Tag: cultural musings

‘Humanizing Christianity’ REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From November 17, 2018

Secularists love to pat themselves on the back for “humanizing Christianity.” Excuse me for a moment: this deserves an appropriate response.

What do they mean, they “humanize Christianity”? I think it means they invent a new-improved model–with Christ taken out of it and replaced by man-made idols, the State and Science, and humanist pseudo-sacraments: abortion, combating “Man-Made Climate Change,” same-sex “marriage,” sex change operations, hate speech trials, and every conceivable variety of fornication. They take away the judgment, take away accountability to God, and set up their political masters and scientific oracles as gods.

How does a secularist even know what’s right or wrong? Mostly they’re content to keep some of the moral law handed down to the human race by God, to the Jews first, and then the Gentiles. But no secularist can actually explain why it’s wrong to commit a murder. We can, but they can’t. For convenience’s sake they retain much of the law and tradition amassed over the centuries by Jews and Christians, who received it from a righteous and infallible God who is a person, who made them in His image, and who loves them.

Yeah, they made Christianity nicer. That’s why more people were murdered by their own governments in the 20th century alone–Red China, the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and a host of others–secularist governments all–than were killed off by all the religions of the world put together in all the other centuries put together. This century is only 18 years old: give it time to come up with new and exciting deviltries all its own.

It is true that God endows all people, even atheists, with common grace, which is an inborn attraction to what is right and good. And so it was always possible for people who had never heard of God’s laws to keep those laws regardless. Common grace is the law written on our hearts. Humanity wouldn’t have survived for two hours without it.

The words of Jesus Christ and His apostles don’t need “humanizing,” and never did.

God defend us from being conformed to this fallen world.

The Saddest Word in the Bible REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From February 19, 2016

Who spoke the saddest word in all the Bible?

In Acts 26, Paul defends the Christian faith before the Roman governor, Festus, and King Agrippa, son of that Herod who murdered the Apostle James, but a man with a decent reputation in history. Paul has high hopes that Agrippa will listen to him, because he knows the king has been an earnest student of the scriptures.

Paul concludes, “For the king knoweth of these things, before whom also I speak freely; for I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden from him; for this thing was not done in a corner. King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? I know that thou believest.”

And Agrippa’s answer (verse 28): “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.”

Almost!

Almost got eternal life. Almost got forgiveness of my sins. Almost reconciled to God. Almost entered into God’s Kingdom, and into the joy of Our Lord.

Missed it by that much!

At the risk of sounding like a 1950s TV commercial, don’t let this happen to you.

All right, yeah, faith can be difficult. It wouldn’t be faith, if it weren’t. The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1)–and King Agrippa didn’t have it.

He almost believed.

That’s sad.

The Biggest Ninny in the Bible REPRINT

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From December 5, 2015

Who was the biggest ninny in the Bible?

Was it the Pharaoh who wouldn’t let the people go? Surely Adam and Eve are in the running. But those were major, world-shaping sins whose effects are still being felt today.

No–I’d say, hands down, the biggest chowderhead in the Bible is Amaziah, king of Judah, son of J0ash. He becomes king in Chapter 24 of 2 Chronicles, and in Chapter 25, Verse 14, he invades Edom and conquers it.

And what does he do next? He “brought the gods of the children of Seir [Edom], and set them up to be his gods, and bowed down himself before them, and burned incense unto them.”

God sent a prophet the ask Amaziah the entirely reasonable question, “Why hast thou sought after the gods of the people, which could not deliver their own people out of thine hand?” (v. 15) Amaziah refused to listen, and threatened the prophet into silence.

The rest of his career is briefly told. He picked a fight with Israel and lost, to the great cost of the people of Judah, and fifteen years later was assassinated by his own subjects.

It took the world some 2,500 years to generate leaders who could match Amaziah for perverse stupidity. By now we have a bumper crop of them. “Hmmm… I think I’ll drop the real God, who gave me everything I have, and worship the idols of these pagans whom I’ve just defeated in a war… Yeah, that ought to work!”

Yes, truly worthy of Angela Merkel. Maybe even worthy of Obama. Definitely Bidenesque in its depth of foolishness.

If Amaziah were alive today, he’d surely be a big wheel in the E.U.

 

‘Excuses are the Patches…’ REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From October 6, 2012

Wednesday’s presidential debate has launched us into a national orgy of excuse-making. On Thursday the media were all making excuses for their president’s abject and humiliating failure. On Friday various persons were making excuses for having voted for the guy. (“Oh, I knew he was totally unqualified to be president! But I was so afraid of Sarah Palin…” That’s what happens when Democrats try to think.)

Here now are some of the excuses people have volunteered to me for not voting for Romney… which I think is the same thing as voting for the communist community organizer who hates America and is trying to wreck it.

1. “I’m not going to vote at all because there is no righteous candidate that I can vote for.” Hey, Ace, do you realize what you’ve done? You have decided to let the unrighteous decide who rules over the righteous. Think that’ll turn out good?

2. “I’m not voting because Republicans and Democrats are exactly the same.”
When he wrote his famous Dictionary, Samuel Johnson defined “pastern” as “the knee of a horse.” (It’s the ankle, BTW). When a woman asked him why he wrote that definition, he replied, “Ignorance, madame–pure ignorance.”

Admittedly something happens to Republicans when they go to Washington, particularly if they have been elected to the Senate. But when it comes to the differences between millions of Republicans and millions of Democrats, only pure ignorance can back the assertion that they’re all the same.

Continue Reading “‘Excuses are the Patches…’ REPRINT” →

Self-Education via Pop Music: Foolishness 101 REPRINT

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From June 13, 2017

One of the ways we continually educate ourselves is by consuming pop culture. And just so you don’t think this present time has a lock on truly ridiculous ideas expressed in music, dig this award-winning turkey from 1962, sung by Jack Jones: Lollipops and Roses.

Do you believe these lyrics? “Make it her birthday each day of the week…” On Dec. 31 she’ll be 365 years old. But even more preposterous, “One day she’ll smile, next day she’ll cry,/ Minute to minute, you’ll never know why…” Sounds like she’s more than ready for the rubber room. Can you imagine living with somebody like that?

So much of our music, our movies and TV, our books, teach us an awful lot of pazoo about how we ought to relate to one another. Do you really think nobody actually picks up on this teaching? No one’s influenced by it? Well, bunkie, there’s a whole advertising industry that’s betting that you’re wrong. And a whole public education industry, too, for that matter.

The only reason nobody gets a degree in Being a Dope is that nobody needs one.

The Year Civilization Collapsed REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From July 27, 2014

We watched a lecture yesterday entitled, “1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed.” It’s a good thing they included the date in the title, or I would have assumed it was talking about 2014.

Even so, how do you collapse civilization without Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Harry Reid and the other idiots and villains who are so busy collapsing ours?

Well, to bring about the end of the Bronze Age, they had droughts, famine, repeating earthquakes, and whole nations of aliens pouring in, taking everything they could and burning everything they couldn’t take. And that was the end of the ballgame for the Hittites, Mycenaeans, Cyprus, Ugarit, and several other Mediterranean civilizations. Egypt survived with incurable wounds. Assyria was flattened, but came back strong.

Point is, it wasn’t their fault. They didn’t have any SUVs or air conditioning or light bulbs to cause *Climate Change* and wreck their civilizations because they didn’t pay a carbon tax. They were destroyed by droughts, famine, earthquakes, and barbarian invasions on a mighty scale. That’s how civilization was able to collapse without Democrats.

They didn’t have culture big-shots preaching sodomy and sex-change operations, high officials encouraging the aliens to flood across the border, created wealth being instantly destroyed by wacko public policies, police on the lookout for bake sales while street gangs have a field day, the US attorney general urging state attorneys general not to enforce their states’ laws, reality TV, Democrat delegates booing God at their national convention, and whole church denominations embracing evil heresies.

Nope–they had to be destroyed by prosaic causes like war and natural disaster. They couldn’t help it.

But what excuse will our age offer history?

And Then They Booed God REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From September 7, 2012

After this post, I’ll try to stay away from politics for a while. But it isn’t every day that professional politicians do something so bizarre, so self-damaging, so crass as this.

Right in the middle of their national convention, on national TV, the Democrats booed God. In case you missed it, catch the video at http://www.rightpundits.com/?p=10455 .

First they took God’s name out of their party platform. When the public’s attention was called to that deletion, they decided they’d better put God’s name back in. Some guy claiming to be a minister of the United Methodist Church, and chairman of the platform committee, made a motion on the floor to make the change–because, he said, the Democrat platform just so brilliantly reflects God’s will.

Yep, that’s the very same Democrat platform that promotes same-sex mockmarriage and abortion on demand (paid for with public funds, no less). Those are two projects dear to the hearts of America’s flatline Protestant denominations, but about as estranged as you can possibly get from God’s will as revealed in Scripture. You might even say it would be profoundly insulting to God to have His name linked to such a document.

The convention chairman called for a voice vote by the delegates. Unable, after three tries, to get the result desired by the party leadership, he simply created his own reality by declaring that the “ayes” had it by a two-thirds majority–a blatantly untrue statement–and so God’s name goes back in. That’s when thousands of the delegates booed God.

What does it say about us as a people, that this continues to exist as a national party in America?

I Stuck My Toe in the Toxic Pool of Pop Culture

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

This afternoon, I decided to catch up and do a “what ever happened to” search about some of the confused characters that were featured–no, more like inescapable–a few years back.

Jazz Jennings:  a highly confused little boy, whose mother, in her infinite wisdom, decided not to discourage her child in this sexual identity thing, but instead chose to go full-bore down the road of fostering and encouraging the delusion.  This started when he was a toddler.  That meant puberty blockers and “sex reassignment surgery”.  I could describe that, but I won’t.  It would do credit to the Spanish Inquisition.  Jazz  claims to be  now very happy, because “she” just lost over a hundred pounds (due to a binge eating problem).  Also, Jazz says there is no boyfriend because right now the main focus will be on “herself”.

Chaz Bono: This individual is Cher’s daughter (Chastity), who waited until the age of 40 before starting the mutilation process. She has done the whole spectrum (another group of surgeries which I will not describe.)  Breast amputation is only the start–and believe me it gets a lot worse.

Suddenly, I realized over an hour had gone by.

I didn’t want to do any more.

If it wasn’t the dead of winter and I couldn’t move my car, I would have liked a nice long swim in some very, very clean water.

Anyone who says our popular culture is not toxic is just plain crazy.

What a Chump I Was in College REPRINT

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

From November 1, 2014

While I was a college student, one of my favorite books was Hercules, My Shipmate by Robert Graves, a re-telling of the story of Jason and the Argonauts. So I was delighted when my wife gave me a copy of it for Christmas. It must’ve been 40 years or more since I’d read it last.

Many books and movies I liked when I was young, I still like now. Some I like even more, like The Lord of the Rings, Agatha Christie’s novels, and Peter Sellers in Never Let Go. And I’ve always enjoyed Robert Graves’ most famous novel, I, Claudius (although Jack Pullman’s screenplay for the I, Claudius TV series is even better). Naturally I expected to be delighted by Hercules, My Shipmate.

Everyone, I suppose, once knew someone whom they thought was the absolute bee’s knees. Then you lose touch with this person, make contact again 30 years later, and wind up asking yourself, “What did I ever see in him? He is a total putz!”

So it went with Hercules, My Shipmate. *Sigh* Mostly it was Robert Graves reconstructing and then wildly enthusing over the creepy paganism of pre-Classical Greece, complete with human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism.

What did I ever see in this? Could I really have been such a chump, back then?

Yes, college can be rather an overwhelming experience. It took me about 30 years to outgrow it, and a lot of people never outgrow it. The better to manipulate you, your professors convince your intellectually defenseless 19-year-old self that you’re a thousand times smarter than your parents and you don’t need any of their silly old stuff anymore–including all that Christianity business. Why, in no time at all, you’ll be as smart as one of these professors!

I look back on this and shudder.