‘Making the text say things that it never meant’

Last updated on: July 26, 2012 at 2:49 am By Fred Clark

One of my pet-peeve misconceptions is the notion that an illiterately literal reading of Genesis 1-11 is somehow an expression of “conservative” theology. It isn’t. Of course this “literal” belief in the six-day creation of a young earth isn’t liberal theology either. It’s just bad theology. Not orthodox, not conservative or liberal, just wrong — just a weirdly misleading way to read this text. Bad theology and wrong theology shouldn’t be blithely equated with conservative theology. Yes, Al Mohler is... Read more

Phyllis Schlafly confuses urban legend with truth, Arlington with Europe

Last updated on: July 26, 2012 at 2:39 am By Fred Clark

Phyllis Schlafly says that President Obama is planning to remove the crosses at Arlington Cemetery: You were talking a minute ago about Arlington Cemetery; if you haven’t been there, I’m sure you’ve seen pictures of all the crosses there and I just wonder if the day is going to come when they want to take down all those crosses. The reference is to this urban legend — usually told about the ACLU — debunked by Snopes here. Snopes also notes... Read more

Robot Eurythphro and news from the religious right

Last updated on: September 10, 2014 at 12:56 am By Fred Clark

“And a good day to you, Robot Euthyphro.” If you’re not familiar with the original, you can read it here. Go ahead, it’s short, and funnier than you might expect. (For best results: Imagine Peter Falk in the role of Socrates.) I found the video above after reading Libby Anne’s response to a column by Tim Challies called “What Kind of God Would Condemn People to Eternal Torment?” I’ve been trying to figure out whether Challies: A) Has never read... Read more

Smart people saying smart things

Last updated on: July 25, 2012 at 1:06 am By Fred Clark

Bill McKibben: “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math“ Since I wrote one of the first books for a general audience about global warming way back in 1989, and since I’ve spent the intervening decades working ineffectively to slow that warming, I can say with some confidence that we’re losing the fight, badly and quickly — losing it because, most of all, we remain in denial about the peril that human civilization is in. When we think about global warming at all,... Read more

Family Feud: Right-Wing Demagogue edition

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 11:55 pm By Fred Clark

You know how to play — 100 cretinous right-wing demagogues were surveyed and their top answers are on the board. Our question: Who or what is to blame for the mass-murder last week in a Colorado theater? Flip Benham, Operation Save America: “The ideology of the Democratic Party.” Margie Phelps: “Direct result of filthy fag pride parade in Colo.” Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas: “Ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs.” Former state Sen. Russell Pearce, R-Ariz.: The unarmed, “unprepared” victims. Greg Stier,... Read more

And they’ll know we are Christians by our T-shirt logos

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 7:46 pm By Fred Clark

“Make your view of Scripture as high as possible, but not higher.” “Why would one not intervene when somebody gives gullible people sewage to drink?” “You go ahead and use the wisdom from the Bible to work on Kirk Cameron’s marriage.” “The determination to double down on a floundering doctrine is driven by a conviction that religion is uncompelling if it fails to make significant demands on an individual’s lifestyle. These demands are always partially if not predominantly sexual.” “Many... Read more

How to be an ungrateful jerk

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 4:48 pm By Fred Clark

The title here is, of course, redundant. Ingratitude is the key to jerkery. If you want to be a total jerk, then you’re going to have to learn to cultivate ingratitude. This is harder than it seems. Wherever you go, you will find yourself surrounded by and confronted with constant reminders — reasons, causes, demands — to be grateful. You must guard yourself against them. You’ll never achieve true jerkhood if you allow gratitude even the smallest toehold in your... Read more

CFPB — a boring name that strikes fear in the hearts of predators

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 12:30 pm By Fred Clark

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is just getting started. It’s an unassuming little office with a blandly bureaucratic-sounding name. And it’s led by Richard Cordray, an unassuming, unthreatening-looking fellow who lacks the TV-hair of a politician. But the CFPB, created by the post-financial crisis Dodd-Frank law, actually has a shot at doing what it’s name says: protecting consumers. That’s a pretty big agenda because there are an awful lot of people, predators and practices that consumers need protection from. The... Read more

Arguing for Emancipation: ‘The Golden Rule is sufficient’

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 10:28 am By Fred Clark

Via John Fea, I read Allen Guelzo’s National Review piece on “Emancipation: The Un-Holiday.” The Emancipation Proclamation did more, and for more Americans, than any other presidential document before or since. It declared that over 3 million black slaves (representing some $3 billion in capital investment) would “thenceforward, and forever, be free” (thus transforming that $3 billion into a net zero, overnight) and turned the Civil War from being a police action against the breakaway southern Confederacy into a crusade... Read more

‘Which gave to a stupid aristocracy political supremacy’

Last updated on: July 24, 2012 at 2:11 am By Fred Clark

“In every age, where liberty and human progress have made notable advances, there comes a time when a brood of stragglers in the rear appear to denounce the progress made as nothing worth, and to demand the restoration of the Bourbons with all of the conditions which once restricted the greater part of mankind to less of freedom, to less of the comforts of life, and to less of intellectual individuality, but which gave to a stupid aristocracy political supremacy.”... Read more