Church of England votes on (contra) gay marriage report

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38982013

The report was contra. It was passed by 2 houses but not three so a new report must be made.

 

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Daniel Kirk on Patriarchy

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/storiedtheology/2017/02/15/cuck-christology/

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Kids and divorce

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

https://twitter.com/BransonParler/status/831943243566817280

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People who regret having children

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/feb/11/breaking-taboo-parents-who-regret-having-children

People have of course always failed to live up to norms, but when the norms are abandoned what is there left?

Now we have “courageous” parents admitting they shouldn’t have gotten into parenting. https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/feb/11/breaking-taboo-parents-who-regret-having-children.
This is of course not new. Admitting it in appropriate places can be healthy. Would you EVER tell your child you regretted bringing them into the world?
We’ve always had bad parents but the whole frame has changed. We have empowered emotional moments to become “the words of the gods” and then rushed into them imagining that heaven will surely follow. What we discover is what humanity has always discovered. Life is hard. We stumble and sometimes fall. People get hurt.
We keep laying over it an imaginative expectation that somehow if something in a moment “feels right” then it will always be “alright”. What folly!
How many moments haven’t you had that “felt right” only later to realize that feelings are simply like this.
Life offers you no “get out of regret free card”.
What happens when parenting becomes an “impulse purchase”?
For much of human history parenting was not a choice. It was a consequence of sexual action, planned, unplanned, welcomed or unwelcomed.
Being an adult means doing what others need, especially your kids, even when it’s hard. Parents fail regularly but it seem our culture simply wants to throw imagined “free passes” all around. It doesn’t work that way with kids, however.
If you divinize feelings what do you tell the kid who is flooded with appropriate feelings of terror or pain because of an supposed adult’s impulse decision? That feeling god is a cruel master.
I’m sure many, many parents have had regrets. I’m not one of them. I don’t regret for a moment any of my 5 children.
Neither should you feel guilty about feeling regret. It’s just a feeling.
Adults face regrets and learn to act and say appropriate things when called upon and figure out when and where words help instead of hurt.
Feelings are good but often complicated companions. Do not make them your master.
Children are so often the victims. As Pat Benatar sang “hell is for children”.
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What’s the best way to read Dante?

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

https://www.neh.gov/humanities/2017/winter/feature/what%E2%80%99s-the-best-way-read-the-divine-comedy-if-you-don%E2%80%99t-know-italian

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Americans warm up to every religious group except evangelicals

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://www.christianitytoday.com/gleanings/2017/february/americans-warm-feelings-religious-groups-evangelicals-pew.html

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Perspecuity of Scripture

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2017/02/15/soul-evangelicalism-will-become-us/

http://blog.ayjay.org/resourceful-christianity/

One of the things that pushed CS Lewis over the edge between Christianity and Hinduism when he was moving from Theism to Faith was what I call scalability. Many religions are two speed. The villagers are monkeying around with idols and paying off the gods while the monks are practicing self-denial. Lewis notes that real things, like apples and chocolates are not like that. https://paulvanderklay.me/2017/02/15/christianity-scales/

The Bible is a very difficult book. Really smart people like Al Wolters and NT Wright spend all of their lives studying it and never even are able to cover all that humanity has discovered. Many other really smart people study it and get it horribly wrong. If you don’t believe me I’ve got a good number of books and commentaries to show you.

We might imagine that uneducated people living without access or ability to delve into the 2000 year conversation have no hope of finding profit in it. Such an assumption is refuted regularly in the darkest, hardest places of the world where ordinary, every day Christians lovingly devote themselves to it and are changed by it in dramatic ways.

Now you might note that many of these people get a lot wrong in their reading of scripture, but don’t the scholars do that too?

The miracle isn’t found in that the scholars find profit even though many don’t, it is in that the simple do.

Luke 12:32 (NIV)

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.

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Christianity Scales

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

The only two systems in which the mysteries and the philosophies come together are Hinduism & Xtianity: there you get both Metaphysics and Cult (continuous with the primeval cults). That is why my first step was to be sure that one or other of these had the answer. For the reality can’t be one that appeals either only to savages or only to high brows. Real things aren’t like that (e.g. matter is the first most obvious thing you meet—milk, chocolates, apples, and also the object of quantum physics). There is no question of just a crowd of disconnected religions. The choice is between (a.) The materialist world picture: wh. I can’t believe, (b.) The real archaic primitive religions: wh. are not moral enough. (c.)The (claimed) fulfilment of these in Hinduism, (d.) The claimed fulfilment of these in Xtianity. But the weakness of Hinduism is that it doesn’t really join the two strands. Unredeemably savage religion goes on in the village; the Hermit philosophises in the forest: and neither really interferes with the other. It is only Xtianity wh. compels a high brow like me to partake in a ritual blood feast, and also compels a central African convert to attempt an enlightened universal code of ethics.

Vanauken, Sheldon. A Severe Mercy (pp. 89-90). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

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Does Christianity have the resources to resist the age? Of course. It always does.

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://blog.ayjay.org/resourceful-christianity/

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Working Won’t Make You Rich

Posted on February 15, 2017 by PaulVK

http://www.inc.com/quora/working-wont-ever-make-you-rich-here-are-5-things-that-will.html

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