So i've saved the best for last. I've gone the long way round, beginning with some philosophical ideas and some practical applications and outworkings, but for followers of Christ the discussion has to begin and end with Biblical truth. This post is primarily for believers as it will be solely based on Scripture, but I trust even unbelievers who stop by will at least see the richness that life has according to God's word.
In Acts 17:24-28, Luke records Pauls speech to the Atheneans, where he says, "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being."
So Paul indicates that it is in God that we have meaning (live and move and have our being). He also touches on where God resides (does not live in temples built by human hands).
In 2 Corinthians 6:15b-7:1, Paul instructs those in the church in Corinth of the need to remain pure before the Lord. "What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: 'I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be there God, and they will be my people.' 'Therefore come out fro mthem and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you. I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord almighty.' Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God."
Again, we see the temple and that God does not live in a temple built by human hands, but rather lives in us that as those who have, by grace and through faith, believed in our hearts and confessed with our mouths that Jesus is Lord are the temple of the living God. What is this idea of the temple? We see that in 1 Kings chapters 5-9 (and similarly in 2 Chronicles 2-7). Therein we see a process of preparation of the OT temple, adornment of the temple and finally a dedication of the temple. Following is an excerpt from Solomon's dedication prayer for the temple:
"But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built!...May your eyes be open toward this temple night and day, this place of which you said, 'My Name shall be there', so that you will hear the prayer your servant prays toward this place..."
OK, so how do we get from the temple, the physical place, in the OT to us individually being a temple and residing place for the Name? The linkage, or linch-pin, or turning point is the cross. It appears in the first three gospels. Luke 23:44-46 says, "It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining, and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, Father into your hands I commit my spirit. When at last he said this, he breathed his last."
The tearing of the curtain represented a cessation of the separation between God and man. Until that point only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies and only then after a long series of purification (with a rope tied around his leg lest he had done something wrong and carried uncleanness in and needed to be dragged out). From that point on the temple was not a physical place, but a Comfortor within each of us.
The things to be recognized for the believer from this is that being the temple of God means more for us than just not smoking and eating right. We must continually work on purifying the temple, fully submitting all ourselves emotionally, volitionally, intellectually and physically to the Lord, dedicating ourselves to Him. This means that all we do and say should be an act of worship. Worship, in fact, is co-extensive with life. We worship God at home, at our vocation and when we relax at home. All our actions, all our words, even all our thoughts should be dedicated to God. So, worship is not just something that is done for 30 minutes on a Sunday morning when songs are sung. No, we as believers gather at a physical building but we bring the worship with us, it is only manifested for a short time in song.
In summary, biblical Christians have meaning as the very essence of their lives, where each and every thing that is done, said, thought or otherwise should be dedicated to the Lord because the Holy Spirit dwells within us and allows us to see through the things of this world to the creator and provider of all those things, and pledge our allegience and faithfulness not to a fabrication of our own or to something below us (something we fashion with our own hand or just arbitrarily choose to hold up) but to the One who is truly worthy. That would be our answer to what is the meaning in life.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Looking Through Life
"I was standing today in the dark toolshed. The sun was shining outside and through the crack at the top of the door there came a sunbeam. From where I stood that beam of light, with the specks of dust floating in it, was the most striking thing in the place...Then I moved, so that the beam fell on my eyes. Instantly, the whole picture vanished...Instead I saw, framed in the irregular cranny at the top of the door, green leaves moving on the branches of a tree outside and beyond that, 90 odd million miles away, the sun. Looking along the beam, and looking at the beam are very different experiences.
When you have got into the habit of making this distinction you will find examples of it all day long. The mathematician sits thinking, and to him it seems that he is contemplating timeless and spaceless truths about quantity. But the cerebral physiologist, if he could look inside the mathematician's head, would find nothing timeless and spaceless there - only tiny movements in the grey matter.
In other words, you can step outside one experience only by stepping inside another. Therefore, if all inside experiences are misleading, we are always misled. The cerebral physiologist may say, if he chooses, that the mathematician's thought is 'only' tiny physical movements of grey matter. But then what about the cerebral physiologist's own thought at that very moment? A second physiologist, looking at it, could pronounce it also to be only tiny physical movements in the first physiologist's skull. Where is the rot to end? The answer is that we must never allow the rot to begin. We must, on pain of idiocy, deny from the very outset the idea that looking at is, by its own nature, instrinsically truer or better than looking along. One must look both along and at everything."
C.S. Lewis, Meditation in a Toolshed, God in the Dock
This life's dim windows of the soul
Distorts the heavens from pole to pole
And leads you to believe a lie
When you see with, and not through the eye
William Blake
For both C.S. Lewis and William Blake it is not enough to simply look at a thing and say you have seen it all. Pondering Lewis' experience in the toolshed for just a moment we see what a shame it would be to see only the things in the toolshed (boards, tables, tools, etc.), and miss out on the trees, birds, sun, etc.
Going back to our previous discussion of meaning and worship for the believer. A right understanding of worship is not an experience that happens for 30 minutes one day a week that we know took place because of a raised hand, the singing of a song, or other expression we can see or hear. We make a cardinal mistake if we look only at those things for meaning (just like looking at money or fame or popularity would be a mistake). Rather, we must look both at and along those things to what lies beyond them. For a believer essence precedes existence so who we are should determine what we do. We don't look at the lucrative singing career for meaning, we recognize the God who created us with the talent, opportunity and priviledge; submit those talents and abilities to Him for His purposes, adore Him for the gift, and live a life in singing that would honor the giver of the gift. In other words, the meaning is inherent in the life and co-extensive with the life, so that even if an accident were to ruin the vocal chords and render the career over, the worship would continue and the meaning would remain equally strong. Quite simply, if the meaning of our life is a fabrication of our own making, or a compilation or summation of temporal experiences, then life has no depth and when the object we choose to look at is gone and there is nothing beyond it, then life's meaning is lost as well.
When you have got into the habit of making this distinction you will find examples of it all day long. The mathematician sits thinking, and to him it seems that he is contemplating timeless and spaceless truths about quantity. But the cerebral physiologist, if he could look inside the mathematician's head, would find nothing timeless and spaceless there - only tiny movements in the grey matter.
In other words, you can step outside one experience only by stepping inside another. Therefore, if all inside experiences are misleading, we are always misled. The cerebral physiologist may say, if he chooses, that the mathematician's thought is 'only' tiny physical movements of grey matter. But then what about the cerebral physiologist's own thought at that very moment? A second physiologist, looking at it, could pronounce it also to be only tiny physical movements in the first physiologist's skull. Where is the rot to end? The answer is that we must never allow the rot to begin. We must, on pain of idiocy, deny from the very outset the idea that looking at is, by its own nature, instrinsically truer or better than looking along. One must look both along and at everything."
C.S. Lewis, Meditation in a Toolshed, God in the Dock
This life's dim windows of the soul
Distorts the heavens from pole to pole
And leads you to believe a lie
When you see with, and not through the eye
William Blake
For both C.S. Lewis and William Blake it is not enough to simply look at a thing and say you have seen it all. Pondering Lewis' experience in the toolshed for just a moment we see what a shame it would be to see only the things in the toolshed (boards, tables, tools, etc.), and miss out on the trees, birds, sun, etc.
Going back to our previous discussion of meaning and worship for the believer. A right understanding of worship is not an experience that happens for 30 minutes one day a week that we know took place because of a raised hand, the singing of a song, or other expression we can see or hear. We make a cardinal mistake if we look only at those things for meaning (just like looking at money or fame or popularity would be a mistake). Rather, we must look both at and along those things to what lies beyond them. For a believer essence precedes existence so who we are should determine what we do. We don't look at the lucrative singing career for meaning, we recognize the God who created us with the talent, opportunity and priviledge; submit those talents and abilities to Him for His purposes, adore Him for the gift, and live a life in singing that would honor the giver of the gift. In other words, the meaning is inherent in the life and co-extensive with the life, so that even if an accident were to ruin the vocal chords and render the career over, the worship would continue and the meaning would remain equally strong. Quite simply, if the meaning of our life is a fabrication of our own making, or a compilation or summation of temporal experiences, then life has no depth and when the object we choose to look at is gone and there is nothing beyond it, then life's meaning is lost as well.
Authentic Meaning
Do I really matter? If I was gone tomorrow would it make any difference? Do the things I do every day really mean anything? These questions and many like them are asked every day by people in all walks of life, young and old. I asked myself some of these same questions when I was around 16 years old. Over the last twenty years I have come to know some pretty meaningful things about meaning in life.
Answers to meaning in life are given in many different areas today. Entertainment is so important in American culture right now, so many are "plugged in" spending so much time with TV, online, or talking on mobile phones or working on tweets that a fair place to look for what contemporary culture offers is important. A quick look through the Billboard music charts shows that ideas like fame, money, relationships, success and wild indulgences is where to find real meaning. In fact, most of American culture now has been secularized to the point that the common view of meaning was summed up by Jean-Paul Sartre many years ago. Sartre said that existance preceeds essence, or what you do defines who you are. Although some of the fundamental understandings of this belief were radically different for Sartre, most today feel that meaning in their life is up to them. Francis Schaeffer pointed out the difficulty in this line of thinking. He said in his work Escape from Reason, "First, Jean-Paul Sartre. Rationally the universe is absurd, and you must try to authenticate yourself. How? By authenticating yourself by an act of will. So if you are driving along the street and see someone in the pouring rain, you stop your car, pick him up and give him a lift. It is absurd. What does it matter? He is nothing, the situation is nothing, but you have authenticated yourself by an act of the will. But the difficulty is that authentication has no rational or logical content - all directions of an act of the will are equal. Therefore, similarly, if you are driving along and see the man in the rain, speed up your car, and knock him down, you have in an equal measure authenticated your will. Do you understand? If you do, cry for the modern man in such a hopeless situation."
As a believer the issue of meaning is approached in exactly the same way. We believe that essence preceeds existence. Or who we are defines what we do. We are created by our Creator in the image of God. We are knit together in our mother's womb, and God knows us before we are born. So we have value and importance that is intrinsic. We don't have to do some grand work, or make a lot of money, or be a success at work for our lives to have meaning. We are valuable from birth not because of what we have done, but because of what God has done in us.
A true understanding of worship is a key to the meaning in life for a believer. Worship was defined by William Temple as, "the submission of all of our nature to God. It is the quickening of conscience by His holiness, nourishment of mind by His truth, purifying of imagination by His beauty, opening of the heart to His love, and submission of will to His purpose. And all this gathered up in adoration is the greatest human expression of which we are capable." Notice that the focus here is not on what we do, but on God. Worship is submitting ourselves totally to God. Recognition of His holiness, His truth, His beauty, His love and His purpose.
You see, if we define ourselves by how we look or our job or money or even acts of our own will for meaning, or value, or authentification then what of the times when those things are gone? If our meaning in life is all centered around our looks and popularity, what happens if there is an accident and our face is marred, or age takes its inevitable toll and our looks are gone? Do we then cease to have meaning? Pride drives us to think more of ourselves than we ought, but a true understanding of worship allows us to submit ourselves to God and adore Him and that brings meaning to everything in life.
Worship is not just something that takes place for a believer for 30 minutes on a Sunday morning. No, it is an involvement in everything we do in life. A submission of all of our will to God. We turn over all our lives to God and every second of every day becomes an act of worship, it is co-extensive with life and brings a richness and respect to life that is absent otherwise. In the next two posts I hope to bring out some illustrations of why the idea of worship is so important to how we see the world and how our behavior is effected, and some of the biblical linkages to the concept.
Answers to meaning in life are given in many different areas today. Entertainment is so important in American culture right now, so many are "plugged in" spending so much time with TV, online, or talking on mobile phones or working on tweets that a fair place to look for what contemporary culture offers is important. A quick look through the Billboard music charts shows that ideas like fame, money, relationships, success and wild indulgences is where to find real meaning. In fact, most of American culture now has been secularized to the point that the common view of meaning was summed up by Jean-Paul Sartre many years ago. Sartre said that existance preceeds essence, or what you do defines who you are. Although some of the fundamental understandings of this belief were radically different for Sartre, most today feel that meaning in their life is up to them. Francis Schaeffer pointed out the difficulty in this line of thinking. He said in his work Escape from Reason, "First, Jean-Paul Sartre. Rationally the universe is absurd, and you must try to authenticate yourself. How? By authenticating yourself by an act of will. So if you are driving along the street and see someone in the pouring rain, you stop your car, pick him up and give him a lift. It is absurd. What does it matter? He is nothing, the situation is nothing, but you have authenticated yourself by an act of the will. But the difficulty is that authentication has no rational or logical content - all directions of an act of the will are equal. Therefore, similarly, if you are driving along and see the man in the rain, speed up your car, and knock him down, you have in an equal measure authenticated your will. Do you understand? If you do, cry for the modern man in such a hopeless situation."
As a believer the issue of meaning is approached in exactly the same way. We believe that essence preceeds existence. Or who we are defines what we do. We are created by our Creator in the image of God. We are knit together in our mother's womb, and God knows us before we are born. So we have value and importance that is intrinsic. We don't have to do some grand work, or make a lot of money, or be a success at work for our lives to have meaning. We are valuable from birth not because of what we have done, but because of what God has done in us.
A true understanding of worship is a key to the meaning in life for a believer. Worship was defined by William Temple as, "the submission of all of our nature to God. It is the quickening of conscience by His holiness, nourishment of mind by His truth, purifying of imagination by His beauty, opening of the heart to His love, and submission of will to His purpose. And all this gathered up in adoration is the greatest human expression of which we are capable." Notice that the focus here is not on what we do, but on God. Worship is submitting ourselves totally to God. Recognition of His holiness, His truth, His beauty, His love and His purpose.
You see, if we define ourselves by how we look or our job or money or even acts of our own will for meaning, or value, or authentification then what of the times when those things are gone? If our meaning in life is all centered around our looks and popularity, what happens if there is an accident and our face is marred, or age takes its inevitable toll and our looks are gone? Do we then cease to have meaning? Pride drives us to think more of ourselves than we ought, but a true understanding of worship allows us to submit ourselves to God and adore Him and that brings meaning to everything in life.
Worship is not just something that takes place for a believer for 30 minutes on a Sunday morning. No, it is an involvement in everything we do in life. A submission of all of our will to God. We turn over all our lives to God and every second of every day becomes an act of worship, it is co-extensive with life and brings a richness and respect to life that is absent otherwise. In the next two posts I hope to bring out some illustrations of why the idea of worship is so important to how we see the world and how our behavior is effected, and some of the biblical linkages to the concept.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Discussion on Evolution
This post is for the continuation of a thead from another site where the Theory of Evolution vs. a Creationist approach is being discussed as to the best explanation for the observable evidences of changes is being discussed. To date, what has been stipulated is that evidence is defined as any data that are verifiable like fossils, DNA and others; that in science a Theory is the top rung and that the Theory of Evolution will never be a "proof" of the observable fact of biological change. The argument is whether the Theory of Evolution (ToE) is in fact the best explanation, which is admittedly the most prevalently believed in scientific circles in contemporary culture.
The evidence has just begun to be examined and, as many times beginnings do, started at the beginning, namely the Cambrian Explosion in the fossil record. Please follow the comment thread for a continued discussion, where the first comment is the last comment and follow-up question from the previous line of discussion.
The evidence has just begun to be examined and, as many times beginnings do, started at the beginning, namely the Cambrian Explosion in the fossil record. Please follow the comment thread for a continued discussion, where the first comment is the last comment and follow-up question from the previous line of discussion.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Re-Defining Marriage?
What is marriage anyway? It seems this question above any other ought to be explored these days. In the last week i've seen no less than three articles in the local paper and have heard even more relative to the upcoming Health Care Bill discussions speaking to the status of marriage in the United States, more states expanding marriage to gay and lesbian couples (Washington D.C. being the latest) and other related topics. Following are my thoughts on the subject for what they are worth:
First off, my starting point is similar to the one I presented in the last post on abortion, namely if marriage is just the joining of two entities who desire to enter into the state recognized union then by all means let there be no bounds on which two entities go through the process and call themselves married. I don't intend to be crass or jocular at all in saying this, but if we continue down the road we are on I really don't think it will be that long until there is an outcry because a person cannot be married to their pet. And why not? If marriage is just the union of two entities who are dedicated to one another and who desire to live in the same home in a caring relationship then why should that not cover the situation I just described? There are many who care deeply for their pets and in some situations the pet is very much loved and real caring relationship exists.
Re-defining marriage is only a problem if marriage was originally ordained by God as the Bible describes. In other words, if man decides what constitutes marriage then it will always be in a state of flux. As moods and conditions change, marriage as defined by the culture's ever changing attitudes must change as well. However, if the Bible is true and the Biblical definition of marriage is true, then regardless of how culture changes marriage cannot change. Why is that? Why do Christians get so upset when gays and lesbians protest so vehemently to be included in marriage?
The answer is really quite simple. God established marriage between a man and a woman as a picture, elsewhere described in the Bible as between Jesus and the Church, and also as a reflection of the very nature of God in the Trinity. How so? God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have existed in the Trinity from eternity in a perfect relationship of community. When God decided to create man, He said it was not good that man be alone and gave him a helpmeet, a partner of his own body to exist with in a relationship, namely woman (taken from man). The man and the woman come together in an intimate way and the Holy Spirit then participates to knit the new life together in the mother's womb. There is no other union where this particular arrangement, which was so beautifully orchestrated, can take place. This is why there is no place in Scripture where homosexual relations are anything but condemned. It is not that feelings are not present, or the desire to be intimate is not present, it is that any relationship other than that established by God does not reflect the glory of the relationship in the Trinity. It does not bring glory to God, and therefore is a perversion of the natural, and should be condemned in any time and in any situation.
As to the sexual preferences of individuals the same sort of closer look is needed. Desires and feelings for things other than those prescribed by God are real. They are just as real as the desire to lie, to cheat, to steal, to dishonor parents. As believers, we must acknowledge that the standard is the same for all sin, it is all deplorable for the same reason: we were created to bring glory to God, when we break His law whether in word, in thought, or in deed we fail to do as we were intended and are in need of forgiveness. Faithfulness here I believe is the key. We must either be faithful to God in being single, or be faithful to God in being married as God established. In this point the Christian has done much damage over the years by not holding up the lifelong commitment and cheapened the covenant of marriage itself. Just think, is it possible for the Trinity to be seperated? That is exactly what divorce implies, that God can be seperated and eternal covenants can be broken. The limitations of humankind, the fall of man and the subsequent provisions for divorce are not being discussed here, but the point remains that as Christians we must hold up our end of the bargain and not say on the one hand that marriage is a covenant relationship established by God and then run to divorce. In "The Loving Opposition", Stanton L. Jones puts it this way, "Outside of the marriage of a man and woman, the proper use of sex is to honor God by costly obedience in living a chaste life...And so, the Christian vision for sexuality and marriage is our foundational reason for rejecting homosexual action as a legitimate moral option."
For the Christian, essence preceeds existance. By that I mean that who we are should define what we do. God created us to bring Him glory through being obedient to His Word, living our lives for Him in whatever circumstance or situation we are in, in short to use the free will with which we were created to actively pursue righteousness. This is why marriage is such an important issue for believers, why homosexuality is similar to all other sin, it is attempting to revise or redefine our very essence, who we are, what we were created to be.
This is a tough issue and I hope this post has been presented in a way that lovingly but sternly addresses the issue from a Biblical point of view. Quite simply, if the Bible is true then marriage is only defined and only legitimate if the arrangement is in accordance with the Word. If marriage is defined by majority decision, or cultural climate, or poll data, or popular opinion then it can be anything and everything. For my part, I believe even the idea that marriage can be re-defined is to believe a lie. Marriage was established by God and will always be just as He originally gave it. What contemporary culture chooses to call marriage, is not marriage re-defined, it is not marriage at all.
First off, my starting point is similar to the one I presented in the last post on abortion, namely if marriage is just the joining of two entities who desire to enter into the state recognized union then by all means let there be no bounds on which two entities go through the process and call themselves married. I don't intend to be crass or jocular at all in saying this, but if we continue down the road we are on I really don't think it will be that long until there is an outcry because a person cannot be married to their pet. And why not? If marriage is just the union of two entities who are dedicated to one another and who desire to live in the same home in a caring relationship then why should that not cover the situation I just described? There are many who care deeply for their pets and in some situations the pet is very much loved and real caring relationship exists.
Re-defining marriage is only a problem if marriage was originally ordained by God as the Bible describes. In other words, if man decides what constitutes marriage then it will always be in a state of flux. As moods and conditions change, marriage as defined by the culture's ever changing attitudes must change as well. However, if the Bible is true and the Biblical definition of marriage is true, then regardless of how culture changes marriage cannot change. Why is that? Why do Christians get so upset when gays and lesbians protest so vehemently to be included in marriage?
The answer is really quite simple. God established marriage between a man and a woman as a picture, elsewhere described in the Bible as between Jesus and the Church, and also as a reflection of the very nature of God in the Trinity. How so? God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have existed in the Trinity from eternity in a perfect relationship of community. When God decided to create man, He said it was not good that man be alone and gave him a helpmeet, a partner of his own body to exist with in a relationship, namely woman (taken from man). The man and the woman come together in an intimate way and the Holy Spirit then participates to knit the new life together in the mother's womb. There is no other union where this particular arrangement, which was so beautifully orchestrated, can take place. This is why there is no place in Scripture where homosexual relations are anything but condemned. It is not that feelings are not present, or the desire to be intimate is not present, it is that any relationship other than that established by God does not reflect the glory of the relationship in the Trinity. It does not bring glory to God, and therefore is a perversion of the natural, and should be condemned in any time and in any situation.
As to the sexual preferences of individuals the same sort of closer look is needed. Desires and feelings for things other than those prescribed by God are real. They are just as real as the desire to lie, to cheat, to steal, to dishonor parents. As believers, we must acknowledge that the standard is the same for all sin, it is all deplorable for the same reason: we were created to bring glory to God, when we break His law whether in word, in thought, or in deed we fail to do as we were intended and are in need of forgiveness. Faithfulness here I believe is the key. We must either be faithful to God in being single, or be faithful to God in being married as God established. In this point the Christian has done much damage over the years by not holding up the lifelong commitment and cheapened the covenant of marriage itself. Just think, is it possible for the Trinity to be seperated? That is exactly what divorce implies, that God can be seperated and eternal covenants can be broken. The limitations of humankind, the fall of man and the subsequent provisions for divorce are not being discussed here, but the point remains that as Christians we must hold up our end of the bargain and not say on the one hand that marriage is a covenant relationship established by God and then run to divorce. In "The Loving Opposition", Stanton L. Jones puts it this way, "Outside of the marriage of a man and woman, the proper use of sex is to honor God by costly obedience in living a chaste life...And so, the Christian vision for sexuality and marriage is our foundational reason for rejecting homosexual action as a legitimate moral option."
For the Christian, essence preceeds existance. By that I mean that who we are should define what we do. God created us to bring Him glory through being obedient to His Word, living our lives for Him in whatever circumstance or situation we are in, in short to use the free will with which we were created to actively pursue righteousness. This is why marriage is such an important issue for believers, why homosexuality is similar to all other sin, it is attempting to revise or redefine our very essence, who we are, what we were created to be.
This is a tough issue and I hope this post has been presented in a way that lovingly but sternly addresses the issue from a Biblical point of view. Quite simply, if the Bible is true then marriage is only defined and only legitimate if the arrangement is in accordance with the Word. If marriage is defined by majority decision, or cultural climate, or poll data, or popular opinion then it can be anything and everything. For my part, I believe even the idea that marriage can be re-defined is to believe a lie. Marriage was established by God and will always be just as He originally gave it. What contemporary culture chooses to call marriage, is not marriage re-defined, it is not marriage at all.
Friday, January 1, 2010
New Year, Same Concern
I purposefully wanted to begin the New Year with a post on a topic that is both controversial but also current and important, namely abortion. Many strong stands are being taken with regard to the comprehensive Health Care bills and the debate over possibilities and variations on inclusion, funding and scope of abortion in the United States under the new Health Care bill. For my part, I have not read the House or Senate Bills in their entirety, although not for a lack of trying. In both cases I attempted to download the document from the government website and read for myself, but the file was so large that it took over 60 seconds for my screen to refresh every time I scrolled down on a page or clicked to a new page. I simply didn't have the time. I say that to say that I cannot speak to the specific language in the Bills, so I won't, i'll just tackle the issue of should abotion be funded by taxpayers.
My answer is simply put in a previous post on this site entered on October 5, 2009 entitled "Justifiable Homocide?" The excerpt is as follows:
"What is the unborn? If that thing growing in the mother's womb is not an individual human being, then kill it and remove it, whether it is for a good reason or not, no justification is needed. If, however, the human fetus is an individual human person differing from a 2-year old child only in size, shape, environment and degree of development then there is absolutely no reason that anyone could give (outside of an immediate fatal condition to the mother such as a tubal or ectopic pregnancy) that would warrant killing that innocent person."
Taxpayer money should not be used to fund abortions because abortion is the killing of an innocent and defenseless human person. For me, the money involved the number of people in favor of or against the bill, results of poll data, other points in the bill that are important, or the necessity to get something done because the medical system is flawed have nothing to do with whether killing the unborn is right or wrong. We don't even ask that question much any more. Is it right to do? It seems more and more the only questions asked are, "Can it be done?" or "Do a majority of Americans agree with doing it?" If we go down that road and make decisions based on pure pragmatism, utilitarianism or majority rule then history has already taught us where it all ends.
With respect to governmental role in the matter, I think it far oversteps any bounds ever laid out for the Legislative, Judicial or Executive branches. I don't even see a need to debate the question of whether the government should be allowed to force anyone in the United States by rule of law to participate in an activity they find morally wrong. I suppose if it is passed those who have for so long called themselves pro-choice will have to change their position to pro-mandate. In any case, I am more concerned about what happens when you take this to its logical conclusion. If we judge what is acceptible by what is passed into law, i.e. it's right because the government says so, then where does that leave all other moral issues. I was amazed to hear in President Obama's speech (in which he condemned the violence against protesters in Iran) say that the protesters were only trying to exercise their universal right to protest for freedom. "Universal right". This used to be an inalienable right, something given by God to all those He created in His image and likeness. Do we now believe the universe gives us the right of freedom? What will we say next, that it is a global right? How about a secular governmental right?
Whether funding for abortion is actually included in the final Health Care bill that is voted on and if passed sent on to the President for his signature is yet to be seen. I belive that abortion is wrong. The unborn are innocent human persons whose lives should be protected just as the lives of toddlers, young men and women, adult men and women and the elderly should be protected.
It is a New Year but this issue and my concern over it remains the same. I continue to pray that the truth will be clearly seen and that more and more we will work to stop the damage we are doing in destroying so many human lives.
My answer is simply put in a previous post on this site entered on October 5, 2009 entitled "Justifiable Homocide?" The excerpt is as follows:
"What is the unborn? If that thing growing in the mother's womb is not an individual human being, then kill it and remove it, whether it is for a good reason or not, no justification is needed. If, however, the human fetus is an individual human person differing from a 2-year old child only in size, shape, environment and degree of development then there is absolutely no reason that anyone could give (outside of an immediate fatal condition to the mother such as a tubal or ectopic pregnancy) that would warrant killing that innocent person."
Taxpayer money should not be used to fund abortions because abortion is the killing of an innocent and defenseless human person. For me, the money involved the number of people in favor of or against the bill, results of poll data, other points in the bill that are important, or the necessity to get something done because the medical system is flawed have nothing to do with whether killing the unborn is right or wrong. We don't even ask that question much any more. Is it right to do? It seems more and more the only questions asked are, "Can it be done?" or "Do a majority of Americans agree with doing it?" If we go down that road and make decisions based on pure pragmatism, utilitarianism or majority rule then history has already taught us where it all ends.
With respect to governmental role in the matter, I think it far oversteps any bounds ever laid out for the Legislative, Judicial or Executive branches. I don't even see a need to debate the question of whether the government should be allowed to force anyone in the United States by rule of law to participate in an activity they find morally wrong. I suppose if it is passed those who have for so long called themselves pro-choice will have to change their position to pro-mandate. In any case, I am more concerned about what happens when you take this to its logical conclusion. If we judge what is acceptible by what is passed into law, i.e. it's right because the government says so, then where does that leave all other moral issues. I was amazed to hear in President Obama's speech (in which he condemned the violence against protesters in Iran) say that the protesters were only trying to exercise their universal right to protest for freedom. "Universal right". This used to be an inalienable right, something given by God to all those He created in His image and likeness. Do we now believe the universe gives us the right of freedom? What will we say next, that it is a global right? How about a secular governmental right?
Whether funding for abortion is actually included in the final Health Care bill that is voted on and if passed sent on to the President for his signature is yet to be seen. I belive that abortion is wrong. The unborn are innocent human persons whose lives should be protected just as the lives of toddlers, young men and women, adult men and women and the elderly should be protected.
It is a New Year but this issue and my concern over it remains the same. I continue to pray that the truth will be clearly seen and that more and more we will work to stop the damage we are doing in destroying so many human lives.
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