Prophetic 'News'

Since when does evangelical preaching constitute news? Since The Denver Post decided to pander to the evangelical movement, I suppose:

New Life Church embraces prophecy
Church legions learn "seeing" is believing
By Electa Draper
The Denver Post
Article Last Updated: 04/30/2008 06:08:17 AM MDT

COLORADO SPRINGS -- The pastor of New Life Church -- Colorado's highest-profile megachurch -- is teaching its 10,000-member congregation how to become modern prophets in their own lives.

"I want all of us here tonight to hear God's voice," Pastor Brady Boyd told the several hundred gathered Monday night. "You've all been uniquely hard-wired to hear the voice of God." ...

The Holy Spirit can give people direct guidance from God on everything from their marriages to their jobs if they learn how to hear it, Boyd said.

The article goes on like this for 591 words. The article presupposes the existence of God and allows for not a single word of criticism or skepticism.

Draper does include one interesting line: "New Life Pastor Jeff Drott... said that God rarely speaks to people in an audible voice, often sending a thought, vision, dream, image or scriptural insight."

Isn't it conceivable that these "thoughts" and "insights" are coming from some source other than God? For instance, if you have a problem and start "thinking" about it or reading the Bible (or any other book offering moral guidance), mightn't you come up with something useful? Do such thoughts and insights really require a belief in God? Or is it possible that non-religious people also get thoughts and insights (and maybe even dreams, images, and the like) when they're contemplating a problem?

And isn't it possible that Electa Draper might, you know, interview somebody for her "news" stories who offers a perspective other than the one that we've been "hard-wired to hear the voice of God?" Alternatively, she could simply cover real news.

Speculations about Jesus' Birth

How did Mary get pregnant? Fox reports new speculation:

In his upcoming biography of Jesus, "Basic Instinct" director Paul Verhoeven will make the shocking claim that Christ probably was the son of Mary and a Roman soldier who raped her during the Jewish uprising in Galilee, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Catholic League President Bill Donohue called Verhoeven's claim "laughable."

"Here we go again with idle speculation grounded in absolutely nothing," Donohue told FOXNews.com. "He has no empirical evidence to support his claim, which is why they say 'may have.'"

I basically agree with Donohue's criticism.

But what is Donohue's alternative account? The Gospel of Luke claims (1:35): "And the angel said to her, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God."

Because the claim that Mary was impregnated by a supernatural being is supported by so much more empirical evidence than the claim that Mary was raped by a Roman soldier.

To Hell with Hell

According to one of Wes Morriston's friends, long ago Morriston insisted that Ghandi was burning in Hell and would continue to do so for all eternity. Now that Morriston has thought about the matter a bit more, he has concluded that, not only is Ghandi not burning in Hell, but nobody will suffer an eternity in Hell. Morriston presented his ideas February 21 at a THINK! lecture sponsored by the Center for Values and Social Policy in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Morriston's complete lecture is available online in mp3 format; his lecture notes too are available.

I was worried when, early on, Morriston conceded that, if there is no life after death, the debate about Hell is rather pointless, but then asked us to suppose that there is life after death. Was this going to be a night of angels and pins? But Morriston's talk turned into a fascinating history lesson of various views of Hell, and an explanation of why many of those views contain faulty arguments.

Morriston argued, "If you believe in God, you probably shouldn't believe in Hell." His basic argument is that people, as finite beings, are incapable of doing something that would merit infinite punishment. If God is just, then he would not sentence any mortal being to an infinite punishment. (Morriston allowed for the possibility of a very long punishment.)

Morriston briefly reviewed the views of Hell by such Christians as Dennis Prager, Augustine, Jonathan Edwards, John Calvin, C.S. Lewis, and Stephen Davis. [Actually Prager is Jewish.] He effectively responded to each argument in turn.

Edwards, for example, claimed about Hell, "The seeing of the calamities of others tends to heighten the sense of our own enjoyments. When the saints in glory, therefore, shall see the doleful state of the damned, how will this heighten their sense of the blessedness of their own state..."

Morriston's most interesting arguments opposed the "free will defense for hell" of Lewis and Davis. The idea is that people "choose to be in hell" and "live their lives apart from God" (in Davis's words). Morriston offered three possibilities for why someone might make such a choice. First, a person might be ill-informed, but then how could the person reasonably be punished for that? Second, a person might be a "reasonable non-believer," which is different from "rejecting God." Again, why would this merit eternal punishment? Finally, a person might ruin his soul to the point where redemption is impossible. But then "why doesn't God fix their wills and restore their freedom?"

But doesn't Christian theology clearly maintain the existence of Hell? Morriston offered two responses. First, if the Bible really supports a belief in Hell (as eternal punishment), then something in the Bible is wrong. Second, it's not clear that the Bible does support a belief in Hell (as eternal punishment); Morriston pointed to an essay by Keith DeRose on the matter.

However, while it's all very interesting to look at some of the details of Christian theology, the supernatural realm does not exist, and that remains the most important reason why one should not fear spending an eternity in Hell.

Coca-Cola Crucifixions

Invesco Field at Mile High. Coors Field. I can handle that. But Coca-Cola Crucifixions? That's going a bit far. Yet, according to the Telegraph, Coca-Cola and Smart Telecommunications are sponsoring a festival in the Philippines in which people reenact the crucifixion of Jesus, in some cases using real nails. The March 20 article by Thomas Bell carries the absurdly understated title: "Easter warning: crucifixion is bad for you."

The link also shows a Reuters photo of a man hanging from a cross with nails through his hands. Well, he's cheating a bit, because his arms are tied to the crossbeam with ropes, and the nails are pounded through his palms. As I learned in my childhood church, the nails actually went through the wrists, so that they didn't tear through the flesh between the bones in the palms. (You wouldn't want people falling off their crosses!) And part of the agony of crucifixion is that it's hard to breath while hanging from the wrists, so you have to keep lifting yourself up by the nails in your wrists, until you become too exhausted to do so and suffocate to death. The man shown in the photo doesn't look especially comfortable, but the ropes are denying him his opportunity to fully share in the misery of Christ. But, then, these people don't imagine that they can come back to life after decomposing in a tomb for three days, so they get to come down off their crosses before doing too much physical damage to themselves. (While I learned little in my church about, for instance, the Christian takeover of Roman government, I learned quite a lot about crucifixions.)

Anyway, the article reports:

Many people in the Philippines consider crucifixion and self flagellation good for the soul, but it is bad for your health according to new government advice for penitents.

"We are not trying to go against the Lenten tradition here because whipping has somewhat already become some form of 'atonement for sins' for some of us," Health Secretary Francisco Duque the 3rd said.

"Getting deep cut wounds during whippings or lashings is inevitable and being so exposed during the course of the penitence, with all the heat and dust blowing in the wind, welcomes all sorts of infections and bacteria like tetanus," he explained.

Re-enactments of the Passion of Christ are common in many parts of the mostly Roman Catholic Philippines but frowned upon by the church authorities.

In San Fernando City 23 people, including two women, have signed up to re-enact the crucifixion at three "improvised Golgothas" around town. Four of them will use real nails.

The city government's website trumpets the preparations.

"The City Health Office (CHO) autoclaved all the nails to be used and will administer anti-tetanus vaccine to all the 'Cristos' to ensure their protection from possible infection," it points out. City officials will conduct an inspection of the Golgothas on Thursday. ... [Credit for link: Paul Hsieh]

Doesn't this juxtaposition of tatanus shots, made possible by germ theory and medical science, alongside ritualistic self-torture, strike anyone as, you know, odd?

Thankfully, here in Denver, reenactments of the crucifixion don't involve actual nails.

Voluntary crucifixion, while morally reprehensible, is similar to prostitution in that it should be legal for consenting adults, however stupid and self-destructive it is. But for the local government to sanction the event is -- I struggle to come up with an adequate adjective. Absurd? Ridiculous? Hysterical? Detestable? Horrific?

But maybe Coca-Cola can push the gig a bit further. Do you think sugar water can be subject to transubstantiation?