I Am Not Mario Cuomo … Neither Am I Darryl Hart … I Am A Christian

Darryl at it again over at

http://oldlife.org/2015/01/i-am-mario-cuomo/

This time Darryl is singing the praises of Mario Cuomo’s ability to live the contradictory hyphenated life. Set aside that Darryl is so enamored with a man who was the darling of the Cultural Marxist left that he proclaims his bromance for Cuomo. Ignore for a moment that Darryl is self identifying with a man who kept abortion chic via his repudiation of his church’s explicit teaching. Instead, focus just a second on what Darryl says here,

Darryl,

But it (private morality vs. public action as a Magistrate) is not a problem that only bedevils Roman Catholics. Protestant politicians may be personally opposed to desecrating the Lord’s Day, and if such a public figure is an officer in a Presbyterian church has even vowed to uphold Sabbatarianism, but in their public duties or owing to political calculation fail to work for Blue Laws. In fact, all believers who hold public office in a religiously diverse and tolerant society need to separate the teachings and practices of their religious communities from the norms that guide civil life. At the very least, they need to juggle the public and private unless they are willing to seek the implementation of their own faith for all of civil society

The irony is that religious right championed a view of the relationship between personal and public responsibilities that derided folks like Cuomo as either hypocritical or cynical. The irony becomes even more ironic when the religious right complains that radical Islam is incapable of making the very distinction that Cuomo defended.

Bret responds,

1.) Consider the call to separate “the teachings and practices of their religious communities from the norms that guide civil life.” This “reasoning” has always flummoxed me. According to Darryl there is a necessity to separate private morality from public morality so that a Christian magistrate’s private morality is not pursued as he serves as a public person and yet it is perfectly acceptable for this Christian magistrate to pursue the private morality of other people (even other Magistrates of other faiths) in their public capacity. For example, Mario might have had personal reservations about abortion and yet he did not force his private reservations upon the public he served. Instead Mario forced the private reservations of countless numbers of other people  about being “pro-life.” So, Mario and Darryl believed and believe it is not acceptable to push their own private morality while a public person but it is perfectly acceptable to push other people’s private morality in the capacity of a public person.  The public positions that Mario held certainly was the private morality of untold numbers of people. Why else hold to those positions? So, why was it acceptable for Mario to push their private morality on the citizenry and not his own?

2.) The policies themselves that Mario pushed were not religiously divers nor did they reflect tolerance. Think about it Darryl. The policies that were finally implemented were policies that some of the citizenry liked and some of the citizenry did not like. Those policies once implemented were in no way diverse nor did they reflect tolerance. They reflected, instead, both a lack of diversity and a severe intolerance. Policy implemented is by its very definition is non diverse and intolerant because it ends up not reflecting what large sections of the citizenry desire.  The whole plea for “diversity and tolerance” is a smoke screen to excuse the moral cowardice of Politicians and to justify the rebellion of high profile ministers.

3.) We do not live in a religiously diverse and tolerant society. This is proven by Darryl’s intolerance for my religion which sees his religion of “diversity and tolerance,” to be intolerant. We live in a society where the varying faiths of the varying religions have been tamed so that they all understand that none of their God or gods are to be taken so seriously as to overthrow the God State who keeps all the other gods in their place. We have the diversity and tolerance of old Rome. Everyone is free to serve their God or gods as long as, like Darryl, they keep pinching incense to the genius of the Emperor.

4.) I do not criticize Islam for its lack of ability to make the distinction about private morality vs public morality that Darryl holds. I criticize it because it hates Christ. I see the totalism of Islam as being perfectly consistent with its opposition to all alien Worldviews including the Christian worldview and the Liberal Darryl worldview.  I criticize Darryl because he deigns to criticize other worldviews (Christianity, Islam, etc.) all the while his pagan worldview is in the ascendancy. I criticize Darryl because of the totalism of his bifurcated worldview that demands everything be divided into private morality vs. public morality. In Darryl’s worldview everyone must operate like this or they are shunned and denounced, just as everyone who does not operate in the context of Sharia in a Islam world and life view must be shunned and denounced. Darryl’s worldview has the same totalism in it that he decries in both Islam and in Biblical Christianity. It’s easy for Darryl to criticize competing worldviews for their desire to have totalistic hegemony while the pagan worldview he holds to, is, in point of fact, exercising totalsitc hegemony.

Je Suis Bret McAtee

The best way to return volley when dealing with satirists, mockers, and the irreverent is to give them a taste of their own medicine. All the West is taking up for the filth put out by French magazine “Charlie Hebdo” and in favor of  their gutter freedom of speech. This is a freedom of speech that found Charlie Hebdo satirizing the members of the Trinity as engaging in sodomite sex with one another simultaneously.

Well, sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. If we are going to mock and satirize Christianity then mocking and satirizing the sacred truths of the secular religion if also fair game. The most sacred truth of the Cultural Marxist Left today is the Holocaust ™. It is an event that dare not be questioned lest one be imprisoned for merely questioning the facts around the Holocaust ™.

Isn’t it curious that while blaspheming the Lord Jesus Christ is a Free speech matter, and insulting the pervert Mohammed is a free speech right, what isn’t a free speech matter is denying the holocaust? I wonder why that is?

So, if we really are going to march for freedom of speech then let it be a march for freedom of all speech. But that will never happen because all cultures and social orders protect via the fence of the law, what is held sacred that culture and social order.

The mocking limericks that follow are here to make a singular point and that point is to eliminate the double standard.

The Double Standard

Trying to get this all straight
Questioning Six Million is hate
But one is perfectly free
To pen the Trinity
As sodomite sexual soul-mates?

It Goes Both Ways

They tell me that the satire pen
Must be free to lampoon all men
But if that is quite true
Then what will they do
When Auschwitz is mocked now and then?

Now Who’s Ox Is Being Gored?

Satire Mohammed as you please
Cartoon the Trinity as in sleaze
But if you do all of that
There is tit for tat
Prepare for jokes about the Holo-hoax disease

Jes Suis Zundel & Irving?

There once were satirists from France
All religions they’d love to lance
But if this is the game
Then others look tame
Give Zundel and Irving a chance

 

Mrs. Marinov … Please Notify your Husband that there is Linkage between Genetics and Culture

 

In the graphic below our old friend, Bojidar Marinov, suggest that proof is found that genetics and culture have nothing to do with each other.  He offers this pearl of wisdom, in his trenchant commentary on the graphic,

<i>”The awkward moment when you think that genetics determines culture, and then geneticists tell you that Spain is more “Celtic” than Scotland, and Austria is about as “Germanic” as Ireland.”</i>

Now the point we will be making below the graphic is not that culture is a reflection of only genetics. That position would force one into the unbiblical position of materialism. No Christian can claim to be consistently Christian and believe that culture is alone dictated by genetics.

However, contrary to Mr. Marinov’s views, neither is it, in the least, consistently Christian to deny that genetics has anything to do with culture. Such a position gives us Gnosticism, the very opposite of materialism. Mr. Marinov’s views that whom God has created us to be in our humanity, has nothing to do with culture is the stuff of which Gnosticism is made.

The best approach to culture is that it is the outward manifestation of a people’s inward beliefs. Note that in this definition we have the inclusion of both what a people think and the fact that it is very real corporeal people, with all their DNA (genetics) who are thinking.

The point that we will be making below the graphic is that Mr. Marinov observation, given above, is just nonsense.

 

View post on imgur.com

1.) We might start by asking Mr. Marinov how it is exactly that Europeans, being closely related to other Europeans, is some kind of “awkward moment.” After all,  Europeans are closely related to each other. That’s not a revelation. And it seems to imply the exact opposite point as Mr. Marinov imagines — that there really is a European / White identity.

2.)  Secondly, we need to note that all because there are different ethnic markers in different places doesn’t mean that  English, Irish, Scots, etc are Swedes, Germans, Danes, etc. Also, we must take into consideration that the West is a lot more mobile now. International corporations have greatly contributed to that mobility (along with the ebb and flow of conquering armies). Corporations have undermined the state and regional loyalties here in the US. So it shouldn’t be surprising that there is a mixture of European ethnicities.

3.) Touching Mr. Marinov’s observations regarding Spain being more Celtic than Scotland. This really isn’t that difficult and if Mr. Marinov knew his history better he wouldn’t be getting out on this limb that is currently being sawed off from beneath him. You see, Galicia (a part of Spain) is borderline one of the Celtic nations. The Gaels who settled Ireland came from Galicia, then went to over to mess with the Picts in Scotland. Also, Celts covered the continent at one point until empires were established over them. Obviously, given this reality one would expect to find just what the graphic reveals. Mr. Marinov’s post demonstrates his ignorance of tribal migration. One hopes this isn’t intentional on Mr. Marinov’s part. Regardless, whether it is ignorance or subterfuge the truth of the matter is that Mr. Marinov is quite inaccurate on this point.

4.) The fact that Europe’s culture is being re-made by the arrival of  non-European people groups ought to be evidence enough that there is a relation between genetics and culture. If one ventures into different parts of “Londonistan” or “Parisistan” one finds a very different genetic pattern accompanied by a very different culture then one finds in French Paris or English London.

5.)  Mr. Marinov says that genetics has no impact on culture. Well, as genetics is determinative of gender (as well as ethnicity) does he really want to advance the idea that there are no genetic differences between male and female such that those differences impact cultures that men and women create?

Are the differences between men and women (not physiological but cultural) only to be accounted for by how men and women think? This is what Mr. Marinov would have us believe if “genetics have absolutely nothing to do with culture.”

Mr. Marinov should visit an all girls school and a all boys school and take tours to demonstrate that genetics effect culture.

More might be said but this is enough to, once again, dismiss the Gnostic impulse of Mr. Marinov.

This rebuttal was a corporate effort by the members of one America’s more illustrious Reformed Think Tanks of which I am a member.

Fisking an idea on how to treat Confessional Documents

In a recent denomination magazine someone wrote a op-ed piece. This is my attempt to find the humor in it.

December 5, 2015 — Discussions about our denomination’s confessions, also known as the Three Forms of Unity—the Belgic Confession, the Canons of Dort, and the Heidelberg Catechism—are ongoing.

Some believe that we should preserve these confessions as they were written. Others argue that we should adapt them to contemporary times but continue to affirm their authority. Still others argue that we should do away with these confessions altogether and start anew. And some have proposed that we add a fourth document to the Three Forms of Unity, such as the Belhar Confession, to make our testimony more complete.

I propose that we refer to the Three Forms of Unity as the “historical confessions” of the CRC. This implies, of course, that the exact language of each confession be minutely preserved. After all, they are historical documents that reflect the precise spirit of their time. These documents should never be altered, and for that reason should always be referred to as “the historical confessions of the Christian Reformed Church.” Further, these historical confessions should never be considered normative for our times because their normativity for today would violate their historicity of yesterday.

Bret responds,

Great idea. Lets apply this reasoning to other historical documents.

1.) I propose that we refer to my wedding vows as the “historical wedding vows.”  This implies, of course, that the exact language of the wedding vow would be minutely preserved. After all, those vows are a historical document that reflect the precise spirit when I was married. This document should never be altered, and for that reason should always be referred to as “the historical wedding vows of Mr. & Mrs. Bret L. McAtee.” Further, this historical wedding vow should never be considered normative for our times because its normativity for today would violate its historicity of yesterday.

II.) I propose that we refer to the membership vows that our members take as their “historical vows” to the local church. This implies, of course, that the exact language of each membership vow be minutely preserved. After all, they are historical vows that reflect the precise spirit of their time. These vows should never be altered, and for that reason should always be referred to as “the historical vows of the members of sundry Christian Reformed Churches.” Further, these historical vows should never be considered normative for our times because their normativity for today would violate their historicity of yesterday.

III.) I propose that we refer to the  Scriptures as “historical Scripture” of the CRC. This implies, of course, that the exact language of each Scripture be minutely preserved. After all, the Scriptures are a historical document that reflects the precise spirit of their time. This document should never be altered, and for that reason should always be referred to as “the historical  Scripture of the Christian Church.” Further, these historical Scriptures should never be considered normative for our times because their normativity for today would violate their historicity of yesterday.

Except for assorted 5 year olds, closed head injury patients, and adult post-moderns who “reasons” like this?

How is it that Historicity is put into antithesis with normativity?

With this kind of methodology how is it possible to still believe that true truth is timeless?

“Yes Aunt Agnes, I know in your time serial adultery was wrong, according to the historic Confessions, but today the normative confessions say that God is pleased with serial adultery.”

What would be normative, however, is a Contemporary Confession. Such a new document would be similar to the CRC’s Contemporary Testimony Our World Belongs to God, but not necessarily identical to it. This Contemporary Confession would be drawn up by the CRC synod. From then on, a synodically appointed standing committee would, upon the instruction of the annual synod, recommend certain modifications, alterations, or additions to the Contemporary Confession as needed.

This process would be repeated at the commencement of each subsequent synod, at which time all the synodical delegates would also subscribe to the Contemporary Confession. The document would then be normative throughout the entire year. Newly elected or appointed office-bearers would also be expected to subscribe to it.

Something to think about!

 

 

Wasn’t this tried before? Some guy, wearing a pointy hat speaks ex-cathedra from the synod (whoops… I mean “The Chair”) and then all of Christendom knows what is true and what they should think. After all, if Synod says it is true then  why would anyone disagree? Didn’t Luther have something to say about this idea.

“I put no trust in the unsupported authority of Pope or councils or CRC Synods, since it is plain that they have often erred and often contradicted themselves) by manifest reasoning.”

I can just see it now.

“My only comfort in life and death (until next years synod meets) is that I am not my own …”

This year the Heidelberg gives us “Sin and Misery,” “Our Redemption,” and “Gratitude.” Next year the Heidelberg could  be divided into, “Low Self Esteem,” “Our Self Actualization,” and “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough,  and doggone it, people like me,” categories.

Really, I fail to understand how any thinking person could reason like this.

 

Christ as the Light

Intro

The book of  John has several words that end up winding their way all the way through both his Gospel and his Epistles. In his Gospel John sets forth the Reformed antithesis with the repeated words “Light” and “Darkness.” St. John, inspired by the Holy Spirit sees men in only on of two camps. They are a people of the light or they are a people belonging to “Darkness.” There is no third category and no tertium quid.  If one belongs to darkness they belong to death. If one belongs to the light one belongs to Life.

As we are going to see this is is a theme that develops its way through the book of John.

I.) Light as Promised Re-creation (John 1:4-9)

When we look at Scripture as a whole one of the ways that we break it down is to speak of the Scriptures as God’s story of “Creation-Fall-Redemption and Re-creation.” This promised “Re-creation” is spoken of in Isaiah as connected to Light.

In Isaiah, for example, we can read of Messianic light that is coming that will announce God’s eschatological promised age to come,

Isaiah 60:1-3  Arise, O Jerusalem; be bright, for thy [a]light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. 2 For behold, darkness shall cover the [b]earth, and gross darkness the people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee. 3 And the Gentiles shall walk in [c]thy light, and Kings at the brightness of thy rising up (cmp. Isaiah 42:6-7, 16).

I begin here because this Isaiah passage forces us to begin even earlier for in Isaiah 60 here the way that “light” is mentioned echoes Genesis 1:2-4. When Isaiah says, “darkness will cover the earth, and deep darkness the peoples” likely is a connection with to Gen. 1

2  …  and [e]darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God [g]moved upon the [h]waters.3 Then God said, Let there be light: And there was [i]light. 4 And God saw the light that it was good, and God separated [j]the light from the darkness.”

So Isaiah 60:1-3 is setting forth the coming re-creation and restoration of Israel against the back drop  of the initial creation. The re-creation will have light shine upon it just as the initial creation did. When we get to the Gospel of John and when we note the application that the Lord Christ is the light we suspect that He is the Light of which Isaiah wrote. In the Lord Christ the fulfillment of the Isaianic prophecies has come to pass.

John opens up his gospel by saying of Christ, “In Him was life and the life was the light of man.”

We are being told here the long awaited re-creation has come in the Lord Christ. Christ is the light that has come that Isaiah spoke of.  In Luke / Acts there is especial application between the Light in Isaiah as applied to the Gentiles but here we see that John opens with Isaiah’s idea the light has come to God’s people.

4 [k]In him [l]was life, and that life was [m]the light of men. 5 [n]And that light shineth in the wilderness, and the darkness [o]comprehendeth it not.6 ¶ [p]There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7 This same came for a witness, to bear witness of that light, that all men[q]through him might believe. 8 He was not [r]that light, but was sent to bear witness of that light. 9 [s]This was [t]that true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

Side-note #1 — Christ as “the light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,” confirms that all men are culpable. No man has an excuse against God for their rebellion for the true light which lighteth every man has come into the world.

Side-note #2 — When John speaks of the Light (the Lord Christ) having light in Himself this is another claim to deity we find in John. John will quote Jesus later saying that as the Father has life in Himself so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself.

II.) Light as that which exposes and condemns (John 3:19f)

John 3:19And this is the condemnation, that that light came into the world, and men loved darkness rather than that light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For every man that evil doeth, hateth the light, neither cometh to light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 21 But he that doeth truth, cometh to the light, that his deeds might be made manifest, that they are wrought according to God.

Here the Lord Christ sets forth the reason that the world rejects Him. In His arrival the Lord Christ is the light that exposes whether a person is righteous or not. So, this light that comes into the world that bespeaks the restoration and re-creation is an offense and elicits hatred from those who love darkness.

And that is what we see in the ministry of the Lord Christ. He was despised, hated, and rejected by those who hated God.

One Implication

Now in as much as we are reflectors of this light we  likewise will be  hated by those who doeth evil. Really, in this culture and in these times it really is the case that our expectation should be to be hated by all just the right people.  We need to remember that “If the world hates us, we know that it  hated Christ before it hated us. If we are of the light we will get the same response as He who is the Light.

As I mentioned at the beginning we should note here in John 3 the interplay with darkness. In John the theme is not only light but darkness. We shall see that as we move through these passages. One of the most interesting ways that John uses the idea of darkness is to note the presence of  nighttime. Nicdoemus comes to Jesus, John records, “when it was night,” and in the Judas betrayal. John tells us that Judas goes to betray the Lord Christ and then John adds, almost as an aside,  that “it was night.” Judas goes to do his hate work of quenching the light and He does so in the context of darkness (night).

III.) Light as a metaphor for God’s Law-Word (John 8:12)

In  Psalm 119 as combined with John 8:12 we notice a connection between the God’s law-word as a light that shines upon one’s path and the Lord Christ. In John 8 the metaphor of a light to illumine a path may well be a connection to  Psalm 119. This idea of God’s Law-Word being a light unto our path  is taken up by the Lord Christ as he applies it  to Himself.

The Psalmist says,

Psalm 119:105 Thy word is a [b]lantern unto my feet, and a light unto my paths.

The Lord Christ can say,

John 8:12 [d]Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am that light of the world: he that followeth me, shall not walk in darkness, but shall have that light of life.

So, we might say here that in this couplet of Psalm 119 and John 8 that the Lord Christ is declaring that He Himself is the incarnation of God’s Law-Word which for the Psalmist was his lamp and light. If we remember that Psalm 119 is all about the delight that the Pslamist finds in God’s laws, precepts, and judgments we would be well served to remember that there is no avoidance of walking in the darkness apart from the Light which is the law and whom also is Christ.

IV.) The Light as connected with the Healing ministry of the Messiah (John 9:4f)

In Isaiah we read of the promised Servant and His work,

Isaiah 42:16 ¶ And I will bring the [s]blind by a way, that they knew not, and lead them by paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them…

In John we see the Lord Christ as the Light that quite literally fulfills all that Isaiah spoke of.

John 9:4 [c]I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is [d]day: the night cometh when no man can work.5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.

This passage is in the context of the man born blind. Immediately, after referring to himself as the “light of the world” Jesus heals the blind man. Those present would likely have seen Isaiah’s prophecy playing out before them.  Isaiah spoke of a Messiah who would be a light who opens the eyes of the blind and would make the darkness light before them.

The Lord Jesus is the Messiah who is bringing the new creational realities to bear upon the fallen world. In Christ, the age to come has come and in Christ, who is the Light of the World, the age to come is reversing the sin corrupted realities of this present age. The healing of the blind man (living in a world of darkness) is evidence that the re-creation has come in Jesus who is the Messianic light.

V.) Light as our identity (John 12:35)

John 12:35 [n]Then Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you: walk while ye have that light, lest the darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in the dark, knoweth not whither he goeth.36 While ye have that light, believe in that light, that ye may be the [o]children of the light. These things spake Jesus, and departed, and hid himself from them….46 I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth in me, should not abide in darkness.

Isaiah 9:2 — The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.

As we talked about earlier our connection to Christ is to be so intimate that we take on His character of light.

Conclusion

Really this has been just the briefest of survey of the usage of light in John. There are more connections that we could make. This gives us enough to see that this metaphor that Christ uses has an important background. The theme of “Light” weaves itself all the way from Genesis to the very end of Revelation.

We  speak of Christ as “the light” being a metaphor for God’s Truth, God’s presences, God’s recreation, God’s condemnation unto those who hate the light, God’s direction via His Law Word.

We would note again that Light in the OT was spoken of in the context of the Messiah and the promised re-creation. The Messiah has come and, in principle, this present wicked age has been and so is being rolled back.

This is objectively true and does not depend upon how we personally feel about it. The Light has come. We are children of the Light.

We have to live then, as we have been fully declared to be.