Science or Religion in the Classroom?

I originally wrote this almost two years ago in answer to an op/ed in our local paper. I submitted it, but I think it was too long. I’ve since been picking away at it, and after reading selections from The Origin of Species I’ve added some new thoughts as well. I am no expert in these fields, so if you happen to hold to evolution and know of the scientific proofs of macroevolution I'l like to hear from you.



I hope that the “Our View” piece in the Friday, May 13, 2005 News Herald has corrected the pervading misunderstanding that because evolution is just a theory it should not be taught as fact; however, I think there are far more telling reasons to question the necessity of teaching all that the theory of evolution entails: namely what it has to say about origins.

The writer of our view states, “Among modern biologists there is no battle over the truth of evolution.” I mean no disrespect, but I do not believe this is true. Many of the proponents of Intelligent Design are not just “religious adherents,” but accredited scientists in their respective fields.
The writer of “Our View” mentioned Richard Dawkins for the evolution side, but did not name anyone on the other side of the debate.Michael Behe, for instance, is a professor of biochemistry, who, not in spite of, but because of his scientific study has weighed evolution and found it wanting. I do not pretend that because Intelligent Design advocates have some PhD’s on their side their views in this area are justified. Nonetheless it’s hardly fair to dismiss a viewpoint because it is embraced by a minority. The substance of the argument should determine the response, not the number of proponents.

Every article I’ve read addressing I. D., however, has ignored the ideas of ID, and has instead launched into character attack (see cartoon at top). ID proponents are portrayed as little more than illiterate fundamentalist creationists who want to dilute science with religion. This is the trump card the evolution advocate pulls: all they have to do is connect I. D. to God and religion, and they can stage this as the mythical battle of science versus religion, Galileo vs. the Church, or Clarence Darrow versus William Jennings Bryan. The immediate implication is that if we let religion win this debate, we’ll find ourselves on the road to the dark ages. It’s a fine use of ad hominem, but aside from educating readers in the art of sucker-punch rhetoric it does little to present the debate in an honest and objective light.

One of Intelligent Design’s key questions concerns an apparent breakdown in logic consistently overlooked or ignored by evolutionists. Richard Dawkins wrote a book, The Blind Watchmaker, in which he describes a program he fashioned for the Mac enabling users to breed facsimile biomorphs in order to simulate evolution. Dawkins states that he attempted to avoid using his knowledge of biology in “designing” the program. I found his use of words quite telling-he had to design a program that would make it possible for even simulated evolution to occur. Now, this is an old argument, I know, but I and others who find merit in Intelligent Design theory are still incredulous. If Dawkins had to design a program that only uses 1’s and 0’s to do its thing, how do we expect something as complex as DNA (composed of four bases) to be shuffled into order without intelligent help?

What I and perhaps most I. D. proponents want is some proof of evolution. I see the theory of gravity at work everyday; it’s not hard for me to accept, but I must ask the child’s question: where is evolution?¹ For years, agnostics and atheists have used the child’s question to debunk God-“If he’s there, then why doesn’t he show himself!” I’m asking the same question of evolution: “If it’s there, show me DNA shuffling itself into order without intelligent help!” I would like to see it at work. I don’t mean microevolution, i.e., adaptations or mutations; they are testable and provable. I am concerned with the central concern of this whole debate: origins.

Much has been made about Darwin’s The Origin of Species, and having read some of it, I can see where he was going, and how he reached certain conclusions. If he would have stayed with the notion of natural selection affecting change from species to species, I would be fine with that, but he and all the evolutionary theorists since then didn’t stop there. I think the title of that book should have been “The Origin of the Kingdoms,” because Darwin’s premise was that a Creator (yes, it is in the book, so if we are fair I guess we have to edit Origin of the Species so no students will be forced to hear about an impossible-to-prove Creator) breathed life into a few forms or ONE. Hmmm…but all the evidence he gives in the book involves changing from species to species, hardly proof that giraffes and amoebas have the same ancestor. ² So spaniels and pointers have the same ancestor? Yes? They’re both dogs! Am I too simpleminded because I believe God created a proto-dog from which other species evolved, but can’t accept the fact that dogs and man have the same ancestor? Why are we even having this silly argument about Intelligent Design being such a scientific heresy if Darwin himself left room for an Intelligent Designer? What’s the big deal with teaching two opposing viewpoints on a topic that cannot be proven in the lab?

Well, High School biology textbooks do claim to have proofs from the lab that address the origins of life on earth from an evolutionary perspective. One is a 1953 experiment in which Miller and Urey simulated the conditions of primordial earth and produced goo brimming with amino acids and organic compounds: the building blocks of life. The book does not mention, however, that the results were inaccurate in light of recent evidence.

According to Bill Bryson, in his book A Short History of Everything, “Despite half a century of further study, we are no nearer to synthesizing life today than we were in 1953 and much further away from thinking we can. Scientists are now pretty certain that the early atmosphere was nothing like as primed for development as Miller and Urey’s gaseous stew” (287). If we were really concerned about the integrity of the scientific education, why is an experiment known to be inaccurate for over thirty years still taught?

Bryson goes on to say that recent experiments in this area have only managed to produce one amino acid, and scientists have absolutely no idea how proteins were formed, which is the real kicker. You see, the fact that no protein has been formed in the lab without intelligent help is the problem I have. I want to see this kind of evidence.

Now, you may be saying, “that’s impossible; you’re making demands that are too high. You’re asking for a miracle.” Exactly! God is kept out of the classroom because His existence cannot be determined by means of science, but science still can present no empirical evidence that evolution could work on the most fundamental level of all: the origin of life. Without scientific evidence, this aspect of evolution is nothing more than metaphysics, i.e., religion.

The writer of “Our View” states, “Scientific hypotheses need to be falsifiable: there has to be a way they could be proven wrong,” but even when aspects of evolution are disproved (as above), the public never hears and students are still taught the proof-turned-myth as science.

I close by referencing the article, “Evolution Debate Moves to Florida” in the Tuesday, May 10, 2005 News Herald in which Marcia Brady said, “We’re not certified to be theologians. That’s social or religious studies.” If metaphysics are to be removed from the high school classroom, please be fair about it, and remove those traces that have mingled with accepted scientific theory. If theists can’t teach their view of origins in the classroom then why is the evolutionist able to teach theirs with no natural or scientific proof to back it?


1 Agnostics use the child’s question of God- “If He exists, where is he?” The problem with asking that question of a being with intelligence is that the being has every ability and right not to answer. If God doesn’t want to reveal himself to people who demand proof, is there a natural law that says he has to? But the evolutionist cannot evade my child’s question: if evolution is true-why can’t we see it at work-there is no intelligent force behind evolution-it is a mechanical process, so it doesn’t have any say. If it works, it works, no matter who’s looking. But the problem is that it doesn’t work while people are looking. It does its amazing work over millions of years so no can observe it. To me it seems clear that this is outside of the realm of science. No one can see it happening, so why are evolutionists so intent on keeping it in the classroom? Sure, I can’t see gravity, I can’t see electricity, but I see their effects and experiments show that they ARE HAPPENING NOW-in the present, but evolution isn’t. Where are the missing links? Why hasn’t the fossil record borne the theory out? That is exactly the point.

2 He does give a lengthy hypothesis that shows how evolution that introduces new Classes, Orders and Phylums COULD happen, but do we have ANY observable proof that this in fact is happening or has happened? Where is the proof of this kind of change? This is an honest question. I don't know of any-if you know more of this than I do and know of some proof in this vein, I would like to hear about it.

More Than a Period Piece

Amazing Grace is one of those movies that, if you’re not careful, can sneak past without much notice or protest. Most people I’ve talked to haven’t even heard of the movie. It is truly unfortunate because I found this film to be quite the diamond in the rough.

Perhaps it is the title that scares even would-be supporters of the film to steer clear. Even though Christianity is supposedly a commercial hotspot right now after The Passion of the Christ, any time “Christian” movies (films that are produced by companies spawned out of the Christian subculture) actually find their way to theaters or the rental store, they are avoided like the plague by the bulk of the populace, because, well, let’s be honest, these movies just plain suck. I’m thinking of Left Behind, Omega Code, Hangman’s Curse and the like. Thankfully this film is not in that vein.

The title is derived from the famous hymn of course, but what you may not have realized is that this hymn was written by a former slave trader-turned pastor named John Newton, who also had a profound impact on a man named William Wilberforce. Wilberforce was the man who for years fought against the institution of slavery in the British parliament and was instrumental in its abolition long before America would follow suit. The film focuses on Wilberforce, the abolitionist, so like 2005’s Capote, is less a biography, than the chronicle of one aspect of a man’s life. It is an engrossing aspect, and the story is well written, directed and acted.

There are a couple of dinger moments. One exchange goes something to the effect of: “So you’re saying you found God?” And all us Christians respond in unison with Wilberforce, “I think He found me.” This kind of thing can be forgiven, though, because elsewhere, the writer, Steven Knight, crafts some really witty repartee, and is often downright profound.

Ioan Gruffudd gives an earnest and believable performance as Wilberforce, and Steven Knight, has infused this portrait of the man with nobility and at the same time frailty, ensuring that we not only root for him, but also identify with him. The supporting cast is peopled by the likes of Michael Gambon, Ciaran Hinds, and Albert Finney (character actors you will recognize, but probably won’t be able to place); all of whom turn in outstanding performances. Albert Finney is absolutely wonderful as Wilberforce’s mentor pastor John Newton.

Some have complained that there is not enough of the horror and atrocity of slavery actually depicted onscreen, and that perhaps the subject has been Disney-fied beyond recognition. But this movie is not seeking to be Amistad or Schindler's List, and to impose that expectation on the film is unfair. Again, the film centers on William Wilberforce the abolitionist, and in spite of its lack of visual aids, it recreates his own abhorrence for slavery very well.

One critic claimed that Wilberforce is not worthy of real heroism because he’s rich and retreats to his well-established estate when not fighting slavery. The writer must have forgotten that Wilberforce leaves his doors open to peasants who overrun his house in one scene. This is not the socially conscious hypocritical celebrity activist of the present, who villifies the president and then returns home to his mansion that dwarfs the president's and does nothing about the problem. This is a man whose rhetoric was not separated from his lifestyle, but whose whole life rang with cohesion.

This movie challenged me, and I think all Christians should watch it to remind us that while we are in this world, we need to be advocates of the truly downtrodden, because even with all our study of the Word, we often leave behind those numerous commands to care for the poor in favor other, more esoteric or advantageous propositions. I hope non-Christians watch the movie as well, to see that there have been great men of God who, though frail and weak like the rest of us, did more than just talk about love or prepare for eternity, but actually helped make this world a better place.

**** out of ****

Selective Deconstruction

I just heard an interview with Elaine Pagels, the writer of Beyond Belief and many books dealing with the Gnostic Gospels. A minority group of scholars consisting of Marcus Borg, Domonic Crossan, Robert Funk, Pagels, and a few others seems to dominate media coverage of anything pertaining to Jesus. This should be no small surprise in a postmodern deconstructionist era in which we are challenged to question long-held assumptions. The mantra of this generation of historians and thinkers is: “the winner writes the history books.” This statement has some veracity, there is no doubt, and I strongly support the notion of questioning even long-held traditions when initial inquiry reveals that something is wrong with these entrenched beliefs.

What I find fascinating is that this attitude of appealing to a minority of experts (which should be expected from a critically minded media) is only applied selectively. So, it is okay to dedicate page after page of U.S. News and World Report and hour upon hour of broadcast on NPR or the History Channel to this minority of religious scholars, but it is absurd to dedicate any fair bit of press or airtime to minority views on global warming, the Holocaust or evolution.

Now, before you x this window out, I’m not saying that the people who deny the Holocaust have any merit to their position. I believe the Holocaust happened and have no need that it be denied. I don’t even understand how a thinking individual could question the reality of the Holocaust, but if the media feels this inexorable need to constantly undermine accepted understanding of history, why does it not apply the same modus operandi when dealing with certain areas? Again, I’m not insinuating that because a lot of people believe one thing that this view should be considered true, and I’m certainly not advocating the idea that a minority will have a better view than the popularly held idea. All I’m asking is: Why should any of this matter? Why don’t we look at the claim, hold it up to critical inquiry, and as far as possible, let the facts speak for themselves?

I’ve yet to hear much debate on the Gnostic Gospels issue, because it always seems that the minority scholars get free reign in the public arena. I’ve never even heard the objections raised by “the holocaust as myth” crowd, because everyone is afraid to give them publicity. I think you give them more publicity by news blurbs that announce their existence, but don’t explore their views and offer a chance to give them a rebuttal. I’ve still yet to see any fair treatment of the Intelligent Design issue. All I ever see is a bunch of talking heads (who are far from scientific experts) denouncing the movement as scientific heretics without ever giving them a chance to present their viewpoints. No, they are just branded as Creationist idiots.

It’s a wonder that the same institutions that decry I.D. scientists for their heresy, laud the Pagels crowd for theirs, giving the latter a bully pulpit with no opportunity for rebuff, and the former only a caricature, and no opportunity to even present their reasons for believing the way the do. If we’re to be critical thinkers, we need to see both sides of a story and subject both sides to critical inquiry. Right now, the accepted evangelical understanding is being subjected to criticism for the gazillionth time in history. Fine, all is fair, but what of Gnosticism? Have you put that worldview under the microscope lately? What of evolution? A theory that for all its charm, after 150 years still lacks adequate proof in the fossil record to vindicate it. Where is the objectivity in all this?

City Pier March 2

The surf was pretty impressive on Friday. I put a little video together from the footage I got.

Brady Mandigo

Brady was a former student of mine at Arnold High. He did this mini-expo for my wife's first grade class, and I compiled a little video. He hasn't even been skating for two years, but he already can do some amazing stuff.

Night at the Museum

Night at the Museum is another in a long line of films adapted from children's picture books. Think movies like Jumanji, Zathura and (croak) Polar Express. Like Jumanji, this film has its share of wild beasts, magical objects and a nice dose of suspense. It's a good-humored film that doesn't aim to high, and ,I think, reaches its mark.

Ben Stiller takes on the role of hopeless dreamer Larry Daley (a la Jack Black's Nick Vanderpark in Envy). He is a father whose belief in far-fetched ideas like "The Snapper" (a device which allows you to turn on lights by snapping your fingers) have kept him from committing to a stable job. His ex-wife gives him an ultimatum to find a job, or she will seriuosly consider decreasing his time with his son.

A job agency finds him a position at a museum, but the secretary warns him that the supervisor has turned all apllicants away. The supervisor, named Cecil, is played by Dick Van Dyke who is joined by veteran character actor Bill Cobbs and film legend Mickey Rooney. While there's nothing particularly inspired about Rooney's one-liners, I couldn't help but laugh every time he was onscreen. He cracked me up the entire time. The guy's first screen appearance was in 1930 for crying out loud!

Chaos ensues when Daley is left alone in the museum along with all this genre's cliches: he loses the item that will enable him to do his job, he screws everything up, he makes that oh-so-notorious blunder protagonists always make in these "you gotta believe" movies by expecting people to believe him when he tells them that all the exhibits come to life at night. Oh, well, you don't come to watch this movie for believability, but I sometimes wonder why screenwriters always use the same ploys. Isn't there a better way to heighten tension than to make your hero look like a numbskull? Half the time I almost want the hero/heroine to fail in these movies because they act so naieve.

I actually enjoyed the movie in spite of its predictability. Owen Wilson was funny, and Stiller had his usual "boy is this awkward?" moments that provided some laughs. The special effects were very well done, and overall it's a fun movie.
Rating: **1/2 out of ****

A Conservative in the Dismantling

So, for a long time I've taken my stand with the Right, but lately I've become disillusioned with both parties, no matter how "bipartisan" they claim to be. When I previously took The World's Smallest Political Quiz I was staunchly stationed in the neoconservative camp, but I took it the other day, and I was surprised to discover I was almost down-the-line libertarian. Then I read the following article in The News Herald, and my suspicions were confirmed. I, too, am leaving behind my "conservative" label because the movement no longer accurately represents my views. I hate conservative educations policy (NO Child Left Behind-harhar snicker snicker), its foreign policy, and as Mr. Maher (not Bill) points out below, I find very little conservative in its continuing acceptance, begrudging or otherwise, of big government.

I liked one line from Maher so much I've made it my new quote. If we are to truly help people, we as PEOPLE need to help people, not pawn it off on the government to do it. The Church bears a lot of responsibility in this whole welfare fiasco because if we were helping the poor as we are commanded to do throughout the entire Bible, welfare would be superfluous. Yes, I really believe that.

You can read Brian Maher's article in its original context at:
Lew Rockwell.com

Confessions of an Ex-Conservative
by Brian Maher

Confession: I used to be a rock-ribbed conservative, or at least I thought I was. The scales slowly began to fall from my eyes after almost accidentally stumbling upon the works of Mises, Rothbard, Nock and a host of other genuine champions of human liberty. I’m beginning to realize that I was really much more libertarian than conservative all along. Not necessarily a Libertarian, but libertarian.

While I find the notion of private police services and courts intriguing, for example, I genuflect to what I consider reality in recognizing that the elimination of all government functions is at present hopelessly quixotic, and I believe it’s best that one picks one’s battles wisely. For now, I’d settle for the far more modest goal of the complete dismantling of the welfare and regulatory state, thank you.

The main reason why I’ve abandoned the Republican Party is its growing embrace of the State and its unforgivable expansion of government spending. It’s been said in the past that the Democrats will take this country over the cliff going seventy while the Republicans will take us over the cliff going fifty-five (or something like that). It’s now becoming abundantly clear that the Republicans will also plunge us to our collective demise going seventy – or perhaps sixty-five; or maybe even eighty. When we’re in freefall it won’t matter how long it took us to get there.

At least partly responsible for this development is the ignoble and oxymoronic doctrine of "compassionate conservatism," a bastard child that should have been strangled in its crib long ago. Like a virulent strain of bacteria it persists, however, and one of its adherents recently wrote an article condemning the benighted among us who still cling wistfully to the quaint concept of limited government. Of course he simultaneously exalted the virtues of activist, muscular government.

One Michael Gerson is a former speechwriter for George W. Bush. He is now a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a compassionate conservative. His association with George Bush is not surprising since the latter is the most compassionate president in American history, if compassion can be measured by the amount of our money a president spends. In a recent Newsweek column, Gerson took traditional conservatives to the woodshed for failing to lavish sufficient spending on New Orleans, ground zero for compassionate conservatism and various species of collectivism, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. What was instead required, according to Gerson, was, "an active response from government to encourage economic empowerment and social mobility." Uh-huh. So what we need most is more of the same government action that created much of the social rot in New Orleans in the first place. Isn’t that always the solution, though?

Especially despicable in Gerson’s opinion were those conservatives who wanted to cut government spending in other areas to offset some of the behemoth costs of the relief, such as AIDS spending for Africa. Pure villainy. Could we slash one dollar from the Medicare prescription drug benefit for seniors? Perish the thought. That wouldn’t be, well, compassionate. And compassion should be the business of government. It doesn’t matter that compassion is a trait of individuals, not governments. The only genuinely distinguishing trait of governments is force. Please take a moment to absorb the full implications of that last sentence. What Gerson and other collectivists of various stripes really demand is compassion (from us) enforced at the point of a gun, which, dare I say, is hardly compassionate by any reasonable definition of the word. But I digress.

Gerson goes on to dismiss libertarianism, with its "disdain for government, reflexive preference for markets and an unbalanced emphasis on individual choice". Oh, the horror of it all! Who could possibly believe in such heretical concepts? He cites Russell Kirk’s description of libertarianism as "an ideology of universal selfishness," a characterization with which I would have to assume he agrees. I guess socialism is therefore an ideology of universal selflessness, and therefore superior.

Gerson has apparently never seriously considered the possibility that government is actually the enemy of civil society, that it actually undermines the very social institutions of family and church that he so claims to cherish. To the contrary, he claims that, "government can act to strengthen them". Sounds a lot like Great Society liberalism to me. In reality, however, it is almost axiomatic that civil society recedes as government gains. I would gently refer Mr. Gerson to the city of New Orleans as an example of the havoc that the welfare state can visit upon a community. It probably wouldn’t do much good, however, for obvious reasons.

Gerson goes on to warn his fellow Republicans about campaigning against big government during the next election cycle. Query: Would anyone with even the most rudimentary cognitive skills take them seriously if they did? While Democrats campaign on health care, poverty and education, Gerson warns that such rhetoric would "be procedural, small-minded, cold and uninspired". Indeed. Confiscating less of your money for the grandiose plans of politicians is small-minded. Even worse, it’s… uninspired.

In other words, to get elected, Republicans must promise as many or more goodies to the masses as the Democrats. H.L. Mencken astutely referred to elections as advance auctions for the sale of stolen goods. They are at that. Of course, most Republicans’ conduct in office has never come close to matching their limited government rhetoric. Ron Paul and a few others are laudable exceptions. Now Republicans should drop the pretense altogether and simply attempt to beat the Democrats by showing that they have bigger hearts. We’d have thinner wallets but hey, politics is politics.

According to Gerson, the answer lies with GOP state governors like Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney. I’m sure he’d include Ahnold out in California and even mayors like Mike Bloomberg and former mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Do any of these men believe in a limited role for government? To ask the question is to basically answer it. Gerson actually thinks otherwise. Particularly disturbing is Gerson’s endorsement of Romney, actually celebrating the fact that he "mandated basic health insurance while giving subsidies to low-income people" (emphasis added).

So it’s praiseworthy – and conservative – when the government forces you, ultimately at gunpoint remember, to buy health insurance, whether you want it or not. It will actually be illegal NOT to own health insurance, if you can afford it. And the government will determine whether you can afford it or not. If you can’t, no need to worry. Your fellow citizens will kindly pick up the tab on your behalf, being as generous as they are. This isn’t the place for an economic analysis but suffice it to say that government intervention in the health care field is largely responsible for its spiraling costs in the first place.

The demand for socialized medicine is the logical outcome of the fact that government intervention in the marketplace produces cascading economic distortions, which are used at each stage to justify further and further government intervention, a self-perpetuating cycle that ultimately establishes complete government control of an industry. Speaking of health care, Ahnold just proposed a similar program to Romney’s in California. Is this the future of conservatism, in the land of the free?

Yet this is precisely what Gerson and his merry band of "compassionate conservatives" want to foist upon the entire nation. I expect that from the Left, but this influential portion of the "Right" has been seduced by the siren song of big government, and has become a willing accomplice in the forward march of state power. Needless to say, government has strayed far beyond its traditional negative role of defending person and property. Where is a lover of liberty to turn when faced with such grim choices?

In fairness to Gerson, he’s just looking out for his Party and its electoral success. In some respects, he’s right. To many of us Americans, talk of freedom and limited government sounds nice and all, but it doesn’t really grab us. It doesn’t fire our imaginations. It isn’t sexy. Promises of universal health care, saving the environment, curing sickness, rebuilding New Orleans and ending poverty are. What right-minded person can be against these things? And let’s face it, we don’t really want to know the details. They might burst our bubble.

Quite frankly, it is difficult to imagine a full-throated libertarian platform finding any sort of traction with the American people at this point in time. We’re too conditioned to believe in the virtue of benevolent government; too fearful of bogeymen in our age of terrorism; too addicted to the promise of government succor; too intoxicated by the seductive lure of the FED’s easy money. We won’t surrender these things easily. We get what we deserve, ultimately. Gerson and his fellow compassionate conservatives are merely a reflection of the times in which we live. Nothing more, nothing less.

January 17, 2007

Brian Maher [send him mail] is a freelance writer living just outside of New York City.

Copyright © 2007 LewRockwell.com

Hardee's Spoof

Well, here's our latest bit of nonsense:

Little Minds Miss Sunshine

A week or so ago I finally watched Little Miss Sunshine. I typically make it a point to read family movie reviews on the Internet before watching movies that are R rated to see if there are any sex scenes or nudity. Yeah, this may seem prudish or immature, but I am subject to being “immature” (if that’s what you call a weak spot for pornography), and for me, seeing a scene that is sexually explicit is akin to an alcoholic taking just one gulp of beer. I just better not do it. Maybe you think it’s silly, but it’s true.



Anyway, I was reading Focus on the Family’s movie review of LMS on its website, Plugged In, and
it enumerated all the morally-suspect aspects of the film. It almost swayed me not to watch it, honestly, because the reviewer said that the final dance scene went too far.

It did sound bad…until I actually saw the movie. And in context, the scene was not bad at all. First of all: it was social commentary. In the reviewer’s attempts to count every speck of sin in the movie, he missed the bigger picture. The boy, while on the pier says, “F*** beauty contests,” and rightfully so-was the reviewer watching the other part of the beauty pageant, in which little girls are judged by mere externals? Would he rather these little girls be exploited so long as they play by the rules? Is a striptease any worse than the objectification that was happening on the stage? And as my wife pointed out-the majority of the girls on that stage will one day be doing stripteases because that’s the logical end of the beauty pageant scene for many of the contestants who fail. We’re not talking about a noble goal here: to be the best looking. Olive’s performance was not necessarily an endorsement of lewd sexual behavior, but an indictment on beauty pageants-showing them for what they really are: paper thin morality that covers a hypocritical obsession with externals.

So, in the reviewer’s rush to judgment, he became an endorser of the beauty pageant. I think conservative Christians tend in this direction way too often-going through the world with a kind of naïve shortsightedness that blinds them to the evils that look good on the surface, when if they’d look a bit closer, they’d see that sin is festering there worse than in the seemingly evil areas, where, I might add, redemption has the tendency to shine through.

Christians tend to become Pharisees by requiring movies to have a clean outside, but a less than admirable inside. Hangman’s Curse was a Christian film that was released some time ago. I don’t think there was one cuss word in the whole movie, and there were some positive things about it, but underlying its clean exterior, it was a crappy movie, filled with clichés, unrealistic characters, and a scene that I would classify as downright ungodly. The football coach is about as one-dimensional a villain as has ever been written. He doesn’t care at all about the poor kids who’ve been beat-up and victimized because he’s an evolutionist. “Survival of the fittest,” he drones. So, the writer punishes him by killing the coach with an army of oversized tarantulas. This is the type of trick bad screenwriters resort to: killing people off who represent ideologies you disagree with. But conservative Christians like these type of movies. So there’s no cussing, but guess what? Not only is it not entertaining, but there is nothing redemptive or instructive in the entire film. The film is an exercise in the art of patting oneself on the back. Does God admire this?

As far as Little Miss Sunshine goes, there is plenty of redemption. A family filled with hateful, self-righteous and vindictive people, repent, unite and embrace one another in the most humiliating way: dancing with their most innocent member before a jeering crowd. That was love, that was selflessness, and humility depicted in a way that the right wing I guess is too blind to see.

If you want repentance you can’t show someone getting on his or her knees and saying the sinner’s prayer. It won’t translate on film. It doesn’t work. Repentance that works in film is Matt Dillon’s character risking his life to save the woman he molested in Crash, not Kirk Cameron’s sitting in a stall and saying the sinner’s prayer in Left Behind. We’re talking about stories here, and stories work best when the person doesn’t jump out and say-“You need to accept Jesus as your Lord and savior.” Jesus didn’t do that when he told parables so why do we? There is an appropriate time for preaching and it’s guess when-while you’re preaching! Save the sinner’s prayer for a sermon.

Good art isn’t always made from all the pretty and nice things in the world. Often, especially on this fallen planet, you have to show the mire in order to get to the redemption. You can’t have the resurrection without the Cross, and you’re rarely going to get good art if you skim the surface and retreat from the dark spaces. Let’s not be small-minded people who can’t see the sunshine for all the specks.

Haggard, Hypocrites, and Hell in the Media

Recently I’ve been wondering why journalism in all its forms seems dedicated to the notion that the most important news is bad news. I can’t speak for everyone, but for me it gets tiresome hearing or seeing the words “Iraq,”¹ “insurgents,”² “Haggard,”³ or “Gibson,”⁴ every time I turn on NPR or open up the paper (Insert time appropriate word: 1-Palestine, Israel, N. Korea; 2-guerillas, Hezbollah, Hamas, Al-Qaeda; 3-Foley, priests, Clinton, Jefferson, Pee-Wee; 4-Michael Richards, etc.). You’d think we’d be impossible to shock after the long parade of scandal, tragedy, terror, and corruption that has been passing us by even in the years since Kennedy’s assassination. You’d think Foley would be par for the course since congressman Gerry Studds was guilty of not only salacious correspondence, but a full on sexual encounter with a page 23 years ago.⁵ And Foley comes as a shock?! You’d think after Nixon, we’d be prepared for corruption, but, no, we still spend months scrambling for every scrap of info about Abramoff. Why is it still interesting?

A few years ago, I was talking to a police officer about the sad depths to which people sink, when I commented that even the best of us have the capability to sink to these depths. I’ll never forget his rebuff: “There’s no need to put a black mark on everyone.” Implied in this statement is the idea that mankind is spotless-only peoples’ choices make them bad, and those few bad people are the problem. Perhaps the media, like the police officer I encountered a few years back, is obsessed with negative news because they still refuse to acknowledge that mankind has a deeply-ingrained evil. They dedicate their powers to exposing the anomalies, thinking they’re doing humankind a service. “If we blow the whistle on all the bad-guys, then the world will be a better place.”

Robyn Blumner was one of the many writers who unloaded criticisms upon the Foley’s and Haggard’s of the world: the hypocrites who preach against a sin only to indulge in it in private. Blumner stated in a recent editorial: “In Dante’s descending circles of Hell, hypocrites were cast into the eighth and penultimate level in honor of their status…I think Dante was too kind. On the scale of despicableness, the hypocrite is king.”⁶ Ron Hart, in another editorial wrote, “These folks have a special place in Hell reserved for them.” ⁷

Now before I voice my response and before you think I’m justifying Haggard’s or Foley’s actions, let me offer a few caveats: first, I recognize that this kind of media judgment is not reserved to liberals criticizing conservatives. The knife cuts both ways, and when every conservative was throwing stones at Clinton for the Lewinsky scandal I was right there with them, but I was pretty naïve then. In my older and hopefully wiser years I’m learning that these witch-hunts, regardless of their source or target, do little to make the world a better place.

Second, I do believe that the two writers I’ve referenced were right about hypocrites-that they deserve every bit of hell they get. Jesus himself spoke many parables to this end. Nonetheless, there are a couple of things that bother me about these writers’ position.


First, their tone just gets to me. They write with such a snobbish, snide and vitriolic ad hominem, you’d think they’d never done a bad thing in their lives. This is actually the thing that pushed me over the edge to type this essay out: I was watching O’Reilly factor over the Christmas break, and the guest host was tearing into Michael Richards and Mel Gibson with such self-righteousness, I just couldn’t handle it anymore. Now get me—I don’t think that what either one of them did was right or justifiable, but for goodness’ sake folks, have you not ever screwed up? Have you not ever flown off the handle and said something you regret later? Should their be accountability? Of course, but can’t we do it with a little more restraint? Can’t we be a bit more understanding? Can’t we be decent enough to admit that we too have screwed up in similar ways? This brings me to the other problem I have with the pundits: in launching their tirades against the Haggards and Foleys, they do the very thing they claim to despise in Haggard and Foley-judging others.

Hart states, “After denying that he ever met the gay escort who says he had a three-year relationship with him, Rev. Ted finally confessed. Yet, before I cast the first stone, what man among us has not summoned a gay male prostitute to our hotel room for a massage and to score a little methamphetamine with Church money?” (emphasis mine). The italicized above is alluding of course to the woman caught in adultery in John 8, whose prosecutors were a group of scribes and Pharisees ready to stone her. Now I’m sure SOME of the Pharisees and scribes could have asked a similar sarcastic question regarding the prostitute: “Before I cast the first stone, what one of us hasn’t committed adultery?” And some of them probably could have passed that test. But notice –Jesus didn’t say, “He who is without adultery, let him cast the first stone,” but “sin.” Even these self-righteous men knew enough of God’s law to know they had their share of sin, so what did they do? They dropped the stones and left. Not so, Hart. He proceeds to state that the likes of Haggard should burn in hell.

I’m really starting to notice that the cover boys for hypocrisy in this nation (the Swaggarts, Bakkers, Foleys, Haggards) have become a nice dumping off point for a new crew of scribes. The hypocritical four above may be or may have been Pharisees in the worst sense of the term (Yes, I’m one of those people who actually believe people can change), but we as a people have become a nation of scribes-writing, reading and indulging in the scapegoating of big names so we don’t have to deal with the real problem: ME.

Jesus could get off with saying hypocrites should burn in the depths of hell because He wasn’t one. But that’s not true of Hart or Blumner or me. The people behind the scandals may get railroaded in the papers and they may be hypocrites now, but thank God that He’s not like Hart or Blumner, or else they wouldn’t have a second chance. None of us would. Psalm 109:31 says of God, “For He stands at the right hand of the needy, To save him from those who would judge his soul.” I find those words at the end interesting-“judge his soul.” When mankind denies the blatant reality that we are all beset by weaknesses and failings, it makes it easy to single out those whom on a social level are worse than us, and not only demand discipline, but judgment upon their very souls.

-------
5 "Studds did not apologize, but admitted to 'a very serious error in judgment.'[5] As his censure was read, Studds faced the Speaker who was reading the motion, with his back to the other House members.[1][6] Later, at a press conference with the former page, both stated that the young man, who was 17, consented. Studds continued to be reelected until his retirement in 1997.[4]"
(Source-Wikipedia)

6 Blumner, Robyn. "Their Demons Make Them Do It."

7 Hart, Ron. "Ministers Do More Than Laypeople."

Great Documentary

Well Dustin keeps turning my attention to some really good stuff with his own blog, and I thought I'd pass one of his ideas on. Last night we watched Dear Francis-a documentary that focuses the AIDS epidemic and its effects on Swaziland. The movie derives its narrative thread by focusing on two Americans college students who traveled with a group to Swaziland to raise awareness about prevention, etc.

The ironic thing about the movie is that is was filmed while my brother-in-law Brandon was in Swaziland with the same group. And the girl that the documentary focuses on was a friend from the Church Brandon and Melissa attended in Mansfield, TX. It was surreal to see her on film, and I half expected the movie to be low quality (I thought sure the budget would have to be very small), but the film is excellent. I highly recommend it.

I've embedded the trailer below, but if you'd like more info go to dearfrancis.org.

U2's Window in the Sky Video

Dustin had this posted at his Blog:
http://dustinbryson.typepad.com/

U2's new video-It's incredible.

Marfa Mystery Lights and Human Nature

My parents live in a small town in West Texas where the mountains of the Big Bend march north from the Mexican border, leaving a number of valleys and foothils in their path. The countryside is not only beautiful (if you like the look of the old west), but has certain unique atmospheric characteristics that many believe to be responsible for a strange phenomenon: the Marfa Lights. The lights are visible at night from a small observatory just off U. S. Route 90 between Alpine and Marfa. I'm one of those guys that's fascinated by UFO's, Bigfoot, and such, so when my parents first told me of this phenomenon I was excited to have a chance to see it.

I think I've been there to view the lights on two separate occasions, and over time I've formed theories as to their origin. First, the lights:

These are time exposures of the marfa lights taken from the area of the observation park. You can find explanations of the pictures and the methodology behind them at: Night Orbs.

Now, I can give my testimony that these pictures adequately reflect what I saw at the observation area. I'm not really writing to make you believe that these things exist and are some kind of alien intelligence or something. But I am writing because I find people's reactions to these lights very interesting.

At the viewing park, there is a display that explains the history of the lights, the direction you should look, and (very important) the direction you should not look: the Southwest. This is because Highway 67 runs over the mountains and is visible from the viewing area. Any lights that are seen emanating from that direction are car headlights, and because of the distance and (I'm guessing) temperature change over the valley, these car headlights look very UFO-like indeed.

On the night of my second visit, a whole group of people were practically jumping for joy because they were seeing Marfa lights with their own eyes! Tons of the lights- dancing around, trading places, disappearing and reappearing. Except, of course, they were in the Southwest. I wanted to tell them to read the display for themselves, but who am I to burst their bubble? The ones that bug me more than the naieve believers, though, are the skeptics who say that the Marfa Lights are nothing more than car headlights on Highway 67. These skeptics, so ready to attack anything potentially inexplicable, don't even bother to take the time to find out that the real sightings of Marfa Lights are not what they are attacking.

Here we have the two extremes of the human condition: the man of faith and the man of reason, Mulder and Scully, Locke and Jack, or Bryan and Darrow. The thing that annoys me most about these two extremes is that it is all or nothing: blind faith or blind reason. This culture (as I suppose every one throughout history has been) is plagued with this dichotomy.

I think the thing that's so telling about my Marfa experience is that it shows that people do not want to learn. We want things to fit just as we expect them to, because otherwise we will be forced to change or, GASP, think!

Conservatives do this all the time with liberals, and vice versa. We're so busy thinking the other person is a communist or a fundamentalist bigot, we don't take the time to hear them out. Dialogue is very rare indeed because we want the other point of view to be wrong. This is the territory in which critical thinking is an absolute necessity, but it is usually replaced with bias.

None of us is perfect in this area; there are certain things that we just can't handle accepting, but we all can grow and learn to suspend judgment and look at the world as objectively as is possible.

It's my opinion that the Unidentified Lighted Objects outside Marfa have an explanation, but why dismiss them out of hand without hearing both sides? It would be better to withhold judgment and admit that we don't know everything than to jump to a conclusion based on insufficient evidence, or as some wise thinker once said, "Better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt."

The fundamentals

“It has been observed that what is instinctive is not enforced, but only what is necessary to hallow and direct our instincts.”
-T. Croskery, Pulpit Commentary on Ephesians

When I was taking an Introduction to Preaching Course, the Professor made a point similar to the above. He was trying to emphasize the need for new preachers to submit to the basic rules common to all “good” preaching. While I think this in itself is somewhat dubious (the notion that the Holy Spirit must speak only through a manmade system of rules is suspect. How is one to accurately assess “good” preaching? Such a scientific judgment of such a metaphysical activity is sure to result in error. Was Isaiah’s or Jeremiah’s preaching not “good” because it lacked three points or any positive responses among its hearers?), the analogy he used to substantiate his point was quite good.

He used the example of a young quarterback that, though talented, must submit himself to the fundamentals if he is to succeed. No college or high school coach will simply allow a gifted quarterback to run wild. He must be tamed, instructed and disciplined.

If the quarterback submits to the fundamentals and follows them without fail, he will no doubt encounter a number of apparent failures: sacks, incomplete passes, a few bone-crunching hits. But in the process, he will learn much. It is a trite, but nonetheless true, saying-that one learns more from his mistakes than his successes. So it is here. The quarterback will learn to sense the defensive lineman breathing down his neck, he will learn that resting on the fundamentals and throwing an incomplete pass is better than trusting his instincts and throwing an interception, and he will learn that sometimes he must trust a teammate to make a play that is less flashy, but more functional than what his instincts would desire.

Without this wisdom gained through the sweat of submission to something seemingly beneath him, the quarterback, regardless of his talent, will not lead the team to victory on a regular basis. Instinct without discipline will yield some exciting plays, but a boring season.

I think this is just as true in life. If we trust our instincts we will only grasp that which is immediate and will miss the big picture. All instincts, abilities and talents, no matter how unique or important, can only benefit from a good dose of discipline.

AFV

Most of you have probably seen this at my MySpace page, but if you haven't...
Josh Crute came up with this idea when he grew tired of some of the more painful and sadistic video clips AFV uses. So here's our spoof:

Brick

I'd heard a lot of this movie before I saw it, and in spite of a few initial hangups, it won me over.
If you haven't heard anything of the movie, it is a modern interpretation of the old 40's and 50's Film Noir genre played out in a high school setting. If you're unfamiliar with the genre, think of films like The Maltese Falcon, Kiss Me Deadly, The Big Sleep, The Third Man, etc. They usually center around a lone hero with a rough side and a less than spotless past who must delve into the criminal underworld without the cops' help to solve some sordid mystery.

It took me a while to get accustomed to the lingo and the slang employed in Brick, and I don't consider myself a stranger to Noir films. But once I adapted to the film's style, I was impressed by the camera angles, the lighting, and the overall drive of the plot, all of which (in spite of the fact that it was filmed in color) recreated the noir atmosphere very well.

The movie starts with Brendan (played stoically by Joseph Gordon Levitt of Third Rock from The Sun fame) wringing his hands as he crouches in a drainage ditch viewing a young woman's dead body. The next scene introduces the opening act, which is a flashback recalling the events that led to this drainage ditch scene. Brendan begins investigating his ex-girlfriend Emily's current situation after receiving her frantic phone call laced with slang that even Brendan can't decipher. He enlists the help of his friend The Brain, who acts as his secret source of intel throughout the film. With a bit of digging, questioning, and pickpocketing, Brendan unveils the location of a secret rendezvous his girlfriend is to have with some member of an underground drug network, but he does so too late, and we are brought back to the opening scene, in which Brendan is staring at Emily's dead body. Brendan tries to get The Brain to discourage him from diving into this mystery, who does so, but of course, to no avail. Brendan pledges to dive in deep to uncover Emily's murderer, and we have a movie.

Levitt plays the part as dead-pan as can be imagined. I don't think he smiles once in the entire movie; even as dire as circumstances were for Bogart's Spade or Marlowe, he would still smirk and offer wisecracks, but Levitt's stone-faced portrayal works in this film all the same, because this mystery is personal. It isn't just any old pretty-faced dame that's come into his PI's office to propel him on a quest after some stolen trinket, but it's his dead ex-girlfriend, whom, as the film reveals, is someone he deeply loved.

The supporting cast fill their roles no less adequately. Matt O'Leary is a lot of fun as Brendan's brainy sidekick. Noah Fleiss plays the intimidating muscle-bound thug to a T, and Heroes' star Nora Zehetner keeps you guessing what's going on behind her eyes the entire film.

The dialogue is delivered with machine-gun rapidity, but it fits the style. The cinematography is great, lots of good shot setups, and some well-planned locations. In addition, there are a couple of unforgettable movie moments: Brendan playing chicken with a speeding mustang and a nail-biting showdown between the ex-es in the drainage ditch in which Emily's body was found.

All this combines to make a great film. There's nothing necessarily revolutionary about the plot or theme, but it's done so well that you won't notice. And of course, revolution is not what this movie seeks to accomplish, but reinterpretation, and it does this flawlessly.
***1/2 of ****

Proverbs 18:2

"A fool does not delight in understanding, but only in revealing his own mind."

I thought today's current quote would be a helpful reminder for everyone in Blogland, because sometimes we just shoot off whatever we think is important or needs to be said at the moment, even if, upon closer scrutiny, it is total nonsense. The sad thing is that we often don't even let ourselves admit that what we've said is wrong. This happens to me in political or moral discussions quite a bit. I'll say something because of a knee-jerk reaction, and later realize that maybe the opposing viewpoint was not quite as radical as I'd like to have thought. I end-up pidgeon-holing the other person's opinion into some preconceived category, even if it doesn't fit. I think we all do this because we don't want to admit we don't know everything. We analyze viewpoints superficially because we want to feel in control. I hope my blog does not become that-just another rock upon which I will carve the views I hold as absolute, never to be changed. I know some of my future posts will carry assertions that will, when read by some, invite critique, and it is my hope that we all can remember this Proverb when self-justification seems more important than real understanding.

Local Talent

The above video features a former student of mine: Brady Mandigo. He does some mind-boggling freestyle tricks on a skateboard.

Casino Royale

We watched the newest Bond film on Saturday night. I will admit that I am no Bond connoisseur, and have only payed to see one Bond film (Tomorrow Never Dies), so I am in no place to compare this with the franchise as a whole. Nonetheless, I found Casino Royale, even if it were a stand-alone film, to be quite the work of art.
SPOILER....
It has it flaws. I think the writers should have had a bit more faith in the public's poker savvy, because I found the time spent at the table much too predictable. It seemed like every play that was given screentime always gave the high hand to the last person showing their cards, which would build up suspense if it weren't so predictable.
Daniel Craig played the part very well, and the action sequences met if not exceeded expectation. The opening foot chase between Bond and a terrorist bomber named Mollaka is fantastic largely because Mollaka is played by Sebastien Foucan-the founder of free running-that incredible sport where people jump off rooftops and off and over walls.
I was impressed by the direction they took this film thematically. The character development was deeper than expected, and I thought the dialogue, especially between Bond and Vesper, was well-written.
I thought it was especially interesting that if left to himself, Bond would have chosen a very tradional love life. He was ready to give his all to one woman, and after that love was lost, he resigns himself to becoming the Bond we all know: the carefree womanizer.

My rating: *** out of ****

Ride for Africa

Dustin Bryson is the youth pastor at our church, and he is embarking on a week long journey to raise support for orphaned children in Uganda. He'll be riding a bike for seven days around Panama City in lieu of driving, and he's looking for people to sponsor him. All money will be donated to Invisible Children, an organization devoted to helping the cause of these Ugandan orphans. Here's a little vid to explain:


There's more info available on Dustin's missions site:
http://dustinbryson.typepad.com/hopeisrampant/

For more information about the organization that works with the Ugandan orphans, visit:
http://www.invisiblechildren.com/