Web Clips and Comments: Dec 15, 2003

SYNOPSIS:

The current news is dominated by the capture of Mr Saddam Hussaein over the
weekend, which opens up a break in current trends in the Middle East. NB: (It
is quite telling to contrast the developing news with the tone and substance
of the local commentary by the punditocracy!) However, in light of a broader
perspective, several other recent developments are worthy of highlighting. Also,
we should remember that on December 17, this week Wednesday, the world will
mark its first century of heavier than air flight.

HIGHLIGHTS:

• The current news on the fate of Saddam is telling: why is it that the Palestinian
  Arabs and Arab Street are dejected and/or in denial at the capture of a mass
  murderer with 400,000 victims lying in mass graves in Iraq? Why is there a
  silence on the part of the leaders of the Arab countries? Could there be implications
  to the prospects that througfh thorough interrogation, the
  links between Arab Governments, their Intelligence Agencies and Terrorist
  groups will be further exposed? Developing . . .
  
  
  
  


• Here in Jamaica, on Tuesday last, the Jamaica Theological Seminary- Caribbean
  Graduate School of theology dual school announced
  its intent to become a full university. it was immediately attacked
  by controversial columnist -- and secularist-hedonist former evangelical --Mark
  Wignall, on the assumed grounds that such an institution could not measure
  up to the true (That is, secularist) standards of scholarship! Not mentioned
  was the fact that currently the degree programmes in the institutions are
  accredited by the UCJ, nor that JTS-CGST graduates have a track record of
  academic as well as career excellence in the region and internationally, nor
  that Christian Universities in fact have a centuries deep tradition of academic
  excellence. Of course, the secularist worldview agenda is simply assumed,
  rather than critically assessed in light of its demonsytrated fatal flaws
  in modernist
  and postmodernist
  forms. [These links are of course drawn from a course
  web page for a JTS course.]
  
  
  
  


• Over the past several months, the neopagan agendas in the West have made
  major advances in the court system and the wider culture, especially through
  the use of the concept of fairness to advance the idea of so-called
  same-sex marriage. (In fact, by attempted
  redefining of marriage, the secularists and gay movement inadvertently
  reveal the destructive
  implications of pulling manhood away from the primary social institution
  that channels male energy into productive directions through marriage and
  the family.)
  
  
  
  


• In so doing, however, they have side-stepped the documented findings and
  issues that homosexuality
  cuts decades off one's life expectancy due to the unhealthy sexual practices
  and high incidence of violence within this sub-culture.
  
  
  
  


• Indeed, the very concept of "same-sex marriage" has the effect
  of destroying
  a keystone institution in human culture, mariage: the institution that,
  together with the family, channel the destructive potential of men into virtuous
  manhood. (In fact as well, homosexual partnershoips seem to be inherently
  quite unstable.)
  
  
  
  


• Similarly, the recent appointment of an openly homosexual man as bishop
  in New Hampshire threatens
  to split the Anglican Communion and bring great discredit to the church
  at large. Maybe most telling of all is the thought that no heterosexual adulterer
  who left wife and young daughter to take up with another woman would have
  even been considered for the post of Bishop. For shame!
  
  
  
  


• Similarly, Justice Roy Moore of Alabama's recent adventures betray the ongoing
  deliberate
  forgetting of the roots of liberty and self-government by a free people.
  Ambassador Allan Keyes' response to the issues deserves to be studied carefully.
  So do the actual
  historic inscriptions.
  
  
  
  


• A recent
  commentary on the AIDS projections in Africa raises questions about the
  validity of the compiuter models used to estimate the current and projected
  numbers of victims. Of particular note is the use of South Africa data as
  a cross-check and the note that even in the areas that have notoriously been
  most affected, population growth trends have been at the 3 percent level,
  in some cases actually accelerating. This raises serious questions regarding
  the validity of the computer projections, and regarding the hype and hysteria
  that surrounds certain issues and agendas.
  
  
  
  


• In Milan, COP 9 to
  the Kyoto protocol has been held, with the backdrop that Russia may refuse
  to sign on to the Kyoto pact on economic damage grounds, and in a context
  where the models seem to be being tuned to track the lower trends being mreasured
  by satellite soundings of the atmosphere. As a result, the projected global
  temperature incrtease over this century is now 0.74 - 1.5 degrees Crelsius,
  which takes the projected trend out of the catastrophic range. Again, the
  issue of the validity of computer models is in question, and the potential
  damage of basing policy on hypoe and hysteria is to be duly noted.

FOCAL ISSUE:

1. Can an Evangelical Institution be of solid academic standard?

Addressing the issue, Dr Noelliste the President of JTS-CGST is summarised:

As a university, the students would be exposed to a range of disciplines
with the proviso that courses would be taught from a distinctly evangelical
worldview. "There is no discipline that cannot be approached from a Christian
perspective and that would be our unique contribution to the Jamaican educational
system," Dr. Noelliste said.

Mr Wignall's revealingly cynical response was:

The point I am making is that while I recognise that religious institutions
have done wonders in education (I went to an Anglican school), the teaching
of religion by itself, especially the strictures inherent in Christianity,
should be seen as a personal attainment/belief and not something that can
be certified by a university. If a man or woman wants to study theology, then
by all means do so. But in my view, that person is then best suited for the
pulpit and not in some business organisation where his or her brainwashing
will be used (unwittingly) to fortify or condemn others.

This should serve as a red flag, revealing the penetration of secularist patterns
of thought in our governance classes and the opinion leaders who influence them.
It is amazing that no consideration of the evident collapse of the secularist
worldview was entertained, nor that worldview-level issues exist in the context
of alternatives that all bristle with difficulties, so the issue is to
develop a coherent understanding of these alternatives in light of the comparative
difficulties.

It
is time for us to wake up and act!

If not NOW, when? If not HERE, where? If not US, who?

END