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Text of the page (random words):
els bonhoeffer church scripture monday february 15 2016 economic issues are moral issues and should be treated as such arthur brooks the conservative heart how to build a fairer happier and more prosperous america new york broadside books 2015 246 pgs arthur brooks the president of aei contends that conservative economic and political policies will do the best good for the poor when they are implemented but that they are unlikely to find wide appeal because conservatives are bad at getting their message across the bulk of the conservative heart is dedicated to unfolding this first premise and then helping people who believe in these principles learn how to communicate them in ways that address the moral issues people care the most about it is commonly thought that progressives care more for people polls show that people overwhelmingly give the edge to progressive politicians on the they care for me score even when the same people disagree with their policies while it can be shown that progressive policies have been bad for the poor and for the working class on the other hand conservative economic principles have nearly always been better for the poor and increasing their social standing but they are rarely implemented due to this political climate where the compassion edge is given to the progressive ideas how can this change brooks argues that conservatives not only need to have the courage of their convictions they need to start seeing these economic issues as moral issues it is popular for instance to champion the poor by advocating for raising the minimum wage that sounds compassionate but when it is raised it is the poor worker who is laid off and hurt why continue advocating for it additionally perpetual welfare wealth transfers have long term negative effects on individuals and families so why not advocate for welfare reform with a work requirement it may appear that the conservative heart is a policy wonk book intended to unfold economic policies in pretty dry and laborious fashion the truth is very different brooks is himself deeply concerned for the poor the working class and the health of the family he argues convincingly that our economic and political systems need to adopt conservative principles in order to reverse many of the negative trends and bring health back into so many corroded parts of our culture he says conservatives are in possession of the best solutions to the problems of poverty and economic mobility yet because we don t speak in a way that reflects our hearts many americans simply don t trust us and are unwilling to give us the chance to implement those solutions pg 15 the goal as he says over and over is not the creation of millionaires and billionaires it is the infusion of opportunity dignity and family strength back into the economy brook s book is a wonderful survey of how economic policies affect the poor and the working class and is a tremendous presentation of conservative principles from several surveys of economic research to fascinating case studies to a discussion on how to best communicate these principles this is a wonderful case for the conservative heart if you thought my review was helpful please say so on amazon posted by phil steiger at 7 08 pm no comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels books economics politics thursday january 14 2016 on worshiping the same god a friend of mine helped me think though some issues regarding whether christians and muslims worship the same god the issue is currently a hot potato in some circles because of professor harris her comments regarding wearing a hijab and wheaton s reaction it seems to me that the simple understanding of the issue is that christians and muslims and all other worshipers of drastically different religions believe in different gods but my friend raised a point held by the catholic church and many philosophers and theologians that is helping me clarify the issue for myself in addition to that i have removed a previous post not because i disagree with my conclusions but because i have decided i was a bit strident in reading several of the reactions against wheaton s actions against harris some of them have become simply disingenuous some are talking as if nobody ever has actually held the ridiculous belief that muslims and christians worship different gods i didn t want to be one of those kinds of voices so i wrote something much more involved and hopefully more thoughtful this point of view is that christians and muslims believe in the same god and that this is the most obvious understanding of this issue in two recent articles both written by respected theist philosophers the position is defended with the argument that christians believe there is actually only one god so therefore everyone who believes in god or worships god believes in the same god but has different beliefs about that god beckwith rae and protestant theologians one no less than mirislav volf in a recent article and several tweets have expressed the same opinion it is commonly accepted and not controversial in many circles to say that two people can have two different sets of beliefs about the same thing or person and one of them even be very wrong and for both of them to be referring to the same thing or person two people can point at the same thing individual have conflicting accounts of what attributes belong to them and yet refer to the same thing individual both articles linked above raise this point and give examples my position is still that christians and muslims believe in different gods but that statement needs some work to make sense in light of the same god sg position described above i want to try to make two basic points the second leading to a third first which is the simplest understanding of what two people believe that they believe in the same god though with conflicting accounts or that they believe in two different gods second what is the theological data we have to work with in the christian scriptures and third what of worship and conversion it was argued in both rae s and beckwith s articles that the simplest position to hold is that two worshipers are pointing at the same god and yet hold differing beliefs about that god my intuition is exactly the opposite in one article written by a theologian who happens to be a convert from islam to christianity he said his first intuition about this issue was that when converting he was still worshiping the same god but with a different understanding but the more he came to know the god of the christian bible he changed his mind rae and beckwith argue that in order to hold the position that we worship different gods one would have to do some pretty significant semantic work and even develop a robust theory of worship and how it works it seems to me that the semantic work is applied one step beyond the assertion they believe in different gods the conclusion they believe in different gods can be arrived at by a very simple question like do you believe jesus is god the rebuttal is the semantic move no in fact because christians believe there is only one god they actually worship the same god but often attribute different attributes to god the rebuttal relies on the train of thought that because two people can apply different attributes to the same person and still refer to the same person and that there is actually only one god these religions are pointing to the same god in different ways but what if they are not pointing to the same god but using the word god to talk about what they believe in this it seems to me is just as easily the case and can be discovered given some fairly straightforward inquiry regarding what different religions sincerely believe about what they refer to when they talk about god using one example cited in the articles linked it is entirely possible for two people to talk about thomas jefferson using different attributes and given the chance to point to the person they mean they will point to two different people in this case they both used the same word phrase as their referent but one maybe both were actually wrong about the referent not the attributes pointing to two different thomas jeffersons has its theological equivalent in describing conflicting and contradictory attributes of god referring to the same thing with different attributes is not the only way people disagree they can refer to two different things with the same attributes or two different referents with overlapping attributes to reduce religious propositional conflict to just the first form of difference might oversimplify the situation in addition some semantic work might need to be done to explain how the phrase believe in works in order to support the assertion that muslims and christians believe in the same god the articles linked above deal with the same god portion of the phrase and i am sure someone somewhere has worked on the first phrase whether someone has or not it needs to be done belief roughly speaking is an internal adherence and some significant level of commitment to a proposition christians and muslims propose very different things about god so from the start it should be pretty easy to see that they literally do not believe in the same god now are we at a place where the burden of work is on sg to tell us why two people who believe in different things actually believe in the same thing whether they say so or not second the theological data it seems to me allows for both to be possible you shall have no other gods before me god exodus 20 3 thinking primarily about a theology of idolatry the worship of idols seems to be treated in two broad fashions in scripture first it is the case the god warns against worshiping him so badly that a person has slipped into idolatry malachi 1 and 2 are examples in this case we may be able to say that two people can worship the same god and say they believe in the same god while at least one of them has so perverted worship that they have slipped into idolatry but the second and what seems to be the primary warning is idolatry in the sense that people literally worship other gods in this case people can worship things other people themselves or spiritual beings as god in any event the theological data regarding idolatry is focused in the first of the ten commandments you shall have no other gods before me the commandment is not and i don t believe can be interpreted to mean you shall not assert false attributes to me when actually worshiping me the biblical worldview posits a universe of spiritual beings that humans have often mistaken as god and believed in and worshiped as gods so of course people can believe in worship different gods in the sense that they attribute ultimate divine worth to beings who are not god they have been doing that for millennia this raises another point that rae mentioned in his article he stated that to assert that religions worship different gods would require a well developed theology of worship while that ought to be done regardless i wonder if the case is exactly the opposite the debate right now is about muslims and christians and seems to be fuzzy around the edges because they are both abrahamic faiths add judaism to the list and it seems fairly easy to say that these religions worship the same god just differently given sg can we justifiably take it another step to say that hindus and christians worship the same god if so then hindus substitute billions of gods with conflicting personalities for the unity of the christian deity that difference is pretty drastic and worship in those two very different faiths would need to be explained to hold to sg what about belief systems that straddle the religious philosophical fence such as buddhism and confuciansim in these systems ultimate reality is at direct odds with christian beliefs about ultimate reality leading some to even label these systems as atheistic and yet at least buddhism has a form of worship and beliefs about ultimate reality and salvation how can both worship the same god that would need to be explained then at the extreme end of this train of thought is atheism atheism has been described as a kind of worship by both theologians and thoughtful atheists and not without merit if atheists worship human potential science technology transhumanism etc and christians worship then sg implies that they worship the same god are we at a point with sg where there is an inherent conflict if not internal contradiction a christian who says there is a god and an atheist who says there is no god both worship the same god this raises a fascinating question for me what about conversion does a convert believe that they are now worshiping the true god as opposed to a false god or do they believe they are worshiping the same god only now they are worshipping more properly and if sg is true it seems we are stuck with saying that in reality they were worshiping the same god all along and this seems incongruent with how both the ot and nt treat other religions and the move from one to another posted by phil steiger at 5 40 pm no comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels philosophy theology saturday january 09 2016 correcting the scoffing fool proverbs 9 7 8 whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury do not reprove a scoffer or he will hate you reprove a wise man and he will love you our first reaction to a passage like this ought to be a self reflective question like how do i respond to correction and reproof i should begin by wondering about myself instead of immediately thinking of everyone i think is a fool does my reaction to legitimate correction incur anger or hatred toward the one who corrects me or does it begin a process of self improvement and even thankfulness and love if i am not open to correction i may think of myself as basically perfect and not in need of correction even if i do not think in those exact words a second insight from a passage like this is that proper correction from people who love us and or are wiser than we are or simply see something we do not is part of growing in wisdom and maturity we ought not journey on toward christ without people who can speak into our lives about areas we may be blind to or areas that are too sensitive for us to deal with personally i am an imperfect person subject to a range of faults and i should learn how to react when i hear good correction i don t like this anymore than anyone else and i receive good correction more often than i would like a third reaction can be something like this it may be better to watch as the storm passes by does its damage and see if anyone is willing and ready to help pick up the pieces of wasted lives and ruined time in the heat of the moment or in the throes of passion or in the wave of powerful cultural mythologies people are often completely deaf ...