Americans supposedly confused by global warming

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From here:

Though the majority of Americans believe that global warming is actually occurring, many do not understand the reasons behind it, suggests new research released Thursday.

According to a study by Yale University researchers, 63 per cent of U.S. citizens believe that global warming exists. However, only 57 per cent know what the greenhouse effect is and only 45 per cent recognize the impact of carbon dioxide in trapping the earth’s heat.

The greenhouse effect involves the trapping of the sun’s heat by gases in the earth’s atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane.

And 50 per cent of Americans understand that global warming is the result of human activities.

On the other hand, perhaps the average unwashed American just isn’t quite as gullible as his liberal betters would like him to be; rather like this physics professor:

For reasons that will soon become clear my former pride at being an APS [American Physical Society] Fellow all these years has been turned into shame, and I am forced, with no pleasure at all, to offer you my resignation from the Society.

It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.

Burka Rage

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From here:

A retired teacher is facing three years in prison for ripping off a Muslim’s face veil in the world’s first known case of ‘burka rage’.

The 63-year-old woman, so far only referred to by her first name Marlene, appeared before the Paris Correctional Court to defend her attack on Shaika, 26, who originally comes from the United Arab Emirates….

Marlene, who is accused of aggravated violence, is said to have ‘lost control’ when she saw Shaika choosing furniture in a department store.

‘I knew I would crack one day,’ said Marlene. ‘This whole saga of the burka was really getting to me.’

Speaking in English to her victim, Marlene, who has taught in Morocco and Saudi Arabia, said: ‘I told her to take off the veil she had on her face. I grabbed and pulled it.

‘To me wearing a full veil is an attack on being a woman. As a woman, I felt attacked.’

A few minutes later Marlene is said to have started hitting Shaika, who refused to take her veil off.

‘I went over to her and tore her veil,’ said Marlene in a police report. ‘We came to blows. I was very upset.’

After allegedly slapping Shaika, Marlene bit her hand before successfully removing the veil, shouting: ‘Now I can see your face.’

Security guards had to separate the women, with one describing the fight as being motivated by ‘pure burka rage’.

Wearing a burka in public in France is now illegal – it wasn’t when Marlene went burka bonkers – but a pre-emptive citizen’s arrest defence isn’t likely to fly. I wonder if she would be facing three years in prison if she’d ripped a ku klux klan hood off its hapless wearer?

Anglican clergyman is reluctant to define Anglicanism

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From here:

The prospect of something codified and named Anglicanism I find unsettling. Roman Catholicism provides an ecclesial authoritarian structure and demands subservient obedience from its adherents. Protestantism provides several forms of confessional authoritarianism, requiring subservience to refined interpretations of scripture and doctrine. Biblical Fundamentalism, of course, comes across as absolutely absolute in its biblical interpretations, that is, according to whomever the pastor or preacher may be. What is disturbing is the concept of subservience to humanly contrived authorities that seem to me to be the antithesis of the liberation and freedom that is the gospel (good news) of God’s redemption through Jesus Christ who we know as Saviour and Lord.

This comes as no surprise, since once you codify – systematise or define – what Anglicanism is, you also define  what it isn’t; and that would exclude many Western Anglicans: to be Anglican requires a person at least to be a Christian.

Canon Gordon Baker seems to think that the Bible is a human contrivance and is disturbed by those who think it isn’t. Although he claims to know Jesus as Saviour and Lord, I can’t help wondering where his knowledge comes from since he doesn’t accept Biblical accounts as fundamental and absolute.

The truth is, his “liberation” is the familiar antinomian bad news of “if it feels good, do it”.

Laughing 17 week old foetus

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In a sane world this would at least make abortion doctors pause and reflect; in a sane world.Add an Image

From here:

Transformed by a beaming smile, this is the tiny face of a foetus just 17 weeks old.

The scan implies that a baby can experience feelings such as happiness and pain much earlier in its development than previously thought.

It will prompt further calls from doctors and campaigners to lower the upper abortion limit from 24 weeks…..

Professor Stuart Campbell, who took the picture at his London clinic with 3-D and 4-D scanning equipment, said it did not necessarily show the unborn child had feelings  –  but it was certainly displaying human behaviour.

‘This is a joyful expression of the humanity of the foetus. I have seen a foetus making a crying face at around 18 or 19 weeks, but not a nice smile.

‘This is the earliest on record  –  it is just a delight.’

Rowan Williams 'concerned' over violence against Christians

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From here:

The head of the Anglican Communion worldwide has expressed concern over the increase in violence against Christian minorities in the country.

On his visit to Kolkatta on Saturday, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, said he would speak with leaders of other religious communities urging them to shun violence and promote peace.

“I am as concerned about the attacks on Christians as I would have been about attacks on people of other communities,” the archbishop said while interacting to mediapersons.

I am concerned about the neighbour’s rabbits eating my lettuce; when it comes to killing people because they are Christians a spot of condemnation is in order. Rowan Williams reserves his condemnation for more overtly dangerous atrocities, though: overly enthusiastic evangelical Christians who try and convert people from other faiths.

The last quoted sentence above implies that Rowan – based on past performance, presumably – didn’t believe his listeners would expect him to stand up for Christians at all but, using the element of surprise to throw them off guard, he did manage to muster some concern. Perhaps his plan was to use a combination of English understatement and Hegelian dialectic to startle the perpetrators into repentance.

Why would anyone take this bumbling twerp seriously?

Where’s Muhammad?

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The editors of the Washington Post exercised their right of craven poltroonery last weekend by not publishing a very mildly satirical cartoon about Muhammad.
From the Annals of Dhimmitude:

What is clever about last Sunday’s “Where’s Muhammad?” comic is that the prophet [sic] does not appear in it.

Still, Style editor Ned Martel said he decided to yank it, after conferring with others, including Executive Editor Marcus W. Brauchli, because “it seemed a deliberate provocation without a clear message.” He added that “the point of the joke was not immediately clear” and that readers might think that Muhammad was somewhere in the drawing.

Would they have published a cartoon that did have a clear – but offensive – message? Obviously not.

God and politics

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I am usually uneasy when a clergyman or a denomination spends a lot of time advocating a particular political view: to do so inevitably seems to lead to the Gospel becoming subservient to politics. I believe this tendency is worse on the political left than the right: mainline churches in North America – notably Anglican and United – have, for the most part, replaced the Gospel with politics. The obfuscating strategy of calling their political manoeuvring “the gospel” fools no-one.

But what should be the relationship between Christianity and politics? Christians have been squabbling over this since Jesus said “Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s”

Two former aids to President Bush have written a book called City of Man: Religion and Politics in a New Era; there is an interview with the authors here. They have this to say about the Christian right:

In important respects, the old model, as embodied in the religious right, is passing away. Some of its key figures — people such as D. James Kennedy and Jerry Falwell — have literally passed from the scene. Others, like Pat Robertson and James Dobson, are less influential than they were. So there is a generational shift that’s occurring.

But we also know from survey data that many Christians who are politically and theologically conservative have turned against the brand of politics practiced by religious-right leaders. Many conservative Christians are looking for a new model of social engagement; they want their leaders to display a lighter touch, a less desperate and anxious spirit, and a more gracious tone.

About St. Paul:

More than any other New Testament figure, he laid out a Christian view of the purpose of government — to restrain evil and promote justice. Rulers are God’s servants, St. Paul wrote; civil government itself was established by God. Christ Himself did not lay out a political philosophy per se; it was left to St. Paul, among others, to interpret Christian ideals in the context of his time, which of course was during the reign of the Roman empire. As a Christian you cannot engage the issue of politics and the role of government without dealing with St. Paul’s thinking.

On Bush, they say:

President Bush showed deep human sympathy for those suffering and in need — and he used the power of his office to do something about it. I think history will say about Bush that he liberated millions of people in foreign lands and, through his AIDS and malaria initiatives, saved millions of lives. As president, he respected different religious faiths and understood their power to do good even as he was deeply committed to pluralism and tolerance. He showed that in the aftermath of 9/11, with his outreach to Muslim Americans. And George W. Bush is also a man of grace. When a senior aide left the White House and later wrote a book that was a betrayal, the president pulled aside his key advisers and told them to show grace, not retribution, for this particular person. Not many presidents — in fact, not many individuals — would have done such a thing.

More Hegelian twaddle from Rowan Willliams: Anglican-Hindu dialogue

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From here:

Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Douglas Williams is hosting a dialogue with five Hindu swamis (ascetics) in Bangalore (India) on October 20. The aim is to “to engage in discussions for mutual understanding.”

Note that Rowan isn’t talking to – sorry, dialoguing with – these worthy swamis with the intent of converting them to become followers of Jesus, but for “mutual understanding.” Evidently feeling flushed with his recent successes at creating mutual understanding between the liberal and conservative factions of his own church, he is intent on creating a AnglHindican, an abomination from the transcendent version of the Island of Dr. Moreau. Come to think of it, though, he didn’t have much – any, actually – success in his own church, so perhaps he has just decided to tackle something easier.

As Rajan Zed points out:

Rajan Zed, the President of Universal Society of Hinduism says “The dialogue may help us vanquish the stereotypes, prejudices, caricatures, etc., passed on to us from previous generations. As dialogue brings us reciprocal enrichment, we shall be spiritually richer than before the contact.”

As every good liberal Christian knows, Christ died on the cross, not to wash away our sins, but to vanquish stereotypes, prejudices and caricatures. I think that is in the gospel of Judas somewhere.

The Diocese of New Westminster has a blog

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In one of its first posts it asks “What is ‘Big Tent’ Christianity and Why Should it Matter to Us?”

The answer seems to be a place where everyone gets along no matter what their theological differences; even, I suspect, their different religions:

Let’s face it. The very term “Christian” has been “so torn apart in the battle-to-the-death between liberals and conservatives that there’s no longer any point in using it at all,” says Clayton. Indeed, I’d add that there’s really no place for words like “liberal” and “conservative” in the exercise of effective Christian witness to a fragmented world. We can’t rehabilitate the word ‘Christian’ until we jettison our baggage of institutional dualistic thinking. Adopting these kinds of oppositional stances which stifle dialogue and over-simplify deep human concerns is not only absurd, but essentially unchristian. The inability to live with one another in a ‘big tent’ in spite of our theological and cultural differences is antithetical to the very Gospel we espouse and hobbles the work of the Holy Spirit.

Bishop Michael Ingham would be very comfortable banishing the term “Christian”, since he isn’t one: if the diocese didn’t allow for members to adhere to non-Christian theology, its own bishop wouldn’t find room in the “big tent”. Not a moment too soon, some of you are probably thinking, but a bit of an embarrassment, nevertheless.

The article goes on to reveal the recipe for revitalising the diocese:

“it’s high time for a more prophetic, more counter-cultural Christian faith”

The only problem is, in a typically grotesque piece of double speak, “more counter-cultural” translates to “more cultural capitulation”:

[a faith] that is welcoming, inclusive, and validates all the gifts that the diversity of human individuals can bring to what are ideally messy, chaotic Christian communities: communities that spill out of themselves to engage our society and culture as followers of Jesus who push the envelope – or as Tim Keel puts it in his book Intuitive Leadership – ‘embrace a paradigm of narrative, metaphor and chaos’

I have no idea what that piece of cliché riddled nonsense means, but I can guarantee it does not contain an iota of anything that is counter-cultural.

The diocese is about to invade the neighbourhood in its zeal to appear counter cultural, though:

We’ll be hearing more about it.  Our own diocese recently hosted an enthusiastic gathering of parishes where all of us were inspired by the stories about the birthing and nurturing of  ‘neighbourhood’ initiatives. The day culminated in some goal setting and proposed action planning that have potential to transform parish life as we, as followers of Jesus,  focus on finding new ways to connect to those around us.

Having worked in large companies for the last 40 odd years, I have learned that as soon as institutional fixtures  get to the stage of saying things like “birthing and nurturing,” “goal setting”, “action planning”, “potential to transform” and “focus on finding new ways to connect”, they have reached a state of mental torpor from which there is no return; nothing will get done and the perpetrators of such desperate banalities will quite soon be gurgling incoherently as they submerge in their own threadbare meanderings. A typical corporate executive whose incompetence has been thus exposed is forced to look elsewhere for employment; preferably employment whose prerequisite is not clear thinking – some end up as Anglican bishops.