Culture – Iron Ink

Revoice Conference Real Quotes vs. A Future Revoice Conference Fake Quotes

Here is a sampling of some of the main speakers at the looming Revoice conference regarding their thoughts on whether their homosexual desires are sinful or not, or rather, whether they really struggle with them. Following the italicized quote I have interjection in standard type the same sentiment but only as related to a sexual perversion that has not yet become acceptable to the “Christian” mind. The purpose for doing so is to expose the fact that these quotes being found acceptable proves that the larger Christian public has already accepted the normalcy of sodomy. This is proven by the fact that the inserted fake quotes created by me would find Christians being morally repulsed. Keep in mind that all these italicized quotes are from speakers who would label themselves, “Gay but celibate.” The point in the varied italicized quotes is that homosexual desires are perfectly fine as long as those desires are not followed through to become live physical same-sex engagement. The point in the varied non italicized quotes is to demonstrate how much homosexuality has been accepted by demonstrating how the same sentiment as applied to some other heretofore agreed upon perverted sexual desire would leave Christians with a moral sense of unease.

“I really think the most important thing is, I really like being gay and I really like being Catholic” ~Eve Tushnet

“I really think the most important thing is, I really like being a necrophiliac and I really like being Catholic.” – Evelyn Nettush

“I believe my same-sex attractions are broken, but I do not believe they are sinful. It is not a sin for me to be attracted to another man, in the same way it is not sinful for you (a man) to be attracted to a woman.” ~Stephen Moss, Organizer of Revoice

I believe my animal-sex attractions are broken, but I do not believe they are sinful. It is not sinful for me to be attracted to an animal, in the same way it is not sinful for you (a man) to be attracted to a woman. -Steven Mossberg

“Simply experiencing attraction to the same sex (or being gay) is not in itself a morally culpable sin.” ~Nate Collins

“Simply experiencing attraction to dead bodies (or being necrophiliac) is not in itself a morally culpable sin.” -Tom Collins

“SSA can be a product of the Fall—like blindness—and yet not be a morally culpable sin.” ~Preston Sprinkle

“Coprophilia attraction can be a product of the fall — like blindness — and yet not be a morally culpable sin.” – T. Inkle Sprinkle

“I do not believe homosexuality in itself is a sin as that would imply our basic human desires for things such as intimacy and beauty would be inherently sinful.” ~Jeb Ralston

“I do not believe bestiality in itself is a sin as that would imply our basic human desires for things such as intimacy and beauty would be inherently sinful. -Deb Ralston Purina

“My main worry with some of the “renunciation” and “surrender” and “death to self” language that Christians use in relation to homosexuality is that, for most people, it will end up implying that we believe all aspects of “being gay” are sinful. This is a devastating burden for many same-sex attracted Christians to bear” ~Wesley Hill

“My main worry with some of the “renunciation” and “surrender” and “death to self” language that Christians use in relation to fang bang is that, for most people, it will end up implying that we believe all aspects of “being a fang bang” are sinful. This is a devastating burden for many fang bang attracted Christians to bear.”- Jon Wesley

Again, the point in contrasting these real quotes in relation to a long acknowledge sexual perversion in conjunction with fake quotes in relation to long acknowledge sexual perversion is to shock the reader who thinks the real quotes are reasonable into seeing that the reason that they see the real quotes as reasonable is that they have already accepted, in principle, how reasonable same sex attraction is.

For a far more erudite discussion of the problems with “Gay Christianity” and the Revoice Conference see,

Full Homosexual Inclusion in the PCA?

Durkheim on the Criminal … McAtee on Durkheim

“Nothing is good indefinitely and without limits. The authority which the moral consciousness enjoys must not be excessive, for otherwise no one would dare to attack it and it would petrify too easily into an immutable form. For it to evolve, individual originality must be allowed to manifest itself. But so that the originality of the idealist who dreams of transcending his era may display itself, that of the criminal, which falls short of the age, must also be possible. One does not go without the other.

Nor is this all. Beyond this indirect utility, crime itself may play a useful part in this evolution. Not only does it imply that the way to necessary changes remains open, but in certain cases it also directly prepares, for these changes. Where crime exists, collective sentiments are not only in the state of plasticity necessary to assume a new form but sometimes it even contributes to determining beforehand the shape they will take on. Indeed, how often is it only an anticipation of the morality to come, a progression towards what will be!”

Emile Durkheim
The Rules of Sociological Method

What the famous sociologist Durkheim is saying here is that crime is necessary because the criminal is pointing the way forward to a new social order morality that is evolving via the criminal. The criminal by his abandoning and violating the law is the evolutionary precursor of the law to come.

Now apply this thinking to sodomy. 60 years ago sodomy was universally outlawed. Sodomites stayed in the closet for fear of penalty. But Durkheim’s humanist methodology was followed and looking back we see that the sodomite of 1958 was really, in fact, the precursor to the new morality we have today. But this new morality also makes for a new criminality as well as a new morality. If the sodomite is going to come out of the closet then the Christian, who still operates by God’s morality, and so consistent with God’s Word warns against the perils of sodomy will be the one who has to go into the closet that the sodomite came out of with the new morality.

Understand also that for Durkheim it is not God’s standard of right and wrong — of legal and illegal — that is the standard for law keeping and morality. Instead, the standard is the general phenomenon of observed behavior. That general phenomenon of observed behavior becomes the new normal and as the standard is merely the general phenomenon of observed behavior any new general phenomenon of newly observed behavior by the criminal class, as practiced in abundance, is a reason to shift the definition of law and morality so that the criminal is no longer criminal.

Clearly what Durkheim is giving us here is an evolutionary morality that redefines itself by the perceived majority report. When enough men, at the same time, together do what is right in their own eyes, then that is right, whatever the perverse or sordid behavior. Crime today then is merely a social evolutionary experimentation which has within itself the wherewithal to vanquish obsolete Christian morality.

Let’s breakdown Durkheim’s first paragraph more closely,

1.) “Nothing is good indefinitely and without limits. The authority which the moral consciousness enjoys must not be excessive, for otherwise no one would dare to attack it and it would petrify too easily into an immutable form

Response

a.) However, it appears that it is good indefinitely and without limit to believe that nothing else except that statement itself is good indefinitely and without limits.

b.) By what standard does Durkheim arrive at this conclusion? By what authority am I to believe that “Nothing is good indefinitely and without limits?” Wouldn’t it be easy to demonstrate that not stealing what legitimately belongs to my neighbor is something good indefinitely and without limit? Wouldn’t it be easy to demonstrate that the prohibition to pedophilia is something good and without limit? Durkheim gives an assertion here but it is only an assertion that has not sustainable authority backing it up.

c.) Clearly, Durkheim’s authority which his moral consciousness is enjoying is excessive. We can easily see that Durkheim’s moral relativism has indeed petrified easily into an immutable form. Where are those who are attacking Durkheim’s moral relativism arguing for a morality standard which grows out of the soil of God’s Word?

For Durkheim, the criminal is the evolutionary signpost of where social order morality is headed. In this mentality, it is easy to understand why criminals are often treated so lightly. If the criminal is the harbinger of our future morality then the criminal should be sympathized with and indeed, even perhaps seen as a noble savage.

Dr. Peter Jones… One or Two?

“One-ism, (all-is-one) is an esoteric read on reality. It maintains that everything can be explained by everything else. There are no qualitative distinctions to be found in the universe. The world creates itself and humans are ‘co-creators’ along with everything else. In this system reality is One. Think of one big circle. Everything is contained within it; rocks, trees, planets, human beings — even God, as a kind of energy. Everything is connected to everything else. There is nothing outside the circle.

Two-ism (all is two) is an exoteric read on reality. It maintains that the world is made by a Creator who is uncreated and radically different from His creatures. There are two forms of existence: the created and the one who created it. The two, while deeply related, are qualitatively distinct. Think of two circles, connected but distinct and essentially different.”

Dr. Peter Jones
One or Two; Seeing a World of Difference — pg. 88

1.) What Dr. Jone’s labels as “One-ism,” is the idea where ontologically speaking, all reality participates in the same being. In most of these systems, one’s status in the social order is dependent on how much of that ultimate being they have unique to others who have less of this Oneist being. The Mahat system of ancient Egypt was a Oneist system. The Pharoah was at the top of beingness and everyone descended from Pharoah had a lesser measure of being than Pharoah possessed. Animistic, Pantheistic, Hindu, are all Oneist systems.

The 1996 film “Phenomenon” is a classic expression of this One-ist Worldview as is the whole “Star Wars” series.

2.) Since everything is one and so all share the same being the ability to make qualitative distinct distinctions is impossible. For example, if a man and a woman share in the same universal being who is to say that there exists a qualitative distinction between what, in a non-Oneist worldview, has always been understood to be “male,” and “female?” Since the Oneist worldview finds an impossibility to make qualitative distinctions we get the idea of sexual fluidity and/or fluctuating gender. Indeed, in any consistent One-ist worldview any distinction has to be seen as temporary or arbitrary. Not only do we see the incapability of making hard gender and sexual qualitative distinctions we are increasingly seeing in some quarters of our culture the desire to erase the qualitative distinctions that once distinguished a child from the adult. There is a push in some quarters to sexualize the child arguing that the distinction between child and adult is unhelpful and arbitrary. On all these points we hear that heretofore universally accepted qualitative distinctions are merely “social constructs.” In Jones’ words above, humans are co-creators and as co-creator humans create these putative ‘social constructs’ that provide qualitative distinctions that we now, as a more enlightened One-ist people, understand are no distinctions at all. We hear this same kind of language about nations. Distinct Nations, it is increasingly said, like gender, sexuality, and age are merely social constructs created by human co-creators who are free to uncreate what they had previously arbitrarily created.

Along this line, in One-ist worldview, religions likewise begin to break down and converge. Hard Ecumenicalism and a refusal to embrace the rough edges that segregate one religion from another becomes the watchword. Unity (really uniformity) becomes the be all end all passion. If all is one then uniformity is obviously the highest virtue and anyone who disturbs the pursuit of uniformity is a pebble in the shoe that must be eliminated. Of course, for the Christian unity is something that is never pursued. The Christian understands that unity is the residual byproduct of a common embrace of truth. The more people agree on truth, the more people will discover unity.

The demonstration of this mad pursuit for One-ist uniformity is commonly seen in the Revolutionary. Whether it was the One-ist leveling of the Bogomils, Cathar, Albigensians, and Ana-Baptists, whether it was the Phrygian cap in the French Revolution with the common leveling greeting to one and all, regardless of status or rank of “citoyenne,” whether it is the universal leveling greeting of “comrade” during the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, or whether it was the ubiquitous leveling Mao suit found in the post-Communist Chinese Revolution, the One-ist worldview passionately desires to press upon people uniformity. Uniformity in One-ist slovenly thought, uniformity in slovenly clothing, uniformity in One-ist speech pattern. If all is one then all are interchangeable uniform cogs in the One-ist world.

Actually, in a genuinely One-ist world, as consistently followed, language and communication would be utterly impossible since qualitatively distinct meaning is impossible in a consistently One-ist world. Perhaps this explains God’s confusing of the language at Babel. Babel was perhaps the greatest attempt to build a One-ist social order ever.

George Orwell’s novel, “1984” is a wonderful fiction that describes the pursuit of Revolutionary One-ism.

3.) The One-ist will, of course, appeal to “Science” as a support to their One-ist cause. However, what most people don’t realize is that convictions don’t change because of science but rather science changes because of our convictions. This is a huge subject and so I will merely recommend three books that explain what I am getting at here,

a.) The Structures of Scientific Revolutions — Thomas Kuhn
b.) The Philosophy of Science and Belief in God — Gordon H. Clark
c.) Hermeneutics and Science –Vern S. Poythress

An appeal to Science in order to prove One-ism will always be successful as coming from One-ist “Scientists.” Of course, if all is one, then anything and everything and nothing can be proven because no qualitative distinctions exist. One of the greatest failures of “Science” to give scientific heft to a distinctly non-scientific pursuit was the Soviet Union’s pursuit of Lysenkoism over Genetics. Lysenko insisted that he had overcome the qualitative distinction between Spring Wheat and Winter Wheat. He hadn’t and food shortages followed. “Science,” so-called, “proves” all kinds of things that just aren’t so. One-ism makes it easier for “Science” to do just that.

All of this to say that Science is only as good as the Theology that it is dependent upon and of which it is an expression.

4.) In Two-ism, because you have a distinct Creator and creature you also have other qualitative distinctions that are what they are because of how they have been named so by the Creator in His revealed Word. Genesis 1 is a long story of the Two-ist God making qualitative distinctions, and then God’s Law-Word goes on to make other qualitative distinctions which are definitely not social-constructs, though the One-ists will insist that God’s qualitative distinctions are instead really just so many social-constructs.

According to Bouwsma the idea of God’s creating qualitative distinctions was something well understood by John Calvin,

“The positive corollary of Calvin’s loathing of mixture was his approval of boundaries, which separate one thing from another. He attributed boundaries to God Himself: God had established the boundaries between peoples, which should, therefore, remain within the space assigned to them … ‘Just as there are in a military camp separate lines for each platoon and section,’ Calvin observed, ‘men are placed on the earth so that each nation may be content with its own boundaries.’”

W.J. Bouwsma
John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait — p.34-35

I highly recommend reading Dr. Peter Jones’ books. He provides scintillating analysis of how the culture and the Church are slipping faster and faster into One-ist presuppositions that are not Christian in their origin. Postmodernism, for example, is a child of One-ist ideology. Postmodernism teaches that no grand narratives exist and that all personal narratives are social constructs. Reality is malleable. Qualitative distinctions do not exist except as man subjectively creates them.

When One-ism slips into the Church the traditional language is retained but emptied of its original Two-ist meaning and is re-filled with One-ist pagan content. Dr. Jones’, in is “One or Two,” demonstrates how the Apostle Paul in Romans 1 deconstructs One-ism while making the case that our church and culture is increasingly falling into Oneism.

A Few Thoughts On Blasphemy

[Otto Scott] Well, there are still social sanctions against blasphemy, but the idols have changed.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Scott] You can’t blaspheme against certain minorities and that includes even discussing their behavior.

[Rushdoony] Yes, very good.

[Scott] Um, Judge Bork is being attacked because in the 1971 article. (In) 1971, he questioned the right to privacy as far as the Constitution is concerned. So he was committing blasphemy against Liberalism.

[Rushdoony] Very good. Excellent point… this is what blasphemy is about. And today, of course, as you have said Otto, we have reversed the moral order. We have made it blasphemy to speak ill of certain minority groups. And this is the problem.

RJR Lecture
Blasphemy

1.) Blasphemy is an inescapable category. All social orders and cultures have either defacto or dejure blasphemy laws.

2.) Once one identifies what subject matter is outside the bounds of sustained and harsh criticism for a social order there one has identified the sacred. Once the sacred is identified then you know what is and is not considered blasphemy in that social order.

3.) Blasphemy laws can be of a dejure nature and often when crafted so the violation of blasphemy means a severe legal penalty. However, more often blasphemy laws are defacto and are not visited with a severe legal penalty but rather are visited with social and economic ostracism. We are seeing this increasingly in the West as a violation of non-legislated speech codes can cost someone their reputation, career and so livelihood.

4.) When the God of the Bible is eliminated from that which cannot be blasphemed the consequence is most usually it is the State which cannot be blasphemed or whatever the State by law or by precedent says may not be blasphemed. That the State sets the parameter for what can and cannot be blasphemed one only needs to look at the Statist youth centers where the children are taught whom the god and gods are in the social order who must not be blasphemed. For example, the whole work going on against “bullying of the LGBQT community,” is largely just a program to set up the LGBQT community and their behavior as sacred and so not to be blasphemed.

5.) Blasphemy laws are about thought control. If one cannot say something one generally does not think that something. There is a tight connection between what one is allowed to say and what someone will end up thinking. If one cannot verbally denigrate God one will not likely give much thought to denigrating God. This is the way political correctness is working today. When we are not allowed to say something because the saying of it is considered blasphemy then the thinking of those thoughts will eventually dry up. For example, people very seldom use the word “sodomite” anymore to describe same-gender relation. The reason is that is the word “sodomite” has successfully been turned into a blasphemous word. To use that word is to raise a hand against that behavior which has become considered sacred.

6.) It is interesting that in Scripture there is little distinction between the sinner who deliberately abuses the name of the Lord ( Lev. 24:10-16), and the one who deliberately flouts his commandments ( Numbers 15:30-31). So tightly is God’s character/name and God’s law bound together that the flouting of either is the flouting of both. For both blasphemy and for the one who deliberately flouts God’s law, the death penalty is prescribed.

7.) Clearly, the God of the Bible is not considered sacred in our social order. In point of fact, a good case could be made that in order to advance in this social order one must not hold God as sacred for to hold God as sacred so as to not blaspheme His name would mean to blaspheme what this current social order takes as sacred.

8.) Summarizing, when one discovers in a social order what can or cannot be harshly criticized (blasphemed) there one has discovered the sacred in that social order. Once one has discovered the sacred in the social order one begins to unravel what the religion of that social order is. Blasphemy is an inescapable concept for all social orders because God and religion are inescapable concepts in all social orders.

Ask the Pastor … Guns in Church?

Dear Pastor Bret,

In light of recent tragic church shootings, should churches consider having members carry concealed weapons to church?

Thanks in advance,

Shawn Channing

Dear Shawn,

Thanks for writing.

I will answer this question in terms of the laws of the State of Michigan. In Michigan, Shawn, those with a concealed carry license cannot carry on any property or facility owned or operated by a church, synagogue, mosque, temple, or other places of worship, unless the presiding official allows concealed weapons. So, in Michigan, one can legally according to Michigan state law conceal carry in Church if one has secured the presiding official’s permission.

Some would counsel to consult law enforcement for expert advice and perhaps even training for those who desire it before the presiding official allows such carry and I would concur with that as long as it was only one factor in the decision-making process. People must realize that law-enforcement officials could well have an interest in making sure only they are the ones carrying weapons. All because someone is in law-enforcement doesn’t make them singularly able to provide counsel on this decision. The decision process should also realize that a Church that is declared as a gun-free zone is a church that is advertising to potential wolves that the gathering of the saints is also a gathering of easy picking sheep. The decision process should also include considering the many recent church shootings where the mortality rate may have been far lower if someone in the congregation where the shootings occurred had begun shooting back at the sociopaths who were discharging their weapons against judicially innocent church-goers.

Secondly, common sense teaches that owning and carrying a gun is a reasonable means of protection. A recent Pew survey reported that two-thirds of American gun owners cite protection as the major reason they own guns. Now, Shawn, some well-intended but misguided people might somehow extrapolate that Pew survey to mean that people are relying on guns as idols instead of relying on God for protection. Such thinking is most unfortunate. Carrying a weapon no more proves that one is not trusting in God than carrying a chainsaw proves that someone who wants a tree cut down is not trusting in God for the tree to come down. Carrying a weapon no more proves that one is not trusting in God than a Chef carrying a frying pan proves that the Chef is not trusting God for the meal to be prepared. A gun is a tool, much like a chainsaw or a frying pan. Having the proper tool for the proper job that might need to be done should not inch us towards concluding that the one carrying a chainsaw, a frying pan, or a gun, is treating that tool as an idol. Such reasoning is quite beyond suspect. American gun owners carry guns because that is one tool God has provided in order to to be protected.

Another truth we might offer here Shaun is that guns do not create the problems they solve. The problems guns solve are men with wicked hearts who wish to bring harm to us, our friends, or our families. Guns don’t create sociopaths who might well show up in Church to do harm. Guns are just one solution to sociopaths who might well show up in Church to do harm.

We should be a people who rely on God as we rely on more potential shooters as the solution to a potential active shooter situation. If we don’t rely on God this way we should seriously examine our hearts to ensure that we have not misplaced our faith by trusting in God in such a way that doesn’t include using all the tools that He has put at our disposal for safety. We need to be careful that we don’t become the butt of that well-known joke,

“Soon a man in a rowboat came by and the fellow shouted to the man on the roof, “Jump in, I can save you.”

The stranded fellow shouted back, “No, it’s OK, I’m praying to God and he is going to save me.”

So the rowboat went on.

Then a motorboat came by. “The fellow in the motorboat shouted, “Jump in, I can save you.”

To this, the stranded man said, “No thanks, I’m praying to God and he is going to save me. I have faith.”

So the motorboat went on.

Then a helicopter came by and the pilot shouted down, “Grab this rope and I will lift you to safety.”

To this, the stranded man again replied, “No thanks, I’m praying to God and he is going to save me. I have faith.”

So the helicopter reluctantly flew away.

Soon the water rose above the rooftop and the man drowned. He went to Heaven. He finally got his chance to discuss this whole situation with God, at which point he exclaimed, “I had faith in you but you didn’t save me, you let me drown. I don’t understand why!”

To this God replied, “I sent you a rowboat and a motorboat and a helicopter, what more did you expect?”

If we refuse to carry weapons to Church and end up getting shot by sociopaths in Church God may well reply to us upon our discussing the matter face to face with him,

“I sent you a Ruger, a Smith & Wesson, and a Glock, what more did you expect?”

Scripture clearly teaches that self-defense is biblically set forth (Exodus 22:2-3). To insist that one should not make provision to defend themselves so they might instead just trust God is its own kind of specious idolatry.

Finally, on this score, we should consider our history on guns in Church. There is a long storied history of guns in Church that even found, at times in history, guns be required by force of law to be carried to Church. In her book, ‘The Sabbath in Puritan New England,’ we learn this from author Alice Morse Earl,

“For many years after the settlement of New England the Puritans, even in outwardly tranquil times, went armed to meeting; and to sanctify the Sunday gun-loading they were expressly forbidden to fire off their charges at any object on that day save an Indian or a wolf, their two “greatest inconveniencies.” Trumbull, in his “Mac Fingal,” writes thus in jest of this custom of Sunday arm-bearing:–

“So once, for fear of Indian beating,
Our grandsires bore their guns to meeting,–
Each man equipped on Sunday morn
With psalm-book, shot, and powder-horn,
And looked in form, as all must grant,
Like the ancient true church militant.”

In 1640 it was ordered in Massachusetts that in every township the attendants at church should carry a “competent number of peeces, fixed and compleat with powder and shot and swords every Lords-day to the meeting-house;” one armed man from each household was then thought advisable and necessary for public safety. In 1642 six men with muskets and powder and shot were thought sufficient for protection for each church. In Connecticut similar mandates were issued, and as the orders were neglected “by divers persones,” a law was passed in 1643 that each offender should forfeit twelve pence for each offence. In 1644 a fourth part of the “trayned hand” was obliged to come armed each Sabbath, and the sentinels were ordered to keep their matches constantly lighted for use in their match-locks. They were also commanded to wear armor, which consisted of “coats basted with cotton-wool, and thus made defensive against Indian arrows.” In 1650 so much dread and fear were felt of Sunday attacks from the red men that the Sabbath-Day guard was doubled in number. In 1692, the Connecticut Legislature ordered one fifth of the soldiers in each town to come armed to each meeting, and that nowhere should be present as a guard at time of public worship fewer than eight soldiers and a sergeant. In Hadley the guard was allowed annually from the public treasury a pound of lead and a pound of powder to each soldier.

No details that could add to safety on the Sabbath were forgotten or overlooked by the New Haven church; bullets were made common currency at the value of a farthing, in order that they might be plentiful and in every one’s possession; the colonists were enjoined to determine in advance what to do with the women and children in case of attack, “that they do not hang about them and hinder them;” the men were ordered to bring at least six charges of powder and shot to meeting; the farmers were forbidden to “leave more arms at home than men to use them;” the half-pikes were to be headed and the whole ones mended, and the swords “and all piercing weapons furbished up and dressed;” wood was to be placed in the watch-house; it was ordered that the “door of the meeting-house next the soldiers’ seat be kept clear from women and children sitting there, that if there be occasion for the soldiers to go suddenly forth, they may have free passage.” The soldiers sat on either side of the main door, a sentinel was stationed in the meeting-house turret, and armed watchers paced the streets; three cannon were mounted by the side of this “church militant,” which must strongly have resembled a garrison. …

In spite of these events in the New Haven church (which were certainly exceptional), the seemingly incongruous union of church and army was suitable enough in a community that always began and ended the military exercises on “training day” with solemn prayer and psalm-singing; and that used the army and encouraged a true soldier-like spirit not chiefly as aids in war, but to help to conquer and destroy the adversaries of truth, and to “achieve greater matters by this little handful of men than the world is aware of.”

The Salem sentinels wore doubtless some of the good English armor owned by the town,–corselets to cover the body; gorgets to guard the throat; tasses to protect the thighs; all varnished black, and costing each suit “twenty-four shillings a peece.” The sentry also wore a bandileer, a large “neat’s leather” belt thrown over the right shoulder, and hanging down under the left arm. This bandileer sustained twelve boxes of cartridges, and a well-filled bullet-bag. Each man bore either a “bastard musket with a snaphance,” a “long fowling-piece with musket bore,” a “full musket,” a “barrell with a match-cock,” or perhaps (for they were purchased by the town) a leather gun (though these leather guns may have been cannon). Other weapons there were to choose from, mysterious in name, “sakers, minions, ffaulcons, rabinets, murthers (or murderers, as they were sometimes appropriately called) chambers, harque-busses, carbins,” …

The armed Salem watcher, besides his firearms and ammunition, had attached to his wrist by a cord a gun-rest, or gun-fork, which he placed upon the ground when he wished to fire his musket, and upon which that constitutional kicker rested when touched off. He also carried a sword and sometimes a pike, and thus heavily burdened with multitudinous arms and cumbersome armor, could never have run after or from an Indian with much agility or celerity; though he could stand at the church-door with his leather gun,–an awe-inspiring figure,–and he could shoot with his “harquebuss,” or “carbin,” as we well know.

These armed “sentinells” are always regarded as a most picturesque accompaniment of Puritan religious worship, and the Salem and Plymouth armed men were imposing, though clumsy. But the New Haven soldiers, with their bulky garments wadded and stuffed out with thick layers of cotton wool, must have been more safety-assuring and comforting than they were romantic or heroic; but perhaps they too wore painted tin armor, “corselets and gorgets and tasses.”

In Concord, New Hampshire, the men, who all came armed to meeting, stacked their muskets around a post in the middle of the church, while the honored pastor, who was a good shot and owned the best gun in the settlement, preached with his treasured weapon in the pulpit by his side, ready from his post of vantage to blaze away at any red man whom he saw sneaking without, or to lead, if necessary, his congregation to battle. The church in York, Maine, until the year 1746, felt it necessary to retain the custom of carrying arms to the meeting-house, so plentiful and so aggressive were Maine Indians.

Not only in the time of Indian wars were armed men seen in the meeting-house, but on June 17, 1775, the Provincial Congress recommended that the men “within twenty miles of the sea-coast carry their arms and ammunition with them to meeting on the Sabbath and other days when they meet for public worship.” And on many a Sabbath and Lecture Day, during the years of war that followed, were proved the wisdom and foresight of that suggestion.

The men in those old days of the seventeenth century, when in constant dread of attacks by Indians, always rose when the services were ended and left the house before the women and children, thus making sure the safe exit of the latter. This custom prevailed from habit until a late date in many churches in New England, all the men, after the benediction and the exit of the parson, walking out in advance of the women. So also the custom of the men always sitting at the “head” or door of the pew arose from the early necessity of their always being ready to seize their arms and rush unobstructed to fight. In some New England village churches to this day, the man who would move down from his end of the pew and let a woman sit at the door, even if it were a more desirable seat from which to see the clergyman, would be thought a poor sort of a creature.”

Alice Morse Earle, The Sabbath in Puritan New England (NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1891), 19-25.