The Problem of Moral Revival

As a Christian and a conservative, I believe we have reached a crossroads where we need to seriously reconsider our approach to cultural engagement. The swift undercurrent of moral decay continues to take most Christians by surprise while our pragmatic approach to morality rooted in tradition and dependent on consensus forces us down the slippery slope of relativism. As much as we want to protect our freedom of speech, have we really had all that much to say? As much as we want to protect the right to life, have we been focused more on the right than the life created in the image of God? And in all of our efforts to defend traditional marriage, have we capitulated to non-biblical perspectives in our appeal to the safety of tradition instead of a risky appeal to Scripture? An explicitly Christian worldview has not been welcome in the marketplace of ideas for some time. As a result, believers have caved to society’s demands for a secularized message under the guise of “public language,” an attempt to give the appearance that morality can be dislodged from its worldview foundations. This enterprise has been anything but successful. Yet Christian conservatives continue to clamor for moral revival in pluralistic setting that might, for only a short time, reflect certain values consistent with Scripture. The problem with this conception of moral revival is that it is about as effective as yo-yo dieting.

Dr. Jameela George, MB BS: Black Market Organ Transplantation & Medical Tourism

Dr. George is a Christian bioethicist in India speaking today on medical tourism, those who are in pursuit of cost efffective, faster or better private medical care. In India there is medical tourism in many areas including cardiology, joint replacement, organ transplants, etc.Reasons for medical tourism include availability and low cost of services.With the cost of a heart valve replacement costing $10,000 as opposed to the $200,000 in the US. The following are some highlights from her presentation:

Surrogacy tourism - Wombs for Rent
Often contracted through hospitals in India.Surrogates live in dormatories or "baby farms."
Ethics issues: Exploitation, concept of family, comodification of physiological process.
Surrogates are paid $5000 - $7000, a relatively low cost.

Kidney Tourism
Donors enticed to go abroad for removal and subsequent tranplantation of their kidneys.
The first human kidney transplant - Boston 1954
Transplantation of the liver followed in 1963 and heart in 1967
The kidney is the most wanted organ for transplantation

Worldwide about 1.2 million suffer from kidney failure. In Israel the average wait is 4 years. Worldwide 50k transplants are performed annually.About 285k people are on dialysis in the US.

Laws about Organ Transplantation
Brazil - illegal to sell organs (1997)
1998 law -all Brazilian adults are organ donors at death

Iran
Kidney sales are legal and regulated

India
Transplantation of Human Organs Act of 1994
Altruistic donation of organs from close family members
Donation b y those who are emotionally attached to the recipients
The Act permits transplantation of various cadaver organs including kidneys

Countries practicing Black market organ trans
India, China, Russia, Turkey, Moldova, Romania...

Partners in Black Market Organ Transplant Business in India

• Surgeons and medical teams
• managers of hospitals
• organ brokers
• jobless people
• tourism industry

Kidney donors can earn up to $2500
Recipients pay as much as $25k in India

Measures to decrease organ gap

• Prevention of renal failure
  
• Increase of domestic supply

Controversial solutions

• Routine recovery from cadavers-implied consent
• legalising sale of organs
• legalizing rewarded gifting of unrelated donors
• upgrading facilities to harvest and transport organs from resource poor settings

Ethical Issues in BMOT

• Lack of respect for person
• Coercion
• Exploitation
• Social Justice
• Violation of Human Dignity

The Theological Roots of...Human Dignity: Dr. David Gushee

David Gushee provided a survey of the concept of human dignity throughout the Old and New testaments. Below are a few highlights.

Old Testament
"Transcendent legal/moral standard over human life creates a critically important human equality before the law. "

"The grounding of all moral obligation in God's law had a deep impact on the understanding of human law."

On Shalom
Shalom - the dream of God for a redeemed world, for an end to our division, hostility, fear, drivenness and misery.

Shalom happens when humans stop killing each other, and therefore life's dignity is honored at its fundamental level.

Shalom means: Delight, obedience to God (the precondition of shalom), the healing of broken bodies and spirits, enough to eat and drink, an inclusive community, the rebuilding of the human community

New Testament
Matthew 4 - Jesus did 2 new things
1. turned the eschatological future into an inaugurated eschatological present
2. Embodied the kingdom of justice, peace, and healing, in which human beings at last treat others and are treated, as God originally desired.

Jesus' inclusive ministry in a religious culture in which:

• Women were devalued
• Leaders subjugated human well being to legal observance
• Sinners treated as beyond the pale of God's care
• Children were devalued
• The sick ere often cast out of the community
• The occupying Romans were hated
• Tensions between jews and Samaritans
• A woman on her own faced desperate financial challenges
• Social-economic divisions were acut

In sum, Jesus smashed the religious, cultural, economic, and political barriers of his context and demonstrated love, respect, and inclusion toward people of all descriptions. Jesus taught "good news" that God loves human beings with an immeasurable love.

"The paradox of the incarnation is that when divinity stooped low and took on humanity, humanity revealed its loliness and yet was elevated through God's mercy."

Jesus died for "the world" - everyone, people in all states, conditions, nations and orientations toward God and neighbor. Everyone should matter to us because everyone matters to God

Christ rose in a body, the victory of God over evil, and the resurrection marks the triumph of life.

Acts depicts rapidly growing church...more inclusive and hospitable community ethos.
Paul offers an expansive theological effort to defend transformation of relationships (Gal 3:28) All divisive human distinctions are transfigured and overcome through Jesus Christ.

Momentum toward radically inclusive and egalitarian community
Multi-ethnic, multi-racial, gender-inclusive, class-inclusive community

What emerged...
Congregations that believed that in their own experience of transformed human relations lay the beginnings of the redemption of the world.

"Only because God became human is it possible to know and not despise real human beings...this is not because of the real human being's inherent value, but because God has loved and taken on the real human being. The reason for God's love for human beings does not reside in them..." D. Bonhoeffer

"A secular, rootless human dignity ethic may be the best that our culture thinks it can manage. But Christians know not only that we can do better but that we must do better and that the resources for doing better are embedded in our tradition."

We must claim our own rich, theological heritage.

For Sale: Human Dignity

Though still on my blogging hiatus, I felt compelled to respond to this news story. A 22 year old girl is selling herself online...her virginity, that is. And apparently it is worth $3.7 million to one potential buyer. The lack of moral outrage by feminism doesn't surprise me as contemporary feminism has discarded the good it once represented in order to promote a completely unfettered lifestyle. Women are free to be exploited themselves, and this is somehow empowering. In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that by creating a culture where women's bodies, eggs, and chastity are up for sale, created is a pleasant environment for human trafficking. There is no need for restraint in a world where individuals willingly put a price tag on what is priceless.

God, Government, and Goodness

In a persistent effort to rid the public square of any religious voices, the few that might be left after this 2008 election that is, the American Humanist Association has launched an advertising campaign to "raise awareness" of humanist doctrine. On ethics, they state

"Morality doesn't come from religion. It's a set of values embraced by individuals and society based on empathy, fairness, and experience."

Competing against God would no doubt make an individual or organization insecure, necessitating the launch of a campaign aimed at desensitizing the voting public against the existence of God. Apart from their inability to account for objective good, they clearly are inconsistent in application of tolerance. A pluralistic public square is indeed what we have, and in a democratic society the predominant beliefs of the people are going to have the greatest impact. So organizations like the American Humanist Association go all, poisoning the well against theistic perspectives on public issues.

But to the heart of this advertising, it's no surprise that they would try to argue for goodness without God. As part of how man was created, he can have a sense of right and wrong, good and evil. But he'll certainly struggle giving an account for the right and the good in absolute terms. Humanism leaves us in the mire of relativism, with numerous interpretations of the right and the good.

As we move into the new administration in 2009, we will undoubtedly encounter more efforts to promote humanistic ideals at the expense of policies that protect human life and promote human dignity. Resulting from this will be more confidence for the anti-theistic verbiage. Clearly we're in for a rough ride, but certainly not a without an aggressive response.

Women's Rights: Defined by Who?

Political commentators, popular feminists, and many writers in the blogosphere are pressing the issue of unfettered reproductive freedom as a fundamental, agreed upon right for all women and that anyone who disagrees with their views can not be pro-woman or an advocate for women's rights. The problem is, we don't all accept abortion and infanticide as a fundamental right for women, we see those as a violation of fundamental human rights, acts against human dignity.

No doubt inequalities exist between men and women throughout the world, and we can speak together against the atrocities occurring in the Middle East and other parts of the world against women in the name of family honor. But there is nothing in the core of our humanity that even implies that killing the unborn is a good thing, let alone a right for anyone. There is neither pride nor fulfillment in the destruction of our own kind, yet it is believed to be a universally understood human right.

Women's rights ought to be only those things that build character and bring the opportunity for peace and fulfillment to women's lives, the ability to pursue happiness without doing harm to others. Right now, abortion is legal, and as a result it is inferred as a fundamental right, but what is legal is not always moral or good. Once it was the case the slavery was legal, or that it was acceptable to discriminate on the basis of race. Appealing to the laws of the land is not the best argument for women's rights, and neither is the radical, seared conscious of those who promote abortion as a woman's fundamental right. I have little hope for a society that grounds women's rights in the willing and active violation of human rights.

Gllian Parrillo, the chair of NOW's pac, stated

We recognize the importance of having women's rights supporters at every level but, like Sarah Palin, not every woman supports women's rights.

Reproductive inequality may have been the thrust of 2nd wave feminism, but the pursuit of this these so-called rights has tipped the scales and prevented fathers of the unborn to keep their human rights intact. There is nothing right about these "women's rights" and the term is in need of some serious redefinition.

Men's and women's rights should not differ in any significant way, but perhaps if our laws were tougher and enforcement less lenient, women might enjoy a life of less physical vulnerability and violation. We should understand women's rights as something more decent and beautiful in juxtaposition to that which is proclaimed by extreme feminism.

Most People are Single-Issue Voters

Prolifers, myself included, are often accused of being single-issue voters. I think its generally true for everyone that there is a particular issue that causes you to lean a certain direction. If you homeschool your kids your issue might be vouchers or protections for homeschoolers, likely a conservative candidate. If you support abortion rights, chances are you aren't voting for any prolife candidate. If you are anti-war, you aren't going to vote for a candidate who is a respected veteran. If you think universal health care is a high priority, chances are your vote will go to a democrat. We all have many issues we're concerned about, but one or 2 in particular will be what drives us.

I believe there is nothing more fundamentally important than the sanctity of life and human dignity, for it is those two that undergird every other good piece of legislation. I can care about other issues, but my priorities begin with respecting life. For instance, I can't imagine supporting someone with a great plan for the economy if they support and encourage the death of millions more unborn children. If we were promised that poverty in the US would be greatly diminished, yet they upheld a woman's right to choose to kill her unborn son or daughter, I could not give him or her my vote. If a candidate could provide substantive evidence that he had a clear shot at peace in the middle east, yet would persist in embryo-destructive research, the ordering of priorities would necessitate I vote for the prolife candidate.

Are economics more important than the lives of the unborn?
Is the concern about poverty a greater concern than the concern for the life or death of others?

Without a proper respect for life at every stage, we cannot create a society--a world--where a great economy or world peace can truly exist. Human dignity needs to be the basis for real change, or there can be no change at all.

Wallis, Social Issues, and Interdenominational Dialogue

In an interview (not yet posted online) with CT, Jim Wallis gives answers on social issues that are no suprise. While he's adamant on his position on abortion, "The abortion debate has gotten very stale...No one seems to care about the abortion rate...The Republicans want a constitutional amendment banning abortion. That's just symbolic..." Wallis uses vague language to keep the door open for his position on gay marriage. And in a very strange way, Wallis believes poverty is the new slavery. He says "Poverty and global inequality are the fundamental moral issues of our time. That's my judgment." As a child, I experienced poverty in rural Wisconsin, yet my own experience wasn't anything like what we see in other places in the world. But it was the opportunities that only a free society can offer that provided my freedom from poverty, if poverty is, indeed, the moral equivalent to slavery.

Asked about civil rights for gays, Wallis talked about it his belief in equal protection under the law, but on the topic of gay marriage he offered no surprises. "But marriage is all through the Bible, and it's not gender-neutral. I've never done a blessing for a same-sex couple...I'm not sure that I would" which means he's not sure that he wouldn't. At this point he insists that churches who disagree on this matter have a "theological conversation" but "live with their differences" and focus their energies on poverty and disease. Clearly those are important issues, too, but now I want to have a debate with Wallis on why we must listen to him and simply live with the differences. Is it the higher moral ground to cave on certain issues and not cave on other issues? Who determines what issues we cave on? Wallis? He sounds a bit like the democrats who expect consevatives to cross the aisle while they sit still. Wallis' condemnation of the Episcopal Church is another example of calling for conversation without expectation for action or decisiveness. Perhaps Wallis is confused, because the church is certainly expected to have views on issues of personal morality...the qualifications of elders and matters of church discipline in Scripture make that abundantly clear. In his recounting of events while he attended TEDS, he insisted on the centrality of the Lordship of Jesus and the authority of the Scriptures, yet it is clear from the interview that his appropriation of the fuller testimony of Scripture is limited.

Stan Guthrie offered a response to the notion that abortion is just one of many social concerns, saying that "if everything is a priority, then nothing is." This is the message that I have been persistent in sharing because there isn't one evangelical who can adequately address every social ill. We need Christians working hard on a variety of issues, and the largeness of the abortion debate and stem cell research necessitates wider evangelical engagement. It's a more complex issue than some others because it involves philosophical dialogue on the nature of personhood and when life begins. It doesn't take quite that much work to agree that poverty is ugly, but it does ask us to consider how to affect societies for longer-term change. My specialization in theology and bioethics doesn't make me the best person to launch a crusade against oppressive forms of government. But there are other evangelicals who might serve better in that area than in the prolife movement or other areas. But for Wallis to encourage dialogue and move no further is irresponsible.

The "Art" of Abortion: Death Imitates Art Part II

I was in a bit of a rush when I wrote my last post on this topic. The general gist of this story is that a college student, Aliza Shvarts, seems to think there is something about the death of the unborn, the medical "waste," that qualifies as art. I must ask why Yale is so quick to dispute whether she actually inseminated herself and self-induced abortions. Why should they be bothered by this either way? What about her story bothers them so much? What is the motivation behind Yale's attempts to discredit one of their own students?

Whatever her intentions, it appears that Yale finds her political statement repugnant. On this basis, it is apparent that Yale is disqualifying it also as art. Yet this is their statement:

The entire project is an art piece, a creative fiction designed to draw attention to the ambiguity surrounding form and function of a woman’s body. NYT

I think Yale's statement is more ambiguous than Shvart's attempt to be heard. And whether she actually accomplished what she said she did, she did succeed in desensitizing more people to the suffering of the aborted.

Death Imitates Art

Aliza Shvarts will soon be exhibiting the what she so ridiculously considers art: the videos of her own self-induced abortions that took place in her own bathtub. What made her do this, you ask?

"I hope it inspires some sort of discourse....Sure, some people will be upset with the message and will not agree with it, but it's not the intention of the piece to scandalize anyone." These are the words of Shvarts reported by Fox.

When does art cease to be art? Obviously when it glorifies the destruction of what has been created in God's image. Secondly, however, I believe this ceases to be art in that it is using shock to make a political point - one which fails to be made in this case.

More on this soon.

Prime Time Bioethics: Euthanasia on Boston Legal

The indignity of suffering......euthanasia happens all the time under the guise of pain management.....these are the arguments declared as just reason for ending the life of a victim of Alzheimer's disease. But the actor/state's attorney helpfully insists that the request for morphine to put the patient "to sleep" is really an attempt to relieve the suffering of the patient's family.

Argued as a matter of constitutional privacy, physician assisted suicide is put forth as a safeguard to self-respect and human dignity because the patient in his current state of decline has no intrinsic value....his life is a misery, there is no sanctity in that.

"Whatever one believes about God.....some lives are taken far too late."

If this issue continues to be legislated in the courts, the right to put a qualitative rather than intrinsic value on human life and dignity will reside with someone else. Advocates of physician assisted suicide/euthanasia really believe that common sense will prevail and no one will really be a victim of these practices. But who will protect the person who is mentally deficient or physically challenged if the courts will not protect those who are most vulnerable now?

Having a Cow Over Cloning

Reportedly, researchers at Newcastle University (Britain) have successfully created a clone using the genetic material of a human and inserting it into the ennucleated bovine egg. You heard it right, human DNA was inserted into the egg of a cow, resulting in what is known as a cybrid, a human-animal embryo. The lack of human eggs for embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) is apparently responsible for pursuing the creation of these cybrids. In the name of scientific progress, ethical lines have already been breached in the pursuit of human eggs from young, financially vulnerable women. And now, another ethical line is being entirely ignored, and we're suppose to be comforted by the fact that these tiny human-cows are destroyed after 14 or so days, not allowed to be implanted in a uterus (human? cow?) and permitted to grow.

I wonder what their beef is with the implantation of these cybrids. Do they find something wrong, something repugnant with the idea of human-cow species? Do they think that humanity is somehow defiled by creating something that cannot live as a human nor should graze in a pasture? These researchers and others who forbid the implantation of these human-animal embryos know there is something terribly wrong with this, otherwise implantation would be of no serious consequence. But what they don't appreciate is that this is not a slippery slope concern. The issue here is not about what could possibly be created in the womb, it's about what has already been created in a dish.

The age of a person is discerned by the length of their existence, with certain attributes present at certain places in development. Human persons all begin and develop the same way, unless abnormalities interrupt these natural developments. Destroying an embryo at day 14 does not prevent a human from entering into the world, it ends the life a tiny person who already exists. I am not comforted by the creation and "early" destruction of these human-cow embryos, I'm terribly alarmed that the dignity of humans has been seriously violated by people who are repulsed by the same organism at a later stage of development.

Response to "Abortion Isn't a Religious Issue" by Garry Wills

Abortion isn't a religious issue according to Garry Wills in a LA Times opinion. If you read the article with a highlighter, searching it for fallacies, you will have a very colorful document when finished. Please check out the article for yourself, I want to address some core issues here.

First of all, this rant against evangelicals opposing abortion on the basis of religion is terribly amusing given that he doesn't quote a single evangelical Christian theologian, philosopher, bioethicist, biologist, etc. Interestingly, he suggests that the relevant experts are

philosophers, neurobiologists, embryologists. Evangelicals want to exclude them because most give answers they do not want to hear.

Apparently his circle of influence is very small, he can't even find a Christian philosopher? And by virtue of his list of qualified professionals, he's left himself out, thus rendering his commentary null and void. After all, what could a historian possibly know about human dignity, when life begins, or about theological arguments supporting the life position?!

For a historian, he does make an excellent point about the issue of exceptions. I agree with him that a consistent life ethic would exclude making exceptions for abortion, because as he states,
"the circumstances of conception should not change the nature of the thing conceived." I've called Sean Hannity on this before.

The heart of Wills' article is the belief that "there is no theological basis for defending or condemning abortion." It's curious that he includes 'defending' abortion, I'm sure the folks at RCRC aren't very happy with him on that. What Wills misses is an entire body of work on the topic of human dignity. Human dignity is the basis for respecting persons and is grounded in the fact that all persons are created in the image of God. This is the basis for the evangelical prolife position and Wills misses it entirely.

The absurdities of this article continue with statements such as

The universal mandate to preserve "human life" makes no sense. My hair is human life -- it is not canine hair, and it is living. It grows. When it grows too long, I have it cut. Is that aborting human life? The same with my growing human fingernails. An evangelical might respond that my hair does not have the potential to become a person. True. But semen has the potential to become a person, and we do not preserve every bit of semen that is ejaculated but never fertilizes an egg.

Is this guy serious? Sperm is a necessary component of fertilizing an egg (unless we are talking about SCNT) but the sperm on its own will never mature into an adult human person. Do we really have to explain these things?

Confronting Gropers

I was happy to read about Faith Hill's confrontation of the woman who groped her husband, Tim McGraw, at his concert last weekend. It reminded me of my own recent experience (details unimportant), and my assessment being that people must really believe that this is how things are - that it is appropriate to take what is not yours. And I think to a great extent, it is true that this is how the world is.....but an IS should not be confused with an OUGHT (ethics 101). Though this may be the way the world is, this isn't the way the world should be. Thanks, Faith, we should all follow your example.

Extreme Feminism's Rally Against Life

This Wednesday should prove to be as riveting as the day before. On Wednesday morning, November 8, 2006, the United States Supreme Court will hear oral argument regarding the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 (“Act”) in Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood and Gonzalez v. Carhart. Liberty Counsel filed amicus briefs in both cases with the Court on behalf of the Association of Pro-Life Physicians and Illinois nurse Jill Stanek, in favor of the Act.

NOW, Feminist Majority Foundation, National Council of Women's Orgs, and other so-called reproductive rights groups are planning to protest outside the Supreme Court - where they belong. The barbarism that they represent is far from being a legitimate interest in reproductive freedoms. The powerlessness that these extremists manifest unfortunately has the most serious implications on the unborn....and never estabishes real power or control for the feminist. How strong, powerful, and independent are these extremists if they must wield their power over the most powerless in our society?

Patrick Warbuton, Secret Abortions, and Parental Rights

Patrick Warburton understands that the victimization of our children by sexual predators would be prolonged by California if not for Proposition 85. Actor and father of four children, he wants to make sure his young daughter does not become a victim of a sexual predator. That’s one reason Warburton has endorsed Proposition 85, the Parents’ Right to Know and Child Protection initiative. Warburton says:

“A California law currently allows someone other than a parent to take a child, a girl as young as 12 years of age, to go and get an abortion without the parents knowing anything about this. This means that your neighbor, a teacher, an older boyfriend, a sexual predator -- can legally take your 12-year-old daughter to go and get an abortion, a secret confidential abortion.”

“That scares me. As a parent, I want to protect, to love, to guide my children. But the state has taken away this right and made it possible for sexual predators to harm our daughters and get away with their crimes with secret abortions behind parents’ backs.”

“That’s wrong. Parents have a right to know so they can protect their daughter. I can tell you, as a father who loves his daughter more than anything in the world, I will vote YES on 85 come Tuesday, November 7th. I hope you do too.”

NOW and Planned Parenthood should be as wise as Patrick Warburton.

3 Reasons to Oppose Egg Donation that Stand Together or Fall Together

1. There are complicationes associated with the harvesting of eggs from a woman's body. The risk of ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome is real.

2. Making money from selling eggs is hardly a donation. Profiting from this is wrong.

3. Eggs donated are used to create embryos that will either

A. become healthy and mature - your child.
B. Die because the procedure didn't "take" - your child
C. Are asexually "tricked" to become real embryos for destructive research purposes - your child

Profiting from the egg market is wrong only because of the inherent dignity of humanity that is grounded in the image of God. And if not for God, if not for truth, we wouldn't need to be bothered by the health risks associated with the scramble for eggs. No serious reason to care.

If this is really all there is, then there is no reason to care about anyone else....but because this isn't all there is, because God exists, we do care about the well-being of others.

Unfertilized eggs may not be people, but the intent is not for them to remain in the unfertilized state. They are intended to become life, i.e. people, either for purposes of embryo-destructive research or for assisting the infertile in having children. But it is because of the sanctity of all human life, no matter the age or the stage, that provides the basis for wanting to avoid risking women's health and viewing the profit from eggs sales as unethical.

Horror Film Frenzy: Is America Becoming a Sick Society?

Fox's Bill O'Reilly asks this question on The Factor tonite. He points out how cannibalism and dismemberment are more and more accepted as entertainment for the whole family. He ponders why this form of dehumanization is so rampant today. The short answer: any society that aims to destroy its most vulnerable members as we do through abortion, ESCR and SCNT, PAS, and euthansia, why should we expect that watching a graphic depiction of death to be anything other than entertaining? A culture of death will always struggle to avoid dehumanizing, but will fail in its attempts. Because of the overwhelming rejection of the inherent dignity of all humans, I don't think we can expect much more.

I took notice of this horror film frenzy, as Bill calls it, when the film Hostel was released this year. I've never seen it, but I found the ads to be extraordinarily frightening. I remember visiting the website for Hostel (research!!!) and couldn't handle it.

America has been so desensitized to graphic violence - that's what this stuff is, not 'horror' - for entertainment purposes. The battle for life is only going to get more difficult.

Is America really interested in relieving suffering? I think America takes joy in it...

Magazine with a Mission

"Blasting holes in scientific naturalism...promoting life in a culture of death...countering destructive ideologies...Debunking the cultural myths that have undercut human dignity...Recovering the one worldview that actually works.

These are only a few goals of Salvo magazine's mission statement. But this shouldn't be the mission statement of only Salvo, but should belong to each of us who call themselves Christ followers. This is basically the mission of Flash Point and Women of Faith in Culture. Man or woman, it should also be yours.

If you want to take back the culture – put your money where your mouth is. . .

There is an “idea factory” over at The Fellowship of St. James called The Crux Project. In the interest of taking back culture with plans to “launch a full-scale multimedia assault on all of the tastemakers, artists, scholars and pundits who have us live only for today and our own selfish desires” they have a new publication out –and it is worth a look!

They have developed Salvo – more than a magazine, it’s an incredibly well done piece of journalism aimed at the ever-widening chasm between faith and science. It’s also aimed at our techno savvy, spiritually questioning, university crowd. You know, the kids that have grown up basically being told that faith is the crutch of the intellectually stunted. Science has the answers that shape, inspire, and give hope to the world.

Today’s students have packed away their “religion” with their high school year books and prom pictures. There is no room for the mystery of God nor the power of the Gospel. There is only the hard, stone-cold facts of science demanding an allegiance that leaves no room for Judeo-Christian Ethics, let alone the Bible.

So what to do about this. . . well, how about dreaming big? How about subscribing to Salvo, if not for yourself, for your favorite college kid. Call him/her up with the offer of Starbucks on you anytime to discuss, debate, dispute, or deliberate what’s in the newest issue. If that is not your cup of joe – pay for a subscription for your alma mater, your church’s college group, your hometown library, or your doctor’s office. You would be investing in what we are all praying is a cultural revival.

The kids today are our future doctors, lawyers, scientists, teachers, novelists, journalists, moms, dads, and caretakers of their own parents – yeah, that’s us. Quit complaining about this younger generation.

What have you done for them lately???