So, it’s official. I am headed to the Evangelical Theological Society general meeting in Washington D.C. to shop a couple book proposals. It is my first time, so I am just a bit excited about going. It will be the second leg of a ten-day trip to the East Coast for me, a trip that will start with visiting the National Apologetics Conference in Charlotte.

Since more people than normal are reading Mere O right now, I thought I would mention that I would love to get together with any bloggers attending either conference, but especially ETS (since I think there will be a lot of us there).

In that vein, I propose lunch on Thursday, November 16th at a location to be determined as a time for bloggers who want to get together to chat and connect. Joe Carter mentioned he was interested, and I am sure we can get Roger Overton to come along. With those two guys in the room, who wouldn’t want to come? (I promise not to bother Joe with rants about universals.) Nothing formal, just doing what bloggers do best. In addition to lots of little meetings, it seems fun to get together all at once.
I’m obviously in a very small corner of the Christian blogosphere, so if you are interested, do me a favor and pass the word along. Also, if more experienced attendees of ETS think another time better, than I will submit to their wiser and more considered judgement. I don’t know if eating in the Hotel would be best, or if going out to lunch is a better idea (I’m open to both), so if anyone has any thoughts about that, they would be much appreciated.

Lesson: taunting other bloggers who are (a) more creative, (b) have a far-reaching audience, and (c) have read more philosophy than I’ve forgotten is never a good idea. Especially when the original conversation happened when everyone was far too tired. Especially when the taunt depends upon a topic that one is eminently unqualified to speak about.

Like “universals.”

Joe Carter turned his evangelicaloutpost cannon on me for the conversation that we had at GodBlogCon about universals. After running the infinite regress argument against Plato’s notion of the forms, Joe proceeds to argue that the notion of necessary and universal properties (forms) is not compatible with Christian theism. Such a position, Joe claims, assails the independance and supremacy of God.

A little backdrop: I argued the position less out of a committment to Platonic forms and more from an intense desire to protect the notion of properties, something Joe seemed to deny (in that conversation). In other words, I argued that greeness is something that is had by green properties–it is a mind and object independant property that can be instantiated in various objects. The conversation took this to forms, which is natural, but not necessary. Contrary to this, Joe argued for a Dooyeweerd like “modes” analysis of objects. I am still not sure what he means by this, but that’s another discussion.

The claim that the forms are incompatible with Christian theism is, I think, the stronger and more interesting claim. Joe tosses the gloves aside and starts swinging with this:

This leads to the question, “Where is God amidst all these Forms?” Plato had no difficulty in answering this conundrum: he simply posited that the God (the demiurgos) had an existence that was co-equal to these Forms. Christians, in contrast, believe that nothing can be self-existent other than God Himself. Biblical Christianity, of course, rejects such metaphysical pluralism so Platonic Christians are forced to circumvent this difficulty by adopting a modified Platonism. They claim that while the Forms do not have aseity (existence in themselves) they do exist necessarily (i.e., they cannot not exist). What this means is that God’s existence is only causally prior to but not temporally prior to their existence…

The problem with this view, as philosopher J.P. Moreland points out,* is that since these entities exist necessarily, they are independent of the divine will. God is not free to not create such beings. Under this view, God could not have existed alone and had no other choice but to create these Forms. This appears to me to be inconsistent with the orthodox Christian understanding of God, particularly in relation to his creation.

The idea that “God’s existence is causally prior, but not temporally prior” to the forms is not a problem for Christian theism. After all, that seems to be the relationship between the Father and the Son, where the Son is begotten of the Father, but there was not a time when the Son was not.
I’m still working through the second issue, but right now I fail to see how the claim that an independantly existing necessary reality impugnes the self-sufficiency of God. What if the Being of God is such that it overflows into other realities? In other words, it is an attribute of the largesse and creative goodness of God that entails the forms existence, not an attribute of His neediness or poverty. On this account, God is no more “free” to not create these things than He is “free” to not follow the laws of logic. The claim depends entirely upon what we mean by “God’s existence”–I often think that it is not so barren or reduced as we tend to think of it.

Additionally, the existence of the Forms independant of God does not at all entail the creation of the real world in matter. While the Forms have some sort of being–after all, they exist–they are not “created” in the sense that this world is created, just as the Son is not “begotten” as human children are “begotten” (I do not use the analogy to put the Forms on the same level as Jesus, but merely to point out the difficulty of the language). The attribute “Creator” is given to God because of His unique ability to bring being out of non-being, which he does in the creation of this world. The existence of Forms neither enhances nor limits that power.

No doubt this won’t solve every problem. But it may save the Forms from the charge that they are inconsistent with Christian theism.

Update: I changed the sentence that was causing confusion (see comment 5) because it contained a silly error. Namely, I wasn’t thinking and used “antecedent” when I shouldn’t have. Poor form, really. I will save other comments for another post.

In the midst of work and writing I took some time off to see The Departed last week.  Star-studded line-up, great screenwriting, and Scorcese behind the wheel combined for an intriguing–albeit violent and profanity-laced–movie watching experience.

Mere O friend Richard Radcliffe reviews the movie here.   I left the theater conflicted about the film, and remain so five days later.  It is a masterful plot, but dissatisfying to me in some deep way that I cannot identify.  It is in essence a tragi-comedy–I could never quite tell whether Scorcese was more interested in telling a fantastic story or in teasing the audience.  Though certainly not exclusive, I think my dissatisfaction lies in the submission of story to, well, Scorcese.  Something does not add up, and it makes the movie less than it could be.

That said, if you can stomach the violence (I barely made it through, but I have a weak stomach for that sort of thing) and the language (which was overwhelming), it is worth seeing once.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

–Hebrews 12:1-2, ESV

The above verse was not only wisely quoted by Touchstone and Salvo Magazines’ James Kushiner (I’ll get to that a bit later), it also describes my experience at GodBlogCon 2006. All of a sudden, I know a cloud more people who are doing the work of the Lord in many different areas of the blogosphere – and in their everyday lives. I had the opportunity to sit under the wiser and more seasoned (never say “old”!), taking in their advice and learning how to be a better servant of the Lord Jesus. Their example pointed me precisely in that direction.
This year’s GodBlogCon was more sparsely attended than last year’s and Fox News didn’t show up this time, but none of that mattered.
Numbers are not the most important thing in the economy of God or in culture-change. In my research for our presentation on the possibilities of Group Blogging, with our very own K.B. Enthusiasmos, I discovered the story of Diderot and Grimm in mid-18th century France. They wrote about the art, culture, politics, and news of Paris – transmitting the thoughts of the salons directly to their readers, which number 30 at best. Thirty readers seems paltry, but not when they include Catherine the Great of Russia, the king of Poland, and a handful of German princes. Even though our society doesn’t flow from the top down as those of the pas, my point is that culture is not changed purely by numbers. Bloggers can reach that important handful and it doesn’t have to be Hilary Clinton or George Allen reading! Culture is changed more by quality than by quantity.

So let me take Hugh Hewitt’s wise words to heart and “praise the good.” (more…)

My picks for the baseball postseason.

I had: Tigers.

Reality: Cardinals.

Yup–that’s full postseason where I only picked one series correctly. Anyone can blog. That sort of failure takes real talent.

Ahhhhhhhhhh……………the memories. It’s 1:42 AM, I’m exhausted, my wife is in bed, and I am playing the massochist and typing up my thoughts before the morning.

I love GodBlogCon. Today was one of the most stimulating, engaging, and fun days I have had in a long, long time. I didn’t end up attending as much of the conference as I wanted, as I instead helped set up for the live broadcast by Hugh Hewitt (more on that in a second). But the conversations were varied and provocative, and I am thankful for them.

So, without further ado, here are some thoughts from the day:

James Kushiner of Mere Comments is smart. Really smart. And Salvo, the younger version of Touchstone Magazine (perhaps with First Things, the most important magazine you could read consistently) looks very, very cool in print. If you know college students in secular schools, do the good folks at Touchstone a favor and subscribe.
Roger Overton of The A-Team is tons of fun to debate with. I disagree with him on, well, let’s say lots. But he is an amazing dialectical partner–fair, rhetorically sophisticated, and too smart for his (or my) own good.

Joe Carter of Evangelical Outpost is just never going to get universals right. It’s impossible. I am giving up.
Charmaine Yoest is as charming and engaging as Joe found her to be. Which given Joe’s theory of Universals, it is a bit surprising to find him such an astute observer of people. Incidentally, Charmaine will be on MSNBC Saturday at 1:45 pm EST talking about the New Jersey decision with Lambda Legal. Charmaine’s son John, an avid blogger himself, made me feel old tonight by playing Weird Al for me, an artist with phenomenal staying power. John is an affable young fellow who I am quite sure could handle me in a debate any time. Incidentally, you can see me in the second picture down on this post by John. I’m talking with Joe Carter. Yes, that Joe Carter. I’m virtually famous. Just like Joe.

John Schroeder isn’t a huge fan of dressing up, I discovered. In my defense at least my ties aren’t this bad. My brother has managed to make dressing up an art form.

If you are disenchanted with politics, you’ll be happy to know that at least one person is running for the Senate that is kind, honest, and hard-working. I had the pleasure of meeting Allen McCullough today, a Senatorial candidate from New Mexico. While he has received exactly no national media attention, he is running a great grassroots campaign that may cause him to be a surprise seat. Contribute to his campaign here, which I have no doubt he needs and would appreciate.

The guys at Boundless are cool. Very cool. Anytime I meet someone with inherent coolness, I get jealous. They have it, I don’t, and it is painfully obvious. They also got stuck in Colorado. Apparently it snows in the world.

Is anyone in the Christian blogging community as wise, as gracious, and as erudite as Mark Roberts? I doubt it.

Hugh continues to amaze with his perpetual cheerfulness and optimism, not to mention his kind support of GodBlogCon and Torrey Honors. Like his politics or not (I do), he pays attention to each person he talks with, and for a speaker with an audience of a million people, that’s pretty impressive. He was kind enough to put me on his show today with the founder of GBC, Andrew Jackson, where I promptly plugged my blog and my brothers, which raises this crucial and as yet unanswered question:

“Deck-urabilia” or “Day-core-abilia”? I don’t know the correct way to type out the phonics, but you get the point. Can we get a ruling on this?

Dustin Steeve and Kevin Wang. (You think they need an explanation?)
Final thoughts: Hugh’s admonitions tonight were worth the price of admission. He quoted Montaigne, I believe, to the effect that “Constant cheerfulness is a mark of a truly wise person.” Indeed. And secondly, “Look for the good and praise it.” The admonition is crucial for blogging and life, where criticism–in a bad sense–dominates so much of our discussion.

Right now, the smart guys (picture at ThinkChristian) are talking about this quote by Linc Ashby of Common Grounds:

Is there any plausibility to the possibility that we are so inept at loving one another face to face that we have to create things like blogging to insure some pathetic measure of appreciation or encouragement or value or identity or worth in these tangled and wrecked lives of ours?

John Schroeder is pressing the smart guys to acknowledge that there are many bloggers who blog because they are looking for affirmation. The point really has merit, though. There have been times that I have not been critical of blog posts or positions because there is a desire to not appear confrontational or wrong. Christian envy of the quality of secular bloggers success can, and maybe does, cause it to compromise its Christian witness.

I raised the point, and Mark Roberts quickly pointed out the reverse problem: people are generally way too contentious in the blogosphere, and the way in which we critique ideas should reflect our Savior. There seems to me to be a fine line between wanting to express the truth in love, and wanting to love at the expense of truth. So here’s the final thought:

I am not sure that young Christians should blog, or at least be linked to regularly and be brought to prominence as bloggers. If only because we are not yet ready to handle the responsibility of being effective Christian witnesses. What’s the difference between blogging and real life? Blogging stays–it’s permanent, and consequently increases the damage done.

James Kushiner of Mere Comments, a man who hasn’t done much in the way of wrong on his blog, said the worst thing that he has done is not include enough qualifiers in his posts. Not bad advice, but hard to follow. Blog posts are necessarily short and are done between other activities (such as what I’m doing right now in a GodBlogCon session!). However, as Kushiner put it, readers may not understand the context in which a post is written so qualifiers are important. Wise words from a thoughtful man, indeed.

Welcome to GodBlogCon! I am going to be “live”-blogging as much of the conference as possible (I typed this earlier and then got in a heated conversation with Joe Carter about universals and forgot to post it). Dustin Steeve and Kevin Wang have done a great job of putting things together this year, and I am extremely proud of them. I am also very excited to be able to relax during the conference and talk with the people that I wanted to spend a lot of time with last year, but couldn’t. It is really good to see friends John Schroeder and Andy Jackson again. Without further ado, then, here are notes from Dr. John Mark Reynolds’ opening talk.

First Major point: We are in the last throws of a revolution. We are in a settling period, where new media is being taken for granted.

We don’t know where things are going. We need to have a conversation about where things are going, which Christians didn’t do about Hollywood. That’s what GodBlogCon is about.

New Media is a great opportunity for marginalized communities to get a place at the table of new media. But that window is closing. The revolution is in its final stages.

The solidification of technology in the hands of the few who have managed to use it well is the second stage of a revolution. The standards at the beginning of the revolution were extremely low, but they are now rising. What used to be acceptable for online video is now no longer acceptable. The standards are going to squeeze out small players. Most of the time, most of us have very little to say that will help people.

Portals—people who are sorting out for people what they need to see—are growing in might and influence because they sort out what needs to be read. People will want order brought to the wild west of the internet, and that may not be good.

Will Christians have a place at the table? Probably not. Professionalization will reward the Andrew Sullivans and penalize traditional Christians on the left and right. The old media has big money still, even though their ad revenues are declining. We are not driving the agenda in the new media sphere, and their big money will make our websites look second-rate.

Second major point: we haven’t taken the “virtual” in “virtual reality” seriously enough. We too often reflect the universities we attended, the media we consumed, the “reality” we grew up in. We do not create a new reality—creating a broad interpretative framework for facts—but react defensively to the old reality.

For instance, ID cares about “legacy journal” opinion rather than create their own journals and acting as if they are right. We want to “Christianize” the NY Times, rather than create our own. We should present an alternative vision of the way we wish the world was. We are not people who deny truth, but people who think in new paradigms—it’s a matter of creating a new Christian mythology over the internet.

Third Major point: We should ask ourselves hard dialectical questions about the relationship between a Christ centered Christianity and our political positions. We must always be looking at what we believe and asking ourselves if what we believe is true. For proof that Jesus does this, see the Road to Emmaus in Luke 24. There is no place for people within Christianity for those who will not hear difficult questions, and then affirm “This I believe” with the tentativeness or fervor of our commitments.

Christian Godbloggers have not been willing to put a full-orbed Christianity on the line and subjected it to the criticism of others. Treat the blogosphere as a simulator—no one dies when architects create bridges on computers. Let a thousand flowers bloom, take the risk of professional shame and scorn, and take the risk of being wrong. But then we have to move beyond hypothesis and dialectic and begin to tell a Christian myth. We have the ability to create a virtual reality that is more real, more lasting, more important than what appears in a newspaper. The Christian blogosphere shows precious little poetry, and precious little fiction. Lenin told a story of peace, land and bread in a time of revolution and swept Russia.

Final plea: ground Christian blogging in the context of the old. Bring forward the best of what has been and build a new vision of the world on the internet.

Joe Carter: How do we tell stories in a non-fiction context?

Reynolds: DANTE! Hoorah for Dante! (Okay, so I didn’t follow that as well as I should have).

Mark Roberts: Maybe the sphere will widen out again because the technology is so easily.

Reynolds: Email—everyone used email at the start, but once it hit the tipping point, we quit doing creative things with it. YouTube is the latest email—people will flock to it, will forward videos, etc. but then everyone will take it for granted and high quality video will rise to the top. Most of us will settle back into the same pattern of life that was going on in the 18^th century. Giving everyone a laptop won’t create more Shakespeare’s. Wikipedia makes use of the aggregate power of the internet, but YouTube is just old media moved online. YouTube is an a new delivery mechanism for old media content. People are successful in EverQuest who aren’t successful in their own lives, but that is totally new. And EverQuest money has real value. The problem with EverQuest is that its mythology doesn’t work well. If we capture the imagination of the next generation then Christian witnessing will be easier. If EverQuest wins, then it will be harder.

The cyberspace world should paint a picture of the world such that people want to live in the real world and transform it. Virtual reality can never replace reality because of pleasure, but because you can not make meaningful pain in virtual reality. Virtual reality will present a reality that will not sedate people, but will baptize their imaginations and help them avoid sin and vice in reality. We run the risk of attacking gaming, or attacking reality tv, and coming to the game too late.

A summary of tonight’s talk: The Velveteen Rabbit.

Holy affections are not heat without light; but evermore arise from some information of the understanding, or some spiritual instruction that the mind receives, some light or actual knowledge.

From the Religious Affections by Jonathan Edwards, Part III, chapter IV.

Edwards has had the misfortune to be known almost exclusively for his sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” which the public schools use to show what nut jobs the Puritans were. As with so many of the false teaching of our government schools, the case is quite different. Edwards is actually one of the more equitable and even-keeled thinkers in American history – besides being the best one.

Perhaps no where is his precise and unbiased thought better demonstrated than in the Religious Affections. He strives to find a middle way between the excessive, outlandish emotional outbursts of those caught up in the throes of the Great Awakening and the reactionaries who insisted that Christian practice go along without any religious zeal at all. (more…)

“Jonathan Edwards argues in his sermon A Divine and Supernatural Light that God will, from time to time, provide a child of His with a flash of insight and understanding of divine things. He uses as his text Matthew 16:17 where Peter confesses Christ and Jesus answers that he is blessed because the Father in heaven has revealed it to him. Peter, here, Edwards argues, has a “sense” of the divine excellency that overpowers him, couples with his reason and zeal and causes him to burst forth in his accurate confession. Edwards carefully delineates that it is not the faculty of reason but the sense of the heart that receives this divine light. However, he also demonstrates that this light does not overrule reason – in fact, it is a rational thing to experience.”

Mr. Selby, a question:

A common objection to the possibility of such “senses of the heart”, or if not their possibility than their feasability for being a useful part of the Christian life, is that a) they seem subjective, and b) there is nothing to prevent the dreadful, and common, experience of a person claiming to have received a divine sense and going on therefore to do some dastardly evil or to preach some old heresy.

Does Edwards respond to this objection or concern?

Faith, it drives me away
But it turns me on
Like a strangers love

-Muse

With regard to a Jewish agnostic friend of ours, Matt Anderson once remarked that he is “flirting with Christianity.”

This friend of ours is a university professor, scholar, and gifted teacher who habitually spends long hours of his valuable time reading and trying to understand great Christian writers. He spends a greater amount of time, true, trying to understand the writings of Plato, but his passionate attention to Thomas Aquinas, Charles Williams, GK Chesterton, and, even, recently, the New Testament, is seemingly dissonant with his long-held distrust of and disbelief in the necessity of following the risen Jesus for living well.

In his conversations with us, he will often play the “devil’s advocate” with regard to our orthodox Christian beliefs, but he will just as convincingly and respectably play “God’s advocate” when the situation calls for it. He might solidly defend a high view of God, (his creative power, for instance, in Genesis) from our oftentimes dim, understated evangelical viewpoint, or he might repetitively force us to take Paul seriously when he says, in II Corinthians, that “knowledge will pass away.” (It is a strange occurance to be have an agnostic Jew defend Christian dogma to me, a lifelong evangelical, when it is being ignored or misunderstood.)

I think that this phrase, “flirting with Christianity,” is a clever and accurate description of our friend, and not only him, but of many people in the world, and of, perhaps, an archetypical attitude that humanity may  assume. It is an attitude of feigned indifference, of playful rejection followed immediately by playful solicitation, followed again by playful rejection. It is an attentive and examining attitude, while remaining a stand-offish one. It’s ceaseless demand is for “more time, more time.” More time to consider, more time to reflect, more time to research, all the while dabbling in the benefits to be enjoyed. With regard to people, flirtatious attitudes seek favors and company, but hope to avoid commitment and responsibility. With regard to worldviews, they seek to the interesting or insightful elements of a worldview, without the less-than-interesting implications or nasty behavioral modifications that must follow. But perhaps Christianity is less a worldview than a person, after all… regardless…
I’d like to do some exposition of the lyrics of my favorite rock band, Muse, to demonstrate that they, too, are flirting with Christianity. This exposition is entirely an eccentric interest of mine rooted in my love for the band’s music, but it should also serve as an instantiation of a more universal (and more useful) analysis of the mysterious movement of the soul towards grace, that is, the movement of the unregenerate, wayward son or daughter back to the loving and forgiving arms of the Father, whom Jesus revealed to us, and who eagerly desires that all men and women be reconciled to Him, now, and forever.

(more…)

I am now intrigued by the possibility of picking every series wrong except for one (Cardinals in round one).

My picks for the Division series champions: Mets and A’s.

Reality: Cardinals and Tigers.

I should pick the Cardinals for Gary’s sake. But I can’t. I just can’t. The Tigers were dominant in their series, while the hapless Cards squeaked by a depleted Mets squad. If Pedro and El Duque hadn’t gone down to injuries, the Cards would be golfing right now. Leyland and Pudge are proven winners, while Albert Pujols has proved to be, well, nothing yet. Plus, I have been wrong twice about the Tigers and am attempting to learn from past mistakes. Tigers in 5.