Some Wednesday morning links, including: Sunday sermons after seminary; the best we've got; imaginary Bibles; libertarianism, downstream; the 60-vote Senate isn't constitutional, or democratic; knowing "one another;" death cafes; Mariano Rivera; George Jones and Jesus in Outer Space. Read more
Either/or. This or that. Only this or only that. Government or individuals — and only government (Leviathan) or only individuals. Laws or markets — and only laws or only markets. Anarchy or tyranny. What a weird, unreal and inhuman way of looking at the world. Read more
The class war continues and most people are not on the side that's winning. Lots o' links, including: Adorable child chimneysweeps for the plutocrat who has everything; $59 in 45 years; permanent inequality; ho-hum, another five years of mass unemployment; reverse incentives; lucky duckies on disability; lucky duckies on food stamps; and capitalist theories of atonement. Read more
God is not mocked. If we turn our backs on the absolute truth of scripture and deny the authority of its clear teaching on the traditional institution of slavery, then we no longer have any basis for morality, meaning, truth or virtue. We lose our foundation, our anchor, and we are adrift. We become godless nihilists, or we set ourselves up as God. Read more
The stupidity of the tea partiers has nothing to do with innate intelligence or with acquired intelligence. It has nothing to do with smartness or brainpower or where anyone falls on the bell curve of Stanford-Binet test scores. It is, rather, a moral stupidity — the inevitable intellectual consequence of a selfish refusal to listen to what empathy is shouting from all sides. Read more
A Monday morning collection of loose ends, links and observations, including: Several more reasons New Hampshire's state legislature is too big; Rush Limbaugh hates subsidiarity; pro-life death threats; "living in sin" isn't applied to usurers or predators, which makes it a really dumb phrase; Al Mohler is on the wrong side of the moral argument, so he says there isn't one; and Businessweek confirms the book of Ecclesiastes. Read more
Whether theists or atheists, we are all of us "unable to be saints." Yet in the midst of pestilence, some — for whatever personal reasons or motives — "strive their utmost to be healers." Read more
Ezra Klein and Evan Soltas on gun laws and "How Washington really works;" Jean Ann Esselink on one thing in Washington that is really working; Thomas MacAulay Millar on teaching consent; Peter Enns on the need for evangelicals to reassess the whole evangelical system for how they read and appeal to the Bible; Helen Lee on what Christian employers should learn from Trader Joe's. Read more
Mark 7:31-37: "He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, 'Ephphatha,' that is, 'Be opened.'" Read more
Q: Why was the suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing read his rights? A: Because he was arrested and charged with a crime. Read more
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