Wheaton College, C.S. Lewis & Bad Jackie: On preferring the nightmare to reality

Last updated on: July 23, 2012 at 3:55 pm By Fred Clark

One unappealing possibility is that Philip Ryken, president of Wheaton College, is making his clumsy debut as a culture-warrior because he is nothing more than a lying hack. I hope that isn’t the case. I hope he is not simply posturing about Satanic baby-killers to stroke his own pride or to feed his addiction to self-righteous indignation or in a grasping attempt for political influence. That would explain why Ryken is publicly saying untrue things about emergency contraception, but it’s... Read more

Dear Wheaton College Biology department faculty: Please correct Ryken’s mistake and/or lie regarding Plan B

Last updated on: July 23, 2012 at 2:26 pm By Fred Clark

TO: Dr. Jennifer Busch, Dr. Raymond Lewis, Dr. L. Kristen Page, Dr. Pattle Pak-Toe Pun, Dr. Nadine Folino Rorem, Dr. Rodney Scott, Dr. Gregory Vanden Heuvel RE: Your college president is misrepresenting Plan B, either due to ignorance or intentionally for political reasons. This is the sort of thing that ought to be mortifying for scientists at an institution of higher education: Wheaton President Philip Ryken said that while evangelicals do not ascribe to the Catholic teaching against artificial birth... Read more

Sweeping exits and off-stage lines

Last updated on: July 23, 2012 at 2:26 am By Fred Clark

“I can play along with Superman using a steel girder to swat someone into outer space, but I just can’t get past the idea that The Daily Planet still occupies one of the largest skyscrapers in all of Metropolis and is totally impervious to newsroom layoffs.” “The Khan of Khans is not interested in Total Customer Service!” “There are few things in this world that are cooler than an adult or a company taking a kid’s question 100-percent seriously.” “But... Read more

Obama drops F-bomb: Tells ‘Internet’ to ‘F— off’

Last updated on: July 22, 2012 at 11:51 pm By Fred Clark

“Let me tell you something. F— off, Internet,” President Barack Obama said on July 15 in a speech in Roanoke, Va. He said that. Those are his exact words. Well, those are his exact letters, anyway. And they’re in the exact order in which he spoke them. If you want to be a stickler for context, what President Obama actually said was: There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me — because they want to give... Read more

‘She was a class act’

Last updated on: July 22, 2012 at 10:44 pm By Fred Clark

My mom’s kid sister was a pretty fantastic woman. “The grand dame of synchronized swimming in Bucks County,” the local newspaper said. Aunt Betts was a terrific athlete who played four sports at Temple University and went on to help train Olympic athletes in synchronized swimming. Here’s a bit of her obituary from the local paper: F. Elizabeth Hess of Fairless Hills passed away Tuesday, July 17, 2012 at Chandler Hall in Newtown after a courageous battle with pancreatic cancer.... Read more

Smart people saying smart things

Last updated on: July 22, 2012 at 12:45 pm By Fred Clark

Ezra Klein: “The world desperately wants to loan us money“ [Ten-year Treasurys are] negative. Negative! The market will literally pay us a small premium to take their money and keep it safe for them for five, seven or 10 years. We could use that money to rebuild our roads and water filtration systems. We could use that money to cut taxes for any business that adds to its payrolls. We could use that to hire back the 600,000 state and... Read more

Sunday favorites

Last updated on: July 2, 2012 at 3:51 pm By Fred Clark

Ephesians 4:14-16 We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself... Read more

Whose idea of good news is this?

Last updated on: July 20, 2012 at 11:38 pm By Fred Clark

OK, so Doug Wilson promotes a vision of sex that seems designed to create a victim-blaming culture of rape, and he’s an apologist for American slavery. But, still, that doesn’t mean we should think of these Gospel Coalition types as evil, right? I mean, these are our brothers in Christ, so we’re supposed to be charitable and civil and to give them every benefit of the doubt. So, yeah, OK, the “penetrates, conquers, colonizes” vision of sex is pretty horrifying... Read more

NRA: Marchons, marchons!

Last updated on: July 20, 2012 at 10:25 pm By Fred Clark

Nicolae: The Rise of Antichrist, pp. 34-35 Buck Williams can’t figure out what to do with the church. He and Chloe have arrived at New Hope Village Church where they broke the news to poor Loretta about the death of Bruce Barnes. But now what? The nominal leader of this congregation is dead. What will they do next? For that matter, what were they doing before? Buck doesn’t have any idea. Neither do the authors. They’re big fans of the... Read more

They loved and they were loved

Last updated on: July 20, 2012 at 3:56 pm By Fred Clark

By now, many of you know, many of you have heard that a few miles outside of Denver in a town call Aurora, at least 12 people were killed when a gunman opened fire in a movie theater, and dozens more are being treated for injuries at a local hospital. … Now, even as we learn how this happened and who’s responsible, we may never understand what leads anybody to terrorize their fellow human beings like this. Such violence, such... Read more