But while admirable as a personal witness, Claiborne’s extrapolation of nonviolent approaches to national policy is extremely naive. For example, as Matthew Tuininga reports, Claiborne gave a lecture at Emory University in which he asked:

What if the United States had responded to the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks after the example of the Amish, declaring forgiveness towards the 19 hijackers who took 3,000 lives on that terrible day and responding to their evil not with war but with love and financial support for their families?

Rewarding the families of suicidal terrorists sounds more like something Saddam Hussein would (and did) do rather than a policy that should be advocated by a Christian peace activist. But as Keith Pavlischek explains, the neo-Anabaptism of Claiborne and his supporters doesn’t have much in common with traditional Christian pacifism:

Claiborne like most modern neo-Anabaptists, on the other hand, insists that the sword is ordained nowhere and never at all. Not only does he insist that Christians repudiate the “violence” of the sword, but that the civil authority do so as well, even in the face of evil, oppression and wickedness. The only moral option for civil authority, according to Claiborne, is some form of “nonviolence.”

Contemporary neo-Anabaptists dissent not only from Augustinian, Thomist, Lutheran, and Calvinist political theology, but from classic Christian pacifism as well. It is high time for traditional evangelical Christian pacifists to call Clairborne and other neo-Anabaptists out on this point, or explain why they repudiate the sectarian pacifism of their theological ancestors.

Read more . . .

In case you weren’t aware, snake fighting is one of the great traditions of higher education. Luke Burns has a helpful FAQ on “The ‘Snake Fight” Portion of Your Thesis Defense“:

Q: Do I have to kill the snake?
A: University guidelines state that you have to “defeat” the snake. There are many ways to accomplish this. Lots of students choose to wrestle the snake. Some construct decoys and elaborate traps to confuse and then ensnare the snake. One student brought a flute and played a song to lull the snake to sleep. Then he threw the snake out a window.

Q: Does everyone fight the same snake?
A: No. You will fight one of the many snakes that are kept on campus by the facilities department.

Q: Are the snakes big?
A: We have lots of different snakes. The quality of your work determines which snake you will fight. The better your thesis is, the smaller the snake will be.

Q: Does my thesis adviser pick the snake?
A: No. Your adviser just tells the guy who picks the snakes how good your thesis was.

Read more . . .

Sayler wrote a lengthy rebuttal aimed at me. I know this because the words “Joe Carter” were included in his essay. If he had not included my name I don’t think I would have recognized he was attacking my ideas since they don’t resemble either anything I’ve said or believe. I would have ignored the rant completely had I not been intrigued by a not-altogether surprising statement:

Just in case it’s not clear, I am not so interested in defending Distributism – an interesting and provocative theory of which I know little – as I am in addressing Mr. Carter’s premises. The question is not whether Distributism lives up to the creed of Western liberalism but whether that creed should be our measure.

For instance – who cares if Distributism contains “a hidden coercive impulse” or not? While I can’t speak for the Distributists I myself endorse coercion quite openly, much as I endorse gravity. Yes, tyranny is a nasty business, but then so is falling down a flight of stairs.

The tagline at FPR is “Place. Limits. Liberty.” Unfortunately, over the past year the “liberty” part has been all but excised from their vision of human flourishing.

But before I delve into that, let me first provide some context and explain my mixed feelings about FPR.

In a Facebook comment yesterday Jake Meador said, “If a line in the sand between FT and FPR hadn’t been drawn already, I think it’s probably getting drawn today.” While many of the commenters at FPR seem to be dismissive of First Things (“I don’t have as much of a stomach for First Things anymore. They are indeed a bunch of liberals, and they even say they are. Conservative liberals, maybe, but liberals none the less.”), the feeling is not mutual. Many of us here at FT are rather sympathetic to the goals and philosophy represented by FPR (our deputy editor, Matthew Schmitz, is even listed on their masthead as a contributor).

While I’ve never been fully on board with “Porcherism”—the affectionate name given to the site’s philosophy by both its critics and friends—I’ve considered myself something of a fellow traveler. I especially admire the way Porchers tend to present thoughtful criticisms of our culture of consumerism and radical individualism. However, though they raise the right questions, they tend to offer, at best, facile solutions.

For instance, a few months ago I attended a conference at Mt. St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Maryland that was co-sponsored by FPR. I was excited to meet and learn from some of my favorite FPR writers (including Mark Mitchell, John Schwenkler, Jeremy Beer, Rod Dreher, and Caleb Stegall) and thrilled to see so many young college students in the audience. The libertarians have been snatching our children away for the past few decades so it was encouraging to see young people interested in localist and traditionalist philosophies. What I wasn’t expecting was that the conference would do so much to disenchant them.

For example, one professor (they were almost all professors) presented his localist bona fides by explaining how he bought his vegetables from a local food co-op. He was very proud of the fact that he paid a higher price to support a local farmer—despite the fact that the same vegetables from the same local farmer could be bought at Whole Foods. For most agrarians throughout history, food was considered fuel for survival and cheap food has made it possible for populations to grow and thrive. For the tenured agrarians, though, food is a totem, a symbol of how they are not only making the “right” consumption choices but how they are supporting the environment and the community in the process (a debatable assumption). The professor’s underlying message—though admittedly presented rather winsomely—was that if you bought bananas at Wegmans rather than whatever was in season from your local farmer, you were part of the problem.

During the question and answer session that followed, an earnest student stood up and asked how people like him—poor kids on the college’s meal plan—were expected to partake in the “luxury of buying local.” The professor’s rather dismissive and surprisingly smug answer was that the student should buy what he could afford and make his meals in his dorm room. And if the student couldn’t afford the higher prices charged by local farmers, then the right thing to do, said the professor, was to eat less food. Hunger was the price one pays for philosophic consistency. Can’t afford organic arugula? Let them eat leeks.

Other presenters denounced the current American trend (that has been going on for over 200 years) of people choosing careers that take them away from the local communities. Ironically, the laments were almost exclusively being made by college professors who had left their own local communities to take jobs in schools far away from their hometowns. (Of course they bought their veggies from a co-op so they could still consider themselves to be good “localists.”)

In America we all get to choose our traditions, so I  can’t really fault folks for choosing to be traditionalists. They may be a bit preachy and lacking in self-awareness, but these types of Porchers mean well and are trying to do the right thing. They also tend to be pro-liberty. They may want you to buy your raw milk from a local farmer but they aren’t going to advocate laws to stop you from buying some pasteurized two-percent at the Walmart Supercenter. They respect freedom—they just want you to use it to make the right choices. I’m fully in agreement with them on that point.

There is another brand of Porcher, though, that is less enthusiastic about giving people the freedom to make choices for themselves. They believe the flaws of democracy and capitalism are so great—individuals continuously make the wrong choices—that we need to abandon (or at least seriously curtail) both. Last year, for instance, John Médaille published a provocative essay on FPR titled, “Why I am a Monarchist.” In a follow-up essay he explains the powers that should be afforded to the King of America:

Concerning the king, he needs to have real authority, an authority that extends to the executive, legislative, and judicial functions. Of course, he should not be the only authority in these areas, nor even necessarily the ordinary authority; but he should, in some sense, be the ultimate authority. The king’s government also needs to have its own revenue stream, one fixed in the constitution and independent of any legislative body. A king who has to beg his bread from the legislature is no king, and whoever holds the power of the purse will soon hold all other powers. The legislature may by its own will supplement the constitutional revenues, perhaps to pay for a war or some other extraordinary expense, and they may control the funds they levy. But for the budgeting of the constitutional revenue, the king should be primary, or even the sole, authority. Other authorities may comment, they may even censure a king, such as when a king neglects the defense of the realm to build himself palaces. But in the practical world, control of the budget is control of everything else. The king should also hold an absolute veto over both the legislature and the judicial functions. And finally, there needs to be a difficult but peaceful means of removing a king; without this, kings themselves become the cause of revolutions.

Your second reaction to this passage (assuming your first reaction was “That’s nuts.”) is likely to be, “But what if this king turns out to be a horrible ruler?” Médaille responds to just that question in the comment section:

To accept a monarch–or any ruler–is to accept the inevitability of a bad ruler. That’s the human condition, and there is nothing to be done about it.

Well then.

In a similar vein, there is a group of Porchers who are quite comfortable with socialism. In a comment to Sayler’s post, I questioned whether he might be advocating socialism. An FPR contributor Russell Arben Fox responded,

Incidentally, I’m one of the socialists you’re worried about–a democratic and decentralist socialist, I hasten to add, though that may not make much difference to you. Anyway, pleasure to make your acquaintance.

Pleased to meet you too, Mr. Fox. And to answer your question, no it does not make a difference. I’m opposed to socialism even if it is democratic and decentralist. Indeed, I find it rather disturbing that purported traditionalists would advocate a system that has a tradition of failure. Socialism doesn’t work, whether on small or large scales.

Ironically, my opposition to such socialism got me labeled a “liberal” by the other FPR commenters. To be fair, they qualified it by saying that I was probably a “conservative liberal” since I supported such travesties as free markets. Free markets are supposedly coercive in a way that is detrimental to human flourishing while decentralized socialism or distributism (headed by a king?) would presumably always make the right choices for us.

Since 2008, FPR has been a fascinating project. But the fusionism of self-sufficient and freedom-loving localists with monarchists and socialists can’t last forever. Either the various groups will go their separate ways or Porcherism will eventually be dismissed as a bizarre philosophy that has no connection to American life in the twenty-first century. It would be a shame if Porcherism failed. We need an attractive presentation of traditionalism that can inspire the masses, not another fantasy ideology that appeals only to quirky academics.

The beginning of a New Year is an an excellent time to try something new. As you make your list of resolutions and goals I want to recommend adding a simple four step process that could transform your life by, quite literally, changing your mind.

After reading the entire post the vast majority of readers will snicker at such a hyperbolic claim and never implement the method I outline. A smaller number will consider the advice intriguing, my assertion only a slight exaggeration, but will also never implement the method. A tiny minority, however, will recognize the genius behind the process and apply it to their own life. This group will later say that my claim was an understatement.

This post is written for those people.

A few years ago I stumbled across a variation of the four steps in a blog post by my Evangel co-blogger Fred Sanders and implemented his recommendation that day. I later had the pleasure of meeting Sanders in person and telling him how his post had transformed my life. My hope is that at least one other person will follow this advice and experience the same transformative effect.

Before I reveal the four steps I want to reiterate that while the advice could transform your life, it likely will not. As with most life-altering advice, it is simple, easy to implement, and even easier to ignore. Statistically speaking, the odds are great that you’ll ignore this advice. But a handful of you will try it so for the one or two people who will find this useful, the four steps that will transform your worldview are:

1. Choose a book of the Bible.

2. Read it in its entirety.

3. Repeat step #2 twenty times.

4. Repeat this process for all books of the Bible.

Christians often talk about having a Biblical worldview yet most have only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible. They attempt to build a framework without first gathering the lumber and cement needed to create a solid foundation. The benefits of following this process should therefore be obvious. By fully immersing yourself into the text you’ll come to truly know the text. You’ll deepen your understanding of each book and knowledge of the  the Bible as a whole.

Since this method is adapted from a book by James M. Gray (1851-1935), How to Master the English Bible‚ I’ll let him explain in his own words:

The first practical help I ever received in the mastery of the English Bible was from a layman. We were fellow-attendants at a certain Christian conference or convention and thrown together a good deal for several days, and I saw something in his Christian life to which I was a comparative stranger—peace, a rest, a joy, a kind of spiritual poise I knew little about. One day I ventured to ask him how he had become possessed of the experience, when he replied, “By reading the epistle to the Ephesians.” I was surprised, for I had read it without such results, and therefore asked him to explain the manner of his reading, when he related the following: He had gone into the country to spend the Sabbath with his family on one occasion, taking with him a pocket copy of Ephesians, and in the afternoon, going out into the woods and lying down under a tree, he began to read it; he read it through at a single reading, and finding his interest aroused, read it through again in the same way, and, his interest increasing, again and again. I think he added that he read it some twelve or fifteen times, “and when I arose to go into the house,” said he, “I was in possession of Ephesians, or better yet, it was in possession of me, and I had been ‘lifted up to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus‚’ in an experimental sense in which that had not been true in me before, and will never cease to be true in me again.”

I confess that as I listened to this simple recital my heart was going up in thanksgiving to God for answered prayer, the prayer really of months, if not years, that I might come to know how to master His Word. And yet, side by side with the thanksgiving was humiliation that I had not discovered so simple a principle before, which a boy of ten or twelve might have known. And to think that an “ordained” minister must sit at the feet of a layman to learn the most important secret of his trade!

Rather than wasting time attempting to defend the wisdom of applying this method, I’ll close with a few helpful suggestions for putting it into practice:

1. Choose shorter books and work up to longer ones. Since you’ll be reading an entire book of the Bible and not just a chapter or two, you’ll want to work your way up to more extensive readings. When beginning this program you may want to start with a short book that has only a few chapters that can be read several times in one sitting. This will give you a sense of accomplishment and help develop the reading habit. For example, a short book like John or Jude can be read four or five times in one sitting allowing you to finish the entire twenty readings in less than a week. [NT books, shortest to longest: 3 John, 2 John, Phlm, Jude, Titus, 2Thess, Rev, 2 Peter, 2 Tim, 1Thess, Col, 1 Tim, Phil, 1 Peter, James, 1 John, Gal, Eph, 2 Cor, Heb, 1 Cor, Rom, Mark, John, Matt, Acts, Luke; OT books, shortest to longest: See this chart.]

2. Read at your normal pace. Treating the material reverently does not require reading at a slower than normal speed. Read for comprehension, ignoring the division of chapters and verses and treating each book as one coherent unit.

3. Skip the commentaries (for now). Don’t get bogged down by referring to commentaries or other outside sources. Commentaries are for your Bible study, rather than for this synthetic reading. Read each book in its entirety and then attempt to summarize in your own words its theme and major points.

4. Stick with the process. After the eighth or ninth reading you’ll hit a wall that is similar to what runners face in marathons. The text will become dry and lose its flavor. You’ll want to move on to the next book or abandon the program altogether. Stick with it. Persevere and you’ll discover the treasures that repeated readings can provide. Keep in mind that not every book will be equally rewarding. It doesn’t mean that you’re a heretic if during one of your readings you find 2 John a bit redundant or Jude just plain boring. Keep in mind the words of 2 Timothy 3:16-17: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” Stick with it and you’ll fully understand the truth of that verse.

5. Choose an appropriate version. A modern language paraphrase is not an appropriate version for synthetic reading. Likewise, the familiar rhythms and cadences of the KJV can, upon repeated readings, get in the way of comprehension. I personally recommend the ESV, though the NIV can be a suitable alternative.

6. Pray. Ask God to open your heart to his Word. Trust the Holy Spirit to illuminate the text and provide guidance and understanding.

7. Begin today. Don’t put it off another day. Don’t say you’l start tomorrow, or next week, or after New Year’s. You won’t. Start with the only time that you are guaranteed—right now. Use some of the time you’d normally spend  reading blogs to begin this program. Start now and then tomorrow, next week, or after New Year’s—after your mind has become saturated with God’s Holy Word—you can tell me my claim was an understatement.

1) Whether power is good or evil depends on its use. Power is often abused. But in itself, power is preferable to powerlessness. It is better to have the power of sight than to be blind, better to have the power to buy food than not, better to have a way of achieving your aims than to be frustrated by insurmountable obstacles. What is true for individuals is true for political communities: Governments need power to protect people, land, and resources from foreign threats, to ensure domestic order, to provide public goods for their citizens. Even those who appear to disagree with this claim do not: Advocates for the powerless want nothing more than to empower them.

Does Anyone in the Media Ever Read the Bible?
Fox News, Eric Metaxas

On marriage, religious liberty, and the “grand bargain”
Mirror of Justice, Robert George

A review of Green Philosophy by Roger Scruton
The Guardian, Jonathan Rée

2012 Christianity Today Book Awards
Christianity Today

(Via: Take Your Vitamin Z)

Top 10 Theology Stories of 2011
The Gospel Coalition, Collin Hansen

Top 10 News Stories of 2011
Christianity Today

Increasing diversity redefining America’s Jewry
CNN, Stephanie Siek

Why and How to Read Calvin’s Institutes
Between Two Worlds, Justin Taylor

I became all too familiar with the DSM in my college days, first as a psychology major and then as a behavioral science major (I switched because I believed behavioral science would be more scientifically rigorous. It wasn’t.) I was constantly shocked that such an utterly absurd book could be considered our primary mental health tool. The diagnostic criteria is often so vague that it is virtually impossible to determine if a patient truly has a mental disorder. Yet almost every diagnosis in America is made based on comparing a patient against the DSM’s checklist of “symptoms.”

Part of the reason the DSM is so flawed is because it is highly politicized. For example, homosexuality was classified in DSM as a sexual disorder until the 1970s. And until 1987, “ego-dystonic homosexuality” was still classified as a pathology. These “mental disorders” were later removed, not because of a change in empirical data (since there is none) but because of the protest of gay rights groups. I agree with the gay rights activists on this one: homosexuality should have never been classified as a mental disorder. But this example shows that the judgments made by psychiatrists are often highly subjective and are rooted more in speculative theories than in scientific fact. (Keep in mind that this is the same profession that, for almost a century, believed the Freudian idea that holding your feces in as an infant affected your personality as an adult.)

Such criticisms against the DSM have been made for decades (mostly by cranks like me) but they are gaining a new hearing because of who is now making them: Allen Frances, lead editor of the DSV-IV. As Frances says, “there is no definition of a mental disorder. It’s [BS]. I mean, you just can’t define it.” As Wired magazine notes:

Some of this disputatiousness is the hazard of any professional specialty. But when psychiatrists say, as they have during each of these fights, that the success or failure of their efforts could sink the whole profession, they aren’t just scoring rhetorical points. The authority of any doctor depends on their ability to name a patient’s suffering. For patients to accept a diagnosis, they must believe that doctors know—in the same way that physicists know about gravity or biologists about mitosis—that their disease exists and that they have it. But this kind of certainty has eluded psychiatry, and every fight over nomenclature threatens to undermine the legitimacy of the profession by revealing its dirty secret: that for all their confident pronouncements, psychiatrists can’t rigorously differentiate illness from everyday suffering. This is why, as one psychiatrist wrote after the APA voted homosexuality out of the DSM, “there is a terrible sense of shame among psychiatrists, always wanting to show that our diagnoses are as good as the scientific ones used in real medicine.”

Since 1980, when the DSM-III was published, psychiatrists have tried to solve this problem by using what is called descriptive diagnosis: a checklist approach, whereby illnesses are defined wholly by the symptoms patients present. The main virtue of descriptive psychiatry is that it doesn’t rely on unprovable notions about the nature and causes of mental illness, as the Freudian theories behind all those “neuroses” had done. Two doctors who observe a patient carefully and consult the DSM’s criteria lists usually won’t disagree on the diagnosis—something that was embarrassingly common before 1980. But descriptive psychiatry also has a major problem: Its diagnoses are nothing more than groupings of symptoms. If, during a two-week period, you have five of the nine symptoms of depression listed in the DSM, then you have “major depression,” no matter your circumstances or your own perception of your troubles. “No one should be proud that we have a descriptive system,” Frances tells me. “The fact that we do only reveals our limitations.” Instead of curing the profession’s own malady, descriptive psychiatry has just covered it up.

Read more . . .