranging from meditiation and prayer to some guru or hindu God (see Eat, Pray, Love) or the current fad for Vampires, Werewolves. Or the “redisovery” (really the invention) of pagan cults like wicca.

These things can infect us. We can find ourselves accommodating the spirit of the age, not confronting it. And when this happen, we lose the ideas of Christ. Paul returned to Christ for a reason: all ouf our spiritual growth flows from him, not from any virtue we have, or any mystic experience.

We should be very cautious about those who teach spirituality, or proclaim their spiritual perfection. This life is imperfect. We are fallen. True spirituality flows from Christ. False spirituality does not.


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Around the traps.

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I am taking a break from analysing data and writing reports to go through some of the more interesting critiques in the last week. David French starts us rolling with his fairly blunt criticism of the mores of contemporary evangelism.

I have my own explanation for these trends, but first let me clearly state that I know there is no such thing as a utopian church. We are still fallen people living in a fallen world, and there will always be premarital sex and unplanned pregnancies. But with that caveat, I think it’s fairly clear that not only can we do better, we’ve done better before.

But why are we doing so much worse now? I tend to think it’s a logical result of the “everything but” culture that’s overrun much of the church. In other words, “We Christians live just like you, but without the sin.” … …Similarly, within the world of Christian marriage, it’s impossible to overstate the extent to which healthy marriage is discussed within secular frameworks of happiness and fulfillment, with scripture providing the holy means for gaining secular ends.

In short, Christians lost the culture but kept adapting to its demands. In the aftermath of the sexual revolution, the culture was bound to postpone marriage, and Christians postponed marriage. In the age of no-fault divorce, the culture was bound to view marriage as more contract than covenant, and Christians viewed marriage as more contract than covenant. But clawing back will require us to do something most of us haven’t been willing to do — give up our cultural “relevance,” give up our one degree of deviation from the mean, and rethink our relationships from inception to conception — and beyond.

Now, the question has to be.. how to rethink it? The Biblical answer to this is tradtional marriage. This involves submission. And no one who goes down that path considers it easy. But there is some witness — that it is worthwhile.

There’s no flow, and the purpose of WHY we do these things has been relegated to the merely utilitarian

Exactly, and that was my motivation for this article. Everyone IRL says, “If you had to do it again, would you?” Sometimes if I’m bored, I’m tempted to say, “No way! I’d stay single and travel and work at a glamorous job.” Or if I’m stressed out, I’m tempted to say, “No way! I’d join a convent and spend my life in contemplative prayer.” But if I’d done either of those things, then I’d be complaining about wanting children, or being lonely, or being bored, or missing sex and romance, or whatever.

I do know that my particular marriage has offered me plenty of chances for spiritual growth because so few things have worked out according to my carefully-laid plans. God apparently knows how to reform me and He seems to have a deep sense of irony. All vocations offer that benefit because choosing a vocation and remaining faithful to it requires you to mature and grow into your new role, even if things don’t really work out.

That’s why a vocation is different than a “job”. If you have a job, you can always change jobs if things don’t really work out and you aren’t having fun. But if you have a vocation, then you’ve made a commitment, and you have to stick it out. You can change your vocation, but it’s not as simple. People try to take that “job” mentality into their vocations, and it causes a lot of grief. That’s why you see people discarding their marriages as if they were shoes that didn’t fit properly. “Oh, we didn’t get along.” “Oh, I had to go find myself.” “Oh, I just thought there might be someone better out there.” These aren’t serious people.

Going into marriage with the expectation that it’ll make you happy just sets you up to be miserable. Being married will make you married, and whether or not you’re happy is mostly up to you. Realizing that has actually made me much happier. I used to get into a bad mood and then get resentful at everyone around me about my mood. (Women, especially, seem prone to this, because we’re so coddled and it can lead to spoilage.) Now if I’m in a bad mood, I just think (or have someone tell me), “Stop being so grumpy!” and then I eventually get over it.

Well Dalrock has been thinking about advice for young women. And he has some trenchant points to make about submission. He states

While wives submitting to their husbands is a clear command in the new testament, very few devout Christians even take this seriously in practice. It flies against the norms of our culture, and even those who are very traditional are likely to be alarmed by the statement.

In fact, (submission) should frighten you. If it doesn’t, you likely aren’t understanding the gravity of the situation. I’m assuming it immediately raised questions in your mind like:

What if he is abusive?
What if he won’t take her needs and wants into sufficient consideration when making decisions?
What if he is prone to make risky or irresponsible decisions?
What if he isn’t faithful?
What if he isn’t motivated to work to provide for his family?
What are his religious and moral values?
Is he a kind person?
Is he mentally and emotionally stable?
Is he capable of leading her in a way which she is comfortable following? (leadership style/game)

The proof that this is the right process is that these are all of the right questions. These are the questions women looking to marry should be asking but very often aren’t.

This also resolves the problem of the wife potentially moving in a different direction than her husband over time. If she is following his leadership, while change is nearly guaranteed they will be changing together. In picking him she is both making a guess at the kind of life she hopes to live and picking someone she trusts to work with her while navigating the process. In the true spirit of one and done marriage, she is hooking her wagon to him for the duration. For richer or poorer, in sickness and health, they will succeed or fail together.

I think Alte is correct: marriage is a vocation and it should be a one-way door. And being married changes you. Having kids changes you. If you are married, then you have to, have to consider your spouse. (And yes, this applies to men — our command is to love our wifes, not oppress them, and give up our lives for them. Neither role is easy).

But… this has been lost in the idea that marriage is about personal growth or fulfilment. It is about being happy. We have forgotten that you cannot chase joy. We have lost our love, We have been compromised: we walk within our society and it has made us dirty. The very idea that we can commit to one person, follow or lead one person, be accountable to one person — in all areas — frightens us. We have been trained to be selfish. The old divines knew of this.

They have lost their clear discovery of Christ. They see Him but dimly. They have lost the sight of His beauty — the savor of His good ointment — the hold of His garment. They seek Him, but find Him not. They cannot stir up the heart to lay hold on Christ.

The Spirit dwells scantily in their soul. The living water seems almost dried up within them. The soul is dry and barren. Corruptions are strong: grace is very weak.

Love to the brethren fades. United prayer is forsaken. The little assembly no more appears beautiful. Compassion for the unconverted is low and cold. Sin is unrebuked, though committed under their eye. Christ is not confessed before men. Perhaps the soul falls into sin, and is afraid to return; it stays far off from God, and lodges in the wilderness.

Ah! this is the case, I fear, with many. It is a fearfully dangerous time. Nothing but a visit of the free Spirit to your soul can persuade you to return. Is it not a time for this prayer — “Wilt thou not revive us again?”

It is no point, at present, looking outwards and arguing against the corruption of our society, and the compromises we are being told to make on issues such as gay marriage unless we are prepared to sit down and weep for our own failures, for our own faults… individually and as a congregation.

A divorce should be a time of mourning and repentance not celebrated and called growth.

Men need to look at hat is the nature of women, in general, and how to lead women. We need much more biblical teaching on this than on how to act in the bedroom. In a similar manner, older women need to obey the clear command to teach younger women how to love their husbands and children. You see, caring for the other does not come naturally. Infatuation can only take you so far. In the end, you need to see marriage, as Alte wisely says, as a vocation.


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Teaching is essential.

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David Stove was one of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century. He is a correction to the inchorenece of Kuhn and his mystical paradigms. But is life was a tragedy: the high church of Atheism did not sustain him in his old age. Instead he chose a rope. His son, devastated, looked for comfort and was converted by a bunch of wise Catholics.
Old fashioned wise catholics, who catechized him properly. As he writes.

I think Father X knew that to the adult mind—even the adult mind as uninformed on vital issues as was my own—emotion is not enough: it is pitifully, painfully not enough. It can be, to a mind periodically disordered anyway, a lethal drug. What such a mind needs is a solid diet: neither the thin watery gruel of quasi-New-Age “spirituality”, nor the pure tabasco of fire- and-brimstone threats. Those who have had the privilege of reading Radio Replies will know how nourishing it is, how fair-minded its author is, and how incapable he is of intellectual sharp practice for the sake of making a cheap point. Those who have not yet read it, are in for a great and sustaining pleasure.

One of the issues about living the Christian life, and how to behave, and how to cling to Christ, and the disciplines of faith… do not spring anew. They have to be taught. People do not want to do this. It is hard work. It is a struggle. You need to have a methodology of living — you cannot rely on emotion, At this point let’s turn to today’s reading.


Colossians 1:24-2:7

24I am now rejoicing in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. 25I became its servant according to God’s commission that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, 26the mystery that has been hidden throughout the ages and generations but has now been revealed to his saints. 27To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. 28It is he whom we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ. 29For this I toil and struggle with all the energy that he powerfully inspires within me.

1For I want you to know how much I am struggling for you, and for those in Laodicea, and for all who have not seen me face to face. 2I want their hearts to be encouraged and united in love, so that they may have all the riches of assured understanding and have the knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ himself, 3in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. 4I am saying this so that no one may deceive you with plausible arguments. 5For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, and I rejoice to see your morale and the firmness of your faith in Christ.

6As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, 7rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

We should honour those who teach. For it is hard, difficult, and requires care. Each person is different. Each person needs different motivations (I should know: the standard methods do not work for me or my boys).

Take, as an example, the habits of faith: meditation on the word, prayer, fasting. What R Stove writes here applies to me — though I am protestant — but I do spend most of my day thinking…

Extreme difficulty in prayer, above all in mental prayer, seems very common among converts. (Waugh undeniably found it so, and lamented as much to Arnold Lunn.) Intercessory prayer for anything but the most urgent of life’s necessities still alarms me, in part because of the opportunities it gives to the most swinish self- indulgence (“gimme gimme gimme”), and in part because my memory is so bad that simply learning the most basic prayers of our church—the Acts of Faith, Hope and Charity, the Memorare, the Confiteor, and so onranks with the hardest intellectual work I have ever been required to do.

We cannot rely on people constructing the habits of faith from their instincts, or rely on the guidance of the spirit. Paul had to teach this: and his giftedness was such that many were cured. If Paul had to teach, and Jesus himself had to teach, we have to explicitly teach the habits and practices of faith.

In short, we still need the Catechism. And most believers are woefully ignorant of the wisdom contained in these documents.

Open Access vs Impact Factor?

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Diagram H index, from the original paper


There are three things keeping the academic publishers profitable.
1. Ownership of high prestige journals with high impact factors. Publication in these journals matters for review, and helps your Hirsch Index
2. Sponsorship of learned societies. The publisher provides the infrastructure for the editors and authors, and the members get a copy…
3. Promotion. The Publishers bundle the journal to sell to academic libraries and individuals. This expands the readership, say of say, the East African medical Journal or the Australian and New Zealand Journal of (insert specailty) beyond that region.

But the model is breaking down. Via slashdot, Harvard has released a memo saying that the cost of journals is now non sustainable. Harvard. Which is not poor. From the memo:

The Faculty Advisory Council to the Library, representing university faculty in all schools and in consultation with the Harvard Library leadership, reached this conclusion: major periodical subscriptions, especially to electronic journals published by historically key providers, cannot be sustained: continuing these subscriptions on their current footing is financially untenable. Doing so would seriously erode collection efforts in many other areas, already compromised.

It is untenable for contracts with at least two major providers to continue on the basis identical with past agreements. Costs are now prohibitive. Moreover, some providers bundle many journals as one subscription, with major, high-use journals bundled in with journals consulted far less frequently. Since the Library now must change its subscriptions and since faculty and graduate students are chief users, please consider the following options open to faculty and students (F) and the Library (L), state other options you think viable, and communicate your views:

1. Make sure that all of your own papers are accessible by submitting them to DASH in accordance with the faculty-initiated open-access policies (F).

2. Consider submitting articles to open-access journals, or to ones that have reasonable, sustainable subscription costs; move prestige to open access (F).

3. If on the editorial board of a journal involved, determine if it can be published as open access material, or independently from publishers that practice pricing described above. If not, consider resigning (F).

4. Contact professional organizations to raise these issues (F).

5. Encourage professional associations to take control of scholarly literature in their field or shift the management of their e-journals to library-friendly organizations (F).

6. Encourage colleagues to consider and to discuss these or other options (F).

7. Sign contracts that unbundle subscriptions and concentrate on higher-use journals (L).

8. Move journals to a sustainable pay per use system, (L).

9. Insist on subscription contracts in which the terms can be made public (L).

The memo refers to DASH, which is the Harvard online repository of papers, There are other ones, such as PLOS and arXiv.org, but these have not made a difference. I usually do not quote Monboit of the Guardian, but on this issue he is correct…

What we see here is pure rentier capitalism: monopolising a public resource then charging exorbitant fees to use it. Another term for it is economic parasitism. To obtain the knowledge for which we have already paid, we must surrender our feu to the lairds of learning.

It’s bad enough for academics, it’s worse for the laity. I refer readers to peer-reviewed papers, on the principle that claims should be followed to their sources. The readers tell me that they can’t afford to judge for themselves whether or not I have represented the research fairly. Independent researchers who try to inform themselves about important scientific issues have to fork out thousands. This is a tax on education, a stifling of the public mind. It appears to contravene the universal declaration of human rights, which says that “everyone has the right freely to … share in scientific advancement and its benefits”.
Open-access publishing, despite its promise, and some excellent resources such as the Public Library of Science and the physics database arxiv.org, has failed to displace the monopolists. In 1998 the Economist, surveying the opportunities offered by electronic publishing, predicted that “the days of 40% profit margins may soon be as dead as Robert Maxwell”. But in 2010 Elsevier’s operating profit margins were the same (36%) as they were in 1998.

The reason is that the big publishers have rounded up the journals with the highest academic impact factors, in which publication is essential for researchers trying to secure grants and advance their careers. You can start reading open-access journals, but you can’t stop reading the closed ones.

As long as we measure productivity and quality by citations, we will not be able to cut the cord. The current way forward is to demand that papers are open access as a consequence of funding. But that approach, or the boycott, will not work as well as simple economics. The publishers are pricing themselves off the market. And if your library cannot afford that closed journal, you will stop reading it.

Anzac heroes.

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This is from today’s Herald. Another Catholic who sets an example for those who follow.

A small bronze crucifix welded from World War I rifle bullet cartridges stands as a testament to the bravery and selflessness shown by an Auckland bishop who tried to rescue the wounded on the fields of France.

The crucifix belonged to Bishop Henry Cleary, the Catholic Bishop of Auckland from 1910 to 1929, who took his duties right to the frontline.

In 1916, Bishop Cleary travelled from Auckland to London to seek medical treatment, intending to resign because of poor health.

Instead, he discovered there was no Catholic chaplain with the New Zealand 2nd Brigade in France and volunteered to serve on the frontline near Fromelles.

After just a night and a day of fighting at Fromelles, 1500 British and 5533 Australian soldiers were killed, wounded or taken prisoner by the Germans.

The soldiers’ bodies and many wounded were left on the battlefield in no man’s land – unable to be recovered and buried.

Although a temporary truce had been made with the Germans to allow the wounded to be rescued it was vetoed by senior officers, and the New Zealand troops were deeply troubled by their inability to recover and bury their comrades.

Bishop Cleary and an officer crawled out and lay in the snow amid the remains of the dead. In his diaries, Bishop Cleary comments several times on the dead lying “out there” and how the Germans used to shoot burial parties.

Just 50m from the enemy line he said a “De Profundis” over the bodies – a psalm which normally forms part of the prayers for the dead recited at Catholic funerals.

However, Bishop Cleary’s wooden crucifix was badly damaged while he was in the trenches so the Kiwi soldiers gathered up spent shell cases and cobbled together a new crucifix for him.

Not all of us are playing the secular games.

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One of the hazards that happen if you hang around this part of the interwebz is that you get really cynical and misanthropic. I look at what is going on and despair when I should not.

Consider for a second the pick up scene. Son one talked to me (when he was 15 at the time) about classmates going down to the student bars and trying to pull girls. He considered them stupid, and putting themselves at risk. (Well there was a context, One of the 17 year old prefects had just hung himself after he was told to provide for his pregnant girlfriend. Last year’s tragedy at school). And there are plenty of young people who are trying to live Godly and circmuspect lives. I’m not of their generation, but I know them through my kids. As Kathy noted:

I am not a young single woman but I know of quite a few. My own nearly sixteen year old daughter has lovely friends. Really nice girls… I have spoken at length with many of them..

And yes the young women that I associate with here in Oz are not mercenary types. I did not say that they do not exist.( Both mercenary men and women DO exist.) Just that I do not encounter them.

My husband has older brothers whose daughters are married. All nice women who married nice blokes.

Much has to do with upbringing. I have always said this.

In the older age group, there are plenty of women who are trying to make the best of it around their families and trying to live godly lives (something we all fail at, in some times, and succeed at, in others). Magistra describes this beautifully

I no longer have the husband but I’m still home-centered until the boys are grown up and gone. I didn’t have any idea what a sinner I was until I married and, especially, had children. I still am confronted with my sinfulness as I am lazy, impatient, unloving, selfish, etc. with my children every single day. I am also daily thankful beyond words for the grace of God in Jesus Christ and the gospel.

The traditional model IS the best and I agree with Alcest that the modern crop of singles who think only of themselves cheapens the idea of the single life. The apostle Paul had good things to say about that vocation and if I am to remain single the rest of my life, I can already see several areas of ministry in which I can participate once my children are grown. What a privilege that would be!

I am testimony that being a SAHM is no proof against divorce but I also have watched the Lord take care of me and my children through various avenues so that I can still follow the vocation He gave me when I first married and bore my children. He is faithful even when husbands and wives are not.

This is the hardest job I’ve ever had (my part-time job is a breeze in comparision) but it is also the most satisfying in many ways. I wouldn’t trade it for the world or a boatload of money.

Now, I have met some people like Magistra. Most of these women are not interested in any romance at present. They have their hands full: with kids, with jobs, with life. Raising kids, particularly small kids, solo is hard.

What we tend to forget is that the hard things make us grow. They make us mentally, physically and spiritually fit. If we want to climb hills, we have to train for it. If we want to be Godly, we have to train at it. And marriage is one of God’s training places. At times all this is messy. Saint Velvet commented on the same thread. (SAHM is an Americanism — “Stay at home mother”)

It’s an interesting study in bigotry to be a sahm who was formerly “career” – add to it a weird family dynamic that essentially declares you a traitor to the sisterhood and a burden to your poor old husband (I love how people assume they know anything about our finances) and you’ve got yourself a tragedy fit for the stage.
… Feminism has compartmentalized the efforts in order to minimize them – there is no “all in” – you’re either a wife or a mother or a homemaker or a business person/employee – few women see themselves in the traditional role Alte describes, they sort of live a la carte existences, call it multi-tasking, and then wonder why they’re so strung out. There’s no flow, and the purpose of WHY we do these things has been relegated to the merely utilitarian. “I shouldn’t have to clean the toilet/mop the floor/carry out the compost because I’m too fabulously educated/beautiful/successful” is just a strange mindset. There is the wonderful list of all the things a man should be able to do, in a generalist spirit, but most women seem to refuse this sort of integrated notion.

Can you tell this is spring cleaning week and I feel the need to validate my existence?

One of the things about American secular life is the emphasis on having it all and doing it all is conflated with presenteeism. You have to be present — at work, in sports, in the culture (attending the opera and art museums) and also keep the home to a Martha Stewart standard while looking like someone who can prowl down a catwalk.

The idea of seaons in a life is lost. The idea of a couple working together to make things flow is lost. And the fact that growth is hard, and childish things have to be given up… is lost. Our children have judged the current secular world as full of fools. Have we?

Glory of man and God

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Today is Anzac day. In my view, this is our true national day, for all New Zealanders can honour the war roll that we have. New Zealanders have fought in the Land Wars (NZ), the Boer War (South Africa), WWI, WWII, Korea, Malaysia (Malayan Emergency) Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. Our men have shed blood for our freedom and way of life. And today, in Australia and New Zealand, we honour them. The service, like all military ceremonies, as a certain glory to it.
But the glory we show is nothing compared to the Glory of God.

16On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled. 17Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God. They took their stand at the foot of the mountain. 18Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the LORD had descended upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln, while the whole mountain shook violently. 19As the blast of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses would speak and God would answer him in thunder. 20When the LORD descended upon Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain, the LORD summoned Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up. 21Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go down and warn the people not to break through to the LORD to look; otherwise many of them will perish. 22Even the priests who approach the LORD must consecrate themselves or the LORD will break out against them.” 23Moses said to the LORD, “The people are not permitted to come up to Mount Sinai; for you yourself warned us, saying, ‘Set limits around the mountain and keep it holy.’” 24The LORD said to him, “Go down, and come up bringing Aaron with you; but do not let either the priests or the people break through to come up to the LORD; otherwise he will break out against them.” 25So Moses went down to the people and told them.

Now the glory of the Law was such that no man or woman could go near the mountain but Moses. The glory of the law inspires in us humans not a sense of exaltation or great self worth, but one of fear, trembling, and a realization that we are small, helpless and guilty. And this is not the full glory of God. For the glory of Christ is greater.

Colossians 1:15-23

15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; 16for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers – all things have been created through him and for him. 17He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. 19For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

21And you who were once estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22he has now reconciled in his fleshly body through death, so as to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before him – 23provided that you continue securely established and steadfast in the faith, without shifting from the hope promised by the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven. I, Paul, became a servant of this gospel.

For a while the services of memorial became less Christian: but the tradition of military hymns, a talk (honouring the dead and the current servicemen) and Last Post comes from a military service. For the military, in the end, fight for honour and their friends, their mates. Even when their nation is in evil, men will fight — putting their lives on the line to defend their families and communities. We cannot remove that part of our nature in this world.

Any glory we have in this world is but glitter compared to the glory in the world to follow, if we remain in the gospel.