On Sunday, August 26th 2018, Mr Gordon Robinson (a Gleaner columnist) abused his privilege by unjustly, directly implying that the Church is guilty of educational and/or financial fraud. His key words:
“Either
the Church has NO CLUE about who/what God really is [--> educational fraud], or it
deliberately misrepresents God's essence in order to frighten people
into becoming church members and tithing [--> financial fraud]. Nothing else makes sense.”
In addition, among many other intemperate remarks, he wrote about
alleged “dangerous
dogma promulgated by the Church and its many brainwashed surrogates,”
“perverse propaganda spread by Christian churches,” “sycophants”
and the like.
He did manage to ask a crucial question, which is pivotal to the response below: “Who/ what
is God?”
Now, the matter was brought to my attention by a colleague ("R") and we collaborated on the first stage response below; which was communicated to the Gleaner's Editors on the principle of a right of reasonable reply to unwarranted and patently false accusation. The Gleaner chose to reject that response. Similarly, the second major newspaper in Jamaica has demurred. This leaves little option but to respond in other fora. For, that major regional media feel free to put up such accusations without room for responsible reply speaks telling volumes on the impacts of the two tidal waves I have warned about for about twenty years now:
The Christian gospel and the church are clearly under increasing and deeply hostile attack across our region, and in some influential quarters our message and leadership are seen as so discredited that they see little or no reason to hesitate before publishing accusations that the church is an out and out fraud, pretending to know about God despite obvious ignorance and/or seeking to exploit the gullible financially through fear mongering in order to extort tithes.
This has to be replied to, at minimum for record.
Likewise, we have to take time to show why it is important to correct such errors, because of the harm they do to our civilisation.
Let us continue (see backgrounders here and here), with a first direct response, the article rejected by the Gleaner:
>>The
Credibility of God
R+G
Sept 2018
Over
the years, many millions have met and been transformed through
meeting God in the face of Christ. This includes countless Jamaicans.
It also includes many famed scholars, eminent scientists and leaders
of powerful reformations. Logically, if just one of these millions
has actually been reconciled with God through Christ, God must be
real and the gospel must be true. (Where, if instead so many are
deeply delusional, that would undermine the rational credibility of
the human mind.)
However,
for some years now various voices have tried to dismissively question
God, the gospel and Christians. So, it is not unexpected to see Mr
Gordon Robinson writing in the Gleaner
recently (on Sunday August 26th),
about alleged “dangerous
dogma promulgated by the Church and its many brainwashed surrogates,”
“perverse propaganda spread by Christian churches,” “sycophants”
and the like.
Along
the way, he managed to ask a pivotal question: “Who/what
is God?”
Regrettably,
he also implied outright fraud by church leaders: “Either
the Church has NO CLUE about who/what God really is, or it
deliberately misrepresents God's essence in order to frighten people
into becoming church members and tithing. Nothing else makes sense.”
In
fact, a simple Internet search might give a better answer. For,
thinkers such as a Thomas Aquinas or an Augustine of Hippo or a Paul
of Tarsus or even a Wayne Grudem or a William Lane Craig have long
since credibly addressed the idea of God and systematic theology at a
little more sophisticated level than Sunday School lessons or
Internet Atheist web sites. In so doing, they have made responsible
cases that rise above the level of caricatures of the art on the
Sistine Chapel’s ceiling.
We
may begin with Paul in Romans 1, 57 AD:
“Rom
1:19 . . . what can be known about God is plain to [people], because
God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely,
his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived,
ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been
made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they
did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became
futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.”
[ESV]
Here,
one of the top dozen minds of our civilisation first points out how
our morally governed interior life and what we see in the world all
around jointly call us to God our Creator. But, too often we suppress
the force of that inner testimony and outer evidence. (This,
predictably, leads to unsound thinking and destructive deeds stemming
from benumbed consciences and en-darkened minds.)
 |
| Crick's
March 19, 1953 letter, p. 5 with a highlight (Fair use) |
For one, consider
how for sixty years now we have known that the DNA in the cells of
our bodies has in it complex, alphanumeric, algorithmic code that is
executed through molecular nanotechnology to build proteins, the
workhorses of biological life. That’s why Sir Francis Crick wrote
to his son Michael on March 19, 1953 that “we
believe that the DNA is
a code. That is, the order of bases (the letters) makes one gene
different from another gene (just as one page of print is different
from another).”
Yes,
alphanumeric code (so, language!),
algorithms (so, purpose!),
i.e. intelligent
design of life
from the first living cell on. Including, us. No wonder the dean of
the so-called New Atheists was forced to admit that Biology studies
complicated things that give a strong appearance of design.
1947
saw the advent of the transistor age, allowing storage of a single
bit of information in a tiny electronic wonder. We have since
advanced to computers based on silicon chips comparable in size to a
thumb-nail, with millions of transistors. These microchips and
support machinery process many millions of instructions per second
and have storage capacities of many gigabytes. Coded electronic
communication signals routinely go across millions of miles through
the solar system. Every one of these devices and systems required
careful design by highly educated engineers, scientists and
programmers. The living, self-replicating cell’s sophistication
dwarfs all of these; yet we question the all-knowing God, the author
of life.
Next,
Mr Robinson and others inevitably appeal to our known
duty
to truth, right reasoning, fairness, prudent judgement, etc. But,
where did that inner
moral law
(testified to by our consciences) come from? Surely, it is not a
delusion; or else responsible, freely rational discussion would
collapse into nihilistic chaos:
might and manipulation (= “power and propaganda”) make ‘right,’
‘rights,’ ‘justice,’ ‘truth,’ ‘knowledge’ etc.
Instead, our conscience-guarded hearts and minds clearly show the
Creator’s design that we freely live by the light and law of truth
and right.
Such
considerations – and many more – point us to the only serious
candidate for the source of reality that can bridge IS and OUGHT: the
inherently good (and wise) Creator God, a necessary and maximally
great being.
Who, is fully worthy of our loyalty and of humble, responsible,
reasonable service through doing the good. Then, we may readily draw
out the classic understanding of God described in scripture and
studied in systematic theology: all-good,
eternal, creator and Lord with sound knowledge and full capability to
work out his good purposes in the right way at the right time.
Moreover,
what we most of all need to know about God is taught by Jesus the
Christ, recorded in scripture within eye-witness lifetime then
accurately handed down to us for 2000 years now, at fearsome cost:
the blood of the martyrs. Martyrs, who had but one incentive: that
they directly knew and must peacefully stand by the eternal truth –
cost what it will. They refused to be frightened by dungeon, fire or
sword, much less mere rhetoric. Why would thousands die horribly to
promote a known lie?
Their
record is that Christ is the express image of his Father, Logos –
Cosmos-ordering Reason himself, prophesied Messiah, the Saviour who
in love died for us on a cross. He rose from the dead as Lord with
500 eye-witnesses, precisely fulfilling over three hundred prophecies
that were long since recorded in the Old Testament. (See esp. Isaiah
52:13 – 53:12, c. 700 BC.)
He ascended to his Father in the presence of the apostles. He shall
return as eternal Judge, before whom we must all account. (Yes,
professing and “backsliding” Christians too.) The Bible also
records Jesus’ prayer for us: “this
is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and
[“thy Son”] Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent.”
[John 17:1- 5, cf. 3:16.]
That
is the truth witnessed by the church, whether it was 33 AD in
Jerusalem before an angry Sanhedrin, or 50 AD before the laughing
Athenians (who had built a public monument to their ignorance of
God), or today. We therefore confidently invite Mr Robinson et al.
to join with us in a serious-minded, substantially informed
discussion about “who/what
God really is”
and about why the gospel is just that: God’s
good news that brings salvation, blessing and hope for the positive
transformation for our nation.
END
In short, there is every good reason to acknowledge or at least respect the credibility of the gospel and associated theology. Difference of responsible views is not educational and/or financial fraud, propaganda or brainwashing, etc. Mr Robinson et al need to acknowledge this and in all decency must retract their unjustified accusations.
Going on, God and the gospel are also highly relevant; at least, if we are concerned to recover from the malaise that haunts us and to have a sound civilisation founded on sound principles of justice. Accordingly, here is the first follow-up article (which was not submitted to the newspapers):
>>The
Relevance
of God
R+G
Oct 2018
From
time to time, we hear various voices in our media suggesting that the
church is a main culprit behind Jamaica’s backwardness.
For
instance,
we saw how Mr Gordon Robinson recently implied outright educational
fraud by Jamaica’s church leaders: “Either
the Church has NO CLUE about who/what God really is, or it
deliberately misrepresents God's essence in order to frighten people
into becoming church members and tithing. Nothing else makes sense.”
He
also spoke of alleged “perverse
propaganda spread by Christian churches,” “brainwash[ing]”
and the like. Clearly, he and others of like ilk believe that the
churches are largely responsible for spreading ignorance,
indoctrination, mis-education, fear- and- hate- mongering (the major
function of “propaganda”),
incivility and the like.
Now,
given the historical and ongoing sterling contribution of Jamaica’s
Christian churches to education, schools and more, such a notion
should instantly be utterly implausible.
Likewise,
for 2,000 years the church has borne true witness to the first,
foremost, central, world-shaping reality, God: the
inherently good (and wise) Creator, a necessary and maximally great
being with sound knowledge and full capability to work out his good
purposes in the right way at the right time.
One, who in love intervened through our Saviour so that “[we]
might know thee the only true God, and [“thy Son”] Jesus Christ,
whom thou has sent.”
[See John 17:1- 5, also 3:16.]
Now,
too, there are indeed far too many Christian voices in Jamaica and
across the wider Caribbean and world who exhibit ignorance, want of
sound education, poor reasoning and worse. But also, such
backwardness is patently true across the board. So – especially in
a nation where there is proverbially a church next door to a bar on
every street corner – in strict logic, the problem cannot primarily
be due to the churches.
We
must look deeper for the root.
The
logical place to find that root is in our formal and informal ethical
and general education systems, especially as we have had universal
access to taxpayer-funded public education for generations now.
Similarly, we have had a mass media culture ever since cheap
transistor radios, then television and now Internet and smart phone
technology pervaded our society. Traditionally, major newspapers are
the people’s colleges, building a national base of general
knowledge and awareness of events and issues; indeed, creating the
public in the modern sense. Today’s social media landscape extends
that culture by turning everyman into his own publisher, journalist
and pundit.
Sadly,
just to list these facts is enough to indict us all: we
have met the enemy and he is us.
For
one, we need to rebuild the habit of serious reading – yes, reading
not just viewing or listening – leading to informed discussion that
rises above pooling ignorance and attack- the- source rhetorical
tactics.
But,
there is more: to
recover from our national malaise, Jamaica needs national ethical
renewal and transformation rooted in sound, God-given moral
principles.
We can already see this from how “Mr Robinson and others inevitably
appeal to our known
duty
to truth, right reasoning, fairness, prudent judgement, etc.” That
leads straight back to: “where did that inner
moral law
(testified to by our consciences) come from?” Plainly, such a known
law of our morally governed nature “is not a delusion; or else
responsible, freely rational discussion would collapse into
nihilistic chaos:
might and manipulation (= “power and propaganda”) make ‘right,’
‘rights,’ ‘justice,’ ‘truth,’ ‘knowledge’ etc.”
The
pagan Roman lawyer and statesman, Cicero (c. 50 BC) gives a key clue.
For, he summarised the received view in his day, on how Law is
“highest
reason,
implanted in [our] nature, which prescribes those things which ought
to be done, and forbids the contrary.”
He continued: “the
voice of conscience is a law . . . moral prudence is a law, whose
operation is to urge us to good actions, and restrain us from evil
ones.”
He then concluded in his own voice: “the
origin of justice is to be sought in the
divine law
of eternal and immutable morality.”
[Cf.
De Legibus.]
No
wonder, the Apostle Paul (the principal figure in the Christian
synthesis of the legacy from Jerusalem, Athens and Rome) adds:
“when Gentiles, who do not have the law [of Moses], by nature do
what the law requires, they . . . show that the work of the law is
written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness,
and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.”
[Romans 2:14 - 15 (57 AD).] Thus, we find a body of known law
written on our hearts; tracing to our Creator, who is Logos, Reason
himself.
So,
we readily see why – in his 1594 Ecclesiastical Polity – Canon
Richard Hooker so freely cited Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics (and
echoed Justinian’s jurisconsults in Corpus Juris Civilis): “That
because we would take no harm, we must therefore do none; That since
we would not be in any thing extremely dealt with, we must ourselves
avoid all extremity in our dealings; That from all violence and wrong
we are utterly to abstain.”
Then,
in laying the foundations for modern constitutional democracy, John
Locke cited “the judicious Hooker” on the Golden Rule:
“.
. . my
desire . . . to be loved of my equals in Nature, as much as possible
may be, imposeth upon me a natural duty of bearing to themward fully
the like affection.
From which relation of equality between ourselves and them that are
as ourselves, what several rules and canons natural reason hath drawn
for direction of life no man is ignorant.” [2nd Treatise on Civil
Government, Ch 2 Sec. 5 (1689), citing Eccl.
Polity,
preface, Bk I, Ch. 8.]
Following
Locke, Thomas Jefferson et al. therefore wrote in the 1776 US
Declaration of Independence (the rights-charter for modern
constitutional democracy):
“We
hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That
whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it
is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it [→ nowadays,
by voting], and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on
such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them
shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Clearly,
the ethics of sustainable democracy stem from our being equally
created in God’s image; where, the worth of a single soul exceeds
the wealth of a planet. Such ethics pivot on the enlightening,
culture-transforming moral force of the positive-form Golden Rule of
neighbour-love; a core law of God written on our hearts and taught in
scripture by Moses, Jesus and Paul. Living by the truth in love then
leads to conscience-guarded, truly enlightened reasoning and
neighbourly living. Which, would transform Jamaica: “Teach
us true respect for all, Stir response to duty’s call . . .”
END
These two articles then lead to a third issue, how do we address the gospel's discipling mandate in terms of its implied challenge of godly national transformation? Not only for Jamaica, but for the Caribbean, our civilisation and the whole world?
Accordingly, article no. 3:
>>Jamaica’s Godly Transformation
Challenge
R+G Oct 2018
As
we have already noted,
Mr Gordon Robinson recently wrote off the church as a damaging centre
of “brainwash[ing],”
“propaganda,” “dangerous dogma”
and the like. Plainly, some view the church as an obstacle to the
sound governance and progress of Jamaica. So, let us now address the
church’s involvement in good governance and in positive national
transformation.
A
good place to begin such is with Plato’s Parable of the Ship of
State, which is so deeply entrenched in our thought-world that the
English Language word “government” comes from the Greek one for
the steersman of a ship: kubernetes.
Regrettably,
this parable is tellingly relevant to Jamaica’s long-standing
governance challenges.
For,
the idea is that the owner-merchant captain of a ship (= the people
of Athens c. 430 - 400 BC) was blind and could not navigate or steer
the ship. Members of the crew (= political leaders and pundits who
got that city into the ruinous Peloponnesian war) then tried to
befuddle him, and clamoured to gain control of the helm through
having popular support; even though they plainly lacked character and
competence. Meanwhile, away in a corner was a disdained, “useless”
stargazer – the skilled navigator. The fate of such a “ship”
was sadly predictable; a grim warning on how democracies can fail.
In
Paul’s day, this parable would have been part of the mental
furniture of any educated person of the Roman Empire. So, in Acts 27,
we can readily see that Luke viewed Paul’s shipwreck on his journey
to Rome c. 59 AD as a real-world case study on the ship of state in
action, illustrating how a Christian leader can act as a model
citizen by being “a good man or woman in a storm.” Thus, Acts 27
opens up the issue of the church’s call to nurture, equip and
support people capable of effectively participating as stakeholders
and of giving soundly prophetic, prudent intellectual, ethical and
cultural leadership in society; contributing to good governance and
positive transformation.
Paul
was on his way to Rome as an appeals prisoner, one of 276 souls
aboard a wheat merchantman standing out of Egypt and heading for
Rome. Due to contrary winds, it was dangerously late in the sailing
season and the ship was stuck in Fair Havens, Crete; about 40 miles
short of a better wintering port, Phoenix. Luke zooms in on an
ill-fated meeting:
Ac 27: 9 “Since much time had passed,
and the voyage was now dangerous because even the Fast [of Yom
Kippur] was already over, Paul [by then, already a veteran of three
shipwrecks] advised them, 10 saying, “Sirs, I perceive that the
voyage will be with injury and much loss, not only of the cargo and
the ship, but also of our lives.” 11 But the centurion paid more
attention to the pilot [= kubernetes] and to the owner of the ship
than to what Paul said. 12 And because the harbor was not suitable to
spend the winter in, the majority decided to put out to sea from
there, on the chance that somehow they could reach Phoenix . . . and
spend the winter there.” [ESV]
The
owner was worried about his ship and his money, the kubernetes knew
exactly who buttered his bread and the people aboard were very open
to a suggestion that a quick afternoon’s sail down the coast to a
nicer port was not overly risky. So, Paul’s prudent concerns were
brushed aside. Then, when a convenient South wind blew they set off
in high spirits.
But,
half-way to Phoenix, they were caught in a hurricane-force
nor’easter; which instantly strained and seriously damaged the
ship. (So, they had to frap the vessel.) They were also being driven
towards deadly sandbars off the North African coast. (That’s why
they used a sea anchor to shift the drift-direction to North of
West.) Soon, they were lost as neither sun nor stars were seen for
almost two weeks. Hope was given up, until Paul gave a prophetic
message in answer to prayer: shipwreck but only loss of the ship, not
lives.
Then, as they approached strange land by
night — through a ruse — the same crew that got everyone into
trouble tried to abandon the passengers. This was spotted by Paul,
and the Centurion Julius — who (at great cost) now knew whose
counsel could be trusted — blocked further stunts by cutting away
the ship’s boat. Then, the soldiers wanted to kill the prisoners
to prevent their escape. Wishing to spare Paul, Julius refused. Thus,
all 276 souls made their way ashore at what is now St Paul’s Bay,
Malta.
Sadly,
history from 400 BC and 59 AD closely parallels how Jamaica lost its
way over the past sixty years. How many times did we brush aside
sound but unwelcome, unpopular counsel; only to stubbornly run
destructive risks? How many times have money and “bought”
expertise misled us into following ill-advised agendas? Or,
propaganda-driven polarised fantasies? The chaotic results are all
around us. We must now raise up sound advisors; we must support
independent platforms for them to speak to the nation freely (and
without fear of retaliation); we must heed sound, godly counsel
before the cost to our nation becomes utterly ruinous. (It’s all
right there in our [--> the Jamaican] National Anthem!)
Now,
“business as usual” [BAU] reflects the balance of power across
factions in a community. So, even when there are strong signs of
danger, powerful interests will back “steady as she goes.”
Especially, if there’s “a sweet South wind.” So, an ill-advised
ideological agenda may prevail, leading to a ruinous voyage of folly.
In
turn, key centres
of influence in a community support and are dominated by the BAU
“roof”: family systems, religion or religion-substitutes,
education systems, media, government, the arts and culture, business
(with linked finance and sci-tech capabilities). So, to challenge BAU
a critical mass of stakeholders has to come together, providing a
capable platform that uses SWOT analysis to question the ill-advised
agenda, gradually building support for a sounder alternative (ALT).
Of
course, it is hard to build up support for change while everyone
wants to “let the good times roll,” but “what sweet nanny goat
mout’ run ‘im belly.” Where, by the time a major crisis is
undeniably obvious to one and all, the ruinous storm has already
struck. In that case, being the “navigator” who forewarned can
shift the balance of credibility, but it also sets one up as a target
for hostile power brokers. Thus again, the need for secure,
independent platforms.
Going
forward, the church in Jamaica needs to stand for sound moral,
intellectual and governance frameworks; rooted in the credibility
and relevance
of God as the source of reality, sound law and sound ethics. Then, we
must all come together as a people to do the fresh policy analysis
required to provide a sustainable national alternative. This will
involve understanding that we are morally governed creatures under
known duties to truth, sound reasoning, fairness, prudence and right.
For, our nationhood, social systems, education, economy, finances and
government are all under our Eternal Father. END
Clearly, the time for keeping a dignified silence is over.
We must stand boldly now, if we are to help to rescue our region from the abyss so many are blind to even as they insist on marching towards the cliff's edge: If not now, then when? If not here, on so central a topic, then where? If not us, then who else will think, speak and act? END
