HRH Wilhelm?

The Commonwealth nations have agreed to change the rules for succession to the British throne. No longer will the throne pass to the eldest son, but to the eldest child of the monarch whether male or female. James Bowman points out one of the consequences had this rule been in place early in the last century:

The Queen herself [Elizabeth II] would never have been the monarch if the new rule had been in effect in Queen Victoria’s day, since the latter’s eldest child, Princess Victoria, would have succeeded her, reigned for less than seven months, and then have been succeeded in her turn by none other than Kaiser Wilhelm II — who would thus have added Britain and her Empire to the German Empire without the tiresome necessity of going to war as he was to do — unsuccessfully, most people are still glad to think — thirteen years later. .... [more]

Yet Another Losing Battle by James Bowman - The New Criterion

The Lark Ascending

Ralph Vaughan Williams is my favorite among 20th century composers. While looking for something else, I came across this YouTube presentation of "The Lark Ascending," a very good recording of my favorite of all of his compositions — heartrendingly beautiful.

"The Lark Ascending" by George Meredith

For Reformation Day

Via The Cinch Review

My little policeman

I've been re-watching the BBC productions of the Hercule Poriot stories starring David Suchet in the title role. Today I came to "The Adventure of Johnnie Waverly," a story about the threatened kidnapping of the four-year old title character. His father is frustrated by the reluctance of Scotland Yard to do anything to protect his son.

Waverly - "That policeman is a fool!"

Poirot - "Ah, no. Japp is a good policeman. Prevention of crime is not what policemen are good at. They would have to have one constable for every citizen and go everywhere with him. But, fortunately for the human race, most of us have our own policeman up here (pointing to his forehead). This kidnapper has, perhaps, no little policeman."

Most of us do have our own little policeman and that is fortunate because without it freedom could not coexist with order. Order would prevail and freedom would be lost.

Simple old-fashioned fun

The Internet Monk re-posts a "Halloween Rant" by the late Michael Spencer. I didn't grow up in a fundamentalist church like he did but otherwise his Halloween church experience was very similar to mine — as was, later, the reaction to supposed pagan or satanic influences in that holiday [and Christmas, too]. Spencer:

.... I grew up among Southern Baptist fundamentalist Baptists. The KJV-only, women can’t wear pants, twenty verses of “Just As I Am,” Jerry Falwell, Jack Chick, twice a year revival kind of fundamentalist Baptists.

We were serious about things like beer. By sheer quantity of attention in sermons, drinking beer was the most evil act one could describe. We were serious about movies, cards, and something called “mixed bathing,” which normal people would call “swimming.”

We were serious about the Bible, Sunday School, suits and ties, and walking the aisle to get saved.

And we were big time into Halloween.

No, that’s not a typo. I said we were big time into Halloween.

From the late sixties into the early seventies, the churches I attended and worked for—all fundamentalist Baptists—were all over Halloween like ants on jam. It was a major social activity time in every youth group I was part of from elementary school through high school graduation in 1974.

We had haunted houses. Haunted hikes. Scary movies. (All the old Vincent Price duds.) As a youth minister in the mid to late seventies and early eighties, I created some haunted houses in church education buildings that would win stagecraft awards.

The kids loved it. The parents loved it. The pastors approved. The church paid for it! ....

And then, things changed.

Mike Warnke convinced evangelicals that participating in Halloween was worshiping the devil. Later, when we learned that Warnke may have been one of the most skillful of evangelical con-artists, lying about his entire Satanic high priest schtick, the faithful still believed his stories.

Evangelical media began to latch onto Halloween as some form of Satanism or witchcraft, and good Christians were warned that nothing made the other team happier than all those kids going door to door collecting M&Ms.

Evangelical parents decided that their own harmless and fun Halloween experiences were a fluke, and if their kid dressed up as a vampire, he’d probably try to become one. If there was a pumpkin on the porch, you were inviting demons into your home, just like it says in Hezekiah.

A general fear of the occult, manifesting itself in Satanic ritual abuse mythology, crept into evangelicalism and took a deep hold on many churches. ....

Today, if you want to split your church, divide your singles group, get a fight started with parents or see the youth minister fired, just find some way to have an old-fashioned Halloween event in your church. .... [more]

The Internet Monk Annual Halloween Rant | internetmonk.com

Justice before mercy?

Reflections on a recent film elicit from Joseph Susanka these observations:

We often find ourselves thinking of justice and mercy as two sides of the same coin, fervently hoping that the coin "comes up Mercy" on the Day of Judgment. To paraphrase Hosea, it is mercy I desire, not justice. ....

Yet what can one possibly mean without the other? We must recognize the vast gulf between our actions and what we could and should have done, before God can offer mercy.

In the Gospel, the prodigal son not only recognized his great folly; he asked his father to deal with him justly: "I no longer deserve to be called your son; treat me as you would your servants..." Yet it was his very desire for justice that permitted the father to show his son such profound mercy.

How can God forgive someone who does not recognize their own need for forgiveness? Sure, a "debt" could be paid, but what would that payment mean if there was no spiritual transformation to accompany it? We must be transformed if we are to be perfected, yet there is no transformation without recognition and acceptance of our own personal, insurmountable failings.

And there is no way to recognize those failings without first embracing Justice.

Shakespeare says that humans are most like God "when mercy seasons justice," and perhaps he's right. But we are most dear to Him when our desire for justice seasons our desperate pleas for mercy.

For it is only once we want Justice that we can truly get Mercy. [more]

It is not, I hope, necessary to "want" justice in order to receive mercy. I hope it is sufficient to confess that we deserve it.
"Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa"

Almighty and most merciful Father, we have erred and strayed from Your ways like lost sheep. We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. We have offended against Your holy laws. We have left undone those things which we ought to have done; and we have done those things which we ought not to have done; and there is nothing good in us. O Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders. Spare those, O God, who confess their faults. Restore those who are penitent; according to Your promises declared unto men in Christ Jesus our Lord. Grant that we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life; to the glory of His name. Amen [BCP]

No Justice; No Mercy!

Halloween

Halloween has for years now been a major event where I live — but not in the way I remember it was when I was a kid. Then there was trick-or-treat from door to door in our neighborhood and, when I had outgrown that, greeting the young trick-or-treaters coming to our house, admiring their costumes and awarding the treat. There was also the annual church Halloween party — with participation by all ages, the challenge of figuring out who was who, and the awarding of prizes for the best disguises. All of that was fun. I'm sure it is like that in many places still.

Today Mollie Hemingway asks "Could We Tone Down the Halloween Mania a Smidge?" and refers to Amity Shlaes' column arguing that "Halloween’s Pagan Themes Fill West’s Faith Vacuum."

I've previously posted blog entries arguing that Halloween's origins were not pagan but that it has lost its innocence. Those posts:

• 2006 "Halloween's not a pagan festival after all"
• 2007 When Did Halloween Get So Ghastly Gruesome?
• 2009 Evangelicals, Fundamentalists and Halloween
• 2010 All Hallows' Eve

The Lady Vanishes

"In Which I Read Vintage Novels" continues "Vintage Movie Week" with a review of one of my favorite Hitchcock films — and, for me, a favorite Hitchcock qualifies as a favorite among all films. The Lady Vanishes was one of Hitchcock's pre-WWII British films. The special effects require a willing suspension of disbelief and it has been re-made several times but, even so, this original is by far the most enjoyable version. The Criterion Collection is about to release a restored Blu-ray DVD of it. From Suzannah's description:

.... It's a snowy night in the little mountain country of Mandrika and a little village hotel is stuffed to the rafters with people trying to get back to England and points west. The train is delayed, so its passengers are forced to try to find a room to themselves: Iris Henderson, an American socialite returning home; Gilbert, a young musical eccentric who won't take any nonsense; Miss Froy, a sweet little Miss-Marple-type who won't stop chattering about her governessing jobs; Caldicott and Charters, two Englishmen very disgruntled about possibly missing the next big cricket game; and many others.

Nothing odd happens right away. But the next morning, on the train, Iris wakes after a nap to find that the friendly Miss Froy has vanished without a trace. Even more disturbing is the fact that every other person on the train denies having ever seen her. Is Iris surrounded by conspirators, or has she gone mad?

The Lady Vanishes is another excellent vintage movie, full of humour and mystery. .... [more]

In Which I Read Vintage Novels: Vintage Movies: The Lady Vanishes

Merely modern

G.K. Chesterton:

The first use of good literature is that it prevents a man from being merely modern. To be merely modern is to condemn oneself to an ultimate narrowness; just as to spend one's last earthly money on the newest hat is to condemn oneself to the old-fashioned. The road of the ancient centuries is strewn with dead moderns. Literature, classic and enduring literature, does its best work in reminding us perpetually of the whole round of truth and balancing other and older ideas against the ideas to which we might for a moment be prone. ["On Reading," The Common Man]

G.K. Chesterton on Dan Brown: The Interview | Carl E. Olson | Ignatius Insight | September 14, 2009

"While in Him confiding..."

From a reflection on William Cowper's great hymn "Sometimes a Light Surprises" I've excerpted this portion about the final verse:

Though vine nor fig tree neither, their wonted fruit shall bear, though all the field should wither, nor flocks nor herds be there; yet God the same abideth, his praise shall tune my voice, for while in him confiding, I cannot but rejoice.

Cowper chose the text from Habakkuk 3 for the fourth and final verse of "Sometimes a Light Surprises." It is an interesting choice for a number of reasons. First of all, it is likely that Habakkuk was a musician. Scholars believe that Habakkuk was a Levite and associated with the temple singers. The last chapter of Habakkuk is in the form of a liturgy with a prophetic prayer meant to be sung.

Secondly, Habakkuk 3 includes the language of lament and, according to one commentator, "provides one of the most moving statements of faith and trust found in Scripture (vv. 16-19)." There is something about honest lament that bridges our limited, finite humanity with our infinite, covenant Lord.

Often when we look around at our circumstances we want to cry out, "Lord, what are you doing? What is going on?" There is something telling in this kind of stark and honest dialogue with God. It may seem obvious, but lament, rather than revealing a distance from God, reveals that an actual relationship is intact. When we feel close enough to God to talk to him honestly about our circumstances, intimacy is revealed. Moreover, it is often through intimate, honest lament that clarity is received. Though it begins with a description of tough circumstances, Cowper's lyric ends with the assurance of God's faithfulness: "yet God the same abideth, his praise shall tune my voice, for while in him confiding, I cannot but rejoice." ....

Sometimes a Light Surprises: The Treasured Gift of a Troubled Soul – The Gospel Coalition Blog

Denial and rage

A New York Times article reports that the state of Rhode Island is in dire financial shape, cutting back on spending, and in danger of reneging on its pension and other obligations. Other states and municipalities are not far behind. Walter Russell Mead predicts that the Times reporter, Mary Williams Walsh,

...can expect angry push back from a whole sector of American political life that thinks this whole problem will go away if we tax the rich, clap our hands and all say together, “I believe in government.”

Mead blames the "Ostrich Party" for bringing Rhode Island — and not only Rhode Island — to this pass. "Unrealistic assumptions about rates of return helped hide the ugly truth about the looming pension meltdown — and anybody who tried to raise the alarm about the coming crisis was hooted down as an enemy of the workers." In this column he describes what happened and why.

.... No Rhode Island retiree can rely on getting the benefits promised; nobody can predict how this will all work out.

That is not the kind of uncertainty that 70 year old retired teachers and firefighters should have to face. A decent society would not let that happen — but the blue social model in its decadent late shark-jumping years of fake promises is anything but decent. Political chicanery, fuzzy math, denial, rhetoric, ambition: this is how a union betrays its members, this is how politicians betray their constituents.

To give the devil his due, this monumental crack up was the result, in its early stages, of ignorance and complacency more than anything else. The union leadership and the statehouse pols took growth for granted. They had grown up in the post war boom; good times were what they expected. They believed that the American economy would continue to grow richer every year and that there was a never-failing cornucopia of “more” somewhere that would somehow make sure that there was always enough money in the kitty to redeem the promises made. You could always squeeze another quart out of the milk cow. ....

Mead writes that there are three approaches taken to respond to the crisis:

• There is the true blue ostrich approach of the unions themselves and their closest allies: denial and rage.
• There is the attitude of more centrist Democrats like Governor Cuomo and Mayor Emanuel: make prudent cuts, hold the line on spending, work to quietly make government more efficient without jumping into a full scale confrontation with the unions.
• And there is the Scott Walker, dragonslayer approach: take them on.

.... [I]f the Mama Bear New Democrats serve their porridge too cool, the Papa Bear Republicans like Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Ohio’s John Kasich risk serving it too hot.

Polarizing politics and demonizing state and local government workers is not a good idea. It is unfair for one thing; it is bad politics for another. Toxic blue model legacy costs are the problem: rigidly bureaucratic government structures, unrealistic costs, years of underfunded pension plans, regulations that choke growth and initiative, outdated progressive ideas about how change works — these are the roots of our problems, not the middle school teacher down the street or the retired post office worker living modestly on a pension that may be underfunded but is hardly a bonanza.

The fifty year old teacher, fireman or police officer may have been naive to believe his or her union leaders, the politicians and the journalists who all said there was nothing to worry about — but most of those workers cannot be called “greedy” or “selfish”. They are victims of a complex, multi-player Ponzi scheme and have been lied to by a lot of people for a long time. They also face some serious financial costs. Not only are their pensions likely to be less generous and solid than they were led to expect; they may well face layoffs and wage freezes as states struggle to cope with legacy costs.

Reform cannot and should not be understood simply as an assault on state and local government workers — although these workers cannot be insulated from the general consequences of a major failure of our political system. The problem is not that teachers and firefighters earn “too much” money; the problem is that we have developed a dysfunctional social system which cannot pay its bills. ....

Ultimately the only solution is for the country to move on to a new post-blue economic model that can generate enough wealth to cover our existing debts. In the absence of a serious growth agenda, both the Cuomo and the Walker approaches can’t get the job done. And what the country needs is a competition between growth strategies, not a contest between strategies for cutbacks. .... [more]

Rhode Island: Athens of America? | Via Meadia

Madison

"The Frugal Traveler" who blogs at The New York Times spent a few days in my city recently and rather enjoyed himself. From "My Trip to Madison: Bikes, Brews, Burgers and a B&B:

.... Armed with an impossibly long list of restaurants and bars to try, I crisscrossed Madison from the University of Wisconsin campus on the west side (which is also home to the Babcock Hall Dairy, makers of my first Madison “meal,” an excellent cone of orange custard chocolate chip), across the isthmus splitting Lakes Mendota and Monona that serves as the center (and location of the State Capitol, home to a fantastic farmers’ market on Saturdays) and as far east as the Ale Asylum....

.... It’s almost impossible to find a beer on tap that’s not made in Wisconsin. The bustling Old-Fashioned, a popular bar and restaurant across from the Capitol, serves more than 50 beers on tap, all from Wisconsin, and more than 100 in cans or bottles, with just one that is not: Grainbelt from Minnesota, which is pointedly listed under “Imports.” And people here know beer. I’m usually happy to argue that New York City is the height of sophistication, but I could only cringe as I compared Wisconsin’s vast beer choices with the Amstel Lights and Stellas at many New York bars. ....

...Madison turned to be as much a burger town as anything else. I tried the famed Plaza burger, staple of campus post-boozing life, and found it excellent in a greasy spoon kind of a way. And the cheeseburger at the Laurel Tavern on the west side was a $5 masterpiece. But my favorite was the black and blue burger (with bacon and hot sauce), $7.29 at Dotty Dumpling’s Dowry. Stand-out sharp flavors, and not so much burger to fit in your mouth ....

I have a very forgiving stomach but even so, I had to stop eating occasionally and visit a few Madison cultural attractions. Every single one was free, unless you count the 25 cents I dropped on a map of the grounds of the Olbrich Botanical Gardens. The gardens were shockingly lovely, a colorful, calm escape from a city that there’s not much need to escape from. I also took a nice walk out to Picnic Point around Lake Mendota....

This is more a football town than an art town, though, and the big event of the weekend was the Wisconsin Badgers game at Michigan State. I settled into State Street Brats (packed with students and families clad in Badger red) to have a $4.50 sausage, drink a pint of Leinenkugel beer (from Wisconsin, obviously) and watch the first half, and then biked back downtown to catch the rest of the game (and close out my weekend of drinking) at the Great Dane.... [Note: I've added many of the links]

There is quite a bit more. He seems to have hit many of my favorite places downtown, and he seems to have ignored our demonstrators - who were definitely there on his weekend. He doesn't mention the Union Terrace [the picture above] but he may well have begun his trek to Picnic Point from there.

My Trip to Madison: Bikes, Brews, Burgers and a B&B - NYTimes.com

Ugly buildings

Why are so many modern buildings ugly and inappropriate for their surroundings? I'm no architect but the explanation offered by Michael Mehaffy and Nikos A. Salingaros in "The Architect Has No Clothes" sounds plausible to me:

Have you ever looked at a bizarre building design and wondered, “What were the architects thinking?” Have you looked at a supposedly “ecological” industrial-looking building, and questioned how it could be truly ecological? Or have you simply felt frustrated by a building that made you uncomfortable, or felt anger when a beautiful old building was razed and replaced with a contemporary eyesore? You might be forgiven for thinking “these architects must be blind!” New research shows that in a real sense, you might actually be right. ....

.... Not only do architects notice and look for different aspects of the environment than other people; their brains seem to synthesize an understanding of the world that has notable differences from natural reality. Instead of a contextual world of harmonious geometric relationships and connectedness, architects tend to see a world of objects set apart from their contexts, with distinctive, attention-getting qualities. ....

This phenomenon has important consequences for the kinds of structures that architects produce—consequences whose seriousness we believe are largely under-appreciated, and, very likely in some cases, repressed. We can begin to explain common contradictions as, for example, when architects produce a building they clearly think is wonderful, but a large majority of non-architects are found to hate it. .... Architects do not see how certain designs disconnect and isolate people and create hostile environments that cannot be shared. ....

A possible explanation:

Why do architects see the world in this unique way? In part this seems to be because of the peculiar environment in which students of architecture are educated (Gifford et al., 2002). Students are typically asked to produce drawings that are pinned up next to one another, and then evaluated in a “crit” (or critique). In such an abstract setting, it is difficult for anyone to evaluate how well a project integrates with its context, if at all. Moreover, projects that are especially distinctive—object designs that stand out visually in an imaginative way by presenting an unusual structure—tend to get more attention from the faculty, and often, better grades. Those architects get rewarded, and selected out to be the later stars of the profession.

This focus on object-design has a deeper history in architecture. Up to about 1900, architects were understood to be practicing an adaptive craft, in which a building was an inseparable part of a dynamic streetscape and a neighborhood. “Blending in” respects the extant complex connective geometry, where components contribute to overall coherence. A building was assumed to meet the physiological and social needs of the people of that neighborhood first and foremost, and only then it would express its artistic qualities.

With the coming of the industrial revolution, and its emphasis on interchangeable parts, the traditional conception of architecture that was adaptive to context began to change. A building became an interchangeable industrial design product, conveying an image, and it mattered a great deal how attention-getting that image was. The building itself became a kind of advertisement for the client company and for the architect (and in the case of residences, for the homeowner seeking a status symbol). The context was at best a side issue, and at worst a distraction, from the visual excitement generated by the object. .... [more]

Guernica / Michael Mehaffy and Nikos A. Salingaros: The Architect Has No Clothes

The Gospels as history

Denny Burk found this lecture by Peter Williams, "The Gospels as Eyewitness Accounts," "absolutely riveting":

Peter Williams is the warden at Tyndale House in Cambridge, England. He is also one of the bright lights of evangelical scholarship. Last March, he gave a fascinating lecture at the Lanier Theological Library in Houston, Texas titled “New Evidences the Gospels were Based on Eyewitness Accounts.” John Piper has called this presentation “the most remarkable (video) lecture on the reliability of the Gospels I’ve ever heard.” I would agree with Piper. I found this lecture to be absolutely riveting.

I've posted it before. If you have the least interest in the historicity of the gospels this is very much worth watching

 

Peter Williams on the Gospels as Eyewitness Accounts | Denny Burk

Countless hours explaining the obvious

From a great essay by Stephen Marche in the NY Times yesterday:

.... First they came for the Kennedy scholars, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Kennedy scholar. Then they came for Opus Dei, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Catholic scholar. Now they have come for me.

Professors of Shakespeare — and I was one once upon a time — are blissfully unaware of the impending disaster that this film means for their professional lives. Thanks to “Anonymous,” undergraduates will be confidently asserting that Shakespeare wasn’t Shakespeare for the next 10 years at least, and profs will have to waste countless hours explaining the obvious. “Anonymous” subscribes to the Oxfordian theory of authorship, the contention that Edward de Vere, the 17th earl of Oxford, wrote Shakespeare’s plays. Among Shakespeare scholars, the idea has roughly the same currency as the faked moon landing does among astronauts.

.... You don’t have to be a truther or a birther to enjoy a conspiracy theory. We all, at one point or another, indulge fantasies that make the world seem more dangerous, more glamorous and, simultaneously, much more simple than it actually is. But then most of us grow up. Or put down the bong. Or read a book by somebody who is familiar with both proper historical methodology and the facts. ....

.... There are many questions in this world over which rational people can have sensible confrontations: whether lower taxes stimulate or stagnate growth; whether abortion is immoral; whether the ’60s were an achievement or a disaster; whether the universe is motivated by a force for benevolence; whether the Fonz jumping on water skis over a shark was cool or lame. Whether Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare is not one of these questions. .... [more]

A frustration of teaching high school history is the student who has seen or read — on the Discovery Channel, or the "History" Channel, or online — and been convinced that the moon landings were fake, or that unseen gunmen assassinated JFK, or, more recently, that a conspiracy involving thousands was responsible for the destruction of the World Trade towers.

Wouldn’t It Be Cool if Shakespeare Wasn’t Shakespeare? - NYTimes.com

"He made no new contribution to theology."

On the occasion of his eightieth birthday Christianity Today reprints a 1990 interview with Thomas C. Oden, United Methodist theologian, professor at Drew University, and proponent of Christian orthodoxy. From the interview:

What were the turning points in your movement away from modernity?

Think of an idealistic kid in high school who is actively engaged in the World Federalist Movement, who, when he goes to college, becomes a pacifist and later becomes enamored with socialist theories and reads Freud. Between 1945 and 1965, every turn I made was a left turn. When I decided to go to theological school, it wasn't because I was strongly committed to the biblical message, but to the hope that the church could be an effective instrument of social change. It was at Perkins School of Theology in Dallas that my political radicalism became somewhat moderated by reading Luther and Reinhold Niebuhr. They shocked me out of my pacifism around 1955. ....

In After Modernity … What? you write that you date your entrance into the postmodern world to the day you had to select the books you would take with you for a research year. Why was that event so significant? What books did you take?

Up to that point most of my theological and psychological study was in contemporary sources. As I was leaving for that research year, I realized that the books I really needed were classics. I had already paid my dues to modernity twice over. I didn't have to do that again. What I needed at that point was a firmer grounding, so I took along the Ante-Nicene Fathers, Augustine, Nemesius, Thomas Aquinas, Calvin, Wesley, and others. I also took along classical writers such as Aeschylus and Dante. That was a moment of recognition: I realized that my consciousness had shifted away from the idolatry of the new, which I didn't know until I packed the books. ....

In place of modernity you call for "a careful study and respectful following of the central tradition of classical Christian exegesis." In other places you call this orthodoxy. What is orthodoxy?

Lancelot Andrewes, a sixteenth-century Anglican divine, stated the answer as memorably as anyone, with a five-finger exercise: "One canon, two Testaments, three creeds [the Apostles', Nicene, and Athanasian], four [ecumenical] councils, and five centuries along with the Fathers of that period," by which he meant the great doctors of the first five centuries: Athanasius, Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, and John Chrysostom in the East; and Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, and Gregory the Great in the West. ....

If we have the Bible, why do we also need the consensual teaching of the first five centuries?

The Bible is crucial to the Christian life because these texts alone incomparably convey the history of God's saving action. It is the textual center of orthodoxy. But the Holy Spirit does not simply drop the Canon into our laps, as it were. The Canon itself emerges out of a history. The process of canonization itself evolves out of a specific history in which these writings were being challenged by false teachings.

The first five centuries are important, then, because during this time the church definitively hammered out a consensus about Christian teaching and the meaning of the baptismal formula. The consensus formed in these centuries clarified for the church what it meant to baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Christological and Trinitarian issues that were defined against severe challenges in those first five centuries expressed the church's attempt to be accountable to its own baptismal act, the fundamental act of inclusion within this community. ....

What would you say to someone who claims, "I've got the Bible. I don't need church history or systematic theology"?

We would not even have the Bible without its reliable transmission, which is another way of talking about the work of God the Spirit. Orthodoxy understands that God is at work in the body of Christ to form that body in history, awaiting God's own coming in the return of Christ.

Christ promised the early church the Spirit, who came on the first Pentecost and continues to dwell in the lives of the faithful. He promised that the Spirit would abide with this community, guide it, lead it to all truth, and help it recollect the words of the Lord. This is just what has been happening for the 20 centuries since the ascension. We're moving in the wrong direction when we say individualistically, "I've got my Bible; I don't need anything except these words." Protestants now need to recover a sense of the active work of the Spirit in history and through living communities. Our modern individualism too easily tempts us to take our Bible and abstract ourselves from the wider believing community. We end up with a Bible and a radio, but no church. ....

What elements of classical orthodoxy have evangelicals tended to ignore or misunderstand?

I see a sad neglect of great fourth-century evangelical writers like Athanasius and Cyril of Jerusalem. Augustine and John Chrysostom are also too often ignored. Why the neglect? The patristic writers' use of allegorical interpretation has scared some evangelicals away. But evangelicals would gain much by entering the world of biblical figures and types as understood by the patristic writers. The greatest Protestant writers were able to do just this. If you read Calvin, John Owen, Matthew Henry, or Richard Baxter, you find a consuming interest in biblical typology. ....

What guarantee do we have that the early generations of Christians were any closer to the essence of the gospel than we are today? Why is old better?

Old is not better. Old can be worse. The apostolic criterion is not flatly whether something is old or new. The criterion is whether it is truthful or not—truthful in the sense of true to the apostolic testimony to God's revelation, the truth personally incarnate in Jesus Christ. There was in the first five centuries a great suspicion of novelty. Novelty was regarded as heretical. Antiquity was one of the criteria for orthodoxy. If it belongs to the apostolic testimony, it is orthodox. ....

You have told about a dream in which you were walking in the New Haven cemetery. You came across your own tombstone and the epitaph read, "He made no new contribution to theology." Were you happy or distressed to read that?

In my dream I was extremely pleased, for I realized I was learning what Irenaeus meant when he warned us not to invent new doctrine. This was a great discovery for me. All my education up to this point had taught me that I must be compulsively creative. If I was to be a good theologian I had to go out and do something nobody else ever had done. The dream somehow said to me that this is not my responsibility, that my calling as a theologian could be fulfilled through obedience to apostolic tradition. .... [more]

Back to the Fathers | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction

Derring-do

Suzannah, who reads "vintage novels" and recommends good ones at her site, is beginning a week of recommending vintage movies. Her tastes in books and films seem to frequently coincide with mine so it was no surprise that her first post is about one that I have enjoyed since childhood, The Mark of Zorro. She also recommends similar swashbucklers. I am happy to say that I have almost all of them in my DVD collection. Suzannah on The Mark of Zorro:

Of all the old swashbucklers we've seen, the favourite in our home is an unassuming little picture from 1940: The Mark of Zorro with Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, and Basil Rathbone. Tyrone Power plays Don Diego Vega, the son of the alcalde of California who is sent to Spain to complete his education. On his return, he finds California changed since he went away: the peasants seem afraid, the new alcalde is spoken of with fear and hatred, and his evil henchman Captain Esteban Pasquale (Basil Rathbone) is bent on squeezing every last penny out of the taxpayers.

Don Diego can see that something must be done. By night he is the bold and daring Zorro, terror of evildoers. By day he becomes the effete and foppish Don Diego, an inveterate flapper of lace-edged handkerchiefs and languid suitor of the alcalde's enchanting niece Lolita (Linda Darnell). Will he dislodge the evil alcalde from California, or does discovery, disgrace, and death await him? ....

If you enjoy The Mark of Zorro, take time to sample the other great swashbucklers of cinema. Captain Blood is one of the very best, of course; but don't miss the Ronald Colman The Prisoner of Zenda, The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Sea-Hawk, or the hilarious Court Jester. .... [more]

Another might be The Scarlet Pimpernel (I prefer the 1934 version with Leslie Howard).

In Which I Read Vintage Novels: Vintage Movies: The Mark of Zorro

"To do my duty to God and my country"

Kathleen Arnn compares the original Boy Scout Handbook to the current one in "Scouts' Honor." Today's isn't bad but it would be much better, she thinks, if it retained the original's emphasis on good character:

The Boy Scouts of America celebrated their hundredth anniversary last year, and this year is the centennial of The Handbook for Boys, their first official manual. Comparing it with the current edition of the handbook—the 12th, published in 2009—shows that the small outpost of civilization manned by the Scouts holds on bravely in America. But decades of aggressive political correctness have had their effect, and the Scouts have lost some of the confident American boyishness that loves heroes and makes for heroes. This is too bad for the more than 3 million boys enrolled in the Scouts today, and for the society in which they will grow up to become men. ....

In the original handbook, Scouts' honor is explicitly traced back to the chivalry of the ancient knights. The Pilgrims and the American pioneers carried this knightly virtue to America, and the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) have taken up their standard. Honor, as the handbook explains, is sacred to a Scout: It "will not permit of anything but the highest and the best and the manliest." "A good Scout must be chivalrous," it tells us:

[H]e should be as manly as the knights or pioneers of old. He should be unselfish. He should show courage. He must do his duty. He should show benevolence and thrift. He should be loyal to his country. He should be obedient to his parents, and show respect to those who are his superiors. He should be very courteous to women. One of his obligations is to do a good turn every day to some one.

The handbook doesn't shrink from invoking shame to motivate Scouts. For example, under Courage: "It is horrible to be a coward. It is weak to yield to fear and heroic to face danger without flinching." There are examples, like the dying Indian who "faced death with a grim smile upon his lips and sang his own death song" and the cowardly knight who fled the battle of Agincourt, much to the disappointment of his lady at home. The original handbook teaches through heroes, providing Scouts with a host of manly examples to emulate. Above all, it cultivates spiritedness, teaching Scouts to defend their honor, their friends, and their country like the great men of the past who "were accustomed to take chances with death" for the sake of the things they loved. ....

We learn about America's great moments through the heroes who lived them: George Washington, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Daniel Boone, Betsy Ross, Johnny Appleseed, and most of all, Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln is a hero among heroes, a central figure in the handbook's discussions of patriotism and of virtue. He is "in heart, brain, and character, not only one of our greatest Americans, but one of the world's greatest men." The manual relays the whole story of his life, from his lowly beginnings that taught him the value of hard work, to his education, and to his presidency and untimely death ("the emancipator of the slave, the friend of the whole people and the savior of our country died, a martyr to the cause of freedom.") This discussion ends with the closing paragraph of the Second Inaugural, "words with which every boy should be familiar, voicing as they do the exalted spirit of a great and good man." ....

Almost all of that, she writes, is missing from the current Handbook.

Robert Mazzuca, the Chief Scout Executive of the BSA, has been quoted as saying that the organization is suffering from "a little arthritis" but is making efforts to modernize. If this means using Gore-tex boots on hikes and ripstop nylon tents instead of canvas, the Boy Scouts may be all right. If it means teaching leadership rather than moral virtue, and timidity rather than manliness, that's another story entirely—one of obtuseness, trendiness, and decline. .... [more]

The Claremont Institute - Scouts' Honor

A different sort of Fundamentalist

Joe Carter was annoyed by an op-ed that appeared in the New York Times yesterday:

Evangelicals who take an interest in the life of the mind inevitably encounter two types of fundamentalists. Although the two types are similar, they are easy to distinguish. Both types believe that their views of the scripture, creation, and/or history are the only legitimate interpretations and condemn anyone who disagrees with them and their preferred “experts.” But the first type filters their beliefs through the KJV while the second type filters their beliefs through the NYT.

Karl W. Giberson and Randall J. Stephens are the second type of fundamentalists. Yesterday, they published an embarrassingly simple-minded op-ed in the New York Times decrying the “simplistic theology, cultural isolationism and stubborn anti-intellectualism” of evangelicals who hold beliefs that differ from their own. .... [more]

Carter refers to Rod Dreher's reaction to the same essay:

I generally agree with Evangelicals Karl Giberson and Randall Stephens, who contend that Evangelicals have to do a better job reconciling their faith with science. And I agree with them that fundamentalists who deny what science is telling us about human origins, preferring instead a literalistic interpretation of Genesis, are badly off course. But then there’s this description of the sort of intellectually respectable Evangelical they prefer:

They recognize that the Bible does not condemn evolution and says next to nothing about gay marriage. They understand that Christian theology can incorporate Darwin’s insights and flourish in a pluralistic society.

That gay marriage point is, ironically enough, a sign that the authors accept, when it suits them, a fundamentalist, literalist approach to Scripture — precisely the thing they condemn! Deciding that if the Bible doesn’t explicitly condemn a thing, then the Bible must implicitly permit is, is reverse proof-texting, one designed to suit liberal ends.

Of course Scripture says nothing about gay marriage. Such a thing was unthinkable in the days of the Bible. The Bible doesn’t say anything about the atomic bomb either. By this logic, “reason” tells us that Christian condemnation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is irrational.

That would be absurd, of course. If Christians condemn the atomic bombings, they do so based on what Scripture tells us about the dignity of human life, of innocence, of war, of justice and mercy. We derive Christian moral teaching about a particular phenomenon based in part on the larger context presented to us in Scripture. That, and in the way the interpretive tradition developed. For example, by Giberson & Stephens’s logic, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity — the central dogma of the Christian faith — must be rationally denied, because there is nothing explicit in Scripture defines it. Do Giberson & Stephen deny the Trinity? I’m sure they don’t, but if not, why not? The Bible says “next to nothing” about the Trinity, after all.

On gay marriage, one has to make all kinds of leaps to reconcile it with Christianity and Biblical moral teaching about the meaning of marriage. Aside from St. Paul’s explicit condemnation of homosexual behavior, there is no way — or at the very least, no easy way — to reconcile same-sex marriage with the Christian moral tradition.

This is not, let me be clear, an argument against legalizing same-sex marriage. That is a different argument. What I’m focusing on here is an argument among Christians, about how we Christians are to interpret our own Scripture and tradition. .... [more]

And then Alan Jacobs reacts:

There’s some truth to this, of course, but — forgive the griping — it’s deeply annoying to me. First, it doesn’t say anything that Mark Noll didn’t say in 1994; and second, the only reason it’s in the NYT is that it flatters the prejudices of the readership. .... [more]

A Different Type of Fundamentalist » First Thoughts | A First Things Blog, Rod Dreher » Gay marriage, fundamentalism, and the Evangelical mind, more than 95 theses — The rejection of science seems to be part of a...

Kreeft on Lewis

Via Justin Taylor, Peter Kreeft on the book and the movie The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Kreeft gave the movie B+ but thought it left out some very important things in the book. Kreeft is an authority on Lewis and the lecture goes beyond Voyage to an exploration of Lewis's worldview.

The Worldview of C. S. Lewis and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader – Justin Taylor