Saturday, December 27, 2008

Another Feminist Myth

Tonight I noticed a new post on CBE's blog, "The Scroll". It begins with this myth:

"In years gone by, no publisher would print a book written by a woman and so women writers had to use pseudonyms to get their work recognised. "

While the author of the post doesn't clarify the period she has in mind when she writes, "In years gone by . . .", given the reference to pseudonyms, I can't helped thinking of the famed, and oh so supposedly repressive long 19th Century. While I admit to being a fan of the cigar-smoking, trouser-wearing Aurore Dupin, Baronne Dudevant (better known as George Sand) and believe that Mariann Evans (better known as George Eliot) penned the greatest novel in English literature (Middlemarch), I am also aware of one or two other lady novelists from the same century who did not feel the need to dress up in men's clothes in order to succeed. Anyone ever heard of Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters (lookee there, a whole clutch of female novelists in one family!), or Elizabeth Gaskell? And let us not forget the queen of Victorian Sensation fiction, Mary Elizabeth Braddon or the grande dame of the gothic, Anne Radcliffe.

I can't help thinking one of my New Year's resolutions is going to be to re-read Middlemarch next year. I will admit though, I cannot read it without wanting to run away with Will Ladislaw in the form of the actor Rufus Sewell.

What are you looking at? Pervert!

Some days I do wonder if there is enough collective intelligence left in what passes for Evangelicalism these days, that, oh bother! I can't even finish that sentence sensibly because there doesn't seem to be any left. The state of your average "Christian store" is appalling. Today I went to one of these to pick up a book I am giving to my pastor. I usually avoid them like the plague, but it was my best chance of getting this particular book without having to order it.

And there they were. Big display near the entrance. Christian clothing, yikes! And what, in particular, draws my disgust but jeans. They mostly look like plain old denim jeans except in the details. The details on the back pockets. Yes, that is right, arty-looking crosses on the back pockets.

I'm guessing modesty isn't a concept familiar to the designer or the marketers, let alone the poor benighted folks who made the decision to carry these things in a "Christian" store. Now I don't know about you, but even if I had the shape I used to have, I wouldn't want folks staring at my ass.

Friday, December 26, 2008

I'll bet she's wondering what happened to it . . .

Now this doesn't happen every night. Tonight, I was emptying a urine container out of the bag it came in and along with the specimen dropped an earring.

Hmmm, I'm still trying to figure out how that happened and if it were mine, would I want it back, even after having been doused in alcohol?

Thursday, December 25, 2008

I already knew that (and so should you)

In an effort to fill air time on what appears to have been a slow news day, one of the local news stations ran a story on how good it is to give. Their "doctor" told us how good it is for our health, that it releases oxytocin (one of the "feel good" hormones, the same one that helps create an emotional bond in a woman when she is kissed by a man), etc., etc.



I was sitting there in the break room at work (about the only time I watch local news), and was thinking to myself, "Hmmmm, this sounds familiar. I think I've heard that before . . ."




35 In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.' (Acts 20:35,
ESV)


Yes, I thought so.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

THIS is the public face of Christianity?

This morning I caught no more than a few seconds of an interview on one of the Sunday morning shows. The interviewee was an actress, Kristin Chenoweth, with whom I am not familiar. In the brief moments I saw, she proceeded to slam Christians who oppose gay "marriage" as judgmental. She, you see, has wider world and believes, "people who love each other should be able to get married". I saw a brief clip from an upcoming indie film where she plays a suicidal prostitute. The scene took place in a confessional, cleavage and cross abounded. Then they showed a picture of a cover she had done for a "men's" magazine, skimpy clothes and provocative pose are no surprise here. She reported that her mother cried about it.

Perhaps she should be crying about her "nonjudgmental" life choices. According to her Wikipedia biography she,


. . . has spoken publicly about her faith; she describes herself as a
non-judgmental Christian.[23] Raised as a Southern Baptist, she later chose to have a personal connection to a faith that is not based in any one denomination. When in California, she attends a non-denominational church in Malibu. In New York,
she attends a United Methodist Church.


Chenoweth also has a large gay fanbase, and was uninvited from a Women of Faith conference in September 2005 "due to her publicized and heartfelt beliefs that God is accepting of all people on earth", including homosexuals.[24][25]


"Personal connection"? Really? That she was even invited to the Women of Faith conference seems to show those connected with the conference aren't familiar with Google. This seems to be a continuing problem with these mega-rallies masquerading as Christian conferences. In the early years of Promise Keepers, one of their speakers was a well-known preacher who does not even hold to an Orthodox trinitarianism. When this preacher's modalist theology was brought to the attention of one of their board members, his response was, "How dare you expect us to check on the theology of all our speakers! He signed our required statement of faith!"

When I attended a theology conference as a seminary student, I heard one of my professors remark, "That is the genius of Evangelicalism, it is able to reinvent itself as circumstances change." Evangelicalism has moved so much that those who would have once been in its mainstream are now called fringe, crackpots, fundamental legalists. Simple, seemingly obvious Christian beliefs such as the exclusivity of salvation in Christ, the sinfulness of premarital sex (which used to be known as fornication), lifetime marriage of one man and one woman, the existence of Hell . . .all these and more are now minority beliefs in what is known as "Evangelical Christianity".

Evangelicalism has become a label more pliable than molding clay. It covers everyone from Pat Robertson to Billy Graham to Rob Bell to T. D. Jakes to nonjudgmental actresses when the need arises. It can also dismiss each of these, except for Graham, when the need arises.

And you wonder why I no longer call myself an Evangelical?

Saturday, December 20, 2008

My exciting night at work

Some days I hate my job - mostly on the days when it gets exciting or interesting.

I still remember the time when my parents flew me back to the Twin Cities to spend the weekend in my grandmother's hospital room before she died. They couldn't really afford it, but they did it anyway -- for her and for me. This was during my clinical year so, on the flight there, I was reading one of my text books and my seat mate, a nice older (to me at the time) man asked me what I was studying. I told him it was my hematology textbook. And then I said, " You know, the worst thing about it is, the work only gets interesting when someone gets sick." And I still find that true more than twenty years later. Even more so now, with so many things automated, I don't even have to approve some of the results before they are released to a patient's chart. So, when everything is normal there is very little to do.

Tonight was one of those nights. I was doing a manual differential - when we looked at a stained blood smear to determine the different types and percentages of white blood cells -- and I wasn't liking what I saw. I really did not like what I saw. A phone call to the ER Doc confirmed the 69 year old patient had Chronic Lymphocytic leukemia. But what I was seeing was an acute transformation of that leukemia. Not good.

Then in rapid succession, I had a second tech agree with my results, I called the Doc back to let him know we would "hold" the differential until a pathologist could confirm our findings on Monday -- THEN we had an overhead page announcing that a "Plan D" was in effect. This means there has been a disaster of some sort and no one gets to go home until we know what the situation is and everything is under control. Tonight's disaster was an airliner at DIA skidding off the runway and catching fire. We were told to expect casualties.

I guess it's not so much my job I hate but the evil of disease and calamity in this fallen world.

UPDATE: It is now being reported that there was only 1 serious injury but that 38 passengers were transported to area hospitals. The injuries seem to be mostly bumps, bruises and a few broken bones. That's good.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

A consumerist eugenics mindset.

http://www.kairosjournal.org/Document.aspx?QuadrantID=4&CategoryID=12&TopicID=41&DocumentID=7486&L=1


This is a "Christian" guide to egg donation. Seems like high-priced prostitution/sex slavery to me.

Kamilla

Sunday, December 7, 2008

Funny, I was thinking it was the worst insult ever . . .

Comment culled from another blog:

"Jane, I once spent 11 days in an unairconditioned quonset hut in 100 degree weather facilitating strategic planning with 1 General, 10 Colonels, 2 Majors, 1 Captain and one Sargent Major. All men. Every afternoon, we played golf. At the end of the first week, one of them looked at me and said, you know, I forget you are a gal because you are like one of the guys.
I never had a better compliment. :o)"

(name changed to protect the "innocent", comment otherwise unaltered)

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Sometimes it is good to be plump

I have a bad habit of scouring the shelves in gourmet shops and delis for new and interesting sauces. I tend to have a heavy hand with some things, so expensive things in fancy bottles are regular fixtures in my kitchen (plus it's a great way to learn more about cooking and get new ideas for dishes)
. Earlier this year, I found what looks like a gorgeous Italian pasta-y tomato sort of sauce. It has capers and three kinds of olives, artichokes and anchovies, along with some olive oil, pinot grigio and of course, tomatoes. But I never knew what to do with it.

Yesterday the solution leaped into my grocery cart in the form of a great, big, fat purple plumpness of eggplant. In an hour I will know if I am a genius or a complete nut.

I dredge the sliced eggplant in seasoned flour and browned it in some olive oil. I then layered it in a casserole with some browned hamburger and the tomato sauce and it's now baking.

Hmmm, can't wait!

Friday, November 28, 2008

Marriage upheld

John Piper has a new book out, This Momentary Marriage. It is available as a free download from his website: www.desiringgod.org ahead of it's 2009 release by Crossway. It looks very good and I will probably buy it when it comes out, even though I could have it now for free, because I am one of those bibliomanes who has to have the bound work in her grubby little hands.

But, for now, let me give you a little preview from the Foreward, written by Mrs. John (Noelle) Piper:

The pendulum of our marriage oscillates and sometimes wobbles, but it is suspended from above, and is firmly attached. By God's grace, it will not crash to the ground. . .We know it is the weight of our sin that accelerates us into the seasons at the bottom .

By God's grace, indeed.

Monday, November 24, 2008

They're still at it, zzzzzzzzzz

When I first became acquainted with Egalitarianism, I was so excited. I wondered why no one had ever taught these things before - wow! this is paradigm-shifting, exciting, terribly, terribly new and important. We've got to get the word out!

But then I gained some time and perspective and learned to ask myself why, after two millennia of dedicated and sincere scholarship, it was left to a few enlightened Egalitarian souls living in the midst of an egalitarian society to discover the true, real and genuine meaning of a word or two in Paul's letters to the Ephesians and Timothy. And trust me, the entire case rests on the twin pillars of kephale and authentein. If those two should be proven beyond doubt to have the meaning Cathie Kroeger and her colleagues at CBE claim, then they have a good case. If those two words should fall conclusively, their claims are all dust.

So, when I say they are still at it, check out today's post on Gender Blog at CBMW:

http://www.cbmw.org/Blog/Posts/Reflections-on-the-2008-Gathering-of-the-Evangelical-Theological-Society

It seems Dr. Kroeger has fired a repeating salvo of her claims that kephale means source, period.


ZZZZZZ. It's going to take a good bit more than fancy footwork and eliding of quotes to convince me she's right.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Counterfeit Romance

The rules are changing -- and not just for vampires who may or may not be able to fly away as little bats, tolerate a bit of sunshine or survive on synthetic blood. Romance novels are just not what they use to be. From Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake to Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse to the latest movie of Stepehnie Meyer's Vampire series, heroines are turning to the dark for their saviours.

I had noticed this trend a few years ago, when I first ran across Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake series. there had also been the Buffy franchise - movie and television series, X-files vampire-themed episodes and dozens of other incarnations of the vampire romance theme. I read the first few of Hamilton's books because her theme of, "who are the monsters" intrigued me. But, there always seems to be a point of no return, beyond which the heroine cannot be released from her liaison with the man who takes rather than gives. The series reached a point where Hamilton's imagination as well as the life of her heroine, Anita Blake, seemed more monstrous than human. In the end, the monsters always win.

Russell Moore, in a recent column, finds this all, "a little creepy, and very sad" (http://www.henryinstitute.org/commentary_read.php?cid=493). He continues, "What does it tell us about the American sexual-industrial complex that women feel a need to fantasize about undead blood-feeders in order to imagine a courtship in which men are less, well, predatory, than they seem right now?" I agree wholeheartedly that this is not only creepy, but more than a little sad. However, I am not sure any vampire heroine or reader believes them less predatory than the man in the next cubicle at the office or the guy who always seems to be jogging when she is walking her dog.

No, I don't think it's about predation. I think it's about what we've been taught, how we have been led to believe The Dance is fiction at best and, at worst, a vestige of the horrid patriarchal cultures of the past. Nowadays we are so enlightened we know that partnering up with someone who is our equal is how these things should proceed. Blech.

But it's what we have been taught, what our culture preaches from the idiot box, the movie screens and the shelves of our local bookstores. So, we try to believe it, but we women still want romance. We don't just want it, we crave it deep in our bones. Somewhere deeper that words can reach, we know that we were created for something more than mere partnership "romance" and marriage. We long for The Dance of Christian marriage, but we've been sold a rotten bill of goods. So we pursue what we know we want and we pay the price because that's not what we're supposed to want.

The price we pay, whether he is a vampire or not, is giving ourselves to a man , a fictional hero, who takes rather than gives. It's a counterfeit of God's good design which we fall for because we have bought the lie our culture feeds us and think we must pay for wanting something else. So, rather than God's way, we succumb to the world's way, we give our life's blood for a man who does nothing but take. We buy him at the price of our blood and our life -- our will is no longer our own once we are in the vampire hero's sway and it is only then that we come to know the death and decay hidden underneath his otherworldly beauty and power. The evil is powerfully attractive, or it wouldn't entice us to believe the lie.

In the words of my friend, Ethan Cordray, "Remember that the favored tactic of the Enemy is to take some good desire -- such as for true masculinity, as expressed in self-control, commitment, and self-sacrifice -- and direct it idolatrously toward some corrupt object. To that end, it's important to retain the external trappings of the true object -- courtship rituals, property (which ought to indicate prudence, but needn't), codes of formality -- to better disguise the debasement."

But hasn't God told us, through the Holy Scriptures, that this is a reversal of the good, this is a counterfeit and, as Ethan says above, a debasement? Instead of turning from our culture's lies (it's clear we know them for what they are), we try to redeem them while still playing by the culture's rules -- and we end up debased, living with death.

Our good and wise Creator has given us a better way. In His plan, when a woman gives herself to a man, his obligation is to lay down his life for her -- to care for her as he does himself in The Dance of marriage. We have the ultimate picture of this in the example of our Saviour, who laid down his life for our sakes, to buy us with his own blood. Instead of women purchasing nothing but bondage with our blood, life and the freedom we have in Christ is His free gift to us.

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Not so easily won, nor kept

I recently re-watched the adaptation of Daphne DuMaurier's Frenchman's Creek which was shown on Masterpiece Theatre here in the States a few years back (yes, I bought it on VHS). I have no idea how faithful it is to the book since I find myself unable to read DuMaurier, though I have enjoyed several adaptations of her novels (Rebecca, My Cousin Rachel and Frenchman's Creek). In this adaptation, in the scene I recall, Lord Rockingham dismisses Dona as having been easily won by her husband, the good Harry. Dona replies, "Not so easily won, nor kept".


That scene occurred to me today as I sat here, thinking about being bought, being won, submitting to those in authority, and the rewards we reap when we submit (even if our submission isn't always joyfully given). You see, we are enduring yet another "employee satisfaction" survey here in the hospital lab where I work. I've lost count of how many we've done and yet the management keeps asking the same questions, receiving the same answers and they seem to think an extra meal ticket here or there, a free movie ticket now and again are just the band aid needed to assuage our dissatisfaction with being left short and unsupported. To their little prezzies I can only reply, "thank you" and yet I cannot be bought. I could be won, but never bought. On the other hand, what I have won in my ten years here is the love and friendship of some of my co-workers. I am blessed to count among my friends some of my co-workers whom others consider to be the most difficult.


But then my mind returns to Lady Dona and her pirate, Aubrey. And, not least, to her good Harry who plays a dangerous gambit in order to win back his love. Harry wins in the end, and the pirate, who said he never wanted to be tied to anyone, loses the only woman who had ever won his heart. Terribly romantic dreck, isn't it?

I've known a pirate or two -- but now I'm waiting for my Harry to play his gambit. It won't be easy, but it is his to play, his battle to wage. And once won, I wouldn't take the risk of Dona's betrayal. No, it's been too long a battle for me to risk the victory. The more I understand about being a godly woman, the more I understand a woman's need to be won by a man who is worth giving herself to in submission, in marriage, the more I desire it. I know it goes deeply against the grain of our fallen natures and the world's siren call of self-sovereignty. But it is one of God's paradoxes that when we give ourselves away, when we seem weakest to the world, that is just when we are strongest.

The world will call a woman who is submitted to her husband a fool. I only want to ask: If marriage is a picture of the relationship between Christ and the Church, his Bride; we know he purchased that Bride at the cost of his own life's blood, if that is so, doesn't the mirror of that sacrifice presented in human marriage require a costly battle, a victory won and a willing submission, the former by man and the latter by woman if they are to be husband and wife?


And, until that victory is won, I have the abiding peace and joy of knowing I belong to Christ and to my friends.

Monday, November 17, 2008

With thanks to two dear friends

(who both told me the same thing - trust God)


Trust And Obey

When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word,
What a glory He sheds on our way!
While we do His good will, He abides with us still,
And with all who will trust and obey.

Not a shadow can rise, not a cloud in the skies,
But His smile quickly drives it away;
Not a doubt or a fear, not a sigh or a tear,
Can abide while we trust and obey.

Not a burden we bear, not a sorrow we share,
But our toil He doth richly repay;
Not a grief or a loss, not a frown or a cross,
But is blessed if we trust and obey.

But we never can prove the delights of His love
Until all on the altar we lay;
For the favor He shows, for the joy He bestows,
Are for them who will trust and obey.

Then in fellowship sweet we will sit at His feet.
Or we’ll walk by His side in the way.
What He says we will do, where He sends we will go;
Never fear, only trust and obey.

Ahhhh - some days I just LOVE being in the Kitchen!

The kale was starting to wilt, the cabbage needed to be cooked and those potatoes -- I forgot they were there! So, this morning, I went on a cooking jag. And here are the results:

Sauteed Kale with lemon and capers

Oven roasted Potatoes and Onions

Red Lentil and Cabbage soup

I pronounce them all a success.

Saturday, November 15, 2008

on Sexual Orthodoxy

Sexual orthodoxy? To many, it's an unfamiliar term. To others, it is a vaguely threatening one and may conjure unpleasant images of judgment.



And the latter are right in a sense. Orthodoxy always involves discernment, discrimination and even judgment. Mormonism is an heretical sect because, among many other things, they hold that Jesus and Lucifer are brothers and sons of "Father God". The Gnostics were not orthodox because they deny the goodness of the physical body. Some Gnostics hold to the heretical belief of Docetism which holds that Jesus only "seemed" to have a physical body. There are yet other sects which fail the test of orthodoxy because they hold to heretical beliefs such as Arianism or Modalism. This latter, where many fail to discern its presence, is gaining much unrecognized influence through the popularity of preachers like T.D. Jakes.



But sex? How does our view of sex and sexual behaviours rise to the level of orthodoxy or a judgment of heresy? Because, as we shall see, our beliefs about sex in many ways determine or affect our beliefs about God, the Holy Trinity, Jesus Christ's incarnation and the Church. A Christian worldview is all of a piece - it is one garment. If you pull at one seam, it begins to unravel and soon the garment is useless. In the same way, our beliefs about sex are terribly important.



To put it simply, sexual orthodoxy is right belief or purity of faith in matters sexual. This means holding to, among other beliefs, that a Christian is to remain chastely celibate while single and maintain fidelity to one spouse until (in the words of the Prayer Book) death do you part. But sexual orthodoxy isn't limited to the sex act itself. It is broader, affecting and governing all of our lives as male and female, men and women made in the image of God.



As I write this, we Americans are in the middle of the fiercest political battle in a generation. It is less than a month to the presidential election -- the outcome of which will influence the direction of our country for the next generation. I am not going to delve into rank politics, but I do find it interesting how both sides are exhibiting the sexual confusion of our time. One candidate is married to the wife of his youth, one is not. One supports same-sex unions which counterfeit marriage, one does not. The list could go on. This election and so many other barometers of cultural health make it clear that sex, sexual expression and the very meaning of being made male and female, both bearing the divine image, are THE battleground for our time.



This election is also dividing Christians in unusual ways. One party has chosen a woman to run on the ticket as candidate for Vice President. Some Christians who otherwise hold to sexual orthodoxy support this choice, others do not. But the truly curious thing about those who claim the Complementarian label and would never support as woman a senior pastor seem to see no conflict, no contradiction, no inconsistency in their support of a woman for Vice President of the United States. They hold that a woman must submit to her husband's leading in the home and the leading of men in the church -- but that she can then be a "heartbeat away from the Presidency" which could have her as her husband's Commander in Chief!



I have to admit I am not entirely surprised by this turn of events because I have held for some time that those who call themselves Complementarians are, by and large, not radical enough. They are not getting to the root issues, the root meaning, the bedrock reasons why God has decreed a woman shall not teach or have authority over a man and that a wife must submit to her husband as the Church submits to Christ. The same principles which prevent us from celebrating women as pastors and priests in the Church, prevent us from lauding female-headed households, and also prevent us from supporting women in civic leadership as a matter of no importance.



These principles matter everywhere because they matter anywhere. They are grounded in our very creation as male and female - which are profoundly different. Man was made from the dust of the ground, woman was made from the man and for the man. We don't take off these sexual natures when we enter the White House or the State House. We don't simply put them back on when we cross our own thresholds or traverse the narthex to enter the sanctuary. No, our natures as male and female are of metaphysical and not merely religious import.



The very design of a woman's body is to give life -- it is how the first woman was named and how the second Eve participated in God's plan of salvation. Can we honestly hold that woman's design as life-giver ceases to be of importance when she is not in the home or the church?



If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, the loyalty of the soldier is proved, and to be steady on all the battlefield besides is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point. (Martin Luther, attributed)



Sexuality is the battlefield of our time. Sexual orthodoxy, the fortress we must defend. If we give in this one area because, let's face it, it doesn't seem to matter much whether the preacher is wearing pants or a skirt, we will soon find we have given all. Just over ten years ago, when I was involved with CBE (Christians for Biblical Equality, the religious feminist organization for Evangelicals or Egalitarians, which was formed at about the same time as the opposing organization, the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood - CBMW), the "inclusive language" bible translation controversy broke wide open. It was the summer of 1997 and at the CBE conference that year many promises were given that such translation principles would never apply to God - but that was a lie from the beginning. Such translations make a habit of erasing Old Testament references to Christ (check Psalm 1:1 in any of them if you doubt me). Yet other groups who first caved on the issue of women's "ordination" have proved themselves faithless within a generation by "ordaining" openly practicing and unrepentant homosexuals. This trajectory has been repeated over and over again, and yet many otherwise conservative, orthodox Evangelical believers still don't see the danger, let alone the heresy involved in placing a woman in the pulpit as their pastor



Yes, I know I am skating very close to making a slippery slope argument. That is true. And such arguments are used, abused and overstated with nauseating frequency. That is also true. However, if I have not yet scared you completely away, come on this journey with me. It will take you to places you might never have known, places I thought I'd never see myself. But in the end we will come out on solid ground overlooking the beautiful, comely vista of God's vision for men and women, His vision for creation, the Bridegroom and the Church, his bride. we will end up at the banquet to end all banquets -- the wedding supper of the Lamb.

Blamires on the Christian Mind

A friend recently gave me a copy of The Christian Mind by Harry Blamires and I am enjoying it immensely - though I am not sure "enjoy" is the best word for such a book. This afternoon, I finished the first chapter of part two and the last two paragraphs struck home. I give them to you below, in the hope it may be convicting, encouraging and a spur to action.

We have become afraid of our own convictions. And our fear has
not been, in this respect, a wholly unworthy one. History has been full of warnings against the damage which fanatical dogmatists can do to human society and so to the Church itself. No men more loudly and impressively than the officers of the Holy Inquisition claimed that temporal well-being must be subordinated to eternal well-being; that physical pain and earthly suffering were as nothing when weighed in the balance against the damnation of a soul. One might go further and say that no body of men more strenuously strove to preserve the distinctness and distinctiveness of the Christian mind. We have perhaps been frightened too much by horrors of this
kind. It is because the devil is an angel that his evil power is so poisonous. It is because the Inquisitors had a crucial element of truth mixed up with their dismal self-deceptions that the perversions they represented were so diabolical.

Twentieth-century Christendom errs and no doubt will continue to err -- but it will not err in the direction of the Inquisition. Rather, through reacting against excessive dogmatism, against exclusiveness, against withdrawal from the proper activities of the world, it may destroy through a too yielding compliance with secularism, a too easy commerce of mind with mind, that powerful and lucid rational construction which constitutes its divinely guaranteed estimate of life.

That "crucial element of truth" is precisely what religious feminists get "mixed up with their dismal self-deceptions" which makes "the perversions they represent so diabolical". The crucial element of truth is our ontological equality as male and female -- and if you ever doubt that a patriarchalist thinks men and women are equal because of the way we think, act, believe, I beg you to recall my earlier post. We are equal in the only way that matters to a Christian - we were bought at the same price.

However, what religious feminists seem afraid of or unable to countenance is that within that equality, we can peel back the layers to reveal an equally inherent inequality. We really are different, bedrock differences seen in our anatomy, physiology, psychology. We were created by different methods for different purposes - Adam from the dust of the ground and Eve from Adam. They were not stood up in the garden side-by-side, created at the same time in the same way -- no, Eve was created from Adam and for Adam.

In the Church, we have become afraid of our own convictions -- so afraid, for so long, we no longer know what they should be. A grain of truth has been mixed with a lie and the heresies of religious feminism have spread through us like the hyphae of a mold. So silently, so quietly, so secretly that, like a mold taking over a load of bread, we are shot through with the invader before it grows large enough to be seen with the naked eye.

And this has happened because, as Blamires writes, we are not thinking Christianly. We might think correctly about this point of doctrine or that practice, but we don't have a Christian mind, there is no comprehensive Christian mind at work in our world today. Even the good folks fighting the battle who call themselves Complementatian are not thinking as radically Christian as they ought - witness Dr. Mohler's easy embrace of Sarah Palin as McCain's Vice Presidential running mate.

We need to take Blamires seriously, both his caution against the excesses of fanatical dogmatists and the error of being too yielding in reaction.

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Proof that women are smarter than men

I belong to an email group that has grown out of a blog hosted on Typepad. Typepad recently changed the commenting format so that comments are broken up into pages after responses have reached a certain length. You have to click on "next" to access the next page of responses.

Now this august group is mainly men. And I deeply admire those men for the depth and breadth of their knowledge and for their collective wisdom. I often find myself wondering how I could have been included in such a group as I usually feel totally out of my league.

However, it seems that the only two women included in the group (me and one other women) are also the only two who have noticed this format change in Typepad.

Just what did those bigheaded men think that little blue "NEXT" icon/button/link meant?

Ahhh, something to brighten my day after last night's national fiasco.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Just for the record . . .

Some folks seem to have gotten the impression that I have a big mouth. My dentist will assure you that I do not - I have had a total of 9 teeth pulled, including all four wisdom teeth. Only my closest friends get to hear the story of the 9th tooth, so don't ask.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

It seems I have a reputation

I will admit to having one or two bugaboos about things. Toilet seats AND lids must be put down before flushing. In a word - aerosols. I think smokers have been unduly demonized, I'll even admit to enjoying catching a whiff of good pipe or cigar smoke from time to time - but don't you dare smoke near my food. Don't chew your gum with your mouth open unless you want to hear my elbow crack (there's catch in my left elbow that cracks from time to time and has been known to create the same sensation as fingernails on chalkboard for those within a mile or so of the sound).

But here's one thing I really don't understand. Why travel if you have to bring everything, including the kitchen sink, with you? Me, I've had perfectly good soft side luggage ripped to shreds in the dim, dark underbelly of one of America's finer airports so I have an additional phobia about checking luggage. But really - you're only going for five days, do you really need to pack five pairs of jeans? Do you really need a 16 ounce bottle of shampoo?

I've been know to travel across the Atlantic to spend two and half weeks on that sceptered Isle of poetic fame with only my carry on and a shoulder tote. Honey, I can pack. Roll something into a little nook or cranny? Haven't you ever heard of rinsing things out in sinks? You do know that you can buy Shampoo and deodorant in other countries, don't you? Did you know that you can probably pack two skirts in the luggage space of one pair of blue jeans, and you don't need to launder the skirt as you would want to launder your jeans after only a day of wear.

I've recently threatened to help a friend pack for a 30-day study trip to Europe this winter - I say only threaten as I don't think she can psychologically bear the trauma of not having 67 pairs of her most treasured socks with her (you get the idea, right?). But I also don't think she can afford the financial trauma of the inevitable extra luggage fees. So, who knows if she will take me up on my mercenary threat or not?

I also have an aversion to seeing people struggle through airports with too many pieces of luggage to keep easily in tow -- or watch them waiting forlornly to see if their bags will be regurgitated in one piece, sometimes not regurgitated at all.

So tonight, I had to laugh when a co-worker told me she intends to pack for her next trip --------






------the "Kamilla way"

HA!

Mrs. Gaskell and her purposefully transgressive younger sisters

This is just one of those things that comes to puzzle my brain from time to time. If Elizabeth Gaskell could be a successful novelist, writing under her own name and frequently being known only as "Mrs. Gaskell" -- why did her two successors, Marianne Evans and Aurore Dupin, need to take on the name of "George" in order to succeed as novelists. You will know the former better as George Eliot and the latter as George Sand. I wonder about that.

What you should not wonder about, however, is whether or not to read Eliot's Middlemarch. That is a given -- if you want to understand how women think and feel about men.

Just call me Dorothea.

Thursday, October 9, 2008

What price equality?

Jesus paid the same price for us all - every man, every woman. There was no discount for any woman because she counts less than a man. Christ paid no premium for any man because men are "dominant".

Each and every one of us cost what we all cost - the sort of death reserved for only the worst of criminals. He was beaten and bruised, pierced and nailed to a couple chunks of wood. And then he was hauled upright on that wooden cross until he suffocated to death.

Give me inequality, please! I don't want to know I cost that much.

Monday, October 6, 2008

Life is Good!

Ah, some days life is just good. Last night, I closed out a very minor chapter in my life. It should have been nothing to speak of, but made me a bit sad. The end of a dream always does, even if it is a very small dream unlikely to ever see reality. Almost immediately, however, it seemed as if God gave me a present in place of the dream. My favorite philosopher will be in town speaking at a conference in three weeks - and I can still register.

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

And she has a great personality . . .

Meet Kamilla the Fruit Bat. Kinda cute, isn't she? She is one of the largest bats in the world, having a wingspan of around 5 feet, and loves to be fed by her handlers. She's a very healthy girl - she really does eat fruit!


Monday, September 29, 2008

I still have hope that someone can prove me wrong . . .

I've come to the conclusion that there are three types of men out there (among those who don't get married by the time they are in their early 30s).

Type 1: The Bad Boy
This category has two subtypes. The first is the Bad Boy who just wants another notch on his belt for getting a Good Girl in the sack. The second subtype is the Bad Boy who thinks a Good Girl will help him reform.

Type 2: The Good Guy
These are really, honestly good guys. They enjoy your company, your rapier whit and sparkling conversation. But they never think of you in that way.

Type 3: The Rotten Sod
These are the guys who do think of you in that way, but they neglect to tell you they are already married. Hence the category title.

I am convinced that these three types account for 98% of the men who find themselves still single into their 40s.

But I am willing to be proven wrong.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Discernment and thorns

How do you know when to quit and when to keep pushing forward? How do you discern when closed doors are supposed to be closed and when you should pick the lock? What do you do when the doors you can't go through are open, beckoning you to come through?

It's difficult. It always is. But it is especially disconcerting when it seems to make no sense which doors are nailed shut and which remain open despite your best efforts to close them.

And then there is the persistent thorn in the side. You know the one that runs so deep it becomes a physical ache, and you reach for the Motrin even though you know that's not the kind of medicine that will heal this thing. Prayer doesn't seem to help. Nor do tears. Nothing helps, not really.

Not even when you get whacked over the head with a 2x4:

7 So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, [1] a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 10 For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. ESV

Friday, September 26, 2008

It's just NOT our week . . .

The "powers the be" changed the scheduled and so our birthday guy isn't coming in until 9pm to work the night shift!

But our potluck was good, as usual. And the Jicama Slaw was a hit.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

3 Strikes and Yer Out!

In the hospital lab where I work, our second shift team is known for our birthday potlucks. We rarely forget one and most of us are good cooks. However, after tonight, one of us will no longer enjoy the privilege. This is the third year in a row one of our PRN (as needed) gals has called in after signing up to work a shift during her birthday week.

Well, we had lasagna and Caesar salad with garlicky bread sticks and chocolate chewy cookies and fruit pudding - and all without the birthday girl.

Friday I'm making my new recipe for yet another of our birthdays. It's Jicama Slaw, yummm!

Kamilla

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Why are my fingers sticking to the keyboard?

Oh, right, kettle corn. I stopped by the farmer's market after brunch today just in time to catch the Kettle corn folks and the german sausage guy. Oh, and here's a scary idea - at lunch I was complaining to a friend that I didn't have any photos of myself I could post and so she snapped some. I've uploaded one to my profile page if you're brave enough to have a peek.

Otherwise - what are you doing inside on this gorgeous fall afternoon? Go out and play!

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Another Freudian slip?

Well, Kamilla sicing the Hound of Heaven on Molly and praying that he bites her neck and saves her from her rebellion, is crystal clear to me . . .


This appeared on another blog a couple of weeks back in response to a discussion here on this blog. And, frankly, nothing about this poster's recap is crystal anything to me. Is this another Freudian slip from the Egalitarian camp? How did the image of someone being grabbed by the nape of the neck so they can be made to face their rebellion get morphed into a "draculan" image if neck biting?

Seems clear as mud to me.

The paradox of "liberation"

I'm just going to post something short here -- something I've been mulling over for a few days now and will likely mull some more (I've got spices for that, you know!). Religious feminism (in one incarnation aka Egalitarianism) seeks liberation from the norms of sexual orthodoxy. Now, I know that is a new term for some, but it is really only what the Church has always and everywhere taught regarding how the sexes are to relate. The funny thing about that is, it often turns out to be not so liberating after all. Chesterton said that when you get rid of the big laws, they are replaced with small laws. Roger Kimball had something similar to say in the New Criterion (/1/26/05):



The demand for excessive freedom is a curious thing. Born in wholesale rebellion against restraint, it grows up erecting its own restraints -- often harsher and more irrational than those it intended to replace.



The curious thing about Christian sexual orthodoxy is not its restraint, but the liberty you have once you choose to live within its bounds. For more on this:

http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=17-08-042-f

Sunday, September 14, 2008

It's definitely Fall

I made a pot of tea this morning - second of the season. I will also admit that I make it the old fashioned way with water boiled in a proper tea kettle, the tea pot warmed, a cozy (makeshift though it may be) and I even go to a special shop to get Britain's "favourite" tea - PG Tips.

Between that and the baking supplies I recently bought (a dozen and a half eggs, Guinness - for bread only, cheddar, sugar for cookies, etc.) . . .

Yes, it's definitely Fall.

Kamilla

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Fun, SCARY and I STILL can't believe I just did it!

It turned out rather nicely. I haven't done it in years, and it turns out I haven't lost the touch - I can still do it.

Monday, September 1, 2008

Coincidence of Opposites

Recently here in Denver, there was something of a coincidence of opposites. The Democrats gathered for their convention. It was a week of festivities and conflict - though, it seems, the folks who vowed to "ReCreate '68" were more talk than action. The object and center piece of their convention was the nomination of an infanticidal man who is the very antithesis of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr's dream. Barack Obama, the junior senator from Illinois was to be their nominee. He is a nearly empty suit - rising to prominence in what is likely the most corrupt political machine in this country. Here is a man with very little on his resume. He was president of the Harvard Law Review and a professor of law at the University of Chicago's Law School - and yet he never managed to publish one law review or journal article in either position. This is unheard of. And, after his supporters criticized a McCain ad likening him to a rock-star, Obama provided nothing less than a rock concert atmosphere for his acceptance speech in the ultimate venue of rock concerts - a football stadium.



Obama's record in opposing measures designed to protect the youngest survivors of violence - babies born alive after attempts to murder them by abortion - is a matter of public record that has been well documented by Jill Stanek and others. His ostensible reason for opposing the legislation was to protect Roe. This is a smoke screen as he also opposed adding a provision to the legislation that would accomplish precisely that goal. He has also promised to sign in to law the Freedom of Choice Act - a law which negates every state provision designed at restricting even late-term abortions and protecting young women from being forced into abortion by their rapists (parental notification guidelines, etc.). In short, Obama is the most radically pro-abortion candidate in our country's history.



This isn't Dr. Martin Luther King's dream - Obama represents the antithesis of the Dream. He is being judged by the color of his skin rather than the content of his character.



On the night Mrs. Obama took the stage to laud her husband, a different sort of gathering was taking place across town from the DNC at the Pepsi Center. There was a vigil outside of the Planned Parenthood Clinic of Stapleton. At this gathering, Dr. King's niece, Dr. Alveda King spoke of the fight against abortion as the newest frontier in the battle for civil rights. Denver's Abp Charles Chaput also spoke and I will leave you with a few words from his address to the vigil:



Killing an unborn child is never the right answer to a woman's or society's problems. Acts of violence create a culture of violence -- and abortion is the most intimate form of violence there is. It wounds the woman, it kills the unborn child and it poisons the roots of justice and charity that bind us all into one human family.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

I learned a new word!

Yes, yes, I know some of you are thinking, I hope she treats it gently, it's in a strange place . . .

This one is just plain fun and a bit apropos, no?

Nympholepsy: a violent emotional state arising as from frustrated idealism

Some people say the most unexpected things . . .

Just when I needed a good laugh, I sent the following email to a friend:


David,

Just in case you need a laugh today, after I joked about eHarmony on your recent blogpost, Sally asked me - what about the rest of the guys they matched me with? So, this morning I re-opened my account and tweaked my profile to see if it improved matters any. It did not. Of the six matches they sent me immediately this morning, one said he drinks 'several times a day' but that his son is the most important thing in his life, another said Anthony Robbins is the most influential person in his life (he's the GREATEST, don't you know?) and a third said the last books he enjoyed reading were by Joyce Meyer and Joel Osteen.

And this is based on 29 dimensions of compatibility?!?!?!!!

Kamilla

To which my friend responded, giving me cause for hearty laughter:

Hi Kamilla,

That is a riot!

What I tell my male students about compatibility, sometimes -- just for a laugh:
"You got one of these here? She's got one of them there? You're compatible!"

David

No, don't look, I'm blushing!

And *my* world is small?!

Over on a blog where I'll simply say I am not well-liked, this comment was left in response to a comment I had left elsewhere:

The majority of people are egalitarians and soft comps.

On a different thread from the same blog, also discussing me and some of my friends, this comment:

Sad really, that the world is so small for the Patriocentric. It is a world that will continue to get smaller


Well, certainly the majority of the "people" may very well be egalitarians or soft comps. However, I was speaking specifically of Christians in Christ's Church. Down throughout history and still today, the majority of Christians have followed the Biblical prescriptions for father-rule in marriage and family life and male rule in the Church. You will not find a single female presiding over a Eucharist or a congregation in the Orthodox church, the Roman Catholic church or in the orthodox and catholic churches outside those two communions. Nor will you find any support for the heresy that likes to call itself egalitarianism.

Now that's a whole lot of Christians who have preceeded us and who are living now that do not belive or practice what these women say "the majority of people" believe and practice.

And they say my world is narrow?

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

My new theme song

I headed over to the new SuperTarget to get some Miracle Whip this morning (can't have tuna without it, ya know). On the way home, I heard a song I rather enjoy for the sheer exuberance, if not the theme of the lyrics. It's the song written by Jennifer Nettles, "Down in Mississippi (Up to no Good)".

So, no, I don't endorse telling off your husband and having a wild weekend with your girlfriends, but I do like this line:

Luck's about to change for these three queens
Tired of getting jokers, deal us up Kings

I don't know about "luck" or being a queen, but I do know I'm mighty tired of gettin' jokers and wouldn't mind opening my front door to find a king (or even a prince) standing there with a big bunch of red roses.

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

An unholy spirit?

It is not unknown among religious feminists to claim Complementarians and Patriarchalists are bowing to the culture in their defense of sexual orthodoxy. I guess then, according to some religious feminists, we Patriarchalists are simply following a long tradition in the wake of St. Paul who was doing the same thing when he made a "Christian gloss on Aristotle's Household codes" according to Don who posted this recently on MereComments. Yippee, I'd rather follow St. Paul any day than some latter day gnostic guru claiming to understand what no one has understood for 90% of the Church's history.



And, contrary to the constant and universal witness of the Church, Don (and perhaps other religious feminists) knows this because, in his own words, "I have the Spirit and she/it helps me many times understand things".



Contrary to the claims of the religious feminists, a quick browse through any newspaper, popular magazine or television show will confirm that patriarchy is most certainly NOT the reigning philosophy of our culture. Feminism, sexual anarchy and general permissiveness (unless, of course, one wants to smoke a cigarette in a bar), rule the courts, the laws and popular entertainment. A call to sexual orthodoxy, patriarchy, a mere suggestion that it is best for children to have their mothers at home and even a whisper that one might want to reconsider their position on the use of oral contraceptives and other methods of birth control, any of these will get you a good laugh of derision by the culture and most of what pretends to be Evangelicalism as well. So, no, I don't think it is those of us who follow these biblical mandates who are bowing to the culture and the spirit of the age.



So, if religious feminists are not following the spirit of the age, one wonders what she/it spirit Don and his fellow travelers are following?

I encourage you to read through the entire discussion over at MereComments - it is enlightening in so many ways, as the good men who inhabit that blog often make it.

http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomments/2008/08/sanctified-inco.html

House Rule #57

Never answer the phone before noon on your day off. Exception to the rule: when in need of extra funds because you just bought a plane ticket.

Reason for rule: The phone call is almost invariably someone from the hospital calling for you to come in and cover a sick co-worker's shift.


(don't worry about the numbering system for rules, it is utterly arbitrary)

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Apparently your Best Life isn't gained by accessing the cockpit, Mrs. Osteen

It seems to me a disproportionate number of religious celebrities get themselves in trouble on airplanes and in airports. A few years ago one got in trouble for allegedly slugging a flight attendant, the reason why escapes me. Now comes Victoria Osteen, co-pastorette of Lakewood Church in Houston. You know the one that meets in an arena, right? She is being sued for assault by a flight attendant and professes astonishment at this. One report has Mrs. Osteen eyeing the door to the cockpit during the flight. One wonders if she thought that was the doorway to her Best Life Now, hmmm? Apparently, the FAA hasn't been paralyzed with astonishment as they have already slapped Mrs. Best Life Now with a $3000 fine for "interfering with a crew member during flight".

The thing that puzzles me about this is -- I can't figure out if it's the religious celebrities just wanting their "best life now" or is it anti-religious celebrity snobbery among flight attendants?




http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,398542,00.html

Friday, August 8, 2008

It's HERE!!!

So you can probably tell I'm a little bit excited, but I have been waiting for this book since I found out he was doing it. Dr. Anthony Esolen is one of my very favorite authors. He "gets it" in a way few authors do. Because of him, I have a stack of reading (Shakespeare's The Tempest, Dante's Divine Comedy, etc.). And now, tada, his latest:

http://www.amazon.com/Politically-Incorrect-Western-Civilization-Guides/dp/1596980591/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218205633&sr=1-1

It's as good a high school graduation gift as is likely to come along for years to come. Since it is past that time for this year - a going away to college present wouldn't go amiss.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Does this mean something?

I just added my 11th Facebook friend - and 5 of them are clergy!

Hmmmmm

Saturday, August 2, 2008

Words of wisdom on The Dance

"A man ought never to be in a position to break a woman's heart unless he is also simultaneously breaking his word. His word ought to always be a protective barrier between him and her heart. He ought never to be in a position to destroy her without destroying his own integrity first."

- from Pastor Doug Wilson's blog

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Why am I not surprised?

I'm beginning to think I should make an "Irony Alert" a regular feature of this blog.

Today I learned of a new PAC called, "Matthew 25 Network". On the banner of their web page they specifically quote verse 40. Typical of the left, they assume that only candidates and policies which support big government programs care about, "promoting life with dignity . . .strengthening and supporting families . . ." Funny thing is, the last 40+ years of increasing government programs designed to help the family have made the goal of strong families even farther away. And the programs will continue to do so as long as they offer Big Daddy Government in place of flesh and blood fathers.

However, the PAC has endorsed Barack Obama, with the approval of signatory Brian McLaren. If you haven't been paying attention lately and wonder where the irony lies in this - go read Matthew 25:40 and then recall that their chosen one has the most pro-abortion record on record.



Addendum:

The group also lists a button on their front page which delivers you to another page on their website which starts: "Some in the faith community have been promoting false and misleading information about Senator Obama’s record on a number of vital issues"

The first point on which they attempt to "put away falsehood" is on Obama's support of what some have termed, "post-birth" abortion. The website claims Obama supported the Federal version of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act. This is patently false, as Jill Stanek has shown. Obama actually OPPOSED changing the language of the proposed Illinois state law which would have brought it in line with the federal language. He then opposed the law altogether on grounds, according to his own words on the floor of the state senate, that he was afraid it would lead to a dismantling of Roe v Wade.

Monday, July 28, 2008

A Bad Influence?

I ask you - am I a bad influence on others?

This weekend I want shopping at WalMart. While I was headed down to the fizzy drinks aisle a package of Oreo cookies leaped into my passing cart! I took pity on the poor thing (things?) and let the package come home with me. However, since I feared eating the whole lot of them myself, I brought them into work to share.

What's so special about a package of Oreos? you may well ask.

Ah, the special thing about these cookies is . . .






Banana Cream filling!

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Shakespeare's thought for today

Here, then, is MacBeth's haunting speech which occurs near the end of the play:

She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

You're a Heretic! No, YOU'RE a Heretic!

Egalitarian writers like Kevin Giles and many of his followers claim that orthodox Christians who defend the historic and universal teaching of the church regarding father-rule and sexual orthodoxy are guilty of the ancient heresy of Arianism for defending the eternal subordination of the Son. I'll leave the shredding of Giles's understanding of orthodox teaching and the quality of his work on this matter to others who have already done the job admirably.

The charge of heresy, however, is again flowing in a different direction. Steve Hutchens, over at MereComments, has hit the nail on the head (again) and laid a different ancient heresy smack on the doorstep of the religious feminists - modalism. [As an aside, it is interesting to note that they would be guilty of the same heresy as the pseudo-christian preacher, TD Jakes, for whom they do not seem to care.]

Here, Hutchens makes the charge:

http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomments/2008/07/losing-god-the.html

Here he explains the analogy:

http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomments/2008/07/note-on-anthrop.html


[I've removed a additional reference to "anthropological modalism" here until I re-read it and understand it better]

I haven't much to add - it's simply something that must be contemplated, puzzled through.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Someone should know about this . . .

One of my besetting sins is what should probably be called a variety of gossiping. I'll run across a blog or an article or just some little tidbit of knowledge and will be utterly convinced that "John Smith" really needs to know about this or Sally Doe needs to know what is being said over there.

And there are times when I really, really REALLY do not want to know some of the things I know (from having been on leadership committees and from having been in healthcare for almost 25 years). It would relieve a burden if I could share some of these things.

But the great majority of the time I really don't *need* to share any of it and sometimes I just, simply, should not.

For instance, I still check the blog of a seminary professor who is a feminist. I won't even tell you if this seminary professor is a man or a woman so you won't be tempted to try and figure out who it is. It will suffice if you know there is great irony being presented there - this professor thinks some are not careful with, "the treasures of orthodoxy" - that and some of the other points made in the post are richly ironic coming from a feminist who denies the treasure historic Christian teaching has bequeathed us in terms of sexual orthodoxy, isn't it?

But I already know this professor is a feminist - what more need I know?

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Barack Obama's Heroine and her Plan for Peace

In July of 2007, Obama gave a speech to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund. After noting that Martin Luther King, Jr. had received the "Margaret Sanger Award" in 1966, he said the following:


That struggle for equality is not over and now we are at one of those rare moments where we can actually transform our politics in a fundamental way. But it’s going to take people as resolute as Mrs. Sanger and Dr. King. . .

The "resolute" Sanger was also resolute in her racism and support for eugenics. A short nine years before Dr. King accepted that award (his wife gave his speech for him), Sanger was interviewed on television by Mike Wallace. In that interview she said, "I was what I would call a born humanitarian. I don't like to see people suffer. . ." Sanger is also concerned with reducing the amount of sin in the world, "I think the greatest sin in the world is bringing children into the world--that have disease from their parents, that have no chance in the world to be a human being practically. Delinquents, prisoners, all sorts of things just marked when they're born. That to me is the greatest sin -- that people can -- can commit.."

In order to achieve this reduction in sin and human suffering, Sanger proposed a "Plan for Peace", which was published in the April 1937 edition of Birth Control Review:

d. to apply a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to
that grade of population whose progeny is tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring.


e. to insure the country against future burdens of maintenance for numerous offspring as may be born of feebleminded parents, by pensioning all persons with transmissible disease who voluntarily consent to sterilization.


f. to give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of
segregation or sterilization.


g. to apportion farm lands and homesteads for these segregated persons where they would be taught to work under competent instructors for the period of their entire lives.


The first step would thus be to control the intake and output
of morons, mental defectives, epileptics.


The second step would be to take an inventory of the secondary group such as illiterates, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes, dope-fiends; classify them in special departments under government medical protection, and segregate them on farms and open spaces as long as necessary for the strengthening and development of moral conduct.


This woman, whose resolute nature Obama thinks we need more of, was also an unapologetic racist and eugenicist and the creator of the "Negro Project":

We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro
population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members

This is the woman in whose name Martin Luther King, Jr. accepted an award. This is the woman whose type Obama thinks we need more of.

And if that isn't enough to convince you, Sanger also left her sickly daughter to die alone.




Oh, right, that's a peaceful woman who wants to reduce both sin and suffering.





Lord have mercy on us and preserve us from more of her kind!





Sources:



http://www.cwfa.org/articles/1466/CWA/life/index.htm




http://www.spectacle.org/997/richmond.html




http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/sanger_margaret_t.html





Daniel Flynn, Intellectual Morons http://www.flynnfiles.com/


Yeah, now pull the other one . . .

I've heard tell Jim Wallis's mantra is, "God is not a Republican . . . or a Democrat". He's probably right. But then why is one of Wallis's God's Politics blog co-horts, Tony Campolo, serving on the platform committee for the Democrats? Campolo's stated aim is to press for, "the inclusion of an abortion reduction plank in this year's platform.



http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/2008/07/prolife-democrats-call-for-an.html



Who are the Sojourners or God's Politics bloggers serving on the Republican platform committee? What's that? There are none, you say? Oh.

Another small law

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/education/2261307/Toddlers-who-dislike-spicy-food-racist,-say-report.html

I want to beg someone to tell me this is a joke - but I don't think it is. Sometimes I wonder why I still love Britain and would, if I ever become fabulously wealthy, by a flat overlooking the Thames in London in a heartbeat.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Chesterton was right (again)

http://www.scottishapartment.com/blog/put-the-pipes-down-and-step-away-from-the-bag

Chesterton said that, "When you break the big laws, you do not get freedom; you do not even get anarchy. You get the small laws."

We've broken, attempted to repeal or forgotten some big laws - at least our governments have. I don't know how this is related to breaking big laws, but it most surely is a petty and small law.

Addendum:

A commenter has mentioned the article on Chesterton in the current issue of the New Yorker. For those who have read the article, I recommend a counterbalancing dose consisting in Dale Ahlquists's response, which you can read here:

http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/blog/?p=2117

Monday, July 7, 2008

Junk

Have you ever noticed that the more fast food "restaurants" and junk food resources we have - the more indigestion we have and the more "supplements" we need to get in our minimum daily requirements? Have you also ever noticed that the more sex everyone seems to be having the more "help" they seem to need to actually do it?

Now, tell the truth. When was the last time you pigged out on carrots? Hmmm? Ever eaten an entire pound of cherries at once? But I'll bet there is an occasion or two in your past that you'd like to forget where you ate a whole pizza or a whole bag of chips without noticing. Be honest.

The more junk we consume, the more we need to consume to feel satisfied. If we eat the good stuff, however, we don't need a gastric bypass to whittle down our bulges or the "purple pill" to take care of the indigestion.

I still remember the first time I had one of my favorite meals. Simple and yet, oh so gorgeous. It consisted of a small bottle of Perrier, I swear those little bubbles are smaller and ticklier than most fizzy waters. Then there was the cheese. It was a small wedge the color of a Colorado sunset that tasted like the warmth of midday. Next came the tomato. It was the perfect red and smelled of earth yet tasted like the sweetness of your first real kiss. There was a handful of nicoise olives, soft and with the perfect note of brine. Last was the rosemary-scented roll with a salty crust. All that was missing was a blanket, a sunny hillside and someone to share it with.

Isn't it amazing how those perfect, simple little things satisfy us in lasting ways that a greasy double-cheeseburger with soggy fries never could?

It is the same way with the "junk food" known as religious feminism. It will never be satisfied and will need to consume more and more and those who adhere to its tenets will become increasingly frenzied in their attempts to achieve validation. Just over ten years ago the leaders of CBE promised that their support for the NIVI and inclusive-language bible translations would stop with language for humans, it would never be applied to God. And yet at a recent Cornerstone Festival, the president of CBE was advocating that we call God "mother"! It will never be enough and they will never be satisfied because they aren't feeding on the good, the true and the beautiful - those things the give a lasting satisfaction.

I had a junk food day and you know what? I feel awful. I'll probably still feel awful tomorrow. But I do have some luscious green grapes, a nice piece of cheese and some walnuts on hand for tomorrow's lunch. Doesn't that sound better than stale tortilla chips with french onion dip? I think so.

And, as for spiritual junk? I'll leave the bitter fruit to the religious feminists while I contemplate the beauty of The Dance.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

SATC - another shamelss plug

I am noticing an interesting phenomenon among reviews of "Sex and the City" - the movie. I don't have certain knowledge about the lives and sins of the reviewers. However, it seems to me that those who have lived (however peripherally) the sort of lifestyle these four women personify, have a less generous reaction to the movie than those who have been sheltered and may have only flirted with that sort of sinful life by watching it on television.

I was late for church Sunday morning because I couldn't tear myself away from Colleen Campbell's interview of Dawn Eden, author of Thrill of the Chaste. I've begun browsing Dawn's blog and highly recommend it!

www.dawnedenblogspot.com

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

YIPPPEEEEE!!!!!

I just thought I would share my joy with all of you good readers (all two of you, that is!) - I am free for six days, yeah!!!!!

Through judicious juggling of holidays and trades and days off, I have nearly an entire week hospital-free. Of course it's not work-free, you know. I am going to endeavour to finish the spring cleaning on the basement that I began, oh, about three years ago.

And no, I won't come over to your house when I am done. phbllttt!

In future, please adress me by title . . .

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is:
Honourable Lady Kamilla the Intractable of Much Madness upon Avon
Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Why don't they ever complain about this?

In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups - the police who investigate crime and the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders... These are their stories.

These are the opening words countless numbers of us hear on a regular basis when we watch Law and Order. Go slowly, read them again. You know the funny thing is, I've never once heard an Egalitarian/Religious Feminist complain about this, but when it comes to Sexual Orthodoxy . . .

Kamilla

Rusell Moore on Liberation Theology

There is a liberation theology of the Left, and there is also a liberation theology of the Right, and both are at heart mammon worship. The liberation theology of the Left often wants a Barrabas, to fight off the oppressors as though our ultimate problem were the reign of Rome and not the reign of death. The liberation theology of the Right wants a golden calf, to represent religion and to remind us of all the economic security we had in Egypt. Both want a Caesar or a Pharaoh, not a Messiah.

http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=21-06-016-v


Dr. Moore is rapidly becoming my favorite patriarchalist within CBMW-style circles. He's already gone on record as preferring the label patriarchlist to complementarian (for which he gets LOTS of points):

http://resources.christianity.com/details/mrki/20070501/d2de20cd-e931-4593-9ba8-71907cc50ce0.aspx

and he also gave the excellent talk, "After Patriarchy, What? Why Egalitarians are winning the Evangelical theology debate" at ETS a couple of years ago:


http://www.henryinstitute.org/documents/2005ETS.pdf

And, in the Touchstone article quoted and linked above, he skewers televangelists from both ends of the political spectrum. Enjoy the links!

Kamilla

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Some of them are quite nice, actually . . .

I'm at work tonight and I went down to the cafeteria for a Dr. Pepper and a piece of pizza for dinner. There was a doc in line paying, and he apologized for jumping ahead of me - I wasn't paying enough attention to know whether he had or not. In the end, he bought my dinner. I tried to give the money back, but he took it and handed it to the checker who took it, over my protests.

A nice little bonus on the day we re-arrange for the next phase of our lab remodel!

Kamilla

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Speak for yourself, Mrs. Obama

I caught a short clip of "The View" the other day in which Mrs. Barack Obama said, "Yes, there's always a level (of sexism). People are not used to strong women,"


As I said, speak for yourself, Michelle. Many of us happen to DEARLY LOVE strong women. I, for one, wish one of the strongest women to ever walk this earth was still here. I wish she was here to confront your husband with words similar to those she addressed to the last Democrat to live at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue when she spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast in 1994:

But I feel that the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of the innocent child, murder by the mother herself. And if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another? How do we persuade a woman not to have an abortion? As always, we must persuade her with love and we remind ourselves that love means to be willing to give until it hurts. Jesus gave even His life to love us. So, the mother who is thinking of abortion, should be helped to love, that is, to father is told that he does not have to take any responsibility at all for the child he has brought into the world. The father is likely to put other women into the same trouble. So abortion just leads to more abortion. Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.

Now THAT is a strong woman.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Compare and Contrast

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080619.wcurfew19/BNStory/lifeFamily/home#



Number one, whenever we define a previable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or the other elements in the Constitution, what we're really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a - child, a nine-month-old - child that was delivered to term. That determination then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place.

- State Senator Barack Obama, speaking on the floor of the Illinois Senate on March 30, 2001 - the sole speaker in opposition to Illinois' Born Alive Infants Protection Act.



First, a few points to make. What Obama terms a "fetus" is an infant child who has survived the attempt on his life, by any one of several methods falling under the umbrella term, "late term abortion". The bill would not have outlawed these abortions, it merely required that, when an infant survives the procedure, he be given comfort until he dies, rather than shoved, out of sight and perhaps out of mind, on a shelve in a soiled utility closet. This is the man who is running for President with the nod of the Democrats. And make no mistake - he is a merchant of the Culture of Death.

The link above that quote is to a Canadian story in which a father was successfully sued by his 12-year-old daughter for excessive punishment. His crime? He refused permission for her to attend a school field trip after she had disobeyed and put pictures of herself on an Internet dating site.

12 YEARS OLD!

I know this is a Canadian story, but if you think this sort of thing is far behind - now, what was that little to-do in Texas with the FLDS all about?

This sort of dissonance never ceases to amaze and sicken me. On the one hand, we have a presidential candidate who thinks it is OK to murder infants fully born simply because the first attempt on their lives wasn't successful. On the other hand, we have a father found guilty of excessive punishment for trying to protect his daughter from herself. Now, if she hadn't been twelve, is she had only been two months prior to birth, her father still wouldn't have had any say in the matter, but her mother could have taken a little trip south of the border and disposed of the little punishment before she ever got a chance to put her pictures up for all the pedophiles in the world to see.

YIKES! It gets scarier and scarier, doesn't it?

The Truth is Out There

I'll admit two things right up front that could be embarrassing. I read the "PEOPLE" celebrity quotes of the week just now. And, I'm an X-phile. There, now I feel better.

I've long had a theory that UFO's are, indeed, real - it's just that people are so very wrong about what they really are. Bible prophecy speaker, Chuck Missler says that they are the return of the Nephilim. I think that is likely very close to the correct explanation. Considering that these beings change shape and tactics according to the times and the culture (succubi, anyone?), I think some sort of spiritual deception/demonic involvement has to be part of the explanation. Vivid dreams and sleep paralysis also go along way towards de-bunking the abduction stories. However, one little matter had never occurred to me. If these things are really beings from somewhere out there, why are they so selective in their appearances?

And don't forget, the X-files movie comes out July 15.




"I don't think aliens or ghosts like black people. We never get abducted; our houses never get haunted. It always happens in rural areas, where no ethnic people live. The day I see somebody from South Central Los Angeles say, 'Man, I got abducted yesterday,' then I'll believe it." – Rapper Xzibit, who is costarring opposite David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson and Amanda Peet in the upcoming movie The X-Files: I Want to Believe

Friday, June 20, 2008

When is a house not a home?

I caught this "news" item today:

http://www.yahoo.com/s/903457

Does anyone seriously believe this show piece was ever a "home"?

Sunday, June 8, 2008

To whom does the Bride belong?

Paul's NT letters provide us with a beautiful picture of marriage. It is hard to imagine the mindset that finds it necessary to atomize husbandly headship and wifely submission in a way that removes all the beauty from these passages, Ephesians in particular, obliterating all references to our Saviour's authority. Some religious feminists have seen the implications for their view of mutual submission and are proclaiming that Christ submits to the church!

I've been pondering that, and the point in a wedding ceremony where the bride is given by father to husband. This is at the heart of marriage and the picture of Christ and His Church - to whom do we belong? Do we belong to our Bridegroom, who seeks to present us holy and blameless? Or do we retain ownershp of ourselves, obliterating the picture of marriage and leaving ourselves open and vulnerable.

For, make no mistake, we always belong to someone.





Ephesians 5:21-33, ESV:


21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.


I'm glad he did!

Recently, Tim Bayly recommended the blog of Doug Wilson:

http://www.dougwils.com

Today, Doug posted this wedding sermon:

http://www.dougwils.com/index.asp?Action=Anchor&CategoryID=1&BlogID=5496

Beautiful, isn't it? And yet this is the very picture religious reminists deny - they deny the possibility of equality within hierarchy, in doing so they deny the very nature of our triune God.

Kamilla

P.S. I'm so very glad Tim made this recommendation.

The Gnosis of the Interpreta Immaculata

Over on her blog, a prominent religious feminist writer begins a post in this manner:

First of all, let it be clear that biblical equality is not grounded in feminism. I am persuaded of all believers’ equal authority in Christ, not because I have adopted the feminism of secular culture, but because I am persuaded by the biblical data that Scripture upholds the freedom and authority of both men and women in Christ. While feminist ideology is derived from cultural factors and philosophies, biblical equality is grounded simply and solely in the properly consistent interpretation of God’s Word.

Now, we readily admit of the possibility of coming to the view of "biblical equality" in an immaculate fashion. However, such protestations of innocence would be more convincing if this writer's readership were not so busy letting their slip show elsewhere:

I have heard it commented more than once that it's sad that the Christian Church in general is so slow to accept something general society accepted years ago-- that a woman is fully as capable as a man. . . .What do you all think? Are there other reasons why Christians as a group tend to be "backwards," to the world's way of thinking, regarding women? Can anything be done about it?

The discussion resulting from this post has lasted several days with not one correspondent noting that, "biblical equality is grounded simply and solely in the properly consistent interpretation of God's word" and is not an attempt to catch up to "the world's way of thinking" - and yet this discussion consists of several responses and has been, according to the site's own statistics, viewed more than 70 times.

Hmmm,

Kamilla

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Where do I begin? . . .

The Cold Feet of Bachelors

http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomments/2008/06/bachelors-were.html#comments


Kamilla

Addendum:

The discussion over at MC has been interesting, to say the least. However, I always find such topics frustrating because the men and women seem to have such different views of each other and why they may have been rejected or otherwise unsuccessful. I am tempted to just tell the men (young and not-so-young) to "man up". Did you give up driving the first time you failed? Did you give up anything worth doing the when it didn't work out as planned?

You see, there's only so much we gals can legitimately do to attract your attention or encourage your pursuit. That is, if we want a marriage worth the name and not some vanilla-flavored equal-partnership pseudo-marriage thingy.

Saturday, May 31, 2008

No words suffice . . .



Except those of our Lord:
28 But turning to them Jesus said, Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. 29 For behold, the days are coming when they will say, Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!
Luke 23:28,29 ESV