Motherhood and fatherhood

This article (linked below) makes (amongst others) a good point that should be made more. Specifically, the idea that "same sex marriage" is the same as (actual) marriage implies that both mothers and fathers are dispensable. i.e. The roles of fatherhood and motherhood are optional/replaceable. Since (according to proponents) two men, or two women, can equally well bring up children as a father and a mother, therefore both motherhood (if the two happen to be men) or fatherhood (if they are women) are unnecessary. You don't need a mother; two fathers can suffice. You don't need a father; two mothers can suffice. You don't need to a home in which you experience the inter-relation of the sexes whilst you grow up. This brings out more clearly the link between "same sex marriage" and the radical sixties teaching that gender is merely a social construct - that a man can be a mother, just as he can be a wife, etc. We force them to stop arguing vacuously that "it's all about lurrve, we luurrrve each other so why shouldn't we marry?" When those implications are more clearly spelled out, more people will realise what an absurdity the idea of "same sex marriage" is. Thus we should do so.

http://www.redstate.com/2013/03/28/same-sex-marriage-is-not-the-same-as-opposite-sex-marriage/

Split-brain

This article (not from a Christian viewpoint, and without having any deep analysis of the problem (or even recognising it as a problem at the deeper level)), captures the radical cleavage between the modern view of humanities and science:

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/2013/06/20/why-study-humanities-what-i-tell-engineering-freshmen/

Nancy Pearcey analyses the fundamental contradiction and analyses it from a Christian point of view really well in her "Saving Leonardo" - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Saving-Leonardo-Secular-Assault-Meaning/dp/1433669277.

Since the Enlightenment, sciences and the humanities have headed on radically contradictory paths. Science = certain, indisputable, universal truth. Humanities = nothing can be known, and perhaps nothing can even be communicated.

This feeds into the modern Western state of affairs, where Christianity (being assigned to the 'humanities' side) is treated as personal, private (weird) subjective preference (that hence has no relevance for fields such as the making of law); and secularism and atheism, assigning themselves (rather arbitrarily) to the 'science' side, demand to be treated as universal, public truth (and hence should rule the roost).

Christians need to understand more of the implications of Christ's universal Lordship in both creation and redemption, and avoid this split-brain approach to reality.

Debate in secularist societies

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theyll-want-to-bring-back-hanging-next-what-rightwing-lunacy-is-there-inside-the-conservative-rebels-alternative-queens-speech-8672008.html

Let's leave aside the politics of any of the policies discussed in that article. My aim is not to be political, but to address issues of Christians living in secular societies, and how we can try to understand how they work and respond to them.

Secularism is relentlessly conformist. Those who jettison doctrines of God, the soul, grace and depravity, often find it hard to understand how any reasonable person can disagree with them. The room for Christian ideas of sphere sovereignty, liberty of conscience, and the like, get gradually squeezed out; what's left is the state. The history of atheist and secularist states in the 20th century demonstrates the awful reality of that thesis in bloody detail. For the secularist leaders (whether in state or media or wherever), you're not allowed just to be wrong (in one's opinion); you must be mad or evil; and hence in danger of the gulag or the asylum.

That's what we see increasingly from the secularist elites (who are mostly political leftists) in the UK government and media, as exemplified in the above article (I noted that the idea that men can marry men was not rated for its lunacy factor).

Look at some of the things that the author things are at the extreme end of lunacy (to pick out a few):

• To make it mandatory for prisoners to serve the full custodial sentence handed down by a court.
• To allow for capital punishment for certain offences.
• To allow smoking in a separate ventilated room in a private members’ club if a majority of club members approve.
• To provide for a tax allowance for married couples.
• Rules for the appointment of a temporary or new Prime Minister in the event that a serving PM is temporarily or permanently incapacitated.
• To restrict access by foreign nationals to public services for which no charge is made.
• To restrict the height, number, location and subsidies of wind turbines situated offshore within 20 miles of the coast.

I make no comment on whether I think those are good, bad or indifferent ideas. The point is that the writer of the article does not do so either. He doesn't think they're ideas at all; they are manifestations of insanity, of lunacy. They suggest a diseased mind that needs treatment - not a possibly thought-out position that one could hold a principled debate with.

To secularists, all right-thinking, intelligent people agree with them. Others are mad or evil. As education and the media in the UK becomes more secular, more and more people are growing up assuming that Christians are so bigotted or brainwashed that you they're not to be debated with - they're to be ignored, stigmatised or clamped down on, depending on the situation and your predilection. That's a situation that Christians themselves will need to be increasingly aware of as it moves from partially jokey (I think) articles in newspapers to employment tribunals, appearances before Human Rights Commissions and the like. Google for how these kinds of things have played out in Canada if you want to see more of how it goes.

How much is enough?

Newspaper headline spotted, concerning the new governor of the Bank of England: " Mark Carney: golden chance for return to prosperity beckons".

What is prosperity? The UK is one of the richest nations that ever existed, now (I believe we presently have the 6th highest GDP worldwide) or in history.

You would not know this from the media. The media would have you believe that we're currently experiencing deep lack and that our ruin lies at the door.

How little an appreciation of our global and historical context we have. Like the horse leech's daughter mentioned by the prophet, all we can cry out is "More! More!". How much will be enough? When will we say "That'll do. Now I will give my heart to something else than the pursuit of greater prosperity."

The problem is, though, once you give your heart to the pursuit of your own comfort, it won't give it back.

Let it be Christ's instead; and if you've already given it, plead for him to take it back. Then you'll never say "I don't possess enough"; you'll say "I possess Christ; infinite riches; I just need to know him more".

Sex education

http://www.christian.org.uk/news/six-year-olds-shown-graphic-sex-dvd-in-school/

Should we more concerned that:

a) The state thinks that it is the "uber-parent" who should provide sex education to children, at all?

or

b) That it thinks that the only problem with showing schoolchildren a video of other people having intercourse is that the children weren't old enough? (At what age should children, young people, adults or anyone at all be doing that?). On which note, from last year: http://mothwo.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/changing-label-makes-no-difference.html

Fidelity is optional

From a recent email circular from the Christian Institute:

Fidelity is optional

The Government maintains that same-sex marriage is the same as traditional marriage. But there are massive differences even in their own Bill. For example, during a debate in the House of Lords it was pointed that there are no laws about adultery or consummation for same-sex couples.

The Minister's reply was breathtaking. The Government said fidelity is not required for any marriage - it is up to the couple to decide for themselves whether they are faithful or not.

That completely shatters the argument of the Prime Minister, that same-sex marriage would extend the values of commitment and stability to a wider group in society. Instead, it enshrines an 'anything goes' concept of marriage, and enforces it on society.

That's what we call "giving the game away". "Gay marriage" isn't driven by the values that drive traditional marriage; it's driven by the 1960s sexual revolutionary values that have been progressively destroying it. The architects of "gay marriage" aren't doing it because they love marriage; they're doing it because they want to destroy it. Don't believe me? You should:

"In October Peter Tatchell celebrated 40 years since the formation of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF), a radical anti-family movement.

The ultimate goal of the group, as stated by its 1971 manifesto, was to destroy the nuclear family."

http://www.christian.org.uk/news/bid-to-redefine-marriage-goes-to-european-court/

When we hear from people that they support "gay marriage" because they are conservative, wish to support marriage, etc., then this springs to mind.

The country we live in

I emailed the Girl Guides concerning their change of pledge, and part of the canned response contained this:

Those who participated in the consultation felt that ‘to love my God’ did not truly reflect the society we live in.

Few truer words were ever spoken.

The question is, though, whether the Girl Guides should "reflect the society we live in", or attempt to improve it. The vision of the original founders was unmistakeably the latter.

Note, though the implicit appeal to the great god demos in the assumption that the former is best. All hail the people!