{"id":4390,"date":"2026-01-29T21:26:16","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T21:26:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=4390"},"modified":"2026-08-31T14:58:16","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T14:58:16","slug":"blog-archive-2024","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=4390","title":{"rendered":"Blog Archive: 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><br \/>\n190. 1\/1\/24 Christianity vs. Wokeness<br \/>\n191. 2\/1\/24 Love Thy Body<br \/>\n192. 3\/1\/24 Signals of Transcendence<br \/>\n193. 4\/1\/24 Politics is Personal: The Devil &#038; Karl Marx<br \/>\n194. 5\/1\/24 The Fringes of Science<br \/>\n195. 6\/1\/24 Truth Changes Everything (At least it should!)<br \/>\n196. 7\/1\/24 Coming to Christ With the Help of the New Atheists<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n190. Christianity vs. Wokeness<br \/>\nJanuary 1, 2024 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cThe Bible is authoritative on everything of which it speaks.\u00a0 Moreover, it speaks of everything.\u201d <\/em>\u2013 Cornelius Van Til<\/p>\n<p>Van Til was right about that, at least in the sense that the Bible addresses all in life that is <em>important.<\/em>\u00a0 I love everything about Van Til except his Calvinism.\u00a0 In the Evangelism section of this site you\u2019ll find my 3-part essay on Van Til\u2019s presuppositional apologetics.<\/p>\n<p>The quote is from Owen Strachan\u2019s informative (and compact \/ readable) book, <em>Christianity and Wokeness:\u00a0 How the Social Justice Movement is Hijacking the Gospel \u2013 and the Way to Stop It.<\/em>\u00a0 He opens by citing a 2016 \u2018anti-racism\u2019 training video, which went viral, featuring a speaker named Ashleigh Shackelford, who told a group of white women that \u201call white people are racists,\u201d and had no hope of changing.\u00a0 \u201cNo, you\u2019re always going to be racist, actually.\u00a0 Even when you\u2019re on\u00a0 a path to be a better human being.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strachan explains that this reflects a core element of the \u201cwokeness\u201d system, in which there is no grace, no love, \u201conly grievance, resentment, and condemnation.\u201d\u00a0 Therefore, it is clear that wokeness is not merely a non-Christian system.\u00a0 It is an <em>anti-<\/em>Christian system.\u00a0 It reveals its true father \u2013 Satan \u2013 who hates God\u2019s image-bearers and devises means to foster misery and, ultimately, damnation.\u00a0 Shackelford revealed her own heart when she commented, \u201cI believe all white people are born into not being human.\u201d\u00a0 Later, she said that white people grow up \u201cto be demons.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The wokeness movement took off in the 1990s in academia, which should be no surprise.\u00a0 Its goal was to convince many who had no racial prejudice that they actually did, and that they could not transcend differences in skin color.\u00a0 Its chief enemy is Christianity, working to infiltrate churches with the idea that Christianity fosters \u201cwhite privilege\u201d and \u201cwhite supremacy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strachan summarizes how wokeness attacks a Christian spiritually.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Wokeness divides us \u2013 oppressors versus oppressed.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness tempts us to despise others based on some category or label.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness tempts us to pride in condemning others.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness robs us of peace and joy.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness directs our attention away from the Gospel.\u00a0 We lose sight of the most vital need of every individual \u2013 salvation.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness tempts to bitterness.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness makes forgiveness difficult.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness diminishes faith \u2013 we lose sight of God\u2019s prophetic vision of history.<\/li>\n<li>Wokeness makes man big and God small.\u00a0 Man\u2019s concerns dominate us.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Sadly, tragically, and ridiculously, many current evangelical leaders claim that wokeness is the way forward for the church.\u00a0 I can only conclude that those who think like this have never been born again.\u00a0 What else could explain such a disgusting lack of discernment?<\/p>\n<p>Van Til\u2019s comment above is grounded in 2 Peter 1:3, which assures us that God\u2019s word is sufficient for <em>all things <\/em>that pertain to life and godliness.\u00a0 With regard to race, there is only one.\u00a0 Paul, in Acts 17:26, noted that God made us all of \u201cone blood,\u201d affirming our parentage from Genesis, Adam and Eve, in Eden.\u00a0 What matters a little more or less of melanin in the skin cells?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWoke,\u201d of course, is derived from \u201cawake,\u201d clued in to the true nature of the world when so many are clueless, asleep.\u00a0 I\u2019ve observed that the woke mindset \/ posture works against postmodernism, which denies definite answers and objective truths.\u00a0 When postmodernism seemed to hit its peak in the 1990s, the gravest sin seemed to be judgmentalism.\u00a0 But the woke crowd is intensely and viciously judgmental, preaching a definitive, yet anti-biblical morality.<\/p>\n<p>Strachan summarizes Critical Race Theory (CRT), the academic veneer of wokism, as the doctrine that \u201call of societal life is structured along racial power dynamics.\u00a0 Race is a \u2018social construct\u2019 . . . it\u2019s not biologically based and exists only in our imagination.\u201d\u00a0 But now they\u2019ve mixed some postmodernism back in and yet . . . how can Shackelford call those women white and racist merely by looking at them?\u00a0 Shouldn\u2019t she ask them how they identify?<\/p>\n<p>CRT goes on to assert that America is infested with racism, using terms like \u201cstructural racism\u201d and \u201csystemic racism.\u201d\u00a0 This ignores the tremendous progress America has seen, especially since the 1950s.\u00a0 But history is ignored or revised to fit the political narrative, and to feed the grievance industry.\u00a0 Martin Luther King\u2019s goal of \u201ccolor-blindness\u201d has been reversed; no longer do the \u2018anti-racists\u2019 desire a society where children are judged by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin.\u00a0 Rather, defeating \u201cwhiteness\u201d is the goal.<\/p>\n<p>The enemy is the ordinary man or woman who leads a quiet, normal American life.\u00a0 Ibram X. Kendi, a widely published professor at Boston U., says that such people are the \u201cmost threatening racist movement\u201d today.\u00a0 Author Robin DeAngelo said that the \u201cregular American\u201d is worse than the cross-burning Klan member.<\/p>\n<p>Apparently, the mom who posts photos of her kids on Instagram, bakes muffins, helps her neighbors, and volunteers at the homeless shelter is a \u201cwhite supremacist\u201d who must be defeated because her very existence oppresses others.\u00a0 In CRT, Strachan notes, life is a zero-sum game.\u00a0 Some win; most lose.<\/p>\n<p>In the woke worldview, <em>intersectionality<\/em> is the principle that the victimhood of many groups overlaps, including blacks, the poor, the disabled, anyone not heterosexual, etc.\u00a0 Also, for each of the oppressed, there must be an oppressor.\u00a0 The rich oppress the poor, the \u201ccisgender\u201d oppress sexual minorities, and men oppress women because of \u201ctoxic masculinity.\u201d\u00a0 Such lists can be extended indefinitely.<\/p>\n<p>Although wokists reject \u201cbinary\u201d thinking in terms of the sexes, they are quintessentially binary in that you are either an oppressor or you are oppressed.\u00a0 What a miserable way to look at the world and to avoid personal responsibility.\u00a0 The mindset also avoids the humility required to own your own sins and repent.\u00a0 Therefore, wokeness opposes the mind and heart conditions required to trust Christ for salvation.\u00a0 It seems far more satisfying be righteously indignant and blame others; in fact, if you can find ways to cancel or punish the oppressors, that really feels good!<\/p>\n<p>Where does CRT and its ilk come from?\u00a0 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels \u2013 for example, in <em>The Communist Manifesto:<\/em>\u00a0 \u201cThe history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.\u00a0 Freeman and slave . . . lord and serf, guildmaster and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Marx hated everything about God and sought to expunge Christian teaching from the face of the Earth.\u00a0 In <em>What Every Christian Needs to Know about Social Justice, <\/em>Jeffrey Johnson notes that the institutions and historic principles of individualism, family, church, and state derive their authority from God; accordingly, Marxists must deconstruct them to eliminate God from society.\u00a0 Furthermore, \u201cfor Marx, deliverance from the evils of capitalism cannot occur until all traces of God are removed from the world.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Critical theorists go far beyond arguing that society is corrupted \u2013 they insist that <em>reason <\/em>is corrupted.\u00a0 Thus, they ignore evidence and logic.\u00a0 Only the woke can see the relevant structures of reality.\u00a0 Voddie Baucham argues that this is simply gnosticism.\u00a0 You can trust only the anointed woke priests and priestesses for enlightenment.<\/p>\n<p>I resonate with Strachan\u2019s take:\u00a0 \u201cThe ultimate source of this ideology does not sound like the voice of God, but like the slithery hiss of a serpent.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strachan cites John McWhorter\u2019s critique of what he calls the \u201cThird Wave Antiracism,\u201d particularly the type of traps the woke set for the rest of us.\u00a0 For example, \u201cYou must strive eternally to understand the experiences of black people.\u00a0 But you can never understand what it is to be black, and if you think you do you\u2019re a racist.\u201d\u00a0 Another:\u00a0 \u201cSupport black people in creating their own spaces and stay out of them.\u00a0 But seek to have black friends.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t have any, you\u2019re a racist.\u00a0 And if you claim any, they\u2019d better be <em>good <\/em>friends.\u00a0 Just know that you still aren\u2019t allowed in their private spaces.\u201d\u00a0 What do you think?\u00a0 Will this approach increase or decrease racism?<\/p>\n<p>Apparently, the most influential book to promote wokeness in evangelicalism is <em>Divided by Faith<\/em>, by Michael Emerson and Christian Smith, 2000.\u00a0 They argue that whites, as the creators of our present society, \u201cmust repent of their personal, historical, and social sins.\u201d\u00a0 Otherwise, they are passed on to future generations.\u00a0 This idea of generational sins is foreign to the New Testament, of course.\u00a0 Such heresies only divide; they do not unite.\u00a0 The Christian viewpoint is that the individual is responsible for his own sins, but can be restored through faith in Christ.\u00a0 Thus, woke heresies distract from the need for 1-2-1 evangelism and the individual\u2019s requirements for salvation.<\/p>\n<p>In 2017 InterVarsity Press published <em>White Awake<\/em>, by Daniel Hill, a Chicago-area pastor.\u00a0 He writes that all white people are racist, even if subconsciously.\u00a0 (Whatever that actually means.)\u00a0 Also, that racism is the chief sin of the Church today.\u00a0 \u201cThe primary enemy of God\u2019s kingdom in this realm is white supremacy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strachan notes that <em>actual <\/em>white supremacy is truly hideous and includes segregation, lynchings, abused women slaves, and a societal order that dehumanizes people based on skin color.\u00a0 Nothing like that exists in America today.\u00a0 He observes that evangelicals today are demonstrably multi-ethnic.\u00a0 Where there is a proper Christian unity, it comes from God\u2019s grace, not skin color.\u00a0 In fact, it is the CRT crowd that <em>yearns <\/em>to divide everyone by race, arbitrary though that may be.\u00a0 Wokeness in the churches attacks unity, fostering distrust and resentment.\u00a0 Of course it does, considering the source.<\/p>\n<p>In short, wokeness is not a helpful paradigm to discover truths within the Christian framework.\u00a0 Rather, wokeness is a different Gospel; indeed, it is anti-Gospel.\u00a0 It is an evil, intentionally \u2018racist\u2019 doctrine.<\/p>\n<p>In magnifying human diversity, wokeness creates attitudes that prevent any chance at unity.\u00a0 Unity is only possible in Christ and, unfortunately, will not be universally realized until the Millennium.<\/p>\n<p>In promoting\u00a0 the CRT narrative, Marxists eagerly ignore or rewrite history.\u00a0 For example, it wasn\u2019t just \u2018whites\u2019 who sinned.\u00a0 Black African traders facilitated the transatlantic slave trade in the 17<sup>th<\/sup> century.\u00a0 Black leaders supported 19<sup>th<\/sup> century colonization.\u00a0 America had numerous black slaveholders.\u00a0 In the 20<sup>th<\/sup> century black leaders have supported the disproportionately high abortion rate in the black community, and young black men are regularly victims of murder by young black men.<\/p>\n<p>In Art Carden\u2019s 2020 essay, \u201cSlavery Did Not Enrich Americans,\u201d he refutes the woke accusation that America and its prosperity was built on slavery.\u00a0 Cotton crops would have been profitable without the expense of slavery; in fact, they would likely have been far more profitable.\u00a0 People are more productive when paid wages that they can then use in freedom to lead their own lives.\u00a0 Furthermore, cotton was not essential to industrialization.\u00a0 Thus, slavery <em>hampered <\/em>the American economy.\u00a0 This position is consistent with many descriptions of antebellum life, which featured (overall) a poor work ethic, a decadent culture, and immorality \u2013 all derived from the conscience-blighting effects of slavery throughout the culture.<\/p>\n<p>Woke Marxists hate free markets.\u00a0 Economist Walter Williams argues that free markets are naturally color-blind.\u00a0 \u201cMarkets have a notorious lack of respect for privilege, race, and class structures.\u201d\u00a0 Strachan concludes that if the woke really wanted \u201cfairness\u201d and \u201cequity,\u201d they would be enthusiastic supporters of free markets, not their enemies.\u00a0 He notes that Robin DeAngelo typically charges $15,000 per speaking event and has earned over $2M from her book <em>White Fragility<\/em>, all the while deriding capitalism as a racist system.<\/p>\n<p>It is well known that so-called \u2018racial\u2019 differences (skin color, eye shape, etc.) account for only 0.012 percent of human biological variation.\u00a0 Skin color derives from the presence of more or less melanin.\u00a0 Ken Ham:\u00a0 \u201cNo one really has red, or yellow, or black skin.\u00a0 We all have the same basic color, just different shades of it.\u201d\u00a0 Such differences are trivial, but the woke want to deconstruct the entire world over nonsense.<\/p>\n<p>In Ibram X. Kendi\u2019s best-seller, <em>How to Be an Antiracist,<\/em> he offers a solution to racial prejudice:\u00a0 \u201cThe only remedy to racist discrimination is <em>antiracist <\/em>discrimination.\u201d\u00a0 How will that work out for future generations?\u00a0 Perhaps the real motivation is to provoke race wars and destroy the West.\u00a0 Strachan suggests that the Satanic goal is not a new order, but an anti-order, opposing everything that God ordained for His image-bearers to find peace with Him and with each other.<\/p>\n<p>Under wokeness the <em>law <\/em>is divorced from retributive justice \u2013 rendering to each what they deserve \u2013 and becomes a tool of distributive justice \u2013 apportioning privilege to those without it.\u00a0 Equality of opportunity is supposedly racist.\u00a0 Equality of outcome is the new principle.\u00a0 Romans chapter 13 makes clear the heresy.\u00a0 God designed government to be a terror to evildoers and to reward good conduct, to execute justice with the power of the sword, if necessary, and that the people should be subject to the authorities.<\/p>\n<p>The state promotes civil law and maintains order against evildoers.\u00a0 The Church preaches the Gospel and disciples believers under the authority of the Bible, and the family raises children to know God, to love others, and to grow up productive members of the community.\u00a0 The boundaries and responsibilities for these institutions are made clear within Scripture.\u00a0 There is nothing complicated here.<\/p>\n<p>The goals of Marxist ideology include the destruction of the family and the Church, and the perversion of the role of the State.\u00a0 Society becomes a contest for power.\u00a0 Individuals, cut off from family and church bonds, are easily controlled and intimidated by the overreaching State.\u00a0 Diversity is achieved without unity.\u00a0 Deconstruction of God\u2019s institutions generates estrangement, fear, and hostility.\u00a0 The world will be ripe for a powerful charismatic leader.\u00a0 The antichrist will arrive just in time.<\/p>\n<p>Strachan argues that wokeness is a new religion, a new worldview, which includes the following pillars:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Neo-paganism \u2013 no Creator; we are our own gods<\/li>\n<li>Sexual libertinism \u2013 anything goes<\/li>\n<li>Marxist statism<\/li>\n<li>Postmodern Darwinism \u2013 evolution got us here and there is no absolute truth<\/li>\n<li>Mystic selfism \u2013 follow your heart<\/li>\n<li>Utopian eschatology \u2013 Earth-centric; make the Earth right via social justice<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The author spends some time describing the Bible\u2019s teaching on the nature of human beings.\u00a0 Genesis chapter 1, for example:\u00a0 We see one human race, with male and female, one couple, the foundation of marriage.\u00a0 Period.<\/p>\n<p>The Bible presents us as made in the image of God, conscious, sentient, knowing good and evil, exercising free will.\u00a0 Jesus Christ is the ultimate example of what man (and woman) should be at its summit, without sin, loving, in perfect fellowship with God.\u00a0 In our present state we are all guilty and condemned by our own willful sins, but obtain forgiveness and a new birth into God\u2019s family by repentance and faith in Christ.<\/p>\n<p>In contrast, under wokeness some are good and beautiful just as they are, and others are definitely not \u2013 those who are born into or exercise \u201cwhiteness.\u201d\u00a0 Strachan notes that when you miss that sin is always personal, you cannot see the problem.\u00a0 \u201cIt is not that society is flawed and we are innocent.\u00a0 It is that we are sinful, and so our world is polluted with our sin.\u201d\u00a0 Christ did not die for society.\u00a0 We are not victims; we ourselves, individually, are criminals in God\u2019s court, lawbreakers in desperate need of salvation.\u00a0 The woke need to be saved, too, but they have embraced a philosophy and attitudes that work hard against it.<\/p>\n<p>When we solve our vertical problem with God, we can line up with Him and His word and thereby line up with each other.\u00a0 \u201cJesus is the only true hope of those who desire unity of any kind in the world.\u201d\u00a0 Of course, this will not happen on any significant scale until the 2<sup>nd<\/sup> coming of Christ, when He rules the world from His throne in Jerusalem.\u00a0 There is no other plan.\u00a0 In this present age, the mission is the Great Commission \u2013 individual souls are at stake.\u00a0 Ephesians chapter 2 gives a hopeful illustration of what unity can be achieved now (and in Paul\u2019s day) in that the blood of Christ unifies Jew and Gentile, which at that time was quite a startling concept.<\/p>\n<p>The cross is not God\u2019s \u201cbest shot\u201d at unification, so that we can improve the odds later with Marxism or psychotherapy or political compromise.\u00a0 Jesus is the <em>only <\/em>way, because He is the source of life, He is the source of truth, and reality is wired for no other options.<\/p>\n<p>Wokeness, Strachan observes, has no concept of God as Creator with us as image-bearers.\u00a0 Rather, it starts with the dull, antagonistic stereotypes of Marxist collectivism and identity fictions.\u00a0 There is no hope in any secular (Satanic) worldview, no afterlife, no Final Judgment, and . . . what should be incredibly frustrating to the Marxist woke . . . no justice.\u00a0 Not to mention, no resolutions, no peace, and no happiness.\u00a0 Have you noticed that the woke crowd is perpetually angry and miserable?<\/p>\n<p>Yet with Jesus and the grace of forgiveness and salvation, people in allegedly antagonistic groups find themselves in the same spiritual family.\u00a0 The most important things in life, they share in common.\u00a0 In a group of truly born again Christians, who care about each others\u2019 souls and the souls of the lost around them, there is neither Jew nor Greek, rich nor poor, white nor black nor brown.\u00a0 A healthy church, even in this age, can show this kind of love if it wants to.<\/p>\n<p>When God\u2019s causes dominate our desires, the trials of this life seem small, petty.\u00a0 And when life gets tough, Christian brothers and sisters are there to help.\u00a0 At least, it <em>can <\/em>be that way if your church is organized around New Testament principles, instead of today\u2019s seeker-sensitive megachurch mindlessness.<\/p>\n<p>If wokeness is creeping into your church, say something.\u00a0 Do something.\u00a0 If you get thrown out, thank God and try to find some other Christians who haven\u2019t gone mad.\u00a0 The truly <em>saved <\/em>Christians won\u2019t get fooled so easily.\u00a0 As you share the Gospel with clearly lost woke individuals, recognize that they cannot consistently live their wacky worldview.\u00a0 Share the distinctives of the Gospel message, that sin and lostness are individual, that humility and repentance are required to seek God, that Jesus paid the ultimate price, and that forgiveness, peace, joy, and the ability to love others who don\u2019t look like you is a gift from God to those image-bearers who want it.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212; <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n191. Love Thy Body<br \/>\nFebruary 1, 2024 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Is there a dichotomy between you and your body, between body and person?\u00a0 Or do \u201cthe two together form an integrated psycho-physical unity\u201d?\u00a0 The Christian (biblical) perspective is to honor our own bodies as a revelation of God\u2019s purpose for our lives.<\/p>\n<p>So argues Nancy Pearcey in her wonderful 2018 book, <em>Love Thy Body:\u00a0 Answering Hard Questions about Life and Sexuality<\/em>.\u00a0 She observes that the physical characteristics of our bodies reveal truths about our identities; further, that our bodies enable rational grounds for our personal moral decisions.\u00a0 Accordingly, ethics depend on biology, especially on the topics of sexuality and abortion.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey quotes Sam Allberry, a Christian pastor with same-sex attraction who practices celibacy:\u00a0 \u201cDesires for things God has forbidden are a reflection of how sin has distorted me, not how God has made me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With comparable humility and courage to face difficult truths Tim Wilkins, who once lived as a homosexual man, but is now married with children suggests:\u00a0 If God created some people gay, then \u201cGod has played a cruel joke on them.\u00a0 He has engineered their minds and emotions for attraction to the same sex and yet created their physiology to be in direct opposition to that attraction.\u201d\u00a0 Pearcey notes that when your emotions war with your physiology, you cannot be a whole person.<\/p>\n<p>We live in a fallen world, but God promises grace to live through brokenness.\u00a0 When his disciples asked Jesus whose sin caused a man to be born blind, the Lord blamed neither the man nor his parents, but that God could manifest even through such tragedy.<\/p>\n<p>Some Christians with same-sex attraction pray for years for God to change their desires.\u00a0 Paul endured his \u201cthorn in the flesh\u201d (whatever it was) despite repeated prayers.\u00a0 Paul ultimately decided to \u201cglory in my infirmites, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.\u201d\u00a0 Similarly, I\u2019ve had a life-long tormenting malady, but have realized that I would rather depend on God\u2019s grace with the affliction, than to be free of it without God\u2019s presence in my life.<\/p>\n<p>The body we are born with and grow up in does indeed limit our freedom, Pearcey notes.\u00a0 Similarly, our biological (family) ties are not discretionary.\u00a0 We don\u2019t choose our parents, relatives, or the place of our birth.\u00a0 But all these realities form our identity.\u00a0 Gilbert Mailaender reminds us that we are not just \u201cfree spirits but embodied creatures.\u00a0\u00a0 Lines of kinship and descent locate and identify us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As Christians we are called to honor our parents and love our children, seeing them as gifts from God.\u00a0 Learning to love and honor builds the character we need to live a fruitful life.<\/p>\n<p>Marriage, differently, begins with consent but continues as a covenant as opposed to a contract.\u00a0 In a contract there is quid-pro-quo consideration, but in marriage we pledge our very own selves, \u201cfor better or worse, until death do us part.\u201d\u00a0 Love is to be unconditional; after all, it may not always be reciprocated as we like, but God\u2019s typology for marriage is an eternal relationship, not breakable.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey (dis)credits the loss of the positive view of the body to Charles Darwin.\u00a0 Darwin, like Richard Dawkins today, could not deny the apparent design of life, but determinedly embraced a philosophy of materialism \u2013 matter is everything \u2013 the apparent purpose of life and its structures must be the result of blind, undirected forces.<\/p>\n<p>Historian Jacques Barzun:\u00a0 \u201cThis denial of purpose is Darwin\u2019s distinctive contention.\u201d\u00a0 Dawkins:\u00a0 \u201cNatural selection, the blind, unconscious automatic process which Darwin discovered . . . has no purpose in mind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With no purpose there is no basis for moral truths.\u00a0 We are merely machines, driven by physics, chemistry, and genetic predestination.\u00a0 Obviously, without God humans may impose their own will.\u00a0 Yet I would point out, as I have many times before, that in materialism you and I have no personhood.\u00a0 If matter and physical laws are all there is, then what is love, hope, meaning, purpose, beauty, integrity, logic, and even rationality?\u00a0 These are fundamental to human experience, foundational to what it means to be a person.\u00a0 If our existence is just about physics, then where does your next thought originate?\u00a0 How small a materialistic worldview is!<\/p>\n<p>(Regarding whether Darwin and his modern acolytes have any clue at all, see my free ebook on the subject of creation vs. evolution.)<\/p>\n<p>This conflict of worldviews is critical to the issues of identity and the body.\u00a0 If an unborn child is just a \u2018blob of tissue,\u2019 then abortion seems plausible.\u00a0 But then there are no <em>immoral <\/em>acts of any kind, anywhere and anywhen.<\/p>\n<p>What about casual sex?\u00a0 It\u2019s \u201cno big deal\u201d according to Western culture.\u00a0 Yet I\u2019ve noticed that secular fiction (TV, movies, novels) often gets it right when they portray the tragic consequences of sexual sin:\u00a0 jealousy, violence, divorce, STDs, addiction, etc.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey reports that a <em>Washington Post <\/em>book review opined that it is healthy when teenage girls \u201crefuse to conflate\u201d love and sex, reinforcing the \u201cno big deal\u201d mantra.\u00a0 The <em>Nation <\/em>asked, \u201cWhy should sex have an everlasting warranty of love attached to it?\u201d\u00a0 Yep, if the body is just a lump of matter, why not just play with it?\u00a0 A video by Children\u2019s Television Workshop, used in sex education classes, defines sexual relations as merely \u201csomething done by two adults to give each other pleasure.\u201d\u00a0 There is no mention of marriage or family.<\/p>\n<p>It is ironic, Pearcey notes, that some see sexual hedonism as too much emphasis on the purely physical.\u00a0 Rather, she concludes, it places too low a value on the body, diminishing moral and personal significance.<\/p>\n<p>Extolling the idea of \u201cfriends with benefits,\u201d the <em>New York Times <\/em>explains, \u201cYou just keep it purely sexual, and that way people don\u2019t have mixed expectations, and no one gets hurt.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, avoid actual friendship to avoid emotional connections.\u00a0 Pearcey relates the story of a teenager who was depressed because her hookup partner had just broken up with her.\u00a0 Despite the euphemisms (\u201cfriends with benefits,\u201d \u201chookup culture\u201d), God has wired our human body &amp; soul systems to take sex seriously, within the boundaries of marriage.\u00a0 Troubles multiply outside the boundaries.<\/p>\n<p>Researcher Donna Freitas interviewed hundreds of students and concluded that hookup culture \u201ccreates a drastic divide between <em>physical <\/em>intimacy and <em>emotional <\/em>intimacy,\u201d teaching young people not to \u201creckon with someone\u2019s personhood.\u201d\u00a0 The hookup culture inhibits dissent.\u00a0 If you want more than sex, like friendship, relationship, or commitment, you will be labeled needy, clingy, and dependent.\u00a0 One student said, \u201cIt\u2019s a contest to see who cares less.\u201d\u00a0 This is a denial of the reality of our human nature designed by God.\u00a0 We were designed for marriage, not hookups.<\/p>\n<p>Miriam Grossman, a UCLA psychiatrist, wrote the book <em>Unprotected:\u00a0 A Campus Psychiatrist Reveals How Political Correctness in Her Profession Endangers Every Student, <\/em>after experiencing the consequences of university policies that prevented her from using concepts of \u201cright\u201d and \u201cwrong\u201d when counseling students.<\/p>\n<p>Christian teachings shocked the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century world by commanding husbands to love their wives, to be sexually exclusive and faithful within the marriage, and <em>not <\/em>to seek sexual pleasure with slaves or prostitutes.\u00a0 At the time it was not considered possible that a man could commit adultery, because women were property.\u00a0 Adultery was not a property crime.\u00a0 The Christian view was radical.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey:\u00a0 \u201cBiblical morality is teleological:\u00a0 The purpose of sex is to express the one-flesh covenant bond of marriage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When a mother nurses her baby, her body releases oxytocin, called \u201cthe attachment hormone,\u201d because it promotes the desire to care and nurture.\u00a0 Surprisingly to scientists who discovered this, oxytocin is also generated during sex, especially in women, but also in men.\u00a0 There is a biochemical \/ emotional bond built between a man and a woman . . . intended for marriage.\u00a0 In hookup culture, you build and break such bonds continually and trouble is inevitable.\u00a0 There is biochemistry connected to Paul\u2019s admonition is 1 Cor 6:18 to avoid fornication because you sin against your own body.\u00a0 Grossman notes, \u201cYou might say we are designed to bond.\u201d\u00a0 Studies consistently report that the people who are happiest sexually are married, middle-aged, conservative Christians.\u00a0 Shocking.<\/p>\n<p>The biblical view of the body is wholistic, Pearcey observes.\u00a0 When you eat, you don\u2019t say, \u201cMy mouth is eating;\u201d rather, \u201cI am eating.\u201d\u00a0 You <em>know <\/em>that you don\u2019t just own your body \u2013 your body is part of <em>you<\/em>.\u00a0 Someday the body of the Christian will be redeemed, transformed, resurrected, made immortal, because we are \u201cembodied beings.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century these ideas were counter-cultural.\u00a0 The philosophies of the day, like Gnosticism, typically disparaged the material world as corrupt, inferior to the spiritual.\u00a0 Salvation was about escaping the corrupt physical and ascending to a higher realm.\u00a0 (Note the reinvention of this idea in sci-fi, <em>Stargate SG-<\/em>1, for example.)<\/p>\n<p>Now, biblically, we live in a presently fallen world, but God created it originally as \u201cvery good.\u201d\u00a0 After the 2<sup>nd<\/sup> Coming of Christ, all the \u201cgood\u201d will be restored.\u00a0 God created a lot of stuff.\u00a0 Stuff is not inherently evil.\u00a0 What we do with the stuff can be righteous or sinful.\u00a0 And God will ultimately redeem all the consequences of the Fall.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey comments that what really set Christianity apart in the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century was the incarnation \u2013 that almighty God took on a physical body!\u00a0 Scripture teaches that the Lord Jesus will remain incarnate throughout the rest of eternity.\u00a0 The apostle John offered a test for genuine faith and legitimate preachers in his Gnostic world:\u00a0 \u201cHereby know ye the Spirit of God:\u00a0 Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God.\u201d (1 John 4:2 and surrounding context)<\/p>\n<p>The resurrection of Jesus is a declaration that God will fix this broken world and regenerate our broken bodies.\u00a0 We won\u2019t float on clouds in some ghostly state, but will have physical feet planted on physical streets and buildings and parks and tennis courts in a physical New Earth and New Heaven, headquartered in a physical New Jerusalem.<\/p>\n<p>One horrific consequence of the view that the body is mere biology, sub-personal, is abortion.\u00a0 Virtually everyone believes that \u201clife\u201d begins at conception, but in the <em>Roe v. Wade <\/em>ruling, Justice Harry Blackmun bluntly declared that an unborn baby is not a person.\u00a0 He admitted that if the baby were a person, then abortion would necessarily be illegal.\u00a0 Judge Blackmun will be judged himself for that wicked judgment.<\/p>\n<p>A famous source for mind\/body dualism is Rene Descartes:\u00a0 \u201cI think, therefore I am.\u201d\u00a0 Descartes saw only the mind as the authentic self.\u00a0 Pearcey evaluates this perspective as illogical.\u00a0 \u201cHow can a free mind influence a body that functions as automatically as a machine or a robot?\u00a0 How can a mind control a body whose behavior is determined by mindless mechanical laws?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The issue is intertwined with materialism.\u00a0 How can a non-material mind \/ soul even exist within a matter-only universe?\u00a0 If there is no spiritual, no soul, then Blackmun is no more a person than the unborn baby he is content to discard.<\/p>\n<p>Bioethicist Joseph Fletcher proposes fifteen qualities to define when human life is worthy of respect and protection, including intelligence, self-awareness, self-control, concern for others, and communication.\u00a0 A problem is that such qualities are not binary (you have it or you don\u2019t).\u00a0 They emerge gradually as you grow, in a continuum from conception until death.\u00a0 Differences between persons are quantitative.\u00a0 Pearcey:\u00a0 \u201cWhat we do not find is a clear <em>qualitative<\/em> transition point for the momentous transformation from a non-person to a person.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So equal rights under the law for all <em>persons<\/em> critically depends on your worldview.\u00a0 Does God exist and, therefore, do you as a person exist?\u00a0 What about the unborn baby?\u00a0 What about the old woman in a years-long coma?\u00a0 Even Friedrich Nietzsche, the dedicated atheist, admitted that the \u201cChristian concept . . . of the \u2018equality of souls before God\u2019 . . . furnishes the prototype of <em>all <\/em>theories of equal rights.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, it\u2019s not within our moral rights to decide that someone else has no right to life or liberty.\u00a0 As a being made in the image of God, my rights and your rights are unalienable, bestowed by our Creator, who loves us and provided for our salvation, if we humble ourselves, repent, and trust in Him.\u00a0 Our world\u2019s cultural and legal and moral disasters arise from those who reject such obvious truths.<\/p>\n<p>Ernst Haeckel was Darwin\u2019s foremost apologist in the late 19<sup>th<\/sup> century.\u00a0 Perfectly consistent with his evolutionary dogma, Haeckel saw caring for the disabled as interfering with the survival of the fittest.\u00a0 He urged society to follow \u201cthe example of the Spartans and Redskins\u201d who killed disabled infants immediately after birth.\u00a0 Haeckel also advocated euthanasia for disabled adults, Pearcey notes.<\/p>\n<p>Today there is still a strong correlation between those who embrace evolution and advocacy for euthanasia, abortion, and even the murder of newborn infants who survive an abortion procedure.\u00a0 Worldview matters.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey explains how \u201cthe Harvard criteria\u201d proposed in 1968 at the medical school switched the debate on euthanasia from biology to philosophy.\u00a0 No longer would death be defined as when the heart cannot be restarted or a certain number of cells die, but rather when you suffer a \u2018loss of personhood.\u2019\u00a0 It is so ironic that materialists depart from scientific (measurable) criteria to a standard \u2013 personhood \u2013 that has no meaning whatsoever in an atheistic worldview!\u00a0 And so death becomes a \u201csocial construct.\u201d\u00a0 Pull the plug when it is convenient to whomever has the power or the money.\u00a0 Pearcey observes, \u201cEssentially a patient is no longer a person when the attending physician says so.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One of Nancy\u2019s students works for a suicide hotline.\u00a0 She said, \u201cI spend hours every week persuading people not to end their lives, telling them that their lives still have value.\u00a0 It breaks my heart that people think they must be able to function in a certain way to be considered significant.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The answer to the suicide crisis is, of course, the Gospel.\u00a0 I wonder how many suicide hotlines offer the assured hope that the Lord Jesus offers, not just for eternal life, but to live with meaning, purpose, and the promise that Jesus will walk with you through the travails of this life.<\/p>\n<p>Right-do-die advocates portray euthanasia as <em>compassionate<\/em>.\u00a0 Yet <em>compassion <\/em>means to \u201csuffer with\u201d (<em>com <\/em>= with, <em>passion <\/em>= suffer).\u00a0 True compassion obligates you to help the suffering bear their burdens, to sacrifice your time and effort and resources \u2013 love in action.<\/p>\n<p>When the Declaration of Independence states that \u201call men are created equal,\u201d that includes a disabled person.\u00a0 The body is part of the person, \u201cthe place where we come to know a person.\u201d\u00a0 Thinking biblically makes it easy to evaluate the morality not only of abortion and euthanasia, but also organ harvesting, surrogacy, and the sale of tissue from abortion products or frozen embryos.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s try thinking biblically about same-sex desire.\u00a0 Geneticist Francis Collins writes that \u201csexual orientation is genetically influenced but not hardwired by DNA, and that whatever genes are involved represent predispositions, not predeterminations.\u201d\u00a0 Not disagreeing, gay advocate John Corvino writes, \u201c<em>It doesn\u2019t matter <\/em>whether we\u2019re born this way.\u00a0 The fact is that there are plenty of genetically influenced traits that are nevertheless undesirable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There is plenty of evidence that both maladies and temptations to sin may be genetic (run in families), including depression, alcoholism, drug addiction, and heart disease.\u00a0 In fact, most people find themselves predisposed toward anger, lust, greed, worry, impatience, etc.\u00a0 The underlying factors go far beyond the genetic, of course.\u00a0 The mix of genetic, environmental, experiential, and even free will factors are incredibly complex, beyond quantitative analysis.\u00a0 God actually knows this, yet commands us to choose righteousness and calls sin out for what it is.\u00a0 When we sin it\u2019s because we <em>want to <\/em>and don\u2019t care what God says and, frankly, usually don\u2019t care whether we hurt someone else.\u00a0 Even when tempted, we can choose to resist, and build patterns into our lives that are constructive.\u00a0 God helps, if we seek Him.\u00a0 Christians can help by offering sincere friendships.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to follow Freud who saw every relationship as sexual.<\/p>\n<p>We live in a fallen world, and we can do right even if it\u2019s not easy.<\/p>\n<p>Doug Mainwaring ended his marriage to engage in multiple sexual relationships with men, and became an advocate for same-sex marriage.\u00a0 After ten years he became a Christian, remarried his wife, and they finished raising their children together.\u00a0 He writes, \u201cAlong the way, I learned that marriage is more than just a tradition or a religious or social construct.\u00a0 Monogamous, complementary, conjugal marriage is a pearl of great price worth investing one\u2019s entire life in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey:\u00a0 \u201cOur feelings do not define us.\u00a0 Our moral commitments do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey cites a <em>New York Times <\/em>article that reports that the part of the brain associated with navigation is enlarged in London taxi drivers, as is the region that controls the fingers of the left hand in right-handed violinists.\u00a0 So brains can be \u2018rewired\u2019 by diligent practice.\u00a0 Other brain studies show MRI patterns that shift after trauma or significant events.\u00a0 Biblically, we understand that the brain is a physical tool subject to the immaterial mind \/ soul.\u00a0 Scripture teaches that we can grow in knowledge, wisdom, and even righteousness.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey discusses how Queer Theory produces a very low view of the body, presuming that one\u2019s psychological state, one\u2019s feelings, define the authentic self, disregarding the biological sex you are born with.\u00a0 But why should mere desires and feelings define identity?\u00a0 How much of reality are you willing to deny or reimagine because you have strong feelings today, which may change tomorrow?<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey notes that Christianity is often accused of being anti-sex and anti-body.\u00a0 Clearly, it is the secular post-modern ethic that is anti-body by denying biological reality (given by God\u2019s design) and anti-sex, by relegating sex to mere transient pleasure while despising the God-given institution of marriage.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey:\u00a0 \u201cIt is Christianity that honors the body as male and female, instead of subordinating biological sex to psychological feelings.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey has a lot to say in her chapter, \u201cTrans<em>gender<\/em>, Trans<em>reality<\/em>,\u201d which I won\u2019t summarize here.\u00a0 Please do buy her book.\u00a0 It\u2019s a wonderful reference.\u00a0 One interesting factoid is that the 80 to 90 percent of children who experience some gender confusion, lose those feelings before adulthood.\u00a0 Yet all the power centers of our culture are pressuring children into mutilating and sterilizing treatments and surgeries . . . God\u2019s judgment will be fearsome upon those who destroy children.<\/p>\n<p>There is a nice historical review of <em>social contract theory<\/em> toward the end of the book.\u00a0 The notable proponents were Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau.\u00a0 They imagined what human nature would be like if we could strip away all accumulated marks of civilization:\u00a0 morals, laws, customs, traditions, institutions, and religions.\u00a0 Especially religions.\u00a0 Rejecting biblical history and the Christian worldview, humans were once, supposedly, in a primeval, pre-social state, the \u201cstate of nature.\u201d\u00a0 Individuals were disconnected and autonomous with no natural obligations.\u00a0 Therefore all social relations are constructed by choice.<\/p>\n<p>Jean-Jacques Rousseau\u2019s most famous work, <em>The Social Contract<\/em>, opens famously with, \u201cMan is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.\u201d\u00a0 Accordingly, we have liberty to throw off whatever chains of cultural or social duties we dislike, and invent our own morality, our own rules . . . or none at all.<\/p>\n<p>Social contract theory was primarily applied, at first, to politics and economics.\u00a0 But now, it intrudes everywhere.\u00a0 Rejecting the Bible, we reject Scriptural principles for the God-given institutions of the family, the church, and government.\u00a0 Let\u2019s create our own visions for alternative forms of marriage and the family, for example.<\/p>\n<p>Pearcey points out that, contrary to Hobbes, \u201cwe do not pop up overnight like mushrooms after a rain.\u201d\u00a0 Starting as a helpless baby, we are born into a pre-existing family, clan, church, town, and nation.\u00a0 We mature into adulthood only if others, especially parents, commit to us sacrificially.\u00a0 God designed this pattern; God designed the family, including the strong natural bonds that inspire and ground us.<\/p>\n<p>She cites the Charles Bronson character in the (terrific) movie <em>The Magnificent Seven<\/em>, who tells a group of boys in a poor village, \u201cYou think I\u2019m brave because I carry a gun.\u00a0 Well, your fathers are much braver because they carry responsibility:\u00a0 for you, your brothers, your sisters, and your mothers.\u00a0 . . . They do it because they love you, and they want to.\u00a0 I have never had this kind of courage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve noticed that God\u2019s system works, even when practiced by non-believers.\u00a0 Years ago I got to know the families that lived in my cul-de-sac, none of which were Christians.\u00a0 They were all middle-aged or older, had avoided divorce, had raised their children to be productive adults, and were \u2018responsible citizens.\u2019\u00a0 Only one had enjoyed a \u2018professional \/ executive\u2019 level job.\u00a0 Another had been a \u2018garbageman,\u2019 one had been a postal worker, one worked in an auto factory, and another had a modest job in construction.\u00a0 But they all prospered \u2013 nice houses, nice cars, and apparently happy in their lives, as far as I could tell.\u00a0 Namely, they all worked largely within God\u2019s framework for family, work, and civic life, and enjoyed the benefits.<\/p>\n<p>My neighbors lived reasonably in sync with reality.\u00a0 Unfortunately, much of America does not, anymore.\u00a0 Trouble results and disaster looms.\u00a0 The way to optimally live in sync with reality is to repent, trust Christ, become a born-again Christian, and live in accordance with God\u2019s Scriptural principles for life.\u00a0 Anyone can do that, but it first requires humility \u2013 that we are not autonomous, independent creatures, that we are not little gods who can shape our own version of reality.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211; <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n192. Signals of Transcendence<br \/>\nMarch 1, 2024 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Why am I here?\u00a0 What is life all about?\u00a0 What\u2019s the point of it all, anyway?\u00a0 Many ask these questions.\u00a0 Many dismiss them quickly, repeatedly.\u00a0 Some begin a quest to find THE answers, but end up in the wrong place.\u00a0 Some find TRUTH and it changes everything.<\/p>\n<p>Os Guinness has written an intriguing book, <em>Signals of Transcendence <\/em>(2023), each chapter a case study of some notable figure who, at a key point in his or her life, cried out, \u201cThere must be <em>something more<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 Guinness credits his mentor, Peter Berger, for coining the term \u2018signals of transcendence\u2019 to describe the experiences that provoke the soul to yearn for more than can be seen.<\/p>\n<p>Is life merely \u201ca tale told by an idiot,\u201d as Shakespeare says in <em>Macbeth<\/em>, or is it just a \u201ctrash bag of random coincidences torn open in a wind,\u201d as Joseph Heller wrote?\u00a0 Guinness asks, \u201cWill it be chance, necessity, determinism, karma, or our stars?\u201d\u00a0 Or is there something . . . someone . . . ultimate, God as revealed in the Bible, who draws all to him, as in John 12:32 and John 6:44, 55?<\/p>\n<p>I can think of three especially poignant \u2018signal\u2019 experiences in my life.\u00a0 The first I\u2019ve written on elsewhere on this site, regarding the crisis of pointlessness I had as a teenage atheist that led to my conversion.\u00a0 Guinness advises us that \u201csignals only signal.\u201d\u00a0 They don\u2019t come with the full story.\u00a0 It\u2019s up to us to take the steps that lead to answers.\u00a0 In my case I had no idea where to look, since I had rejected all religion when I rejected my Roman Catholic heritage, and since it was the evolutionary worldview, that suffused all of my formal education, that had provoked the \u2018life-has-no-purpose\u2019 crisis in the first place.<\/p>\n<p>If we are just \u2018naked apes,\u2019 or selfish genes, or as Plato put it, \u201cfeatherless bipeds,\u201d there would be no hope, no point.\u00a0 (Diogenes responded to Plato by plucking a chicken, throwing it into the assembly, and declaring, \u201cHere is your Platonic man.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>God was gracious to me.\u00a0 With perfect timing he crossed my path with a Christian family, offering me the chance to respond when I heard some truths I\u2019d never considered before.\u00a0 It took several months for me to work through this new landscape, but when I realized that Jesus is exactly who He claims to be in Scripture, I believed.\u00a0 Life changed completely, forever.<\/p>\n<p>Guinness\u2019 first chapter describes the <em>signal <\/em>event in the life of Malcolm Muggeridge, the prolific and famous writer and journalist.\u00a0 In WW2 Muggeridge was an intelligence officer monitoring German shipping in Mozambique, what seemed to him to be an utterly pointless role in a life altogether too pointless thus far.\u00a0 He was drunk, alone, depressed, and decided to commit suicide.\u00a0 He swam out into the ocean, planning to go too far to possibly return.\u00a0 But he glanced back at one point, saw the lights along the coast and thought of his wife, Kitty, back in England.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey were the lights of the world; they were the lights of my home, my habitat, where I belonged.\u00a0 I must reach them.\u00a0 There followed an overwhelming joy such as I had never experienced before; an ecstasy.\u201d\u00a0 He swam back.\u00a0 He had hope again.\u00a0 Was he converted?\u00a0 No, not at all.\u00a0 But he began a quest for meaning.<\/p>\n<p>Guinness reports that Muggeridge eventually became a Christian, which is the consensus view.\u00a0 His \u2018Christianity\u2019 however, was at first Anglican, then later Roman Catholic.\u00a0 Muggeridge brought Mother Theresa to the attention of the world in his TV documentary, <em>Something Beautiful for God.<\/em>\u00a0 In short, Malcolm properly started the quest, but landed in the wrong destination in the end.\u00a0 It is significant, I believe, that Guinness provides no details of an actual born again conversion experience or testimony on the part of Muggeridge.<\/p>\n<p>I love Os Guinness, but he has a serious lack of discernment about what is wheat and what is tare within Christendom.\u00a0 Not that it\u2019s easy!\u00a0 And there is no way to validate any specific case of true vs. false conversion while we reside under this blue sky.\u00a0 But in this case there are definite clues that, while Malcolm Muggeridge became a theist, and even embraced Christendom, he never understood the Gospel.\u00a0 If he had, he would not have fallen into the grasp of Rome.<\/p>\n<p>W. H. Auden was one of the 20<sup>th<\/sup> century\u2019s foremost poets, according to Guinness and many others. WW2 was underway, but the U.S. had not yet entered the war. He visited a local cinema in Manhattan in a largely German-speaking community.\u00a0 The film was a documentary of the Nazi conquest of Poland; it was graphic and violent.\u00a0 Auden, an Englishman, was horrified to hear the audience cry out in support of the Germans \u2013 \u201cKill the Poles!\u00a0 Kill them!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Auden\u2019s convictions until this point had included a belief in the natural goodness of mankind, and that the solutions to the world\u2019s problems could be found in politics, education, and psychology.\u00a0 The cinema experience convinced him he was wrong.\u00a0 The Nazis\u2019 actions were absolute evil and must be judged and condemned.\u00a0 Auden had been in sync with the late 19<sup>th<\/sup> century book by Herbert Spencer, <em>Social Statics,<\/em> which asserted \u201cevil perpetually tends to disappear. . . . Progress, therefore, is not an accident but a necessity.\u00a0 Evil and immorality must surely disappear; man must surely become perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spencer was simply expressing the optimism of the 18<sup>th<\/sup> century Enlightenment but, as Guinness states, \u201cafter the Great War it was ludicrous and after World War II and the Nazi death camps, it was unthinkable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Auden\u2019s elite education had assured him that there were no absolutes in his universe.\u00a0 Judging anything absolutely was done only by \u201cthe great unwashed.\u201d\u00a0 God was dead (Nietzsche) and truth was dead and all that was left was relativism (your truth \/ my truth) and emotivism (what I feel is good is good, etc.).\u00a0 How could anyone judge the Nazis if there were no absolute standards?\u00a0 Yet they <em>must <\/em>be judged!<\/p>\n<p>Berger wrote, \u201cDeeds that cry out to heaven also cry out for hell.\u201d\u00a0 Many proclaimed that \u201changing is not enough\u201d for Eichmann.\u00a0 The soul demands damnation in the full biblical sense.\u00a0 Only God can deliver that.<\/p>\n<p>Winston Churchill once growled that a powerful argument for God \u201cwas the existence of Lenin and Trotsky, for whom a hell was needed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Auden entered the theatre an atheist and left it a seeker after an unconditional absolute.\u00a0 Eventually, he began attending church and became a Christian.\u00a0 Once again, Guinness reports no clarity \u2013 no testimony from Auden and no distinctive change of life in accord with New Testament principles.\u00a0 Wikipedia mentions that Auden was an Anglican and that he had a serious homosexual relationship in the 1940s.\u00a0 So, was W. H. Auden a \u2018born again\u2019 type of Christian?\u00a0 Guinness offers nothing.\u00a0 Did Auden have a \u2018signal\u2019 experience that changed his perspective?\u00a0 I don\u2019t doubt Guinness on this.\u00a0 But that\u2019s a long way from repentance and saving faith.<\/p>\n<p>G. K. Chesterton, author of 80 books, 200 short stories, hundreds of poems, and thousands of essays, is a favorite of Guinness. Chesterton\u2019s \u2018signal\u2019 arose from wrestling with the dichotomies of beauty and brokenness, optimism and pessimism. In his book <em>Orthodoxy <\/em>he writes that Christianity was accused of being too optimistic about the universe, and of being too pessimistic about the world.\u00a0 He realized that this made sense, however, in the Bible\u2019s account of creation and the Fall.<\/p>\n<p>What Guinness (and Chesterton) should have realized is that prophecy\u2019s end, the 2<sup>nd<\/sup> Coming, and the New Heaven \/ New Earth as restoration of the creation, completes the arc and is the foundation for the ultimate hope of every believer, whether healthy and prosperous, or tortured and dying in a dungeon for his faith.<\/p>\n<p>But Chesterton landed on potentially fruitful ground, realizing that the Christian worldview allowed him to be both optimistic and pessimistic simultaneously.\u00a0 It explained \u201cwhy I could feel homesick at home.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chesterton finished his autobiography just weeks before he died, ending with a chapter entitled \u201cThe God with the Golden Key,\u201d describing his faith as \u201cthe overwhelming conviction that there is one key which can unlock all doors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He famously argued, \u201cThe worst moment for an atheist is when he is genuinely thankful, but has nobody to thank.\u201d\u00a0 And, \u201cIf my children wake up on Christmas morning and have somebody to thank for putting candy in their stocking, have I no one to thank for putting two feet into mine?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chesterton\u2019s most famous fictional character was Father Brown, the small town priest who solved crimes the police always seemed to get wrong.\u00a0 The moral themes in the story were right in Chesterton\u2019s wheelhouse because, yes, G. K. was a staunch Roman Catholic.\u00a0 He was even considered for RCC sainthood.\u00a0 Accordingly, I can find no clear testimony from Chesterton to indicate he knew he was lost in his sins, humbled himself, repented, and was born again.\u00a0 If he had been truly born again, understanding the Gospel and his own accountability and responsibility, surely he would not have dwelt contentedly within Roman Catholicism, with its sacramental grace, priestly intercessions, and works-based uncertainties regarding eternal life.<\/p>\n<p>C. S. Lewis decided that he was an atheist at the age of 14. For me, it was at 13. His parents were religious, but nominal, members of the Church of Ireland.\u00a0 My family was Roman Catholic \u2013 my mother and her relatives were fairly serious RCs, while my dad turned out to be an agnostic.\u00a0 Lewis\u2019 atheism was triggered by his mother\u2019s death when he was nine, his father\u2019s coldness, and his own horrific experiences in the trenches of WW1.\u00a0 He was also rebellious, despising authority, and loved the autonomy of atheism.\u00a0 For me it was both the moral autonomy and the constant drumbeat of evolution that I experienced in my public Junior High, the Chicago Museum of Natural History, the subscription to <em>Scientific American <\/em>my parents were so generous to provide me, and a host of books on my dad\u2019s shelves that supported an evolutionary worldview.<\/p>\n<p>In Lewis\u2019 autobiography, <em>Surprised by Joy<\/em>, he admitted to \u201can inconsolable longing\u201d for something beyond human experience.\u00a0 He longed for Joy \u2013 with a capital \u201cJ\u201d \u2013 as distinguished from both pleasure and happiness, which depend on transitory experiences . . . a beautiful landscape, the smell of perfume, etc.\u00a0 Yet Joy could be triggered by beauty, music, poetry, and human love.<\/p>\n<p>On a summer day he had a memory of his brother, Warnie, with a toy garden, the memory overwhelming him with a sensation of blissful joy.\u00a0 But then it was gone; the world was ordinary again.\u00a0 Eventually, he realized that these \u2018whiffs\u2019 of something transcendental, these \u2018signals\u2019 pointed to something beyond all human objects.\u00a0 The \u2018whiff\u2019 simply was triggered by something terrestrial.\u00a0 He knew that it was foolish to make idols out of objects or experiences associated with them.\u00a0 So he began his search.<\/p>\n<p>A fellow don at Oxford \u2013 a skeptic \u2013 remarked that the evidence for the historicity of the Gospels was \u201csurprisingly good.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 This shook up Lewis:\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cIf he, the cynic of cynics, the toughest of the toughs, were not \u2018safe,\u2019 where could I turn?\u00a0 Was there then no escape?\u201d\u00a0 Lewis began to study the Gospel accounts and became convinced of their truth.<\/p>\n<p>He described his crisis point as feeling \u201cthe steady, unrelenting approach of Him who I desired so earnestly not to meet.\u00a0 That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me.\u00a0 In the Trinity Term of 1930 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed:\u00a0 perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Now, I\u2019ve written about C. S. Lewis before, and presented evidence that he never understood the Gospel at a personal level, that he knew he was a sinner under just condemnation, needing forgiveness, and expressing a sincere repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus.\u00a0 Consider the testimony above.\u00a0 As far as I know, he never recanted that miserable profession, never explained that he was \u2018kidding,\u2019 that he was in fact extraordinarily grateful that he found forgiveness and embraced a desire to follow Jesus.\u00a0 In his book <em>God in the Dock<\/em>, a collection of writings, he recounts many events where circumstances cried out for him to challenge or plead with lost sinners to repent and believe the Gospel, but failed to do so without any hint of conscience.\u00a0 In his most famous book, <em>Mere Christianity<\/em>, he shows zero discernment regarding the heresies that abound within Christendom.\u00a0 Doctrine seems to matter not at all, even the vital doctrines tied to the salvation of souls.<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, Lewis turned from atheism to become a strong advocate for theism, and even Christendom.\u00a0 But a born again Christian?\u00a0 I hope I\u2019m wrong, but I don\u2019t expect to see him in Heaven.\u00a0 And I am fully aware that I am in a tiny minority on this.<\/p>\n<p>In discussing his grandfather, Whitfield Guinness, Os argues that human love is a poignant signal that God provides to help sinners find Him.\u00a0 He quotes a line from a Michael Martin Murphy song: \u201cIf love never lasts forever, tell me what\u2019s forever for?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Love is a loud signal \u201cbecause it is a rare moment when we are simultaneously most ourselves and least ourselves.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cLove reaches out, love risks, love offers, love affirms, love gives.\u201d\u00a0 (See also 1 Corinthians chapter 13.)\u00a0 Love fuses two people into one, culminating in marriage, at least what marriage should be.<\/p>\n<p>Yet human love crashes against mortality.\u00a0 The cherry blossom is gorgeous in full bloom, but then it dies so soon.\u00a0 The grip of love on the human soul cries out for eternity.\u00a0 Shouldn\u2019t love last forever?\u00a0 Only God\u2019s love satifies this yearning, because God <em>is <\/em>love, God is the author of love, God is the source of love and offers His love for eternity . . . purchased by His blood on a cruel cross.\u00a0 We must come via the cross.<\/p>\n<p>Whatever the signal, whether love or joy or beauty or an epiphany of understanding, Os Guinness challenges the reader to pay attention.\u00a0 \u201cBe ready, then, for the call that will come to you in your life.\u00a0 Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear.\u201d\u00a0 What Guinness fails to make clear, throughout his book, is the destination, the Gospel, what <em>everyone <\/em>must understand about salvation, and what to do about it.\u00a0 How do you write a book like this and leave that out?<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s right in his concluding remarks that \u201cthe perspiration that follows the signal is as important to the search as the inspiration.\u201d\u00a0 He\u2019s right in describing the materialist \/ secularist worldview as \u201cpoor, narrow, and constricting.\u201d\u00a0 He\u2019s right in that for anyone and everyone, \u201cthe time is ripe for a great escape, a grand spiritual awakening.\u201d\u00a0 He agrees with Tolstoy that someone needs to \u201ctear asunder the enchanted circle in which people are now shackled.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Well, that\u2019s the job of the evangelist, the Christian \u2013 <em>any <\/em>Christian who cares about souls.\u00a0 Based on many other writings and interviews, I\u2019m confident that Os Guinness is a born again Christian.\u00a0 If this were the only book of his I had available, though, I would really wonder.\u00a0 Is this a sign of the times, a delusion of Satan that beclouds the minds of God\u2019s people so they don\u2019t make clear the pressing need for the salvation of souls all around them?\u00a0 I don\u2019t know, but it is distressing.<\/p>\n<p>The theme of <em>Signals of Transcendence<\/em> is vital.\u00a0 The execution of the theme within this book is lacking.\u00a0 But it is still worth reading.\u00a0 It will provoke the Christian who <em>cares <\/em>about souls to be sensitive to the signals \u2013 the drawing of the Holy Spirit \u2013 in the lives of lost sinners all around us.\u00a0 And even if you aren\u2019t aware of the signals touching those around you, just take a shot anyway.\u00a0 Hand out some tracts this week.\u00a0 Start a conversation with someone who lingers and explain the Gospel.\u00a0 Make it personal.\u00a0 Don\u2019t let someone go to Hell without a clear warning.\u00a0 Love them enough to give them a chance!<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n<strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;- <\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><br \/>\n193. Politics is Personal: The Devil &#038; Karl Marx<br \/>\nApril 1, 2024 <\/strong> <\/p>\n<p>In 1862 Karl Marx wrote a letter to his friend and partner, Friedrich Engels, noting that his wife\u2019s misery was so poignant and persistent that she said every day that she wished to die.\u00a0 Marx commented, \u201cBlessed is he who has no family.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Aristotle once wrote, \u201cMen start revolutionary changes for reasons connected with their private lives.\u201d\u00a0 Marx was followed by a long line of communist revolutionaries, from Lenin to Mao to Castro to Che, etc., whose personal lives also were dysfunctional, corrupt, and utterly self-centered.\u00a0 Their apparent coping strategy was to build tyrannies to visit their misery on the multitudes they sought to control.\u00a0 Paul Kengor:\u00a0 \u201cNo other political ideology has produced as much wretched poverty, rank repression, and sheer violence.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This is the theme of the 2020 book, <em>The Devil and Karl Marx:\u00a0 Communism\u2019s Long March of Death, Deception, and Infiltration<\/em>, by Paul Kengor, which focuses on the (truly) Satanic influences in the life of Karl Marx, and how these influences have brought misery to the world ever since . . . even and especially in present-day America, in which the culture and every institution is infested and afflicted by Marxist ideology and tactics.\u00a0 Militant atheism and a rabid anti-Christianity were at the core of Marx\u2019s beliefs and have been central to communism ever since.\u00a0 In the <em>Communist Manifesto<\/em>, Marx and Engels declared, \u201cCommunism begins where atheism begins.\u00a0 Communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Consider its success today.\u00a0 Regarding the LGBTQIA+ takeover of law and culture, the strange proliferation of drag queen story hours, the sexualization of children including pornography in school libraries . . . where are the moral boundaries?\u00a0 No one asks the cultural Marxists, \u201cWhat would be immoral?\u00a0 Where\u2019s the line?\u201d\u00a0 Of course there are no boundaries for the Marxist, the dedicated follower of Satan.\u00a0 The goal is deconstruction, obliteration of morality and the Christian foundations that enable a peaceful civilization.\u00a0 Nikolai Bukharin, <em>Pravda\u2019s <\/em>founding editor and a lieutenant to Lenin and Stalin asserted, \u201cA fight to the death must be declared upon religion . . . (we must) take on religion at the tip of the bayonet.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Well, then, \u201cCry \u2018Havoc\u2019, and let slip the dogs of war!\u201d, as Marc Antony (and General Chang) said.\u00a0 Hey, Christian, wake up!\u00a0 The war is approaching a crescendo whether you\u2019re on the field or not.\u00a0 Your part is spiritual \u2013 particularly, the Great Commission \u2013 so grab some tracts and head out to a neighborhood or a store and launch some Gospel missiles into the fray.<\/p>\n<p>OK, well, back to our story . . .<\/p>\n<p>From Marx\u2019s <em>Communist Manifesto,<\/em> along with other writings, Kengor summarizes a few key principles:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Communism seeks \u201cto abolish the present state of things.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Communist goals can be achieved \u201conly by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Communists will support all kinds of revolutionary movements as long as they work against the existing social and political order.<\/li>\n<li>A fruitful communist tactic is the \u201cruthless criticism of all that exists.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Marx loves the quote from Goethe\u2019s <em>Faust<\/em>: \u201cEverything that exists deserves to perish.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>In Marx\u2019s essay declaring that religion is \u201cthe opium of the people,\u201d he asserted that \u201cthe criticism of religion is the beginning of all criticism.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>You might observe that these sentiments are perfectly in sync with Satan\u2019s desire to overthrow God, destroy His imagebearers, and tear down everything good in creation.\u00a0 Robert Payne\u2019s biography of Marx includes this analysis:\u00a0 \u201cAnd after he has abolished property, family, and nations, and all existing societies, Marx shows little interest in creating a new society on the ruins of the old.\u201d\u00a0 In one of Marx\u2019s poems he imagines throwing a gauntlet at the world (the <em>Communist Manifesto<\/em>, perhaps), watching the world crumble, and wandering through the ruins, his words glowing, with a heart like the heart of God.\u00a0 Perfectly Satanic.<\/p>\n<p>Kengor points out that a lot of people don\u2019t recognize Marxism\u2019s war against all of us today, because they think of it in the 19<sup>th<\/sup> century terms in which Karl Marx developed it \u2013 economic war between the working class and the property-holding elites.\u00a0 By the mid-20<sup>th<\/sup> century communist \u2018intellectuals\u2019 recognized that the economics of communism had failed completely, and so they shifted to the cultural and the sexual.\u00a0 But the vision never changed \u2013 destroy Chrisitianity, destroy morality, persecute Christians, and corrupt the society so severely that it cannot recover.\u00a0 From Satan\u2019s point of view in the spiritual realm, harden the culture so thoroughly that the Gospel will be despised and no one would consider becoming a Christian.\u00a0 The Devil wants to populate Hell with as many image-bearers as possible.<\/p>\n<p>Kengor notes that as he drafted his last chapter, the lead article at CPUSA\u2019s website was entitled, \u201cThe Capitalist Culture of Male Supremacy and Misogyny.\u201d\u00a0 Such is the intellectual fare of modern communists.<\/p>\n<p>In the book\u2019s Foreward, Michael Knowles observes that socialism has succeeded everywhere it has been tried, \u201cat least for a time.\u201d\u00a0 He points out that the problem with socialism isn\u2019t the inefficiency, but rather the evil.\u00a0 Karl Marx, like modern Marxists, \u201csought to radically transform society by changing human nature.\u201d\u00a0 This is Satan\u2019s war against God, featuring persistent denials of the reality created and sustained by God.<\/p>\n<p>I would go further than Knowles.\u00a0 It\u2019s not that socialism succeeds, only apparently, for just\u00a0 a while when it takes over.\u00a0 It succeeds thoroughly by corrupting and destroying souls for a generation at least, once it takes hold within a nation.\u00a0 It is designed to corrupt and to destroy.\u00a0 As of 2023 the Russian and Chinese tyrannies have persisted for a century.\u00a0 How many souls have perished in that century, particularly those who were prevented from hearing or considering (freely) the Gospel?<\/p>\n<p>Kengor:\u00a0 \u201cMarxism from the outset was a seriously perverse ideology that brooded in misery, wallowed in misery, advanced itself in the name of misery, and ultimately produced misery.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Under communism there are no individual <em>unalienable <\/em>rights, no rights endowed by the Creator.\u00a0 I have lived long enough to see, amazingly, free speech disappear on college campuses and in other aspects of American life.\u00a0 I recently saw a news report that Harvard University was ranked worst among all American colleges and universities for free speech.\u00a0 Students profess that it is impossible to have friendly and open discussions on a large list of topics wherein the Marxist narratives have already been settled.<\/p>\n<p>Ronald Reagan wondered whether mankind can survive Communism.\u00a0 He called it a \u201cvicious disease.\u201d\u00a0 Also, \u201cCommunism is neither an economic or a political system \u2013 it is a form of insanity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Insanity:\u00a0 a denial of God\u2019s ordained reality.\u00a0 Marx\u2019s biographer, Robert Payne, concluded that Marx \u201chad the devil\u2019s view of the world, and the devil\u2019s malignity.\u00a0 Sometimes he knew that he was accomplishing works of evil.\u201d\u00a0 Payne further speculated that Marx, although not a Satanist \u2013 after all, Marx was a determined atheist \u2013 was, in fact, possessed by a demonic spirit.<\/p>\n<p>A caveat on Paul Kengor\u2019s perspective \u2013 he views spiritual warfare from a Roman Catholic perspective.\u00a0 Accordingly, he is happy to quote RC authors, Pope Benedict XVI, for example, who noted that the fatal flaw of communists is that their anthropology is wrong:\u00a0 they don\u2019t understand man, especially man\u2019s spiritual need to find God.\u00a0 A consequence of this denial of reality is the original emphasis of Marxism, that economics is the alpha and omega of human existence.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus, however, reminded Satan that man does not live by bread alone.\u00a0 Satan, rather, historically inspired communists to obsess on money and material things.\u00a0 Currently, the emphasis has shifted to identity or denial of one\u2019s God-given identity.\u00a0 Whatever works.\u00a0 Whatever serves to deny God\u2019s order and distract men and women and children from recognizing their need of forgiveness and salvation.<\/p>\n<p>Marx wrote that human nature had to be changed.\u00a0 In the Soviet Union, the idealized \u2018Soviet man\u2019 would learn, drill, and memorize the text of the <em>Communist Manifesto<\/em>, while shunning any counter-revolutionary literature, especially the Bible.\u00a0 Religion was considered to be a powerful enemy, not to be taken lightly.<\/p>\n<p>Communists have therefore persecuted Christians diligently.\u00a0 Richard Wurmbrand, in his autobiography <em>Tortured for Christ<\/em>, states, \u201cAll the biblical descriptions of hell and the pains of Dante\u2019s <em>Inferno<\/em> are nothing in comparison with the tortures in Communist prisons.\u201d\u00a0 Some torturers would declare, \u201cI am the devil.\u201d\u00a0 Another told him:\u00a0 \u201cI thank God in whom I don\u2019t believe, that I have lived to this hour when I can express all the evil in my heart.\u201d\u00a0 Wurmbrand experienced first-hand how Communism deals with its enemies.<\/p>\n<p>In their <em>Communist Manifesto <\/em>(1848), Marx and Engels advocated the abolition of private property and right of inheritance, centralization and state control of communication, transportation, industry, and agriculture, and a free public school education to conform the thinking of future generations.\u00a0 Strikingly, they proclaimed, \u201cAbolition of the family!\u201d\u00a0 They desired \u201cthe most radical rupture in traditional relations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They admitted their program required despotism, and that \u201ctheir ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.\u201d\u00a0 Revolution, even violence would be necessary.\u00a0 Lenin followed this path in Russia:\u00a0 \u201cThe truth is that no revolution can be successful unless the resistance of the exploiters is crushed.\u201d\u00a0 We should recall these sentiments when we observe the antics of the Left in the West.\u00a0 Regardless of the topic, there is no interest in analysis or debate; the tactics are intimidation, defamation, even violence.<\/p>\n<p>The young Karl Marx was a determined poet.\u00a0 Poetry was his refuge.\u00a0 But his poetry was dark and troubled.\u00a0 For example . . . \u201cthe hellish vapors rise and fill the brain, Till I go mad and my heart is utterly changed.\u00a0 See this sword?\u00a0 The Prince of Darkness sold it to me.\u00a0 For me he beats the time and gives the signs.\u00a0 Ever more boldly I play the dance of death.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The poem is entitled, \u201cThe Player,\u201d whose identity is clearly Lucifer, and the music he plays frenetically is meant to accompany the end of the world.\u00a0 The Player, a violinist, destroys the world to spite God, while deriding and mocking the Creator.<\/p>\n<p>In another poem, the love of his life drinks poison and dies and goes to the flames.\u00a0 Robert Payne comments, \u201cfor a man does not write such things unless he is on the verge of madness or despair.\u201d\u00a0 Tragically, the evil in Marx\u2019s life was visited upon those around him.\u00a0 Two of Marx\u2019s daughters killed themselves with poison in suicide pacts.<\/p>\n<p>A notable aspect of Kengor\u2019s book is that most biographies of Marx neglect the spiritual issues, discounting the Satanic, and relegating the early poems of Marx to the folly of youth.\u00a0 Namely, most biographers take a secular perspective on his life, a perspective that Marx, himself, might well be content with.<\/p>\n<p>Marx also wrote a poetic play entitled <em>Oulanem<\/em>, an anagram for \u201cManuelo,\u201d or \u201cEmmanuel\u201d \u2013 God.\u00a0 In the play violence is turned against all of mankind; the characters are learned in the arts of destruction and are consumed with a rage for vengeance.\u00a0 This was Marx\u2019s attempt to match Goethe\u2019s <em>Faust<\/em>.\u00a0 Marx loved Goethe\u2019s line, \u201cEverything that exists deserves to perish,\u201d and used it in multiple writings.\u00a0 In <em>Oulanem<\/em> every character is aware of his own corruption and yet flaunts it and celebrates it.\u00a0 Such celebration of evil is certainly prevalent in our current culture, more than in any previous generation, perhaps since the days of Noah.<\/p>\n<p>Karl was born Jewish, but his parents converted and raised him to be Lutheran.\u00a0 Karl became an atheist in his college years.\u00a0 In his thesis at age 23 in 1841 he quoted the Roman philosopher Lucretius, condemning the \u201cburden of oppressive religion,\u201d and \u201cReligion lies at our feet, completely defeated.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As a teen and young adult, Marx refused to work for a living, parasitically drawing income from his parents.\u00a0 When his parents finally cut him off, it enraged him.\u00a0 Karl\u2019s mother wished that \u201cKarl would accumulate capital instead of just writing about it.\u201d\u00a0 His wife complained along the same lines, bitterly.\u00a0 Karl\u2019s wife and children were regularly short of money, food, a steady roof over their heads, and even medical care.\u00a0 After the financial cutoff, Karl didn\u2019t visit his mother for twenty years, and only then to pressure her for cash.<\/p>\n<p>Karl was a serial moocher, trying to hustle relatives, friends, fellow travelers in the Communist cause, and anyone he might con into supporting him.\u00a0 Marx envied Engels\u2019 wealth and begged money from him continually; eventually Engels cut off the money flow, too.\u00a0 Marx\u2019s personal habits were disgusting:\u00a0 drinking, smoking, lack of exercise, warts and boils from lack of washing, the stink of not washing his clothes.\u00a0 The apartment was always a mess, with broken furniture, broken dishes, and broken toys strewn about.<\/p>\n<p>The point is that when Satan takes over a life, it affects every aspect.<\/p>\n<p>The family \u2018employed\u2019 a nanny, Lenchen, but Karl didn\u2019t pay her.\u00a0 Kengor:\u00a0 The \u201cchampion of the proletariat, protestor against wage exploitation, never paid Lenchen a penny.\u201d She was a virtual bondslave, and was sexually abused by Karl, which was a grief to his wife, Jenny.\u00a0 Lenchen eventually got pregnant.\u00a0 Karl refused to admit his responsibility and never paid any child support.<\/p>\n<p>Karl and Jenny had three daughters, but he denied them an adequate education, hindered them from pursuing careers, and was hostile to suitors.\u00a0 Four of Marx\u2019s six children died before he did, and the two daughters who survived him later committed suicide.<\/p>\n<p>Karl was also an outspoken racist against blacks and Jews, despite his Jewish heritage.\u00a0 Kengor has much to say about Karl\u2019s specific racist comments, but I won\u2019t mention them here.<\/p>\n<p>Friedrich Engels was also morally degenerate.\u00a0 A year after Marx\u2019s death in 1883, Engels published his book, <em>The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.<\/em>\u00a0 It included considerable material contributed by Marx.\u00a0 Some of the ideas . . . a mother\u2019s housework should be co-opted by the State, so mothers can return to more \u2018meaningful\u2019 work in the fields and factories.\u00a0 Childcare would be a communal task.\u00a0 Education, of course, would be State-run.\u00a0 Engels hoped, \u201cThe single family ceases to be the economic unit of society.\u201d\u00a0 One useful result, he anticipated, would be \u201cthe gradual growth of unconstrained sexual intercourse.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Lenin followed Marx in hating God and God\u2019s works:\u00a0 \u201cAny religious idea, any idea of any god at all, any flirtation even with a god, is the most inexpressible foulness . . . the most shameful \u2018infection.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Lenin likened religious belief to venereal disease.<\/p>\n<p>On Christmas day in 1919, Comrade Lenin ordered his secret police to be alert to anyone who failed to show up for work . . . they should be shot.\u00a0 In the summer of 1918 in the Yekaterinburg diocese, forty-seven clergymen were shot, drowned, or axed to death.\u00a0 This was just one incident in a long campaign directed by Lenin.<\/p>\n<p>Leon Trotsky rejoiced in Darwinism.\u00a0 \u201cThe idea of evolution and determinism took possession of me completely . . . I was intoxicated with his (Darwin\u2019s) thought.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>We can trace a direct line of ideology from Marx through Lenin through other Marxists right up to the present day.\u00a0 Hatred of God and God\u2019s word is core to Critical Race Theory, gender ideology, and every wokist perversion under the sun.<\/p>\n<p>The Soviet Union was officially atheist.\u00a0 \u201cIt was not neutral,\u201d Kengor notes.\u00a0 This hostility continues today in China, North Korea, and Cuba.\u00a0 Leftists in the West are working hard in the same direction.<\/p>\n<p>Marx designed a philosophical system and a ruthless mindset to enable the overthrow of the existing order, but did not explain how to rule after the success of the revolution.\u00a0 Marx figured, \u201call contradictions would be resolved, man and the world would finally sort themselves out.\u00a0 Then everything would be able to proceed by itself along the right path.\u201d\u00a0 In effect, utopia would follow the revolution \u2018naturally.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Marxist revolutions have certainly had their opportunities.\u00a0 Communists were successful in the revolutions of Russia, China, Cuba, Vietnam, Venezuela, and other places.\u00a0 Tragedies followed in every case . . . inevitably.\u00a0 The ongoing revolutions in the West show the same trademarks.\u00a0 In CRT, once the white supremacists (all of the white people) are demonized and oppressed and the reparations are forcibly extracted, what then?\u00a0 Does utopia break out?\u00a0 There are no answers from the communists who surround us.<\/p>\n<p>Kengor has much to say about liberal or progressive \u2018Christians,\u2019 and their sympathy with Communist causes, sharing sentiments about workers\u2019 rights, wealth redistribution, and other areas generally lumped into \u2018social justice.\u2019\u00a0 An expert ex-communist, Herbert Romerstein, concluded that communists found progressive pastors to be \u201cthe biggest suckers of them all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As an example, Kengor recounts how communists infiltrated men\u2019s groups within the RCC in the 1930s.\u00a0 Catholic men\u2019s groups were quite active in anti-communist initiatives back then.\u00a0 But communists were even able to infiltrate the editorial board of <em>Wisdom<\/em>, a Catholic anti-communist publication.<\/p>\n<p>In the 1930s political realm, communists within the Roosevelt administration convinced FDR to establish formal diplomatic relations with Stalin\u2019s totalitarian USSR, after previous US presidents had rejected Stalin\u2019s attempts.<\/p>\n<p>American communist leader Earl Browder was proud of their successes in achieving \u2018united fronts\u2019 with various church groups to promote social justice issues.\u00a0 He admitted, of course, that as a communist he despised all religions, but he was happy to accept their help on specific causes; he saw the united fronts as a way to bring anti-religious ideas to their unwitting partners.<\/p>\n<p>Kengor:\u00a0 \u201cAs communists in the West assured Christians that they wanted to shake hands with them, communists in the East and elsewhere handcuffed them and blew up their churches.\u201d\u00a0 Kengor goes on to develop a fairly detailed history of communist efforts in America during the 20<sup>th<\/sup> century, including the infiltration of seminaries, both Protestant and Catholic.\u00a0 An example:\u00a0 In the 1930s communists were told by the Party to rejoin the churches they had left in order to establish cells for both influence and takeover.<\/p>\n<p>Bella Dodd admitted in the 1950s that the Communist Party subsidized hundreds of young men to go into the ministry, especially into the more liberal churches.<\/p>\n<p>The Communist pattern of deceit, infiltration, and corruption has persisted since its beginnings in the 19<sup>th<\/sup> century.\u00a0 A Romanian spy chief who defected to the West in the 1970s admitted that Liberation Theology was created by the KGB.\u00a0 These ideas were critical motivations for several Latin American revolutions in the late 20<sup>th<\/sup> century.<\/p>\n<p>Harry Hay (1912 \u2013 2002) is credited as the founder of the modern gay movement.\u00a0 Hay used a combination of Marxism, Native American revivalism, and New Age spirituality to advance gay and transgender causes.\u00a0 His shrewdest tactical move was to portray homosexuals as a \u2018minority\u2019 class, evoking sympathy from the Left.\u00a0 Author Will Roscoe asserts, \u201cWithout the idea of Gays as a cultural minority, there would be no Gay identity and no Lesbian\/Gay movement today.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Communist Party in America has embraced all forms of sexual libertinism, ruthlessly criticizing every traditional moral value.\u00a0 Destroying morality has become a favored means to destroy Christian influence, the family, and other pillars of peaceful civilization.<\/p>\n<p>Kengor concludes his book with a detailed discussion that ties all that is woke with Marxism, but I\u2019ll trust you to acquire his book, which I highly recommend.\u00a0 Analysis of \u2018woke\u2019 issues is trivially easy, as I see it, from a Christian point of view.\u00a0 If it\u2019s woke, it\u2019s anti-Christian and it\u2019s evil.\u00a0 Simple, huh.\u00a0 Sin is blatant now; subtlety is gone.<\/p>\n<p>If you embrace a Christian worldview at all, why would you embrace any idea that originates in the demon-possessed life of Karl Marx?\u00a0 It <em>does matter <\/em>where the idea originates.\u00a0 What might seem plausible on the surface may connect to a deeper, sinister agenda.\u00a0 Christian principles, on the other hand, originate in the character of the Lord Jesus Christ.\u00a0 The key elements of His life and His teachings are recorded in Scripture for all to see, and for all to decide to accept or to reject.<\/p>\n<p>But there is a more dangerous trap for Christians in this age of unrestrained wickedness.\u00a0 Too many Christians respond to the political and cultural threats of this day without recognizing their spiritual core.\u00a0 Their energy goes primarily into politics and complaining about the culture.\u00a0 I have visited adult Sunday School classes that feature considerable discussion on the woes of today\u2019s culture.\u00a0 I have interrupted such discussions with the question, \u201cWell, what are you all doing about it?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Christian\u2019s response should be and must be what has always been the mission \u2013 the Great Commission.\u00a0 Share the Gospel.\u00a0 That\u2019s the solution, the only solution.\u00a0 Don\u2019t just pray for political change.\u00a0 Pray for power to share the Gospel effectually.\u00a0 God might just bless that.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;- <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n194. The Fringes of Science<br \/>\nMay 1, 2024 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Rupert Sheldrake has come to know many scientists, some ruthlessly ambitious, others kind and generous, some narrow-minded, cowardly, others brave, visionary.\u00a0 In short, scientists are people.\u00a0 That\u2019s my experience, too.\u00a0 The practice of science includes competition for resources and for prestige, is constrained by peer-group pressures, often involves politics, and unfortunately is rife with temptations, just like any other high-stakes enterprise.<\/p>\n<p>In science, as in other fields, the facts do not speak for themselves.\u00a0 Prevailing scientific narratives depend on rhetorical skills, power structures, and alliances, in addition to experimental and theoretical competence.<\/p>\n<p>Such realities form the background of Sheldrake\u2019s exploration of scientific dogmas that he believes should be questioned and, perhaps, discarded, in his 2012 book <em>Science Set Free:\u00a0 10 Paths to New Discovery<\/em>.\u00a0 The book is a gutsy challenge to materialistic dogmas from a secular point of view . . . Sheldrake is not a Christian, and certainly not a creationist.<\/p>\n<p>Some of his calls to open up new lines of research are intensely practical.\u00a0 For example, studies of East African women show they can carry up to 20 percent of their body weight on the head \u2013 \u201cfor free\u201d \u2013 without burning more energy compared with walking.\u00a0 Also, they can carry 70 percent of their body weight using 50 percent less energy than a U.S. Army infantryman with a backpack.\u00a0 It involves a special type of gait, but Sheldrake questions whether there might be more to it.\u00a0 He also asks why this skill isn\u2019t taught in every Western phys-ed class.\u00a0 He suggests that since the skill is found in low-status 3<sup>rd<\/sup> world cultures, it is disrespected in ours.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake\u2019s vital point is that a spirit of inquiry has been choked off by the delusions that science has answered all the vital questions short of particle and cosmological physics.\u00a0 And that we cannot learn from those less educated in mainstream science.<\/p>\n<p>Rupert Sheldrake is a cell biologist with a successful career at Cambridge University and as a research fellow of the Royal Society.\u00a0 He\u2019s been attracted to puzzles far beyond his own field, however, discovering problems that defy the materialist dogma that <em>all reality <\/em>is merely physical.\u00a0 The dogmas that he challenges in his book include the following:\u00a0 people and animals are just machines; human consciousness is an illusion of merely material activities within brains; nature is purposeless; telepathy does not exist; and memories are just material traces destroyed at death.<\/p>\n<p>He\u00a0 points out that materialism is a philosophical assumption.\u00a0 It is not, indeed it cannot be demonstated by the scientific method.\u00a0 (My synopsis of the scientific method:\u00a0 Science employs techniques of counting, weighing, and measuring, observing results, creating hypotheses to organize and to explain phenomena, and designing experiments to validate some hypotheses at the expense of others.\u00a0 Human creativity, decision-making, and judgment are always in play.)\u00a0 Since human scientists must employ logic, mathematics, and judgment calls on experimental design, \u201cgoodness\u201d of data, and validity of conclusions \u2013 which are <em>all non-material<\/em> \u2013 consciousness, personhood, and nonmaterial qualities permeate the existence of science.\u00a0 Thus, \u2018science,\u2019 which is an immaterial concept using immaterial methods, clearly cannot \u2018prove\u2019 materialism.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake cites the philosopher David Chalmers, who calls the very existence of subjective experience the \u201chard problem,\u201d hard because it defies explanation via mechanisms.\u00a0 An elementary example:\u00a0 Even if we understand the physics and biochemistry of how eyes respond to red light, \u201cthe <em>experience<\/em> of redness is not accounted for.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019m partially color blind and it is quite evident to me and to my wife that I don\u2019t see the Fall colors the same way she does.\u00a0 How do I explain the difference in <em>redness<\/em> that I experience?\u00a0 How can she explain to me what she sees so that I fully comprehend?\u00a0 Such experiences are entirely internal.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake notes that within the life sciences, molecular biologists have the preeminent status.\u00a0 The molecules of life (DNA, proteins) are foundational to making life work.\u00a0 Indeed, scientists <em>cannot <\/em>explain how life works unless they can understand it at that nanotechnological level.\u00a0 Then they can \u201chand the baton to chemists and physicists, who will reduce the properties of molecules to those of atoms and subatomic particles.\u201d\u00a0 This is the way of materialistic reduction and the framework of evolutionary thinking.\u00a0 How did it all get started?\u00a0 Start with the Big Bang and elementary particles, and develop a story bottom-up to generate planets, life, and ecosystems.<\/p>\n<p>Yet it is clear that life had to be <em>designed <\/em>top-down.\u00a0 Living <em>systems <\/em>are the most complicated of all systems, far exceeding the human-designed systems of buildings, automobilies, supercomputers, and cities.\u00a0 None of those systems make any sense if they must be explained by bottom-up processes.\u00a0 (As I\u2019ve written much about in the Creation vs. Evolution section of this web site.)<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake suggests that trying to explain organisms in terms of their chemical parts \u201cis rather like trying to understand a computer by grinding it up and analyzing its component elements, such as copper, germanium, and silicon.\u201d\u00a0 Such a process will never reveal the circuit diagrams, nor its programs, and especially nothing of the purposes for which it was built.<\/p>\n<p>Yet Sheldrake is an evolutionist, perhaps something of a pantheist.\u00a0 He suggests that the Gaia hypothesis is a recognition of the earth as a living organism, as is perhaps the solar system and the rest of the universe.\u00a0 But when he gets mystical in his writing, he seems to avoid specifics.<\/p>\n<p>Rupert dabbles in cosmology in the chapter, \u201cIs the total amount of matter and energy the same?\u201d\u00a0 He observes that in cosmological models, the density of dark energy in the expanding universe is assumed to be constant.\u00a0 But since the universe is expanding, the total amount of energy would be increasing.\u00a0 Such questions do not seem to be testable at present, though.<\/p>\n<p>More down to earth, he cites Paul Webb\u2019s studies in the late 1970s on energy balance in humans, measuring caloric intake, exercise, metabolism, etc.\u00a0 Despite extraordinarily careful efforts, he could not account for an excess 27% in energy expenditure.\u00a0 Did life have access to unmeasurable energy reserves?\u00a0 Most would conclude that the measurements were simply not thorough enough.\u00a0 But Sheldrake considers the question open enough to warrant more research.<\/p>\n<p>He cites historical examples of religious mystics who lived for extended periods with no food, even years.\u00a0 Much controversy surrounds such cases, but Sheldrake asks, \u201cAre there new forms of energy that are not at present recognized by science?\u201d\u00a0 \u201cIf such a form of energy exists, how is it related to the principles of physics, including the zero-point field?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the chapter, \u201cAre the laws of nature fixed?\u201d, Sheldrake recounts the recent history of the variation in the determination of the gravitational constant, G.\u00a0 Between 1973 and 2010 the experimentally determined values fluctuated by 1.1 percent.\u00a0 This is a huge variation, considering the supposed precision of the measurements, which are typically registered to three, four, or even five decimal places.\u00a0 Does G vary in time?\u00a0 A group at MIT discovered a daily rhythm; if more research is done, perhaps other variations might be discovered.\u00a0 \u201cThe variation of fundamental constants is now a matter of serious debate among physicists.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake controversially (perhaps wildly) proposes his own \u201chypothesis\u201d for variations, patterns within cosmology, physics, and even biology and behavior.\u00a0 He calls it \u201cmorphic resonance,\u201d without ever explaining exactly what that means. The root word of \u201cmorphic\u201d means form or structure, as \u201cmorphological\u201d is used in biology. \u00a0Sheldrake explains, \u201cSimilar patterns of activity resonate across time and space\u201d to affect what we see now.\u00a0 There is a \u2018memory\u2019 in a morphic field that links past effects to the present.\u00a0 This applies to \u201call self-organizing systems, including atoms, molecules, crystals, cells, plants, animals, and animal societies.\u201d\u00a0 (He\u2019s quite bold to call all of those \u2018self-organizing systems.\u2019)<\/p>\n<p>As an example, he mentions that a growing crystal of copper sulfate is in resonance with countless previous crystals, to facilitate the same growth pattern and lattice structure.\u00a0 Similarly for a growing oak seed or the spinning of a web by an orb-weaving spider.\u00a0 \u201cIt follows the habits of countless ancestors, resonating with them directly across space and time.\u201d\u00a0 Morphic resonance also applies to human learning, he suggests, for example in that the more people that learn how to snowboard, the easier it will be for others to pick up the skill.<\/p>\n<p>Morphic fields, he asserts, shape the development of plants and animals, instincts and behavior, social group behavior, and are akin to quantum fields, probabilistically imposing patterns on what might seem to be random events.\u00a0 Certainly evolutionary events would fall under the morphic resonance umbrella.<\/p>\n<p>This seems to be simply mysticism, if not mumbo-jumbo, to avoid both the materialistic worldview and that of biblical creation and top-down design for the universe, planets, and life itself.<\/p>\n<p>To his credit, Sheldrake attempts some specific examples of the effect.\u00a0 Turanose, a sugar, known for decades as a liquid, was first crystallized in the 1920s after much difficulty.\u00a0 Thereafter, it was synthesized readily all over the world.\u00a0 The idea is that, under morphic resonance, once the process succeeded, a \u2018memory\u2019\u00a0 resonated to other labs where the process succeeded much more easily.<\/p>\n<p>A polymorph is an alternate form of a crystallized compound.\u00a0 In the pharmaceutical industry polymorphs can be big problems.\u00a0 For example, ampicillin was first crystallized as a monohydrate (one water molecule per ampicillin molecule).\u00a0 But in the 1960s it began to crystallize in laboratories as a trihydrate, with a different form, and henceforth the monohydrate could not be made again.\u00a0 This type of effect has happened on multiple occasions for different drugs.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake concludes:\u00a0 \u201cThe emergence of new polymorphs makes it clear that chemistry is not timeless.\u00a0 It is historical and evolutionary, like biology.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He tackles the materialist \/ dualist debates next.\u00a0 Materialism is bankrupt because it denies consciousness.\u00a0 Dualism (reality is both material and spiritual) doesn\u2019t explain how one\u2019s spirit interacts with matter.\u00a0 As a Christian I can live without having to explain how my soul \/ spirit interacts with my brain, because it is obvious that it does.\u00a0 All scientific instruments that measure voltage, current, force, weight, etc., clearly do not have the capacity to measure spiritual entities, but that simply speaks to the limits on science.\u00a0 So be it.<\/p>\n<p>After reviewing some of the debate\u2019s history, Sheldrake figures only one way out \u2013 panpsychism \u2013 the idea that even atoms and molecules have a primitive kind of mentality \/ experience \/ consciousness.\u00a0 The Greek word <em>pan<\/em> means everywhere, and <em>psyche <\/em>means soul or mind.\u00a0 The more complex the object, the more sophisticated the consciousness.\u00a0 This is an ancient idea, which shows up in pagan beliefs about souls infesting all aspects of the natural world, including Gaia for the Earth.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake:\u00a0 \u201cMaybe all organisms, physical and biological, have experiences and feelings, including atoms, molecules, crystals, cells, tissues, organs, plants, animals, societies of organisms, ecosystems, planets, solar systems, and galaxies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He does not seem to propose any specific research to explore these issues, but it serves as a pillar of his worldview, so he can dance apart from both materialists and theists, creating his own perspectives and agendas.\u00a0 It is amazing to what lengths intelligent people will go to avoid God.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake then goes on to challenge materialism\u2019s view that nature is purposeless.\u00a0 Why not God and design, Rupert?\u00a0 Anything but that!\u00a0 He spins off the ideas of a mid-20<sup>th<\/sup> century biologist, Conrad Waddington, who suggested that the incredibly complex processes of embryonic development might be explained by what amounts to form-shaping morphogenetic fields.\u00a0 After all, how can you get from a fertilized egg to the spectacularly complex human form without some guiding magic?\u00a0 He offers metaphors about attractors and gravity wells that objects fall into, and then topological models that might inform how biological structure is guided.\u00a0 But it\u2019s all hocus-pocus.\u00a0 Mysterious \u201cmorphogenetic fields,\u201d if they existed, would need their own explanation, indeed their own brilliant Creator to do the job of constructing full-grown creatures.\u00a0 They would have to be both incredibly brilliant and incredibly complex themselves.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake marvels at the protein folding problem \u2013 it takes about two minutes for a newly constructed protein molecule to fold inside the factory of the cell.\u00a0 If the molecule had to experiment to find just the right folded pattern, it would take trillions of trillions of years.\u00a0 In fact, researchers once predicted that knowing the amino acid sequence would enable them to predict the 3-D folded shape.\u00a0 This has proven to be impossible.\u00a0 So how does folding work?\u00a0 Either there are mysterious morphogenetic guiding fields, or else the cell\u2019s internal structures must be so brilliantly designed that you would require an Almighty God as the cell\u2019s Engineer.\u00a0 Guess which Sheldrake chooses?<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake does a wonderful job in dismantling atheistic materialism with his analysis, but he can\u2019t seem to conceive the very possibility of God as Author of the creation.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake\u2019s mystical fields, I believe, find a kinship with Plato\u2019s forms, which Sheldrake admits.\u00a0 Real trees aspire to the tree form, real tables to the table form.\u00a0 He does not believe in a conscious purpose for non-sentient objects and creatures.\u00a0 But . . . \u201cBoth evolution and progress can be interpreted in terms of attractors, with influences working backward in time from future goals.\u201d\u00a0 Apparently, cause and effect often work backwards!<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake discusses the hubris associated with the first published draft of the human genome in the year 2000.\u00a0\u00a0 A <em>Nature <\/em>editor gushed, \u201cGenomics will allow us to alter entire organisms to suit our needs and tastes . . . We will have extra limbs, if we want them, and maybe even wings to fly.\u201d\u00a0 But optimism waned quickly with the realization of the awesome gap between gene sequences and actual human beings.\u00a0 I\u2019ve discussed this in other essays, including those on Stephen Meyer\u2019s books, on discoveries of the multi-dimensionality of the genome, plus epigenetic complexity that matches or exceeds that of the genome.<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, Sheldrake insists that the existence of morphic fields is testable, even with regard to behavioral effects.\u00a0 If squirrels learn a new trick in one location, then squirrels elsewhere on Earth should be able to learn it more easily.\u00a0 He cites his books <em>A New Science of Life <\/em>and <em>The Presence of the Past<\/em>, where he discusses such cases.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake applies his morphic fields idea to memory.\u00a0 Does the brain store specific memories in specific neurons?\u00a0 Research on the physical basis of memory has miserably failed to find just where memories reside.\u00a0 Experiments on rats, monkeys, and chimpanzees has shown, astonishingly, that learned memories can persist even after large amounts of brain tissue have been removed.\u00a0 A conclusion has been voiced that \u201cmemory is both everywhere and nowhere in particular.\u201d\u00a0 This is all consistent with the Christian\u2019s dualist view, though, that soul (mind) and brain are distinct, yet interact in ways beyond our ability to measure at present.<\/p>\n<p>He cites the extraordinary case of a young man with an IQ of 126 and a college degree in mathematics who was afflicted since infancy with hydrocephalus (\u201cwater on the brain\u201d).\u00a0 His skull was lined with just a thin layer of brain cells about a millimeter thick; the rest was filled with fluid.\u00a0 With about 5% of a normal brain mass, he functioned quite normally \u2013 above normal, in fact, since the average fellow does not possess a B.S. in math.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake asks whether minds are confined to brains.\u00a0 Since other fields (electric, magnetic) can extend far beyond their physical source, might not our consciousness?\u00a0 Can we affect others just by looking at them?\u00a0 In fact, this is testable.\u00a0 Extensive surveys have found that many people have the experience of causing people to turn around by looking at them.\u00a0 In Oriental martial arts, students have been trained to increase their sensitivity to someone looking at them from behind.\u00a0 (\u201cFeel the force, Luke!\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>Professionals (police, soldiers, surveillance specialists) report that people they are watching regularly react to covert surveillance.\u00a0 A Marine Corps sniper discovered that some targets seemed to suddenly realize that he was watching them, even through telescopic sights at a great distance.<\/p>\n<p>Carefully posed experimental tests have found the effect to be real with a high statistical significance.\u00a0 The effect does not occur frequently, necessarily, but it does occur far more than chance would suggest.\u00a0 It occurs when subjects and starers are separated by windows or one-way mirrors, and even when cameras are used with CCTV.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake offers some wonderful stories on animal telepathy.\u00a0 For example, his neighbor in Newark-on-Trent owned a cat who was very attached to her son, who was away on duty in the Merchant Navy.\u00a0 One day he was able to get away on leave, but did not tell his mother, just deciding to surprise her.\u00a0 Mom figured it out, though, when the cat sat on the front-door mat meowing for an hour before he arrived.\u00a0 Mom was able to prepare dinner for him ahead of his arrival.\u00a0 Sheldrake has a database with over a thousand accounts of dogs and over six hundred of cats who anticipated their owners\u2019 returns.\u00a0 He also cites data on animals anticipating natural disasters, including earthquakes and tsunamis.\u00a0 Dogs in London during WW2 anticipated the explosions from V-2 rockets, even though they could not have heard the approach.\u00a0 V-2s were supersonic.<\/p>\n<p>Do dogs and cats have souls?\u00a0 Yes.\u00a0 Spirits to connect with God?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 But perhaps our souls can extend their influence through another dimension at times.\u00a0 This is not inconsistent with a biblical view of reality.\u00a0 (We don\u2019t need morphic fields to explain it.)<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake also includes accounts of human telepathy.\u00a0 With help from a midwife, he personally conducted a study of nine nursing mothers in London over a two-month period.\u00a0 When separated from their babies, they often knew when their babies needed them, experiencing a breast-feeding response mediated by the hormone oxytocin.\u00a0 This normally is initiated by hearing the baby cry, but some mothers respond \u2018mysteriously,\u2019 even when miles away.\u00a0 Eliminating normal feeding rhythms and recording data on both mother and child, there were apparently telepathic connections that occurred, defying chance by odds of a billion to one.\u00a0 The effect is real.<\/p>\n<p>Sheldrake offers some evolutionary and morphic field mumbo-jumbo, but the effect is plausible enough from a soul \/ body duality designed by God.\u00a0 Perhaps the effect is not as consistent as it might be because of the Fall.\u00a0 Perhaps we were originally designed to make useful spiritual connections with each other, but sin and de-volution intervened.\u00a0 Perhaps our restored resurrection bodies will have abilities we can only imagine.<\/p>\n<p>I recommend Sheldrake\u2019s book to you, but you should read it from within a biblical worldview.\u00a0 In his conclusion, he notes:\u00a0 \u201cThis na\u00efve, old-fashioned reductionist faith bears no relation to the reality of the sciences.\u00a0 Physiologists do not explain blood pressure in terms of subatomic particles but through the pumping activity of the heart . . . Linguists do not analyze languages in terms of the movements of . . . molecules in the air; . . . they study the patterns of words, grammars, and meanings . . .\u201d, etc.<\/p>\n<p>He goes on to cite physicist John Ziman who argues that at higher levels of complexity, all the way through human cultural institutions, \u201cwe find systems obeying entirely novel principles.\u00a0 The behavior of such systems is not predictable from the properties of their constituents.\u201d\u00a0 Similarly, the majesty of the Taj Mahal cannot be gleaned from the properties of a block of marble.<\/p>\n<p>The startling conclusion he misses in this analysis is that creation only makes sense in light of top-down design.\u00a0 Ultimately, God designed the subatomic particles so that they could form atoms, molecules, cells, and organisms, not to mention stars and planets.\u00a0 But we don\u2019t live in a random sea of subatomic particles, nor a black hole swallowing all of them.\u00a0 Clearly the structures of creation, from galactic clusters to ribosomes are purpose-built, tied to functions that ultimately serve consciousness, the consciousness of beings made in the image of God, namely us.\u00a0 I pray that Rupert eventually figures that out.<\/p>\n<p>He does a great job dismantling atheistic reductionistic materialism, but he misses the point of it all.\u00a0 I do hope that he has success in exploring some of the mysteries he unfolds in the book.\u00a0 I guarantee that as we learn more, that will only cause us to marvel at God\u2019s creative genius.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211; <\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><br \/>\n195. Truth Changes Everything (At least it should!)<br \/>\nJune 1, 2024 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>About 25 years ago, I was encouraged to read the wonderfully organized book by David A. Noebel, <em>Understanding the Times<\/em>, all about the principal worldviews embraced across the globe and their implications for economics, ethics, psychology, history . . . and life.\u00a0 Noebel was the founder of Summit Ministries in Colorado Springs; they conduct intensive training courses for high school and college students, helping young Christians to engage with anti-Christian philosophies as they begin adulthood in a spiritually contentious culture.<\/p>\n<p>Recently I picked up the 2022 book by Summit\u2019s current director, Jeff Myers, <em>Truth Changes Everything:\u00a0 How People of Faith Can Transform the World in Times of Crisis<\/em>.\u00a0 I cannot recommend this book, though, because of an utter lack of discernment between \u201cChristendom\u201d and a properly Christian \/ biblical worldview.\u00a0 Myers continually cites Roman Catholic thinkers with no caution;\u00a0 on page 190 he cites six different RC authors on one page!<\/p>\n<p><em>Nevertheless(!), <\/em>there are some nuggets worth mentioning, so we\u2019ll glean what we can.<\/p>\n<p>Myers is right about Truth driving our beliefs about God, politics, race, and everything else.\u00a0 A major theme is <em>Truth<\/em> (absolute, objective) vs. <em>truths <\/em>(subjective, dependent on desire).\u00a0 \u201cConflicting stories cannot be true and untrue at the same time and in the same manner.\u201d\u00a0 Either Jesus died on a Roman Cross (New Testament) or he didn\u2019t (Islam).\u00a0 Either Jesus rose again (NT) or He didn\u2019t (atheism).\u00a0 Either we have freedom of speech on campus, to share the Gospel, for example, or it is punishable hate speech to explain that sex outside of a biblical marriage is sin.<\/p>\n<p>Weaponizing and warping language is a well-used tactic of today\u2019s most virulent anti-Christian worldviews \u2013 the Marxist \/ leftist \/ woke.\u00a0 Myers cites a Lenin biography (Victor Sebestyen) which notes his harsh and abusive method of argument, and how Lenin \u201calmost single-handedly . . . changed the language on the revolutionary Left.\u201d\u00a0 His opponents were \u201cscoundrels,\u201d \u201ccretins,\u201d \u201cfilthy scum,\u201d or profanely worse.\u00a0 A Lenin associate observed that he did not just reply to opponents; he ridiculed and castigated them.<\/p>\n<p>Lenin taught his team to \u201cplay the man, not the ball.\u201d\u00a0 It became \u201csettled Bolshevik practice.\u201d\u00a0 Barack Obama\u2019s hero and mentor, Saul Alinsky, in his book <em>Rules for Radicals<\/em> advises, \u201cRidicule is man\u2019s most potent weapon.\u00a0 There is no defense.\u00a0 It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule.\u00a0 Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Christian in this spiritual warfare is not to play the same game.\u00a0 Indeed we should be playing offense, but with the sword of the Spirit, proclaiming the Gospel, and trusting the Holy Spirit to do the hard work in the hearts of men.<\/p>\n<p>Myers notes that fighting fire with fire admittedly gets more clicks.\u00a0 \u201cWatch person X humiliate person Y in three sentences\u201d in a social media link gets more attention than \u201cWatch person X respond to person Y with Truth and grace.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I resonate with Myers that today\u2019s important battles are <em>not<\/em> between Democrats and Republicans, between religious and non-religious, etc., but between the two competing views of truth.\u00a0 Nancy Pearcey uses \u201ctotal truth\u201d and Francis Schaeffer calls it \u201ctrue truth.\u201d\u00a0 (I recommend both authors unreservedly.)\u00a0 Since ancient times most people have believed that Truth exists and can be discovered.\u00a0 Only in recent generations has the balance tipped \u2013 in America now over half claim that truths are up to the individual.<\/p>\n<p>A Summit \/ Barna study found that self-identified Christian churchgoers under age 45 were four times as likely as those older to agree that \u201cif your belief offends someone or hurts their feelings, it is wrong.\u201d\u00a0 What an effective way to put the final nail in the coffin for 121 evangelism!\u00a0 The Gospel does have a habit of offending, after all.\u00a0 But even more so, the \u201cChristian\u201d who holds such a position cannot be born again himself, can he?<\/p>\n<p>More results:\u00a0 Only 6 percent of young adults agreed that \u201cmoral truth is absolute.\u201d\u00a0 Fear is so rampant now that 75 percent say they hold views they are unwilling to share lest they be shamed or lose their jobs.<\/p>\n<p>The world has changed quite a bit in my own lifetime.\u00a0 If these attitudes were as rampant across America in my youth, there is no way I would have joined the military and sworn an oath to defend the Constitution.\u00a0 Back then I had to believe that my chain of command, all the way up to the White House, had as much respect for the Constitution as I did.<\/p>\n<p>Modern folks tend to look for Truth in precisely the wrong place, Myers notes \u2013 within themselves!\u00a0 How arrogant is that?\u00a0 The Christian perspective is that Jesus Christ, the Creator, is the source of Truth (John 14:6).\u00a0 Jesus wired up human beings and is the Author of the rest of reality.\u00a0 He defines the questions and He provides the answers.\u00a0 How should we live?\u00a0 What is marriage and how do we make it successful?\u00a0 What are ethical business principles?\u00a0 How should we raise children?\u00a0 What is the purpose of life?\u00a0 What comes afterward?\u00a0 What does God expect out of us?<\/p>\n<p>People can manipulate and distort truths with word games.\u00a0 Metaphors can illustrate, but they can also lie.\u00a0 Nazis called the Jews \u201cvermin\u201d to help excuse their extermination.\u00a0 Similarly, the Hutu leaders in Rwanda demonized Tutsis as \u201ccockroaches.\u201d\u00a0 Unborn babies are called \u201cproducts of conception\u201d or \u201cfetal tissue\u201d to justify murder.\u00a0 Myers cites Michael Bauman:\u00a0 \u201cWhen words lose their meaning people lose their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Feelings do not alter Truth.\u00a0 Between male and female, biologically, there is far more than XX vs. XY.\u00a0 Apparently, there are at least 6,500 other genetic differences.\u00a0 If a female says, \u201cBut I don\u2019t <em>feel <\/em>like a female,\u201d what does that even mean?\u00a0 No wokester seems to be able to explain that.\u00a0 Without objective criteria, harmful and irrational decisions are made that damage thousands of children.<\/p>\n<p>If considerations of Truth are grounded in Scripture and the words of Jesus, and He promises guidance via the indwelling Holy Spirit, it is fairly hard to get into trouble, other than trouble which comes from the hands of the Adversary.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus was quite the counter-cultural revolutionary.\u00a0 Myers observes that He did not call His followers to defeat their enemies militarily; rather, to win them through love, hanging out with them until you can persuade them.\u00a0 Christianity is not about following rules, but about living by principles that work in reality.\u00a0 This enables the Christian\u2019s testimony, helping to persuade the unbeliever why he should switch teams.\u00a0 The hardest sell, of course, is to convince the lost fellow that his sins are serious and that he needs forgiveness, that genuine repentance is demanded along with a whole-hearted trust in the crucified and risen Savior.\u00a0 Once born again, then a new life begins, and the Lord Jesus helps continually with that.<\/p>\n<p>The Truth about the Christian life is that it is going somewhere.\u00a0 Indeed, all of history is going somewhere, on a prophetic arc that leads to a New Heaven and a New Earth.\u00a0 It\u2019s a <em>big<\/em> story and we need to tell it.<\/p>\n<p>One startling consequence of Christian Truth, as opposed to the \u2018truths\u2019 of other worldviews, derives from the <em>imago Dei<\/em>, the idea that we are made in the image of God; therefore, both human bodies and souls have dignity.\u00a0 The incarnation demonstrated this, Myers claims, when the Creator forever became both a human body and soul.<\/p>\n<p>In ancient times, pagans believed in alleviating suffering only for the \u2018deserving.\u2019\u00a0 Christians opened up medical charities for everyone, though.\u00a0 You cannot claim to love God without loving others, including enemies.<\/p>\n<p>The 19<sup>th<\/sup> century poet, James Russell Lowell, offers this dare:\u00a0 \u201cI challenge any skeptic to find a ten-square-mile spot on this planet where they can live their lives in peace and safety and decency, where womanhood is honored, where infancy and old age are revered, where they can educate their children, where the Gospel of Jesus Christ has not gone first to prepare the way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Searching for Truth is connected to our natural desire to learn, to grow.\u00a0 A proper education, in contrast with mere schooling, helps us acquire wisdom to see meaning in what we do.\u00a0 Once again, that quest starts with Jesus:\u00a0 \u201cThe fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.\u201d\u00a0 (Prov 9:10)<\/p>\n<p>Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls it \u201cflow\u201d when we have a sense of well-being and competence in our activities.\u00a0 The greatest flow is achieved when we are working hard at something we find fascinating.\u00a0 The lowest flow comes from leisure \u2013 watching TV, passively.\u00a0 Older adults are happier if they keep learning.<\/p>\n<p>J. Warner Wallace points out that the world\u2019s top 15 universities were started by Christians with the expressed purpose (in most cases) of advancing the Gospel. Unfortunately, those universities are dedicated to Satan\u2019s work now . . . for which they will be severely judged.<\/p>\n<p>Today\u2019s Christian had better not be dependent on the secular system to grow in knowledge and wisdom.\u00a0 We can see God in everything, because He is the source of all Truth, whether mathematics or botany or atomic physics or music or even athletics.\u00a0 The secularist may be intimate with the mechanics of a tree, but only the Christian can see God\u2019s purpose in designing trees and revel in God\u2019s glory for doing so with such spectacular results.<\/p>\n<p>Myers has a thoughtful treatment on how the Christian faith informs just war theory.\u00a0 War is always an evil, but when it is launched by evil men with evil purposes, the Christian view is to minimize the destruction and seek a just peace.\u00a0 \u201cBlessed are the peacemakers . . .\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Accordingly, aggression is condemned, but defensive war is legitimate to stop evildoers.\u00a0 The goal is to seek a peace, not secure revenge or to gain wealth.\u00a0 Destruction of a nation\u2019s people or resources is wrong.\u00a0 Since war can be properly waged only by governments, only the agents of governments may fight or be attacked; noncombatants should enjoy immunity as much as practical.<\/p>\n<p>The admonition by the Lord to \u2018turn the other cheek,\u2019 applies to individuals, not governments.\u00a0 Indeed, war is on a continuum, as I see it, of law enforcement.\u00a0 Romans 13 advises criminals that a nation\u2019s rulers \u2018bear not the sword in vain,\u2019 and that is the principal reason for God to establish government, so that we may lead peaceable lives.\u00a0 Aggressive war is criminality writ large.<\/p>\n<p>My sense of the individual \u2018turn the other cheek\u2019 principle is that it was designed especially for Christians under persecution, as a witness to unbelievers of the mercy and grace of God.\u00a0 Throughout history, multitudes of martyrs have provoked other multitudes in turn to repent from their own sins and be converted.<\/p>\n<p>Myers points to the ahead-of-its-time administrative law system delivered through Moses to regulate community life.\u00a0 Securing town borders, protecting property rights, recording economic transactions to establish holdings, ensuring food safety, resolving disputes, and a host of other issues must be codified for peace within a land.<\/p>\n<p>The \u2018many truths\u2019 ideas of postmodernism are totally unworkable when it comes to living life in reality.\u00a0 The simple act of turning on a tap to drink water assumes a system of laws and taxes to acquire water sources, pumps, pipes, building codes, engineering standards, commercial enterprises for faucets, joints, valves, etc., and an entire waste treatment system for unused water.<\/p>\n<p>What happens when God\u2019s commands and men\u2019s laws come into conflict?\u00a0 Myers cites Brother Andrew who smuggled Bibles illegally behind the Iron Curtain.\u00a0 The principle is simple:\u00a0 \u201cWe ought to obey God rather than men.\u201d\u00a0 (Acts 5:29).\u00a0 Although simple, it\u2019s not necessarily easy.\u00a0 Christians have to be willing to suffer the consequences of standing up for the Gospel in opposition to the Satanically-driven rulers of this world.<\/p>\n<p>Although work is a consequence of the Fall \u2013 \u201cthe sweat of thy face\u201d \u2013 the Lord Jesus has redeemed work for His followers:\u00a0 \u201cDo all to the glory of God.\u201d\u00a0 Much of humanity has missed this message.\u00a0 A Gallup world poll across 160 nations has reported that 70 percent of workers struggle or suffer in their lives, rather than thrive.\u00a0 Eighty percent lack engagement \u2013 \u201centhusiasm about, and commitment to their work and workplace.\u201d\u00a0 The tasks of daily toil suck the life out of most people.<\/p>\n<p>Gallup estimated that low employee engagement costs the global economy seven trillion dollars a year in lost productivity.<\/p>\n<p>Philosopher Soren Kierkegaard famously sought \u201cto find the idea for which I am willing to live and to die.\u201d\u00a0 He thought that if he could see the world from God\u2019s perspective then, like Archimedes, he could move the world with a long enough lever and the knowledge of where to place a fulcrum.<\/p>\n<p>But of course we <em>do <\/em>have God\u2019s perspective, through His word.\u00a0 And He promises to walk with us as we embrace the Great Commission that Jesus gave to us.\u00a0 Hopelessness and pointlessness are for those who don\u2019t know the Lord.<\/p>\n<p>We can ask God to bless and multiply the \u2018mundane\u2019 work we do.\u00a0 Myers observes that the human mind has created more wealth than all the natural resources of the world.\u00a0 Only two of the world\u2019s twenty wealthiest companies derive their profits from natural resources like oil.\u00a0 The others develop software, make financial arrangements, and develop systems to deliver products and services.<\/p>\n<p>Myers quotes the traditional Kenyan proverb, \u201cYou can count the number of seeds in a mango, but you cannot count the number of mangos in a seed.\u201d\u00a0 Myers was instructing a group of high school students on the \u2018multiply\u2019 principle, to encourage them to find ways to create more pies, rather than just seek to grab a piece of existing pie.\u00a0 A young lady asked him how she could do that in her dog-walking business; she charged $10 an hour and there are only so many hours in a day.<\/p>\n<p>Before he could respond, her eyes lit up and she answered herself.\u00a0 \u201cWait.\u00a0 Who says I must walk only one dog at a time?\u00a0 Or that I have to be the only person doing the walking?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Good stewardship requires thinking.\u00a0 Given that we must work to support ourselves and our family, we may as well make as much money as possible in the time we have to give to it.<\/p>\n<p>When people you know are within geographical proximity, don\u2019t let social media burn bridges.\u00a0 Myers has a friend in a high-conflict environment who regularly asks potential or actual adversaries, \u201cCan I take you to coffee and hear your viewpoint and share mine?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Some useful conversational gambits arise simply from the Christian perspective of valuing another as made in the image of God and caring about the relationship, not just your goals.\u00a0 For example:\u00a0 \u201cTell me more about that.\u201d\u00a0 People generally will love to do that!\u00a0 Also, ask questions.\u00a0 A skeptic states, \u201cEvolution proves that the Bible is untrue.\u201d\u00a0 You might ask what they mean by \u201cevolution,\u201d \u201cproof,\u201d and \u201ctruth.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If someone passionately claims, \u201cI could never believe in a God who would allow evil,\u201d you might say, \u201cIt sounds like there is a story behind that.\u00a0 Would you be willing to share it with me?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A 2021 survey of American adults indicate that they suffer from many significant fears.\u00a0 The Bible\u2019s message repeatedly includes, \u201cFear not.\u201d\u00a0 We musn\u2019t forget the people we interact with are generally having a hard time.<\/p>\n<p>In the Christian perspective we walk day by day in eternity.\u00a0 C. S. Lewis noted that atheists think that nations and civilizations \u201cmust be more important than individuals,\u201d because \u201cindividuals live only seventy odd years each and the group may last for centuries.\u201d\u00a0 But, he observed, to the Chrisitian, \u201cindividuals are more important, for they live eternally; and races, civilizations, and the like are in comparison the creatures of a day.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jeff Myers closes his book with an anecdote about a guy who walked past his house in Manitou Springs, shaking a stick and proclaiming, \u201cLove!\u00a0 Peace!\u00a0 Happiness!\u201d\u00a0 Jeff looked puzzled, so the guy explained, \u201cI just made a new wand and I\u2019m casting happy spells on the neighborhood.\u201d\u00a0 Jeff smiled and said, \u201cThank you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He regrets that he didn\u2019t think to explain to the fellow that peace, love, and happiness don\u2019t happen by magic; we\u2019ve got to actively work at it.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m flabbergasted that after consideration <em>that <\/em>was Myers\u2019 regret.\u00a0 Why didn\u2019t Jeff see that the fellow was a lost soul in need of meeting the only true Source of love, peace, and happiness?\u00a0 Why wasn\u2019t he instant in season, out of season, to share the Gospel, to at least give the fellow something <em>TRUE <\/em>to think about.<\/p>\n<p>Sigh.<\/p>\n<p>Well, we ought not to miss our own opportunities to help someone out eternally.\u00a0 Or simply go to your local grocery store and create some opportunities.\u00a0 Stop for gas and <em>go inside<\/em> so you can engage some more souls.\u00a0 Stop by Taco Bell on the way back and give the drive-through worker a stack of tracts for the entire crew.\u00a0 Let me know how you feel about it afterwards.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211; <\/strong><br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n196. Coming to Christ With the Help of the New Atheists<br \/>\nJuly 1, 2024. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe wouldn\u2019t like me for saying this, but Dawkins put me on the road to Christian faith (which is not belief without evidence but placing your trust in what the evidence shows you.\u00a0 He shook me out of my apathy and insisted I follow the evidence where it led.\u201d\u00a0 This is part of former atheist Peter Byrom\u2019s public thank you to Richard Dawkins, in his chapter of the 2023 book, <em>Coming to Faith Through Dawkins:\u00a0 12 Essays on the Pathway from New Atheism to Christianity<\/em>, edited by Denis Alexander and Alister McGrath.<\/p>\n<p>Your typical committed atheist, well into adulthood, is <em>not<\/em> looking to follow the evidence where it leads.\u00a0 But the younger, uninformed atheist may still have a chance because his conscience has not been fully hardened into concrete.<\/p>\n<p>One of Dawkins\u2019 well-published compatriots, Christopher Hitchens, mentioned in his book, <em>God is not Great:\u00a0 How Religion Poisons Everything<\/em>, how he appreciated a quote from Gotthold Lessing, who insisted that \u201cif God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left only the steady and diligent drive for Truth,\u201d he would choose the left hand even if he knew that he would forever err in his search.\u00a0 Now that\u2019s commitment!<\/p>\n<p>What explains the futility of such a hopeless stance?\u00a0 Only a hatred for God and a love for sin, only a rabid arrogance that the atheist determines his own morality and that no god or God can tell him what to do.\u00a0 Namely, only a heartfelt denial of reality can explain the pointless path of the atheist.\u00a0 He doesn\u2019t know what he wants, but he is sure that God and the Gospel are not it!<\/p>\n<p>In McGrath\u2019s introduction to <em>Coming to Faith through Dawkins<\/em>, he suggests that the rise of the \u2018New Atheists\u2019 was jumpstarted by the terrorist attacks on 9\/11.\u00a0 The apparent ideological cause was <em>Islamic religious fanaticism<\/em>, which was shortly recast by anti-theists as <em>religious fanaticism<\/em>, and then <em>religion<\/em>.\u00a0 In the West, the principal target was Christianity, especially biblical Christianity.\u00a0 This was a brilliant ploy by Satan, fostering a supposed equivalence between one of his own false religions and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Imagine . . . now atheists could preach that the real culprits behind 9\/11 were serious Christians, who are essentially no different from Islamic jihadists!\u00a0 I note, however, that the famous anti-theists have no stomach to attack Islam publicly, but eagerly denigrate biblical faith.<\/p>\n<p>Four days after 9\/11\/2001, Richard Dawkins wrote, \u201cTo fill a world with religion, or religions of the Abrahamic kind, is like littering the streets with loaded guns.\u00a0 Do not be surprised if they are used.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cAbrahamic kind\u201d \u2013 that\u2019s the trick to claim equivalence between Islam and Christianity.<\/p>\n<p>An unexpected consequence of the rise in activist atheism was, however, a reawakened interest in exploring spiritual matters.\u00a0 McGrath\u2019s own experience in speaking publicly on the relationship between science and faith was a dramatic increase in attendance, expecially after the so-called \u201cFour Horsemen,\u201d Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris, \u2018went viral\u2019 with their anti-Christian books and appearances.<\/p>\n<p>As I read the twelve essays in the book I noticed some common themes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Young atheists, initially impressed by the wit and passion of the activists, eventually reacted to the over-the-top name-calling, realizing that most of the arguments were not rational at all, but superficial and pejorative.<\/li>\n<li>Apologetics helped along the way toward conversion, but not immediately.<\/li>\n<li>A typical ingredient was one or more kind, patient, and composed Christians in their life whose witness was personally credible.<\/li>\n<li>The transformation from atheist to Christian may take many years.<\/li>\n<li>If the Christian witness has some compromise (doctrinal defects, a worldly church culture, etc.), the convert may not grow effectively.<\/li>\n<li>If the compromise is too serious, the atheist may convert to theism, but not be born again \u2013 he may become a Roman Catholic, for example.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Our western culture is \u2018rich\u2019 in satanically-sown corruption, including atheistic \/ evolutionistic indoctrination.\u00a0 The enemy is relentless, as we well know, working through the educational systems, entertainment media, government sanction, news sources, etc., to divert souls from Truth.\u00a0 Accordingly, Christians must be relentless in sowing Gospel seeds through personal witness, Gospel tracts, social media, and in speaking up in season, out of season when Truth is challenged.\u00a0 I\u2019ve worked at designing thoughtful and challenging tracts on a variety of themes, as you can see at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thinktracts.com\/\">ThinkTracts.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The first chapter of the book recounts the testimony of Sy Garte, a PhD biochemist, whose parents were members of the American Communist Party.\u00a0 He was taught that science rules out the supernatural \u2013 a false assertion because science is simply a method to analyze the material world around us.\u00a0 Science has nothing to say about the <em>super<\/em>natural.\u00a0 Nor is it capable of explaining any nonmaterial concept, including logic, mathematics, justice, integrity, hope, meaning, or love.\u00a0 <em>Science <\/em>must be built atop a foundation that includes rational thought, logic, mathematics, and values.\u00a0 It is a tool to make sense of matter and its interactions; it is a <em>small <\/em>part of a much wider human experience.<\/p>\n<p>Garte, like me, was also taught about the evil practices of religions historically.\u00a0 Explorations into religious history was also helpful to me in my youth, to provoke me to reject the Roman Catholic Church of my upbringing.\u00a0 My path to Christ necessarily led through the atheistic wilderness.<\/p>\n<p>In Sy Garte\u2019s life, the New Atheists overplayed their hand, eventually.\u00a0 Sy saw Dawkins\u2019 book, <em>The God Delusion,<\/em> as disturbingly vitriolic.\u00a0 He also found the alleged \u2018rational\u2019 arguments to be weak.\u00a0 For example, morality is supposedly due to evolution.\u00a0 Humans have \u2018evolved\u2019 to do good things for merely reciprocal benefits, or for their kin, to benefit the transmission of genes (kin altruism).\u00a0 Evil supposedly evolved from selfishness driven by survival impulses.<\/p>\n<p>But Garte had read enough to realize that genes (DNA molecules) do not code for behaviors \u2013 they code for proteins.\u00a0 Which genes can make us nice?\u00a0 How does that work?\u00a0 Invoking evolution is just raw assertion.<\/p>\n<p>On the origin of life, Garte discovered that the activist atheists gloss over the vast difficulties in the supposed emergence of biology from chemistry.\u00a0 This is consistent with my experience, and is extended well beyond theist \/ atheist debates.\u00a0 Atheists \/ evolutionists rarely engage in polite fact-based debates or discussions with Christians \/ creationists.\u00a0 Rather, they insult or cancel or persecute (in the schools) anyone who doesn\u2019t kneel down to their dogma.\u00a0 Similarly Marxists \/ leftists \/ Democrats won\u2019t engage in honest policy debates with conservatives \/ free market \/ liberty advocates.\u00a0 Why should they, when personal attacks and censorship work so effectively?<\/p>\n<p>Garte cites Daniel Dennett\u2019s assertion that human consciousness is a myth and Sam Harris\u2019 insistence that free will is an illusion.\u00a0 Such assertions are trivially discredited.\u00a0 Does Harris freely write his books or are they the result of mechanistic brain chemistry?\u00a0 Why should we take the ravings of brain chemistry seriously?\u00a0 Was Dennett conscious when he wrote his books?\u00a0 Whom does he expect to read them?\u00a0 Unconscious people?<\/p>\n<p>Another chapter is authored by the historian Sarah Irving-Stonebraker, who argues that science\u2019s experimental methods are based on the Christian <em>distrust <\/em>of human sensory and cognitive abilities, with uncertainties rooted in sin and our fallen nature.\u00a0 She cites historian Peter Harrison, that \u201cthe attainment of knowledge was not a natural, easy process, but rather one that called for the imposition of external constraints, rigorous testing of knowledge claims, repeated experiments, . . . the use of artificial instruments to amplify the dim powers of the senses, and the corporate rather than individual production of knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In reading the history of science, Sarah was disturbed to discover the intimate compatibility of science with Christian theology, in contradiction to what she had been told by the activist atheists.\u00a0 She was then shaken by attending a series of lectures at Oxford by the famous atheist philosopher, Peter Singer, who claimed that the innate preciousness and equal value of human beings is a Christian myth.<\/p>\n<p>She realized that in the atheist worldview, with no God there is no purpose for humanity, no love, and that reality is mere biology.\u00a0 Her conscience was still alive and offended at assertions that the disabled or otherwise undesirable people have no basis for the preservation of their lives.<\/p>\n<p>At age 27 she was already quite successful, a Cambridge PhD, a published author, a fellowship at Oxford, good friends . . . life was great.\u00a0 But it wasn\u2019t enough.\u00a0 She hungered for meaning.\u00a0 Wandering into the theology section of the library, she opened a book of sermons and found them intellectually robust.\u00a0 The biblical references introduced her to the idea that man is made in the image of God, and that \u201cThere is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female:\u00a0 for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.\u201d\u00a0 (Galatians 3:28)\u00a0 It resonated.\u00a0 There were many more steps along her path, but eventually she found Jesus.<\/p>\n<p>In Peter Byrom\u2019s essay, he relates a common testimony . . . raised in a Christian home, he dropped his superficial faith when he got to college.\u00a0 A drama student, he came to view Christians as backward simpletons who saw the world in black and white and believed it to be only six thousand years old.\u00a0 Interesting.\u00a0 Even drama students rely on the evolutionary myth to buttress their rejection of the Christian faith.\u00a0 That\u2019s one reason why I publish a number of tracts refuting the idiocies of evolution.<\/p>\n<p>Byrom attended a debate between Sam Harris and William Lane Craig.\u00a0 Byrom reports that Craig delivered a detailed, knock-down refutation of Harris\u2019 moral theory, but in Harris\u2019 rebuttal he gave no response to the criticisms.\u00a0 Namely, he showed up for the debate, but then spoke as if Craig wasn\u2019t even there.\u00a0 I recently watched a debate between James Tour and an evolutionist on origin of life issues.\u00a0 Tour delivered a number of very specific challenges and criticisms.\u00a0 His opponent ignored every one of Tour\u2019s points.\u00a0 There must be a playbook used by the Devil\u2019s team.<\/p>\n<p>When Johan Erasmus sought entry to the theology program at a South African Christian university, he was interviewed by a panel of faculty.\u00a0 Asked, \u201cWhy do you want to study theology?\u201d, he answered, \u201cI want to know if it is true.\u201d\u00a0 Wrong answer.\u00a0 A professor told him, \u201cBrother, you don\u2019t study theology to gain faith; you have faith and then you study theology.\u201d\u00a0 He switched to humanities.<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, he came across Kent Hovind\u2019s materials and young-earth creationism.\u00a0 But a friend with a science background discouraged him from that perspective \u2013 unfortunately, Johan provides no details on his rejection of simple biblical truth, despite the fact that a literal interpretation of Genesis 1-3 is backed up by overwhelming scientific evidence.\u00a0 Several times, in fact, he makes disparaging comments about young-earth creationists.\u00a0 Accordingly, when Johan did become a Christian, he brought along some compromising errors with him.<\/p>\n<p>Still only 19, it wasn\u2019t rational apologetics that helped or hindered him.\u00a0 His hormones still raged, provoking Johan to find any excuse to avoid repentance.\u00a0 Johan explains, \u201cWhen we want something to be true, we find the relevant arguments to support it.\u00a0 Laurence Peter describes me well:\u00a0 I was looking for God the same way a thief looks for a policeman.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Johan read the New Atheists, plus a variety of famous scoffers, back to Friedrich Nietzsche.\u00a0 But a Christian introduced him to William Lane Craig on morality and design and N.T. Wright on the resurrection.\u00a0 Eventually, it was a wide variety of sources and arguments, but above all a yearning for \u201csomething more\u201d that turned him to Scripture and salvation.<\/p>\n<p>Johan observes that it is not surprising that the Gospel has taken hold much more in Africa than in prosperity-mad Europe.\u00a0 Mockingly, he suggests that you\u2019ll never see the headline:\u00a0 \u201cSomalian Pastor Now Atheist After Reflecting on the Problem of Evil in His Underground Church.\u201d\u00a0 Where suffering is real and widespread, hearts are more open.\u00a0 He mentions the idea of <em>imagined suffering <\/em>in the West, where you experience the pain of others more intensely than they do, which leads to virtue signaling and other woke madness in Western culture.<\/p>\n<p>I agree with Johan on another point \u2013 Atheism is not the big problem in Western society.\u00a0 Apathy is.\u00a0 Indeed.\u00a0 Apathy sends a lot of souls to Hell.\u00a0 In the 70s, 80s, and 90s, it was easy and generally interesting and satisfying to get into a debate with skeptics on spiritual issues.\u00a0 In the last generation, though, it\u2019s much harder to get people to engage, or even lift up their eyes from their phone.<\/p>\n<p>Nick Berryman eventually noticed that <em>The God Delusion <\/em>exhibited a consistent pattern of ridicule \u2013 as opposed to argument \u2013 and that the person of Jesus was hardly mentioned.\u00a0 Odd, that the <em>Center<\/em> of the Christian faith was ignored in the diatribe against that worldview.\u00a0 Nick eventually found the Bible to be incredibly honest and realistic about human nature, both in virtues and in flaws.<\/p>\n<p>Another essayist reports how her ultimate conversion resulted in joining the Roman Catholic Church.\u00a0 Oops.\u00a0 How did this essay get past the editors?\u00a0 They must see all of Christendom as Christian.<\/p>\n<p>A testimony from another South African relates how he discovered a church that had a strong emphasis on apologetics.\u00a0 This church seemed to attract a variety of people who struggled with the faith, but the Christians there provided articulate answers.\u00a0 They even featured Q&amp;A during worship services.\u00a0 His experience there was a key factor in his conversion.<\/p>\n<p>I have visited a large number of churches as I\u2019ve traveled around the country.\u00a0 There is very little interest in apologetics.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Apologetics focuses on forming coherent and cogent answers to those with objections to the Christian faith, whether atheistic \/ evolutionistic, or Mormon, or Roman Catholic, or New Age, or whatever.<\/p>\n<p>Such studies are vital defenses for Christians growing in their faith, but also vital <em>on offense<\/em> for those who want to share their faith.\u00a0 Anyone practicing 1-2-1 evangelism will be driven to apologetics, so they can answer and help those they share the Gospel with.\u00a0 So why is there so little interest in apologetics?\u00a0 Simply because there is so little interest in personal evangelism.\u00a0 This current generation of evangelical Christians in the West cares not whether the people around them go to Hell.\u00a0 Yeah, it\u2019s that simple.\u00a0 They don\u2019t want to <em>play offense.<\/em>\u00a0 Furthermore, it is clear that young people growing up in church depart from their supposed faith at a rate of perhaps 90% when they leave home.\u00a0 Ergo, their parents and church\u2019s pastoral staff are not training the next generation to defend the faith.\u00a0 They care not whether their children go to Hell.<\/p>\n<p>Most of the testimonies in <em>Coming to Faith Through Dawkins <\/em>are stories of genuine conversions, no doubt.\u00a0 But it strikes me that the paths were far too long and tortuous.\u00a0 They should have encountered far more Christians along the way who cared for their souls.\u00a0 The Christians they did encounter should have been far more prepared with answers.\u00a0 Non-Christian worldviews are intrinsically self-contradictory and incoherent, as I\u2019ve discussed on this site many times.\u00a0 With a little work, Christians can easily help an open-minded unbeliever over his obstacles.<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, it is vital that Christians be prepared with <em>right <\/em>answers.\u00a0 Many of the conversion stories end with, yes, a genuine Christian, but a weak one in several ways.\u00a0 If a Christian, although born again, holds onto errors, his growth will be hindered, and he will hinder others.\u00a0 Such errors fall into areas such as a literal Genesis (creation in 6 days is what God said He did), Calvinism, Pentecostalism, eternal security, inerrancy (versions), eschatology, and ecclesiology, among others.\u00a0\u00a0 My \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=84\">10 Heresies<\/a> . . .\u201d essay discusses some of the issues.<\/p>\n<p>That South African church that focused on apologetics \u2013 what a rare gem!\u00a0 Perhaps in your church you could start a small group that focuses on <em>and practices <\/em>121 evangelism and apologetics.\u00a0 You can use the material on this website, however you find it useful.\u00a0 The books you study \u2013 pick the right ones.\u00a0 I\u2019ve recommended quite a number on this site, and provided cautionary notes in the essays on books that I consider a mixed blessing.<\/p>\n<p>Get busy!<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>drdave@truthreallymatters.com<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;- <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>190. 1\/1\/24 Christianity vs. Wokeness 191. 2\/1\/24 Love Thy Body 192. 3\/1\/24 Signals of Transcendence 193. 4\/1\/24 Politics is Personal: The Devil &#038; Karl Marx 194. 5\/1\/24 The Fringes of Science 195. 6\/1\/24 Truth Changes Everything (At least it should!) 196. 7\/1\/24 Coming to Christ With the Help of the New Atheists 190. Christianity vs. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":7,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4390","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4390"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4467,"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4390\/revisions\/4467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}