Focus on Sacralist Jurisprudence 4

Taking up the sword of the Spirit, which is Civil Litigation.

There was another story on the programme regarding a woman who was attending a university in pursuit of some kind of counseling degree. I believe it was near the end of the course that an issue arose regarding counseling homosexuals and she openly declared her Christian beliefs and insisted her worldview rested upon Divine Revelation.

They basically told her that unless she changed her belief system they could not grant her certification, she could not graduate.

The Federal Government's Day of Thanks... to the Unknown God

It sure isn't the God of the Bible. Maybe it's the giant idol in New York harbour? Actually it's pretty clear what America worships.....food, football, and consuming for the sake of consumption...in others words America's 'god' is not the Father of Jesus Christ. It's America itself. America has a knack for taking things that aren't necessarily intrinsically evil and making them into something heinous and perverse.

Beware of those who confuse this god with the God of Scripture.

I didn't have time to write my Thanksgiving 2011 post. Maybe next year. So for now I'll just post the link to last year's article.

As for me....it's just another Thursday. I'll be working outside. Thankfully, the weather is supposed to be a bit warmer tomorrow.

http://proto-protestantism.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-day-2010.html

Focus on Sacralist Jurisprudence 3

Self-Deception Regarding Motives

Some have argued that we should abolish public schools altogether. Okay, again when they're in control are they going to allow the Leftists to form private schools that teach Atheism, Socialism, anti-Christian morality? No? Then are they going to form a government institution to regulate education? I think they're either being naive or deceitful...or a bit of both.

Do you really think if they took control of the nation’s institutions that they would allow an education free-for-all, complete liberty?

Focus on Sacralist Jurisprudence 2

Bringing Down the Babylonian School System

They make much of their fight for school vouchers. The argument goes something like this…Basically in the United States we pay property taxes that go toward paying for public schools. People like me who home school or others who send their children to private schools are paying these taxes but receiving no direct benefit. Of course so are the many people who don't have children in school. The Voucher argument is that these families should receive a subsidy or voucher to then pay for the private school, charter school or whatever. It's about choice, fairness, and liberty they say and resisting the government schools and their agenda.

While I have little sympathy with the government school agenda I will suggest doing something people on the Christian Right refuse to do...often out of principle. Step into the other person's shoes for a moment, not to validate them, but to give a little larger perspective.

Answering Questions #12- Negativity, Interpretation and Agenda

I like a lot of the things you write and the way it makes me think, but I'm concerned with the negative tone. Does everything always have to be so dark and gloomy?

I've been meaning to get to this for some time and after a recent exchange I thought it might be a good time to answer it.

The Envy Straw Man

A Response to Colson's Fantasies

I hear Colson every day on the radio. It’s amazing but whatever the topic he has an almost perfect track record, he gets it wrong almost every time.

The latter part of the 20th century has seen some incredibly destructive forces at work in the Church...

Francis Schaeffer, RJ Rushdoony, Billy Graham, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, James Dobson, Chuck Colson are all part of the generation that is rapidly disappearing.

The new generation is just as bad if not worse…except for one thing. Their errors are perhaps more obvious in some ways. Maybe I’m fooling myself to think that, but it would seem the Joyce Meyer’s, the Joel Osteen’s, the Rick Warren’s and the Brian McLaren’s are so obvious that no one reading their Bible would fall for them…but I guess people still do. The nature of the error changes or in some cases is just repackaged and tracks differently.

But you have to hand it to Colson, he’s achieved some pretty amazing stuff. Within a generation he softened the Evangelical posture toward Roman Catholicism and that coupled with Dominionism’s ever growing fondness for the Middle Ages has brought about a new appreciation for Rome and its errors.

He’s influenced a lot of people and done great harm to the cause of Christ and His Kingdom. Here’s yet another interaction with his daily commentary. Today’s just put me over the edge. He contradicts himself terribly and he has either a very inverted sense of truth, reality or both.

Rejecting both Patriarchy and Egalitarianism in the Church- Part 4

Final segment....

And with Pietism you always abandon wisdom for a checklist. You can’t think through issues and say this might be okay for this kid and not for that one, or this might be okay on occasion. Or (and this never seems to arise), maybe I don’t know that family’s situation and though they’re not doing things the way we do…it’s really not my place to judge them.

Rejecting both Patriarchy and Egalitarianism in the Church- Part 3

For those familiar with the terms, do this mean I’m arguing the Complimentarian position? Maybe, but if I go to the Wikipedia article on Biblical Patriarchy I can agree (in part) with many of the notions outlined there as well. The key differences are with regard to Dominionism and the questions it engenders in the social sphere and my main critique with regard to many in the movement is that they make these issues into components of the gospel.

Rejecting both Patriarchy and Egalitarianism in the Church- Part 2

We always have to behave as Christians and sometimes that means in order to do that, we have to turn our backs on certain activities. Not because they are inherently unclean as a Pietist would argue, but because at the given time and place they are corrupted or structured in a way that we either have to violate Christian principles to do it or be deceitful and mislead those around us. Ignoring the prescribed rules and forms we force our Christianity on those around us.

Maybe as a Christian I cannot be a police officer, but when Christians enter into that office and then choose to ignore the enforcement of laws they don't like...they're breaking their oath (which they shouldn't have taken in the first place).

If I can’t be violent and prideful in my normal Christian life, then I can’t do it while I hide behind a vocation or office. If I can set aside my Christianity for the sake of office, then women certainly can as well.

You don't get to suspend your oath to Christ in order to do your job.

But then the Dominionist counters… how can we conquer that sphere? It's a false dilemma generated by a wrong set of questions.

The question of Christian women being politicians...the fact that we're even asking the question shows we're on the wrong track.

Rejecting both Egalitarianism and Patriarchy in the Church Part 1

A follow up note to the post dealing with the 12 November 2011 Republican Debate.



This is hardly an exhaustive treatment of these issues but I wanted to elaborate on my comment regarding Christian female politicians. I believe they shouldn’t be running for political office, but in saying that I’m not arguing from the Patriarchal position. Let me explain.

America, the failed experiment…

Evidence? Just watch the November 12, 2011 Republican Debate.

I’m not really sure why I am surprised, but I am. Last night as I watched the Republican debate on Foreign Policy, on more than one occasion, I was literally stunned. Watching this with my kids, I keep asking them if they understand what is meant by certain terms and if not, explaining them. I try to interpret political speak for them, making it very clear for them why politicians are referred to as forked tongued serpents.

A poignant example from tonight was when I had to explain what Mitt Romney means by the 21^stcentury being “an American Century,”

...or what terms like ‘exceptionalism’ mean, when they’re used be people like this. 

In this case they're euphemisms for Empire.

My children are usually asking about which candidates are Christians or claim to be…every day as they learn about current events, the contemporary church and Church History…they’re learning the meaning of these caveats and how the term Christian has become almost meaningless.

Focus on Sacralist Jurisprudence 1

Culture Warriors and the Sacralist Swords of Threat, Litigation, and Fear.

The other day on Focus on the Family they had a guest from the Alliance Defense Fund. As the Christian Right has grown in influence, its leaders have deliberately worked to form organizations and tools that will help them wage relentless culture war. Increasingly they are forming groups devoted to tackling legislation and the judiciary. To do this they're looking to lawyers, lobbyists, and politicians all interfacing in the overlapping realms of Christian media, ministries, think-tanks, and political organizations.

Dominionism: Part 6

Elitist Tendencies

One final point.

There is an Elitist tendency among those who profess this creed. Focusing on Ivory Tower philosophical issues and matters of theory these folks end up spending a lot of time on issues that the average person doesn't really have a lot of time to think about.

The factory worker and the farmer are not terribly concerned with residential architecture, sociological models, what makes good art, and so forth. Not to say the aforementioned questions have no value, but they simply are not that important to people's daily lives and I don't think they need to be.

I know the arguments...the trickledown effect of what happens in these circles and that's why they're focused there. They are truly the architects, the planners of a new culture.

Dominionism: Part 5

The Unassailable Philosophical Wall

Are the Dominionist Blueprints, their models for transforming the spheres...Christian? Biblical? Are they providing us with a Biblical Worldview?

While coherent with the philosophical systems they've created, in many, maybe even most cases they're not in accord with Scripture, and this is usually pretty clear by just comparing what they're suggesting with the Pilgrim ethic of Scripture. Just reading through the Gospels or Epistles in most cases quickly resolves any doubts. I'm afraid their systems are man-made and many of them have reached a point in which it would seem they can no longer see the forest through the trees.