Midwestern Mugwump (mw)2

Noll on the election

I'm a big Mark Noll fan, no bones about it. I studied with him at Wheaton, he has influenced me tremendously and I think he is one of the countries great historians - a subtle thinker and a profound theologian even though his disciplinary specialty is history. His election to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences was a well-deserved achievement and a great moment for Christian scholarship.

And you know what's coming - I disagree with him regarding his Christian Centuryarticle entitled - None of the Above: Why I won't be voting for President. Frankly (and with all due respect - really, I think the world of him), I think its kind of a cop-out (he's not a reader, so I'm probably safe and he can't change my grade!!).

The idea of not voting as some form of protest just doesn't make any sense, except perhaps on the margins. It isn't practical and it is too divorced from the messiness of the actual political realities that exist. I don't think you have to give in to those political realities, like a pig wallowing in mud, but you do have to work with them. Ultimately, I am inclined to think that NOT VOTING is a luxury that we don't have (or shouldn't exercise). Its letting the perfect be the enemy of the good - or good enough.

To avoid being co-opted, Noll has chosen opting out. That doesn't seem like the best response.

I generally agree with his choice of the important issues that we as a country and we as Christians should be focusing on - "race, the value of life, taxes, trade, medicine, religious freedom and the international rule of law," though I would perhaps couch them differently. I don't want to go into specifics, except to say that I think Christians can agree that an issue is important and even agree on the ends they would like to achieve, while honestly disagreeing in the best steps to meet those ends - race, taxes, medicine and foreign policy would fit those categories for me - but that is a discussion best handled later or over drinks.

(Hat Tip - GetReligion)

Mainliners and Human Rights

As a corrollary to last weeks discussion about Presbyterian divestment is a report from the Institute for Religion and Democracy describing the human irghts activities of mainline protestantism and the decidedly anti-Israel.

Bainbridge, Volokh, Instapundit, Christianity Today weblog and Southern Appeal.

I'll stick with Gail Heriot's impression that the denominations leadership isn't so much anti-semitic as it is anti-Western, but the numbers sound pretty damning - 37% of the issued criticisms criticized Israel while 32% criticized the United States. And people criticize Evangelicals for not being in touch with human rights issues - which we haven't been, but we are beginning to wake up to those issues - albeit slowly.

Bainbridge quotes the report that claims that the mainline denominations criticize the U.S. and Israel because:

Without a strong sense of absolute moral standards based on the Scriptures and natural law, these church leaders may not be intellectually equipped to counter the self-serving arguments of dictators. By contrast, they feel more confident in criticizing the United States and Israel because those two nations share a common liberal democratic culture that values human rights, and therefore both can be subjected to criticism under the standards of that culture.

Evangelicals have taken important roles in bringing pressure (such as it is) on the situation in Sudan. Gary Haugen has done outstanding work on child slavery at the International Justice Mission. And CT has an article today about ongoing issues involving U.S. Navy personnel and prostitution. Its a terrible and ongoing situation that could probably be greatly improved by Pentagon leadership simply speaking out. It doesn't sound like a powerful solution, but I guess it can go a lot further than I imagine.

All things considered, evangelicals would do well to counteract their image of not caring about these issues. Its not like giving money to fight these evils is going to offend anyone. And if we can call anything evil, these certainly qualify. As people of privilege (and let's face it, I am), we have a responsibility to help others out of compassion and worship of our Lord.

And Bainbridge is right, Catholicism, particularly in the person of the current Pope, provides a powerful moral example to all of us.

Baseball and Cities

ESPN has an article about the impending move of the Montreal Expos. Largely, I don't have opinions except that I generally don't like massive public subsidies of private enterprise with limited exceptions.

Irritating to me are the demands that the city of Washington pony up $13 million dollars to renovate RFK stadium. What's that all about - isn't that the price of an underperforming 2nd baseman? Pay it yourself with the receipts from the new owners.

There is also the demand that the district build a new stadium for around $400 million. Now, ultimately this is a decision for D.C. - despite its subsidy by the American taxpayers, I'm personally not so bothered. But that's a lot of money for MLB to be demanding of a broke municipality. I understand that it wil happen, but I think its too bad from the point of view of the city. After all, at the same time, they will be selling the franchise for substantially more than they paid for it (assuming the initial purchase price isn't tied to the re-location price). Further, if there are multiple bidding parties (Fred Malek and Stan Kasten are both reportedly interested in putting together bids - both of which have substantial prior involvement in MLB and are therefore not naive to the economic realities), the economics wouldn't necessarily demand it (though the competition between cities clearly allow for it). MLB - Rich players and richer owners stealing money from urban schools.

Squirrel Blogging

No, dear readers, I am not kidding. Squirrel Blogging - but it won't be a regular feature of (mw)2, don't worry.

The South Bend Tribune has an interesting (yes, really) article on the different types of storing habits of different types of squirrels - with a hilarious photo of a fox squirrel just chilling out. Check it out here.

When we were at Notre Dame we had a bird feeder in our backyard. We loved the birds, but grew tired of the squirrels, who would eat all of the seed. So we put up a squirrel guard. One daring young creature decided to test the contraption and almost fell off. He quickly scrambled back up to the branch and threw himself (okay, maybe there's a little dramatic license in there) down with all four paws gripping the branch - much like our friend in the article, though more desperate and less non-chalant. Pretty funny - good times.

Will Evangelicalism have an intellectual legacy?

In April, Letters from Babylon, asked the question "Will Evangelicalism have a legacy of its own?" At the time, I answered NO.*

That's right, NO. Well, perhaps it should be a resounding 'sort of.'

I am inclined to think that Evangelicalism's intellectual and scholarly legacy can best be described as animating and invigorating the intellectual traditions of faithful, orthodox, Protestant Christianity. Perhaps it will have a legacy separate from its ability to motivate the mining of other traditions (like Reformed perpsectives on X or Wesleyan ideas about Y), but I am not so sure and don't think it matters.

Clearly, I am fully on board with Noll's (and company) project, but I might (and I don't know if he would agree or disagree) phrase it as "recovering the Christian mind among evangelicals." I think of evangelicalism's impact here in the role of an adverb rather than an adjective - Evangelical Reformed intellectual rather than Evangelical intellectual. If that makes any sense.

And I don't mean to exclude Catholic or Orthodox traditions from being profitable for investigation (the study of law and morality, for instance, absolutely MUST begin with Catholic sources and ideas), just to emphasize that evangelicalism's best (and most original work) will be done investigating protestant traditions - not because the others aren't rich, but primarily because other people are already working in those areas. Evangelicals need to engage with Catholic and Orthodox traditions, and thankfully have and are (especially in certain fields), but this won't be our primary work.

As an example of some of the best work being done in "Evangelical Scholarship," that illustrates what I am TRYING to say - The Ancient Christian Commentary Series.

*The above appears to diminish the role that Catholic scholarship plays in invigorating evangelical intellectual life. This isn't because I don't think its HUGELY important, but the question originally at issue was about evangelicalism's impact. Catholicism's impact on evangelicalism is properly quite large and evangelicals gain much more than they give in this relationship.

Noll on the Evangelical Mind

Clearly, I've been reading Mirror of Justice. Rob Vischer notes that Mark Noll has a retrospective in First Things on the 10 year anniversary of The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind. The article isn't on-line yet, but Vischer notes that Noll is more optimistic than he was 10 years ago, particularly resulting from increased engagement between Catholics and Evangelicals stating:

While evangelicals offer Catholics eagerness, commitment, and an ability to negotiate in a culture of intellectual consumerism, Catholics offer evangelicals a sense of tradition and centuries of reflection on the bearing of sacramentality on all existence.

Later, Noll reminds readers that "tradition without life might be barely Christian, but life without tradition is barely coherent."

Given that several of the members of Mirror of Justice are converts to Catholicism (from, as I understand it, varying forms of 'evangelicalism'), I would be interested in reading their reflections on the engagement between evangelicalism and Catholicism and its effects on evangelicalism and (to a MUCH lesser extent) Catholicism, or at least American Catholicism.

I'll also offer up this recycled post regarding whether evangelicalism will have an intellectual legacy of its own.

And as I've said before, all the more reason to cheer for Notre Dame football!!

Times Sunday Magazine

Rick Garnett at Mirror of Justice points to this New York Times Sunday Magazine article about automobiles and the new urbanism. Its long, but interesting and I generally agree with Rick's comments that it presents a thought provoking series of challenges to advocates of new urbanism.

BUT BEFORE READING the NYT Magazine piece - go to Lileks Bleat about reading the NYT Sunday Magazine. It's hilarious, particularly for those of us who aren't privileged enough (or are to cheap and don't have enough time) to get the Sunday Times delivered to us. Imagine the latte sipping Manhattanite listening to 'Morning Jazz' while leisurely glancing through the paper. And then there's Garnett, 4 kids in South Bend, Indiana, hustling off to Mass on Sunday morning before he comes home and throws up a post about new urbanism - not the same reader that Lileks describes (to Garnett's great credit).

Horror and Hilarity on the 7th Circuit

Rick Garnett at Mirror of Justice points out an important Seventh Circuit decision (and horrifying dissent) regarding the question of immigration asylum for a woman fleeing China's forced abortion policy. Judge Diane Wood (who I don't think is particularly pro-life) wrote for the majority (its not too long and worth reading), reciting the testimony of required IUD implantation, required quarterly IUD check-ups, and forced abortions (with fines). The decision hinges on evidentiary matters and the standards for appellate courts to overturn lower court/administrative hearings - but the core horror comes through and is compelling. But the dissent (which is only on a minor point) is indeed another story - frightening for its tone more than its decision. Judge Evans states:

No doubt, Lin's story (if true) is quite compelling. Who would want the state to force a woman to have an abortion? On the other hand, China has a huge population problem, and there are people who applaud its efforts to fix it. But when Congress, in 1996, amended the law to add forced abortion as a ground for granting refugee status, it made a value judgment about China's population control policy.

Indeed, I was under the impression that making "value judgments" and policy decisions was the central task of the legislature, how bold. "On the other hand" "applaud" - there are those, I guess, but this equivocation almost sounds like a tacit endorsement of China's policy.

To make matters worse, Judge Evans then feels compelled to comment snarkily on the policy making progress - "That is interesting because it looks a bit like the congressional anti-abortion faction outmaneuvered its anti-immigration faction - which itself is ironic given that most members of Congress who belong to one of the factions belong to the other as well."

That's nice - unnuanced gotcha politics from a sitting circuit judge.*

For a little balance and fun (the hilarity) take a peak at Wood's decision in a copyright matter between the remants of the band - Survivor (think Eye of the Tiger - go ahead and hum it to yourself) and its claims against the TV show - Survivor.

*The assessment of the politics of Congress' decision strikes me not only as unnecessary in a judicial decision but intentionally overly simplistic. Might the two 'factions' have weighed their positions and decided that their anti-abortion concerns (or even basic human rights concerns) outweighed their anti-immigration concerns? Why find irony and inconsistency so easily?

PBS Again

One of my first posts criticized PBS (Do We Still Need PBS?) for having a Phil Collins special during Pledge Week.

So tonight, I'm cleaning up the house, eating dinner, and doing a little channel surfing. First, Friday night TV is terrible - they must figure what kind of loser is at home on Friday night with the TV on?? Yes, that's me. At any rate, we came across one of the local PBS Affiliates with some music, we hesitate and notice its - Amy Grant (that was an easy web search!!). We check the info button and its Soundstage - Peter Cetera with Special Guest Amy Grant. We're feeling nostalgic, Amy's singing, nothing else is on - we leave it. I make some crack about visiting a dorm at Grace College in like 1986 and seeing a life size poster in some guy's room. She's been around a long time. As she begins to introduce the next song, I commented to my wife on whether or not Ms. Grant had indeed peaked with her famous Age to Age album.

And on cue, what does she sing - yes, El Shaddai. We laughed uproariously and then were quiet, because I'll admit - the song touches me. Perhaps its a blast to my past.

Peter Cetera - what can you say, some of that junk (The Glory of Love) just screams Karate Kid II. Seriously dreadful.

Presbyterian Sanity

A small counter to the discussions of Presbyterian craziness is Mark D. Roberts. Dr. Roberts is the pastor of Irvine Presbyterian Church in California: a guy with a few books, a website, and a blog to his credit. Recently on the 'blog he took the challenge from Hugh Hewitt, evidently a friend of his, to react to the decision of the Cardinal Archbishop of New York not to invite the two presidential candidates to the Al Smith Dinner.

While it would seem appropriate to insert a joke here about turning a question into a discourse (Harvard man, pastor, PhD, Presbyterian - they all represent easy humor targets), we are well-served for Dr. Robert's discourse as it is thoughtful, provocative, and well-seasoned by his pastoral experience and sensibilities.

So here's the link - its worth reading the whole thing.