Sloppy Theology

The National Association of Evangelicals has the following in their statement of faith.
"We believe the Bible to be the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God."

Really?!?! Do they really believe that? If so, I would be surprised. I've yet to meet an evangelical pastor who would deny that Jesus is the infallible, authoritative Word of God, Incarnate. To limit the infallible, authoritative Word of God to just the Bible is idolatry, Bibleolatry, if you will.

As I see it, much of this sloppiness stems from a deviation from the way creeds have been formulated for most of Christian history. For most of Christian history, creeds were viewed as minimalist statements, with negatives and words like "only" practically nonexistent. One prominent exception to this rule would be in referring to Jesus as the "only" Son of God in the Nicene and Apostles Creeds, which unlike the above statement is a quote from Scripture itself.

The Evangelical Theological Society does a much better job, stating in their "doctrinal basis" that "The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs."

What I wonder, though, is how such a prominent association of evangelicals can get away with such sloppy theological statements regarding such an obvious and important point. Isn't anybody in these groups paying attention?

Dirty Jobs' Mike Rowe on Lamb Castration, PETA, and American Labor

Here's a video I came across that I found fascinating. It made me realize how out of touch I am (and perhaps most of us are) with... well, aspects of reality, I guess -- what we expect to be true and what really is -- and finding joy in life and satisfaction in work.

It's long at about 21min but you can probably judge whether it interests you by the first several minutes. At once I greatly envy all the stories Mike must have, and yet... I have to draw the line somewhere in terms of new experiences, and I think it is here. :) Enjoy.

Truthtelling Regarding Funding for Abortion in Health Care Reform Bills

Lies, demagoguery and distortion, misinformation. These charges wouldn’t be so bad if Obama wasn’t lying himself in calling others liars, at least according the Annenberg Foundation’s Fact Check website.

“…we take no stand on whether all abortions should or should not be covered. As for the House bill as it stands now, it’s a matter of fact that it would allow both a "public plan" and newly subsidized private plans to cover all abortions.”

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/abortion-which-side-is-fabricating/

Honestly, I liked the ideas Obama presented at first and thought if he could have just been honest about the facts of the bills presented, then his speech would have been much more effective. Especially disconcerting is Obama saying his door is only open to those who are honest about the facts… while calling people who are honest according to third party sources liars. He sounds as bad to me as the scaremongers on the side when he stoops so low… of course, nobody at PBS could catch that misinformation because they are pretty much just a bunch of misinformed liberals who don't expose themselves to enough conservative commentators or even nonpartisan fact checkers to spot a lie. As the PBS commentator just stated to her national audience, “If the goal if this speech was just to clear up misperceptions, he at least succeeded in that.” Well, for some things yes. When it comes to public funding of abortion, hogwash, to put it nicely.

Quote of the Day

"Sometimes I think we're such a dumb species, we don't deserve to survive on this planet."
Ellen Silbergeld, PhD (or was it necessary to add that last bit)

Ironically, I agree with the first phrase often-times, and think she's probably onto something with the research on drug-resistent bacteria. It's the "we don't deserve to survive on this planet" bit that makes me shake my head at the arrogance of some professors.

MB

Adoption and HIV

I found this interview about adopting kids with HIV fascinating.

Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3

How Children Learn Manners

This article has some interesting food for thought.

I remember hearing, quite some time ago, that the best way to teach children to allow others to go first is not by forcing them to let everyone else go first all the time, but by seeing others model the "after you" attitude. I think of our family gatherings . . . The youngest children are almost always served first, followed by the oldest people in the gathering (i.e. grandma).

It seems that as the children grow older, they naturally gravitate from being the one stepped aside for, to stepping aside for others. Sometimes, though, they do get some reminders or encouragement.

The thought about it not being polite to tell others what to say has me thinking. I do think that, as parents, it is our job to coach our children and instruct them. But I do also think that kids naturally tend to reflect the tones and attitudes that are used toward them, and this is definitely something worth being aware of.

Right now we're dealing with the issue of our kids correcting others or telling them what to do a lot. I realized last night that when one of my kids is rude and judgemental toward someone, my responding in a rude and judgemental tone is not exactly helpful. So, I've been working on my response to this.

If I respond by saying something like, "[Child's first and middle name], that is NOT the way you talk to someone! How rude!" then I'm really modeling exactly the type of behavior I am trying to correct--harsh, rude and shaming.

Instead, I'm trying to come up with an approach that is instructive while modeling the respectful, polite tones that I want them to learn--something like, "Oops, that didn't come across very politely. Can you think of a kinder way to say that?" And then helping them with some ideas to rephrase it.

I'm also realizing that I need to teach my children not to interrupt and to listen politely when someone else is talking not just by instructing them in those skills. I also need to make a concerted effort to give them my full attention and listen politely without interrupting when they are talking.

What do you all think, and how do/would you approach these kinds of issues?

Conservative is to Liberal what Republican is to Democrat... or is it?

I remember those word association questions on the SAT, and if the test designers had put the above question in the test, I would have certainly gotten it incorrect, according to Gallup.

I've always associated conservatism with the Republicans and liberalism with the Democrats, so I've found this poll by Gallup to be quite counterintuitive. At a time when the Republican party seems to be trying to find it's voice, has gotten it's arse kicked in a few recent elections and when various pundits are writing it off, people who self identify as conservatives match the highest recorded level going back to 1992.

For me, the only part that makes sense is that the number of self-identified liberals has gone up 4 percentage points since the low in 1992... but that's still only half the number of self-identified conservatives and not much more than the rise in the number of people self-identifying as conservatives in just the last year. Do liberals just prefer to call themselves moderates because of some stigma attached to the word "liberal?" Has the Democratic party become the "big tent" that all the folks in the middle want to flock to? Has the Republican party lost it's bearings so that conservatives no longer feel welcome? Is the idea of conservative so broad in the vernacular, that it offers relatively little in predictability of people's political ideology? Off the top of my head, those seem like obvious potential reasons, but I'm sure there are more and I have no idea which reasons are the primary drivers in this phenomenon.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/120857/Conservatives-Single-Largest-Ideological-Group.aspx?version=print