Last week a friend phoned me to describe a bumper sticker she had noticed on a car in the parking lot of a local mall. Playing off a familiar query, it posed this question: “What would Jesus bomb?”
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Is the War in Afghanistan a Just War?
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A Russian View of Sexuality
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Navy SEALs and the Taliban
My newest son-in-law, who is military, gave me a book to read for Father’s Day. It’s a best-selling novel entitled Lone Survivor (2007). Given the circumstances I decided to read it right through. Turns out it is the dramatic story of a covert Navy SEAL operation into the mountains of Afghanistan, via a nighttime helicopter drop, to take out a particularly dangerous Taliban leader. More to the point, it’s the story of how the whole thing went horribly bad. The narrative is provided by Marcus Luttrell, the only survivor—his survival itself something of a miracle. There’s a moral to the story.
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Child Casualities of the Good News
A remarkable letter of apology, signed by the chairman of the board of directors of the Christian & Missionary Alliance, was printed in the February 2009 issue of Alliance Life, the denomination’s official magazine. The board acknowledged “its deepest regrets for the significant trauma” experienced by vulnerable children of missionaries, and apologized contritely for decades of failure by Alliance leadership to recognize, acknowledge and stop abuse at the Alliance’s mandatory boarding schools for missionary children. After decades of damage control, and attempts to sweep the scandal under the rug, the new board has courageously (and biblically) come clean.
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The Lost Shepherd
The scandalous Ted Haggard, recently ousted president of the National Association of Evangelicals, has resurfaced. You’ll remember him, no doubt, as the Colorado mega-church pastor whose secret meth-addled trysts with a homosexual prostitute finally came to light a couple of years ago. His devastated church removed him from office, but gave him a full year of severance pay, and asked him to cooperate with a “restoration” process that involved being accountable to some national-level religious leaders like (for awhile, anyway) James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Evidently the process did not go very well, and finally unraveled.
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A Sad Day for Evangelicalism
This is a sad day for the evangelical movement. The National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) just tossed Richard Cizik overboard. A more apt metaphor might be that some biggies in the NAE, who had been stalking him for a while, finally nailed their target. Charles Colson responded to the news of Cizik’s departure with this: “I’m not surprised. I’m sorry for him, but I’m not disappointed for the evangelical movement.” I’m not surprised either, but I’m sorrier for evangelicals than I am for Cizik. Richard can hold his head high; I’m not sure we can.
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Baseball Salaries in Moral Perspective
According to ESPN and local sports pundits Trevor Hoffman, the future baseball Hall of Famer and closer for the San Diego Padres since the early 1990s, has been treated shabbily. Despite all he’s done for that organization, the Padres offered him a paltry $4 million for next season. After he pondered this unacceptable proposal for weeks, the organization withdrew it altogether and negotiations ended. Hoffman had dreams of becoming a local hero in perpetuity, like Tony Gwynn. Not anymore, I guess. He’ll finish his career wearing a funny ball cap in someplace like Pittsburgh or Cleveland. This is our latest local soap opera. But wait a minute. Did someone mention four million dollars? Yes, and if you are among those who feel outraged by the cheapness of the Padres’ offer, maybe you need to get a grip.
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The Politics of Intimidation
When the fish die you know there’s something wrong with the water. When the bees disappear, it means the ecosystem is in trouble. When it’s the height of the election season, and there are hardly any signs on neighborhood lawns, you begin to suspect that something may be amiss this time around. The truth is that there aren’t many lawn signs or bumper stickers. My theory is that American citizens no longer feel safe about taking a public stand one way or the other. That’s because we’re witnessing the rise of the politics of intimidation.
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Sarah Palin and Female Submission
Hey, what’s up with this Sarah Palin? If she’s elected VP, won’t she sort of “have authority” over men? Like maybe 150 million of them! Do you think a hockey mom (self-described as a pit bull with lipstick) is practicing appropriate biblical submission? Will her husband Todd still get to be the decider on the domestic front? Will it be sufficient if, while Sarah is sending American troops into Russia or deciding to annex Canada, that Todd can decide whether the family buys or leases a Ford Expedition for moose hunting and diaper-runs to Wal-Mart? Will he still be “the head”?
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Does Gay Marriage Threaten the Gospel?
The California Supreme Court has decided that gay couples should be allowed to wed. The decision went into effect last month (June 2008). Not surprisingly many of my fellow evangelicals are up in arms. Does gay marriage threaten the proclamation of the Gospel? Some are claiming that it does. I doubt it.
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