Prohibition Makes Perpetual War
Tim Dick
Sydney Morning Herald
. . . One thing is clear from the current strategy in the war on drugs: prohibition is a ruinously expensive failure.
As
former AFP commissioner Mick Palmer wrote in 2012: "The reality is
that, contrary to frequent assertions, drug law enforcement has had
little impact on the Australian drug market. This is true in most
countries in the world. In Australia, the police are better resourced
than ever, better trained than ever, more effective than ever and yet
their impact on the drug trade, on any objective assessment, has been
minimal."
The intention of prohibition – making drug consumers
criminals – is to stop consumption, but it doesn't work. Because it
doesn't, prohibition effectively protects the criminal cartels which
deal drugs: no tax, no costly safety standards, no workers' compensation
for those in your distribution network. Those dealers who get
caught are usually mules or street-level addicts. Prohibition fills
prisons with them and clogs the courts and does 10-fifths of bugger all
to reduce addiction. Yet it is so embedded in the political
culture of Australia, the US, and international law, that we ignore
sensible and proven alternative ways to reduce the harm to users while
bankrupting the murderous criminal syndicates who supply them.
Thursday, 23 April 2015
Daily Devotional
Depending on God Alone
TO MARY WILLIS SHELBURNE: On the hard task of learning to depend only on God and on nothing and no one else.
I was most distressed by the news in your letter of Dec. 2nd. . . . And I can’t help you, because under the modern laws I’m not allowed to send money to America. (What a barbarous system we live under. I knew a man who had to risk prison in order to smuggle a little money to his own sister, widowed in the U.S.A.) By the way, we mustn’t be too sure there was any irony about your just having refused that other job. There may have been a snag about it which God knew and you didn’t.
I feel it almost impossible to say anything (in my comfort and security—apparent security, for real security is in Heaven and thus earth affords only imitations) which would not sound horribly false and facile. Also, you know it all better than I do. I should in your place be (I have in similar places been) far more panic-stricken and even perhaps rebellious. For it is a dreadful truth that the state of (as you say) ‘having to depend solely on God’ is what we all dread most. And of course that just shows how very much, how almost exclusively, we have been depending on things. That trouble goes so far back in our lives and is now so deeply ingrained, we will not turn to Him as long as He leaves us anything else to turn to. I suppose all one can say is that it was bound to come.
In the hour of death and the day of judgement, what else shall we have? Perhaps when those moments come, they will feel happiest who have been forced (however unwillingly) to begin practising it here on earth. It is good of Him to force us: but dear me, how hard to feel that it is good at the time....
All’s well—I’m half ashamed it should be—with me. God bless and keep you. You shall be constantly in my prayers by day and night.
From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III
Compiled in Yours, Jack
The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume III: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy 1950-1963. Copyright © 2007 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers. Yours, Jack: Spiritual Direction from C. S. Lewis. Copyright © 2008 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
TO MARY WILLIS SHELBURNE: On the hard task of learning to depend only on God and on nothing and no one else.
C. S. Lewis
6 December 1955I was most distressed by the news in your letter of Dec. 2nd. . . . And I can’t help you, because under the modern laws I’m not allowed to send money to America. (What a barbarous system we live under. I knew a man who had to risk prison in order to smuggle a little money to his own sister, widowed in the U.S.A.) By the way, we mustn’t be too sure there was any irony about your just having refused that other job. There may have been a snag about it which God knew and you didn’t.
I feel it almost impossible to say anything (in my comfort and security—apparent security, for real security is in Heaven and thus earth affords only imitations) which would not sound horribly false and facile. Also, you know it all better than I do. I should in your place be (I have in similar places been) far more panic-stricken and even perhaps rebellious. For it is a dreadful truth that the state of (as you say) ‘having to depend solely on God’ is what we all dread most. And of course that just shows how very much, how almost exclusively, we have been depending on things. That trouble goes so far back in our lives and is now so deeply ingrained, we will not turn to Him as long as He leaves us anything else to turn to. I suppose all one can say is that it was bound to come.
In the hour of death and the day of judgement, what else shall we have? Perhaps when those moments come, they will feel happiest who have been forced (however unwillingly) to begin practising it here on earth. It is good of Him to force us: but dear me, how hard to feel that it is good at the time....
All’s well—I’m half ashamed it should be—with me. God bless and keep you. You shall be constantly in my prayers by day and night.
From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III
Compiled in Yours, Jack
The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume III: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy 1950-1963. Copyright © 2007 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers. Yours, Jack: Spiritual Direction from C. S. Lewis. Copyright © 2008 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
A Paean to Humanitarianism
A Diabolical Joke
Australian columnist, Tim Blair writes in The Telegraph:
Australian columnist, Tim Blair writes in The Telegraph:
The UN recently decided that Israel was the number one violator of women’s rights in the world today. And then the UN appointed the Islamic Republic of Iran to the executive board of the UN’s Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women.The United Nations sits as a bloated Shelob upon the shores of Turtle Bay, sucking the lifeblood out of humanity.
UPDATE. Anne Bayefsky in 2008:
What we are seeing now is that universal human rights are being undercut by the very organisation that was created to protect them.Seven years on, the UN is making things worse.
It can’t stop genocide in Sudan, it’s can’t stop the butchery that’s going on in Zimbabwe or get Aung San Suu Kyi out of Myanmar. And civilisation is threatened, we can’t be sanguine about it, we can’t sit around waiting and hoping that one day the UN will get it right.
Wednesday, 22 April 2015
Government Science--An Oxymoron
Elderly Scientist Takes on Young Buck
Climate Change Hysteria
Dear Sir Peter
I would like to comment on the speech Trusting the Scientist published at http://www.pmcsa.org.nz/blog/trusting-the-scientist/ a summary of which you delivered to the recent seminar Scientists Speak Out organised by the New Zealand Association of Scientists.
You begin with the following statement:
It is instructive here to consider what the public role of science has been until now. For much of history beyond the classical period, the answer is a simple one: little or none. Or so it was, at least up until the modern inter-war period, and even then it was rather limited until perhaps the late 1980s. Before then the scientist with a media profile was, too often, looked upon with suspicion by his or her colleagues.
Surely science has always had a vital public role if you interpret science to mean the discoveries which are the basis for the many technologies which have led to the progress of human race. You seem to accept the existence and importance of the early science which culminated in ancient Greece and was the main influence throughout the Middle Ages. Modern science is regarded as beginning well before the 1980s with Copernicus, Kepler Galileo and Newton.
Daily Devotional
Christ All In All
"The Amen."
Revelation 3:14
If you come to him, he will say "Amen" in your soul; his promise shall be true to you. He said in the days of his flesh, "The bruised reed I will not break." O thou poor, broken, bruised heart, if thou comest to him, he will say "Amen" to thee, and that shall be true in thy soul as in hundreds of cases in bygone years. Christian, is not this very comforting to thee also, that there is not a word which has gone out of the Saviour's lips which he has ever retracted? The words of Jesus shall stand when heaven and earth shall pass away. If thou gettest a hold of but half a promise, thou shalt find it true. Beware of him who is called "Clip-promise," who will destroy much of the comfort of God's word.
"The Amen."
Revelation 3:14
Charles H. Spurgeon
The word Amen solemnly confirms that which went before; and Jesus is the great Confirmer; immutable, forever is "the Amen" in all his promises. Sinner, I would comfort thee with this reflection. Jesus Christ said, "Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."If you come to him, he will say "Amen" in your soul; his promise shall be true to you. He said in the days of his flesh, "The bruised reed I will not break." O thou poor, broken, bruised heart, if thou comest to him, he will say "Amen" to thee, and that shall be true in thy soul as in hundreds of cases in bygone years. Christian, is not this very comforting to thee also, that there is not a word which has gone out of the Saviour's lips which he has ever retracted? The words of Jesus shall stand when heaven and earth shall pass away. If thou gettest a hold of but half a promise, thou shalt find it true. Beware of him who is called "Clip-promise," who will destroy much of the comfort of God's word.
Investment Advice for Secularists
No Future
The mindset of our secular age is incurably religious. It's just that the objects of its fealty and devotion are other creatures. Other humans--or humanity in the abstract. Instead of a theocracy, secular humanism has erected a humanocracy, which is profoundly religious and worshipful. As secular humanism has waxed so its tolerance of contrary beliefs has waned; as its power has grown, so its fear of, and anger against, contrary beliefs has burned more intensely.
In pre-modern Christendom it was believed that all of society was linked to, and dependant upon God. If heretics were tolerated, evil consequences would fall upon the community in general. Charles Taylor puts it this way with respect to the pre-modern age:
The mindset of our secular age is incurably religious. It's just that the objects of its fealty and devotion are other creatures. Other humans--or humanity in the abstract. Instead of a theocracy, secular humanism has erected a humanocracy, which is profoundly religious and worshipful. As secular humanism has waxed so its tolerance of contrary beliefs has waned; as its power has grown, so its fear of, and anger against, contrary beliefs has burned more intensely.
In pre-modern Christendom it was believed that all of society was linked to, and dependant upon God. If heretics were tolerated, evil consequences would fall upon the community in general. Charles Taylor puts it this way with respect to the pre-modern age:
Tuesday, 21 April 2015
Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow
With Stirrups Raised to Molech
Douglas WilsonBlog&Mablog
The modern world has seen many revolutions, from the French revolution to the Russian, but the bloodiest of all of them has been the sexual revolution. And that provides the backdrop to our current uproar over the definition of marriage.
We are now much occupied with the issues swirling around same sex mirage, but we need to take great care not to get distracted. Why have the homosexual activists gone all in on this issue? Why is their prosecutorial zeal so adamant? We went, in just a matter of months, from “let’s let individual states” decide on this, to federal judges striking down state statutes, followed up hard by official harassment of florists, bakers, and photographers. Why the anger, and why the savage over-reach? And do they really think we wouldn’t remember all the things they were assuring us of this time last year?
I was talking last night with my daughter Rachel, and she mentioned something that she had observed, and which I believe is very much on point. The battle over same sex mirage is not just a distraction, but is intended to be a distraction. We do have to deal with these challenges to marriage, but without forgetting what they might be trying to drag us away from. And I am talking about the relationship between the abortion issue and the homosexual battle.
Daily Devotional
Don’t Be Like the Mule
Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you. (Psalm 32:9)
John Piper
Picture God’s people as a farmyard of all sorts of animals. God cares for his animals, he shows them where they need to go, and supplies a barn for their protection. But there is one beast on this animal farm that gives God an awful time, namely, the mule. He’s stupid and he’s stubborn and you can’t tell which comes first — stubbornness or stupidity.Now the way God likes to get his animals into the barn for their food and shelter is by teaching them all a personal name and then calling them by name. “I will instruct you and teach you the way that you should go” (Psalm 32:8). But the mule will not respond to that sort of direction. He is without understanding. So God gets in his pick-up truck and goes out in the field, puts the bit and bridle in the mule’s mouth, hitches it to the truck, and drags him stiff-legged and snorting all the way into the barn.
That is not the way God wants his animals to come to him for blessing. One of these days it is going to be too late for that mule. He’s going to get clobbered with hail and struck by lightening and when he comes running the barn door is going to be shut.
Therefore, don’t be like the mule, but instead let everyone who is godly come to God in prayer at a time when he may be found (Psalm 32:6). The way not to be a mule is to humble ourselves, to come to God in prayer, to confess our sins, and to accept, as needy little farmyard chicks, the direction of God into the barn of his protection.
For more about John Piper's ministry and writing, see DesiringGod.org.
Cultures and Warfare
When Ignorant Armies Clash By Night
Nations not infrequently fall into the trap of thinking that the armies and military of other nations are relatively useless. It can trap them into a false sense of security. It can also make them more bellicose and trigger-happy, persuading them that going to war is a small matter. It will all be done and dusted in five minutes. Or so we are told. Nationalistic fervour is never a reliable guide in such matters.
The history of nationalistic fervour leading to underestimating one's enemy is not exactly garlanded with laurel leaves. Norvell De Atkine, a U.S. Army retired colonel with eight years residence in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, and a graduate degree in Arab studies from the American University of Beirut, acknowledges some of the spectacular failures that have resulted from underestimating an enemy. In an article entitled, Why Arabs Lose Wars, he writes:
Nations not infrequently fall into the trap of thinking that the armies and military of other nations are relatively useless. It can trap them into a false sense of security. It can also make them more bellicose and trigger-happy, persuading them that going to war is a small matter. It will all be done and dusted in five minutes. Or so we are told. Nationalistic fervour is never a reliable guide in such matters.
The history of nationalistic fervour leading to underestimating one's enemy is not exactly garlanded with laurel leaves. Norvell De Atkine, a U.S. Army retired colonel with eight years residence in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, and a graduate degree in Arab studies from the American University of Beirut, acknowledges some of the spectacular failures that have resulted from underestimating an enemy. In an article entitled, Why Arabs Lose Wars, he writes:
Monday, 20 April 2015
Letter From America (About the Democratic Party)
Democrats Are the Real Abortion Extremists
Ian Tuttle
Two unrelated incidents this week showcased the oft-ignored fanaticism of abortion proponents.
Wasserman-Schultz spared him the trouble of asking. “I support letting women and their doctors make this decision without government getting involved,” she volunteered in a statement. “Period. End of story.”
One day earlier, Kansas governor Sam Brownback had signed into law the “Unborn Child Protection from Dismemberment Abortion Act,” which would, according to the Associated Press, “ban a common second-trimester procedure that critics describe as dismembering a fetus.”
“Dismemberment” is not a term of propaganda. Here is Supreme Court justice Anthony Kennedy, describing the procedure in his opinion for the court in Gonzalez v. Carhart (2007):
Daily Devotional
The Rod of Promise
"And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun."
Exodus 17:12
Moses grew weary, and then his friends assisted him. When at any time your prayer flags, let faith support one hand, and let holy hope uplift the other, and prayer seating itself upon the stone of Israel, the rock of our salvation, will persevere and prevail. Beware of faintness in devotion; if Moses felt it, who can escape? It is far easier to fight with sin in public, than to pray against it in private. It is remarked that Joshua never grew weary in the fighting, but Moses did grow weary in the praying; the more spiritual an exercise, the more difficult it is for flesh and blood to maintain it. Let us cry, then, for special strength, and may the Spirit of God, who helpeth our infirmities, as he allowed help to Moses, enable us like him to continue with our hands steady "until the going down of the sun;" till the evening of life is over; till we shall come to the rising of a better sun in the land where prayer is swallowed up in praise.
"And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun."
Exodus 17:12
Charles H. Spurgeon
So mighty was the prayer of Moses, that all depended upon it. The petitions of Moses discomfited the enemy more than the fighting of Joshua. Yet both were needed. So, in the soul's conflict, force and fervour, decision and devotion, valour and vehemence, must join their forces, and all will be well. You must wrestle with your sin, but the major part of the wrestling must be done alone in private with God. Prayer, like Moses', holds up the token of the covenant before the Lord. The rod was the emblem of God's working with Moses, the symbol of God's government in Israel. Learn, O pleading saint, to hold up the promise and the oath of God before him. The Lord cannot deny his own declarations. Hold up the rod of promise, and have what you will.Moses grew weary, and then his friends assisted him. When at any time your prayer flags, let faith support one hand, and let holy hope uplift the other, and prayer seating itself upon the stone of Israel, the rock of our salvation, will persevere and prevail. Beware of faintness in devotion; if Moses felt it, who can escape? It is far easier to fight with sin in public, than to pray against it in private. It is remarked that Joshua never grew weary in the fighting, but Moses did grow weary in the praying; the more spiritual an exercise, the more difficult it is for flesh and blood to maintain it. Let us cry, then, for special strength, and may the Spirit of God, who helpeth our infirmities, as he allowed help to Moses, enable us like him to continue with our hands steady "until the going down of the sun;" till the evening of life is over; till we shall come to the rising of a better sun in the land where prayer is swallowed up in praise.
Reality Check in China
Virtual Worlds Meet Divine Law
When men in their arrogance attempt to abrogate Natural Law--as established and decreed by God--they are given rope--enough rope with which to hang themselves. The consequences of the rebellion are usually unseen, but ultimately hard and real.
An example is China's one-child-policy. This policy was originally enacted to combat an alleged problem: the over-population of China. The rationalist-cum-materialists (aka, communists) decided the solution was to restrict couples to just one child. The destructive consequences of this rebellion against divine law are becoming more and more evident. This one instance of reckless hubris will end up doing more than anything else to weaken China from within.
There is now a severe and burgeoning imbalance between the sexes which will destabilize Chinese society. If you are allowed only one child, and abortion is the central state method of enforcing the dictat, then male children will be preferred to female because males are deemed to have better prospects. For every hundred female children born, there are 117 males. That adds up to millions of Chinese men unable to marry because there are no women available. Men, unable to enter into marriage, congregating in large numbers will inevitably be drawn into anti-social, marauding behaviour.
A society cannot rebel against the Creator's law--systematically and relentlessly--and escape the consequences. Some of those consequences, whilst initially subtle, are now increasingly manifest.
When men in their arrogance attempt to abrogate Natural Law--as established and decreed by God--they are given rope--enough rope with which to hang themselves. The consequences of the rebellion are usually unseen, but ultimately hard and real.
An example is China's one-child-policy. This policy was originally enacted to combat an alleged problem: the over-population of China. The rationalist-cum-materialists (aka, communists) decided the solution was to restrict couples to just one child. The destructive consequences of this rebellion against divine law are becoming more and more evident. This one instance of reckless hubris will end up doing more than anything else to weaken China from within.
There is now a severe and burgeoning imbalance between the sexes which will destabilize Chinese society. If you are allowed only one child, and abortion is the central state method of enforcing the dictat, then male children will be preferred to female because males are deemed to have better prospects. For every hundred female children born, there are 117 males. That adds up to millions of Chinese men unable to marry because there are no women available. Men, unable to enter into marriage, congregating in large numbers will inevitably be drawn into anti-social, marauding behaviour.
A society cannot rebel against the Creator's law--systematically and relentlessly--and escape the consequences. Some of those consequences, whilst initially subtle, are now increasingly manifest.
Saturday, 18 April 2015
Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow
The 5 Smooth Stones of Theocratic Libertarianism
Douglas Wilson
Things in
our public life together are gummed up enough that I believe we can
openly call for radical reform. Whether we do or not, I think we are
going to get the same treatment. We might as well respond with something
that might actually help. Whatever the case, we will not be able to
trim or pirouette our way out of this mess. As an insightful sailor on
the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor might have said, as the third wave of
Japanese bombers flew over, “The time for nuance is passed.”
At any rate, here are the basic features of theocratic libertarianism. Here are my five smooth stones.
Daily Devotional
Keeping On
TO MARY WILLIS SHELBURNE: On keeping to a regular pattern of religious life during the storms of life.
C. S. Lewis
9 November 1955I agree: the only thing one can usually change in one’s situation is oneself. And yet one can’t change that either—only ask Our Lord to do so, keeping on meanwhile with one’s sacraments, prayers, and ordinary rule of life. One mustn’t fuss too much about one’s state. Do you read St. Francis de Sales? He has good things to say on this subject. All good wishes.
From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III
Compiled in Yours, Jack
The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume III: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy 1950-1963. Copyright © 2007 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers. Yours, Jack: Spiritual Direction from C. S. Lewis. Copyright © 2008 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
The Death Spiral
Void-Integration Moving Apace
It seems that the Democratic Party in the United States has become relentlessly committed to abortion. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Chair of the Democratic National Committee faced up to a question indirectly put to her by Senator Rand Paul.
The latter was being pilloried by media with a whole host of gotcha questions about abortion provided by the Democratic National Committee (led by Debbie Wasserman Schultz). These questions only went one way, to one kind of candidate (i.e. conservative Republican candidates). The press as a rule never press advocates of abortion. Paul deflected the questions, by suggesting that the media ask Wasserman Schultz what her position was:
It seems that the Democratic Party in the United States has become relentlessly committed to abortion. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Chair of the Democratic National Committee faced up to a question indirectly put to her by Senator Rand Paul.
The latter was being pilloried by media with a whole host of gotcha questions about abortion provided by the Democratic National Committee (led by Debbie Wasserman Schultz). These questions only went one way, to one kind of candidate (i.e. conservative Republican candidates). The press as a rule never press advocates of abortion. Paul deflected the questions, by suggesting that the media ask Wasserman Schultz what her position was:
Why don’t we ask the DNC: is it OK to kill a 7-pound baby in the uterus? You go back and you ask Debbie Wass. if she’s OK with killing a 7-pound baby that is just not yet born yet. Ask her when life begins, and you ask Debbie when she’s willing to protect life. When you get an answer from Debbie, come back to it.Wasserman Schultz rose to the challenge.
Friday, 17 April 2015
A Vast Menu of Crimes
The Tyrannical Administrative State
According to the national anthem of the United States that country is the "land of the free and the home of the brave". But well over one hundred and fifty years ago, the United States decided that Christendom was dead, and the Age of Man was just beginning. The moot question at the time was whether there could be a secular society (with the odd, occasional reference to a Deity) which would be able to maintain the freedom from that tyranny which was the casus belli of the War of Independence.
Now the question is no longer moot. It has become obvious that when a society believes there is no higher power than man himself, collective man (the state) will construct an elaborate, comprehensive tyranny by which it will crush the citizens. Now, more than ever before, it is apt to call Americans not citizens, but subjects. The United States is no longer the "land of the free".
George Will addresses this reality in a piece published in National Review Online. He calls for the fixing of a tyranny. He has no clear solutions about how to go about dismantling this tyranny, beyond a call for it to be done. Banning the national anthem as a lie might be a startlingly good start.
According to the national anthem of the United States that country is the "land of the free and the home of the brave". But well over one hundred and fifty years ago, the United States decided that Christendom was dead, and the Age of Man was just beginning. The moot question at the time was whether there could be a secular society (with the odd, occasional reference to a Deity) which would be able to maintain the freedom from that tyranny which was the casus belli of the War of Independence.
Now the question is no longer moot. It has become obvious that when a society believes there is no higher power than man himself, collective man (the state) will construct an elaborate, comprehensive tyranny by which it will crush the citizens. Now, more than ever before, it is apt to call Americans not citizens, but subjects. The United States is no longer the "land of the free".
George Will addresses this reality in a piece published in National Review Online. He calls for the fixing of a tyranny. He has no clear solutions about how to go about dismantling this tyranny, beyond a call for it to be done. Banning the national anthem as a lie might be a startlingly good start.
Daily Devotional
Talk to God, Not Just About Him
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. (Psalm 23:4)
John Piper
The form of this psalm is instructive.In the first three verses David refers to God as “he”:
The Lord is my shepherd . . .Then in verses 4 and 5 David refers to God as “you”:
he makes me lie down . . .
he leads me . . .
he restores my soul.
I will not fear, for you are with me;Then in verse 6 he switches back to the third person:
your rod and staff comfort me;
you prepare a table before me;
you anoint my head with oil.
I shall dwell in the house of the Lord.The lesson I have learned from this form is that it is good not to talk very long about God without talking to God.
Getting The Terms of Argument Clear
A Deformation of Islam
Let's have a reformation, shall we. Ayaan Hirsi Ali has just published her latest book, entitled Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now. She begs an important question, What is a "reformation"?
Before we get into the details, for those of our readers unfamiliar with Ali, one of the most courageous voices of our day, The Daily Beast provides a brief biography:
Let's have a reformation, shall we. Ayaan Hirsi Ali has just published her latest book, entitled Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now. She begs an important question, What is a "reformation"?
Before we get into the details, for those of our readers unfamiliar with Ali, one of the most courageous voices of our day, The Daily Beast provides a brief biography:
Few figures on the intellectual scene today are as controversial or as compelling as Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A Somali-born author, speaker, activist, and former politician, Ali, 45, became a hijab-wearing radical Islamist as a teenager in Kenya, then a liberal atheist as an immigrant in the Netherlands; the Sept. 11 attacks of 2001 led her to a final break with faith. She became a member of parliament who championed the rights of women and girls in immigrant Muslim communities, drawing both applause and ire with her forceful statements about the role of traditional Islam in their oppression. That theme was at the center of the 2004 short film Submission, on which she worked with gadfly filmmaker Theo Van Gogh—and which led to Van Gogh’s murder by a Muslim man and a death threat against Ali. She lives under heightened security to this day.In calling for a reformation within Islam, we intuitively understand what Ali is arguing for. She goes on to explain:
Thursday, 16 April 2015
Letter From the UK (About an Anti-Christian Agenda in the NHS)
More Persecution in the UK
Christian NHS worker appeals ruling she 'bullied' Muslim colleague by praying for her; Suspended for Gross Misconduct
Lawyers for Victoria Wasteney lodge appeal against tribunal, claiming human rights were breached when she was disciplined after claims she tried to convert Enya Nawaz
A Christian health worker who was found to have bullied and harassed a junior Muslim colleague when she prayed for her has launched an appeal, saying the ruling breached her human rights. Senior occupational health therapist Victoria Wasteney, 37, claimed she was branded a "religious nutcase" after being disciplined when she was accused of trying to convert 25-year-old Enya Nawaz.
Miss Wasteney denied she ever attempted to convert her Pakistani Muslim colleague, saying she thought she and Miss Nawaz were friends.She also alleges Miss Nawaz was "manipulated" into complaining against her by colleagues at the East London NHS Trust, who allegedly had an "anti-Christian agenda".
Victoria Wasteney was suspended by the NHS
Miss Wasteney, from Ilford, had been the £50,000-a-year head of forensic occupational therapy at the John Howard Centre in Homerton, a secure hospital for mentally ill patients, since 2007. She took the trust to an employment tribunal claiming it had failed to clear her of wrongdoing after an eight-month disciplinary process because it would be "politically incorrect" to find a Christian innocent.
The trust insists the disciplinary hearing was fair and denies it discriminated against Miss Wasteney.
The decision was upheld by an employment tribunal, but now lawyers have lodged an appeal citing article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects freedom of conscience and religion. Andrea Williams, chief executive of the Christian Legal Centre, said: "The tribunal found it was inappropriate for her to engage in prays [sic] or give her colleague a book given her senior position.
"She is just an open, friendly, kind person and had a normal relationship with a colleague and there was nothing untoward. We are going to the Employment Appeals Tribunal and will be arguing that the ECHR enshrines the freedom to be able to speak about faith in the workplace and not be disciplined for it and have conversations with others. We lodged the papers on Thursday."
She added: "The NHS is increasingly dominated by a suffocating liberal agenda that chooses to bend over backwards to accommodate certain beliefs but punishes the Christian."
The tribunal had heard Miss Nawaz, whom Miss Wasteney had previously met when she was a student, started as an occupational therapist as part of a group of 30 managed by Miss Wasteney. Miss Wasteney told the tribunal the younger woman had "sought a personal friendship" with her as well as regularly seeking her out for advice on how to "grow professionally within the service".
She added they would speak in a "mutually curious" way about their "shared passion for the things of God", adding it was "not unusual" for Miss Nawaz to initiate conversations about faith.
The John Howard Centre
Miss Wasteney said it was the Muslim woman who had first approached her about her interest in combating human trafficking and was "so excited" when she came to an anti-slavery event hosted by the Christian Revival Church at the O2 Arena, which she attended.
She said Miss Nawaz had then come to her in tears because she was upset about health problems and had agreed for Miss Wasteney to pray for her. Miss Wasteney also gave Miss Nawaz a book, "I Dared to Call Him Father", about a Muslim woman who converts to Christianity - but denied it was an attempt to make her convert.
On June 14 2013, the claimant was presented with the complaint by her supervisor John Wilson, which accused her of wanting to convert Miss Nawaz to Christianity. The allegations included Miss Wasteney requesting Miss Nawaz pray with her, setting up healing sessions at Miss Nawaz's house and telling she would not be healed unless she was converted. She was suspended on the grounds of "gross misconduct" and a hearing held in February 2014 heard there had been a breakdown in the "firewall" between her personal beliefs and her work.
She was given a final written warning as a result, which was later reduced to first written warning on appeal. She returned to work in March 2014, but alleged the "hostility" she experienced pressured her into leaving the John Howard centre and moving to the trust's headquarters.
• Christians should 'leave their beliefs at home or get another job'
Daily Devotional
The World's Honour
"O ye sons of men, how long will ye turn my glory into shame?"Psalm 4:2
Charles H. Spurgeon
An instructive writer has made a mournful list of the honours which the blinded people of Israel awarded to their long expected King.1. They gave him a procession of honour, in which Roman legionaries, Jewish priests, men and women, took a part, he himself bearing his cross. This is the triumph which the world awards to him who comes to overthrow man's direst foes. Derisive shouts are his only acclamations, and cruel taunts his only paeans of praise.
2. They presented him with the wine of honour. Instead of a golden cup of generous wine they offered him the criminal's stupefying death-draught, which he refused because he would preserve an uninjured taste wherewith to taste of death; and afterwards when he cried, "I thirst," they gave him vinegar mixed with gall, thrust to his mouth upon a sponge. Oh! wretched, detestable inhospitality to the King's Son.
3. He was provided with a guard of honour, who showed their esteem of him by gambling over his garments, which they had seized as their booty. Such was the body-guard of the adored of heaven; a quaternion of brutal gamblers.
Sally Kohn For President!
More Qualified Than Most
We are reasonably hopeful that the homosexual shock troops will find themselves embarrassed by one Sally Kohn. Once again the vanguard of secular statism is probably finding itself afflicted by the syndrome of the embarrassing advocate. If so, you have our sympathy and condolences. There's nothing much you can do when you have friends like Sally.
This, from Patterico
We are reasonably hopeful that the homosexual shock troops will find themselves embarrassed by one Sally Kohn. Once again the vanguard of secular statism is probably finding itself afflicted by the syndrome of the embarrassing advocate. If so, you have our sympathy and condolences. There's nothing much you can do when you have friends like Sally.
This, from Patterico
Wednesday, 15 April 2015
Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow
Our Transgressive Daisy Chain
Douglas WilsonBlog&Mablog
The great
need of the hour is for Christians in North America to get a map in
their heads, a map that has an x on it, that x indicating “you are
here.” Related to this, we need to know how exactly we got here. We need
to be oriented, and that means we need to be oriented by Scripture
— not by the secularists who taunt us, on the one hand, or by the
evangelical bedwetters, who believe every last one of their taunts, on
the other.
It is not as though we were not warned. We were warned repeatedly,
but we did not have the right categories in our minds to process those
warnings. We had some prophetic souls who were able to point out where
the x was going to be a century after their time. We are now standing on
it and we still don’t know. Here is Chesterton, near the beginning of
the 20th century. |
| Too big to fight, or too big to miss? |
And this libertine excess, which throws off the “chains” established by God’s moral order, does not result in greater freedom for all. It results in petty tyrannies, soft despotism, and all those 16 ounce soda bans. Chesterton again:
“For when you break the great laws, you
do not get liberty; you do not even get anarchy. You get the small laws”
(Chesterton on Dickens, Collected Works XV, p. 151).
A glaring example of breaking the great laws would be our culture-wide unwillingness or inability to tell the difference between boys and girls, along with our unwillingness or inability to admit that these are the only two possible options on the menu.
Daily Devotional
On Bereavement And Loneliness
TO MARY MARGARET McCASLIN: On how, after weathering a bereavement, one feels abandoned by God; on how God works on our behalf even when we feel He is inactive; and on the necessity of continuing to use the ordinary means of the spiritual life during times of extraordinary need.
C. S. Lewis
2 August 1954Thank you for your letter of the July 25th. I will certainly put you in my prayers. I can well believe that you were divinely supported at the time of your terrible calamity. People often are. It is afterwards, when the new and bleaker life is beginning to be a routine, that one often feels one has been left rather unaided. I am sure one is not really so. God’s presence is not the same as the feeling of God’s presence and He may be doing most for us when we think He is doing least.
Loneliness, I am pretty sure, is one of the ways by which we can grow spiritually. Until we are lonely we may easily think we have got further than we really have in Christian love; our (natural and innocent, but merely natural, not heavenly) pleasure in being loved—in being, as you say, an object of interest to someone—can be mistaken for progress in love itself, the outgoing active love which is concerned with giving, not receiving. It is this latter which is the beginning of sanctity.
But of course you know all this: alas, so much easier to know in theory than to submit to day by day in practice! Be very regular in your prayers and communions: and don’t value special ‘guidances’ any more than what comes through ordinary Christian teaching, conscience, and prudence.
I am shocked to hear that your friends think of following me. I wanted them to follow Christ. But they’ll get over this confusion soon, I trust.
Please accept my deepest sympathy.
From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III
Compiled in Yours, Jack
The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume III: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy 1950-1963. Copyright © 2007 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers. Yours, Jack: Spiritual Direction from C. S. Lewis. Copyright © 2008 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers. Sourced from BibleGateway.
What is the Truth?
Just the "Framing" Ma'am
Why is truth important? Well, in everything but a Christian society it's likely not. Telling lies, gilding the lilly, burnishing a narrative, propaganda for the cause are all perfectly acceptable in the worldview of secular materialism. It's the narrative. It's the framing. It's the vibe of the thing. That's what's important. At least Muslim ideology is candid about it. Its doctrine of taqiyya justifies lying in a number of "circumstances". In Hindu belief, since good and evil are part of the panoply of deities, both truth and lies are equally ultimate.
It is becoming more and more acceptable in the West to "lie for the cause". The most recent example is a completely false story of an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia perpetrated for ideological reasons. The gullible were gulled--as expected. Rolling Stone published the sensational story whilst the Chattering Classes ululated into their Chardonnay. Dramatic stuff. But . . .
Why is truth important? Well, in everything but a Christian society it's likely not. Telling lies, gilding the lilly, burnishing a narrative, propaganda for the cause are all perfectly acceptable in the worldview of secular materialism. It's the narrative. It's the framing. It's the vibe of the thing. That's what's important. At least Muslim ideology is candid about it. Its doctrine of taqiyya justifies lying in a number of "circumstances". In Hindu belief, since good and evil are part of the panoply of deities, both truth and lies are equally ultimate.
It is becoming more and more acceptable in the West to "lie for the cause". The most recent example is a completely false story of an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia perpetrated for ideological reasons. The gullible were gulled--as expected. Rolling Stone published the sensational story whilst the Chattering Classes ululated into their Chardonnay. Dramatic stuff. But . . .
Tuesday, 14 April 2015
A Man-Made Disaster
California's Drought
“With different policies over the last 20 years, all of this could be avoided,” Fiorina said on Glenn Beck’s radio program. “Despite the fact that California has suffered from droughts for millennia, liberal environmentalists have prevented the building of a single new reservoir or a single new water conveyance system over decades during a period in which California’s population has doubled.” Fiorina said that as a result, 70 percent of California’s rainfall “washes out to sea” year after year. . . .
“In California, fish and frogs and flies are really important — far more important apparently than the 40 percent unemployment rate in certain parts of central valley,” Fiorina said. “So the Senate and the president could waive some of those water restrictions. They have been asked to do so, and they have refused to do so.” [TheBlaze]
Carly Fiorina describes how the worst ever drought in California is due to the ignorance of the pagan natives.
Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina said Monday that California’s water crisis is the result of “liberal environmentalists” who are “willing to sacrifice other people’s lives and livelihoods at the altar of their ideology.”“With different policies over the last 20 years, all of this could be avoided,” Fiorina said on Glenn Beck’s radio program. “Despite the fact that California has suffered from droughts for millennia, liberal environmentalists have prevented the building of a single new reservoir or a single new water conveyance system over decades during a period in which California’s population has doubled.” Fiorina said that as a result, 70 percent of California’s rainfall “washes out to sea” year after year. . . .
“In California, fish and frogs and flies are really important — far more important apparently than the 40 percent unemployment rate in certain parts of central valley,” Fiorina said. “So the Senate and the president could waive some of those water restrictions. They have been asked to do so, and they have refused to do so.” [TheBlaze]
Daily Devotional
God Strengthens Us Through Others
“Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.” (Luke 22:31–32)
John Piper
What about the other ten apostles (not counting Judas)? Satan was going to sift them too. Did Jesus pray for them? Yes he did. But he did not ask the Father to guard their faith in the very same way he guarded Peter’s.God broke the back of Peter’s pride and self-reliance that night in the agony of Satan’s sieve. But he did not let him go. He turned him around and forgave him and restored him and strengthened his faith. And now it was Peter’s mission to strengthen the other ten. Jesus provided for the ten by providing for Peter. The strengthened becomes the strengthener.
There is a great lesson here for us. Sometimes God will deal with you directly, strengthening your faith alone in the wee hours of the morning. But most of the time (we might say ten-elevenths of the time) God strengthens our faith through another person. God sends us some Simon Peter who brings just the word of grace we need to keep on in the faith: some testimony about how “Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning” (Psalm 30:5).
Eternal security is a community project. Whenever God encourages your heart with the promise that in Satan’s sifting your faith will not fail, then take that encouragement and double your joy by using it to strengthen your brothers and sisters.
For more about John Piper's ministry and writing, see DesiringGod.org.
The Balkanisation of Western Europe
Stupid Arrogance
Cultures never exist in a vacuum. Never. Every human culture draws upon habits, beliefs, and truths which, consciously or unconsciously, reflect a particular world-and-life view. For many, if not most, particular cultural beliefs and practices have no more foundation than habit. We do this or that (for example, female genital mutilation, or drinking in the pub on a Friday night) because we "have always done it".
But if one starts to think further Big Questions immediately come into play. Is female genital mutilation right or wrong? Is drinking at the pub right or wrong? If both are moral actions, by what standard are they justified? And upon what standard does the standard justifying female genital mutilation and pub-drinking rest in turn? Whence does its authority come and upon what or whom does it rest? And so forth. Every culture will have embedded, tacit answers to these questions.
Cultures never exist in a vacuum. Never. Every human culture draws upon habits, beliefs, and truths which, consciously or unconsciously, reflect a particular world-and-life view. For many, if not most, particular cultural beliefs and practices have no more foundation than habit. We do this or that (for example, female genital mutilation, or drinking in the pub on a Friday night) because we "have always done it".
But if one starts to think further Big Questions immediately come into play. Is female genital mutilation right or wrong? Is drinking at the pub right or wrong? If both are moral actions, by what standard are they justified? And upon what standard does the standard justifying female genital mutilation and pub-drinking rest in turn? Whence does its authority come and upon what or whom does it rest? And so forth. Every culture will have embedded, tacit answers to these questions.
Monday, 13 April 2015
Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow
Ickybod
Douglas Wilson
Usually
Jonah Goldberg talks good sense, but yesterday I heard him defending
the Indiana law as nothing more than a pitiful little consolation prize
for the religious right. He was saying that the same sex mirage
juggernaut has carried the day, and all conservatives are asking for now
is the right to be left alone. I want to explain why this is not the
case. I want to provide a theological explanation on why this is not
what is happening at all.
First, opponents of same sex mirage have often failed to recognize that rebellion against God’s order for marriage can fail on multiple levels, and not just one. In other words, homosex is not just immoral, as opposed to moral. It is not just disgusting, as opposed to alluring. It is not just kinky, as opposed to straight. All observations along those lines would be correct, but they do not explain why the current battleground is made up of florist shops, bakeries, and photography studios. That is what I wish to explain.
Daily Devotional
Cross Bearing
"On him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus."
Luke 23:26
But let us comfort ourselves with this thought, that in our case, as in Simon's, it is not our cross, but Christ's cross which we carry. When you are molested for your piety; when your religion brings the trial of cruel mockings upon you, then remember it is not your cross, it is Christ's cross; and how delightful is it to carry the cross of our Lord Jesus!
"On him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus."
Luke 23:26
Charles H. Spurgeon
We see in Simon's carrying the cross a picture of the work of the Church throughout all generations; she is the cross-bearer after Jesus. Mark then, Christian, Jesus does not suffer so as to exclude your suffering. He bears a cross, not that you may escape it, but that you may endure it. Christ exempts you from sin, but not from sorrow. Remember that, and expect to suffer.But let us comfort ourselves with this thought, that in our case, as in Simon's, it is not our cross, but Christ's cross which we carry. When you are molested for your piety; when your religion brings the trial of cruel mockings upon you, then remember it is not your cross, it is Christ's cross; and how delightful is it to carry the cross of our Lord Jesus!
Knowing One's Place
Recovering The Joy of Battle
In our corporate experience there are plenty of faithful Christians who live conscience stricken. They are sure that they are not obeying sufficiently well to satisfy the exhortations and injunctions that come upon them like a deluge every Lord's day. The preacher has just completed an exposition of the Apostle's command, "pray without ceasing" and many poor saints depart certain that they have failed to obey that command and that they live miserable Christian lives, racked with general unfaithfulness. So the saints perpetually mourn, with little gaiety and laughter.
They have forgotten (or have perhaps never been taught) that most of the commands and exhortations, particularly in the New Testament, are given to the church corporate, of which the individual believer is one part--or to use a Pauline illustration, a single member of an entire body. True, the believer must play an role--a role appropriate to their gifts and calling--so that the congregation as a whole can pray without ceasing.
When Christians sort this out, the joyful release from false guilt can be palpable. Theologian, John Frame provides a broader and deeper biblical argument for this reality. He argues that each of us must prioritize God's commandments in the light of one's situation and, in particular, one's callings.
In our corporate experience there are plenty of faithful Christians who live conscience stricken. They are sure that they are not obeying sufficiently well to satisfy the exhortations and injunctions that come upon them like a deluge every Lord's day. The preacher has just completed an exposition of the Apostle's command, "pray without ceasing" and many poor saints depart certain that they have failed to obey that command and that they live miserable Christian lives, racked with general unfaithfulness. So the saints perpetually mourn, with little gaiety and laughter.
They have forgotten (or have perhaps never been taught) that most of the commands and exhortations, particularly in the New Testament, are given to the church corporate, of which the individual believer is one part--or to use a Pauline illustration, a single member of an entire body. True, the believer must play an role--a role appropriate to their gifts and calling--so that the congregation as a whole can pray without ceasing.
When Christians sort this out, the joyful release from false guilt can be palpable. Theologian, John Frame provides a broader and deeper biblical argument for this reality. He argues that each of us must prioritize God's commandments in the light of one's situation and, in particular, one's callings.
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