The most “viral” thing I had written prior to today was Why We Have Children. It’s probably, since I began writing for Patheos, the piece of which I am the most proud. Yet today, the response to my Open Letter to Harold Camping and Those Who Expected Judgment Day has been something to behold. Whether or not it’s truly “viral” depends on your frame of reference. Compared to a piece at Huffington Post, 2,000 shares (where it stands about six hours after... Read more
[Note: Many thanks to those who have shared this letter. Thanks to Ed, Dillon, Collin, and others who’ve posted links so far. Please consider connecting with me on Facebook or Twitter, and please see the UPDATE at the end.] When people say, “It’s not the end of the world,” they usually mean those words to be comforting. Yet those words will not be comforting to you. Not today. That the Day of the Lord did not arrive when you had... Read more
I’m preparing a post on the conditions afflicting the American elite class. A couple days ago I pointed to a few pieces from Paul Krugman and Walter Russell Mead. I’m especially pondering these words: We have had financial scandals before and we have had waves of corporate crime. We have had pirates and robber barons. But we have never seen a collapse of ordinary morality in the corporate suites on the scale of the last twenty years. We have never... Read more
Pieces of news and commentary I found interesting or important this morning: 1. Giving credit where credit is due: DefSec Gates gives Obama props for his gutsy decision to green-light the mission that took out bin Laden. 2. A great dialogue between Paul Krugman (yes, I know) and Walter Russell Mead on the structural and cultural problems afflicting America’s ruling class. Krugman writes: The fact is that what we’re experiencing right now is a top-down disaster. The policies that got... Read more
A friend (thanks Alex) saw yesterday’s post in which I sang the praises of Sam Beam, Iron and Wine, and “The Trapeze Swinger.” He responded by recommending Future of Forestry. I confess I had never heard of them, and their full story is still not known to me. They’re evidently Christian, but they don’t sound like any Christian band I’ve ever heard. I predict they’ll go on to massive success. The friend linked me to a rehearsal performance of a... Read more
Variety, they say, is the spice of life. It’s also an essential ingredient in all my favorite blogs. So as I’ve been ramping this blog up, I’ve been considering the kinds of posts I would like to offer. I am launching several series — “With Distinction” will offer philosophical or conceptual distinctions that can help us sift through current events and debates, the resuscitated “Morning Update” will include links to interesting pieces elsewhere around the interwebs, and today I’m launching... Read more
Last week I began a series of three posts responding to the death of Osama bin Laden — and to the discomfort many felt at the way in which that death was celebrated by Americans, including many American Christians. The first post considered the claim, “The people celebrating the death of bin Laden are like the people who celebrated in the ‘Angry Arab Street’ when the towers fell on 9/11.” The second post asked “What ought we to celebrate, and... Read more
A couple months ago I began a series inspired by Amy Chua’s “Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior.” Although her column was less nuanced than her book, the column was a cultural event in itself — it’s now been shared over 362,000 times on Facebook — and it deserved a response. It also provided an opportunity to explore the strengths and weaknesses of stereotypically “eastern” and “western” styles of parenting. Raised by thoughtful Caucasian-American parents, but joined by marriage and ministry... Read more
As I noted in Part One of this series, a controversy has blossomed in the blogosphere and on social networking sites over the “Excessive Celebration” of many young people in DC, New York, and just about every college town once the news was confirmed that Osama bin Laden had been killed. The first part considered whether there was any reasonable moral parallel between the 5/2 (the day on which Osama bin Laden died) celebrations and the 9/11 celebrations in many... Read more
UPDATE: I originally came across this story through a Tweet, and Live Leak, and the blog known as Atlas Shrugs. I don’t regularly read Atlas Shrugs, although I know that Pamela Geller (the proprietor of that blog) has written some things regarding Muslim matters that seem wrong to me. Anyway, after posting this, some folks who regularly read what I write (even though they often disagree with me) suggested that I was wrong to have passed this along without learning... Read more
Philosophical Fragments
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