Lift up your glass and raise up your pitcher to good Judge Roy Moore

At Iron Ink we talk a good deal about the lesser magistrate doctrine as developed by the Reformers and their descendants. This doctrine simply teaches that if Magistrates (Elected officials) at the top of the ladder go off the rails in wickedness then the Christian faith allows people to follow elected officials at a lower lever in overturning the design of wicked higher officials.

Some would contend that Alabama’s State Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore is just such a lesser Magistrate who is throwing off the wickedness of a lower Federal judge who has ruled that Alabama must allow sodomite and lesbian marriages. I disagree. It is my conviction that Judge Moore in this case is the higher magistrate overturning the ruling of the lesser lower Federal court judge. However, even if Judge Moore is a lesser magistrate he is still doing what is right both Constitutionally (Where does the US Constitution explicitly command that States must embrace sodomite marriage?) and according to Natural Law and according to Biblical Law.

My friends, somewhere a line has to be drawn or else we are going to discover that marriage can be defined as any combination imaginable. In this completely arbitrary definition of “marriage” that we are on the threshold off we will doubtless soon find a man, a woman who used to be a man, a man who used to be a woman, a homosexual transgender and their toaster all joined in holy wedlock.

May the Lord Christ bless Judge Roy Moore.

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWK4PNmtTBg

THE NORMAN AND THE SAXON by Kipling


“My son,” said the Norman Baron, “I am dying, and you will be heir
To all the broad acres in England that William gave me for share
When he conquered the Saxon at Hastings, and a nice little handful it is.
But before you go over to rule it I want you to understand this:–

“The Saxon is not like us Normans. His manners are not so polite.
But he never means anything serious till he talks about justice and right.
When he stands like an ox in the furrow – with his sullen set eyes on your own,
And grumbles, ‘This isn’t fair dealing,’ my son, leave the Saxon alone.

“You can horsewhip your Gascony archers, or torture your Picardy spears;
But don’t try that game on the Saxon; you’ll have the whole brood round your ears.
From the richest old Thane in the county to the poorest chained serf in the field,
They’ll be at you and on you like hornets, and, if you are wise, you will yield.

“But first you must master their language, their dialect, proverbs and songs.
Don’t trust any clerk to interpret when they come with the tale of their wrongs.
Let them know that you know what they’re saying; let them feel that you know what to say.
Yes, even when you want to go hunting, hear ’em out if it takes you all day.

They’ll drink every hour of the daylight and poach every hour of the dark.
It’s the sport not the rabbits they’re after (we’ve plenty of game in the park).
Don’t hang them or cut off their fingers. That’s wasteful as well as unkind,
For a hard-bitten, South-country poacher makes the best man- at-arms you can find.

“Appear with your wife and the children at their weddings and funerals and feasts.
Be polite but not friendly to Bishops; be good to all poor parish priests.
Say ‘we,’ ‘us’ and ‘ours’ when you’re talking, instead of ‘you fellows’ and ‘I.’
Don’t ride over seeds; keep your temper; and never you tell ’em a lie!”

Why is it so hard to talk about why it is so hard to talk about Homosexuality — I

In the February edition of the Banner Rev. Ron Nydam wrote an article probing as to why it is so hard to talk about homosexuality. I wanted to spend some time probing Rev. Ron’s probing.  It is my conviction that Rev. Nydam’s article is written in order to grease the rails into accepting the idea of the normalcy of relationships that the Scripture characterizes as sinful.We should note at the outset that it is always the goal of those who want to make something formerly taboo to be acceptable to get people talking about the taboo. Conversations about the taboo make the taboo more acceptable and less frightening. As such Nydam and the Banner are advancing the agenda of the LBGT crowd by continuing to insist that this is something that must be spoken about. In a sense, even my writing of this essay serves their agenda because continues the conversation they so desperately desire in order to mainstream aberrant behavior.

Rev. Nydam leads off by mentioning the CRC study committee due to report in 2016 on providing pastoral guidance  to churches, pastors, church leaders, and members on appropriate ministry and expectations in a culture where same-sex marriage is increasingly legal and common. Rev. Nydam throws in the bisexual and transgender people into this pool of ministry consideration since their pastoral needs may be quite similar. My question for Rev. Nydam and others is why stop with LGBT folk? Shouldn’t we include in the report the pastoral needs of necrophiliacs and bestiality oriented folks as well? After all, why should we be so narrow as not to include their very real pastoral needs?   The answer to the bigotry of the CRC against these folks is that LGBT has become societally acceptable while those who perhaps suffer the most from unmet pastoral needs are left not considered. This is a black mark upon us as a Denomination.

Rev. Nydam speaks of the necessity of shalom that we are to seek in our congregations and is concerned that this issue will divide congregations. He’s afraid that this issue will bring strife and divisions to families, friends congregations, and Denominations. In writing this Nydam has suggested that the acceptance of the LGBT agenda, sure to be at the very least hinted at in the coming report, is not something so serious as to actually divide over. We must be see that our false unity as based on false theology is more important then any unity that can only exist in the context of dividing from people with whom we have no unity.

Rev. Nydam subtly suggests that people who disagree with LGBT-ism struggle do so wisely and biblically. Rev. Nydam insists that what he is writing about is not the ethical issues around sexual behavior but only to examine the high anxiety in the hetero-sexual community. But Rev. Nydam seems not to realize that the very reason there exists high anxiety in the hetero-sexual community is because of the ethical issues around sexual behavior. It really is impossible to tamp down high anxiety on this issue without also engaging in the ethical issues around sexual behavior. For Rev. Nydam to suggest that he is only going to address high anxiety but not ethical issues is like someone saying they are going to address conductivity without mentioning electricity. In point of fact, by inviting the “gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender members to listen in” he has at that moment touched upon the ethics of all this.  Is it ethical for Christians (even celibate ones) to self identify as sinners?

Rev. Nydam then suggests that the real problem here is that Scripture appears to be being interpreted “in new and different ways.”  Once again, we are back in the realm of ethics. We have to ask, “Is it ethical to appear to be interpreting Scripture in new and different ways when it comes to the issue of sexual ethics. (?)

Rev. Nydam next suggests that since we are all sexual sinners in one form or another then none of us have the place to speak to the sin of the LGBT community. After all we all have beams in our own eyes therefore we have no business worrying about the beams in other people’s eyes. This is the classic moral equivalency apologetic. If you have one sin in your life you are no longer qualified to hold up God’s standard. In point of fact no one is qualified to hold up God’s standard since no one is without sin. Somehow Rev. Nydam knows that “all of us struggle to some degree with our sexuality.” Really? All of us? Each and every one of us?

Rev. Nydam implicitly complains about the double standard that Christians have regarding sexual sins. He says that on these sins we are “especially punitive.” Maybe though the reason we are especially punitive on these sins is that the Scripture teaches that these sins are especially grievous?

“Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.” (I Corinthians 6:18)

In the Ten Commandments God gave us two commandments that protect the family. Maybe we are especially punitive on sexual sins because we know that not only do they destroy the individual but they destroy the family and eventually, if left unchecked, they destroy the community.

(And Rev. Nydam … can you give me the names of folks who say that each and every sin is as bad as any other sin that can be imagined? Is the sin of a 5 year old stealing a cookie as bad as the sins of Stalin?)

Rev. Nydam then notes that we heterosexuals might be committing the sin of “self-righteousness” for being pleased that we are heterosexual. But might not Rev. Nydam be committing the sin of self-righteousness for being pleased that he is not being guilty of the heterosexual pride which leads to self-righteousness? What Rev. Nydam seems to be attempting  here is getting everyone in the same sin boat. Once we are all in the same sin boat then none of us can complain about the sin of anybody else since, in Rev. Nydam’s words, “one sin is as bad as another,” and “we are all pretty crooked.” But if Rev. Nydam is pretty crooked also why is he here faulting the crooked heterosexual people who are opposed to mainstreaming the crookedness of LGBT-ism? Who is the crooked Rev. Nydam to correct anybody?

Next Rev. Nydam launches into a soliloquy on homophobia, and patriarchy. In doing so he trots out the Matthew Shepard canard.  It seems that Rev. Nydam has not learned yet that Shepard was not killed because of homophobia but rather the murder was due to a Meth deal gone bad.

The Book of Matt: Hidden Truths About the Murder of Matthew Shepard

And Now a Word From Rachel McAtee Contra The Doug Wilson Vaccine Nonsense

If Doug Wilson would like to have a civil discussion on vaccines, he would be wise not to start off by portraying anti-vaxxers as cute but ignorant hippies (Seriously? Multi-colored wind chimes?)

Wilson’s whole article presupposes that vaccines work and are effective. He says that we are able to debate about vaccines because they have been “so successful”. He pooh pooh’s the claim that vaccines have a correlation with autism. Instead of discussing the vaccine itself (because that’s where he knows he could get in trouble), he wants to speak abstractly about whether people should have personal choice when it comes to vaccines. But let us suppose for a moment that the anti-vaxxers are right and that vaccines are ineffective and harmful. Suppose they are right that vaccines are the main cause of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). If so, why are we talking about whether the government should be able to force death down our throats? Shouldn’t we be discussing whether anyone should be getting a vaccine in the first place? Shouldn’t we be doing tests to see what the long term effects are of numerous shots full of mercury, formaldehyde, genetically modified human protein, and aborted fetal cells? If vaccines really do cause death, would Doug Wilson still be arguing that the government has the “right” to force their “convictions” on us? I hope not. If he can first prove that vaccines do indeed work, are effective, and do not cause death, then we can talk about whether the government has the right to forcefully vaccinate all members of society.

Doug Wilson cites Leviticus 13:1-4 to make his point that because a person’s personal choice on vaccination affects all of society, the “society” (by which he really means the federal government) should be able to not only have a different conviction, but be able to dictate their conviction to the individual person. Now first of all, there are plenty of individual decisions a person makes every day which affect all of society. Let us look at homeschooling for example. The homeschooling movement has doubled between 1999 and 2012, from 1.7% to 3.4%. (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2013/2013028/tables/table_07.asp) Homeschooling is definitely a decision that affects society, especially as it continues to grow at its current rate of 8% per year. (http://www.nche.com/stats) If the government decides for whatever reason that homeschooling is harmful to a society, should they be allowed to force children into the government schools? Doug Wilson wants to subscribe to the Hillary Clinton’s theory that “it takes a village to raise a child”, as though individuals and parents are hippie loonies who don’t know or care what is best for “society”. We see more and more attempts to take away personal and parental rights out of concern for the “society”. However, individual and parental rights are fundamental to the freedom of a society. As individual and parental rights continue to get taken away, our society becomes more and more enslaved to our own government. As Ronald Reagan said in 1961, “Drugs and devices are prescribed without getting parental consent or giving notification after they’ve done so. Girls termed “sexually active”—and that has replaced the word “promiscuous”—are given this help in order to prevent illegitimate birth or abortion…Is the Judeo-Christian tradition wrong? … Isn’t it the parents’ right to give counsel and advice to keep their children from making mistakes that may affect their entire lives? But the fight against parental notification is really only one example of many attempts to water down traditional values and even abrogate the original terms of American democracy. There’s a great spiritual awakening in America, a renewal of the traditional values that have been the bedrock of America’s goodness and greatness.”

Let us allow Doug Wilson, for now, that a government should be able to override individual and parental rights for the good of a society. Wilson is then stuck in no-man’s land as even the choice TO vaccinate affects all of society. Wilson is obviously ignorant of the fact that many vaccines can shed the live virus they contain for weeks or even months. The measles vaccine, TB vaccine, yellow fever vaccine, oral polio vaccine, smallpox vaccine, and nasal flu vaccine are just some of the vaccines that contain live viruses and have been proven to spread the virus to anyone who is unvaccinated, which can be serious trouble for those who cannot receive vaccines such as the elderly, infants, or the immune compromised. (http://www.vaccineriskawareness.com/Vaccine-Shedding) One study done by scientists working for the Bureau of Immunization, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, and the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which looked at the 2011 measles outbreak in New York City concluded “This is the first report of measles transmission from a twice vaccinated individual. The clinical presentation and laboratory data of the index were typical of measles in a naïve individual. Secondary cases had robust anamnestic antibody responses. No tertiary cases occurred despite numerous contacts. This outbreak underscores the need for thorough epidemiologic and laboratory investigation of suspected measles cases regardless of vaccination status.” (http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/58/9/1205.long) In other words, someone who has been vaccinated twice could transmit measles to four other individuals, even individuals who themselves had been vaccinated against measles. Who wants to get vaccinated against measles with those kind of statistics? Certainly the choice to get vaccinated against measles is one that will affect all of society. If Doug Wilson really wants the good of the society, perhaps he should be arguing against vaccines.

Touching Vaccines, Prudence and Multi-colored Windchimes

The Master of Moscow writes,

Someone with a loathing of guns can certainly refuse to have one in his home. And if he lives in a part of town that is otherwise heavily armed, his home can enjoy the same kind of safety from burglars as do the armed ones. Such is the nature of the world.

One of the reasons why we are even able to have a debate about vaccines is that vaccines have been so successful. The gunless fellow is certainly free to claim that his house is left alone because of the good vibes put out by his multi-colored wind chimes. We all think that’s cute, and are glad we live in a free country where there are guys like that.

But the analogy breaks down with something like whooping cough. That’s not so cute.

Bret Responds,

All of what Doug says here and says throughout this piece is premised on the idea of “herd immunity.” This is a concept that is not scientifically indisputable.

http://www.vaccinationcouncil.org/media/Obamsawin_Vaccination_Tables.pdf

Now what is statistically indisputable is if one lives in a neighborhood where people point guns at bad-guys while pulling triggers you will be safer in that neighborhood even if you dislike discharging weapons. But as we see in the above link (lots of good science there for those who practice scientism) it is the case that when comparing guns in neighborhoods with  vaccines and herd immunity one of these things is not like the other.

So Doug, right out of the gate, indulges in the false analogy fallacy. (Don’t tell anyone or his Canon press logic course sales might dip.) This, boys and girls, is what I like to call the kumquat – Rutabaga fallacy.  I suspect Doug only used this fallacy because

1.) He is ignorant regarding the facts on herd immunity theory
2.) He was just seeing if anyone was paying attention

The Credibility of the CREC continues,

Now I do have views on the efficacy of vaccines, but I want to address another element of this — the idea that even if they were effective, a requirement that everyone get vaccinated is necessarily statist and tyrannical. Why isn’t this a matter of personal choice and conviction? The answer is that it is not a matter of personal choice because everyone else is involved.

“And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, saying, When a man shall have in the skin of his flesh a rising, a scab, or bright spot, and it be in the skin of his flesh like the plague of leprosy; then he shall be brought unto Aaron the priest, or unto one of his sons the priests: And the priest shall look on the plague in the skin of the flesh: and when the hair in the plague is turned white, and the plague in sight be deeper than the skin of his flesh, it is a plague of leprosy: and the priest shall look on him, and pronounce him unclean. If the bright spot be white in the skin of his flesh, and in sight be not deeper than the skin, and the hair thereof be not turned white; then the priest shall shut up him that hath the plague seven days” (Lev. 13:1–4).

Bret responds,

1.) Doug assumes a great deal here and we are being asked to do a large amount of reading between the lines to gain his meaning.

In a pretend world where it is everywhere known and proven that vaccines are effective does it remain true that the State would have role and responsibility to force vaccines on the population?

What if the vaccines were effective but with dire possible consequences Doug? What if the vaccines were cultured on aborted babies and what if vaccines were full of heavy metal (no, not “Metallica” Doug) like mercury? Would it be wrong for a Christian to object to State mandated vaccines — even if they were effective — if it meant that one was taking a bath in mercury and formaldehyde? Would it be un-Christian — even if vaccines were effective — to resist the State’s requirement for vaccines if it were known that the side-effects could be worse then the disease contracted?  Would it be un-Biblical for a Christian to protect his children from vaccines — even if they were effective — if the Christian didn’t want to tacitly support the abortion industry?

Really though, in the end vaccines are just so much junk science and the fact of the matter is, is it is far from conclusively proven that vaccines are effective but even if they were and are effective it would not be a slam dunk that they could be forced on us by the State.

2.) The Scripture verse is nice Doug. When we get God speaking with the kind of authority on vaccines such as He has on leprosy we will be sure to tune in and adjust our beliefs and practices accordingly.

The fomenter of Federal Vision finishes,

So take this as a very limited claim. This is not a claim that vaccines are always perfect, or that the side-effects are not a problem, or that frauds can never interfere with the science (as happened with the Lancet article which claimed a correlation with autism), and so on. This is a fallen world, and no problem of this nature can ever be addressed risk-free. The claim I am making here is very limited. If a person has decided personal convictions about the contagious disease he is carrying, the society in which he lives has an equal right to have decided and contrary convictions about that same contagious disease he has. And if there is an outbreak of such a disease, and the government quarantines everyone who is not vaccinated, requiring them to stay at home, the name for this is prudence, not tyranny.

Bret responds,

Doug is assuming here that those vaccinated are not the carrier of the disease. However,

a.) with live virus vaccines, in the period after people are vaccinated, those vaccinated can still be the ones carrying and transmitting the disease

b.) vaccinations is not equal to immunization. Those who are vaccinated are not immune to the disease. Nobody knows how long these vaccines last. Nobody knows just how often booster shots are needed. Further, the vaccinations have created mutant forms of the diseases that they are now trying to eradicate and so the vaccinated are not necessarily protected from the new form of the disease. Plus, a quarantine of those non-vaccinated is not going to do any good since the vaccinated can carry the disease as well as the non-vaccinated.  The only good quarantine is the quarantine of those who actually have the illness or who have been exposed.

Maybe Doug meant all this. Maybe we were supposed to read this into everything he said. I suspect it is more the case that Doug shouldn’t have even written the article because he seems to know more about multi-colored wind chimes then he does about vaccines.

Now to wrap this all up. Let’s keep in mind that the FEDS never do anything they do without citing prudence as the reason. When they were seizing guns in the aftermath of Katrina that was done for prudence’s sake. When the FEDS were entering into private homes after the Boston bomb without search warrants or reasonable cause that was done in the name of prudence. The FEDS never do anything illegal except in the name of prudence. For Doug to suggest that the FEDS could act with prudence in this kind of matter is to just invite the FEDS to create a false flag in order to do just that.