Here, my co-hosts and I discuss the recent SBC decision to remove Saddleback and other churches who have women pastors. We attempt to discuss it in a way that is relevant to other denominations as we also discuss how and when Christians should draw lines in the sand.
Been a while since I’ve updated. We did a series on counseling, particularly on the debate between Christian and biblical counseling. Enjoy!
A lighter episode but still a topic many Christians wonder about:
I address here the problems with trying to claim that Scripture or theology compels Christians to support student debt relief but don’t get into the details of policy as such because I want that site to be free of purely political discussion. Below, I’ll give my thoughts on the policy itself.
Now I lean libertarian on many issues, so it might surprise some people when I say that I am not against partial student debt relief itself. However, that doesn’t mean I think what the president did was good or that his messaging makes any sense. I think his move has three major problems: Process, timing, and root issues.
Bad Process
Quite frankly, the president does not have the authority to unilaterally lessen or cancel student loans (or at least, he shouldn’t have the authority if one reads our current laws with any sort of plausibility). This was something even Nancy Pelosi adamantly said not too long ago when Biden was facing criticism from left-wingers that he hadn’t dealt with the student debt problem yet, and it is a bit entertaining, though not surprising, that she has now changed her tune. The administration is trying to ground his authority to do this on the pandemic and the updated Heroes Act, which is flimsy at best.
As I have argued many times before, process matters and wise people take it into account, not just results. You may like the results of the president’s action, but if you’re wise, you should be concerned about how he did it because then he, or someone else, can just unilaterally wave his magic wand and do things you don’t agree with. If the country was going to do this at all, then debt relief needs to go through Congress, as dysfunctional as it is.
Continue readingI feel like I keep saying the same thing over and over again, but it seems like people need to keep hearing why they should be a lot more careful about claiming how the Bible supports their political positions.
We discuss the sexual abuse report regarding the Southern Baptist Convention and how Christians can better recognize sexual abuse happening in our midst.
Check it out here: https://interchristianity.wordpress.com/2022/07/07/episode-23-should-christians-actually-be-pro-choice/
This was an interesting discussion and we tried to model civil disagreement between Christians.
Took a bit of a break but we have a new episode out. Check it out: https://interchristianity.wordpress.com/2022/06/23/episode-22-discussing-ot-violence/
Roe v. Wade was overturned today, consistent with the leaked decision a couple of months ago, and the reactions are highly passionate as usual. I’ll direct the reader to this post where I share my thoughts on it, but in any case, what I want to address now is the unhelpful trend of reacting to headlines rather than actually reading what SCOTUS argued and understanding the reasoning and intended scope of their decisions. One can obviously disagree with those decisions, but at least argue things that are relevant rather than resorting to talking points, bumper sticker arguments, and emotional appeals. I’ll use three recent examples:
Continue readingI was on a family vacation in California when I heard the news that another school shooting occurred in Uvalde, TX. Long story short, an 18 year old young man had bought two guns and a bunch of ammo beforehand and then began his evil day by shooting his grandmother in the face (she survived). He was pursued by police and crashed his car before entering into an elementary school. He locked himself in a classroom and open fired on teachers and students, killing a total of 19 kids and two teachers before an off-duty border patrol agent entered the room and shot him. It’s a horrifying event that has led to a lot of sadness, anger, and finger-pointing.
I’ve written on school shootings before but more from a theological viewpoint of processing evil, and I also wrote one imploring people to have better discussions by avoiding cheap virtue-signaling and approaching the topic with sober-minded analysis. I’ll try the latter again, though oftentimes, even telling people to stop screaming slogans or that their loud social media presence doesn’t make them better people tends to make them angrier.
I’m going to say this as gently as I can: Spewing uninformed takes doesn’t make you virtuous, nor does it prove that you care more than people who disagree with you. Let’s start with the pretty obvious assumption that most everyone is horrified and mad about what happened, so let’s hit the brakes on accusing other people of bad motives. We also have to understand that A. It’s going to take a multifaceted approach to try to curb these kinds of shootings and not just hyper-focus on one aspect B. Laws rarely work at all times for everyone, so there are usually downsides and trade-offs to consider and C. There will always be a human element involved, so even policies in place to stop shootings can fail when people don’t do their jobs. That’s the world we live in.
In any case, a multifaceted approach will have to encompass at least these things: The home, gun laws, school security, law enforcement, and mental health. Let’s go through them in turn:
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