This week's post will be brief since comments made earlier in the week became irretrievable. Hopefully they can be included in next week's post.
June 30
To Dan Borvan and his guest blogpost on the beginning of Unitarianism. This appeared in the Heidelblog.
Really
there are problems on both sides. The denial the Trinity and other key
doctrines cannot be tolerated. But holding the Confessions up as a
standard that needs no change or additions can indicate an idolatry of
the standards and those whom they represent as well as their time
period. In addition, there were severe abuses before the Great
Awakening. Burning people at the stake, as done in Calvin's day, for
heresy or witchcraft? The only defense that can be offered for such a
heinous crime is a reliance on relative morality.
See, there is a
double standard when we don't distinguish between essential doctrines
of the standards from nonesential ones. The double standard comes in
when we as parishoners are called to be in constant self-criticism, a
very valid call, but placing the writings of the fallible Westminster
Devines above our criticisms suggests that the Devines were above the
same self-criticisms. And not all of the criticisms of what the Devines
wrote have to be corrections, some could be additions to what the
Devines either neglected or could have never foreseen. And our
willingness to criticise the Standards on nonessential issues shows our
ability to distinguish between the Standards and the Scriptures.
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To Joseph Sunde and his blogpost on finding significance in blue-collar work. This appeared in the Acton blog.
Work
does shape the soul. So what should we expect a worker to feel when
they perform a repetitive job and they are in the position of taking
orders with little chance to make decisions that impact the workplace.
Add to that today's economic climate where workers are so easily
displaced when others who are willing to work for less can be hired to
replace them. If people find little meaning in the work it is because
those who benefit the most from their labor do not recognize them as
having significance. And thus it will be the exceptional person who
finds significance in such a workplace.
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July 1
To Elise Hilton and her blogpost about ISIL. This appeared on Acton's blog
Just
some corrections. First, Al-Qaeda has distanced itself from ISIL
becaues of the differences in the degree of violence practiced between
the two groups. Both are terrorists groups but ISIL is significantly
worse. Second, the description of how the Shiite led government in Iraq
was a bit of an understatement. The Iraqi gov't's against the Sunnis
went beyond not hiring to practicing harsh persecution against the
Sunnis and we were, for the most part, silent about it.
When a
group like ISIL arises from the ashes of our invasion, the question
becomes whether we have reached a tipping point for US intervention in
the Middle East so that regardless of what we do now, we have done too
much harm for any good to come from it.
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