If you're an Episcopalian, you may have been told that the "average age" of Episcopalians is 57.9 (and "rising rapidly"). Where does this number come from?
Well, it doesn't appear to come from anywhere, at least not from some actual study. It's also (in the mouths of other denominations) the average age of Methodists and of Presbyterians. And its pairing with an average age of US residents (a number given anywhere from 35 to 40) is utter nonsense.
The Canadian Census people do in fact collect pretty detailed info about religious affiliation and age. Their reports give an average age of about 50. There is a group called US COngregations which also does some study work along these lines. They report an average age for all US worshippers of about 50. A report they prepared specifically for the Methodists gives similar numbers.
These last two, by the way, show why the comparison with the average age in the USA is nonsense: they do not count children under age 15 at all.
I took the liberty of exchanging a few messages with C. Kirk Hadaway, Director of Research at The Episcopal Church Center. He wrote back:
"I have been unable to find the source of this number. I suspect that it is actually an estimate of adult Episcopalians from a national survey. Obviously, including children would lower the average age. I have tried to develop an estimate using known percentages of members 60 and over and demographic age distributions of the population. This is somewhat speculative, but I am sure that the actual average age is around 47 or 48 rather than 58."
and later:
"By combining Faith Communities Today data for the Episcopal Church with a census population pyramid I get an estimated average age of 49 in 2000. That is an estimate, of course, but any figure in the high 50s is highly suspect."
As for "rising rapidly", even if not a single Episcopal baby were born nor a single person converted, the average age could not rise by a year every year. The aging of the population is counterbalanced, to a degree, by the dying off of older members.
So why do people repeat these numbers? It's because they want to alarm people with the notion that their church is dying out. The reality is that large denominations tend to have population distributions that reflect that of the nation as a whole: a fairly uniform distribution of members across age groups. There is of course a dip in teen to 20s attendance, but its effect is not so dramatic as this.
Thursday, January 13, 2005
Saturday, December 25, 2004
Maybe I'm a Reasserter
But then again, maybe I'm not. Well, anyway, Salty Vicar has a list of Questions for Reasserters, and I feel some sort of response is called for. I think, however, that a different sort of response is called for than an a mere list of specific replies.
Perhaps the most common failing of theologians is to look upon scriptural material as being their especial province. That is, they like to believe that everyone needs theologians in order to have a hope of getting anything out of scripture. Now, considering the condition of the writing of the NT texts, this is an utterly preposterous conceit.
And as Ponty is wont to point out, the attitude of Salty's questions tends towards the condescending. Take this one:
Augustine one said that "all truth is one." Harmonize, if you can, insights from Adam Smith, Einstein, Freud, Chomsky, and Galileo with Biblical cosmology. Explain why it makes no difference in your interpretation of scripture.
I'm with Ponty in wondering what Chomsky is doing in there; surely he political fatuosity puts paid on his cosmological imprint. One wonders whether a Rev. Salty of twenty years ago would have included Karl Marx. The hidden assumption in this is that these people have something to say about cosmology in a way that has anything to do with NT religion. It's a highly questionable assumption, especially considering the range of people cited. Let's start with Galileo (a "poster boy" choice at that): must we assume that the Evangelists or Apostles would have been shocked to learn that the earth travels in an elliptical path around the sun? I think not. It is not a given that people are so heavily invested in the commonplaces of their day, and indeed, it seems that most people accept such changes to common knowledge with aplomb.
But there's a deeper assumption: that the skepticisms of the modernists have to be taken as given. By right, claims of science do not merit this. Newton and Einstein have earned their places of honor in formulating models that withstand the assaults of years of use. Adam Smith? Well, economics is still controversial, is it not? And so is psychology-- indeed, Kinsey's "foundational" studies have attracted increasing criticism as it becomes more apparent that they are heavilty contaminated by the sin of self-justification.
Thus, it isn't proper that the modernists expect to get a pass on their presumptions. What's unreasonable about reading scripture in a, well, normal manner? Like, um, some of it is literal and some isn't and some is both?
Perhaps the most common failing of theologians is to look upon scriptural material as being their especial province. That is, they like to believe that everyone needs theologians in order to have a hope of getting anything out of scripture. Now, considering the condition of the writing of the NT texts, this is an utterly preposterous conceit.
And as Ponty is wont to point out, the attitude of Salty's questions tends towards the condescending. Take this one:
Augustine one said that "all truth is one." Harmonize, if you can, insights from Adam Smith, Einstein, Freud, Chomsky, and Galileo with Biblical cosmology. Explain why it makes no difference in your interpretation of scripture.
I'm with Ponty in wondering what Chomsky is doing in there; surely he political fatuosity puts paid on his cosmological imprint. One wonders whether a Rev. Salty of twenty years ago would have included Karl Marx. The hidden assumption in this is that these people have something to say about cosmology in a way that has anything to do with NT religion. It's a highly questionable assumption, especially considering the range of people cited. Let's start with Galileo (a "poster boy" choice at that): must we assume that the Evangelists or Apostles would have been shocked to learn that the earth travels in an elliptical path around the sun? I think not. It is not a given that people are so heavily invested in the commonplaces of their day, and indeed, it seems that most people accept such changes to common knowledge with aplomb.
But there's a deeper assumption: that the skepticisms of the modernists have to be taken as given. By right, claims of science do not merit this. Newton and Einstein have earned their places of honor in formulating models that withstand the assaults of years of use. Adam Smith? Well, economics is still controversial, is it not? And so is psychology-- indeed, Kinsey's "foundational" studies have attracted increasing criticism as it becomes more apparent that they are heavilty contaminated by the sin of self-justification.
Thus, it isn't proper that the modernists expect to get a pass on their presumptions. What's unreasonable about reading scripture in a, well, normal manner? Like, um, some of it is literal and some isn't and some is both?
Omnis Mundus Jocudetur Nato Salvatore
The sun has set on Christmas Day, and rather than going to bed and catching up on sleep as I should, I'm sitting here blogging.
As far as on-line talk is concerned, I think what distresses me the most for the year is the bitterness and the contempt. I pray that this bitterness be put behind us.
Merry Christmas to all who read these words.
As far as on-line talk is concerned, I think what distresses me the most for the year is the bitterness and the contempt. I pray that this bitterness be put behind us.
Merry Christmas to all who read these words.
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
Jerks For Jesus
Surely one of the most abiding principles of internet discourse is "Venom in the defense of my moral principles is no vice!" Here, courtesy of Fr. Jake, is a particularly mean-spirited "sermon". Well, actually, it's a church politics speech. "Poorly educated, theologically unsophisticated, [and] socially regressive" translates to "doesn't agree to the latest teachings of the liberal secular establishment", when it comes to that; the complaints about Rowan Williams are all about Cantuar failing to enact the (liberal) party line.
Now, all the tendentious teaching about what Jesus didn't say is beside the point. It's theologically unsophisticated and socially regressive (for American society, anyway), and doesn't say anything I haven't heard before and haven't rejected as bad exegesis. Heck, I feel the need for a bit of a sermon myself here:
For Christians, there is no choice between personal purity and social action. If you think that what you do in the bedroom is private and doesn't affect everyone around you: that's self-indulgent wishful thinking. If you think that leading a pure life is enough: purity also lies in how you treat others, even though whom you cannot see. Ridicule purity, ridicule charity, ridicule those who advocate either, and you're writing your own ticket to hell, along with anyone foolish enough to follow you.
But beside that, the point is in how the opponents are treated. To be blunt: a long list of cheap shots, liberally showered in contempt, shouldn't be anyone's model of an acceptable sermon. As an Anglican Christian, I'd like to think that we can actually treat our enemies with genuine human respect, and hear what they say. If what they say is wrong, let its error fall on its own lack of merit. The tantrums of the saints are not for emulation.
Now, all the tendentious teaching about what Jesus didn't say is beside the point. It's theologically unsophisticated and socially regressive (for American society, anyway), and doesn't say anything I haven't heard before and haven't rejected as bad exegesis. Heck, I feel the need for a bit of a sermon myself here:
For Christians, there is no choice between personal purity and social action. If you think that what you do in the bedroom is private and doesn't affect everyone around you: that's self-indulgent wishful thinking. If you think that leading a pure life is enough: purity also lies in how you treat others, even though whom you cannot see. Ridicule purity, ridicule charity, ridicule those who advocate either, and you're writing your own ticket to hell, along with anyone foolish enough to follow you.
But beside that, the point is in how the opponents are treated. To be blunt: a long list of cheap shots, liberally showered in contempt, shouldn't be anyone's model of an acceptable sermon. As an Anglican Christian, I'd like to think that we can actually treat our enemies with genuine human respect, and hear what they say. If what they say is wrong, let its error fall on its own lack of merit. The tantrums of the saints are not for emulation.
Thursday, December 09, 2004
Reverse Triumphalism
Anyone who has followed much about this years' ECUSA crisis has surely seen a lot blog entries and comments proclaiming the death of ECUSA or Anglicanism in general. Personally, I would like to discount these. It's not because they may or may not be right, but mainly because it's been done so many times before. We get a wave of these with every new outrage or attempt to deal with the issues. Sometimes get them just because someone posts something-- anything-- about ECUSA.
In case anyone hasn't noticed: Churches don't fall quickly. It's not entirely unreasonable to date the current debacle back to 1976, with the approvals of owmen as priests and the current BCP. So check your calendars, people, because that was over twenty-eight years ago. The Windsor Report has been out less than two months; it's unreasonable to expect drastic action in so short a time.
And yet we have all the reverse triumphalist proclamations, people who I suppose fancy themselves like the dead collector in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The church isn't dead yet, so they have to hit it over the head a few times.
The fellows over at Balaam's Ass have been on this one too.
In case anyone hasn't noticed: Churches don't fall quickly. It's not entirely unreasonable to date the current debacle back to 1976, with the approvals of owmen as priests and the current BCP. So check your calendars, people, because that was over twenty-eight years ago. The Windsor Report has been out less than two months; it's unreasonable to expect drastic action in so short a time.
And yet we have all the reverse triumphalist proclamations, people who I suppose fancy themselves like the dead collector in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The church isn't dead yet, so they have to hit it over the head a few times.
The fellows over at Balaam's Ass have been on this one too.
Tuesday, December 07, 2004
The Six Foot Shelf
The Vatican has (allegedly) its secret library; I have the Six Foot Shelf of Bad Religion. It features such gems as
The Book of Mormon and The Pearl of Great Price
New World Translation of the Scriptures (by the JWs)
The Lost Years of Jesus by Elizabeth Clare Prophet
The Pictorial Key to the Tarot by Arthur Waite
The Desire of Ages by Ellen G. White
The Hidden Dangers of the Rainbow by Constance Cumbey
Gyn/Ecology and The Wickedary by Mary Daly
...and many others. Why do I have these things? Well, partly because my wife absorbs books. But it's also because primary sources are important. If you're going to denounce something, it's more effective if you can refute it accurately. Inaccurate refutations are often enough tantamont to endorsement.
The Book of Mormon and The Pearl of Great Price
New World Translation of the Scriptures (by the JWs)
The Lost Years of Jesus by Elizabeth Clare Prophet
The Pictorial Key to the Tarot by Arthur Waite
The Desire of Ages by Ellen G. White
The Hidden Dangers of the Rainbow by Constance Cumbey
Gyn/Ecology and The Wickedary by Mary Daly
...and many others. Why do I have these things? Well, partly because my wife absorbs books. But it's also because primary sources are important. If you're going to denounce something, it's more effective if you can refute it accurately. Inaccurate refutations are often enough tantamont to endorsement.
Monday, December 06, 2004
Yet Another Function of Infallibility
At some point one is certainly entitled not to rehash old arguments. I do not personally get involved in discussions of the trinity as a doctrine; there's almost no chance that anyone will present me with an argument I haven't seen before.
I count this, however, as a personal prerogative, not some doctrinal statement about my authority.
So over in Ponty's blog we get into this long thread about Mariology, and in comment #30 he says:
"#23: Your presupposition is “If the popes and Eastern patriarchs have endorsed it, it is correct.” But of course, Protestantism is practically defined by its rejection of some sort of generative infallibility among a certain class of people.
"Exactly! And that is precisely why Protestantism is incapable of holding on to the fullness of the faith in its confrontation with modernity."
Well, in a sense Catholicism has been incapable of holding on to it too, for Catholicism spawned Protestantism. Claiming infallibility is fairly effective in cutting off interminable debate of basic principles, at least internally. It does nothing at all about cutting them off externally. And in fact, it presents a tradeoff. The ultimate defense of arguments is being tested against refutation; hence, anything that curtails those tests reduces confidence in those arguments.
In practice, cutting off debate is a temptation to sin by ignoring the refutation of poor arguments. In the world at large, debate cannot be cut off, but it can be crippled by poor communication. Hence bad RC and EO doctrinal claims are refuted every day; it's just that RC and EO authorities ignore these refutations. And I mean "refuted" in a very specific and objective sense: they are found to be not valid by individuals.
As soon as one has to talk about infallibility, one is admitting that human reasoning is not all that it could be-- and not because of the limitations of reason, but because sin contaminates reasoning. It's obvious that claims to infallibility occaisions of near (if not actual) sin, due to the temptation to dress one's assertions up in supernal authority. But such assertions should not be refutable even in ordinary reasoning.
Which brings me back to the original quote. Even if the "infallible" churches are less tempted to dump basic items of faith, I do not think they are protected from obscuring these truths in a thicket of errors or extraneous claims and practices. Mariology stands as an object case: one need not look far to see places in the RC church where devotion to Mary is elevated practically to worship, and Jesus becomes an appendage.
Also, infallibility must stand on its own feet. If it is needed to justify dogmatizing certain principles, the more fundamental solution is to dogmatize them directly. The more controversial propositions infallibility is stretched to cover, the more people are encouraged to doubt the fundamentals. In that wise, Protestantism is nothing more than the acknowledgement of the real state of human judgement.
I count this, however, as a personal prerogative, not some doctrinal statement about my authority.
So over in Ponty's blog we get into this long thread about Mariology, and in comment #30 he says:
"#23: Your presupposition is “If the popes and Eastern patriarchs have endorsed it, it is correct.” But of course, Protestantism is practically defined by its rejection of some sort of generative infallibility among a certain class of people.
"Exactly! And that is precisely why Protestantism is incapable of holding on to the fullness of the faith in its confrontation with modernity."
Well, in a sense Catholicism has been incapable of holding on to it too, for Catholicism spawned Protestantism. Claiming infallibility is fairly effective in cutting off interminable debate of basic principles, at least internally. It does nothing at all about cutting them off externally. And in fact, it presents a tradeoff. The ultimate defense of arguments is being tested against refutation; hence, anything that curtails those tests reduces confidence in those arguments.
In practice, cutting off debate is a temptation to sin by ignoring the refutation of poor arguments. In the world at large, debate cannot be cut off, but it can be crippled by poor communication. Hence bad RC and EO doctrinal claims are refuted every day; it's just that RC and EO authorities ignore these refutations. And I mean "refuted" in a very specific and objective sense: they are found to be not valid by individuals.
As soon as one has to talk about infallibility, one is admitting that human reasoning is not all that it could be-- and not because of the limitations of reason, but because sin contaminates reasoning. It's obvious that claims to infallibility occaisions of near (if not actual) sin, due to the temptation to dress one's assertions up in supernal authority. But such assertions should not be refutable even in ordinary reasoning.
Which brings me back to the original quote. Even if the "infallible" churches are less tempted to dump basic items of faith, I do not think they are protected from obscuring these truths in a thicket of errors or extraneous claims and practices. Mariology stands as an object case: one need not look far to see places in the RC church where devotion to Mary is elevated practically to worship, and Jesus becomes an appendage.
Also, infallibility must stand on its own feet. If it is needed to justify dogmatizing certain principles, the more fundamental solution is to dogmatize them directly. The more controversial propositions infallibility is stretched to cover, the more people are encouraged to doubt the fundamentals. In that wise, Protestantism is nothing more than the acknowledgement of the real state of human judgement.
Saturday, December 04, 2004
Possibly the Most Laughable Thing Spong Ever Wrote
Over in Ponty's blog the question of Spong's intellectual achievements. For my contribution, I offer a passage from Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism which is so profoundly stupid that it has brought laughter to those to whom I have read it.
Not surprisingly, Spong invests heavily in the "three-story universe" theory. Naturally, he equates this "prescientific" theory with ignorance and, well, stupidity. He doesn't say "stupid", but ultimately the ultimate cause of not being able to understand must be insufficient intelligence.
So we come to chapter 3: "The Pre-Scientific Assumptions of the Bible", and we have this choice passage on the top of p. 31:
Luke did not comprehend the vastness of space. No one in his day did. He could not have imagined space travel. Under the popularizing influence of astrophysicist Carl Sagan, we can now put the ascension into a new physiological context that reveals the inadequacy of biblical literalism. If Jesus ascended physically into the sky, and if he rose as rapidly as the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) he would not yet hav ereached the edges of our own galaxy. (emphasis mine)
Now, it isn't true that people in the period didn't understand the vastness of space. Ptolemaic astronomy, the standard theory of the time, held the earth to be essentually point-like with respect to the universe as a whole. But we do not need to lay upon apostles and evangelists the study of astronomy. Likewise, it's presumptuous to theorize about their ability to understand space travel, at least to the extent that the average viewer of Star Wars understands it. But besides the rediculous picture of Jesus jetting across the cosmos, there's the problem that Spong has the scriptural text wrong! Here's what Acts 1:9 actually says (RSV):
And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
Jesus didn't appear to rise out of sight indefinitely; he only had to get as far as a passing cloud-- maybe 30,000 feet up. Even at a much more leisurely rate than an ICBM, that's not hard to achieve.
Not surprisingly, Spong invests heavily in the "three-story universe" theory. Naturally, he equates this "prescientific" theory with ignorance and, well, stupidity. He doesn't say "stupid", but ultimately the ultimate cause of not being able to understand must be insufficient intelligence.
So we come to chapter 3: "The Pre-Scientific Assumptions of the Bible", and we have this choice passage on the top of p. 31:
Luke did not comprehend the vastness of space. No one in his day did. He could not have imagined space travel. Under the popularizing influence of astrophysicist Carl Sagan, we can now put the ascension into a new physiological context that reveals the inadequacy of biblical literalism. If Jesus ascended physically into the sky, and if he rose as rapidly as the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) he would not yet hav ereached the edges of our own galaxy. (emphasis mine)
Now, it isn't true that people in the period didn't understand the vastness of space. Ptolemaic astronomy, the standard theory of the time, held the earth to be essentually point-like with respect to the universe as a whole. But we do not need to lay upon apostles and evangelists the study of astronomy. Likewise, it's presumptuous to theorize about their ability to understand space travel, at least to the extent that the average viewer of Star Wars understands it. But besides the rediculous picture of Jesus jetting across the cosmos, there's the problem that Spong has the scriptural text wrong! Here's what Acts 1:9 actually says (RSV):
And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
Jesus didn't appear to rise out of sight indefinitely; he only had to get as far as a passing cloud-- maybe 30,000 feet up. Even at a much more leisurely rate than an ICBM, that's not hard to achieve.
Friday, December 03, 2004
The Keyboards of the Kingdom
Jason in New Hampshire has been looking at internet argument about religion for a while too, and he's not pleased with what he's seeing.
I live out at the Anglican/Catholic/Orthodox end of internet discussion, so the specifics of the disagreements have a different flavor. But the point about the "keyboards of the kingdom" is even more valid for us. Technically, only bishops can speak to Anglican or Catholic or Orthodox doctrine. When the rest of us do theology, it may be right, it may be wrong, but it isn't the church speaking. Therefore, it is always high time for us to get out of the cathedra and speak as if we were the ordinary mortals that, in fact, we are.
I live out at the Anglican/Catholic/Orthodox end of internet discussion, so the specifics of the disagreements have a different flavor. But the point about the "keyboards of the kingdom" is even more valid for us. Technically, only bishops can speak to Anglican or Catholic or Orthodox doctrine. When the rest of us do theology, it may be right, it may be wrong, but it isn't the church speaking. Therefore, it is always high time for us to get out of the cathedra and speak as if we were the ordinary mortals that, in fact, we are.
A Clerihew
Inspired by discussion of Spong's denuciad of John Stott, I have been moved to the challenge of writing a clerihew:
John Shelby Spong
Said that his church had it wrong
Whereas John Stott
Said that it had not.
Sunday, November 21, 2004
In the "Orwell Was Right" Department
Word comes from Ecumenical Insanity that Planned Parenthood doesn't like the Third Order Franciscans offering an abortion/contraception-free health plan to federal workers in Illinois. Now, as it turns out, according to OMB there are twelve other plans available in Illinois (not counting the nationwide plans such as Mail Carriers)so I don't think "choice" is really an issue.
This isn't PP's first foray into doublespeak-- I suspect most people have lost count by now. A quick glance at their website reveals these gems:
'Choose Life' Plates Unconstitutional: Planned Parenthood and ACLU Claim Victory for the First Amendment (preventing people from expressing their anti-abortion opinions is really a triumph for free speech and free exercise of religion)
FDA Corrupts Science with Ideology, Denies Women Essential Access to Plan B® Emergency Contraception (essential, at any rate, to embedding the practice of abortion in the culture)
Planned Parenthood Announces Return of Annual “Choice on Earth” Holiday Card (a striking act of tastelessness concerning a holiday about a birth)
and we mustn't forget statements like
Nation's Leading Reproductive Health Organization Criticizes Politically-Motivated Legislation Targeting The FDA and Early Medical Abortion Option (well, actually they are the nation's leading abortion provider)
I don't agree with the RC Church position on contraception. But I am man enough to tolerate RC men and women following the moral dictates of their church. Planned Parenthood likes to talk about extremism, but their "eye" fails when it meets a mirror.
This isn't PP's first foray into doublespeak-- I suspect most people have lost count by now. A quick glance at their website reveals these gems:
'Choose Life' Plates Unconstitutional: Planned Parenthood and ACLU Claim Victory for the First Amendment (preventing people from expressing their anti-abortion opinions is really a triumph for free speech and free exercise of religion)
FDA Corrupts Science with Ideology, Denies Women Essential Access to Plan B® Emergency Contraception (essential, at any rate, to embedding the practice of abortion in the culture)
Planned Parenthood Announces Return of Annual “Choice on Earth” Holiday Card (a striking act of tastelessness concerning a holiday about a birth)
and we mustn't forget statements like
Nation's Leading Reproductive Health Organization Criticizes Politically-Motivated Legislation Targeting The FDA and Early Medical Abortion Option (well, actually they are the nation's leading abortion provider)
I don't agree with the RC Church position on contraception. But I am man enough to tolerate RC men and women following the moral dictates of their church. Planned Parenthood likes to talk about extremism, but their "eye" fails when it meets a mirror.
Saturday, November 20, 2004
Do Protestants Exist?
From time to time one sees statements, most typically from Eastern Orthodox respondents, as to what "Protestantism" holds. Now theoretically, I'm a Protestant, being an Episcopalian and all that. Well, you can find Anglicans who say that Anglicans aren't Protestant, and you can find others who'll claim that some Anglicans aren't Protestant. But at any rate, what's the "-ism" in "Protestantism"?
It's easy enough to find a common historical origin to protestant churches: their separation from the Roman Catholic Church. This implies but two "doctrines": that the claims of the RC church to infallible teaching are false, and that there is grace outside of the RC church. Other doctrines? Well, there is hardly any topic which does not elicit radical disagreement somewhere among some "protestants".
It's not hard to see the deeper meaning of statements as to what Protestants believe. These statements are about differentiation. Converts are particularly susceptible to making them because converts need differentiation badly; conversion, after all, involves ceasing to be of one's former group. But the urge to differentiate is at best dubious, because it tempts one to exaggerated generalizations, to the point of absurdity. There is no system in "Protestantism, not when one tries to put the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society in the same bin with Wheaton College, Bob Jones University, and Episcopal Divinity School.
It's easy enough to find a common historical origin to protestant churches: their separation from the Roman Catholic Church. This implies but two "doctrines": that the claims of the RC church to infallible teaching are false, and that there is grace outside of the RC church. Other doctrines? Well, there is hardly any topic which does not elicit radical disagreement somewhere among some "protestants".
It's not hard to see the deeper meaning of statements as to what Protestants believe. These statements are about differentiation. Converts are particularly susceptible to making them because converts need differentiation badly; conversion, after all, involves ceasing to be of one's former group. But the urge to differentiate is at best dubious, because it tempts one to exaggerated generalizations, to the point of absurdity. There is no system in "Protestantism, not when one tries to put the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society in the same bin with Wheaton College, Bob Jones University, and Episcopal Divinity School.
Thursday, November 18, 2004
The Law of the Stupidest Argument
Most internet discussion areas are subject, more or less, to The Law of the Stupidest Argument:
"In a discussion among strangers, the least thoughtful controversial position stated will dominate the argument."
This doesn't mean it will prevail, but subsequent discussion will tend to revolve around this position. And the actual merit of the "stupid" position is irrelevant; be it simple or simplistic, it will drive subtler and more complex positions out of the discussion.
"In a discussion among strangers, the least thoughtful controversial position stated will dominate the argument."
This doesn't mean it will prevail, but subsequent discussion will tend to revolve around this position. And the actual merit of the "stupid" position is irrelevant; be it simple or simplistic, it will drive subtler and more complex positions out of the discussion.
Monday, November 01, 2004
We Kant Go On Like This
In this exchange about the epicopagans, Fr. Jake says:
"Where we differ is your assumption that you believe that 'absolute truth' can be perceived by a human being. It is your perception of the truth, as any first year philosophy student would tell you."
I'm going to object to this claim, because I think it is a rationalization of the real difference.
In looking at the differences and trying to prune away enough jargon to be able to explain it to my 11-year-old, I quickly come upon an obvious result: two straightforward statements about what the numinous is like-- and I don't need the word "numinous" to explain either of them. One side says that God has a specific nature which is adequately spelled out in the Bible, and that other deities aren't if fact really God, and that discriptions of God which disagree with the Bible are, well, wrong. To get the fundamentalist boogeyman out of here, I need to add that disclaimers about accuracy for transmission apply. I'm saying the bible is essentially accurate, not absolutely accurate.
The other side says that most religions, if not all, do describe the same divinity, but all are basically flawed because God doesn't really intervene directly in the world, is not really incarnate in a specific historic person, doesn't specify acts of worship, and doesn't have any specific name. And one can pretty much focus it all down to one question: Is the doctrine of the Virgin Birth true?
On the crucial level, there's no religious language at all. "Mary gave birth to a male child even though she had never had sex with anyone." In the ordinary sense that we judge statements of ordinary fact, this is such a statement. And it gets an ordinary answer from either side. Traditionalists say yes, pretty much everyone else says no. (Some people try to claim "it doesn't matter", but I've never found a case where this isn't either an excessively qualified "yes" or a baldly gutless "no".) From "yes", it's a short trip to "If Christ were not arisen, our faith would be in vain"; but the dissent is working from "Since Christ is not arisen,...." And furthermore, for the most part they will provide a baldly ordinary assertion that Mary was made pregnant by some ordinary human male.
In other words, I don't buy the assertion that the supposed change in paradigm is the cause of this. I think that it is the conclusion of it, because it is the resolution of the dissonance between skepticism about Catholic factual claims and commitment to a belief in the numinous.
And what's more, there's nothing novel here. One gets tired of talking about the Gnostics, but the parallels are obvious. The neo-whatever way of talking about sacred story, far from being more modern, is actually one of the oldest ways of talking about myth. Indeed, in the Graeco-Roman world it could be argued that everything we know about mythology is colored by this attitude towards it; it accounts for the decided comic-book quality of Greek myth as we have it.
And beyond that, the picture of traditionalists as unsophisticates is dubious to the point of misrepresentation. C.S.Lewis, for one, is someone whom I would count reasonably learned on the subject of reading mythological texts. And when I read Til We Have Faces I see many, many passages which address these issues.
The bottom line: "it's all perception anyway" is taking the same place in theological rationalization as "it's all relative" did for an earlier generation's capitulation to moral indifference. The first owes no more to Kant than the second does to Einstein.
"Where we differ is your assumption that you believe that 'absolute truth' can be perceived by a human being. It is your perception of the truth, as any first year philosophy student would tell you."
I'm going to object to this claim, because I think it is a rationalization of the real difference.
In looking at the differences and trying to prune away enough jargon to be able to explain it to my 11-year-old, I quickly come upon an obvious result: two straightforward statements about what the numinous is like-- and I don't need the word "numinous" to explain either of them. One side says that God has a specific nature which is adequately spelled out in the Bible, and that other deities aren't if fact really God, and that discriptions of God which disagree with the Bible are, well, wrong. To get the fundamentalist boogeyman out of here, I need to add that disclaimers about accuracy for transmission apply. I'm saying the bible is essentially accurate, not absolutely accurate.
The other side says that most religions, if not all, do describe the same divinity, but all are basically flawed because God doesn't really intervene directly in the world, is not really incarnate in a specific historic person, doesn't specify acts of worship, and doesn't have any specific name. And one can pretty much focus it all down to one question: Is the doctrine of the Virgin Birth true?
On the crucial level, there's no religious language at all. "Mary gave birth to a male child even though she had never had sex with anyone." In the ordinary sense that we judge statements of ordinary fact, this is such a statement. And it gets an ordinary answer from either side. Traditionalists say yes, pretty much everyone else says no. (Some people try to claim "it doesn't matter", but I've never found a case where this isn't either an excessively qualified "yes" or a baldly gutless "no".) From "yes", it's a short trip to "If Christ were not arisen, our faith would be in vain"; but the dissent is working from "Since Christ is not arisen,...." And furthermore, for the most part they will provide a baldly ordinary assertion that Mary was made pregnant by some ordinary human male.
In other words, I don't buy the assertion that the supposed change in paradigm is the cause of this. I think that it is the conclusion of it, because it is the resolution of the dissonance between skepticism about Catholic factual claims and commitment to a belief in the numinous.
And what's more, there's nothing novel here. One gets tired of talking about the Gnostics, but the parallels are obvious. The neo-whatever way of talking about sacred story, far from being more modern, is actually one of the oldest ways of talking about myth. Indeed, in the Graeco-Roman world it could be argued that everything we know about mythology is colored by this attitude towards it; it accounts for the decided comic-book quality of Greek myth as we have it.
And beyond that, the picture of traditionalists as unsophisticates is dubious to the point of misrepresentation. C.S.Lewis, for one, is someone whom I would count reasonably learned on the subject of reading mythological texts. And when I read Til We Have Faces I see many, many passages which address these issues.
The bottom line: "it's all perception anyway" is taking the same place in theological rationalization as "it's all relative" did for an earlier generation's capitulation to moral indifference. The first owes no more to Kant than the second does to Einstein.
Sunday, October 31, 2004
Conservative Persecutors Need Weekends Too
There hasn't been anything new actually new in the Anglo-Druid story, but I suppose that this has been a blessing to the anti-conservatives, who were having a little trouble getting their RPMs up up on this at first.
But they are reporting in now about how vicious and (don't forget this part) backward we "conservatives" are. Now it's probably just me, but I don't see "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" as being a particularly conservative principle. But I guess I'm out of touch.
I'll start with the Salty Vicar. It worries me a bit when people start identifying themselves with biblical condiments, because most of the popular ones-- salt, mustard-- can render your food inedible if not downright toxic in large quantities. Anyway, it seems my inner Pharisee has been outed:
Conservatives should be careful. If they get hijacked by the intemperate, they will be revealed to be... sadly human in their mob mentality, more passionate about perversion, than enthusiastic in evangelising. I submit to you, if they had the fire of the gospel, they would seek to convert those wayward druids, rather than burn and ruin them.
I'm actually on record in a few places about this one. I'm not at all happy about the injury that seemingly must be inflicted on this couple in the course of this. But I also do not see how it can be avoided. It's not an unreasonable conclusion that the Church cannot have these two representing it as its clergy.
More to the point, Rev. Salty, what are you doing about converting them? What-- nothing at all? Come on, Rev; Mr. Rev. Melnyk has offered to communicate by e-mail.
And "mob mentality"? How about the sheer delight in ferreting out the trail which our druids have so thoroughly failed to cover up?
THen we have this from Father Jake:
Answer me honestly; if the rites these two priests developed were originally a Jewish rite, or even a Muslim or Buddhist rite, would everyone be so upset? I don't think so. Christians have a built in bias against anything Pagan. And that is what this latest flap is really all about.
Well, um, the obvious difficulty with this analogy is that what was posted on the national church website was, as Ted Olsen so helpfully pointed out, a carefully crafted Anti-Jewish rite. It almost sounds like a seminary assignment:
"Write a liturgy contravening at least the first commandment. Use ritual acts denounced by at least two OT prophets."
One can at least do something with Buddhism that isn't so determinedly perverse, and one can at least pretend that Allah and YHWH are different names for the same thing. What set people off so about this "liturgy" was how an office of the national church could have the gall/stupidity to put up instructions for comitting sins that I at least thought we got out of our systems during the Babylonian Captivity.
So I have to ask you clerics: do you have a problem with you, personally, with conducting or participating in such a rite? (Not you, Al-- I know you'ld be a "happy druid".)
But they are reporting in now about how vicious and (don't forget this part) backward we "conservatives" are. Now it's probably just me, but I don't see "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" as being a particularly conservative principle. But I guess I'm out of touch.
I'll start with the Salty Vicar. It worries me a bit when people start identifying themselves with biblical condiments, because most of the popular ones-- salt, mustard-- can render your food inedible if not downright toxic in large quantities. Anyway, it seems my inner Pharisee has been outed:
Conservatives should be careful. If they get hijacked by the intemperate, they will be revealed to be... sadly human in their mob mentality, more passionate about perversion, than enthusiastic in evangelising. I submit to you, if they had the fire of the gospel, they would seek to convert those wayward druids, rather than burn and ruin them.
I'm actually on record in a few places about this one. I'm not at all happy about the injury that seemingly must be inflicted on this couple in the course of this. But I also do not see how it can be avoided. It's not an unreasonable conclusion that the Church cannot have these two representing it as its clergy.
More to the point, Rev. Salty, what are you doing about converting them? What-- nothing at all? Come on, Rev; Mr. Rev. Melnyk has offered to communicate by e-mail.
And "mob mentality"? How about the sheer delight in ferreting out the trail which our druids have so thoroughly failed to cover up?
THen we have this from Father Jake:
Answer me honestly; if the rites these two priests developed were originally a Jewish rite, or even a Muslim or Buddhist rite, would everyone be so upset? I don't think so. Christians have a built in bias against anything Pagan. And that is what this latest flap is really all about.
Well, um, the obvious difficulty with this analogy is that what was posted on the national church website was, as Ted Olsen so helpfully pointed out, a carefully crafted Anti-Jewish rite. It almost sounds like a seminary assignment:
"Write a liturgy contravening at least the first commandment. Use ritual acts denounced by at least two OT prophets."
One can at least do something with Buddhism that isn't so determinedly perverse, and one can at least pretend that Allah and YHWH are different names for the same thing. What set people off so about this "liturgy" was how an office of the national church could have the gall/stupidity to put up instructions for comitting sins that I at least thought we got out of our systems during the Babylonian Captivity.
So I have to ask you clerics: do you have a problem with you, personally, with conducting or participating in such a rite? (Not you, Al-- I know you'ld be a "happy druid".)
Saturday, October 30, 2004
Texts From Rev. Rose
For the benefit of the assembled masses, I've collected a few links with statements from Rev. Rose that may (or may not-- your decision) bear upon the current matter. I have avoided statements from hostile sites (e.g. David Virtue).
As a prelude, here is the ENS announcement of Rev. Rose's appointment as head of Women's Ministries.
The following came from ECUSA Women's Ministries:
The following is from Every Voice Network:
The following is from Covering Religion:
As a prelude, here is the ENS announcement of Rev. Rose's appointment as head of Women's Ministries.
The following came from ECUSA Women's Ministries:
- Letter to Prophetic Church Women: "Our own work is to seek to tell the truth, to find sacred space, both for worship and for our own sacred circles."
- A Litany of Women's Power: Adapted by Rev. Margaret Rose for the Opening Liturgy for the Anglican Delegation to the UN/CSW; February 27, 2004
The following is from Every Voice Network:
- in article Mothers of invention: Women, power, and the church see the following: After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Rose started doing what feminist education has long advocated: monitor power-sharing at the highest levels by counting the number of women and minorities on the front pages of newspapers, noticing whether this number is equal to that of white men. "I can tell you that since then, the increase in the number of white men has been astronomical," she says. "There's a kind of power exercised in a way that's just despicable, and lying."
The following is from Covering Religion:
- in article Gene Robinson’s Consecration Recalls the Debate on Women’s Ordination see the following: "Scripture has been used a lot to oppress people," said Rev. Margaret Rose, director of the Episcopal Women’s Ministries,which brings together leaders of women’s ministries from churches across the country. "Groups of people who hold that scripture is inherent and literal, take it and use it as a weapon."
The "Episcopagan" Flap
For the past few days the Anglican blogosphere (with some help from Christianity Today) has been clanging loudly over an explicitly pagan ritual posted at the main Episcopal Church website by the Women's Ministry office. The getreligion.org survey article has links to most of the places you would need to go to pick out the details of this, so I am going to skip that part and begin with a very quick analysis of the blog-forces involved.
Naturally, there have been plenty of people willing to take this as an excuse for their next rite of posturing about the Apostacy of ECUSA. They've fortunately been basically drowned out by other matters. The initial outrage over the 815 involvement in the episode was drowned out by the deliciously tabloid revelation that the origin of the offending material was a couple of Episcopal priests who had been quite indiscrete about how they mixed, um, their day and night jobs, and by the bloggish glee in thwarting their panicky attempts to cover their tracks. I'm guessing that this aspect is going to burn itself out soon because there doesn't seem to be much left to uncover. Their fate is in the hands of their bishop, where it must rest for now.
The other, more important line has been overshadowed by the gush of detail about neo-druids (and the inevitable need to keep correcting misunderstanding about the Gorsedd of Bards). Ted Olsen at CT has however been relentless in keeping the heat on the galling appearance of the offending rite under the ECUSA trademark, which is the keystone to the arch of this story. The whole thing would have blown over if the offending webpage had appeared on some other website, even with Ruppe-Melnyk's name on it.
And now that the blog-watchers at getreligion.org have pushed the whole thing to the surface, the liberal blogs are starting to join in. More on that in the next message.
Naturally, there have been plenty of people willing to take this as an excuse for their next rite of posturing about the Apostacy of ECUSA. They've fortunately been basically drowned out by other matters. The initial outrage over the 815 involvement in the episode was drowned out by the deliciously tabloid revelation that the origin of the offending material was a couple of Episcopal priests who had been quite indiscrete about how they mixed, um, their day and night jobs, and by the bloggish glee in thwarting their panicky attempts to cover their tracks. I'm guessing that this aspect is going to burn itself out soon because there doesn't seem to be much left to uncover. Their fate is in the hands of their bishop, where it must rest for now.
The other, more important line has been overshadowed by the gush of detail about neo-druids (and the inevitable need to keep correcting misunderstanding about the Gorsedd of Bards). Ted Olsen at CT has however been relentless in keeping the heat on the galling appearance of the offending rite under the ECUSA trademark, which is the keystone to the arch of this story. The whole thing would have blown over if the offending webpage had appeared on some other website, even with Ruppe-Melnyk's name on it.
And now that the blog-watchers at getreligion.org have pushed the whole thing to the surface, the liberal blogs are starting to join in. More on that in the next message.
Monday, October 25, 2004
The Cassandra Prophecy Award Goes To
David Virtue, in his opening comments for the week following Gene Robinson's consecration:
"The Archbishop is hoping that a commission on homosexuality, Eames II, will resolve the problem. It won't. Eames II like Eames I on Women's Ordination proved singularly elusive. It is loaded with liberals and will satisfy no one except Western Liberal bishops and their acolytes. Those of us who know Archbishop Eames, know only too well the outcome of these commissions before they even meet. It will be Anglican fudge from first to last."
Virtuosity is one of the standard spots for reportage and linkage in Anglican-Land. Like many web types, however, David Virtue's analysis is heavily spun by his own perspective, which is radically conservative and more than a bit confrontational. The report is thoroughly Anglican, to be sure-- and Virtue ought to sit back a second and consider how much his preconceived distaste for the report derives from his personal deviance from the Anglican character. I also think that Virtue underestimates the subtlety of Rowan Williams' actions. What has become important about the report isn't anyone's opinion of it, but that fact that the radical liberals are refusing to do more than pay lip service to it-- and moreover, lip service which is quite transparently a rejection of the report.
Internet discussion of the report follows much the same pattern. A lot of conservatives are unhappy that the report didn't recommend a summary execution for Robinson and exile for the bishops who consecrated him. From outside the communion, I see additional commentary proclaiming the report as the deathknell of Anglicanism. Nothing could be further from the truth. One week later, it's becoming clear that the report has in fact laid out the battlefield so that the conservatives have been given a great victory. The radical liberals have put themselves outside the limits of the communion in their responses to the report, and question now before the communion is how much of the rest of ECUSA and the other questionable jurisdictions we stay with the vast conservative majority.
"The Archbishop is hoping that a commission on homosexuality, Eames II, will resolve the problem. It won't. Eames II like Eames I on Women's Ordination proved singularly elusive. It is loaded with liberals and will satisfy no one except Western Liberal bishops and their acolytes. Those of us who know Archbishop Eames, know only too well the outcome of these commissions before they even meet. It will be Anglican fudge from first to last."
Virtuosity is one of the standard spots for reportage and linkage in Anglican-Land. Like many web types, however, David Virtue's analysis is heavily spun by his own perspective, which is radically conservative and more than a bit confrontational. The report is thoroughly Anglican, to be sure-- and Virtue ought to sit back a second and consider how much his preconceived distaste for the report derives from his personal deviance from the Anglican character. I also think that Virtue underestimates the subtlety of Rowan Williams' actions. What has become important about the report isn't anyone's opinion of it, but that fact that the radical liberals are refusing to do more than pay lip service to it-- and moreover, lip service which is quite transparently a rejection of the report.
Internet discussion of the report follows much the same pattern. A lot of conservatives are unhappy that the report didn't recommend a summary execution for Robinson and exile for the bishops who consecrated him. From outside the communion, I see additional commentary proclaiming the report as the deathknell of Anglicanism. Nothing could be further from the truth. One week later, it's becoming clear that the report has in fact laid out the battlefield so that the conservatives have been given a great victory. The radical liberals have put themselves outside the limits of the communion in their responses to the report, and question now before the communion is how much of the rest of ECUSA and the other questionable jurisdictions we stay with the vast conservative majority.
Friday, October 22, 2004
The Best (serious) Analysis of the Windsor Report
By Leander Harding in titusonenine:
"You (the Episcopal Church, USA and the Anglican Church of Canada) have been acting as though you can do anything you want without consulting the rest of the Anglican family and still consider yourselves part of the family. You cannot."
"[to the AMiA sponsors:] "Back off. You are not helping and are making a chaotic situation more chaotic."
Like the Report or loathe it, this summary of the report gives, in my opinion, the best picture of the possibilities of the months ahead. As of now, the ECUSA troublemakers are refusing to repent (or even give more than a lame "sorry you got mad" apology); Akinola seems prepared to lead the Africans away from ECUSA. Cantuar? Holding his cards close.
This summary also illustrates what's wrong with all the demands for anathemas: they aren't necessary. Sure, denuciations are a great feel-good boost to one's own sense of righteousness, but do they have any effect on the issue? Even without resort to them, the current situation is untenable and hopeless. It appears that the communion [i]will[/i] decide the sexuality issue, and it will do so in division.
"You (the Episcopal Church, USA and the Anglican Church of Canada) have been acting as though you can do anything you want without consulting the rest of the Anglican family and still consider yourselves part of the family. You cannot."
"[to the AMiA sponsors:] "Back off. You are not helping and are making a chaotic situation more chaotic."
Like the Report or loathe it, this summary of the report gives, in my opinion, the best picture of the possibilities of the months ahead. As of now, the ECUSA troublemakers are refusing to repent (or even give more than a lame "sorry you got mad" apology); Akinola seems prepared to lead the Africans away from ECUSA. Cantuar? Holding his cards close.
This summary also illustrates what's wrong with all the demands for anathemas: they aren't necessary. Sure, denuciations are a great feel-good boost to one's own sense of righteousness, but do they have any effect on the issue? Even without resort to them, the current situation is untenable and hopeless. It appears that the communion [i]will[/i] decide the sexuality issue, and it will do so in division.
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