Out of the Mouths of Atheists

While Western man continues to attempt to find meaning and purpose in life in a post-Christian culture many atheists seem to continue to flaunt the satisfaction that comes from their godless worldview. Atheists such as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens argue that atheism is the only way of life that fulfills all of man's desires. Yet, this is contradicted by every atheist who lived before them from Bertrand Russell to Friedrich Nietzsche. In their most candid of writings atheists have shown that they desire and need God--that their life is not complete without God.

I made the following video years ago showcasing this very candid fact:

How To Ruin a Cake

I like cake.
Do you like cake?
I think everyone likes cake.
Perhaps I'll go bake a cake.
I'm going to be very liberal about it.
Instead of two eggs I'm going to use three or four.
Instead of sugar I might use salt.
I'm not sure how long it'll bake for.
I'm not conservative when it comes to cake.
I don't care much for the recipe book.
This will be a new cake.
A change in cake.
I think everyone likes cake.
Do you like cake?
I like cake.

The God of All Possible Worlds

Ontological arguments are strictly a priori ways of attempting to prove God's existence by way of modal logic. What this means is that within reason alone they set out to show that certain propositions are impossible, necessary, or possible. Compare this with an argument that might point to the Big Bang and state that the best explanation of the event is God. An ontological argument never leaves the realm of intuition and logic. A priori arguments do not start from the world and argue to God, rather we use modal logic to show what must and/or could be true of the world.

Take the following statements:

(a) The moon is made of cheese.
(b) Bob is a married bachelor.
(c) Triangles have three sides.

Let's examine them.

We all know that (a) is false. The moon is not made of cheese; however, it is possible that the moon is made of cheese. We can all imagine in our heads that the moon be made of cheese. There is nothing illogical about the statement. It might not be true of this world that the moon is made of cheese, but it is certainly possible that the moon could be made of cheese. Therefore, it is possible, but not actual that the moon is made of cheese.

Proposition (b) asserts that Bob is both married and a bachelor, but this seems absurd. The very definition of a bachelor is a person who is not married. So put another way what we are stating is that Bob is married and not married. Can you think of a person who could both be married and not married at the same time? If I held in my hand a piece of chalk and told you that the piece of chalk in my hand was not a piece of chalk what would you conclude? Hopefully you'd conclude that I was speaking nonsense. Another example is like trying to imagine a square circle or a one-ended stick. Can you form an image of such things? Obviously not, they are both completely contradictory. Therefore, it is an impossibility that Bob is a married bachelor--there is no possible world (as in a state of affairs) where (b) could be true.

Finally, when we come to (c) we read that all triangles have three sides. This is necessarily true. If a triangle exists then it must have three sides. There is no possible world where a triangle can exist and not have three sides. Triangles have tree sides by definition. Therefore, all it means for something to be necessarily true is that it must be true.

From all of that hopefully you understand what is meant for something to be impossible, possible, and necessary. Now I am going to present an argument for God's existence by Alvin Plantinga as formulated by Norman Geisler. Please do not freak out and quit reading when I state it as I'm going to break it down so that it will hopefully be accessible to everyone.

(1) The property has maximal greatness entails the property has maximal excellence in every possible world.
(2) Maximal excellence entails omniscience, omnipotence, and moral perfection.
(3) Maximal greatness is possibly exemplified.
(4) There is a world W* and an essence E* such that E* is exemplified in W* and E* entails has maximal greatness in W*.
(5) For any object x, if x exemplifies E*, then x exemplifies the property has maximal excellence in every possible world.
(6) E* entails the property has maximal excellence in every possible world.
(7) If W* had been actual, it would have been impossible that E* fail to be exemplified.
(8) What is impossible does not vary from world to world.
(9) There exists a being that has maximal excellence in every world.
(10) The being that has maximal excellence exists in the actual world.

WHAT?! you say? Stick with me.

Take a look at the following diagram (click to enlarge):



Has it all become clear? No? Good, I'm not done.

The first world is the one in which we live. The others are possible worlds, but not actual worlds. Please note that what I mean by possible world is not anther planet, but think rather a parallel universe. I am speaking of what might be, or what could be if things were different in reality. We know that in world 1 the moon is not made of cheese, but it is possible for the moon to be made of cheese in another world. We also know that it is not true that Bob could be a married bachelor in the actual world, nor could it be true in any possible world. Thus, while the moon could be made of cheese in another possible world, there is no world where Bob could be married and not married, a square circle could exist, or we could come across a one-ended stick. Finally, it is true of every world that if a triangle exists, then that triangle must have three sides.

Now, "maximal excellence" means to have omniscience, omnipotence, and moral perfection in some world, whereas "maximal greatness" refers to having maximal excellence in every possible world.

So, maximal greatness is possible in some world; that is, it is possible that there is a world where there is an object which is omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect in all possible worlds (just as it is possible that there is some world where the moon is made of cheese.) There is nothing contradictory or impossible about a world where both of these notions are known to be true. Therefore, it is possible that there is some object in some world that is maximally great in all possible worlds.

What this means is say that in world 2 the moon is made of cheese, this is quite possible. Fine, but that's all it means. Perhaps we say in world 3 it is true that there is an object which is maximally excellent, meaning that there is an object that is omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect. Cool, neato, nifty.

However, now we state that in world 5 there is an object that is maximally great; that is, there is a possible world where an object is maximally excellent in every possible world. Yet, if it's maximally excellent in every possible world, then there must be a maximally excellent object in the actual world. Seeing as that the actual world must be a possible world, it must also be necessarily true that there exists an object in our world that is omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect (God).

Therefore, God exists.

Screaming for the Silent

If you read this, please make sure you read the last section as well. I do not wish to damn anyone personally on an issue I am discussing propositionally. It is not my job to judge the world.

In an earlier post I argued that without a transcendent point of reference there is no absolute standard for teleological declarations about the world. If there is no God, then there is no final purpose for anything in life, and therefore we can rationalize the world how we see fit. However, there is a God, and therefore there is an intrinsic foundation for life. This is something we all know as we're built in the image of the God who created us. So, then, to hold to positions that we innately know as false we attempt to redefine the world before us. This brings us to the position which has been branded to be "pro-choice." Remove everything you know about abortion from your mind and think about how you would answer if someone asked you if you were pro-choice. You'd probably give an emphatic and resounding “Yes!” Who doesn't like choice? Go to Starbucks, everyone likes choice. Choice and free will are a God given perfection, but that's not what the pro-choice position is about, nor is it about planning for your parenthood. It's about the justification of killing babies; unborn babies, but babies nonetheless. Let's turn, then, to the different arguments used for the pro-choice position and my response.

“It's not a baby, it's a clump of cells (parasite, invader, attacker, blood and tissue, etc)!”

Word games. Of course if it's just a clump of cells, a parasite, or a blood thirsty invader from hell we're going to want to kill it. However, that's not what we are talking about here. From the moment of conception a fertilized ovum has everything from sex to skin tone present and determined in the child's genetic code. These qualities are present regardless of those which exist in the mother. This isn't merely a clump of cells that happen to reside in the mother's body; it's a completely unique and distinct entity that has things true of it that are not true of the mother. Further, the fact remains that this “clump of cells” is in a state of development that was once true of all of us as well. Take a petri dish and scrape a clump of cells from your mouth, head, arms, or wherever you please and wait a couple of months. No human is going to develop, and this is because the entity in the womb is not a clump of cells, it has attributes true of it that are not true of the cells that make up the rest of your body. This is why people get abortions--it's not just a clump of cells, it's a living human being. The clump of cells that make up the child are not merely a clump of cells much like cancer is not merely just another clump of cells. It's something radically different.

As for those who call the unborn a parasite or an attacker of the mother, I think they really need to take the time to evaluate their position. This is a game of gymnastical semantics at its worst. What does it even mean to call the unborn a parasite or invader? The child in the womb is neither as it is in its natural and rightful place. It isn't doing anything wrong or immoral. It's following its natural and biological role in the child/mother relationship. Call the baby what you will, call it Adolf Hitler if you want, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a human being. It might make it easier on the conscience to murder, but it doesn't change the fact that it is human.

“We cannot be sure when life begins.”

Imagine you're driving down the road late at night and in your headlights you see what might be a small child crawling across the road. Do you continue driving because you aren't sure? No, you slow down and make sure that you aren't going to kill anyone. If the question of what is and what is not life is above your pay grade, then it's time to slow down and take a look at the facts before you continue. No one acts on this principle in life. If it's possible that my dinner might be poison, then I'm not going to eat it. If I think pulling the trigger might result in the loss of life, then I'm going to remove my finger. Agnosticism is not a platform for action, but caution!

“It's not life, it's potential life.”

Potentialities are states of affairs which may or may not come to be. I am currently sitting down at my computer but the potential is there for me to get up and grab something to drink. However, that potential does not become actual until I choose to get up and do so. Sperm and eggs have the potential to create life, but they are not life. Once they combine the potential for life is no longer a mere possibility, it is an actuality. This actuality, as was already stated, is something that is not merely a sperm or an egg as it has properties that are not true of a sperm or egg, but rather are true of life.

Imagine that you have before you a blueprint and parts of a chair. Imagine going to your tool box and grabbing everything you need to assemble the chair to bring it from potential to actual. Now wait. How long did you have to wait before the chair became actual? The answer, of course, is forever. Potentialities do not actualize themselves, they can only be made actual from without. However, a fertilized ovum develops naturally on its own and only requires time, air, water, and food which we all need as well. Potential life does not reach adulthood, only actual life does. Nor does potential life require an abortion. No one dismembers their own reproductive organs because they hold the potential for life.

“The unborn lack thought, size, feelings, etc.”

Arguments like these are a sure sign that our culture has lost the ability to think analytically. In logic there is a form of argumentation called a reductio ad absurdum which is Latin for "reducible to the absurd." Most arguments for abortion fall into this category of fallacious argumentation, but none as obvious as these. Basically all this term means is that if one takes up a position then it implicitly leads to absurd conclusions. For example, if being human is dependent on size then those larger than others would be more human. Size has no relation to how human we are, nor does feeling, awareness, or intelligence. Those who are unconscious, unaware, or mentally retarded are not any less human than those who are awake and reading (and understanding) the landmark work on mathematics and logic, Principia Mathematica. If we black out we do not move from being human, to non-human, and then back to human again once we wake up.

“Women have a right to choose.”

Of course women have a right to choose. Women have a right to choose to do whatever they want. This choice was granted to us by God way back with Adam and Eve. Choice is a good thing, but good things can be used in the wrong way. Women can choose to have abortions, and I can choose to rape women. Both can be carried out through the gift of choice, but just as rape is not justified because of the right to choose, neither is abortion. Life always comes before choice on the scale of values. If there was no life, then there would be no choice. Choice is not the ultimate trump card nor is it a warrant to do whatever we please. Yes, you have a right to choose, but a right to choose what? A right to choose to murder your child? You might have that God given potential, but it's not justified merely because you can do it.

“It's my body! I can do what I please!”

No, it's not your body. The child is merely within your body. If there are attributes true of the embryo that are not true of you, then it's not your body--it's the baby's body. Do what you want with your body, but let the baby be. And really, you don't have a right to do whatever you please with your own body. Your body belongs to God, so take care of it.

“Abortion is a matter of privacy.”

Just like choice, privacy is not the sonum bonum or greatest good. I don't have a right to do whatever I desire just because I close my door. If men don't have the right to beat their wives in the privacy of their own home, then women don't have the right to murder their children behind closed doors.

“You're a man, and therefore should have no say in the matter of abortion.”

Those who have never been slaves or married still have a right to argue that slavery and divorce are wrong. In fact, sometimes being outside of a situation allows one to truly be objective. The war in Iraq is not limited to those in the military nor is the current economy limited to stock brokers and CEOs. The issue of abortion is dealing with a debate of person-hood, and I am a person.

“Abortion is fundamental to liberating women.”

Killing your own children is not liberating. All it does is liberate one from the responsibilities of being a parent and taking care of a child. How our society can take this issue from being a coward to being liberated is beyond me. If abortion is necessary for the rights of women, then only males should be open for being aborted. No one seems to care about liberating those in the womb. If one wants to find liberation, then they need to live according to God's design no matter how hard that choice might appear to be.

Further (and here is the irony of the left), the pro-choice side does not treat women as what they are worth. It treats them as amoral idiots. Take for example the Ryan-Delauro Bill which was introduced a couple months ago. It intended to "prevent unintended pregnancies, reduce the need for abortion and support parents" through seeking common ground in the abortion debate. In Congressman Tim Ryan's own words the idea behind this bill is "we have to have birth control and contraceptive offered to [poor women] who don't have access to contraception... there's no other way we're going to be able to reduce [abortions]." In effect what Ryan and the bill are presupposing is that women are too dumb to be educated in realizing that killing a human being is always wrong. You see, what the left gives with one hand it takes with the other. From one side of their mouth they argue that abortions empower women and liberate them and then from the other they push bills that argue they're too stupid to be able to realize on their own they should not kill their children. Women, apparently, are without the means to make proper choices because it is the right thing to do, instead the demagogues have to create a certain socioeconomic environment in which women will make the right decisions by handing them a pill or money. This is what the pro-choice side's logic always is: The politician is personally against abortion, but publicly for it, yet they always want to reduce it; not through moral logic and intuition, but political coercion. Apparently, in our world, some women just don't have the capability to be morally upright without the government holding their hand.

“You can't force a victim of rape to have a child.”

Last time I checked one percent of the cases involving abortion were due to rape. This percentage might be higher because not all women will admit to being raped, or it could even be lower because many use rape as an excuse to get an abortion (the “Roe” of Roe v. Wade admitted she lied about being raped). Whatever the percentage, this isn't an argument for allowing abortion on demand. Exceptions never define the norm. There is a chance that wearing your seat belt could end up killing you in certain accidents, but this doesn't mean that we should never wear a seat belt. A couple months ago when my cat had a severe facial injury I drove well over the speed limit to get her to a vet, and if I was pulled over a cop probably would have let me go. This does not mean, however, that the speed limit should not be legislated or left to personal conscience, choice, or privacy.

That being said, appeals to rape for abortion are appeals to emotion and pity. I hate to be cold and logical when speaking of inhuman acts of humanity, but just because a woman is raped does not mean that she has a right to commit murder. When a woman is raped she is violated, degraded, and is left with permanent scars, both physical and psychological that she will have to deal with for the rest of her life. This does not mean that she can now violate, degrade, and permanently scar the baby. The rapist might deserve to have his head crushed in, but the unborn and innocent child in the womb does not. Indeed, the violence of abortion parallels the violence of rape. If a man decides to use his body to destroy another this is called rape, but if a woman does it then this is argued to be a fundamental right, the logic of the circumstances and the morals held are contradictory. A woman should not choose to compound the indignity by committing murder, she should bring about life and turn her unfortunate circumstances into something wonderful.

"What if the mother's life is in danger?"

Just as in the issue of rape, exceptions do not define the norm. Cases where the mother's life is in danger when it comes to pregnancy are extremely rare. However, when the mother's life is in danger because of the child that child is no longer innocent. Sure, the child is not aware, nor is it attacking the mother intentionally, but the child has become a danger to the mother's well being. If I was sleepwalking and acting violently, then even though I was not acting intentionally other people still have the right to prevent me from acting out, and that includes lethal force. If there was a war and the enemy was strapping bombs to children and forcing them to run at us, then we are justified in gunning them down.

This is an issue that is between the mother and the father. The child, unlike the ridiculous definitions of pro-baby killers in the first argument, has launched an actual attack on the mother. Life may be taken away from guilty parties in order to protect the innocent. However, the mother, in an act of heroism and true love may give her life so the child may live. This is logically consistent with the logic of the pro-life position and the moral law. In fact, even before abortion was made legal, this was always the case.

“What about the quality of life or circumstances the child might be born into?”

Logical presuppositions at their worst again. Implicit in such an argument is the claim that it is better to murder someone than to bring them into a imperfect state of affairs. Surely it's not better to kill me than to inflict a harsh life upon me. My life was far from perfect growing up. I lived in a house where my grandmother would stack cans in front of her bedroom door because she was afraid my grandfather would try to come into her room and kill her in the middle of the night. My parents had me while they were in high school and I'm sure an abortion entered into their minds at some point or another. I'm sure it was probably even discussed by some members of my family. If it's a legal option, then it's always going to be brought up somewhere along the way. Yet, I doubt there is one person who would argue that this world or myself would be better off if I was never born and murdered in the womb. We can never predict the quality of life that a child might have. The grace of God is beyond anything that humanity can know, and regardless of the home a child may be born into, or the physical defects it might bear, everyone has a right to life. It is never better to kill an innocent human being for the betterment of that human being. Abortion does not make life better for the child, it terminates life for that child. Abortion does not avoid child abuse, it is child abuse.

“Are you going to adopt all these babies that are being born?”

No, I'm not and I fail to see what this point has to do with anything. Just because I'm not going to take slaves into my house and take care of them doesn't mean that I cannot speak out against the evils of slavery. Abortion is morally wrong, and regardless of if or if not I fulfill whatever moral duty another party wants to impose on me has absolutely no bearing on the issue at hand. The failures of another person never justify our own actions. This is a classic childhood defense for when we do something we know is wrong.

“Pro-lifers are for the death penalty, their morals are contradictory.”

First, even if contradictory it says nothing about the issue of abortion. Pro-lifers might believe that 2+2=5, or that the sun revolves around the Earth, but this does not mean that abortion is moral. This is an ad hominem, that is, an attack against the person instead of the issue.

Second, not all pro-life people are for the death penalty.

Third, and finally, the pro-life and pro-death penalty position are not contradictory. They are both based on the position that life is sacred and that you must give what you have taken. We are not pro-life because we are against killing a human being, we are against baby killing because the child in the womb is innocent. The convicted criminal is not innocent, he has taken the life of another, and must give what he has taken from another. You must pay for what you have done, the child in the womb has nothing to pay for, they have done nothing wrong.

Finally, those who bring up this issue seem to be more concerned about protecting murderers than the unborn.

“Making abortion illegal would lead to back-alley abortions.”

We've all heard the graphic imagery: back-alleys, rusty coat hangers, bloody bathtubs, and dead women. This argument is not for the rights of women, it makes women look like idiots. Do people really believe that women are going to start grabbing rusty coat hangers and attempting to perform abortions on themselves? Seriously now. The pro-choice crowd seem to think that women are a bunch of insane people on par with junkies who are hallucinating about bugs being under their skin so they grab razors to extract them.

Moreover, this appeal to emotion is nonsense. If abortion is murder, then we should not build clinics to keep murderers safe. There are people that are building bombs illegally in their homes right now, and I'm sure this isn't very safe, but that doesn't mean we should construct bomb building facilities for these individuals.

“Abortion will help fix the over-population problem, world hunger, poor, etc.”

Because of our wonderful school system the more educated people become the more you start to hear them say really crazy things. This crowd admits to the person-hood of the child in the womb, but then still argues that we should murder them for a specific end. This might be to use the child to cure a disease, or the help fix a problem of overpopulation. Whatever the reason might be they all fall into the category that the ends justify any means. I'm sure that many goals could be achieved through mass murder. Indeed, both the Nazis and Planned Parenthood started by setting their sights on eliminating an inferior race of people for the betterment of the species. If anybody wants to challenge this strong claim then merely read the writings of Hitler and Margaret Sanger. The echo and connection between them is the same, as Sanger's magazine Birth Control Review even had articles by Ernst Rüdin whose ideology was picked up by the Nazi Party.

If I desire a position at work of someone who has status over me, then there are many ways I can attempt to take it, but this does not mean that all of those means are justified just because the ends are desirable. I could work harder than this person, or I could kill all those who get in my way. Both lead to the outcome, but obviously these means are not equally justified. If you really think that killing another human being will help better the world, then I suggest volunteering and killing yourself instead choosing for someone else that they are the ones to die.

“Abortion is a moral issue, and we cannot legislate morality.”

Sure we can. In fact, all laws legislate a morality. Speed limits say that one ought to not drive faster than the posted limit. Oughts are what one should do, and what one should do is the definition of morality. One ought not kill another human being and so murder is illegal--morality legislated! Legislating morality is unavoidable, as even arguing that we should not legislate morality is legislating the morality that we ought to not push our morals onto others.

“Do not push your morals on me. ”

Anyone who utters such a phrase has pulled the rug out from under their own feet. They are demanding that we should not push our morality onto them, when they are pushing their morality (i.e. we should not push morality onto others) onto us. It's not a matter of pushing morality, but what is the moral law that transcends us all? I do not have my morals, and you do not have yours, we share the same morality which transcends every society that has ever lived. I'm not pushing morality, I'm merely speaking of what we all already know in our hearts: murdering babies is wrong.

“Making abortion illegal will not stop abortions from taking place.”

The last time I checked there have been no laws which have successfully removed any such behavior from the world. Murder, theft, rape, and etc. all still take place regardless of the laws which are in place. The nation used to be divided on the issue of slavery, yet how many people do you know that are for slavery today? Not many, I assume. Slavery moved from being legal to being illegal. Since abortion has become legal do you know what we've become divided on today? That's right, abortion. If anyone actually believes that lifting the bans on murder and theft will have no effect on the extent that they take place they are living in another world. If I found myself in a store and I was told that stealing the merchandise in it was a matter of personal conscience you can be damn sure than my rationale would lead to me to taking everything in sight.

“What if you woke up one morning to find a man surgically implanted to your body that requires your body to survive?”

In 1971 Judith Jarvis Thompson made an argument that made a huge blow to the pro-life position. Ironically, I doubt you will find any pro-choicer that has even heard of it (but to be charitable, I doubt you will find many pro-lifers that can give a compelling case for their position as well). Greg Koukl has responded wonderfully to the argument called the “Violinist.” Its strength lies in the fact that it assumes that those in the womb are human, but that we have a right to kill them anyway.

Thompson asks us to imagine that we wake up one morning and find that on our back a famous violinist has been surgically added to our circulatory system. The Society of Music Lovers had on their hands a violinist that would die unless they found someone who could support his kidneys for nine months. They found that the only person in the world who could do this was you. So in the middle of the night they kidnapped you and left you in the hospital to sustain this man until he could be removed. The doctors inform you that unfortunately you do not have a right to remove this man from your back and you must remain in bed at the hospital for nine months regardless of your own personal feelings on the matter. The doctor tells you that the violinist is a person, and that all persons have a right to life, and that life is greater than our rights to our own bodies. It might be heroic to do such a thing for this stranger, but is it a moral necessity? Now imagine if we were told that you were going to have to be stuck with this man for the rest of your life. Surely this is absurd, and thus the pro-life argument is fallacious.

There are several things that can be said in response to this. First, the child in the womb is naturally where it should be. Females have a biological disposition to have children, the child is not in a place where it should not be. The violinist is not where it should be, and it has violated the rights of another in an unorthodox fashion. If the logic of the argument is taken up, then we are left once again at looking at the children in the womb as a predator. This is just not true. Predators are by definition where they are not supposed to be. All children in the womb are where they are supposed to be.

Second, there is a difference in removing life support and actively killing another. This is why people can be morally removed from life support. We are not murdering them, we are merely letting death take its natural course. Abortion is not removing life support, it is chopping the baby up and sucking out its brain. While we might be able to argue that we can remove support for the violinist, we would never argue that it would be okay to slice him to pieces to remedy the situation.

Third, the fallacious nature of the argument becomes apparent when we replace the stranger and stranger with a mother and a child. Surely we do not have to save everyone that we can regardless of the cost, but we do have a duty to our own children. I'm sure I could donate my organs right now to save the life of others, but it is not morally wrong for me to not do so. However, if my father or mother were going to die and my kidney could save them, then it would be abhorrent for me to refuse to help them. If my parents have no obligation to me in the womb (and remember this argument assumes those in the womb have all the rights of others), then there is no obligation that they have to me outside of the womb.

Thompson's thought experiment falls on the same sword of every other argument for abortion. They allow us to kill and remove support from any human being whenever we please. I must commend her, however, for actually trying to give a logical reason against the right to life instead of spouting the nonsense that we normally hear from the left.

“I'm against abortion personally, but...”

This makes absolutely no sense. Personally I'm against drug dealers selling drugs to children, but this doesn't mean that I'm going to make it a right for drug dealers to deliver drugs to children. When someone comes to you and tells you that they are personally against abortion but they want to make sure it's a right for everyone else they are either lying through their teeth for political reasons or just inept at thinking logically about morality. No one would take me seriously if I said I was personally a racist, but that legally everyone should have a right to equality--nor would anyone vote me into office. Our personal convictions naturally influence public policy, and to be personally against abortion but allow it in the public square is to be for baby killing. Period. When a baby is murdered it doesn't make any difference if those who watched were personally pro-baby killing or against baby killing. Listening to your neighbors murder their children doesn't free you from any moral obligation if you decide to personally not take part in the murder.

“A pro-lifer killed an abortion doctor.”

So what? I don't care if the president of some pro-life group out there decided to cook and eat their two year old, what does that prove about anything? This is like when someone argues that Christians do bad things, therefore Christianity is false. What type of logic is this? It's not reason in any form; it's a smoke screen used to fool the masses when all real argumentation has failed. Where is the cry for the fourteen mothers who are killed a year in abortion clinics? We shed not a tear for them. No, we instead cry out for the half a dozen abortion doctors who have been killed since Roe v. Wade.

“Pro-lifers stigmatize women by using harsh language and showing them graphic pictures.”

Are the words and pictures an accurate representation of what is taking place? If I show someone graphic pictures of the Holocaust and describe it using strong language does that mean I am doing something wrong? It's a matter of fact. If abortion kills a baby, then it isn't wrong to call the pro-choice movement pro-baby killing. That is, by tautology, what pro-choice then means. This isn't hard to figure out. What this cry is really asking for is that we sugar coat the issue so that it is easier on the heart, mind, and soul of all parties involved. It is not loving to sugar coat harsh realities and lie to ourselves.

At the end of the day...

With all this being said I do not think that all women who get abortions are murderers. Murder requires the intentional killing of an innocent human being. Our society through organizations such as Planned Parenthood has brain washed millions into believing that those in the womb are not human, that they really are nothing but a clump of cells. All abortion kills the child in the womb, but not all women realize what they have chosen to do. This is why legislation which requires ultra-sounds and education about the child in the womb does not pass. If the mothers saw what was within them then not many would go through with the abortion. Fewer abortions are bad for business.

Regardless of what mothers (and fathers) have done, and regardless of if we realize that the entity in the womb is human or not God can repair and forgive all sins. If you have had an abortion and feel a sense of guilt, might I suggest that this is only natural. Guilt is something we all deal with, and the secular world will have no answers for us, no matter how hard they try to develop a way to rid us of guilt's epidemic. The only answer for guilt is forgiveness, and this is exactly what God provided for us on the cross. On that stake of wood the ultimate death and murder of an innocent took place, and it was through His blood that true liberation, fundamental rights, and ends must come.

At the end of the day it comes down to a matter that the culture we live in has lost our Godly roots. Ignoring the revelation of God found in Scripture and nature we are left attempting to define everything ourselves. When this occurs it isn't hard, indeed, it's natural and expected that we come to the wrong conclusions. In the end, humans are not worth anything because of the development of our bodies, feelings, brain waves, or emotions. We, as the Declaration of Independence states, have inalienable rights because they are endowed by the Creator. If there is no God, then each man is worth only what we deem them to be worth. Under this logic there is absolutely nothing wrong in killing those in the womb or even our neighbors. It is not hard to apply the same arguments that the left use against those in the womb and apply them to justify killing our children at five, ten, or even fifty years old. This is because the logic of the left is not grounded in anything but utilitarian ethics, ad hoc declarations, and social contracts. That is, the means are always justified by the current desired ends, ungrounded morals, and opinion polls. No longer does America seem to have her sight fixed on God above, but instead attempts to direct the ship lost in the storm by its own sails. Unfortunately, fixating on those sails will never allow us to avoid the sharp rocks on the horizon, and we'll never see what hit us until we have already wrecked. Though, perhaps we already have, and we are merely witnessing the death toll.

Of Cats & Men

[I wrote this months ago, but I like it so I'm revisiting it. Talli is alive and well.]

I have a cat. Her name is Metallicat, a portmanteau of “Metallica” and “cat.” I normally hate cats, but this one grew on me for whatever reason. Maybe that would be true of all cats, but Talli (that's her shortened name) seems to be different than other felines, almost dog-like in many ways, but still the stuck up “it's on my terms"/“I own you” attitude that most cats possess and carry with them--and she carries it well.

Two days ago I awoke to find her on the patio resembling a creature from a Japanese horror film. Her lower jaw seemed to be missing, her tongue was hanging out, and there was blood pouring out of her mouth onto the tile below. The part that I can't shake from my mind was how absolutely pathetic she looked. One eye half sealed shut from the blood, she had her head dropped towards the floor, with her one untarnished eye gazing up at me with this look that seemed to cry, “please, Chris, help me.” I died inside and upon closer inspection her jaw was still there, but it had been ripped from the side of her skull and was hanging off. She had no idea what she looked like, but it made me want to throw up all over myself. I don't know if it was the sight of blood, or just that it was my cat that bled there before me. Either way, I wish I didn't eat those four donuts before bed.

A human would have wiped the flood of red that was gushing from their mouth aside or spit it out on the ground, but Talli just sat there and let it flow. It was disturbing and in many ways surreal. She was ignorant, but at the same time she knew something was wrong. I could see it in her eyes, and they continued to scream for help. I can't help but think that this is how we look in front of God. We dress up in our pretty clothes and superficial smiles, but God sees through our facade and observes us as the bloody, broken, battered, and bruised creatures that we are. He knows we need help, and I think we all do as well. And so we foolishly turn towards religion, rituals, self-actualization, government, fame, success, drugs and everything else on this endless but ultimately empty list. Sin wrecks havoc on the world as we are oblivious and ignorant of most of its effects and existence. When we turn to God He sees us for what we are and the absolute devastation to our mind, bodies, and soul shows through. I doubt we will ever realize the devastation that God, and only God, offers to save us from. Talli never will as well.

My mind raced as I took in the sad state of affairs. What could have caused this to her? I assumed it was an animal, but the trauma seemed to be concentrated on her face and there appeared to be no bite marks, scratches, or signs of a fight. If it was an animal then she probably wouldn't be sitting on my porch but off dead or dying with half of her face missing and her body fractured into pieces. The worst part was the gagging sounds she would make as she coughed and choked up her own blood. Perhaps if she would have just spit it out or wiped it from her mouth she could have breathed comfortably, but no, like us, she didn't know any better and kept trying to swallow and breathe through her injuries. I assumed it was a car that hit her, and she was rushed off to the vet.

My aunt was with me, and she had placed her into a laundry basket, covered it with a towel, and was holding her in as I drove. Talli wanted out, but my aunt held her down despite her cries. It wasn't safe for her to be leaping about, but Talli had no idea. She was probably in extreme pain and terrified at the same time, but it was for her best. If I came across a wild non-game animal in the woods that had become entangled in a hunter's trap I might have to tranquilize it so that it would neither harm me or itself further. The dart would pierce the animals skin, and the creature would feel pain and fear. "Why was this happening? How can this person be good when they are shooting me?" Then I might come close and have to tighten the trap around its leg some more so the mechanism could finally release like a Chinese finger trap. Once again, from the animal's perspective: why? "This person cannot possible be good, they have only come to cause me more pain." Yet, then the trap would release and they would be free. Might this not be true of God and suffering? The Bible promises that while evil, pain, and suffering exist, they are there for an ultimate good. We look at the world and attempt to rationalize what is occurring, but the pain only continues, grows worse, and then sometimes subsides, but we will not always see the logical connection of how through the pain, salvation came. We lack God's transcendent vantage point, and like Talli trapped in this plastic cage wanting to get out, we fail to realize that it's for our own good.

When we reached the vet we rushed her in and handed her over to the doctor. They had me fill out some forms, and the receptionist called around town to make sure that I wasn't lying when I said she had received her shots required by law. Then she asked if Talli was spelled with an 'i' or 'y.' I told her it was with an 'i' but that Talli probably wouldn't know the difference. Everyone in the waiting room laughed and I wondered if I'd ever come to a point in my life where I wouldn't have to crack jokes. Probably not. A few minutes later the doctor called us into her office and we talked about her injuries. She was going to be fine, but she might need surgery. If so, it was going to be expensive and I thought about making a joke but I forced myself not to. Talli was brought into the doorway cleaned up and wrapped in a towel, I glanced at her quickly, but then put my back to her so I didn't have to look again--cue the jokes.

I thought about putting Talli down or just telling them I couldn't afford surgery, but the doctor couldn't tell me the specifics without further examination so I gave them a deposit and we left. That evening when I was showering for work I weighed the idea of putting her down verses paying for surgery. She would also probably need more care later on down the road. The simple pragmatic answer would be to put her down. It was an option, but one that I couldn't choose. She still had half of her life left and I had a responsibility to her. The money wouldn't kill me, and I could do whatever needed to be done to pay the bill. I'd have to sacrifice a couple things but it was the right thing to do. I realized that the damn cat would never realize the cost of her injuries, but I don't think we'll ever see the cost of Christ dying on the cross for our own either. Some take the name of their Savior and mock it, use it as a swear word, or try to drive it out of the market place of ideas (because they have run out of ideas) while my cat pees on my bathroom rug. Stupid people, and stupid cat.

I received a call after surgery and the doctor said she was going to be fine and I could pick her up on Monday. Looking back now I'm not sure what caused her injury. It wasn't an animal and I really don't think it was a car. The wound was too localized and almost deliberate. It makes me think a neighbor threw something at her or took a bat to her head. If it's true I hope they get their skull crushed in and are left in a ditch to die over a period of days like the pathetic fuck that they are. Not the most Christian thing to say, but it's how I feel. And looking back on the mangled face of my cat I can't help but think of the pain and suffering I've caused to others on so many different levels. It's almost as if God was making me look into the face of sin itself. I guess it's hypocritical of me to get angry with whomever (if anyone) did that to Talli. I can't say I've smashed in the head of another creature, but I know I have it in me; and before God I probably already have. That ditch is there for all of us pathetic fucks to die in, but God can rescue us from it. The choice is ours, but only if we realize some things about our own limited knowledge and our relation to the God that sacrificed His life for us. Talli will never fully realize what happened to her or the condition she was in, nor will she ever really realize the extremely small and petty sacrifice I had to make for her. We're a small level above my cat in awareness, and though limited, we can grasp small portions of the larger picture, but we'll never grasp it all. I suggest you bring yourself before God as you are and I suggest you do it soon. The ditch isn't getting any further away, it's being dug by your own hands.

RE: Complaining In Restaurants

I've worked in the service industry for nine years now, take that as my curriculum vitæ if you will. I think, therefore, that this grants me my PhD in serving making me an authority in the field. While there are nuances and tricks to the job, I believe that if I was to bestow upon anyone one piece of advice before they started it would be this: As a server it is very easy to begin to view your tables as just another step between you and rent. This does not lead to good service as the customer has been dehumanized, and anything dehumanized has been robbed of how it should be treated. The trick, then, is to view each table as your job in and of itself. Why is this so? Simply because if you reverse the perspective from waiter to “waitee” the paradigm shift becomes obvious. While it's descriptive to say that a table is merely another task I have to run through to go home, it doesn't tell the whole story; just as it's not ample to say that being in love is to merely be having one's brain secreting such and such a chemical. To the table the meal could be a very special night out, or it could be a dinner that they have been saving up for for a long time; the possibilities are endless. Sure, you have the people who go out to eat for the night where the food is just the backdrop for conversation, or a business deal, but the exceptions never define the norm, and therefore, it is the server's job to attempt to make every table's experience special.

Holding all that in mind I can completely understand when a guest feels upset when they have spent a lot of time and money preparing for an evening only to have it ruined because of the service. Anger and frustration is only a natural reaction, and this understandably leads to wanting their voice to be heard. Yet, I do not feel more sympathy when a guest complains about their server. This is because in the service industry when a server receives a guest complaint they immediately have their job on the line. I think we can all remember times in our lives that would have been destroyed if we lost our jobs at that moment. I have seen people who I thought were the nicest and most genuine people in the world lose their job over complaints and I have seen others get fired who had it coming. My point, however, is that while the guest may be completely correct about the server's performance I still find this irrelevant to voicing the complaint. This is because no one can be perfect all the time. While not excuses for poor service, perhaps the server might have just been taken the wrong way in something they said, perhaps they were stuck in a situation that caused the guest's evening to suffer, perhaps they were going through a rough time in their personal life causing their mind to be elsewhere, or perhaps they just might have been purposely rude, but I still believe that they should be given the benefit of the doubt. If the server really just doesn't deserve their job then the chances are that they will not be working there much longer anyway.

During Jesus' sermon in the sixth chapter of Luke Jesus tells his listeners that if they are slapped they should turn the other cheek and if they have their coat stolen they should offer the thieves their shirt as well. This is a radical teaching, but such is the nature of Jesus' philosophy. Contrary to people who find the Bible absurd, Jesus isn't speaking literally here. A quick note on literal is necessary. People often ask me if I take the Bible literally and what this usually equates to is, “are you really so stupid that you believe this stuff?” When I say I take the Bible literally what I mean is that what the authors intended to say is what I take the text to mean. Jesus was not speaking literally here in the sense that he was giving advice on what to do if someone slaps you in the face or steals your jacket. Jesus is using hyperbolic language to get the point across that when we are wronged we should not automatically attempt to get revenge or what we are due. There is a time to be merciful even when we have been betrayed by another. This is possible because all wrongs will ultimately be payed for either on the cross or in hell. There is a time to take things out of our hands and leave them open to the wrath of God. This is the definition of mercy, a concept shown in no greater way than by Christ's death on said cross--something that no one was worthy of, but was provided for us regardless of that fact.

Finally, there is a way to voice your opinion about the service without placing your server's job on the line. Reflect it in your tip. Contrary to this current climate of socialism one should only get paid on what they worked for. If the server did not perform their job well, then leave them a tip that lets them know. Hopefully the server will hold to the same philosophy I do and not complain about it, but attempt to reflect on what they could have done better. There are times when I realize that a table did not receive the service that they should have gotten and when I still receive a good tip I quietly thank them in my head. Regardless of whether they were ignorant of what service should be, or if they just decided to be generous even though they had to wait longer than normal the end result is the same: I'm thankful. I know there are many out there who would not be, but I think that's the point. Ultimately it's not up to us to pay back every right and wrong, it's up to God's absolute and perfect knowledge. This, I believe, is applicable to every circumstance of life regardless of the meal or milieu.

Oh, and a small postscript. I hope I did not come across as trying to present my job as some large sacrifice and role that demands great respect. It was merely a random thought that rolled off my tongue and I figured it was a wanting, yet apropos analogy for the larger point of life. May I get you anything to drink?

Science Schmience!

I'm starting to hate science. It's a shame really, because of how useful of a tool it is, but in today's society it's paraded around like it's some ultimate authority on Truth. Standing on every street corner is a white coat fundamentalist who comes at you preaching the gospel according to Science. Religion is held to be a long outdated idea; man is now living in the age where scientific investigation and technology shall answer everything that lies before him. This, however, is a belief I believe to be complete foolishness. Science, while valuable, is not all it's claimed to be.

Science could never get off the ground without philosophy.

Many people seem to think that science is really the only way to obtain knowledge. This can be summed up in the popular phrase that seeing is believing. Yet, have they ever tried to validate the scientific method using science? I'll save them some time- it cannot be done. It's like arguing that you will only believe in what you can see. The problem is that you cannot see the metaphysical and epistemological principals behind that statement. Thus, the person could not believe in the statement they just made, and therefore, the view that (only) 'seeing is believing' is false and self-defeating.

Further, science cannot use the scientific method to justify the laws of logic; the existence of truth, numbers, and values; the causality and uniformity in nature; or to demonstrate that we can trust our senses. All of these different foundations must be in place before science can even begin to operate, but they are beyond the scope of scientific investigation. Sadly, in today's day, all this goes ignored by a large portion of the public, and they seem to think that they are givens.

Science is not without interpretation.

Scientific theories are not a set of straight up facts. Behind them lie certain presuppositions and philosophical views. For example, if we came across a set of kitchen utensils ranging from a spoon to a pot and every similar object in between we could interpret this data in different ways (assuming we knew nothing about them). We could say that the pot evolved from the teaspoon, or we could say that they were designed. Further data must be brought in to determine which theory better fits the facts at hand. Applying the previous example to the diversity of life and we have theists who believe in supernatural causes, and therefore have no issue with allowing for a designer; but then we also have atheists who only hold to natural causes, and they are left with only natural mechanisms to explain the biological diverseness. The debate that follows from here lies in an area of philosophical argument, science only comes in later to add weight to the thrust of the arguments. However, as we will see in the next section, scientific understanding is always in constant flux.

To give an example of something that's not a matter or creation vs evolution; and therefore, hopefully less controversial and more blatant, let me quote particle physicist John Polkinghorne from Beyond Science:

In the middle 1950s great effort was exercised by many physicists in trying to understand some puzzling coincidences in the behavior of meson decays. They believed there must be two sorts of particles involved because they seemed to be seeing two different kinds of behavior... yet, all the other properties of these supposedly different mesons were exactly the same. After about two years of increasingly desperate but unconvincing attempts at ingenious explanation of this strange coincidence, two American-Chinese, T.D. Lee and C.N. Young, made the brilliantly simple suggestion that maybe particles in these types of decay did not have to have a unique form of behavior under reflection... there could be just one kind of meson involved, after all... that what we call parity is not conserved in weak decays.

Once Lee and Young had this new outlook they needed to show that parity, while conserved in electromagnetism, strong interactions and gravity, was actually violated in weak interactions. With this new theory in practice they discovered through further testing that this was indeed the case. Thus, as we can see, science not only has philosophy behind it, but different outlooks and ideas have a large effect on how we interpret the data.

I would argue that current scientific data does not contradict the claims of Christianity, it is the naturalistic interpretation of the data that does so. I would also admit, that parts of current scientific understanding does call for an explanation from the creationist camp. Either by incorporating the information into a creationist model, or by holding that more investigation will prove the current understanding to be false. Areas of testing that will allow for falsification must be given and examined.

Science's understanding of reality is never finalized.

Scientists are always proving themselves wrong. I'm not saying that the scientific method is invalid, but that the nature of how science operates is though checking itself by looking for circumstances where the expected result will not occur. Carl Sagan in The Demon Haunted World makes his offering at the altar of science by praising it to be the savior of humanity due to it's skeptical nature. He writes:

[T]he reason science works so well is partly that built-in error-correcting machinery. There are no forbidden questions in science, no matters too sensitive or delicate to be probed, no sacred truths. That openness to new ideas, combined with the most rigorous, skeptical scrutiny of all ideas, sifts the wheat from the chaff... [In Science] diversity and debate are valued. Opinions are encouraged to contend- substantively and in depth.

If science were to argue that the current understanding of the universe is how it actually is then the entire endeavor would end in ultimate failure. If science closed the book on light when James Clerk Maxwell argued that electromagnetism spread through space by means of the aether this theory would have completely fallen short on explaining the reality. In the twentieth century Einstein demonstrated that light had a wave/particle duality. Then Paul Dirac gave the first quantum field theory giving a quantum mechanical account of light. The scientist's work is never done, and therefore, we must be careful to allow science to have the final say on matters because scientific scrutiny always looks at itself as currently incomplete and incorrect.

When it comes to understanding the universe it seems that the more we come to learn, we ironically find that we know less and less. We used to believe that the atom was indivisible, then we discovered subatomic particles, and things got even messier when we found quarks, photons, and neutrinos. Ptolmy's geocentricism was moved aside when Copernicus came upon the scene with heliocentricism, and Newton's view on gravity was replaced by Einstein's. What awaits us in the future? Stephen Hawking ends his book A Brief History of Time saying that we one day might know the mind of God. If we can only find a theory that explains the totality of the universe, then we can be like God and know the answers to the why the universe is the way it is as well as how the universe operates. Yet, the more we crack into the universe's shell, the more we realize we really are not any closer than when we began. And sadder yet, if science actually does one day come to completely answer all the questions in life, then man kind is left in ultimate despair.

Science cannot answer man's ultimate purpose and guide him in life.

The musical group King Crimson sang in Epitaph that "knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules." When it comes to science we can gain a greater understanding of the world around us, but we must look other places if we wish to know how we should use this information. Richard Dawkins blatantly states this to be true:

There was a well-known television chef who did a stunt recently by cooking a human placenta and serving it up as a pate, fried with scallops, garlic, lime juice, and everything. Everybody said it was delicious. The father had seventeen helpings. A scientist can point out as I have done that this is actually an act of cannibalism--worse, since cloning is such a live issue at the moment, because the placenta is a true genetic clone of the baby. Science cannot tell you if it is right or wrong to eat your own baby's clone, but it can tell you that is what you are doing, then you can decide for yourself whether you think it is right or wrong.

Unfortunately Dawkins gives the privilege to every man on what to do. Science can tell us what we are doing, but we are the final authority on if we ought to do it. A scary thought, but it will not be added to, the main point here is that science cannot tell us everything about the universe. Science is not the ultimate guide. Science can help us understand the particulars, but it cannot tell us how we should live, or give us our purpose. We can make scientific advancement our personal endeavor in life, but science cannot provide us with a reason to do such. Such a decision comes from a man's own values.

Newton's formulas can help us send a space probe to Mars, but they cannot explain the totality of our solar system, for this we need Einstein's theories. Science can help save us from invading viruses, but science cannot help save us from ourselves. Newton can help us send a missile to decimate other nations, but his research cannot help us know if we should do such a thing.

Stephen Hawking fears mankind when left to only itself as well:

My only fear is this. The terror that stalks my mind is that we have arrived on the scene because of evolution. Because of naturalistic selection, and natural selection assumes natural rejection, which means we have arrived here because of our aggression. And my hope is that somehow we can keep from eating each other up for another 100 years. At that point science would have devised a scheme to take all of us into different planets of the universe and no one atrocity would destroy all of us at the same time.

Technology is a great thing, but it can only take us so far. When shall we turn away from attempting to pull ourselves up from the goo by our own technological bootstraps, and turn to that which can provide us with a real purpose to live for, and a guideline to follow in how to do it? Leonardo da Vinci realized years ago that man, when left with only himself and the particulars, is destined for complete pessimism. Science today is trying to actually show Leonardo's fears that man is nothing more than a machine, that humans can be reduced to nothing but natural causes and effects (that somehow came to realize this through that cause and effect). With nothing to live for, and no hope to break free from the grasp of determinism it's of no wonder that so many are checking out of life. The supposed savior of mankind is becoming (has been) its own harbinger of death.

Truly, then, theology is the queen of the sciences, for it can provide us not only with an adequate world in which science can operate, but one in which we can live as well.

On Health Care and Loving Your Neighbor

There are many things I like to speak of, but those are not the things that I know nothing about. So, then, before I begin let me lay before you the particulars I know about the supposed health care problem in America:

[There is supposedly a problem with health care in America.]

[Umm... that's all I know.]

I say supposedly because I do not follow the news in great detail, nor do I really care to. I do not trust what I hear coming in over the airwaves whether it's from Fox News or MSNBC. I try and pick up a fact or principle now and then, but as soon as the application comes about I turn away the second I see things detour from the previously stated facts or turn into philosophical nonsense.

Allow me this segue to lead to the point proper. President Obama wants both the pro-life and pro-abortion sides to find common ground and hold hands in the abortion debate. The pro-life side argues that all people have a right to life and that those in the womb are persons. The pro-abortion side (defined by Obama) believes that children do not have a right to life unless the mother chooses to grant the child life. Can anyone find the common ground between these two positions? If I was married and you asked my wife if she was pregnant and she said 'yes' and I replied 'no' would you take this response and attempt to find a common ground? Probably not because there is no common ground between the two. In logic we call this the law of excluded middle. Either A or not-A. Something cannot be and not be at the same time. Apply this to the issue of abortion. President Obama would like us to find the common ground between the unborn having an intrinsic right to life, and having a right to life only bestowed by the mother. Do you know what his answer is for this supposed common ground? It's the latter. His answer is that both sides should respect the decision of the mother and work to reduce unwanted pregnancies. Well guess what his common ground equates to? That's right! It's the position of the pro-abortionists. Either the unborn have an intrinsic right to life, or they do not. There is no other option.

Obama also took up this position when it came to the issue of another country killing its own citizens. He cried out that we are not in a position to meddle in their affairs. Moral relativism defined. “Who are we as America to say what another country should do?” “Who are we to tell a mother what she is supposed to do with her own body?” According to Obama, when it comes to these issues there is no absolute ethical norm that we can refer to which transcends society.

Yet, when it comes to the issue of health care President Obama comes before the religious right and starts arguing that we have a duty to our neighbor. He even begins to quote the Bible to prove his point. Are you a moral relativist or are you not Mr Obama? Do we have a duty to our fellow man or do we not? Should we meddle in others affairs or do we allow them to live as they please? This immediately starts to set off warning signals in my head. Any case built upon contradictions is not a case for anything at all.

Further, suppose two gentlemen are walking down the street. We shall call one Jimmy and the other George. As they are walking down the road out of the sky comes an alien named Blarg from the planet Blooie. Blarg lands before them, pulls out his blaster ray and shoots Jimmy in the face causing poor Jimmy's face to fall off. Blarg then bids them good day and flies off into the sky singing Def Leppard. Jimmy now needs to have his face resown onto his head, but the only problem is that Jimmy does not have health insurance nor does he have the money to pay for the surgery. George, however, does have the money but refuses to pay for Jimmy's surgery. Is George doing something wrong in this situation? Why should he have to pay for Jimmy's surgery? Sure he could if he wanted to and it would be rather nice of him, but what moral obligation is he breaking by not paying for it? Surely there are a million operations I could afford to pay for right now, but it doesn't make me immoral by not supplying the necessary funds for them.

Now imagine another alien named Zilgabob from the planet Floop comes out of the sky and tells George that there are millions of people in the world who suffer from Blarg blasting their faces off. Zilgabob tells George that he is going to forcefully take his money lest he suffer consequences and use it to pay for all of these faceless victims. Has George done something moral here? No, he had his money stolen from him. Has Zilgabob? No, he stole the money and gave it to someone else. Has anyone actually loved their neighbor here? No, no one has. The only way anyone here could do anything moral was if George decided out of the goodness of his heart that he was going to help Jimmy get his face planted back on. It is good for George to help people in need, but it is not morally necessary to help everyone in need that he can possibly can. Who George helps and when he helps them is left up to the decisions of George, not another person.

Obama is not asking us to love our neighbors, he is asking us to implement a system through which the government will redistribute the wealth in an attempt to supply everyone with health care. Argue what you will about the pragmatic value of such a system, but don't try to tell me that this allows everyone to love their neighbor. If you wish to say that I'm being selfish with my money, then this is a moral problem which all of humanity falls into being diagnosed with, and that includes the federal government. I have no reason to trust the government with being moral when it can't even apply moral principles in a coherent way.

Mr Obama Sir, quit attempting to extend your hand to the religious right, we don't want it--mainly because it's not really there.

Collapse the Light into Earth

About a year ago Aliza Shvarts of Yale University did her senior art project using the medium of her own reproductive system. Rumor mill has it that she never actually went through with her project, but the zeitgeist that birthed the idea is still prevalent. Her “art” included her artificially inseminating herself multiple times and then having an abortion. She explained the meaning of her project as such:

[The project] creates an ambiguity that isolates the locus of ontology to an act of readership. An intentional ambiguity pervades both the act and the objects I produced in relation to it. The performance exists only as I chose to represent it. For me, the most poignant aspect of this representation... is the impossibility of accurately identifying the resulting blood. Because the miscarriages coincide with the expected date of menstruation (the 28th day of my cycle), it remains ambiguous whether the there was ever a fertilized ovum or not. The reality of the pregnancy, both for myself and for the audience, is a matter of reading.

In laymen terms she is attempting to show how an object is nothing in and of itself, rather we predicate meaning and purpose onto it. According to her, the fetus, and everything else, are "very much a linguistic and political reality, an act of reading constructed by an act of naming — an authorial act." Her pregnancy relies not on some source beyond herself, whether nature or God, but on her own interpretation of the facts. "Just as it is a myth that women are 'meant' to be feminine and men masculine, that penises and vaginas are 'meant' for penetrative heterosexual sex (or that mouths, anuses, breasts, feet or leather, silicone, vinyl, rubber, or metal implements are not 'meant' for sex at all), it is a myth that ovaries and a uterus are 'meant' to birth a child."

The world agrees.

The pseudo-philosopher of the quantum world argues that light is both a wave and a particle; that subatomic particles exist and do not exist at the same time; that we form and appear to change reality just by observing it. Is it there, is it not there? That's in the eye of the beholder. Hollywood, through movies such as Pulp Fiction, argues that one nation calls a burger a Cheeseburger Royale, another a Quarter Pounder with Cheese, and even another as the Whopper. The burger is whatever we declare it to be. Some people prefer ketchup on their fries, others mayonnaise. Some mother's are having a child, others are merely carrying a choice. Some men prefer to marry a woman, some prefer to marry a man, and others their own family.

The birthing begins, as Nietzsche's observed, with the idea that “God is dead"; however, few actually look further down the page to what he declared must necessarily follow. When God dies so do the stars on which we chart our course. How is one to answer Nietzsche's flurry of questions without a fixed point of reference?

Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon?

What were we doing when we unchained this earth from its sun?

Whither is it moving now?

Whither are we moving?

Away from all suns?

Are we not plunging continually?

Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions?

Is there still any up or down?

Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing?

Do we not feel the breath of empty space?

Has it not become colder?

Is not night continually closing in on us?

Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning?

The Bible, as always, completely contradicts the starting point of the world. Genesis begins with God as does the Gospel of John: "In the beginning God," and "in the beginning was the Word"--they are one and the same. Pause and meditate on this for a moment, for it places a whole new meaning on the phrase “the Bible is the Word of God.” It's not merely some things that God has said, but it is quite literally speaking about how everything that has ever been should be seen. The Word is absolute and never changing. Heraclitus was wrong when he said “you could not step twice into the same river; for other waters are ever flowing on to you.” While this world is ever changing and evolving there is a standard to be found beneath it all. The river is not defined by the water, but by its bed; there is a relationship between the two, but the bedrock is fixed.

Shvarts's art project is only an example of the natural outcomes in a world that has no where left to turn but to our own autonomy. Human life thrown away in the name of art, philosophy, and a piece of paper. Life destroyed not only because of a political statement, but life destroyed because we don't even know how to begin to define it anymore. A unified and universal context through which to define the particulars is no more, and man's hands are left bloodied as he tries to find his way through the dark.

Who are we to say that abortion is morally wrong? Who are we to say that a man should not enter into another man as he does a women? Who are we to say that one religion or answer is better than another? After all, if everything is merely in the eye of the beholder, then on what ground do we have to affirm anything at all? If God has not said, then man is left talking to himself. From these rationalizations the perverse idea of freedom is born. If something is possible, then we seem to want to have a right to do it. Yet, freedom does not mean a freedom to do and live however one pleases. That is not freedom, that is anarchy; and those who subscribe to such a philosophy have nothing to be free in. Rebelling against everything leaves nothing for one to freely live in. Freedom requires boundaries, and without the boundaries set by God we will never have a world to be free in.

GK Chesterton dares us to imagine a tall island in the middle of the ocean where children are playing. If there are walls, then they can play without worry and care tossing themselves about more than the raging seas below. Remove the walls, however, and these children will no longer sing their songs of joy, but instead will be gathered in fear in the middle of the island. As secularism continues to take hold of America and we continue to erode our Christian walls we will not see the sun illuminating the world to live as we please, but we will instead be left huddled in terror not only from the ferocity of the sea, but the ferocity of one another.

Those without God have no basis for defining what is human, what marriage is, what right and wrong are and how to apply the titles. For them it's not a matter of what should be, but what could be. But they live a lie. Shvarts is wrong. Absolutes exist and they dictate who we are and what things are meant to be for. There is meaning, purpose and design in life, but that is only because God is there and He has spoken.

-overture-

And so begins this oratorio of mine on what I perceive as truth:

Please come if you can't, stay at home if you can. Admission is free, pay at the door, pull up a chair and sit on the floor. I stand here before you, to sit down behind you and play you a song I really don't know.

Confused yet? Good. You should be. We all agree that I've just uttered a lot of nonsense and if I were to continue the auditorium would soon be empty. Yet when the same reasoning is presented on the larger issues in life, this postmodern society seems to clap her hands and cheer. When the Christian comes along singing a message of the absolute and exclusive, the same society gathers in an angry mob hell-bent on bringing the heretic to their knees.

"Truth is absolute!"

"Absolutely not!"

Yet in their rage and fury they fail to see the nonsensical nature of their objections. So, then, as a Christian fighting his way through a relativistic society I use this space to hopefully transcribe some thoughts of meaning. While some notes might be off-key, I believe to be on time with the Conductor of life. Let the other performers play the song on their own, and let the audience give their standing ovation to the complete discord that follows. The One who waves the baton I follow has ears that will hear me play loud and true among this sea of dissonance.

And what an awesome Maestro He is.

The show is over, so let it begin.