Is Infanticide the Next Logical Step Beyond Abortion?

Several days ago, The Journal of Medical Ethics, which is an international peer-reviewed journal for health professionals and researchers in medical ethics, published a new article by Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva.  In this paper, Giubilini and Minerva advance four major lines of argument, regarding the right of societies to abort newly born infants:

1. As a society, we have endorsed the moral acceptability of abortion even in circumstances where the fetus’ health is not at risk.
2. Because the fetus and the newborn infant both lack cognitive awareness, they do not share the same moral status as actual persons.
3. Any potential to develop into an actual person is irrelevant as their current cognitive development does not permit them to understand their own potential and thus they are not capable of experiencing a sense of loss in terms of their own future potential.
4. Adoption is “not always in the best interest of actual people.”

Therefore, Giubilini and Minerva find themselves in the position of advocating a stance long held by highly influential Peter Singer,[1] who is most famous for once having argued:

“Human babies are not born self-aware or capable of grasping that they exist over time.  They are not persons.  Therefore, the life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee.”[2]

So what do you think?  Is there a moral difference between aborting a fetus in utero and taking the life of a newborn infant?  And if so, what is that difference?

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[1] Peter Singer is an animal rights activist who serves as the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and the Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne.

[2] Singer, Peter, Practical Ethics (Cambridge University Press, London: 2011).  This book was first published in 1979.

Large Churches more Orthodox and Faithful than Small Churches …?

A recent report issued by the Barna Group in November of 2011 has turned up some interesting findings related to church size and the nature of an individual’s theological beliefs and actions.  This study, which was based upon interviews of more then 3000 church-going Protestants, has revealed that individuals who attend large churches are more likely to adhere to orthodox Christian beliefs than those that attend churches with 100 or fewer adult attendees.

Please click to enlarge the image.

More interesting still were the findings related to behaviors and church size.  According to the report, “on seven of the eight behavioral measures, attenders of large churches were substantially more likely than those of small churches to be active. (These included behaviors such as attending church in the past week, reading the Bible in the past week, volunteering at their church in the past week, etc.) The average difference related to these seven behaviors was 17 percentage points.”

So what do you think?  Do these findings surprise you, or is this what you already expected to be true?

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* “Born again Christians” were defined as people who said they had made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that was still important in their life today and who also indicated they believed that when they die they will go to Heaven because they had confessed their sins and had accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. Respondents were not asked to describe themselves as “born again.”  

** “Evangelicals” meet the born again criteria (described above) plus seven other conditions. Those include saying their faith is very important in their life today; believing they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs about Christ with non-Christians; believing that Satan exists; believing that eternal salvation is possible only through grace, not works; believing that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth; asserting that the Bible is accurate in all that it teaches; and describing God as the all-knowing, all-powerful, perfect deity who created the universe and still rules it today. Being classified as an evangelical is not dependent upon church attendance or the denominational affiliation of the church attended. Respondents were not asked to describe themselves as “evangelical.”

From the Ashes of War: The Gospel According to Mark – Part 2

Mark 1:1 – On Empires, Osama Bin Laden, and the Smashing of Imperial Symbols.

Earlier this week, we started a new series on the Gospel According to Mark; and in the first article, it was argued that this Gospel is best understood in what we call the sitz im leben – or the “life setting” – in which it was written.  As you may recall, the “life setting” for Mark is a rather tumultuous time in ancient Judaism – a time in which the devastating might of imperial Rome had been brought to bear upon the tiny, isolated state of Israel.  Following the rather ill-advised revolt that was instigated by the Zealot leadership within Israel, more than 60,000 Roman troops had been dispatched into the region, the Temple had been destroyed, the people had been slaughtered or sold into slavery, and as for the capital city of Jerusalem itself, “there was nothing left to make those that came there believe that it had ever been inhabited.”[1]

This is the world into which Mark is writing. War had left Israel in a state of ruin, and the recently crowned, Roman Emperor Vespasian, was sitting securely on his newly established throne.

Now consider the very first words that Mark chooses to pen as he sets quill to papyrus:

“The beginning of the gospel of Jesus…” 

For most of us in the 21^st century, these words mean almost nothing.  But for those living in the days of Vespasian, these are electrifying words, charged with the power of defiance and conviction.

At the risk of offending the reader, perhaps the best way to understand this opening narrative is to consider the American empire at the dawn of the 21^st century.  As you may well recall, in those days, there was little doubt as to the role that America played in the world at large.  As the last and greatest of the  “Superpowers” to have emerged from the Cold War, America comprised only 5% of the world’s population, and yet it controlled over 20% of the world’s cumulative wealth.  Whereas half of the world struggled to live on less than $2 per day, the average American teenager was spending almost $150 per week.  The Dow Jones Industrial Average was scaling new and unprecedented heights, the housing market was booming, technology was promising an ever-brighter future, and the promise of American freedom was being well-defended by military bases that had been installed in more then 70% of the nations around the world.

But then, on the crystal clear morning of September 11, 2001, one man dared to proclaim a counter-imperial message.  Shaking his fist in defiance of the West, he orchestrated and privately funded an assault led by four planes that were to be flown into the heart of the empire.  And in just two short hours, the central symbol of America’s economic might had collapsed into “the pile,” while the symbol of our military prowess was left with a gaping, smoldering wound in its outer walls.

Bin Laden was anti-imperialist with a message for the world: the United States may have thought that it was in control, but there were forces that were capable of standing against it – forces capable of bringing it to its knees.

To understand the full meaning of Mark’s bold opening, you need to understand that Rome was an empire controlling vast stretches of territory, all held in check by the power of symbols and the power of the Roman sword.  What’s more, you need to understand that the word “gospel” was a Roman symbol and  not a newly minted phrase, coined by the church for its own purposes.  The word “gospel,” which is derived from the Greek word euangelizo, was actually a word widely used throughout the Roman empire, most often in association with the Roman imperial cult.[2]  When a new heir to the throne was born, it was called “gospel,” or “good news.”  When this heir ascended to the throne and began to rule in earnest, heralds were sent forth throughout the Empire, bearing testimony to the “gospel” of the Emperor’s reign.  And when the forces of Rome, under the guidance of the Emperor, defeated an enemy, the battle was announced as “gospel,” for the Pax Romana – the peace of Rome! – had been established and this was to be understood as “good news” by all who heard it.[3]

So you see, when Mark opens his account of the Christ’s life with these words, he is shaking a fist in defiance of Rome.  He is striking at the heart of Rome by discrediting the symbols that it used to maintain its control.  He is saying: “Your king is not the real king!”  Yes, Rome may be capable of laying waste to Jerusalem.  Yes, it may even be capable of bullying the known world into submission.  But this – this announcement of Jesus – was the beginning of an insurgency – a revolution.  Rome may have thought that it possessed the power to impose its will through the force of its economy and its military, but Rome and its Emperor were actually powerless and illegitimate.  For there was a New King who had come to inaugurate a New Beginning; and it was His birth that inaugurated a new era of hope.  It was His ascension to His throne that would bring about a new sense of justice.  And it was His death and His resurrection that would upend the principalities and powers of this world.

So am I really equating the announcement of the Christ with the announcement of Bin Laden’s war on the West?  Yes and no.  In one sense, both the author of Mark’s Gospel and Bin Laden were making their statements within the context of war.  Moreover, they both understood the power of symbols in maintaining the might of the Empire, and they both understood that subverting those symbols could lead to dramatic and profound confrontation.  But that is about as far as the metaphor can be taken.  Ultimately, Bin Laden was a man of violence, and his announcement came in a form that Empires are quick to recognize – the form of naked aggression.  By contrast, the Gospel of Mark was a masterpiece of wartime rhetoric designed to undermine the “truth claims” of the Empire through the preaching of a sacrificial lifestyle that would be marked not by oppression, but by a radical obedience to the Prince of Peace.

Questions to Consider:

1. Why do you think the author of the Gospel elected to open it in such a confrontational manner?
2. What might this confrontational tone tell us about the author’s feelings regarding the power of Rome?  He has heard and/or seen what has been happening in Jerusalem and the outlying regions of Israel.  Does he seem fearful that this same power might be brought to bear upon the Christian community?
3. What might this say to us, as readers in the 21^st century?  How might the author want us to see the powers of this era? 

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[1] Josephus, War, 7.1.1.

[2] One frequently cited example of a Roman “gospel” is found on an inscription that describes the birth of the Emperor Augustus, who ruled Rome at the time of the Christ’s birth.  This inscription can be found on this blog in the third part of this series, entitled: From the Ashes of War: The Gospel Acccording to Mark – Part 3.

[3] For a deeper discussion on the roots of euangelizo in the Roman imperial cult, see: C.C. Broyles, “Gospel (Good News)” in Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, eds. Joel B. Green, Scot McKnight, I. Howard Marshall  (Intervarsity Press: Downers Grove, 1992), 283-286.

The Sunday Seven

Welcome to my new series, “The Sunday Seven.”  Here, you will find a rather motley collection of articles, blogs and other various musings that have captured my attention over the past seven days.  No promises as to what you may find on a week to week basis.  But like Baskin Robbins on a hot summer night, there’s a little something for everyone here, so why not make your way up to the counter to see if you can’t find a flavor that suits your fancy.

Newly discovered blog that has captured my attention …

How to Talk Evangelical: An Annotated Glossary.  Take The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce and add to it the writings of Kathleen Norris.  Now place these in a blender and hit “puree. ” Equal parts humorous and painful, definitely a blog to watch.

Newly discovered blog that makes me want to vomit …

Pastorfashion.com.  That’s right: pastorfashion.com, the place “where faith and fashion intersect.”  Does your pastor have a bit of a “muffin top?”  Does his tie not look quite right?  Then maybe he needs a little help from Pastor Ed or maybe he just needs a new set of spanx.  Whatever the case, you know where to send him.

From the Files of the Unexpected …

Atheist Insists that Society Needs Guidance from Religion.  When a well-known atheist picks a fight with an even more well-known atheist, things get interesting.  When the fight has to do with building an atheist temple, well … you’ll just have to read it yourself.

From the Files of the Inevitable …

J.K. Rowling to pen a new novel.  It’ll be interesting to see what the author of Harry Potter can do outside the realm of Hogwarts and Muggles.  Even more interesting … a novel aimed at adults.

A Voice in the Wilderness …

Give Up the Gimmicks Youth Pastors.  This link will take you to an excerpt from a promising new book by Brian Cosby.  From all reports, this is a clarion call to re-centering youth ministry on the Gospel of Jesus the Christ.

From my friend, the Pagan/Wiccan …

Bait and Switch Afflicts Contemporary Christian Society.   I’m not going to tell you anything about this one.  Just read it with an open mind and consider what Beck is trying to say.  I think you’ll find it worth your time.

And finally, a little wisdom from the “Philosoraptor” …

We May No Longer Call Them “Bastards,” but the Real Question is: Do We Treat Them as Such?

In 1965, Daniel Moynihan, then working for the United States Department of Labor, issued a report in which he found that 24% of black children and 3% of white children were born out of wedlock.  At the time, the report was a scandal, and the culture was abuzz with questions regarding the state of black families in America. 

When Presidential Candidates Talk About God

It is a commonly held belief that American voters want to know about the religious leanings of their presidential candidates.  Do they believe in a god; and if so, which one?  Why do they believe?  And how will this belief inform their policies?  Will they defend the separation of church and state?  Or will they use federal monies to fund “faith-based” initiatives?  These are the sorts of things we want to know … aren’t they?

Last month, USA Today reported on a new study just released by Lifeway Research.  According to their survey of 2000 voters, only 16% of Americans would find themselves more likely to vote for a candidate if he or she were to consistently express religious beliefs in public forums.  Now take a look at some of the other findings:

As you can see, Republicans (32%) are eight times more likely to be positively influenced by a candidate’s religious views than are Democratic voters (4%).  Conversely, more than half of all Democrats (55%) would actively move away from supporting a religiously vocal candidate, as opposed to the 7% of Republicans who would do the same.

So what do you think?  Does a candidate who expresses his or her religious beliefs have the potential to draw you towards them or does it tend to push you away? 

Dying to Bring You the News

I know almost nothing about her, save for the few sketchy details that have emerged in the aftermath of her death.  I know that she was a Yale graduate in her fifties and that she had been married three times over the course of her life.  I know that shrapnel took her left eye in 2001, but that it didn’t deter her from going right back into war zones of this world.  I know that she was a journalist, working in places like the Balkans, Chechnya, Sri Lanka, East Timor and Syria.  And I know that she died as a willful witness to the very worst elements of humanity.

Today, I honor Marie Colvin, veteran war correspondent for the Sunday Times.  History may never recall her as one who changed the world, but I, for one, will always be grateful that there are people like her who are willing “to speak the truth to power” – people willing to “send home the first rough draft of history.”

Goodbye Ms. Colvin.

From the Ashes of War: The Gospel According to Mark – Part 1

Introduction and Background

For most of us who are relatively unaware of the history of the ancient world, to say that the Gospel of Mark was written sometime between 68 and 71 A.D. is to say very little.  But for those that know their history, this statement is actually quite stunning.  For if this Gospel was, indeed, composed during this era, than we know that it’s author was writing during one of the most tumultuous times in the history of the Jewish people – a time when everything the Jews knew and believed to be true came to a devastating end.

Lessons from a Dying Pastor

This is the story of Ed Dobson – the story of a dying man.  In 2001, Ed was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), and was given 2-5 years to live.[1]  But this is not what makes Ed’s story so fascinating and so worthy of our time.  You see, Ed is a Christian whose life has taken him down a path that few within our society are willing to travel – a path that ultimately puts him at odds with political activists on both the left and the right.

Born in Northern Ireland in 1949, Ed Dobson immigrated to the United States in 1964.  By the age of 23, he had earned his Masters Degree from Bob Jones University, and had taken his first post as the Dean of Men at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.  Just seven years later, in 1979, Ed joined the Board of Directors for Falwell’s newly organized Moral Majority.  In the hopes of combating the moral decline of American culture, Falwell, Dobson and others eschewed the traditional Baptist practice of separating faith and politics; and instead sought to build a grassroots network that would lobby for a “pro-family” agenda in America.

But by the late 1980s, Ed Dobson had come to realize that Falwell’s vision of a fundamentalist “Christian Nation” was one that he could no longer embrace.  While his convictions regarding Jesus and the Scriptures remained rock solid, he came to believe that the cultural problems of the late 20^th century were not problems that could be remedied through political activism.  So, in 1987, Ed left Liberty University and the Moral Majority, and became the Senior Pastor of Calvary Church[2] in Grand Rapids, Michigan.  For the next 18 years, he labored to build into this congregation, before eventually resigning when the rigors of his illness became too great to bear.

Now, in the Twilight of his life, Ed Dobson has undertaken a new venture.  No longer able to minister in the ways that he once did, he has released a series of short films, in which he ruminates on the lessons he has learned as a follower of Christ.    These are not lessons about building grassroots organizations, nor are they lessons about ministering in the context of a megachurch.  Instead, Ed is taking us on a journey to the doorsteps of death, bravely offering insights about what it means to live as a Christian at the end of a long and unexpected journey.

Today, I’d like to challenge you to sit down for 10 minutes with Ed Dobson.  Listen to what he has to say.  And if, by the end, you find yourself longing to hear more, you can follow this link,which will lead to you to Flannel.org.  There, you can purchase all five “shorts” for just $7.99.

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[1] Amyotrophic lateral scleosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a motor neuron disease.  In the simplest of terms, it is a disease in which the spinal cord begins to deteriorate, which in turn leads to weakness, muscle atrophy, and spasticity.  Generally speaking, most patients die of respiratory compromise and/or pneumonia within 2-3 years of the initial diagnosis.

[2] It may be of interest to the reader to know that Calvary Church is the church responsible for planting Rob Bell and Mars Hill.

“Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” (2011): A One-Minute Film Review

There is an old adage that tells us that a recipe can only be as good as the ingredients that are used.  If that is true, consider the Oscar-nominated Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. It begins with director Stephen Daldry, a man so narratively gifted that all three of his previous films have gone on to earn “Best Picture” nominations.  To that, you add the two-time, Academy Award-winning actor, Tom Hanks, in the role of a saintly father who may be the only person on earth who understands his uniquely challenged son.  Now mix in Sandra Bullock, just two years removed from her own Oscar-winning performance, as a bereaved mother left to deal with her own grief, even as she struggles to help her son come to grips with his loss.  Finally, take all these ingredients and set them in the context of the “jumpers” leaping from the burning towers on September 11^th.  What should emerge from the oven is a scintillating film that finally gives voice to our collective grief and rage.  But, unfortunately, this is not the case.  Indeed, there are two critical weaknesses that take the legs right out from underneath this film and ultimately prevent it from becoming anything more than an overly-saccharine sympathy card that leaves nothing but a bad aftertaste in your mouth.

So what are the issues?  Well, the first problem has to do with the adaptation of the source material itself.  In fairness to Eric Roth, anytime a screenwriter has to distill the content of a novel down to a script that can be filmed in two hours, material is going to be sacrificed.  But in this case, many of Jonathan Safran Foer’s most insightful musings on the nature of war and terror have been left on the editing room floor.  In the novel, the only reason the grandfather re-emerges into the life of this scarred young boy is because he, too, knows what it means to lose a parent to the ever-turning gears of war.  But here, in the film, the fire-bombings of Dresden during World War II are used only as a set up to explain the grandfather’s selectively mute nature.  Thus, the larger theme of war and its impact on the lives of the innocent is almost completely absent.  And that is a very real problem when you are attempting to say something of value on the subject of 9/11. If you do ultimately decide to see this film, ask yourself this: how would the film have been substantially changed if Oskar’s father did not die in the attacks of 9/11, but in a random car accident that left him with just enough time to place a few phone calls?  If you believe, as I do, that nothing would have functionally changed, than you will begin to see the central problem with the film.  To reduce the events of September 11^th to nothing more than a plot device that allows a character to grow is to fundamentally disrespect the nearly 3000 people that lost their lives on that day in history.

The second major issue with this film has to do with the casting of young Thomas Horn.  For some inexplicable reason, director Stephen Daldry made the decision to cast a complete unknown in the role of Oskar Schell.  Prior to this film, Horn had never acted either in film or in television; and that is a massive liability for a film in which the young actor is required to play an emotionally shattered boy who is likely suffering from the effects of Asperger’s Syndrome as well as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Yes, every once in a while, a Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense comes along to take us all by surprise.  But that is the exception and not the rule.

So where does Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close sit in the pantheon of 9/11 films?  Probably somewhere beneath Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center, and just above Adam Sandler’s Reign Over Me.  At best, it’s an adequate film that leaves the viewer wondering: is it just too soon to expect a film to really be able to handle the events of that day? 

This film has been rated PG-13 by the MPAA for emotional thematic material, some disturbing images, and language.