Replaying the familiar Gospel scenes in an "anti-Gospel" of Nicolae Carpathia would have allowed our authors to explore the character and meaning of both Christ and Antichrist. Such an approach might have proved both entertaining and edifying, which is what Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins say they intended these books to be. But I'm afraid our authors aren't terribly interested in the character and meaning of either Christ or Antichrist. Read more
Moral obligation -- love, solidarity -- is boundless and universal. It is also, always, particular and differentiated. Those two things are not in conflict. Those two things have never been in conflict. Pretending that they are in conflict always leaves a trail of bodies. Read more
Purity is the main thing here, after all -- retaining the unsullied perfection of our undefiled religion. The whole orphans and widows bit is really just thrown in there as an afterthought for those who feel kind of weird just sitting around, avoiding the world, stayin' pure and undefiled. But clearly it's optional. Extra-credit, maybe, but not required. And really it's just too dangerous to risk it. Read more
A T-shirt reading "Sandusky is innocent" is not a claim that those wearing it have access to some body of evidence unknown to the courts and the public and Sandusky's own attorneys. The claim has nothing to do with evidence or with logic. It's based on desire. This is what they want to be true, and so this is what they choose to believe "truth" means. Read more
Any discussion of Trumpian racism is likely to be changed, abruptly, into a discussion of former West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd -- the No. 1 go-to tu quoque response for white Republicans defending Trump. Tu quoque is a fancy Latin phrase meaning, roughly, "So's your mother," and like all arguments taking this form, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Those shouting "Robert Byrd!" inevitably don't understand what they're saying -- rejecting the basis of their own argument as well as its only possible conclusion. Read more
"Those who mock the poor insult their Maker; those who are glad at calamity will not go unpunished." Read more
This, keep in mind, is being presented as stirring oratory. "Buck was tired and felt grimy wearing two-day-old clothes," L&J write. "But his worries were a distant memory as Carpathia moved along." And what, exactly, does Carpathia say that causes Buck to forget his worries? He recites the names of the member states of the United Nations. Alphabetically. No, really. Read more
I wish I could say that these "insults" were directed at me because I had distinguished myself with an exceptional track record of demonstrating the love such terms accuse me of. All I can do is strive to better live up to such "accusations." So to all who have called me a "_______-lover," let me say thank you for the reminder and the challenge to meet such lofty aspirations -- the highest calling to which any of us can aspire. Read more
The Internet is open to the public. We can Google, search on Facebook and Twitter, or browse through the comments at YouTube and the local newspaper site. We can see how and when the insult "SJW" is used. And in the vast majority of cases, that has nothing to do with some imagined meaning about ridiculing self-righteous moral crusaders. In the vast majority of actual usage, the epithet is directed at someone who criticized racism or sexism as unjust and undesirable. That's how the word is used. That's what it means. Read more
Before we get into the appalling specific applications of that suffix, though, just consider what meaning it brings to the conversation. It says you are defined by your love. It says that love is the whole of your identity. That's usually a reliable move when the goal is to insult another person. Select a single trait and reduce that other person to nothing but that trait. Define them with and confine them to that single thing and you deny them the dignity of being fully human. Usually. But that doesn't work with love. Read more
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