For the record, I do not think they are.
Another question to ask, is if so bad, why don't Fundamentalists attempt providing a speculative narrative alternative.
Click On The Headline
Monday, August 19, 2013
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Undressing Assumptions In A Church Clothing Debate
When theologians and the like remark how society has become more casual, it might be helpful if they explained what is exactly meant by that, to what extent they oppose the development, and how this trend is supposedly harming the individual.
For example, it is probably best for those holding elected, ecclesiastical, or professional office to adorn themselves worthy of the part as they execute their duties.
However, it does not follow that the remainder of us should be similarly miserable if we are not enjoying the same degree of prestige, payment or opportunity.
Relatedly, sometimes those latching onto this complaint insist one can no longer distinguish between men and women in contemporary America.
Yet other than assorted gays, certain men with long hair, and women with eating disorders in serious need of treatment, it is not that difficult to tell the difference between a man and woman in a pair of jeans or slacks.
If solving that mystery stumps you, perhaps one ought to spend a little less time in scholastic isolation and instead study the intricacies of the human form.
In a Facebook exchange regarding this issue of attire in the church, for suggesting that there is nothing wrong with the average attender adorning themselves a bit more casually while it is probably better for the clergy to dress a bit more solemnly, it was hinted at that I was undermining my usual position of vocational equality.
But foremostly, the validity of that allegation depends on what is meant by equality.
The pastor is to lead the order of service within the church.
That's why one does not shout out how full of it many of them are in the middle of the service.
However, the pastor is not in charge of my home or what goes on in my head.
That is why in my vocation as a critic under the First Amendment why I am able to convey my findings and conclusions to a broader audience through social media upon my return home.
It was also observed that most dress better for work or a restaurant than they do for church.
However, those particular places have established rules regarding what one must wear if one does not want one’s access to such places restricted or rescinded.
Unless one is on its administrative staff, such regulations do not normally exist for a house of worship.
Do we want to start barring those not deemed “good enough” in terms of outer formality from entering the house of God?
These days, so long as the “strategic areas” of the anatomy are concealed, shouldn’t we just be glad someone shows up at all in light of all the other options competing for someone’s time and attention?
By Frederick Meekins
Friday, August 16, 2013
In response to a Time Magazine article about choosing to be childless, home school activist Kevin Swanson heaps condemnation and judgment upon those having done so for any variety of reasons. His sect is particularly harsh on a regular basis upon those not having spawned in their late teens or early 20’s. But is it really proper to heap guilt upon people for circumstances or inclinations beyond their control? One would assume God would want the individual to be somewhat selective with whom one decides to breed. Shouldn’t you at least love the person? There is no pleasing those of the Swansonite mentality. They harangue just about up to the point of revoking the status of Christian from those not yielding to their fanatical agenda but would rain down even hotter hell fire upon those seeking a mate beyond the boundaries of their borderline cult. Might it be best in some circumstances for those not suited in terms of personality and occupational status to refrain from having children rather than to end up in a situation where neither parent nor child would be particularly happy? Or perhaps the purpose of harping on this by certain homeschool factions is to drag the remainder of Christendom down to their particular level of misery and dissatisfaction.
A complaint has been enunciated that most dress better for work or a restaurant than they do for church. However, those particular places have established rules regarding what one must wear if one does not want one’s access to such places restricted or rescinded. Unless one is on its administrative staff, such does not normally exist for a house of worship. Do we want to start barring those not deemed “good enough” in terms of outer formality from entering the house of God? These days, so long as the “strategic areas” of the anatomy are concealed, shouldn’t we just be glad someone shows up at all in light of all the other options available for someone’s time and attention?
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
In a critique of Millennials and Christianity, it was observed that people today live their lives in a manner cognizant of what it is they want to reveal about themselves through social media. But how is that all that different than these Amish who react to a matter not by asking whether something is right or wrong but rather out of concern over what the COMMUNITY might have to say about it? Or, to place the issue in a more contemporary context more people can relate to, what Christian hasn’t been less than totally forthcoming as to exactly why they weren’t in the service the previous week or what exactly it was they watched on television the night before?
In a discussion of the Reformation, a fanatic homeschooler mocked a bishop from around that period that believed the way to resolve the junebug infestation of his diocese was to hold a procession and then to excommunicate the offending insects. When you come down to it, how was that idea any worse than the notion promoted by this very same pastor and activist that a number of Colorado residents have lost their homes in wildfires because of gay marriage being legalized in that state? No proof has been provided that these victims played a governmental role in authorizing this disputed matrimonial practice.
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
A number of Christians have made it a part of their calling to point out the errors of figures such as C.S. Lewis and Charles Finney. From the extent of the fuss made, one could conclude that these influential thinkers shouldn’t even be considered believers at all. Do those registering these complaints ever address the deficiencies in how the application of what is interpreted to be Biblical or orthodox Christianity gave room for those of deficient theologies to rise to prominence? For example, do those warning against Charles Finney ever speak out against the cold aloofness and detachment that would drive some to embrace the excesses of revivalism? Do the critics of C.S. Lewis ever encourage fellow Christians to try their own hands at speculative literature such as science fiction and fantasy?
Monday, August 12, 2013
A study of studies conducted by a University of Rochester research team concludes more intelligent people tend to be atheists while the dimwitted tend to adopt a religious outlook. However, has all of this brainpower enabled the intelligent to develop a way to extinguish the burn of Hellfire in the Afterlife?
In regards to a column I posted on evolution, it was commented “We need to be a little wiser in dealing with these issues.” That usually translates as that we should not address the issue at all unless one has diluted a Christian response on matters such as these to the point where it it is indistinguishable from standard modernism or postmodernism.
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Evolutionists More Insistent Than Ever About Being A Monkey's Uncle
One wrench that use to be tossed into Darwinism's mechanistic view of the universe was the raising of the issue of what supposedly happened to all of those transitional forms.
Even Darwin himself is alleged to have relented that his theory would ultimately be proven or discarded on the basis of such geological evidence.
For well over a century now, those wanting to extol what passes for education over and above commonsense have attempted to elaborate any number of conceptual bypasses around the 800 pound subhuman hominid in the room. An article in the May 2011 edition of Discover Magazine makes such an attempt by positioning that we ourselves are the transitional forms or at least what's left over of them in terms of primate evolution.
No longer are we to think of ourselves in terms of being exclusively modern homo sapiens. Rather we are to view ourselves as the genetic composites of previous ancestors such as Neanderthals and those other creatures reminiscent of Chaka from Land of the Lost.
This theory is put forward as an attempt to silence the critics of naturalistic evolution.
Yet the hypothesis ends up raising a number of questions that reveal just what one has to ignore and overlook in order to accept this particular narrative's attempt to account for the origins of man.
Foremost, if other higher order hominids were eventually wiped out or disappeared because they interbred increasingly with what we would recognize as human beings, why wouldn't these alleged ancestors we are more reluctant to embrace as part of our own kind, if they are able to produce a fecund offspring as a result of copulation through mating, be considered fellow human beings?
For is not the history of Anthropology literally littered with the corpses of people thought to be of the status of less than fully human? I recall Ken Ham one time claiming that at one point in the 1800's Australian Aborigines were harvested as research specimens.
Even when these remains are uncovered as part of legitimate research and excavation, it must be asked if a number of these conclusions arrived at are really inherent to the evidence or are active imaginations reading back into the data what these researchers instead intensely want to see.
For if Neanderthals could interbreed with run of the mill human beings to the point where certain evolutionary theorists are insisting that we ourselves are partially Neanderthal, aren't Neanderthals just anther racial or ethnic group?
Researcher Jack Cuozzo hypothesized in “Buried Alive:The Startling Truth About Neanderthal Man” that Neanderthals may have been the extremely aged or the diseased suffering from degenerative bone conditions similar to arthritis. For daring to proffer such a conjecture foremost proponents of inquiry and knowledge resorted to intimidation and threats of violence for presenting such an unconventional perspective.
By downplaying distinctions between human beings and what were at one time categorized as species preceding us along the chain of primatology obviously nothing more than glorified apes, radical evolutionists hope to further erode the preconceived boundaries between the species for the purposes of biological manipulative amalgamation.
Several years ago, I posted a column about Darwinistic propaganda speculating that in prehistoric times that the genetic boundaries might not have been as set in stone with jungle fever taking on a connotation that might shock those of us entrapped by a morality that frowns upon transpecies romance. Sophisticates of the scientific establishment easily dismiss bloggers for being out of touch and not playing with a full deck. However, seldom will they speak out against media mouthpieces allied in the cause of foisting a revolutionary secularism upon the nation such as The New Republic. On the cover of the April 23, 2008 issue was a photo that bordered on the creepy. Depicted was a chimpanzee gazing dreamily off into the sky. However, that was not the truly disturbing aspect.
For as the chimp looked to the sky, tucked beneath his arm was a human female. However, this was not the embrace of a zookeeper showing a little affection to one of her charges or like one would share with a pet. Rather, from the depiction, one gets more of the impression that these two are somehow lovers.
The look on the woman's face with head tilted back with her eyes shut and her hand intertwined with the paw of the chimp causes one to wonder if the duo might go swinging in the trees together a bit later if one gets the drift.
Some might dismiss such shock as the rantings of a prude with too much time on their hands. However, numerous credentialed scientists have come out speculating as to the possibility of a human/chimp hybrid as mankind's technical expertise continues to advance while moral expertise among the overly educated continues to atrophy.
According to an article in Wired Magazine titled “Science Without Limits”, such a primate hybridization program was suggested by renowned evolutionary theorist Stephen Jay Gould. Categorizing the experiment as “the most potentially interesting and ethically unacceptable experiment I could imagine”, Gould speculated such a hybrid would theoretically shed light on how the retention of juvenile characteristics in chimpanzees led to the rise of human beings. That is if one believes in that sort of hooey.
The Wired article insists such an endeavor would not be as outlandish as it sounds. Research conducted with baboons and rhesus monkeys suggests that given genetic similarities such an undertaking might be biologically feasible. Such a creature could be brought into existence through the techniques of invitrofertilization and placed within a human surrogate.
Proverbs 8:36 teaches that those that hate God love death. That not only applies to the individual existential death that comes to mind when contemplating that term horrid to all people of goodwill. It also applies to the broader obliteration of our species that will result from the failure to properly recognize those distinctions that set mankind above his fellow creatures in the natural order below.
By Frederick Meekins
Thursday, August 08, 2013
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