Archive for the ‘Conviction’ Category

TOLERANCE

Monday, November 9th, 2009

This author doubts, really, if a free, and open debate can occur in a community (i.e., the university) where there is no loyalty to a higher truth, where consensus is absent. The best the American secular university can generate is tolerance for the sake of tolerance. History is reduced to a “pleasure principle.” Reality is not based on truth but on the latest political agenda of the reigning department head.

At the beginning of the 21st century there is truly an exciting phenomenon occurring in American society: a resurgence of evangelicalism. As sociologist Peter Berger accurately observes, evangelicals generally subscribe to two strongly held propositions: that a return to Christian values is necessary if the moral confusion of our time is to be overcome, and that the Enlightenment is to be blamed for much of the confusion of our time (Peter Berger, “At Stake in the Enlightenment,” First Things, March 1996, p. 18).

In fact, 21st century evangelicalism is one of the most potent anti-Enlightenment movements in world history. The excesses of Enlightenment rationalism, exhibited so ably in the secular university, have sabotaged the certitude of classicism and Christian theism that so strongly influenced Western culture long before the formidable onslaught of the likes of David Hume.

The Washington Post in 1993 coyly observed that evangelicals are “largely poor, uneducated and easy to command.” And, among our own, evangelical professor Mark Noll unkindly observed, “The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind.” Indeed. Not any more. While conceding that faith is not a makeshift bridge to overcome some Kierkegaardian gap between beliefs and evidence, Evangelicalism posits that it still is important that people look beyond their experience for reality. Human needs and aspirations are greater than the world can satisfy, so it is reasonable to look elsewhere for that satisfaction. Worth is the highest and best reality (a decidedly anti-Enlightenment notion) and its genesis and maintenance come exclusively from relationship with God alone.

Evangelicalism, then, moves backward in time, far back in time, when intellectualism was not separate from religion. It blows the claims of the Enlightenment to bits.

THE EFFICACIOUS UNIVERSITY

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

This author’s understanding of an efficacious university is a place that humbly admits that the Truth is already known. It is the job of humankind to be a good citizen by reflecting the glory of God. Many American secular universities see the university as a place for the advancement of knowledge; Newman sees the university as a place for the communication of knowledge and advancement of the Kingdom of God.

As previous explained, there are gods galore at the American secular university. The American secular university deified “toleration,” “scientific inquiry,” and “intellectual honesty.” Today, though, there is considerable confusion about how we ought to live with our differences. The modern appeal to toleration begs the question.

In the modern secular university there is only one viewpoint that is deemed legitimate: that is the conviction of uniform toleration! The net result is that people are forced to choose between their epistemology and their cosmology. People are forced to give up convictions based on what they believe to be true and right if their views appear remotely intolerant. Thus, if an Evangelical believes that homosexuality is a sinful lifestyle he is accused of intolerance. But he believes it because his world view framework demands that he believe it. He believes that the Word of God is truth and cannot be militated or compromised by circumstances or exigencies.

The problem is, according to S.D. Gaede, When Tolerance is no Virtue (Downers Grove, IL: Inter Varsity Press, 1993) is that the university asks a question it has no right to ask and then offers no satisfactory answer. What is truth? The American secular university does not have a clue. Many secular scholars know it and they conclude that there is no truth. They have lost confidence in truth searching and have come to the conclusion that truth is unattainable. Universities conclude that holding to a plurality of truths and tolerating them is virtuous. This author agrees, however, with G. K. Chesterton who argued, “Tolerance is the virtue of a man without conviction.”

The evangelical commitment to toleration and intellectual honesty grows out of a commitment to truth and justice. This toleration is expressed through love, which is inevitably misunderstood by the secular university as intellectual dishonesty and parochialism.

While attending a secular university, I remember discussing religion over lunch. Each person shared his faith position. There was much interest engendered among this enlightened university crowd! Compliments and affirmations flowed freely, until I, the token Evangelical, was asked about his faith. I stated, “Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”

“You mean, a way, don’t you?” a conciliatory classmate helpfully asked.

“No, I mean Jesus Christ it the ONLY way to wholeness and life,” I gently responded.

Well, the Evangelical ruined everyone’s lunch–again!

False notions of toleration breed false notions of relativism. Relativism is defined loosely as “anything goes as long as it is embraced sincerely and injures no one else.” Evangelicals are ringing a fire bell and warning American culture that there are significant dangers in living in a relativistic world. The fact is, a relativistic world has no universally held view of truth and goodness. Inevitably the modern university is intolerant of intolerance which makes everyone confused and inconsistent.

Oedipus Complex

Monday, October 26th, 2009

Sigmund Freud introduced the idea of the Oedipus Complex in his Interpretation of Dreams (1899). The term derives from the Oedipus we know, who unknowingly slew his father and married his mother; its female analogue, the Electra complex, is named for another mythological figure, who helped slay her mother. Without going into particulars, the concept is that one looks within oneself for explanations of aberrant and destructive behavior—not at circumstances or behavior. The problem is the attitude presented by the Chorus close to the end of the play: “O Oedipus, famous king,/You whom the same great harbor sheltered/As child and father both,/How could the furrows which your father plowed/Bear you in silence for so long?” (Bernard Knox Translation, p. 90) All the blame lies outside Oedipus—he is only the victim. Thus, Freud’s Oedipus Complex. The problem is that Freud recommended that we ignore what he called “guilt” and we Christians call “conviction.” Sigmund Freud gave the world permission to do what is right in its own eyes because it was to avoid guilt (or conviction). This destroyed the whole notion of redemption in many lives because it removed sin as a determining agent in human life.

Call Forth Elijahs

Friday, January 30th, 2009

In 49 BC, the crossing of a small stream in northern Italy by ambitious Roman general Julius Caesar became one of the pivotal events in world history. From it sprang the Roman Empire and the genesis of modern Europe.

An ancient Roman law forbade any general from crossing the Rubicon River and entering Italy proper with a standing army. To do so was treason. Caesar was well aware of this. Coming up with his troops on the banks of the Rubicon, he halted for a while, and rehearsed in his mind the importance of the next step. “Still we can retreat!” he said. “But once let us pass this little bridge, – and nothing is left but to fight it out with arms!” (Suetonius ). He crossed the river and we all know the rest.

After raising four home schooled children, attending over 300 home school conventions, participating in a HSLDA court case victory (Stobaugh, et al., vs. Pittsburgh Board of Education), attending 15 or 16 field trips a year, it is time for Karen and me to cross the Rubicon.

America is very different from the American in which Karen and I began home schooling in 1985. Really different. Our president wonders why we 2010 evangelicals cannot be “civil” in our discussions about things like abortion. Civil? Abortion is murder, Mr. President. Murder. I could be civil discussing tax increases or even the Surge in Iraqi, but there are some things I just can’t be civil about.

In 1 Kings 18-19, the famous Mt. Carmel challenge chapters, choleric Elijah is coming home—and no one wants him to come home. He is crossing his Rubicon. After a long time, in the third year, the word of the LORD came to Elijah: “Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the land.” King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, of course, hate him. But even, Obadiah, a faithful follower of God and trusted advisor to the king and queen, who had learned so well to survive in this hostile land, who has done so much good for God’s people—Obadiah was not too thrilled to see him either. In fact, no one welcomed Elijah – not the hostile king and queen nor the pious evangelical Obadiah.

Even though Elijah brings good news – it is finally going to rain—no one welcomes him. Elijah’s fish-or-cut-bait prophetic messages are irritating the life out of the status quo. That is bad enough. But what really scares the dickens out of everyone is the fact that Elijah has come home to Zion, to the City of God, to challenge the gods of society to a duel.

Crossing the Rubicon 3

Thursday, January 1st, 2009

Elijahs brought Good News but not welcome news. Good News that we gave them in our modest homes. Year after year, one music lesson after another, one coop meeting after another, year after another, we raised this generation. And today, today they are on the threshold of changing their world. They are housewives, they have small businesses. They are writing scripts in Hollywood. Writing speeches for presidents. Lobbying for Godly causes in Congress.

Do we have a vision of what lies ahead? Will we seek the Lord’s face to cooperate in His equipping , enabling and empowering process? Will we trust God? Elijahs are wild and crazy! They will move beyond our traditions and our comfort zones. Elijahs always do.

So Obadiah went to meet Ahab and told him the bad news, and Ahab went to meet Elijah. When he saw Elijah, he said to him, “Is that you, you troubler of Israel?”

“I have not made trouble for Israel,” Elijah replied. “But you and your father’s family have. You have abandoned the LORD’s commands and have followed the Baals.

Challenge the gods of this age home schoolers!