R. Albert Mohler Jr.'s Blog, page 343
September 29, 2014
September 26, 2014
Jenkins Center Panel Discussion on the Christian Understanding of Islam
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Transcript: The Briefing 09-26-14
The Briefing
September 26, 2014
This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
It’s Friday, September 26, 2014. I’m Albert Mohler and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
1) Resignation of influential and controversial Eric Holder reminder of importance of elections
The announcement came yesterday that US Attorney General Eric Holder would resign his office. This ends one of the longest tenures of any Attorney General of the United States and it brings to an end one of the most historically significant. Significant in the first place because Attorney General Holder is the first African-American to play this very decisive role in the American political system. The Attorney General. is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States of America, and the Attorney General is, constitutionally, the attorney who acts on behalf of the United States.
But Eric Holder will also be remembered as one of the most significant Attorneys General in the history of United States because the of many of the positions that he took, and the policies he established in his long tenure. Because Eric Holder will certainly be remembered as one of the most radical Attorneys General in the nation’s history.
That was made clear in an article about his tenure published in today’s edition of the Seattle Times. Writing for McClatchy’s Washington Bureau, Michael Doyle, William Douglas, and Lesley Clark wrote
“The Columbia Law School graduate was the first African American to lead the Justice Department. During his tenure, the department dealt with major issues, including civil rights, crime, same-sex marriage and terrorism.”
The very next paragraph of the article reads like this,
“He had setbacks: He was forced to drop plans to try a major terrorism suspect in New York, for example, and was found in contempt by the U.S. House of Representatives for refusing to turn over documents in an investigation of a Justice operation gone bad.”
That operation, of course, was known by the codename “Fast and Furious.” As the McClatchy article in the Seattle Times makes clear, he had “investing considerable time and effort on civil rights, voting rights and drug-sentencing issues, scoring wins in several areas.”
But Christians considering the tenure of Eric Holder will be reminded the fact that he was the Attorney General who ordered the Justice Department, under the direction of President Barack Obama, to cease defending the Defense of Marriage Act. This was a remarkable act by an Attorney General of the United States. The constitutional role the Attorney General and the oath of office requires the Attorney General to uphold the law of the land. And Congress had passed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996; it was signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton after both houses of Congress had passed the legislation overwhelmingly. But the Attorney General, acting under the direction of President Obama, ordered the entire federal government to cease defending the Defense of Marriage Act.
That act, known as DOMA, defines marriage for the purposes of the federal government as exclusively the union of a man and a woman. And the Attorney General’s decision no longer to defend DOMA set up the situation that led to the Supreme Court decision in the Windsor case in June 2013 whereby a majority of that court struck down DOMA as unconstitutional. That is one of the landmark decisions for same-sex relationships and eventually for same-sex marriage in the nation’s history. And of course, we’re also looking at something else; we’re looking at the fact that this Attorney General also gave advice to the Attorneys General of the 50 states suggesting that they too should consider ceasing any effort to defend various forms of legislation and constitutional amendments in those states that would also have defined marriage as exclusively the union of a man and a woman.
The Attorney General is an inherently controversial figure. And as he retires after a very long tenure – not unprecedented, but unusual in that office – he leaves having left a lasting impression not only on the Justice Department, but on the nation as a whole. That’s why many people be watching very carefully to see who will succeed him in that very important role. Once again, President Obama will make the nomination. But this resignation comes as midterm elections are arriving in November, and the composition of the United States Senate may be very different then after that election than it is now, and there is no doubt that it will be a new Senate, however comprised after the 2014 elections, that will establish whether or not President Obama’s nominee is confirmed and will take office.
This points again to the fact that these midterm elections are exceedingly important. It is rumored, at least by many, that the Attorney General scheduled his resignation in order – at least in part – to activate the Democratic base to understand just how important it is for that constituency to maintain control of the United States Senate. But Attorney General Holder also reminds us of the fact that the Attorney General, like so many other strategic positions in our federal system of government, is inherently tied to the election of the President of the United States. One of the most important political adages of American history is this; elections have consequences. And one of the consequences of electing Barack Obama president in 2008 was that the Justice Department came under the leadership of Eric Holder. He was a champion and a hero to many in the civil rights movement and especially to those in the Democratic left, including the proponents of same-sex marriage. He also became a symbol for everything that was wrong with the Obama Administration’s approach to the law, to marriage, and to the role of the Justice Department in the federal system of government.
There is no doubt that the Attorney General of the United States plays a very crucial role. And when you look at the history of this country and understand that several of the individuals who upheld that office have had a decisive impact on their own times. That certainly will be true of Eric Holder, and as we are reminded that elections have consequences, we are also pointed once again to the fact that when we look at our system of government, it matters greatly who sits in the most important chairs. Behind the most important desk. And that is not limited to the Oval Office, though it certainly begins there.
2) Southern Baptist Executive Committee rightly disfellowships from ‘Third Way” church
Meanwhile, as the week comes to an end, it’s important we recognize that one of the most important events of the week, in terms of American Christian life, was the fact that the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention voted unanimously this week to decide that the New Heart Community Church in La Mirada California, to use the language of the committee, “does not presently meet the definition of a cooperating church.” That technical language means that the Executive Committee, voting on behalf of the Southern Baptist Convention, decided that this church in California is no longer a Southern Baptist congregation. When the Southern Baptist Convention met in Baltimore in June of this year, the denomination had just learned days before that the New Heart Community Church had affirmed its pastor in declaring the congregation to be a ‘Third Way’ church in the issue homosexuality, in effect allowing for the affirmation of same-sex sexuality and relationships.
In an hour-long video that was posted to the New Heart Community Church’s website, the pastor, Danny Cortez, explained his personal change of mind on the question of homosexuality and traced his journey back to a beach day in August 2013, when “I realized I no longer believed in the traditional teachings regarding homosexuality.” As the pastor told his story, he related the fact that he told his then 15-year-old son of his decision only to hear from his son a simple declaration: “Dad, I’m gay.”
In short order, other events transpired. Drew Cortez, Danny Cortez’s son, posted a coming-out video on YouTube. Pastor Cortez then told his congregation of his change of mind on homosexuality. He told his church, as he acknowledged, that his change was a ‘radical shift’ (to use his own words) that put him at odds with the historic understanding the Christian church, and also with the Southern Baptist Convention’s confession of faith, the Baptist Faith and Message. Eventually, the church would split over the issue. Those who remained declared their intention to affirm the pastor and become the ‘Third Way’ church that he proposed, allowing for disagreement on the question of the sinfulness of homosexual acts and same-sex marriage.
As I argued with the church made its announcement, there is no third way. A church or denomination will either believe and teach that same-sex behaviors and relationships are sinful, or it will affirm them. In short order, every single congregation in America will face the very same decision. The question is this; do we affirm same-sex relationships or not? Those who suggest that there is some way around this supposedly binary choice are fooling themselves and they’re confusing the church. Consider this; the only way to construct a third way is to suggest that one can allow for the affirmation of homosexuality without actually affirming it. That simply doesn’t work. To allow an affirmation is to make the affirmation.
This was the sad lesson that was learned by conservatives in the Church of England on the question of women priests. The third way presented then to the Church of England promised that those who believed that women should not be priests could coexist within the church with those who affirmed that women should be priests. The problem is that the church had to decide who would be priests – and they decided for the ordination of women. Thus, the third way was just an argument to get to the eventual goal that the church would have women priests. The ‘Third Way’ disappears really quickly when the church has to decide if it will recognize or celebrate a same-sex marriage. There’s no third way when that decision arrives. And there are limitless decisions that will eventually have to be made.
It’s really important to understand the documentation in this case. The deacons of New Heart Community Church sent a letter to the SBC Executive Committee, and in the letter the church affirmed once again its decision to be a ‘Third Way’ congregation, arguing that even as some members of the church affirm same-sex marriage the church itself had taken no position on the question. The church, said the deacons has “no official stance on same-sex marriage.” But, amazingly enough, that very senates was followed by a section of their letter in which the deacons wrote this, and I quote
“Finally while our church remains without an official stance on same-sex marriage, our preaching pastor has officiated a same-sex marriage. We do not believe that this alone would confirm that our church has acted to affirm or endorse homosexuality. But,” the deacons wrote, “we accept that the SBC may have a different view of such terminology.”
Indeed the SBC does, and the denomination’s Executive Committee voted unanimously to dis-fellowship the congregation. The church, while claiming to taken no position affirming homosexuality, also went so far as to inform the Executive Committee in this letter, that the church – to use its own language,
“will accept as voting members at least, and possibly as servant leaders additionally, LGBT persons who we discern are, as leaders, loving, faithful, fitting, worthy, respected, and clean of conscience that they are disciples in the way of Jesus.”
There is no third way. There’s never been a third way on a question of this magnitude and consequence. In this sad case, it was the issue of homosexuality that defined the dividing line, but there been many necessary dividing lines before in history the Christian church. I want to know that I had an opportunity to meet privately with Pastor Danny Cortez when he came to Nashville to speak for his church before the Executive Committee. He is a very kind and gracious man, who really seems to believe that there is a third way in the situation, but he also admits that the third way is not a lasting destination.
Division is always painful, but on a clear question of biblical truth division is sometimes the only act that faithfulness to Scripture will allow. This is one of those moments. And homosexuality and same-sex marriage now looms as the great dividing line that will certainly tear some denominations apart and will lead yet others to define the terms of their convictional cooperation. That’s exactly what the SBC Executive Committee did. And they sent a signal that the Southern Baptist Convention intends to stand without compromise on this question. In other words, the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention, on behalf of the denomination as a whole, saw clearly the impossibility of any third way. The issue is now inescapable, not only for the SBC Executive Committee but for every church, every denomination, every seminary, indeed every Christian organization. The question will be asked, and some answer will be given. When the question is asked, any answer that is not completely consistent with the church’s historical understanding of sexual morality and is also fully consistent with the full affirmation of biblical authority, will mean a full embrace of same-sex behaviors. If not immediately, then eventually. And also a full embrace of same-sex relationships. There is no third way, and as this sad case makes very clear, there never was.
3) President Carter’s comments reveal homosexuality a church dividing line of deep significance
Meanwhile, just the day before the SBC Executive Committee took that action, former US President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn appeared before students at Grand Rapids Community College in Michigan. They made remarks, and in those remarks President Carter made very clear his own support of same-sex relationships.
He said, “ I never knew of any word or action of Jesus Christ that discriminated against anyone.” That’s an interesting statement; very revealing and not entirely unexpected. That’s the kind of statement made by many who argued the Christian church is simply going to have to embrace same-sex relationships. But we need to note very carefully what’s going on here. President Carter pointed to Jesus, suggesting that Jesus never discriminated against anyone. That’s one of the statements that you frankly just have to unpack word by word.
Discrimination, in this case, is one of the odd words that fits our contemporary political context, but really doesn’t fit the Scripture. What in the world does discrimination mean in this case? There is no question that Jesus Christ, very consistently, held up the Law and held up the moral principles of the Law, making clear that not one jot or tittle of the Law would disappear until all had been fulfilled. Of course, he is the very one who by his active and passive obedience perfectly fulfilled the Law. But in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus went so far as to make very clear that the moral law continues amongst his own people. He went so far as to argue that indeed it matters in the interior not merely in the exterior life. It’s not enough to demonstrate an external compliance with the command such as ‘you shall not murder’ or ‘you shall not commit adultery.’ Jesus said not only that those moral principles of the law continue, but that now it’s not enough for his people even to have anger in the heart – tantamount to murder – or lust in the heart – tantamount to adultery. Christians have to be exceedingly careful never to try to draw any line of division between Jesus and the Scripture. Jesus said of the Old Testament Scriptures, “these are they that testify of me,” and concerning the New Testament Scriptures, he promised his own disciples that the Holy Spirit lead them not away from the truth went into truth, and that is the evangelical affirmation of the total trustworthiness and truthfulness of Scripture.
President Carter’s statement didn’t come out of a vacuum. He and his congregation separated from the Southern Baptist Convention years ago over other issues related to the conservative affirmations made by the denomination. Furthermore President Carter, back in 2012, told the Huffington Post in an interview, “I personally think it’s very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies.”
In comments the former president made there in Michigan on Monday night the President went further, speaking about his congregation’s current policy. He said,
“I’m a Baptist, and I believe that each congregation is autonomous and can govern its own affairs. So if a local Baptist church wants to accept gay members on an equal basis, which my church does by the way, then that is fine. If a church decides not to, then government laws shouldn’t require them to.”
In that statement, the most important section is where the former president identifies his own church, Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia, formerly a Southern Baptist church, as being a church that, in his words, “accepts gay members on an equal basis.”
Once again homosexuality demonstrates itself to be a dividing line in Christian churches and denominations. President Carter spoke of his church long after that congregation had voluntarily separated itself from the Southern Baptist Convention. The very morning after the former president made those comments in Michigan, meeting in Nashville Tennessee the SBC Executive Committee pointed to the same dividing line, dis-fellowshipping the New Heart Christian Church there in California from the denomination. In our generation it certainly appears that the issue homosexuality, at least in the United States of America and Europe, may well be the dividing line for many years to come.
4) United parents a key factor in Derek Jeter’s exemplary career
Finally there’s a story to make you happy and to make us think. As USA Today reports this morning,
“Derek Jeter, trying to blink away the tears, and holding a towel over his face, walked slowly around the Yankee Stadium infield Thursday night, his head spinning, trying to digest what just happened.
When he finally reached the dugout, hugging his family, and walking through the tunnel for the final time toward the clubhouse, he finally surrendered, with the emotions oozing out of his body.”
As Bob Nightingale for USA Today writes,
“In one of the most surreal and remarkable farewells in Yankee history, leave it up to Jeter to deliver the dramatic game-winning hit in the Yankees’ 6-5 triumph over the Baltimore Orioles, just minutes after the Yankees had blown a 3-run lead.
[Jeter said] “It was sort of an out of body experience…It was a weird range of emotions. I was just trying not to cry.”
Well good try; he did cry.
As Daniel Henninger wrote for the Wall Street Journal, what happened last night brought an end to 20 years of Derek Jeter and the New York Yankees. As he wrote,
“Once the cheering stops at Yankee Stadium, if it ever does, the retiring Captain’s admirers will be left to figure out what, exactly, Derek Jeter represents.”
He then made a rather interesting statement about Derek Jeter’s career he said, “It was exemplary. A model.” And he wasn’t speaking of athleticism, at least not exclusively. He was speaking about character. Henninger writes,
“Sports, unlike modern life, is played by rules. Derek Jeter appeared to believe that he should play his sport and live his life by rules. Among the words one may now attach to the baseball career produced by that decision are dignity, composure, equanimity and silence.”
Henninger points to the fact that the other athletes of taken a very different understanding of their role, Charles Barkley once said “I am not a role model.” But Derek Jeter seemed believe that he was. Henninger writes,
“Though exemplary, was Derek Jeter the exception? In statistician-speak, was he an outlier?”
Henninger then went back to 1967, when Paul Simon recorded a song known as “Mrs. Robinson” about the state of the nation as it was then. As you will recall, that song by Paul Simon included the line “Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio ? Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.” Simon answered, “Joltin’ Joe has left and gone away.”
Henninger then writes,
“Now we have Derek Jeter’s departure, and Paul Simon’s 47-year-old question returns, still relevant—whether Derek Jeter is the norm, or whether American culture has ratcheted down to something less admirable.”
As the New York Times itself reflected about Derek Jeter, there never was even a tinge of controversy to his entire career. In terms of modern sports, especially for sports at this level, especially a sports tenure of this length, that’s rather remarkable. And that fact in itself is very sad.
But why did that happen? Why was Derek Jeter an outlier in terms of character and being a role model? Well the answer that comes in yet another article in USA Today, and that’s what should have our attention. In an article about Jeter’s retirement, Bob Nightingale wrote,
“They have watched him for 40 years now, from birth to a child to a man to an icon.
They drove him to Little League games. Hauled him around to travel ball. Watched all of his high-school games. Attended his New York Yankees’ signing day. Went to his major-league debut. Celebrated his World Series triumphs. And toasted his 3,000th hit together.
Now, [he writes] Charles and Dot Jeter will be seeing their son play baseball [today] for the final time at Yankee Stadium.”
He then writes, “Yes, just like Derek Jeter’s adoring fans, his parents recognize it’s time to say good-bye.” Dot Jeter told USA Today, “You spend your whole life trying to instill in them [speaking of children] a sense of family, a sense of pride.” she then said, “Don’t disappoint yourself, we tell them. But you never stop worrying. I still worry all of the time.”
So if Derek Jeter was an outlier in terms of his exemplary character in terms of sports career – the fact that it wasn’t even a whiff of controversy – well Christians should understand that one key reason for that is the fact that his mom and dad were in the stands, together. And they stayed together, and they raised him together, and Derek Jeter himself in this article made very clear that his parents were and remain decisive influences in his life; sitting there in the stands, always watching, always encouraging, always challenging to use his mother’s words, “Don’t disappoint yourself.”
It had to make a decisive difference that this young man, this boy when he was in Little League and on those traveling teams, and playing in high school, had two parents – not just one but two – sitting in the stands. Sitting in the stands consistently and their home as well. Speaking of his parents, Jeter told USA Today,
They’re the ones who taught me right from wrong…the ones you lean on when you need someone to talk to. And I talk to them a lot…They mean everything to me”
The retirement of Derek Jeter may lead some people to question just how important sports might be. I’ll leave that for some other discussion. But you can’t question how important parents are. That is made emphatically clear, not only in this article, but more importantly and Derek Jeter’s own words and in his career. As the week comes to an end, we’ll take good news where we can get it.
Thanks for listening to The Briefing. For more information to my website AlbertMohler.com. There you’ll find the full article on the situation about New Heart Community Church and the decision by the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention. To follow me on Twitter go to twitter.com/albertmohler. For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary go to sbts.edu. For information on Boyce College just go to boycecollege.com.
I’m speaking to you from Santo Domingo, capitol city of the Dominican Republic, and I’ll meet you again on Monday for The Briefing
The Briefing 09-26-14
1) Resignation of influential and controversial Eric Holder reminder of importance of elections
As attorney general, Holder made friends, enemies and history, Seattle Times (Michael Doyle, William Douglas and Lesley Clark)
2) Southern Baptist Executive Committee rightly disfellowships from ‘Third Way” church
Homosexuality as Dividing Line — The Inescapable Issue, AlbertMohler.com (Albert Mohler)
3) President Carter’s comments reveal homosexuality a church dividing line of deep significance
President Jimmy Carter stands up for LGBT rights: ‘Jesus didn’t discriminate against anyone’, Christian Today (Lucinda Borkett-Jones)
Former President Jimmy Carter On Gay Rights: Jesus Christ Never Discriminated Against Anyone, Huffington Post (Carol Kuruvilla)
4) United parents a key factor in Derek Jeter’s exemplary career
Derek Jeter’s unbelievable closing act at Yankee Stadium, USA Today (Bob Nightengale)
Where Have You Gone, Derek Jeter?, Wall Street Journal (Daniel Henninger)
Of All His Numbers, the One on Jeter’s Back Matters Most, New York Times (Harvey Araton)
Jeter’s Parents on End of Era: ‘This Won’t be Easy’, USA Today (Bob Nightengale)
September 25, 2014
Transcript: The Briefing 09-25-14
The Briefing
September 25, 2014
This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
It’s Thursday, September 25, 2014. I’m Albert Mohler and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
1) Obama UN address reveals insufficiency of secular vocabulary in facing evil
Just listen to these words,
“There can be no reasoning — no negotiation — with this brand of evil. The only language understood by killers like this is the language of force. So the United States of America will work with a broad coalition to dismantle this network of death.”
The quiz might go something like this; who said that? Which President of the United States? In one sense, just looking at that particular sentence you can imagine that that statement could have been made by President George W. Bush or now, as it was yesterday, by President Barack Obama. Yesterday President Obama gave his annual address to the General Assembly of the United Nations. And it was President Obama, not President George W. Bush, who used that language about evil and what he called the “dismantling of this network of death.” Now just keep in mind that back in 2008, when President Obama was running for President, he ran against just about everything George W. Bush had stood for as President – especially the kinds of comments that President Bush said immediately after the 9/11 2001 attacks, and consistently thereafter. You’ll recall that President Bush spoke of what he called the “axis of evil.” And there were many on the President’s left, especially liberal members of the democrat party and some such as Barack Obama – later to become a United State senator, and eventually of course to become the President – who claimed that that kind of language was completely out of place; more at home in the medieval world than the modern world – a form of moralizing, they said, that amounted to very dangerous foreign policy. But now that kind of statement is not being made by George W. Bush alone, it was made by Barack Obama as he spoke at his annual address to the United Nations General Assembly.
And he spoke in the background to beginning what military analyst believe will be a year-long struggle against the group known as the Islamic State. But of course President Obama doesn’t want to refer to it as the Islamic State, preferring to call it ISIL – doing his very best to avoid using the word “Islamic.” But in his recent presidential statements, and in this address to the United Nations, President Obama has to use the word evil. He refers to ISIL with the words, “this brand of evil.” And President Obama didn’t use President Bush’s phrase, “axis of evil,” instead he spoke of the network of death. But having shared the word evil and referring to the network of death, President Obama, against many of his own instincts and certainly his recent pattern, found himself using language he hadn’t used before. Christians looking at this need to come to a couple of observations; first of all, there are times when the word evil is the only appropriate word – nothing else will suffice. This isn’t maladaptive behavior, this isn’t a pattern of anti-social behavior, this is pure unadulterated evil – it is murderous terroristic evil, and President Obama referred to this as, to use his phrase, this “brand of evil.” He didn’t mince words. And that tells us something, it tells us that even those who do their very best to avoid using the kind of, well to use the expression of some liberals, ‘moralistic language.’ When it comes to dealing with something like the Islamic State, the only word that fits is the word ‘evil.’ As we have said over and over again on this program, one of the problems for seculars with the word ‘evil’ is that it requires some sort of theological definition.
But the second thing we need to note is that President Obama, who along with many others, had derided President Bush for speaking of the “axis of evil” now talks about a “network of death.” An understanding that evil is more complex than having a single, simply identified, evil opponent. Instead, this is a network of evil, an axis of evil, or to use President Obama’s new phrase, “a network of death.” Anyway you construe it, once you speak of evil, and you speak of this kind of conspiracy, you’re making very clear that what President Bush spoke about in 2001 is the very same challenge we are facing now. And as President of the United States, bearing that responsibility in rallying the American people, and now attempting to rally the world to this cause, President Obama finds himself using the same kind of vocabulary that had been used by President George W. Bush. When it comes to an enemy like the Islamic State, the secular vocabulary of the secular left just won’t suffice.
2) German committee on incest shows triumphing of erotic liberty over idea of family
An absolutely horrifying news story came from Germany as it was published in the pages of a major London newspaper, the Telegraph. Justin Huggler reporting from Berlin provides the headline, “Incest a ‘fundamental right’, German committee says.” As he writes,
“Laws banning incest between brothers and sisters in Germany could be scrapped after a government ethics committee said they were an unacceptable intrusion into the right to sexual self-determination.”
In a statement released by the committee, the body said,
“Criminal law is not the appropriate means to preserve a social taboo. The fundamental right of adult siblings to sexual self-determination is to be weighed more heavily than the abstract idea of protection of the family.”
Again and again on this program, I’ve made the argument that in the contest of contemporary liberties, erotic liberty is triumphing over other forms of liberty – in particular, most recently, religious liberty. But now in this statement from an official Germany government committee we see that erotic liberties now triumphing even clearly over the idea of family. To use the language of the German committee, the right of adults, here defined as the right of “adult siblings to sexual self-determination,” triumphs over what is described in this statement as the “abstract idea of protection of the family.” A couple of very important issues here; first of all, the issue of personal autonomy is triumphing all out of bounds of any moral proportion. It’s all out of bounds of any sexual or moral sanity when you have the phrase used by this committee of “sexual self-determination.” That’s one of the most fundamentally anti-Christian statements imaginable – that is, a statement that is in direct opposition to the Christian worldview.
The biblical worldview tells us that we are not capable of sexual self-determination; our sexuality is determined by our Creator – as in our gender. The idea of this kind of self-determination is simply something that exceeds almost anything seen in previous epics of human history. And when it comes to the family, one of the scariest aspects of this article is the way that the natural family is described simply in terms of, “the abstract idea of protection of the family.” So now the protection of the family is nothing more than an abstract idea, when the concrete reality to which that abstract idea has to give way is sexual self-determination. It’s hard to imagine how any society can maintain, even the smallest minimal amount of moral sanity, if this kind of logic takes hold. But at least in terms of this official German government committee, this logic just hasn’t merely taken hold – it’s clearly in the driver’s seat.
As Huggler reports,
“Their intervention follows a notorious case in which a brother and sister living as partners in Saxony [that’s a German state] had four children together.”
And as it turns out, two of the couple’s children are disabled and as Huggler says, it’s believed that “incest carries a higher risk of resulting in children with genetic abnormalities.”
Now that’s an understatement. He’s writing here with undue care. It’s not merely some kind of moral theory that suggest that sexual relations resulting in reproduction among related couples will sometimes lead to a higher incident to genetic abnormalities, that’s a scientific fact. And furthermore, it’s a fact that is well known – not only by medical doctors but by anyone involved in the reproduction of animals on a farm. But what you have here is a refutation, not only of the moral tradition that has shaped human societies for millennia, but you also have a refutation of any kind of moral sanity that results in any kind of protection of the family. As the article makes very clear here, the Ethics Council, that is this committee, that was appointed by the German government, dismissed the argument that the risk of genetic abnormalities was even significant on the basis, says this report, “…that other genetically affected couples are not banned from having children.”
Now keep in mind the fact that in recent debates here in the United States over the legalization of same-sex marriage, the argument has been made, and that argument is correct, that the redefinition of marriage to allow for same-sex couples to marry will inevitably mean, eventually, if not very quickly, to the fact that other people who want to gain access to marriage will be allowed to do so. Polygamy is probably next in line – but, what about incest? You may recall that some of those who have been arguing for the legalization of same-sex marriage in this country, have assured us again and again that there are no public health reasons against same-sex marriage, but there are profound public health concerns about incest. Well this German committee said, while accepting the scientific evidence, that simply is not enough to prevent the goal of sexual self-determination when it comes to adult citizens – even, as in this notorious case in Saxony, they happen to be brother and sister.
What you hear in this news report from Germany is not merely a horrifying news development. It’s not merely a sign of the greater loss to sexual sanity then perhaps many of us feared. It’s a sign of an entire human civilization crumbling. Because when you think about what is just dismissed in this article as the abstract idea of the protection of the family, you’re looking at the central thesis of how civilizations were built in terms of what is now called western civilization itself. Any review of human history will reveal this unquestionable fact, there is no civilization that has either triumphed or survived that has not protected the family. But now you have an official German committee, describing the protection of the family as nothing more than an abstract notion, and explicitly rejecting the protection of the family as a goal in favor of sexual self-determination. No civilization was built with this understand of sexual self-determination, and the minimization of family. And we can be assured that no society can survive this kind of transformation. Oh, and by the way, the next time you hear someone arguing for the legalization of same-sex marriage – argue that those who raise these other issues are guilty of nothing more than scare tactics and slipper- slope argumentation – just point to this news report from Germany, it wasn’t made up. This news report is based upon the official report of a German government committee.
3) Young Americans increasingly see marriage as product, not process of adulthood
Shifting now to the United States, what about the state of the family here, and the state of marriage? An article that appeared in yesterday’s edition of the New York Times by Claire Cane Miller tell us that marriage is increasingly taking a back place to other concerns – especially, among young adults, financial security. She writes,
“Of all the milestones on the road to adulthood, [people] are increasingly forgoing one of the biggest: marriage. Twenty percent of adults older than 25, about 42 million people, have never married, up from 9 percent in 1960,”
This is from yet another Pew Research Center report, this one released just yesterday. As the article makes clear,
“So as the left and right debate the relationship among marriage, parenthood and poverty, young people seem to be sending policy makers a message: that marriage is not necessarily part of the plan. That shift could reshape [says the article] not just American families, but also policies like those around taxes, children and entitlements.”
Later in the article we read,
“But with the rise of birth control, household technology and women in the work force, marriage became less about economics and more about love,”
Now, that’s a very interesting statement. And it’s an argument that’s made by someone that I’ve cited many times in the past, Stephanie Coontz – she’s written a new book entitled Marriage, A History. She is the leading marriage revisionist, that is, she argues that marriage and family need to be radically redefined in multiple ways in order for marriage and family to meet the needs of the modern age. But it’s very interesting that this article turned to her, that’s not really a surprise, because the argument that she makes, that marriage simply has to give way – as does family – to new social realities, is what many people, especially the policy makers among the elites, say is the only way we can go. All we can do is merely respond to these massive social changes. But in the article by Claire Cain Miller we also read this,
“Though marriage was once a steppingstone to economic stability, young adults now see financial stability as a prerequisite for marriage. More than a quarter of those who say they want to marry someday say they haven’t yet because they are not financially prepared.”
And the final words of the article is these,
“In other words, marriage has gone from being a way that people pulled their lives together to something they agree to once they have already done that independently.”
So, this article straightforwardly states that what we’re seeing in these trends in regarding marriage – or more properly the absence of marriage – is the fact that in previous generations, young adults saw marriage as a way of pulling their lives together. Now, they believe they must do that independently, and only after they’ve pulled their lives together do they intend to enter into marriage – merely as a companionate and romantic institution. But that’s the real problem, because marriage was never seen as the product of growing into adulthood, but rather as the process of it. And furthermore, marriage is how most young adults, throughout human history, have pulled their lives together – exactly as the final paragraph of this article indicates. But when you young adults who are now saying, ‘I can’t get married’ or ‘Won’t get married until I get my life together, professionally, financially, and in every other way’ they are never going to get married. Because it turns out that marriage itself, in terms of its benefits as given to us by our Creator – the marriage benefits include the ability at pulling one’s life together in a way that that life can never be together apart. And that’s why if you are waiting for marriage, only after you’ve pulled your life together, you’re never going to get there.
So how in the world do we find ourselves in this predicament? Well, sociologist and theorist of other sorts will certainly tell us, at least how they think it happened. But from a Christian worldview perspective, at least this much should be considered – it turns out that when human beings know that their life is determined by the Creator, and that they are to find their fulfilment – well let’s use the language of the article – pulling their lives together, in terms of God’s purpose and plan, then they’re going to accept what God gives as their good gifts (such as marriage), and by the enjoyment and fulfillment of marriage, find themselves pulling their lives together. But if you are living in a secular age, or are operating out of a secular worldview, and thus there is no notion of a Creator who has a plan and purpose that’s functioning in the thinking, it’s very easy to imagine, ‘we’ll come up with our own plan to pull our lives together. We’ll come up with our own plan for marriage, childbearing, reproduction, and all the rest.’ And as it turns out, vast millions of American are saying ‘My own plan is that I must pull my life together before I get married.’ Sad to say, that’s just not going to happen.
One other profoundly important aspect of this report from Pew is the affirmation, once again, that we are entering into a society – basically a two-tiered society – on marriage: with those who are wealthy and well educated getting married, and staying married – and those who are at the bottom rungs of the economic and educational period, well they’re not getting married. And when they do get married, they’re not staying married. What we’re looking at in many of these situations reveal to us in terms of the data, are patterns that reveal moral changes that are more vast and more amazingly swift than we ever really could have imagined. We’ve seen a reversal of roles in terms of American society. It was once the most educated and wealthy, they were the ones who saw marriage as a bourgeois institution they could do without – and many of them did. The radicals, especially, the educated wealthy radicals of the 60’s and 70’s, well they’ve grown up and come to understand. Or perhaps even their children understand more profoundly, that marriage is not only a good idea, it’s a moral necessity. So the children of many of the moral radicals of the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s turn out to be, at least on the issue of marriage, very conservative – if not by what they say, then by what they do. But the shift works the other way, and that’s the tragic part. The great middle class of America, the great blue collar class of America that had been the mainstay of marriage and of marriage fidelity and stability for generations, if not centuries, well that cohort of Americans is now deeply troubled when it comes to marriage. There are indeed financial considerations in play here, there are professional and educational considerations in play, but as you look at these pathologies, we have to come back to that same point over and over again. You can’t fix the pathologies in order to try and achieve marriage. To the contrary, marriage has to be understood as a very essential way of escaping these pathologies, and the moral and sociological patterns that produce them. That’s the kind of logic however that a secular age resists with every white blood cell, so to speak, in its intellectual immune system. The secular left, and especially the creative elites, they are so committed to individual autonomy and to all those aspect of the moral revolution, that they really can’t even conceive that the family unit – and at the heart of the family, the marriage unit – is absolutely essential in terms of its millennially honored form for the very cultivation of civilization and the survival of civilization, any alleviation of all sorts of human pathologies that lead to real human suffering. They really can’t understand that marriage and family, rightly understood and rightly defined, rightly honored and rightly structured, are absolutely necessary for human happiness and human flourishing. And so what we see in these various news stories that have come together today is the reality that you have testimony from a report about the United States and the official report of a German government committee. You have evidence of the fact, that on one hand – social and moral sanity can simply be entirely lost. And on the other hand, that it can also be regained. In the case of being regained amongst those who are the most educated, and the most wealthy in America – who have learned lessons the hard way about the importance of marriage. And in their own marriages, tends to be deeply conservative, if not by how they speak and how they vote – but by how they live and how they raise their own children. In other words, they wait until marriage to have children, and once they get married and have children they stay married. In the oddest twist in this late modern age, what we need is for many of those who have relearned the lessons of marriage, but are now socially on the political left as far as what they preach for everybody else, what we need from them is not to practice what they preach – but to the contrary, we need them to preach what they practice.
Thanks for listening to The Briefing. For more information go to my website at AlbertMohler.com you can follow me on Twitter by going to twitter.com/albertmohler. For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary go to sbts.edu. For information on Boyce College just go to boyecollege.com. I’m speaking to you from Jacksonville, FL and I’ll meet you again tomorrow for The Briefing.
The Briefing 09-25-14
1) Obama UN address reveals insufficiency of secular vocabulary in facing evil
Obama’s Address to the United Nations General Assembly, Wall Street Journal —Transcript
2) German committee on incest shows triumphing of erotic liberty over idea of family
Incest a ‘fundamental right’, German committee says, The Telegraph (Justin Huggler)
3) Young Americans increasingly see marriage as product, not process of adulthood
Marriage Rates Keep Falling, as Money Concerns Rise, New York Times, (Claire Cane Miller)
Record Share of Americans Have Never Married, Pew Research Center (Wendy Wang and Kim Parker)
September 24, 2014
Homosexuality as Dividing Line — The Inescapable Issue
The vote to declare that the New Heart Community Church of La Mirada, California “does not presently meet the definition of a cooperating church” came unanimously as the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention met this week in Nashville. It was a solemn moment and a moment perhaps to be repeated any number of times in coming months and years. Homosexuality was the dividing line.
The SBC Executive Committee was acting in its ad interim capacity on behalf of the Convention itself. Between the annual meetings of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Executive Committee fulfills its functions. When the SBC met earlier this year in Baltimore, Southern Baptists had just learned days before that the New Heart Community Church had affirmed its pastor in declaring a “third way” on the issue of homosexuality — in effect allowing for the affirmation of same-sex sexuality and relationships. In an hour-long video posted to the church’s website, Pastor Danny Cortez explained his personal change of mind on the question of homosexuality and traced his journey back to an August day in 2013 when “I realized I no longer believed in the traditional teachings regarding homosexuality.”
When Pastor Cortez told his 15-year-old son about his change of mind, his son responded with the simple declaration, “Dad, I’m gay.” In short order, Drew Cortez, Danny Cortez’s son, posted a “coming out” video on YouTube and Pastor Cortez told his congregation of his change of mind on homosexuality. As he told his church, his change was a “radical shift” that put him at odds with the historic understanding of the Christian church and the SBC’s confession of faith, the Baptist Faith and Message.
The church eventually split over the issue, with those remaining declaring their intention to affirm their pastor and to become a “Third Way church” that allows for disagreement on the question of the sinfulness of homosexual acts and same-sex marriage.
But, as I argued at the time, there is no third way. A church or denomination will either believe and teach that same-sex behaviors and relationships are sinful, or it will affirm them. In short order, every single congregation in America will face the same decision — do we affirm same-sex relationships or not? Those who suggest that there is some way around this “binary” choice are fooling themselves and confusing the church.
Consider this — the only way to construct a “third way” is to suggest that one can allow for the affirmation of homosexuality without affirming it. That simply does not work. To allow the affirmation is to affirm.
This was the sad lesson learned by conservatives in the Church of England on the question of woman priests. The “third way” presented then to the Church of England promised that those who believed that women should not be priests could coexist within the church with those who affirmed that women should be priests. The problem is that the church had to decide who would be priests, and they decided for the ordination of women. Thus, the “third way” was just an argument to get to the eventual goal that the church would have women priests.
The third way disappears very quickly when the church has to decide if it will recognize or celebrate a same-sex marriage. There is no third way when that decision arrives, and there are limitless decisions that will eventually have to be made.
In a letter sent by the deacons of New Heart Community Church to the SBC Executive Committee, the church affirmed again its decision to be a “Third Way” congregation, arguing that even as some members of the church affirmed same-sex marriage, the church had taken no position on the question. The church, said the deacons, has “no official stance on same-sex marriage.”
But that statement was followed by these words:
“Finally, while ‘our church’ remains without an official stance on same-sex marriage, our preaching pastor has officiated a same-sex marriage. We do not believe that this alone would confirm that ‘our church’ has acted to ‘affirm or endorse homosexuality,’ but we accept that the SBC may have a different view of such terminology.”
A central fact of free church polity is that every congregation is responsible for its minister and its ministry. The decision to affirm a pastor is a decision to affirm the pastor’s teaching and actions and to take congregational responsibility for them. The claim that the congregation has not taken a position when the pastor they affirm has taken a position is a fiction.
Furthermore, the church — while claiming to have taken no position affirming homosexuality — also informed the Executive Committee that the church “will accept as voting members at least–and possibly as servant-leaders additionally–LGBT persons who we discern are–as leaders–loving, faithful, fitting, worthy, respected, and clean of conscience, that they are disciples in the Way of Jesus.”
There is no third way, and there has never been a third way on a question of this magnitude and consequence. In this sad case it was the issue of homosexuality that defined the dividing line, but there have been many necessary dividing lines before.
I had the opportunity to meet privately with Pastor Danny Cortez when he came to speak for his church before the Executive Committee. He is a gracious and kind man who really seems to believe that there is a third way in this situation — but who also admits that the third way is not a lasting destination.
Division is always painful, but on a clear question of biblical truth, division is sometimes the only act that faithfulness to Scripture will allow. This is one of those moments, and homosexuality and same-sex marriage now loom as the great dividing line that will tear some denominations apart and lead others to define the terms of their convictional cooperation. The unanimous vote by the Executive Committee is a sign that the Southern Baptist Convention intends to stand without compromise on this question — and that the members of the committee saw the impossibility of any third way.
The issue is now inescapable for every congregation, every denomination, every seminary, and every Christian organization. The question will be asked and some answer will be given. When the question is asked, any answer that is not completely consistent with the church’s historical understanding of sexual morality and the full affirmation of biblical authority will mean a full embrace of same-sex behaviors and same-sex relationships. There is no third way, and there never was.
I am always glad to hear from readers. Just write me at mail@albertmohler.com. You can follow me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/albertmohler
For more information on Southern Seminary, visit SBTS.edu and for more information on Boyce College, visit BoyceCollege.com.
R. Albert Mohler, Jr., “There is No ‘Third Way’ — Southern Baptists Face a Moment of Decision (and so will you),” Monday, June 2, 2014. http://www.albertmohler.com/2014/06/0...
David Roach, “‘Third Way’ Church Disfellowshipped from SBC,” Baptist Press, Tuesday, September 23, 2014. http://bpnews.net/43416/third-way-chu...
Terry Barone, “California Convention Expels ‘Third Way’ Church,” Baptist Press, Friday, September 12, 2014. http://www.bpnews.net/43349/calif-con...
Transcript: The Briefing 09-24-14
The Briefing
September 24, 2014
This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
It’s Wednesday, September 24, 2014. I’m Albert Mohler and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
1) Pew reveals moral revolution accompanied by some second-guessing
Just about anyone with the slightest sense of perception understands that America is now undergoing a vast cultural and social change. We’re actually seeing something that can only be called a moral revolution before our eyes. But many people assume, including many proponents of this moral revolution, that what has to take place is a forward arc of progress, an unbending arc in one direction. But a recent study released by the Pew Research Center on Monday indicates that, at least in the short term, it’s not quite so even as many had expected. There are many interesting aspects to this study, but one of the most interesting of the perspective is how the national media responded to it. For one thing, the headlines, if you read them separately, would lead you to understand that the news stories weren’t even dealing with the same report.
Yesterday the New York Times reported on the study. The headline of the article, “Growing Majority in US See Religion Losing Sway;” on the other hand the Associated Press also ran a major story on the same report, but the headline in most newspapers of the AP story with something like this, “Support Drops for Same-Sex Marriage.” When you look at those two headlines, the casual reader would assume those reports have nothing to do with one another – but they do. We’re talking about the same research project and we’re talking about the same major release of information from Pew on Monday. And both of these headlines are verified by the report itself. The interesting thing is that there were several reporters or editors that looked at the same report and came up with very different understandings of what the main point was. Or, you might say, what they wanted the main point to be.
I’m not suggesting actually anything nefarious or evil in this; nothing diabolical or sinister. Simply the fact that reporters and editors, journalists, all, are human beings too – who also have an agenda. The idea that anyone can be totally objective and unbiased is simply not fitting in terms of the Christian worldview. We understand that we all operate out of a worldview and that worldview means that we are not, indeed we are never, so objective as we might like to think ourselves to be. But when we’re looking at this report the came out from Pew, both of these headlines become very important. In Michael Paulson’s report in the New York Times he begins by writing,
“The secularization of the United States appears to be affecting the world of politics. A growing majority of Americans see religion as losing influence in the public square and many regret that trend.”
Paulson does a pretty good job summarizing the report. He points out that the Pew Research Center reported that 72% of Americans believe religion is losing its influence on American life. That’s up considerably from the year 2012. He also notes that is a striking development in a nation where religious arguments, leaders, and voting blocks, had been playing an important role – and had done so for a long time. He writes on, any declining influence of religion is perhaps a natural side effect of the declining religiosity of Americans. That’s also profoundly true. And later in the article he also writes the poll also found the support for allowing gays and lesbians to marry, which had been rising in recent years, has dropped to 49% from 54% in February and 50% say it is a sin to engage in sexual behavior up from 45% last year. Well, Christians need to take a pause whenever we see this kind of research and remember that while we find these kinds of surveys interesting and revealing, what the surveys do not reveal is what anyone should hold in terms of a moral conviction. You can’t get morality from a poll, but you do understand the moral values of Americans as reflected in this kind of research. Christians looking at this should recognize that one of the things that comes immediately to mind is that you can put support for same-sex marriage and secularization side-by-side. They are definitely correlated, as virtually everyone on both sides of this argument understands. If you simply look at a map of the United States, you can see that the density of Christian population and support for same-sex marriage are inversely correlated. That’s easy to understand. Where you find the greatest percentage of Christians, you find the lowest support for same-sex marriage. Flip the coin and an increasingly secularized society is increasingly open to the normalization of homosexuality and the legalization of same-sex marriage.
The coverage of the survey that was found in the Wall Street Journal in an article by Tamara Audi pointed out, from the survey, that an increased number of Americans indicated that there concerned that there isn’t enough religion in American politics – in other words, that American politics is becoming too secular. She also writes,
“According to Pew, six in 10 Americans still want members of Congress who have strong religious beliefs—a number that hasn’t changed since 2010. Fewer Americans—30%—believe the Obama administration is friendly toward religion, down from 37% in 2010. Far more Republicans—59%—support church involvement in politics than Democrats, at only 42%, according to the study.”
There’s very little here that is really groundbreaking, but the totality of the survey and the importance of it in terms of this cultural moment, means that it is worthy of our consideration. Let’s ask the question, why, when there had been a recent pattern of increased support for the legalization of same-sex marriage and the normalization of homosexuality, why would there be at least a short-term turn in the other direction? Well, perhaps you’re familiar with the real estate term ‘buyer’s remorse,’ that’s well-known in the real estate market; sometimes by car salesman as well. It turns out that when Americans – or any people that matter – make a major purchase, they often find themselves, almost immediately after making the purchase, remorseful about having made it. There is a pattern about this that follows with the excitement of making the purchase, the excitement of receiving the item or moving into the house, gives way to a sense of remorse or at least questioning as to whether was such a good deal after all. Eventually most people settle into their house or continue driving the car. But when it comes to this kind of moral change, it appears that at least some Americans are beginning to have second thoughts about the trend that they had reported themselves to support as a matter of just a few weeks ago. If nothing else, it appears that a significant percentage of Americans are having second thoughts about the normalization of homosexuality. There is a greater percentage of Americans, according to the study, indicating right now that they consider homosexual acts to be sinful than the same study found in the same kind of questioning just a matter of months ago. Is that a major cultural shift, a major moral shift in direction? Probably not. But it does indicate that moral change doesn’t take place without some fits and starts, and without, some of a least what might be called, buyer’s remorse.
The coverage in the Wall Street Journal also points to the second major issue at stake here: that is the encounter between America and its increasing secularization – including the secularization of politics. Americans appear to be having a bit of buyer’s remorse on that issue too. Just a matter of months ago, a larger percentage of Americans said they wanted religion and politics to be completely separate – as if that were possible by the way – but at least they stated that they believed it ought to be so. Now, an increased number of Americans are saying they’re afraid that it might be so. Are Americans schizophrenic and divided in mind about this? In some sense – yes. A significant percentage of Americans often say they want religion and politics to be completely separate, but once you begin to see that separation become operational, an increased number of Americans say this isn’t such a good idea after all. If nothing else, a vast majority of Americans want to make certain that those they elect to office do believe in God. Indeed “have strong religious beliefs.” That’s 6 out of 10, and that doesn’t mean that the other 4 out of the 10 wanted secular politicians; it just means that they wanted more mildly religious politicians. There are very few Americans who will tell a pollster that they want to elect an openly identified atheist to public office. This is something about which the atheists have been complaining. But this study points out that as much as Americans at least sometimes want to say, perhaps because they think it’s what ought to be said, that religion and politics out to be completely separate, when they actually see what happens when a secularizing politics begins to predominate; they get quite concerned about what the actually see. The data in the Pew report gives is no indication that there’s a likelihood these long-term trends are going to be reversed, but it is revealing that there is a good deal of second-guessing going on. From a Christian worldview perspective, that second-guessing tells us something.
2) White House intruder reminder how those who trust in chariots and horses will be disappointed
Shifting the topic to the intruder that climbed over the White House fence and actually gained entry to the White House before being apprehended by the Secret Service – the follow-up news accounts concerning this rather surprising incident are also very revealing. You have an article that appeared in yesterday’s edition of the New York Times. Michael Shear and Michael Schmidt report,
“Secret Service officers stopped Omar Jose Gonzalez last month as he carried a hatchet in front of the White House, but let him go even though [the Iraq war veteran] had been arrested this summer in Virginia with a mini-arsenal of semiautomatic weapons, a sniper rifle and a map clearly marking the White House’s location.”
Yesterday’s edition of the Wall Street Journal includes this paragraph in an article by Michael Phillips and Jeffrey Sparshott,
“In July, Mr. Gonzalez was arrested in Virginia on felony charges of evading arrest and possession of a sawed-off shotgun, police and the prosecutor said. Police also found sniper rifles, handguns and a cache of other weapons in his vehicle, as well as a map of Washington with a line drawn to the White House, Virginia State Police said. He was released on bond.”
Now keep in mind that the White House is supposedly the most closely guarded, most secure facility, on planet earth – and here you have a man who was arrested and was charged with felony counts, who was known to have an arsenal of weapons and rounds by the hundreds, in terms of ammunition, who was arrested carrying a hatchet in front of the White House and then was released. What in the world is going on here? How in the world could this have happened? How can the world’s most sophisticated security operation let someone gain entry actually into the White House, supposedly the world’s most secure location? How in the world was the front door apparently unlocked to the White House of all things? In the aftermath of Friday’s intrusion, congressional leaders said there would were be a flurry of investigations into this latest development – yet another embarrassment to the Secret Service. But you know, I thought of something else. I thought of that verse in Scripture that reminds us that those who trust for security in horses and chariots will be put to shame. President Obama said what a president would have to say in the aftermath of this particular embarrassment to the Secret Service. He said he thanks all the brave men and women of the Secret Service who protect him and protect his family. But if you’re President Obama in this situation, you have to wonder just how proficient the Secret Service is. After all, the President, the first lady, and their daughters, had just left for Camp David before a man, armed with a folding knife, entered through the front door of the official presidential residence.
We stand in long security lines in airports, we go through security checks for all kinds of events, we have security cameras documenting moves made in a city like London, and there are supposedly very few places where – at least in terms of public – you’re not on camera somewhere. That same trend seems to be expanding now to cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City – a not to mention Washington, especially since the terrorist attacks of September 11 with the rise of the kinds of threats coming from Al Qaeda and Islamic State. We supposedly have a vast security apparatus and we should be very thankful at times it clearly works. The Secret Service has foiled attempt to harm presidents. The national security apparatus has foiled terrorist attacks. But just like those of old who put their trust in horses and chariots, only to be put to shame; those who trust in modern security systems will likely face the very same shame. Just think of the red-faced Secret Service, embarrassed now after the revelation that an intruder crossed the lawn and entered the front door the White House. The front door the White House evidently wasn’t even locked.
3) Extreme secularism of the New York Times evident in sheer ignorance of Christianity
In terms of secularization, one of the most secularized components of American society is made up of elite media. And sometimes they profoundly miss the obvious; especially when it turns out the obvious has to do with Christianity. Mollie Hemingway writing at the Federalist points out that the New York Times has done it again – the most respected, well-funded, well-resourced newspaper in the United States of America gets Christianity wrong, not just slightly wrong but profoundly wrong again and again. She reminds us back in April 2013 the New York Times had to run a correction that ran like this,
“An earlier version of this article mischaracterized the Christian holiday of Easter. It is the celebration of Jesus’s resurrection from the dead, not his resurrection into heaven.”
Of course the phrase ‘resurrection in heaven’ doesn’t even make theological sense, but how can anyone, even in the most secularized stratum of American society, not know what Easter is about in terms of historic Christianity? How can someone who is a part of the intellectual elite, hired in the reportorial core of the New York Times, not know enough about Christianity – even just in terms of a cultural knowledge – to know what Easter is all about or what Christians believe about Christ. But they’ve done it again, writing about the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. The reporter for the New York Times indicated that this church is where many Christians believe Jesus is buried.
Jesus is buried?
The verb tense betrays the enormous ignorance, even the unrecognized ignorance, of the New York Times who had a reporter who evidently believes that Christians believe that Jesus is buried anywhere, and you had a copy editor, perhaps even a series of copy editors, who didn’t even recognize the problem. The verb tense is the issue; Christians do understand that Jesus was buried in Jerusalem, but Christianity is predicated upon the absolute truth that Jesus is not buried there now, but instead has risen from the dead. The New York Times, that often publishes corrections such as the one about the Easter story last April, corrected the story but didn’t run a correction. They didn’t want to draw attention to the problem with their own news article. At the end of her essay on this controversy, Mollie Hemingway writes,
“In any case, maybe the New York Times can get an in-house Christianity consultant to help them navigate the topics not covered in journalists’ education any more.”
What she doesn’t say needs to be said. If the only way that reporters and editors in a newspaper like the New York Times are going to learn what Christianity teaches is by having to have some kind of course or seminar in the subject, that just points out how totally secular the worldview of that newspaper really is. This is perhaps the world’s most respected newspaper, and it messed up the resurrection of Jesus Christ – two years in a row.
4) Lawyers jockey for chance to represent same-sex marriage case before Supreme Court
Well, the writers of the New York Times might not know much about Christianity, but they do know a great deal about the nation’s court system. Adam Liptak, finally, writing in yesterday’s edition of the New York Times tells us that lawyers working for the legalization of same-sex marriage coast-to-coast are now jockeying with each other, and amongst one another, trying to be the legal team with the plaintiff who will eventually have the name on the case that these lawyers believe will mean the legalization of same-sex marriage coast-to-coast. Their jockeying, trying to be the legal team with the plaintiff to get the case before the Supreme Court on appeal from the US circuits, that is the appellate courts. And what we’re looking at now is a very clear indication that the Supreme Court is going to take one of these cases, and it’s very important to say one of these cases, and it’s likely to be hearing oral arguments as early as January or early February of 2015 with an eventual decision to be handed down by the last day of June of next year.
Just about everyone on both sides of this issue understands that the Supreme Court is poised to act. And it’s very revealing isn’t it, that the legal team is now pushing for the legalization of same-sex marriage at the Supreme Court want to be the one who will take this to the final decision. They want their name written into American legal constitutional and political history. They’re looking for the plaintiff to have just the right story, just the right claim, just the right case, and they want to have their name right there in terms of the winning side of what they see to be an inevitable court victory. Evan Wolfson, longtime advocate for same-sex marriage and one of the pioneers in the effort said,
“Every attorney in the world, it seems, is now eager to be the one that stands before the court in the freedom to marry case,”
Well, not every attorney in the world, Mr. Wolfson, but no doubt plenty of them.
Thanks for listening to The Briefing. For more information go to my website at AlbertMohler.com you can follow me on Twitter by going to twitter.com/albertmohler. For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary go to sbts.edu. For information on Boyce College just go to boyecollege.com. I’m speaking to you from Jacksonville, FL and I’ll meet you again tomorrow for The Briefing.
Transcript: The Briefing 09-25-14
The Briefing
September 24, 2014
This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
It’s Wednesday, September 24, 2014. I’m Albert Mohler and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
1) Pew reveals moral revolution accompanied by some second-guessing
Just about anyone with the slightest sense of perception understands that America is now undergoing a vast cultural and social change. We’re actually seeing something that can only be called a moral revolution before our eyes. But many people assume, including many proponents of this moral revolution, that what has to take place is a forward arc of progress, an unbending arc in one direction. But a recent study released by the Pew Research Center on Monday indicates that, at least in the short term, it’s not quite so even as many had expected. There are many interesting aspects to this study, but one of the most interesting of the perspective is how the national media responded to it. For one thing, the headlines, if you read them separately, would lead you to understand that the news stories weren’t even dealing with the same report.
Yesterday the New York Times reported on the study. The headline of the article, “Growing Majority in US See Religion Losing Sway;” on the other hand the Associated Press also ran a major story on the same report, but the headline in most newspapers of the AP story with something like this, “Support Drops for Same-Sex Marriage.” When you look at those two headlines, the casual reader would assume those reports have nothing to do with one another – but they do. We’re talking about the same research project and we’re talking about the same major release of information from Pew on Monday. And both of these headlines are verified by the report itself. The interesting thing is that there were several reporters or editors that looked at the same report and came up with very different understandings of what the main point was. Or, you might say, what they wanted the main point to be.
I’m not suggesting actually anything nefarious or evil in this; nothing diabolical or sinister. Simply the fact that reporters and editors, journalists, all, are human beings too – who also have an agenda. The idea that anyone can be totally objective and unbiased is simply not fitting in terms of the Christian worldview. We understand that we all operate out of a worldview and that worldview means that we are not, indeed we are never, so objective as we might like to think ourselves to be. But when we’re looking at this report the came out from Pew, both of these headlines become very important. In Michael Paulson’s report in the New York Times he begins by writing,
“The secularization of the United States appears to be affecting the world of politics. A growing majority of Americans see religion as losing influence in the public square and many regret that trend.”
Paulson does a pretty good job summarizing the report. He points out that the Pew Research Center reported that 72% of Americans believe religion is losing its influence on American life. That’s up considerably from the year 2012. He also notes that is a striking development in a nation where religious arguments, leaders, and voting blocks, had been playing an important role – and had done so for a long time. He writes on, any declining influence of religion is perhaps a natural side effect of the declining religiosity of Americans. That’s also profoundly true. And later in the article he also writes the poll also found the support for allowing gays and lesbians to marry, which had been rising in recent years, has dropped to 49% from 54% in February and 50% say it is a sin to engage in sexual behavior up from 45% last year. Well, Christians need to take a pause whenever we see this kind of research and remember that while we find these kinds of surveys interesting and revealing, what the surveys do not reveal is what anyone should hold in terms of a moral conviction. You can’t get morality from a poll, but you do understand the moral values of Americans as reflected in this kind of research. Christians looking at this should recognize that one of the things that comes immediately to mind is that you can put support for same-sex marriage and secularization side-by-side. They are definitely correlated, as virtually everyone on both sides of this argument understands. If you simply look at a map of the United States, you can see that the density of Christian population and support for same-sex marriage are inversely correlated. That’s easy to understand. Where you find the greatest percentage of Christians, you find the lowest support for same-sex marriage. Flip the coin and an increasingly secularized society is increasingly open to the normalization of homosexuality and the legalization of same-sex marriage.
The coverage of the survey that was found in the Wall Street Journal in an article by Tamara Audi pointed out, from the survey, that an increased number of Americans indicated that there concerned that there isn’t enough religion in American politics – in other words, that American politics is becoming too secular. She also writes,
“According to Pew, six in 10 Americans still want members of Congress who have strong religious beliefs—a number that hasn’t changed since 2010. Fewer Americans—30%—believe the Obama administration is friendly toward religion, down from 37% in 2010. Far more Republicans—59%—support church involvement in politics than Democrats, at only 42%, according to the study.”
There’s very little here that is really groundbreaking, but the totality of the survey and the importance of it in terms of this cultural moment, means that it is worthy of our consideration. Let’s ask the question, why, when there had been a recent pattern of increased support for the legalization of same-sex marriage and the normalization of homosexuality, why would there be at least a short-term turn in the other direction? Well, perhaps you’re familiar with the real estate term ‘buyer’s remorse,’ that’s well-known in the real estate market; sometimes by car salesman as well. It turns out that when Americans – or any people that matter – make a major purchase, they often find themselves, almost immediately after making the purchase, remorseful about having made it. There is a pattern about this that follows with the excitement of making the purchase, the excitement of receiving the item or moving into the house, gives way to a sense of remorse or at least questioning as to whether was such a good deal after all. Eventually most people settle into their house or continue driving the car. But when it comes to this kind of moral change, it appears that at least some Americans are beginning to have second thoughts about the trend that they had reported themselves to support as a matter of just a few weeks ago. If nothing else, it appears that a significant percentage of Americans are having second thoughts about the normalization of homosexuality. There is a greater percentage of Americans, according to the study, indicating right now that they consider homosexual acts to be sinful than the same study found in the same kind of questioning just a matter of months ago. Is that a major cultural shift, a major moral shift in direction? Probably not. But it does indicate that moral change doesn’t take place without some fits and starts, and without, some of a least what might be called, buyer’s remorse.
The coverage in the Wall Street Journal also points to the second major issue at stake here: that is the encounter between America and its increasing secularization – including the secularization of politics. Americans appear to be having a bit of buyer’s remorse on that issue too. Just a matter of months ago, a larger percentage of Americans said they wanted religion and politics to be completely separate – as if that were possible by the way – but at least they stated that they believed it ought to be so. Now, an increased number of Americans are saying they’re afraid that it might be so. Are Americans schizophrenic and divided in mind about this? In some sense – yes. A significant percentage of Americans often say they want religion and politics to be completely separate, but once you begin to see that separation become operational, an increased number of Americans say this isn’t such a good idea after all. If nothing else, a vast majority of Americans want to make certain that those they elect to office do believe in God. Indeed “have strong religious beliefs.” That’s 6 out of 10, and that doesn’t mean that the other 4 out of the 10 wanted secular politicians; it just means that they wanted more mildly religious politicians. There are very few Americans who will tell a pollster that they want to elect an openly identified atheist to public office. This is something about which the atheists have been complaining. But this study points out that as much as Americans at least sometimes want to say, perhaps because they think it’s what ought to be said, that religion and politics out to be completely separate, when they actually see what happens when a secularizing politics begins to predominate; they get quite concerned about what the actually see. The data in the Pew report gives is no indication that there’s a likelihood these long-term trends are going to be reversed, but it is revealing that there is a good deal of second-guessing going on. From a Christian worldview perspective, that second-guessing tells us something.
2) White House intruder reminder how those who trust in chariots and horses will be disappointed
Shifting the topic to the intruder that climbed over the White House fence and actually gained entry to the White House before being apprehended by the Secret Service – the follow-up news accounts concerning this rather surprising incident are also very revealing. You have an article that appeared in yesterday’s edition of the New York Times. Michael Shear and Michael Schmidt report,
“Secret Service officers stopped Omar Jose Gonzalez last month as he carried a hatchet in front of the White House, but let him go even though [the Iraq war veteran] had been arrested this summer in Virginia with a mini-arsenal of semiautomatic weapons, a sniper rifle and a map clearly marking the White House’s location.”
Yesterday’s edition of the Wall Street Journal includes this paragraph in an article by Michael Phillips and Jeffrey Sparshott,
“In July, Mr. Gonzalez was arrested in Virginia on felony charges of evading arrest and possession of a sawed-off shotgun, police and the prosecutor said. Police also found sniper rifles, handguns and a cache of other weapons in his vehicle, as well as a map of Washington with a line drawn to the White House, Virginia State Police said. He was released on bond.”
Now keep in mind that the White House is supposedly the most closely guarded, most secure facility, on planet earth – and here you have a man who was arrested and was charged with felony counts, who was known to have an arsenal of weapons and rounds by the hundreds, in terms of ammunition, who was arrested carrying a hatchet in front of the White House and then was released. What in the world is going on here? How in the world could this have happened? How can the world’s most sophisticated security operation let someone gain entry actually into the White House, supposedly the world’s most secure location? How in the world was the front door apparently unlocked to the White House of all things? In the aftermath of Friday’s intrusion, congressional leaders said there would were be a flurry of investigations into this latest development – yet another embarrassment to the Secret Service. But you know, I thought of something else. I thought of that verse in Scripture that reminds us that those who trust for security in horses and chariots will be put to shame. President Obama said what a president would have to say in the aftermath of this particular embarrassment to the Secret Service. He said he thanks all the brave men and women of the Secret Service who protect him and protect his family. But if you’re President Obama in this situation, you have to wonder just how proficient the Secret Service is. After all, the President, the first lady, and their daughters, had just left for Camp David before a man, armed with a folding knife, entered through the front door of the official presidential residence.
We stand in long security lines in airports, we go through security checks for all kinds of events, we have security cameras documenting moves made in a city like London, and there are supposedly very few places where – at least in terms of public – you’re not on camera somewhere. That same trend seems to be expanding now to cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City – a not to mention Washington, especially since the terrorist attacks of September 11 with the rise of the kinds of threats coming from Al Qaeda and Islamic State. We supposedly have a vast security apparatus and we should be very thankful at times it clearly works. The Secret Service has foiled attempt to harm presidents. The national security apparatus has foiled terrorist attacks. But just like those of old who put their trust in horses and chariots, only to be put to shame; those who trust in modern security systems will likely face the very same shame. Just think of the red-faced Secret Service, embarrassed now after the revelation that an intruder crossed the lawn and entered the front door the White House. The front door the White House evidently wasn’t even locked.
3) Extreme secularism of the New York Times evident in sheer ignorance of Christianity
In terms of secularization, one of the most secularized components of American society is made up of elite media. And sometimes they profoundly miss the obvious; especially when it turns out the obvious has to do with Christianity. Mollie Hemingway writing at the Federalist points out that the New York Times has done it again – the most respected, well-funded, well-resourced newspaper in the United States of America gets Christianity wrong, not just slightly wrong but profoundly wrong again and again. She reminds us back in April 2013 the New York Times had to run a correction that ran like this,
“An earlier version of this article mischaracterized the Christian holiday of Easter. It is the celebration of Jesus’s resurrection from the dead, not his resurrection into heaven.”
Of course the phrase ‘resurrection in heaven’ doesn’t even make theological sense, but how can anyone, even in the most secularized stratum of American society, not know what Easter is about in terms of historic Christianity? How can someone who is a part of the intellectual elite, hired in the reportorial core of the New York Times, not know enough about Christianity – even just in terms of a cultural knowledge – to know what Easter is all about or what Christians believe about Christ. But they’ve done it again, writing about the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. The reporter for the New York Times indicated that this church is where many Christians believe Jesus is buried.
Jesus is buried?
The verb tense betrays the enormous ignorance, even the unrecognized ignorance, of the New York Times who had a reporter who evidently believes that Christians believe that Jesus is buried anywhere, and you had a copy editor, perhaps even a series of copy editors, who didn’t even recognize the problem. The verb tense is the issue; Christians do understand that Jesus was buried in Jerusalem, but Christianity is predicated upon the absolute truth that Jesus is not buried there now, but instead has risen from the dead. The New York Times, that often publishes corrections such as the one about the Easter story last April, corrected the story but didn’t run a correction. They didn’t want to draw attention to the problem with their own news article. At the end of her essay on this controversy, Mollie Hemingway writes,
“In any case, maybe the New York Times can get an in-house Christianity consultant to help them navigate the topics not covered in journalists’ education any more.”
What she doesn’t say needs to be said. If the only way that reporters and editors in a newspaper like the New York Times are going to learn what Christianity teaches is by having to have some kind of course or seminar in the subject, that just points out how totally secular the worldview of that newspaper really is. This is perhaps the world’s most respected newspaper, and it messed up the resurrection of Jesus Christ – two years in a row.
4) Lawyers jockey for chance to represent same-sex marriage case before Supreme Court
Well, the writers of the New York Times might not know much about Christianity, but they do know a great deal about the nation’s court system. Adam Liptak, finally, writing in yesterday’s edition of the New York Times tells us that lawyers working for the legalization of same-sex marriage coast-to-coast are now jockeying with each other, and amongst one another, trying to be the legal team with the plaintiff who will eventually have the name on the case that these lawyers believe will mean the legalization of same-sex marriage coast-to-coast. Their jockeying, trying to be the legal team with the plaintiff to get the case before the Supreme Court on appeal from the US circuits, that is the appellate courts. And what we’re looking at now is a very clear indication that the Supreme Court is going to take one of these cases, and it’s very important to say one of these cases, and it’s likely to be hearing oral arguments as early as January or early February of 2015 with an eventual decision to be handed down by the last day of June of next year.
Just about everyone on both sides of this issue understands that the Supreme Court is poised to act. And it’s very revealing isn’t it, that the legal team is now pushing for the legalization of same-sex marriage at the Supreme Court want to be the one who will take this to the final decision. They want their name written into American legal constitutional and political history. They’re looking for the plaintiff to have just the right story, just the right claim, just the right case, and they want to have their name right there in terms of the winning side of what they see to be an inevitable court victory. Evan Wolfson, longtime advocate for same-sex marriage and one of the pioneers in the effort said,
“Every attorney in the world, it seems, is now eager to be the one that stands before the court in the freedom to marry case,”
Well, not every attorney in the world, Mr. Wolfson, but no doubt plenty of them.
Thanks for listening to The Briefing. For more information go to my website at AlbertMohler.com you can follow me on Twitter by going to twitter.com/albertmohler. For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary go to sbts.edu. For information on Boyce College just go to boyecollege.com. I’m speaking to you from Jacksonville, FL and I’ll meet you again tomorrow for The Briefing.
The Briefing 09-24-14
1) Pew reveals moral revolution accompanied by some second-guessing
Public Sees Religion’s Influence Waning, Pew Research
Many Americans Want More Religion in Their Politics, New York Times (Michael Paulson)
Poll: Support for Gay Marriage May Be Leveling Off, ABC News (Rachel Zoll)
More Americans Support Mixing Religion and Politics, Wall Street Journal (Tamara Audi)
2) White House intruder reminder how those who trust in chariots and horses will be disappointed
White House Intruder’s Past Raises Concern, New York Times (Michael D. Shear and Michael S. Schmidt)
Accused White House Fence Jumper Had Earlier Arrest Record, Wall Street Journal (Michael M. Phillips and Jeffrey Sparshott)
3) Extreme secularism of the New York Times evident in sheer ignorance of Christianity
Will Someone Explain Christianity To The New York Times?, The Federalist (Mollie Hemingway)
Hoping War-Weary Tourists Will Return to Israel, New York Times (Matthew Kalman)
4) Lawyers jockey for chance to represent same-sex marriage case before Supreme Court
Seeking a Same-Sex Marriage Case Fit for History, New York Times (Adam Liptak)
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