Just Another Blog in the Wheel

A glance at the output of contemporary philosophy departments justifies this sardonic assessment: 20^th century philosophy suffered so many hernias from pushing Kant against the wall, that the first decade of the next century has proved too short a time to calculate the damage, identify the lost trajectory, or get back to business. Publishing houses long regarded as belonging to the first rank, now promote philosophical tomes insisting that the real world and make-believe worlds share the same reality.

It gets better (worse?). In fact, philosophy has fallen so far off the curb, it has become for the profession less a question of which way is up, as whether “up” has any meaning. If it is suggested by some rapscallion that it does, you may expect another Rabelaisian to immediately publish his thesis in which he “proves” that, if “up” does actually exist, it evidently bears no relation to “down.” Rab and Rap then join forces in securing a Federal grant which enables them to construct a team of scholars ready to demonstrate… something.

This nearly chaotic condition afflicting Socrates’ child offers the raw materials for a splendid, even a riotous, evening. All you need to do is,  1) secure the most recent Oxford University Press catalog of philosophical offerings;  2) buy two or three bottles of  fine Merlot;  3) gather several adults for an after-dinner fellowship; and 4) have each take turns reading aloud the titles, subtitles and blurbs. You cannot go wrong; you will not be disappointed. You’ll create a memory. Consider the following thrilling volumes, each alleged to own real estate on the cutting-edge of mankind’s intellect-in-action:

· Moral Machines, “The first book to address the problem of creating ethical robots…”
· Philosophers Without Gods, which appears to be a sort of devotional for God-haters. The subtitle says it’s Meditations on Atheism and the Secular Life, which I take to be a claim that it will aid readers in thinking deeply about what isn’t. Come to think of it, this book might explain a lot—about the authors. They’re missing something for sure.
· Drugs and Justice,  Oxford says, addresses “the central issues in drug policy: the lack of a coherent conceptual structure for thinking about drugs.” This is clear proof that the authors have not yet taken enough drugs to qualify to write such a book.
· Worlds and Individuals, Possible and Otherwise, explains how you can get a terminal degree while believing “that non-actual possible worlds and individuals are as real as the actual world and individuals.”
· Value, Reality, and Desire -Oh man, I treasure this book. Really. I want it.

All together, these portend the imminent self-immolation of the Enlightenment Project. Safe bet that the altar flames will be carried first from the Philosophy Department to the rest of the campus. Listen—I didn’t even mention the book which argues for the moral superiority of non-existence. (Stay tuned.) That’s right. For this optimist,  to be or not to be is not the question. “Not to be” is his aggressive preference, for everyone, as a norm. Leave it to a philosopher, well-practiced in his atheistic devotions, to tell us a better use for the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

Consider this: if, as some have suggested, Nietzsche’s Superman paved a highway for Hitler, what do you suppose awaits us when some leader-to-come operates on the presupposition that bringing everyone into non-existence is to do them a favor?

Here, surely, is the terminus of man’s autonomous reason: exactly as Scripture says—death. And not as a dreaded, hated thing, an intrusion. And not, as the Word calls it, an enemy. No. This is to gaze upon it as a lover. To prefer never having been to life everlasting  is to have allied one’s self with Satan at an earlier, an even more primitive  point of departure than that taken by our First Parents. Their devotion to Satan was so strong that to rescue them God first had to place enmity where their allegiance had been. Just so, all who begin the knowledge enterprise apart from the fear of the Lord, do not engage as neutral players, but as lovers of death (Proverbs 8:28). This love may be dormant; it is easily disguised.

But when, in an age of epistemological self-consciousness—when the darkness covers every landscape beyond Goshen’s borders—that fetid love feels safely hidden. As light causes the plant of pure love to grow, to blossom, so it is when surrounded by darkness that the darnel dares lift up its head. Having neither light to see in nor eyes to see with, still it boasts, it swaggers, it beats against the wheat and calls out to it, “Come! Join me. For behold, my dearest companion has arrived and bids us feast with him. How I have longed for his appearing! And now he is here. Come meet him. Come meet my only friend, the End.”

Yes, this is the truth of knowledge falsely so called. Yet, by God’s common grace, we must acknowledge that this century of philosophy past was not entirely worthless. For example, even a casual survey would reveal that the futility of unbelieving philosophy, has, in several sub-departments, made itself known, if not yet felt. And, skipping past other, brighter spots, there was important progress made in appreciating the inseparability of Word and Being. More narrowly, work of inestimable importance was done demonstrating how language does more than influence, does more than shape our perception of reality. To a very large extent, it determines it.

Not being one to start a celebration while there’s a perfectly good funeral to go to, I must report that the inextricable connection which enables language to define reality has not gone entirely unnoticed. That’s right. It’s been noted, and put to work, by feminists and sodomites and by numerous other entitlement groups. Yet, despite this exploitation having taken place in full view of the Church, Christians have—even with a Bible in hand that disclosed, even on its first page!, the Word/Reality relation millennia before Wittgenstein was a gleam in his daddy’s eye—Christians somehow (one is tempted to say miraculously, but it’s too painful, precisely because it is too true) managed to remain oblivious to the progress noted above, and altogether unaware of its value.

Which brings me to the provocation which prompted this lament—it was a brochure publicizing the Annual Conference of the National Association of Nouthetic Counselors. “Wait a minute!,” you say. “Aren’t they the good guys?” Indeed they are. They are the people who are “pursuing excellence in Biblical Counseling.” And therein lies the tragedy. Even those among us who have the proven discipline and skill to win skirmishes, somehow manage to show themselves ever more skillful at losing entire wars.

“Why? What are you talking about, Schlissel?” I’m talking about something that appears on the inside front cover of the brochure. “What? What? What could it be?”

Please don’t be offended if I say, I fear you may not yet share with me the sort of alarm-value indicated by the word I read. But I won’t keep you in suspense. It was the simple, casual, hardly noticeable identification of one of their principal people as “Chairperson” of a certain department.

“Chairperson?! You get this worked up about the use of ‘chairperson?’ How sad!” The writing on the wall, however, is the fact that so very, very few do get worked up by this. For, first of all, the man in question is no such thing. He is the chairman. Of course those determined to turn God’s order upside down would buck and chafe at reminders of His sovereignty, and His ordained order, but those who find God’s will irresistibly sweet must surely embrace the use of reality-impacting language that speaks reflectively in accordance with God’s will.

You see, feminists began their work in good communist fashion, by unjoining that which God had joined together. In order for them to set men and women at odds with each other, in order for them to effectively initiate policies that would destroy families, they had to cast life as lived, not by families, but by “individuals.” In this way, specialized segmentation could take on a life of nearly infinite adaptations. Order is not to be found in that which well serves families, but rather in that which serves individuals, abstractly defined after being first abstracted from families.

If families had one vote each, cast by the head of the family, it was twisted to appear not as “one family-one vote,” but as one vote for a man, and a vote denied to a woman. Never mind that God had declared these two one. When political purposes demand the redefinition of an entity, unbelievers are always quick to make it. The news, however, used to be in how quickly believers joined them. But it isn’t news anymore.

The reason this instance was so very distressing is because I’ve been compelled to witness the demasculization of language as the style-czars cemented it into place as policy governing the printed works of every secular publisher. Then, one by one, it has mowed down (nearly) every evangelical publisher, with hymn-publishers reckoned among the earliest casualties. Thus, I reason, if we can’t speak like God would have us speak when we write for others, at least we can use covenantally inclusive language¹ when we write for ourselves. But no! The rot has infested so deeply, so thoroughly, the wall is so horribly mildewed that any priest worth his salt knows it’s his sad duty to tell the dwellers, their abode must be torn down. It is time for judgment to begin with the household of God. When those who advertise themselves as the most faithful among us start using the rhetoric of the Revolution (i.e., as van Prinsterer defined it, viz., raw, anti-Christian unbelief), that time of judgment has arrived.

Why do we prove ourselves ready to censor or alter any word which might remind anyone that God made man to be a covenant head? When Christians self-publish, any willingness shown by them to adopt the rhetoric of anti-Christianity should be met by severe disapproval. Why deliberately reinforce a distortion of reality and a falsehood?

Although the world has waged war on male headship, it seems necessary to remind my fellow Christians that, this war, whose chief weapons are nouveau-speech, redefinition and censorship, is doomed to fail. Why do Christians insist on being distinguished as the folks who walk in the same direction as revolutionaries, only a few yards to the rear? You’ve heard that “slow obedience is no obedience.” But understand this: slow disobedience is still disobedience! Every time a self-described Christian organization adopts the egalitarian style book, they betray their God, His created order, and they give aid and comfort to His enemies.

All my life I witnessed men and women speak and write about men—chairmen, postmen, handymen and mankind—with no offense given or taken. It was only when feminists decided to exploit the one area of philosophical progress of the 20^th century that women were made to feel as if they should be offended. But it was—and is—all as phony as a three dollar bill. There is no offense to any God-created reality—not for His own children!

As long as men are taller, and as long as women insist on marrying taller men-and as long as the first floor of Department Stores are devoted to cosmetics—feminism confesses itself a fraud. Jesus is the Truth. His church is its pillar and foundation—presenting and representing His truth in this world. It’s time for women of both genders to get used to Christian writers and publishers using language which accords not with a fantasy world, but with the one real world which God has made, the same one He pronounced good.

NANC—repent. Seeing how central gender is to identity, if you can’t honor gender differences (even in language), and the callings respective to each of the two genders, why would anyone trust you to help them become more integrated in terms of who they “really” are? There are rules—and exceptions. That language is legitimate which reflects God-imposed rules. Language which subverts those rules is illegitimate. It is language in service to a revolt against His ordinances.

NANC: Repent. Please. Rewrite. Today.

.                                                                                      .

1. He/she, or the recent s/he is, contrary to a self-conferred description, not inclusive but exclusive language. The use of “man” so as to include men, women and children is actual, genuine inclusive language. But make no mistake, the double pronouns and strained possessive cases are temporary. Already the burden has led many publishers to abandon s/he and its cognates in favor of straight up “she,” “her” and more. It seems it wasn’t power that was offensive. It was power that recognized and served the family above abstracted individuals—that power was offensive—or so fools were made to think. In consequence of such thinking, they allowed themselves to be set to war against their own interests, for the profit of  parties other than the fool combatants.

Evolution, of course.

Evolution, we are told, is the neutral, scientific, secular reality which accounts for our being, our here, our being here, and our being here now (not to mention everything else, seen or unseen, known or unknown).

Evolution is the spittoon of the Western classroom, placed in every room to collect the awkward questions and keep them separate from the answers. The wardens are confident that “natural” revulsion will keep away most who might be tempted to look and see if anything that was hawked up and in, was actually paired. “How do you account for…?” “Ach-tooie, uh, evolution.” “And what about…?” “Achtooie, evolution.”

It’s the silent butler, or the butler designed to silence, to catch the crumbs of unanswerable questions and remove them from sight, lest anyone be reminded of all that remains unaccounted for. You know, the incidentals, like meaning, purpose, sacrificial love, unexpected heroism, eyes that see, and informed consciences and mommies.

It’s the dumpster where the memories of oppressive expectations (like performance of duties and fulfilling of roles) are tossed. And despite the “DO NOT RECYCLE” painted prominently on the dumpster’s broad side, those oppressive expectations manage to show up again, often as politically correct slogans which, when uttered, must be greeted with, “Yeah, man,” the “Sieg Heil!” of the 21st Century. Must be greeted with a “yeah, man,” or else. In other days the response was “Amen,” but that has been scuttled lest someone perchance dream there was a defining Word uttered before ours.

This spittoon/butler/dumpster functions also as the reservoir and food pantry from which the raw stuff of all food served in the modern classroom has been retrieved. (So there is much recycling after all!) It’s where the teacher scavenges for an answer when confounded by the wisdom of a 5-year-old who asks, “Where do I come from?” It is said that the answer most used is a location. “You come from Baltimore, Cindy.”

I just want to know how it is that at all times and in all places, the ratio of males/females born ranges from 49/51 to 51/49. Why is that? And please don’t tell me “Baltimore.”

The allure of Evolution is that it promises to account (for the past) without an accounting (in the future).

God punishes improper responses to His Word by binding His enemies to false beliefs and false explanations of things.

I am not sure what you mean by that… (view full text of question in comments section - Interlude II - Credo)

Speaking of knowing: Do I know your name? If not, level the field for me a bit, won’t you?

You had asked me about the relation of ethics and epistemology. I think it is fine if we limit our discussion to this—it is wide enough to have fun in, without ranging off into Natural Law’s existence.

I’m sorry I failed to cite the verses supporting my statements. I had assumed you would connect those circuits yourself, but I see that I should not have assumed. I’m sorry. This should help:

In 2 Thessalonians, you will find the passage I paraphrased. Speaking of certain people who “received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved,” the Holy Spirit says,

Because they refused to love the truth, “God shall send them strong delusion so that they will believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth.” (2:10-11) This really is the Gold Passage on the subject, don’t you think? I suspect you formulated your response to my post as if I was just theologically rambling rather than relying on Scripture. So what we should do from here, after I get your name, is to get your take on the Thessalonians passage. How does this impact your view on the question under discussion? And please do note, emphasizing again the original concern of setting ethics and epistemology in right relation in our thinking, note verse 12. There we learn why it is that these folks were given over to believe a lie, that is, why they refused to love the truth. It was because they “had pleasure in unrighteousness.” The truth didn’t thrill them. Wickedness did. So God said to them, as He did to Israel in the quail episode, “O, is that what you want? Okay. I’ll give it to you. Here! Now choke on it.”

Here we come face to face with a God unimpressed with protestations about “free will.” On another occasion I would like to try to show you why the very notion of “free will” is riotously funny, but I don’t see that it needs to touch our discussion at this stage. My assertions treat of ethics and epistemology, not volition. And on any reading of “free will,” the passage in Thessalonians can be reconciled. For Free Willers, these folk abused their free will, using it to pursue wickedness. This gave God the right to cause them to be arrested by their own sin and to be cast into the House of Lies, their house of detention. You’d need to argue for a sort of freedom that is able to break God’s imposed judgments. By that standard, everyone should be able to will themselves not to suffer or die. No one goes THERE. I am assuming again, but I fear I’d insult you to think any other way. You do recognize that if something comes as a sentence of God, He might indeed lift it, especially if there should be repentance. But we cannot say He is under obligation to give the condemned power to escape their condemnation! We don’t see judges handing AK-47s to those found guilty in their courts, telling them they now have even odds of either going to or escaping from the slammer. There is such a thing as JUST punishment. It is to that that I direct your attention. What can you learn about the relation of ethics and epistemology from the fact that God has told us of His sovereign sending of delusions which render people incapacitated (through their own fault) in so far as their being able to recognize or embrace the truth. This is a really serious question, and one that would help us all to get to know the God Who Is more accurately. He’s that frightening. He is.

Yours and His,

pastor steve

“And to the immoral and wicked, each day brings into clearer relief the relationship between ethics and epistemology.”

Interesting remark. Can you expound on how epistemology and ethics are related? I have followed your stuff before and I don’t remember this emphasis. What do you mean by epistemology? Are you speaking in the Van Til vein? Or epistemology generally?

Thank you for your good question(s). I am tempted to spend the rest of this day answering you; I’m not sure if that would be immoral (wink). Let us briefly, then, dance a cha-cha in the Field of Knowledge. 1, 2, 3.

1. The Enlightenment project sought to trump God in the Knowledge Wars from the outset of the enterprise by relieving Him of any responsibility or relationship to or with our knowing of a thing or things. It actually wasn’t a great leap from our declaration of independence to our barring God from the discussions altogether. Since He had been excluded as a matter of METHOD, the method obviously presupposed autonomy and adequacy. God’s Lordship moves from Sovereign to Trusted Adviser to Hired Consultant to Who-Asked-for-Your-Opinion? The religion of Humanism has brilliantly engineered the seating arrangements for those in their theater, making it appear as if their thinking alone is uncontaminated by religious prejudice. Along with this fantasy comes its concomitant:

“Since we got here without His help (har har hardy har har), we do not need His help now, although, if He wants to agree with us and wish us well, we’ll let Him have a seat—somewhere; perhaps even a seat of honor—so long as He behaves. What we most certainly will not do is share our glory with another. No. This is OUR story, not His. All the evil that ever happened came about because people pretended to speak for this “God” who, by definition, cannot be wrong. To this fairytale belief must be attributed every past and present evil, including mass murder, sexual dysfunction, and insufficient parking spaces in Brooklyn. We’re not going to surrender all our gains by pretending we need Him now. That would be a step backward and worse.”

The Word once confessed to be the light in which we see light has become equated with darkness and ignorance. The light in Enlightenment was distinguished from the darkness which was from the beginning identified with the Word of God and traditions derived therefrom.

Witness the small “e” definition of enlightened: rational, tolerant and well-informed. What a set-up! That’s like an accused thief telling the court that every item found in his possession after the robbery-every item with the victim’s name etched on it-bears in itself the obvious evidence of rightfully belonging to the thief. “Of course it’s mine, your honor. The very fact that it says “from the library of Steve Schlissel” suggests that this egomaniac was jealous of my growing collection and sought to have it regarded as his by a mere engraving of his name. Not only does this prove all these etched items were mine all along, but it also makes the plaintiff guilty of vandalism for defacing my property.” Everything that can be considered as true “evidence” must pass a prior test of being regarded as vindicating the defendant. In order to be regarded as true knowledge, one needs to have begun the acquisition autonomously .

The Enlightenment project is the human-racial continuation of taking from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and by that method, bypassing (we imagine) reliance upon God. (I’m wondering if we haven’t answered your essential question, by the way, simply by recalling here the NAME of the forbidden tree—KNOWING right and wrong, good and evil; in other words, the epistemology of ethics.) The underlying assumption is either a) God is not there so there’s no use waiting for instruction from Him; b) God is there but He has a serious ego problem and regards us as competitors, thus making communications from Him suspect—something like the Patriots coach telling the Giants what their next play ought to be; c) He is there and He means well, but He’s a bumbling communicator and simply unable to help us sort things out—His Word, variously interpreted from Day One (Six?), proves its inadequacy by that very variety. If it were REALLY God’s Word, it would pass all the tests that I’ve conjured beforehand, for, before looking or listening, I’ve firmly decided what qualities God’s Word OUGHT to have if it is indeed to be received as God’s Word. One of those qualities is convincing. If it is to be reckoned as coming from God it must have such power, pertinence and clarity as would make “misunderstanding” impossible.

All of that is merely an updated version of “The woman Thou gavest me…” It is humanity’s ace-long-out-of-the-hole. If there is a problem here, the matter of to whom responsibility can be traced, is obvious. No matter what: it’s God’s fault. The disparities which exist between His Word and our being, thoughts, and activities are only explicable on the basis of His imperfections (or His ignorance or His immorality, etc.).

Since we ARE created by the one true God, we insist that the very notion of our knowing anything independently of our Creator is manifest rubbish. Yet the devil aimed just here when seeking to remove our first parents from their created estate (i.e., in unbroken covenant with God). “Upon what basis shall you assign any particular to the category of ‘Good’ or the category of ‘Evil’?” (Perhaps we should note that, when ontology is added to this discussion—as it must be at some point—we have completed the headings of the principal areas of philosophical concern: Being, Knowing, Right Living.)

As you can see, the question from the beginning has been, “Whose knowledge is true, adequate and comprehensive enough to make Law?” If we speculate about knowledge as if it were distinct from, or unrelated to, Law, we would be engaging in the definitive act of futility: abstracting. God’s knowledge, for us, is no merely theoretical thing, but as intimately related to the what and ought of all, as the Holy Spirit is to the Father and the Son. These may be distinguished. They may NOT be separated.

God demonstrates His right to be the sole Lawmaker by creating the universe. This gives Him a distinct advantage over all competitors’ claims to equal adequacy. You will no doubt recall how this was the focus of God’s rebuke to Job and Co. “Did you make the world? Why then do you talk as if you did?” Until we create ex nihilo, we are doing nothing except playing catch-up (even though, ironically, playing catch-up puts us further and further away from God). The only proper response to the Word of God is to shut the mouth, bow the knee, open the ear. Even kids in the Bible know that. Little Sammy said it all: “Speak, Lord. Your servant is listening.”

Okay, quickly. Number 2 in our discussion about the unbreakable bond between knowledge and ethics would concern the skepticism and cynicism that has engulfed us. The greater our claims to infallible, autonomous knowledge, the deeper the skepticism that characterizes the daily lives of ordinary people. At the beginning of the 20th century, Western Civilization did not believe (as Hebrews 11 describes it). At the beginning of the 21st century, we disbelieve. An interesting byproduct of our disbelief has been the tyranny of the experts. This glorious human race that knows so much by itself that it doesn’t have need of a god, this same race daily becomes more insecure about anything and everything it thinks it knows. Just as God is boxed out of the legal, educational, and entertainment spheres, so also is knowledge gained by generational experience considered worthless.

There are few areas untouched by this pathetic slavery to experts, but one standout area that has provided the most compelling proof that moderns don’t know their tuchases from their elbows is child-rearing, particularly pedagogy. It’s enough to know that it worked for a thousand years to disqualify it for continued use. The tried and true is, for that reason, regarded as false. If a method successfully prepared literate and thoughtful citizens since 1776, it is sure to be scrapped in favor of the novel, the inane, or the insane. When it comes to modern school policies, from the rejection of phonics to the subjective “rightness” of wrong answers in mathematics, parents who follow the “experts” can count on just one thing: that their children will be ignorant and morally degenerate when they complete the requisite 12 years of preparing for four more years of drunken parties and STD’s.

(How should we rank our collective response to AIDS when evaluating the quality of particular evidences which illustrate and prove the inextricable bond between ethics and epistemology? It must be near the top, no? We KNOW, beyond a doubt, we KNOW the answer available to EVERYONE, which, if accepted and adopted, would provide a virtual guarantee that you would NOT get AIDS. [We are aware of the statistically miniscule likelihood of accidental contagion, but even that small group would be made smaller by the large-scale doing of deeds in keeping with repentance.] Yet, because the solution involves self-control and moral living, it is rejected out-of-hand. We have made the decision that we must NEVER instruct our youth that there are inescapable consequences attached to certain behaviors and choices. We have nationally accepted the fact that the truth is of no value in combating the so-called “plague of the 21st century.” Sufferers in the Great Plague that decimated Europe would have regarded it as nothing less than a complete miracle-by marrying as virgins and then remaining faithful to your respective spouse, you will successfully escape “the plague.” Yet moderns regard that price as insufferably high. It is rejected before it is proposed.)

Any alien peeking into the homes of today’s Yuppy parents would think that no preceding generation had ever had children, so entire is their reliance on new methods of child-rearing. Spanking? Abuse. Forbidden socially, soon by law. Yelling? Out. Displeasure? Debatable. That this radical fear of punishing is cause-effect connected to the guilty consciences of this generation of parents is not discussed. It is simply assumed that effective discipline is equivalent to barbaric discipline. These moms and pops are enlightened! What’s enlightening is to hear the names the three and four-year-olds call their parents in public spaces whenever the little wretches hear that most hated of all words (”No”).

3) A third area you might want to consider in assessing the relationship of knowledge and morality is that which is suggested by God’s bringing of judgment upon willful sinners to “believe the lie.” As an exercise, why don’t you write a brief essay drawing out some implications? God punishes improper responses to His Word by binding His enemies to false beliefs and false explanations of things. What does that imply about what we “know”—if anything? Please do write a piece, short or long, then send it along to me as an encouragement by which I can know that my reply justified the time put into it. Or else I’ll feel guilty. Let’s figure stuff out together. Waddayasay?

Thanks again,

pastor steve

There are limits to everything.

Aren’t there? Well, there used to be. Or so it seemed. But I can’t tell if there are any still in place. And, I wonder, if there are limits, what they might be?

Every sunrise brings new reasons to believe Leonard Cohen was in an inspired, prophetic estate when he wrote his magnus opus, The Future. Looking at the prospects of Western and world civilization, the Canadian Jewish poet/alt-cocker-rocker wrote:

Things are going to slide, slide in all directions;

Won’t be nothing

Nothing you can measure anymore

The blizzard, the blizzard of the world

Has crossed the threshold and it has overturned

The order of the soul

One could say Cohen’s is an expansion and application of Dostoyevsky’s great truism: “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.” Whence limits in an unregulated world of total possibility?—where phantasmal global warming and ill-coursed meteors are the only potential spoilers permitted consideration. Speak not of judgment to come! But Mankind’s real worry ought to be about “moral warming,” the state of affairs that replaces the bishop’s chair when the pleasure of our corporate “Amen-ing” of each of God’s Words has gone missing with Him.

And His absence was very much by man’s design. For the LORD God was given an eviction notice 150, even 200 years ago. He was informed that any reality He seeks to invade must be limited to men’s closets. The Public Spaces—by which was meant every sphere of life except the realm where personal opinions or private delusions grow, so long as these are judged to have no affect on one’s neighbors—all activity in the Public Spaces would henceforth and forever be regulated by man’s own sense of fairness and the common good. The Public Square would be under the strict regulatory powers of man qua Man. Any legislation perceived to have its origin in the mind of God, is, for that very reason, deemed unfit to become public policy. All discussions must begin and end with statistics gleaned from instruments subject entirely to man’s control. “Thus saith the Lord,” is thereby made equivalent to, “Thus saith the exiled monarch,” the one we tried to do away with entirely when He appeared to be within our reach two thousand years ago. We remember it well. We number the years of the Common Era from that noble effort to make Barabbas king. Well, it might be so that we couldn’t keep that Jesus dead, but at least we can keep Him off His throne (we think).

Moral warming becomes inevitable when God is declared not to exist. Because such a declaration is too provocative as long as cathedrals stand, a more polite way of saying the same thing was sought. The winner was, “God may or may not exist, but the wheels of government, time, life and Microsoft cannot be expected to sit idly by while that existence is debated.” Thus God was granted provisional existence, so long as He did not interfere with progress. He was permitted to mind His business as long as that posed no restraints on us in the conduct of ours. And everything we thought, said or did was our business, not His.

When such a state of affairs is believed to actually be, moral absolutes are gutted. The sharp gives way to the round, the sure to the perhaps, condemnation to approbation. Anything goes. Cole Porter didn’t tell the half of it. We have come to the place where the solid, deep and stable truths, which provide both framework and shape, support and hope, for life—the kind of life lived by Creatures—these truths are liquidated. In the meantime, the fluorocarbons of evolutionism and egalitarianism deplete the ozone of our consciences. People in the proverb business will be offering many revocalizations of Dostoyevsky’s truth in the coming days, as that proposition born of a seer’s contemplation is incarnated. When it is beheld by all, then it will be described as a result of observation, not speculation. Then it will be assessed in the light of the “is” as opposed to the likely, or the could-be. Poets and artists will wrap the phenomenon with descriptions as mothers wrap their babies with clothes before venturing out on a chilly day.

Nevertheless, to the gleg, each day brings vast amounts of instruction. That’s why I periodically cancel my subscription to the New York Times. Information overload. File cabinets stuffed. Take your data elsewhere.

You know, of course, that the data I refer to is not the pleasant 17% of The Times’ text which delights, informs, broadens, engages, enhances and/or enlightens. The overload occurs with the 83% which appears as self-conscious political propaganda, the so-called “news” that is, in fact and effect, a guidebook directing disparate anti-American and anti-Christian troops where they should apply the next wave of pressure if they are to effectively destroy yet another limit.

And to the immoral and wicked, each day brings into clearer relief the relationship between ethics and epistemology. Wanna talk some more about this? Prove it.

We had been lamenting Andy Kuyvenhoven’s triumph over truth when he had converted a victory of communication in the cause of righteousness into just another lost cause.

I don’t know how to catch up explaining to my children and my students all they need to know if they are to keep at least one foot in the real world. They are daily assaulted by falsities (falsies? that’s a Holden Caulfield flashback!), half-truths, and actual-truths-made-vicious by having been set in false contexts. What set me on this tangent was the need I felt to explain how vitally important is the role of Mediator in all of life. That role is made more critical when the Mediator simultaneously serves as Instructor to the masses and the Sole Definer & Conveyor of what may/ought-to-be taken as fact or reality.

Chicago–the group, not the city–sang, Color My World. We live in a world where virtually all residents, Christians included, have given to non-Christians the responsibility to color God’s world for us. Each morning we pick up the paper, and each night we invite talking heads to tell us, what are the borders, contours, colors, shapes, and events of the world, along with any and all implications and meaning which might be found therein. This awesome responsibility is entrusted to an unelected group known collectively as Media, but who we’d better start thinking of and calling Mediators. Standing between a world of people-viewers and a world of people-in-events, the Mediators inform all as to what is, what happened and what it all means. (Is what they DON’T report on beginning to become significant to you?) What is real? What is history? What meaning is there? You can only put together words from letters known to be available. If every story which we take as God-decreed and signified (in some way or another), is presented as having both existence and meaning apart from any mention of God, how long before the world of events is seen as having wholly independent existence, a wide domain perfectly explicable without any god. The most that could be said for a deity in the setting created by autonomous Mediators would be that he’s a deus ex machina which some people rely upon for closure. Do practitioners of Americanity ever consider that there’s a difference between a deity who may or may not exist and a God who is the indispensable presupposition of all intelligible predication? Not if their methods of gathering news is to be counted as evidence.

Though Scripture quite significantly tells us that God has appointed just one Mediator between God and man, Christians have come to believe that Christ’s mediation, if it is appropriate in any sphere, is best left confined to just one: the religious. The rest of life, despite being in equal need of Christ’s mediation, we demand be mediated to us by pleasant looking people who smile a lot. Though they be ever fronting for products, corporations, special interests and private agendas, we allow an occasional hollow claim to neutrality to serve as proof that they are. They are, in fact, as neutral as Pharaoh when confronted with the claims of Jehovah: “Who is the Lord that I should obey Him?” (You’ll find out.) In a world created by God, who put His signature everywhere, and branded all things as the work of His hands–in a world created by the God who is revealed in man more fully and magnificently (twisted and distorted as man might be by sin), a world where the suppression of the knowledge of God is an arduous, wearying but deemed necessary task, neutrality is a pure impossibility. Everywhere confronted by God, relying on Him for all, we pretend that His claims are open matters in no need of swift resolution. It is clever, when Henry steals Fred’s house and car and sleeps with Fred’s wife, to demand that Fred prove to you, Henry, his prior claim to that which you’ve stumbled upon and usurped, but it’s a ploy destined to become just one more indictment on the day you are called to give account. The point of all this is, simply to say, the people we’ll hire to tell us what is real are people who have either sworn to Henry’s lies or promised Henry never to mention Fred’s true claims.

The importance of the roles played in our societies by these Mediators of reality is difficult to calculate. Perhaps it can be apprehended when we consider that, of all the things which happen in a given day in the created universe, the whittling down of them all to a few which are to be regarded as newsworthy inescapably involves discrimination, if not plain censorship. Why, for example, does persecution of Muslims after 911 count as news when the slaughter of Christians by Muslims across a vast swathe of Africa does not? Aside from culling, the designating of some events only as newsworthy involves the imposition of judgments concerning relative value (which in turn require a belief, always unstated, in some sort of Absolute value). You couldn’t report everything if you wanted to. Once you limit your content to that which could be conveyed/digested in a reasonable amount of time, a huge amount of sifting has already taken place. And we are permitted neither to know nor to view the standard employed in sifting.

It’s rather frightening to think of how naïve Christians continue to be regarding these simple, accessible truths. They simply trust that the news being reported is real news, worthy of noting, discussing, being commenting upon–and that it is in fact news without and apart from an agenda functioning as a FILTER, keeping certain KINDS of stories out while insuring that stories of another type, which serve the agenda, get in. The mass media are very, very aware that the infallible way to advance any given agenda is simply to ignore the venerable opposition. Who appointed Al Sharpton as a spokesman from Negroes of the Northeast? Certainly not Negroes of the Northeast. But the time in front of the camera taken up by the Allege-a-rev necessarily means that Thomas Sowell has NOT been sought out nor presented as that voice. When feminism was making its desperately important first moves–as a renewed and invigorated, reality-manipulating force–it was a commonplace to have a story presented as a news item with which women should be concerned. I remember how the major outlets (really censoring stations) routinely called upon a spokesman for the National Organization for Women to provide “the women’s reaction” to such and such a piece. No one was granted the opportunity to vote for the candidate who would be selected as the presumed “legitimate” representative of the newly identified and ever-manipulated power group. This was a power reserved for the media-elite alone.

Thus my daily infuriation, as a topic would be artificially dragged to the fore only so it would serve as a catalyst demanding, in turn, the ushering in of an expert to provide comment or opinion. Not a handful of people, watching the news like lambs led to truth’s slaughter, allowed themselves to question why N.O.W., an organization of 50,000 ugly bra-burners, was put front and center in every American living room to rub in the latest toxin through the brain pores of silly, uncritical humans, while Concerned Women of America, comprised of upwards of two million women, was treated as if it did not exist. But even when CWA spokeswomen were ushered in, networks acted as if they were the soul of fairness by giving CWA views equal time with N.O.W. views (a practice long since abandoned; now the N.O.W. views are the only recognized women’s views). Curiously, the same principles never govern coverage of people like Ron Paul. Does his lawful presence and perseverance in a race mean that his views should be given equal time with those of opposing Republicrats? Ha! CWA, an organization far more likely, if membership numbers in a free society suggest anything, to represent views reflective of the those held by American women, is, AT BEST, treated as though its 40-to-1 membership advantage is of no relevance when the Mediators are selecting a “spokesman” for women.

Because this bias toward a particular agenda is performed cleanly, out of sight, off camera, before the news ever airs; because it is passive, integrated beforehand, treated as if a presupposition, Americans watching “the news” are actually submitting their brains for reprogramming. The ONLY way to watch the news in America, or in totalitarian nations worldwide, is with firm disbelief. But because we have a God-given instinct to connect with those addressing us, to begin relationships with trust rather than cynicism, to graciously grant a presumption in favor of a person’s integrity–because we are programmed to presume that well-spoken people who sound sincere ARE sincere, because we ESPECIALLY regard good looking people as good folk, the manipulation of determining who may be a spokesman for whom becomes just one more tactic in a sea of tactics designed to convey impressions as if these were truth itself. Indeed, truth itself–and the consequence which ought to be bound up with truth alone, viz., epistemological certainty–are, in our culture, judged by the style in which the content was delivered rather than by any objective or verifiable data supporting it. By donning the most elegant attire, by being given prominent places at the information banquets, falsehoods come finally to be accepted as unchallengeable, “Everybody knows that” truths. In reality, nobody even knows what hit them. And OJ Simpson was innocent.

I digress along the path of the above not because I want to persuade my fellow-Christians to shut off TV news, period–even though they should–but rather because I would like my fellow believers, especially parents, to understand that MEDIATORS COUNT–big time. Mediators are those who stand between history, reality and truth, on the one hand, and those who want to know what happened, what will happen, and why. I will resist the temptation to offer a fuller exposé of what the news, by itself, alone, can succeed in doing to the critical faculties of our young people, and blurt instead that perception is what now functions in place of “truth”.

This deserves a pause. People of principle generally seek to take actions in accord with what they know to be true. They try not to be governed by whim, fashion, trend or other baser motives. “Good people” generally seek to act in accordance with what they believe are deep and strong and well-grounded convictions. But when PERCEPTION (the flip side of appearance) replaces TRUTH as the standard for what may be collectively regarded as REAL, the huckster’s job has become infinitely easier. The people can be moved to action more easily, for all they required as a predicate was an impression, a perception.

Alvin Plantinga, Epistemologist Extraordinaire, was taken on his own turf. Andy Kuyvenhoven, without any difficulty, simply by lifting a clause from its context in my speech, and featuring the clause as if it were the whole speech, led those sheep who are moved to action by impression rather than truth, he led them where he wanted them to go. The spin was in. Alvin’s utter brilliance and rigorous training were no match for a huckster, because Alvin had not yet seen that his implicit trust in Mediators had paved the way for a reduction in the standard for warranted belief. If that’s what happens to the best and brightest, what chance do Charlie and Margaret Spinhoven, the Everymen of the CRC, have?

When the standard for regarding something as real falls to mere perception, the satisfying of the craving for truth among the meat-eaters becomes painfully difficult. People who require truth before they act are left on the sideline twiddling their thumbs. The absence of truth means people with the higher standard will not act at all, for they act only when they act upon known truth. Those who have been taught that action is justified on the basis of perception will act when that standard is satisfied. In this way, the news turns out to be recruitment programming. Each day, hundreds of millions of Americans pick up the morning paper, and/or come home to turn on the idiot box, asking of the Mediators: “What happened today?” They are then (especially in the evening) treated to technologically sumptuous multimedia manipulation. It is not much of a contest: despite having heard about huge integrity “lapses” by media (organizations and individuals), Americans, helped by the handsome Mediators, recall only the lapses of “religious” or political leaders.

Let me tell you the bottom line. Watching TV news is participating in anti-Christian catechism. Discussing “the news” around the water cooler or on the subway, or over the cubicle, Americans are participating in catechism reinforcement exercises. They leave unasked any question not already in their catechism. The fact that Mediators do not–and arguably cannot–present alternative interpretive schemes as providing more satisfactory answers or conclusions, does not prevent practitioners of Americanity from believing that they’ve come away with the truth.

It gets worse–really. Because people are what God–and many Christians–say they are, and they are NOT what secularist evolutionary humanists say they are, the rituals which secularists scorn as vestiges of superstition, are actually inescapable instincts woven into man’s being. Everyone indoctrinates their offspring into their religion, even if it’s a syncretistic patchwork. All people participate in rituals, and all people require those under their authority to participate in rituals–RELIGIOUS RITUALS–which reinforce and bring into relief the us/them power inherent in the religion’s distinctive views. Watching the nightly news and reading the morning NY Times are attendance at catechism, where the whole nation is drilled in the wisdom of the world, and taught to apply the faith, first by becoming sufficiently suspicious of all religions which deviate from the one taught by the major stations.

(What are the odds that, given the innumerable events occurring on any given day around THE WORLD, that three massively funded network news teams, operating independently, would choose the SAME lead story, the same #2 and #3 stories–in fact, what are the odds that all three would carry the same stories in the same position relative to the broadcast schedule, and with the same spin, not simply on one incredible day of coincidence, but every day, 5-7 days per week, 52 weeks per year, year after year? Who has so little grey matter that they could fail to see in these exercises what amounts to inquisitorial control of the interpretation of reality?! Do you think America’s devotion to these anti-Christian catechetical rituals might have something to do with why CHRISTIANS are so trusting toward those blood-sworn to destroy them, so submissive to those dedicated to warring against them and their professed God every step of the way? Do you think it is only in Public Schools that such RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION takes place? EVERYTHING is religious. In a God-created world there could not possibly be any area of neutrality.)

Please understand–I am not speaking by way of metaphor when I refer to commercial television and its news programs as Mediators of an anti-Christian religion. I mean it “literally” or at least, without a need to grasp for an accounting of any aspect or dimension of what occurs in these rituals (process or content) beyond or beside what occurs in the most rigorous Christian catechetical instruction leading to confirmation. It is Worldview Training, 100%. The water coolers are where on-the-spot-quizzes are given to make sure everyone has been attending catechism. Job interviews, and an increasingly greater portion of on-the-job-training sessions, are devoted to assuring that everyone in the system has adopted to heart the religion of the system–adopted in their hearts the Doctrinal Confessions of Baal and Ashtoreth, learned by rote the Catechism of Unbelief, and sworn themselves to the maintenance of the anti-Antithesis, offering as incense pinches to Caesar expressions of scorn for the Confession of the Churches, starting with its obnoxious notion that there is such a God who chooses and determines things, or who is laughably believed capable of ruling or overruling in the affairs of men. They are tested for remnants of faith in a God who speaks reliable truth, a God who thinks He is right AND that all who oppose Him are WRONG, by definition. When a surviving heretic is discovered, when the insufferable remnants of vestigial Christianity are detected, the body politic immediately goes into self-preservation mode. This requires, above all else, immediate expulsion of the heretic, or, minimally, isolation of the heretic by shunning and deprivation of privilege. In some cases (where the appearance of tolerance and a readiness to forgive are thought to be called for), a subjection to extra brainwashing sessions is permitted as the sanction. By these sessions the Priests of Baal make one more attempt to save the heretic’s soul. After all, if anyone should be found wandering from the path, he who rescues his brother and brings him back to the faith openly confessed, covers a multitude of sins.

But our society, we are told, is NOT religious, has no national catechism, no tests of faith. Uh-huh. And Jackie Gleason is the man in the moon. The religion competing with the Judaeo-Christian faith in the Public Square is a lying, ruthless, carnal beast, filled with insatiable covetousness and envy, lusts run amok, and a set of commandments, rigorously enforced, including a requirement not only to turn the face away from the Christian God, but to turn away from any of His apparent children. They are taught to run away, not only from Christians, but from any other dangerous heretic who believes in such a thing as knowable truth, a single God, a knowable history, or any message which implies that man needs to make any material changes, especially changes which might require suppression or management of those instincts which man has singled out as his compensation for suffering in this vale of tears the true God created.

Of course, by shutting out God and His representatives, the designs and goals of the Humanists are brought into obvious relief. What emerges is a message in which we hear them putting us on notice, warning us of the vicious intolerance that awaits any who even secretly harbor heresies in their hearts. Made patent, too, is their insistence that one god only be acknowledged, praised or worshipped in the Public Square. And the ONLY requirement needing to be fulfilled by any candidate for acknowledged deity is this: that He not bear or lay claim to the Name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Thus has America, sanctified as an offering to God by our fathers who came here expressly to serve Him, become a place devoted to the eradication of Jehovah worship. While the roots accounting for this dramatic change go back to the Garden of Eden, the forms used for soldier recruitment and the means employed for their training have resulted in a phenomenal acceleration of victories accumulated by the devil. If there is a form more pernicious than the regarding of Mediators as a neutral concern, I don’t know how we might find an accounting for the thoroughness of this change of religion we have witnessed in our generation. We allowed any spokesman, regardless of consideration of their credentials, free access to our children, in schools all day and at home for the balance of hours of life.

We have entered the terminal stage. That is when the means of indoctrination have become invisible, for all are thought to be simply normal parts of the landscape. “Why, that’s not indoctrination! That’s education!” Or, “That’s not indoctrination! That’s entertainment.” Yes. It is. Screwtape and Wormwood are rolling in the aisles.

Are Curves and Straight Lines Interchangeable?

Brilliance, Perception, Lenses, and the Christian Reformed Church

Having come across an article I found to be a true treat, intellectually, I asked Craig, the Go-To-Man at Messiah’s, if he would mind calling Alvin Plantinga to get permission for us to post it on the Net, or perhaps reprint it. While Dr. Plantinga graciously granted permission, for his part (there are other parties who must also grant permission), he brought back unpleasant memories of days in the Christian Reformed Church. It was the late eighties when the spin doctors luxuriated in their power, not only in national and international media, but also in small editorial positions, like that enjoyed by Andy Kuyvenhoven as editor of the Banner, the denominational magazine of the CRC.

Andy was as charming a Dutchman as you were likely to meet; I always found him winsome in person, quick, clever, able to do repartee with most Jews of my acquaintance (a serious compliment). I recall talking with him once outside Calvin College auditorium about feminism or some such. He said, “Communism, Plagiarism, the only -ism we should be concerned with preserving is Calvinism.” I think it can be explained by his having spent too many freezing nights working the oil fields in Alberta, but his deadpan left me lost as to whether he was serious or about to wink. It’s probably that which keeps him in a pleasant file cabinet in my mind, despite the fact that his editorship often infuriated me (and many others).

Andy was of that school of journalism that thinks editors are missionaries, but their mission is to stir. This could be a welcome blessing, or just as easily a disposition Satan would very much like to recruit in his service. To challenge the mostly Dutch immigrant churches of the CRC to think seriously about the meaning of their American past and future, his most infamous cover was a pair of wooden shoes–on fire. That was a pretty hostile swipe at a mere cultural expression. Was he serious, or was he going over the top so that the point could be made without daring to take him seriously? God knows, and Andy knew. I didn’t.

Anyway, as I was saying, he loved to stir the pot and get everyone riled and talking. He was the Banner editor during most of my 15 minutes. It was 1987 and I had just delivered a very well received speech to Concerned Members of the CRC, gathered in a large convention in South Holland, IL. During that speech, I sought to make a point using an illustration. Suppose there is a wayward child, always daring God and parents to discipline him, if for no other reason than to protect the child from himself. The child so frequently provoked disciplinary instincts that at last the parent could not envision continuing the struggle. I compared that child to the CRC’s bureaucrats who were determined to take her down a latitudinarian and death-tempting trail. Envisioning the point where the parent (in this case, the weary conservatives in the CRC) just gives up, I had them saying, “Go ahead. Go ahead. Have your whores at the seminary, your evolutionists at Calvin College. I don’t care anymore. Just leave me alone.”

I’d have to listen to that speech to tell you exactly how, but I can tell you that it sure seemed clear to me that I was talking about executives and teachers at the seminary (and college and at 2850 Kalamazoo Avenue Headquarters) who dared to defy the confessional integrity of Calvin Sem (and other agencies) in a full, frontal assault on the treasured convictions of the money-base in the CRC, flagrantly revising the confessional understanding of Creation—and Scripture’s testimony to the same, as well as the Bible’s general character as a conveyor of God’s will, Word and wonders. This they were doing without benefit of discussion or synodical vote. Rather, they introduced their poison surreptitiously, by means of mere political positioning, and that done dishonestly. They would flatly deny to inquiring supporters that any such changes or revisions had ever been discussed, let alone promulgated, and these denials were issued while they were getting themselves and their cronies into place. After securing those power positions—from which they could not be easily moved— they would suddenly, freely and aggressively confess their agenda, always implying that they undertook the entire subterfuge “for love of our denomination.” I despised them then, and I cannot but despise them now. They were marked by an utter lack of integrity—or brains. I had trouble deciding which accounting would be less offensive, but I was sure it was one or the other: they are too stupid to understand how the devil is using them, or they were being quite deliberate in their plan to seize control of the denominational infrastructure.
Since I always knew what I meant when I mentioned the “whores at the seminary,” I confess to being more than a little shocked when the Banner covered the Concerned Members assembly by declaring in a headline that Schlissel had called all “female seminarians” whores! WHAT!? Where did they get that from? Not content to allow Andy Spinhoven have the last lying word, I called the seminary president and told him of the false report. I asked for the names of every female seminarian so that I might send a personal, handwritten explanation of the truth, along with a humble apology for any grief they may have suffered properly attributable to me. Of course, since I said no such thing, that apology should have come from Andy. Ha!
So why is all this whirring around my brain just now? Because when Craig asked Alvin if we could use his great essay, Dr. Plantinga said he was inclined to allow it “even though Schlissel had called his daughters whores.” There are several instructive lessons in this occurrence. The one that interests me the most is how even an epistemologist could be so unaware of the flimsy basis of what he thought he knew. “But,” you’ll say, “it was simply because he operated on the news he had received.”
Perhaps. But I don’t think so. I think it can be traced to Plantinga’s own feminist inclinations and a choice he made, on some level or other, to remember the events the way he did. Now whether or not that is the accounting for his misperception, I still find it fascinating how even the most aware and brilliant people on the planet, even devout, brilliant Christians, can be so sadly mistaken about realities in front of their noses. When epistemologists can’t sort out what they know from what they think they know, we’d do well to consider the power of the delusion that is at work in feminism. God willing, I’ll give more details in the next turn of the wheel.
steve

We’ve nearly concluded a lengthy sermon series on POWER. It is, itself, part of a longer series on INESCAPABLES. By inescapables we mean things or categories or realities that no one can avoid in life. We have in mind, more narrowly, those categories and entities which we “religious people” are accused of making use of which our more enlightened, “secular” colleagues do not, having escaped the need for such things as atonement, they say, through normal evolutionary growth. “When we Westerners were children,” they might be heard saying, “we certainly believed in religion. How else were we to explain the inexplicable? We were without the means—the technologies and mechanics—as well as wanting in adequate theories and postulates. Of course we attributed an object falling to the Deity of Down, but Newton got us out of the batter’s box and we began making contact with the bases. The whole playing field opened up for us. In the several hundred years since the Enlightenment, the questions man asks have changed nearly entirely. Then we looked at what was and wondered, ‘Why?’ Now we look it what might be and ask, ‘Why not?’ (With that wink and nod to Bobby Kennedy, we turn our kepela to acknowledge our debt to Virginia Slims for helping us articulate—without recourse to metaphoric light years—the distance traversed by man since Newton: You’ve come a long way, baby! Yes, that says it.) We’ve no longer any need for religion, except in so far as it serves as a psychosocial balm to ease distress and fear resulting from the responsibilities which we have found accompanying our fantastic discoveries. Man, or I should say, Humankind, has more than flirted with Aquarius. We’ve dang-near mated. Everything will be coming up roses soon, and when it does, we’ll have ourselves and science to thank, not the Deity of Down, or Up, or Trees, or Whatever. Man, er, Humankind is the measure of all things. Well, me! I almost found myself saying, ‘Amen’!”

Against this sort of tripe, we aver that the categories necessary for man to find coherence and meaning—not to mention relief from fear—have not changed since they’ve been experienced in Eden, and ever onward, treated in Holy Scripture, and given voice through the great theological and systematizing efforts of the Church, particularly in the West. The need for atonement, for example, is simply inescapable.

R.J. Rushdoony was doubtless often brilliant, but rarely more so than when he nailed the truths concerning inescapable categories. He wisely began his Systematic Theology with essays recycled from an earlier period in which he explained that INFALLIBILITY is a concept shared by all, not just the “religious.” He explained the same in regard to systematization of knowledge. It can’t be helped, it will be done, either well or poorly. But it will be done.

Likewise, Rush exposed the methods by which modern man seeks atonement. This was done with bracing clarity in the first chapters of POLITICS OF GUILT AND PITY. No one should be permitted to counsel another (or himself) who has not first read how sadism and masochism arise not in a vacuum but as a result of failure to find the downward-spiral-breaking power of Jesus Christ, the Lord.

All right. I’m done. It’s 2am and I have a meeting at 6am. Perhaps I’ll be of more use to others if I got a wink to go with all these nods, above.