Category Archives: News

News

How does church appear to someone raised in a non-Christian home?

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Church sucks, that's why men are bored there

My friend Wes posted an article about how communication is set up in the church, and why it’s not effective at equipping Christians to defend their worldview in hostile environments. The article describes what I encountered in church, after I was raised in a non-Christian home and become a Christian on my own by reading the New Testament. The view presented in the essay is how I viewed the church, and is probably how most outsiders view church. I think it explains why young people leave the church in droves once they move out of their parents’ houses.

The author writes:

On the Internet, one soon discovers that many respected church leaders are quite unable to deal directly with opposing viewpoints. In fact, many of them can’t even manage meaningful engagement with other voices. Their tweets may be entirely one-way conversations. They talk at their audiences. They can talk about other voices, but fail to talk to them, let alone with them. Their representations of opposing viewpoints reveal little direct exposure to the viewpoints in question.

[…]Around this point, it can start to dawn on one that many church leaders have only been trained in forms of discourse such as the sermon and, to a much lesser extent, the essay. Both forms privilege a single voice—their voice—and don’t provide a natural space for response, questioning, and challenge. Their opinions have been assumed to be superior to opposing viewpoints, but have never been demonstrated to be so. While they may have spoken or written about opposing voices, they are quite unaccustomed to speaking or writing to them (not to mention listening to or being cross-examined by them). There are benefits to the fact that the sermon is a form of discourse that doesn’t invite interruption or talking back, but not when this is the only form of discourse its practitioners are adept in.

Many church leaders have been raised and trained in ideologically homogenous cultures or contexts that discouraged oppositional discourse. Many have been protected from hostile perspectives that might unsettle their faith. Throughout, their theological opinions and voices have been given a privileged status, immune from challenge. Nominal challenges could be brushed off by a reassertion of the monologue. They were safe to speak about and habitually misrepresent other voices to their hearers and readers, without needing to worry about those voices ever enjoying the power to answer them back. Many of the more widely read members of their congregations may have had an inkling of the weakness of their positions in the past: the Internet just makes it more apparent.

One of my friends who comments here as “Wintery’s Friend” actually did his M. Div, and I think it was he who told me that his seminary had dropped the lone course in apologetics that had been part of the curriculum. Now seminary grads don’t learn any opposing views. They just pre-suppose that the Bible is true in the same way that Mormons pre-suppose their Bible is true. It’s a Mormon epistemology that’s been adopted by Christian seminarians.

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If one’s opinion has never been subjected to and tried by rigorous cross-examination, it probably isn’t worth much. If one lacks the capacity to keep a level head when one’s views are challenged, one’s voice will be of limited use in most real world situations, where dialogue and dispute is the norm and where we have to think in conversation with people who disagree with us.

The teachers of the Church provide the members of the Church with a model for their own thinking. The teacher of the Church does not just teach others what to believe, but also how to believe, and the process by which one arrives at a theological position. This is one reason why it is crucial that teachers ‘show their working’ on a regular basis. When teaching from a biblical text, for instance, the teacher isn’t just teaching the meaning of that particular text, but how Scripture should be approached and interpreted more generally. An essential part of the teaching that the members of any church need is that of dealing with opposing viewpoints. One way or another, every church provides such teaching. However, the lesson conveyed in all too many churches is that opposing voices are to be dismissed, ignored, or ‘answered’ with a reactive reassertion of the dogmatic line, rather than a reasoned response.

You can imagine that the first questions that you’ll be asked by a non-Christian co-worker would be things like “why think God exists?” and “why think the Bible is history rather than legend?”. What I’ve learned from listening to pastors is that very few are equipped to answer those questions. Most just assume that God exists and that the Bible is inerrant. And they don’t show their work, because they haven’t done the work. Moreover, they actively oppose apologetics as “divisive” and “prideful”. And so their flocks can attend church for 20 years and never learn a single useful piece of information that can be used in a real-world discussion. If you’re wondering why kids raised in married Christian homes start getting drunk and shacking up with atheists the minute they hit college, then look at the pastors who mocked their honest questions instead of preparing to answer them with evidence.

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I believe that there are various problems in the Church that are exacerbated by this. Where they are led by voices that can’t cope with difference or challenge, churches will tend to become fissiparous echo chambers, where people are discouraged from thinking critically about what leaders are saying and doing. The integrity of the Church’s theological conversation will not be tested through criticism and challenge. Churches that are led by such leaders will habitually develop polarized oppositions with their critics.

Unfortunately, in conservative churches, pious church leaders like Al Mohler, Russell Moore, Denny Burk, etc. oppose the use of evidence in apologetics, especially scientific and historical evidence. They don’t like the idea that humans can consider evidence rationally, and make a decision – even though Jesus regularly presents evidence to people who don’t believe in him in the Bible, and expects them to respond to it. The approach of pious Christian leaders to Christian teaching is to parrot Bible verses and hope that it has a magical effect of compelling faith in unbelievers. I call this the magic-words view of the Bible. For example, these pastors would not use peer-reviewed evidence from the social sciences when discussing moral issues like premarital sex, they would just cite the Bible’s teaching on it – to non-Christians!

I don’t know about you, but I think that a peer-reviewed paper on the dangers of premarital promiscuity has far more weight than something like this from Denny Burk:

If the Bible is the word of God, then it merely needs to be proclaimed. It has intrinsic power that cannot be nullified by the most hardened of skeptics. For that reason, we can have confidence in proclaiming it to anyone. And we can say “the Bible tells me so” without blushing.

That’s just fideism, and it’s the majority view among conservative church leaders. If you had to pick a single passage that explained the decline of Bible-based Christianity in America, you couldn’t find a better passage. What’s most surprising is that this fideistic view of Christianity is not even Biblical. The Biblical view of faith is that faith is trust in God, based on evidence. This is why Jesus offered his own resurrection as evidence to a generation of unbelievers. His miracles were also evidence offered to unbelievers. And the Old Testament is filled with examples of people like Isaiah presenting evidence to unbelievers. The fideist view sounds more like the Mormon “burning of the bosom” view.

I think the Mormon / fideist camp is just imposing their own man-made views onto the text in order to get out of the hard work of having to actually study and prepare to have debates with non-Christians. The motivation is laziness, and piety is just how they dress up their laziness to make it seem positive. Unfortunately, the product of this pious laziness is ignorance, and ignorance costs young people their faith. It doesn’t seem to bother these pastors at all that they can’t have meaningful engagements with non-Christians, or that they don’t equip young Christians to defend themselves. They’re oblivious to the world outside of the church doors.

In conclusion, we really need to stop giving respect to fideist pastors, if we expect to train up a generation of young Christians who are able to retain their faith and have an influence. We would never accept Mormon fideism as a sign of competence in any other real-world area of our lives, e.g. – auto repair, software engineering, surgery or tax law. We shouldn’t accept Mormon fideism as a sign of competence in teaching the Bible, either.

Positive arguments for Christian theism

News

Viral Red State article answers: why don’t men want to marry any more?

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Here’s the article from Red State, written by Brandon Morse.

The first point he makes is that feminism teaches women to have character traits that make them unattractive to marriage-minded men. Feminism teaches women that evaluating men for marriage according to traditional male roles is “sexist”. There are no traditional male roles that women should prefer. Moreover, feminism teaches women that there are no female roles either. So, these women don’t understand men, and they aren’t prepared to be wives and mothers.

Brandon writes:

Even in modern families, men are taught how to treat a woman, provide for her, and work hard to keep her happy. Women aren’t taught how to treat a man or how to make him happy; they’re strictly taught what to expect from a man.

I can’t speak for all men, but in my case, I have definite plans for my marriage, and so a woman’s preparation and desire to be supportive is very important to me.

I’m trying to achieve these goals:

  • influence the church with apologetics
  • influence the university campus (students and professors) with apologetics
  • be involved in politics, advocate for conservative policy
  • open the house to students and neighbors to teach apologetics and demonstrate a loving marriage
  • raise 3-4 financially independent and influential children

And when I ask women what they bring to the table to help me to achieve all that, they often say that they’ve done nothing. Even the Christians try to get out of having to do anything hard by saying that God has a mysterious will that’s higher than my plans – plans which are designed to achieve specifically Christian goals. But if you look at the woman’s life, this mysterious God’s will never requires her to do anything difficult that would serve God. In practice, “God’s will” is just another word for doing what is easy, fun and peer-approved.

Brandon writes:

The sad truth is that many young women nowadays don’t know how to be in a marriage… they’re not taught how to treat a man, but what to expect from him… they’re flat-out dissuaded from providing anything but their presence to the partnership. They believe that offering their love to the man is sufficient and that men should just be grateful to have them.

What can you tell about a woman who has not prepared for tasks, like defending her faith, promoting conservative policies, or raising effective children? If she has not studied or practiced to do these things, then she isn’t suddenly going to become disciplined and effective after a wedding ceremony.

Men like when they set out to do something, and get support from their wives to achieve it. Can women today support men?

Brandon writes:

Along the lines of never learning how to treat a man, women are never taught how to value a man’s emotions unless they pertain positively to her. He must prove every day how much he values her for just existing. She expects this but is taught by our society to not reciprocate unless he earns it.

Men feel this weight, and the thing that would give them strength is withheld. Men suffer attempting to emotionally support the partner who has no interest in uplifting him in return. It’s a lonely existence in a relationship for two, making it, in truth, a relationship for one…her. What makes matters worse is that women are confused by their men’s lack of emotions. They were never taught how we think, much less appreciate it.

It’s rare for me to get support from younger women. Older Christian women can do it, but they are from a different time.

Now, people say to me “just go ahead and get married, and you can change the woman’s mind afterwards to value the things you care about”. But do young women today offer a way for men to change their minds about anything?

Brandon writes:

Now, let’s say you’re a young man entering into the stage of your life where dating to marry becomes typical. Looking at your prospects for marriage you see career-oriented women, some of whom make more money than you do and are very proud of this fact…. their opinions on any given subject seem more trendy than well thought out. They seem shallow as a result.

You see these women in your dating pool consistently exhibit opinions about your sex that are less than kind on social media. They’re taught they’re your intellectual superiors, that they’re right in any given argument no matter what… Very rarely do they display any joy in being giving or of service to their men. Even more rare are displays of humility. It reeks of narcissism.

One of the questions that I ask women to see if they are teachable is “where do you get your political news”? This question is to see if they care about anything other than their own feelings and social standing. I also ask “have you ever read any non-fiction that caused you to change your mind”? This to see whether she changes her mind about anything by increasing her knowledge.

But what I get from the Christian fundamentalists AND the career-focused feminists is the same: “I don’t read news, and I don’t read non-fiction”. If she doesn’t form her beliefs by gaining knowledge, then what method does a man have for leading her? She will only do what she feels like or what is pleasing to her peer group. If she doesn’t respect knowledge in general, then she doesn’t respect a man’s knowledge.

Brandon concludes:

Men want to feel welcome in their own relationships. Right now, they aren’t. They feel like passengers, or maybe even more accurately, chauffeurs. If women want men to marry them, then women will have to become marriage material and that means leaving behind the mainstream pop-philosophy and looking into the idea that maybe the feminists were wrong.

The schools, churches and culture are not doing anything to teach women how to be valuable to men. So why would a man marry? If I have to commit my time and money to being someone else’s slave / handbag then that will cause me to achieve goals less, right? As a Christian man, I don’t see how being a slave / handbag to a woman serves God.

News

Is there evidence of systemic racism in the United States?

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Systemic racism is the idea that people can’t lift themselves out of poverty by making good decisions, because powerful groups in society that hold the poor down, regardless of their decisions. Do you think that America is a place where no matter what choices you make, you’ll never be able to be more prosperous? That’s what the leaders of Black Lives Matter think.

Here’s what Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of the 1619 Project, says in the New York Times (a former newspaper):

To summarize, none of the actions we are told black people must take if they want to “lift themselves” out of poverty and gain financial stability — not marrying, not getting educated, not saving more, not owning a home — can mitigate 400 years of racialized plundering.

Got that? It doesn’t matter what individual choices a non-white person takes in America, they’re going to be poor. The “systemic racism” of the powerful whites will always keep them down. Single motherhood doesn’t make people poor, and marriage doesn’t make people wealthier. Dropping out of high school doesn’t make you poor, and getting a Masters degree in computer science won’t make you wealthier.

But let’s take a look at the data from the 2019 Census, and see the evidence:

Income By Ethnicity in America
Income By Ethnicity in America

White people are doing a bad job of keeping non-whites down

Well, it looks like at least SOME people of color are able to do well in America despite all the “systemic racism” that keeps non-whites down. And do you know what those non-white groups at the top have in common? They’ve made good decisions, they’ve worked hard, they haven’t blamed other people when they fail, and they’ve saved their money instead of spending it on shiny junk.

Let’s look at some decisions that the non-whites who are prosperous have made, that those further down have not.

Asians marry before they have children, so the kids have two parentsAsians marry before they have children, so the kids have two parents

Education and marriage

This article is written by the far-left radical Nicholas Kristof, writing in the radically-leftist New York Times (a former newspaper).

Excerpt:

A new scholarly book, “The Asian American Achievement Paradox,” by Jennifer Lee and Min Zhou, notes that Asian-American immigrants in recent decades have started with one advantage: They are highly educated, more so even than the average American. These immigrants are disproportionately doctors, research scientists and other highly educated professionals.

It’s not surprising that the children of Asian-American doctors would flourish in the United States. But Lee and Zhou note that kids of working-class Asian-Americans often also thrive, showing remarkable upward mobility.

[…]There’s also evidence that Americans believe that A’s go to smart kids, while Asians are more likely to think that they go to hard workers… Asian-American kids are allowed no excuse for getting B’s — or even an A-. The joke is that an A- is an “Asian F.”

One reason Asians students do so well is because their parents are usually married:

Strong two-parent families are a factor, too. Divorce rates are much lower for many Asian-American communities than for Americans as a whole, and there’s evidence that two-parent households are less likely to sink into poverty and also have better outcomes for boys in particular.

American blacks have a 73% out-of-wedlock birth rate. A huge difference compared to Asians.

So, when Nikole Hannah-Jones tells you that education and marriage don’t matter, she’s just wrong.

Compound interest

Education and marriage are important, but so is saving your money. The wealthiest people in America are typically the ones who are experts at saving money early, and investing it. They know about the law of compound interest. If you invest money early and leave it alone, then it will grow into a fortune by the time you are read to stop working.

This graph explains compound interest:

Don't trust people with non-STEM degrees to tell you how to get richInvesting $24,000 from age 21 to 41 vs investing $24000 from age 47 to 67

What does Nikole Hannah-Jones say when she looks at that graph? She doesn’t think that saving money makes a difference to having more or less wealth. She thinks skin color determines whether saving money makes you wealthy or not. The graph clearly shows what we should be recommending to young people of color. They need to stop spending money and start saving it, and the earlier the better. It doesn’t matter what your skin color is, saving money early JUST WORKS.

Similarly, when she says that home ownership doesn’t make you more wealthy, this is just terrible advice. It’s always better to pay down your own mortgage (at least when interest rates are low like they are now) than to pay someone else rent. You have to live somewhere, and paying for your own home is better because it costs about the same as rent, and then you get to keep the home when you’re done paying for it.

Communism

Nikole Hannah-Jones does have a “solution” to disparities in wealth. Her solution is communism. She wants to transfer money from those who earn, to those who don’t. But we already have tried that in the 20st century and it resulted in the deaths of over 100 million people. That’s not my opinion, that’s all documented in a book published by Harvard University Press.

Socialism Communism Countries Per Capita GDP Income
Socialism Communism Countries Per Capita GDP Income

You don’t even have to read the book to know the truth – just look at countries that score low on the Index of Economic Freedom, and compare their GDP per capita to countries that score high on the Index of Economic Freedom. The more communist a nation goes, the less wealth there is for the citizens. That’s why people in Venezuela are eating zoo animals and selling their bodies in prostitution for food, while nearby capitalist countries like Panama and Chile prosper. Nikole Hannah-Jones wants to reduce economic freedom, but we know by looking at other countries that this reduces per-capita GDP over time.

There’s a lot more than could be said here, but the point is that we need to be telling American blacks to make decisions that match the decisions of other successful non-white communities in America. We need to start teaching young people basic economics so they don’t fall prey to charlatans.