Failing To See The Log In One's Own Eye

Apparently there is a struggle going on in the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA). That denomination is a conservative Presbyterian denomination that holds to Christianity's fundamental beliefs as identified by past conservative scholars like J. Gresham Machen. Only the PCA understands those fundamental beliefs within a Reformed Theological context provided by Martin Luther, John Calvin, and the conservative Presbyterian standards such as the Westminster Confession and Catechisms. But that is not all, the PCA has also been described as a 'big tent' denomination that includes others who are not as well trained in those traditions. 

And so when one adds to the mix calls from those inside the denomination to update how the denomination should respond to new cultural perspectives and societal challenges, if not a perfect storm, then a very good size one is brewing in the denomination. A traditionalist perspective of the rumblings in the denomination has been reported in the Reformation21.org blog (click here for the article). The battle within the denomination appears to be between Reformed Theology traditionalists vs. Progressive Christianity.

Dr. Harry Reeder (click here for a bio), a minister at Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama wrote an article about the struggles in the PCA (click here for the article). The article is important to read even though it has some glaring faults such as a failure to provide both clear definitions of at least one key term and a sound logical argument. The article, however, is important to read because it provides a perspective on how Christian traditionalists are attempting to address some of today's problems.

Reeder's partial solution to the problems within the PCA involves distributing J Gresham Machen's book Christianity and Liberalism. a book that helped provide a clear distinction between conservative Christianity and the theological liberalism of the day. Reeder holds Machen up as a theological hero because of his resistance to compromise the Christian Faith with the then modern demands of the time and cultures of his own time. At the forefront of those demands was the then scientific approach to the Scriptures and the Christian Faith--a point that is under appreciated by Reeder's article.

Reeder attacks Progressive Christianity as being willing to compromise some foundational beliefs for the sake of cultural relevancy. And so when Reeder distributes and promotes Machen's book to counter the influence of various progressives in the denomination, as demonstrated in the title, he is contrasting what he calls 'Biblical Christianity' with a Progressive Christianity, with the latter seeming all to be too eager to be relevant to the culture.

Now we could go through the article and show why it needs to provide a least one well-defined term and sound logic, but there is another point to make. That point is that, all too often, my fellow Christian traditionalists are blind to how cultural influences that modified the views of their theological and religious heroes. And here we will take J. Gresham Machen as the key example.

Perhaps Reeder is not aware or perhaps he forgot that Machen exhibited significant personal racial prejudices against Blacks. Dr. R. Scott sadly and honestly acknowledged the presence of those racial prejudices in Machen and attributed them to the cultures in which Machen lived (click here for Clark's article). Here we must remember that Machen grew up and lived during the Jim Crow era. In addition, according to Clark, Machen grew up in the South and was raised in a family that was economically privileged. Now the point in saying that is that Machen's views of Blacks and integration, the latter being an important cause so some workers for social justice, were more influenced by some of the cultures of his day than by the Scriptures.

Jemar Tisby, in his book The Color Of Compromise, lists some similar influences on Edwards which Machen experienced which influenced Edwards into not only accepting the American slavery during his life, but he owned slaves as well. This is another example in which a conserative theological hero, whose beliefs would be described as well-representing Biblical Christianity, was  more influenced by the culture of his time than by the Scriptures.

BTW, what did Machen say that was so racist? Using archives of Machen's writings from Westminster Theological Seminary, Timothy Isaiah Cho reported the contents of letters Machen wrote to his mother about both attempts to integrate Princeton Seminary dorms and those who promoted that integration (click here and there). One can read those article to see what Machen wrote. What he did write was strongly racist.

Having noted Machen's racism, what else did Machen say or even teach that was influenced by the cultures in which he lived? Was it his political leaning to libertarianism. That certainly colored some of his perspectives. And we might ask the same of those who wrote standards of the Reformed  denominations.

But pertaining to the article that is being partially reviewed here, we find that the Progressives in the PCA are not the only ones who have been more influenced by culture and are trying to appease it. Apparently the problem is that all Christians are vulnerable to and suffer from time to time. Thus Reeder's contrast between Progressive Christianity and those theologians whom Reeder portrays as representing Biblical Christianity is not as great as Reeder supposes. And, just perhaps, in Reeder's apparent total rejection of those Progressives and their causes, Reeder too is trying to appease at least the cultures in which he resides.

References

1. https://gospelreformation.net/historic-biblical-christianity-contemporary-progressive-christianity/
2. https://harryreeder.wordpress.com/about/
3. https://timothyisaiahcho.medium.com/j-gresham-machen-warfields-views-are-black-republicanism-f44fa49c7bff
4. https://threader.app/thread/1037419431108829184
5. https://theaquilareport.com/machens-letter-to-his-mother-or-what-to-do-with-dead-sinners/
6. https://heidelblog.net/2018/09/machens-letter-to-his-mother-or-what-to-do-with-dead-sinners/
7. https://faithfullymagazine.com/tale-of-two-machens/
8. 
   

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For July 14, 2021

The comment below was blocked in its original form. Thanks to a hack, it was posted later. 

July 9

To Gene Veith and his blogpost on how Christianity is seeing an increase in adherents in the nation of Iran. At the end, the article states that the increasing influence of Christianity in Iran is a 'blow to Western Secularism.' This appears in the Cranach blog on Patheos.

What is the compulsion to make progress or set backs for Christianity as either a blow to or victory for Secularism? Why not allow for interpretations of the news that assumes a context of peaceful coexistence rather than for some kind of competition for control?

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July 13

To R.Scott Clark and his blogpost quote from an article by Jon Payne that stated that there is no room for compromise with Side B Christianity and CRT because they are unbiblical. This quote of Payne's article appeared in Heidelblog. 

Jon Payne's article, from which Clark's quote originally appeared in, can be found at: 

    https://gospelreformation.net/the-pcas-bright-future-without-a-bigger-tent/

"We mustn't make room for Side B or CRT"? Does that mean that those who believe to any significant degree in what Side B or CRT are saying must be excommunicated from the Church? That neither view has any truth in them? Is that what is behind that quote?  After all, to take that quote with any seriousness at all and to take what he says later in the article about how there can be 'no compromise,' Church discipline is required on those who advocate any part of either view. Otherwise, the Church could affirm the legitimacy of parts of Side B and CRT.

But my guess is that the PCA doesn't want to discipline those who advocate to any significant degree those questionable views. The conservatives in the PCA just wants marginalize those who advocate such views within the denomination. Perhaps it is out of hopes that such advocates would disappear from the denomination out of attrition. But certainly, this is a control issue. And though such fears are more understandable for the Side B view, such fears over CRT has more to do with what is and is not kosher with the PCA subculture than with the Bible. That subculture being a predominantly an American conservative political one. And that subculture view is more dominated by influences from European and our nation's founding fathers, and thus a white subculture view, than by the Scriptures.

We should note something about racism in the discussion of CRT. While most conservatives who reject CRT want racism to be defined in terms of what it means to them, most of whom are white, CRT defines racism in terms of what it means to the victims of racism. Thus, such a rejection shows a problem that those conservatives have with being self-absorbed. But such a reliance on the past also shows a continuity with the Pharisees to whom Jesus was speaking  in Mark 7: those who relied on their traditions to understand the Word of God.

In short, the all-or-nothing approach to Side B and CRT is more out of the most pronounced weakness of conservatism: that they rely too much on the past, here I am excluding the Scriptures, to understand the and respond to the present. And in that sense, conservatives are against the notion of always reforming but are also in danger of associating unbiblical conservative subculture views too closely with the Scriptures.

Controversies And The Necessary Dangers Of Deduction

Ever since the Apostles have died off, because they did not see the  2nd coming of Jesus Christ the Church has had to employ deduction in answering some questions and controversies. Why? Because as time marched on, the Church faced new controversies and questions that were not directly addressed by the teachings of Christ or of the Apostles. The controversy over the Arian view of Christ is an example. Arius, and his supporters, argued that if Christ was begotten by the Father, then Christ did not exist eternally. Such would then contradict His deity. And if Christ was not God, then our salvation in Christ is called into question for it is only the Lord who saves.

Part of the problem in combating the Arian teachings on Christ was that those who followed it did so because they believed that they were being faithful to what the Scriptures literally said. Thus, in how they defined Christ, the Arians felt that they were faithful to the Apostles and Christ because they were most faithful to the language used by Christ and the Apostles. Athanasius, on the other hand, employed logic to deduce that Christ had to be eternal. Athanasius reasoned that because God is eternal, that His begetting of His Son Jesus is also eternal. Here is where deduction was correctly applied to defeat a misunderstanding caused by literalism.

However, deduction can cause problems as well. In determining what should become the law of the land and what shouldn't, some religiously conservative Christians reason that since rulers are to punish evil as stated in Romans 13:1-7 (click here for the passage), God's laws should, either in part or in whole, should become the laws of the land. As a result, we see some Christians conclude that the government must punish the LGBT community because of their sexual practices. Not only that, they want the government to punish all forms of adultery. Their powers of deduction are limited or selective however in that many of these same Christians don't want those who engage in economic exploitation to be punished. Nor do they want those who harm the environment to be punished. Nor do they want their own countrymen who wage unjust wars to be punished. The point is, however, that they show how one can misuse deduction in interpreting the Scriptures.

This brings us to the article to be reviewed. It is actually an open letter from PCA minister Todd Pruitt (click here for a bio) to a fellow PCA member Andrew White who is running to become Governor of Texas. While campaigning, White has said that he both personally objects to abortion but would do nothing but to recognize Roe v. Wade as the law of the land. White also said that he would not let his personal faith interfere with how he governs. Todd Pruitt's open letter uses deduction to challenge White's position (click here for the open letter).

What bothers Pruitt about White's abortion position is that Pruitt believes that White's personal objection to abortion has to do with White's belief that the unborn child is a human life and thus abortion would be taking an innocent human's life. Thus, Pruitt reasons that anyone, especially any Christian, who believes that about the unborn child should object to abortion for it is the taking of human life and thus murder. Pruitt then concludes that since God's Word is important to White because White is a ruling elder in the same conservative denomination that Pruitt belongs, that White is bound to oppose abortion because God's Word does not speak of the life in the womb in any other way than that it is fully human.

Now while Pruitt's logic in his open letter is flawless, he makes a possible error in his claim that the Scriptures do not recognize the life in the womb to be anything else but fully human. In the OPC committee report on abortion, the minority position written by Paul Woolley questions whether the fertilized egg is a human person and thus not fully human (click here for the full report from the committee). Here we should note that the OPC is a far more conservative denomination than the conservative denomination of the PCA. And yet, in its minority report, there is a disagreement on whether the fertilized egg is fully human. And Woolley not only calls such a notion 'rationalistic folly,' he cites an admission from the majority report that says the following:

There is no way to demonstrate, either from Scripture or from science or from some combination of the two, that the unborn child is a human person from the point of conception.

Here we should note that Woolley was not saying that all cases of abortion are not sinful for he wrote that some cases of abortion are. He was simply challenging whether all cases of elective abortion are sinful. 

So the question becomes whether Pruitt either overstated what the Scriptures say about life in the womb or he is misusing deduction to compel White to change his political position on abortion. As one who believes that human life begins at conception, it seems that we should always be willing to reevaluate the definition of human life. At the same time, one should remain faithful to how one sees the scriptural definition of human life.

ONIM For July 4, 2016

Christian News

• Evangelicals In The Church Of England Urge 'Biblical' View On Sexuality -- Christian Today (UK)
• Christian Leaders Warn Against Election Violence In South Africa -- Christian Today (UK)
• Russia's Proposed Law: No Evangelizing Outside Of Church -- Christianity Today
• 20 Of The Most Creative Christians We Know -- Christianity Today
• Issues In The Future Of Evangelism -- Christianity Today
• Reflections From A Black Presbyterian On The PCA's Overture On Racial Reconciliation -- Reformed African American Network
• What I Saw In The 44th General Assembly Of The PCA(1) -- Mortification Of Spin
• Sexual Revolution: Take 2 -- Mortification Of Spin
• Listening To Abused Women -- Mortification Of Spin
• Christians Are The Most Persecuted Religious Group In The World -- McClatchy
• The Dark Pessimism Of American Christians -- The Week
• Open Letter To Reverend Franklin Graham -- Huffington Post
• Russell Moore: A Time For Choosing -- The American Conservative
• Hope After Brexit -- The Gospel Coalition
• A Conversation With Four Historians On The Response Of White Evangelicals On The Civil Rights Movement -- The Gospel Coalition

World News

• Angela Merkel Surprised By Massive Protest March Against TTIP In Berlin -- Business Insider
• Jeremy Corbyn 'Still Prepared To Call For Tony Blair War Crimes Investigation' -- Independent
• Empathy Is Killed By Popular Painkiller Found In 600 Different Drugs -- Psy Blog
• Noam Chomsky: America Is Only A Democracy For The 1 Percent -- Salon
• Chocolate Makes You Smarter, Study Suggests -- The Telegraph
• Germany Bans Fracking Forever -- Politics Breaking
• Singapore Airplane Catches Fire Moments After Making Landing -- Yahoo News
• Israeli Official: Reconciliation Deal Reached With Turkey -- ABC News
• 'I Believe In Miracles': A Palestinian Sprinter's Olympic Dream -- NBC News
• Brexit Has Given Voice To Racism--And Too Many Are Complicit -- The Guardian
• Hanoi'd With Jane -- Scopes.com
• DNC Convention Costs Leaving Young And Poor Delegates Out In The Cold -- Enabon
• Hungary Destroys All Monsanto GMO Cornfields -- Real Farmacy
• SCOTUS Ruling Makes Corrupt Officials Harder To Prosecute, Experts Say -- Yahoo News
• Israel Should Be Deeply Disturbed By The Brexit Vote -- Mondoweiss
• The Radical New Face Of The Jewish Settler Movement -- Forward
• Racist Incidents Skyrocket After Brexit Vote -- Huffington Post
• Witness At Ted Cruz Hearing Accuses Congress' Two Muslim Members Of Muslim Brotherhood Ties -- Huffington Post
• Hillary Clinton's Email Story Continues To Get Harder And Harder To Prove -- The Washington Post
• Betraying Progressives, DNC Platform Backs Fracking, TPP, And Israel Occupation -- Common Dreams
• 7 Out Of 10 Amerians Agree That Economy Is Stacked Against Them -- Common Dreams
• Want To Cut Government Waste? Find The $8.5 Trillion The Pentagon Cannot Account For -- Yahoo News
• All Signs Point To ISIS In Istanbul Attack -- Yahoo News
• Three U.S. Students Among Those Killed In Bangladesh Restaurant Attack -- Yahoo News
• Elizabeth Warren Defends Israeli Shelling Of Gaza Schools, Hospitals -- Huffington Post
• The Play Deficit -- Aeon
• Shocking New Report: Bombing People Causes People To Hate You -- Daily Kos
• Alberta Passes Bill Banning Political Donations From Corporations And Unions -- The Globe And Mail
• Mississippi Forces Welfare Recipients To Work, Liberals Ticked At Surprising Results -- PolitiCulture
• New Poll Finds That Hillary Supporters Are Pretty Racist Too -- Slate
•  A Note On Lesser Evil Voting -- Counterpunch
• How Social Media Has Changed The Landscape For Editorial Cartooning -- Columbia Journalism Review
• Winners In Brexit: Old People, Old Media -- Columbia Journalism Review
• Activists Occupy Major Park In Budapest To Stop Unwanted Development -- Waging Nonviolence
• Puerto Rico Mounts Historic Decolonization Effort Amid Efforts To Free Oscar Lopez Rivera -- Waging Nonviolence
• As Britain Exists, The Need For A Strong Climate Agreement Remains -- Waging Nonviolence
• Cornell West's Bold Speech As He Abstains From Supporting DNC Platform -- YouTube

Pick(s) Of The Litter

• Noam Chomsky: We Are Suffering The Major Downside Of Global Economics -- Alternet
• Massive Turnout In Mexico March To Protest Oaxaca Massacre -- Telesur
• Clinton's "First Major Betrayal"?: DNC Surrogates Defeat Anti-TPP Measure -- Common Dreams
• In 'Voisine V. US,' SCOTUS Ruled People Convicted Of Domestic Violence Cannot Have Guns -- Policy.Mic
• My Four Months As A Private Prison Guard -- Mother Jones
• "My Four Months As A Private Prison Guard": Shane Bauer Goes Undercover To Expose Conditions -- Democracy Now
• Inside Mother Jones' Monster Investigation Of Private Prisons -- Columbia Journalism Review
• People, Even More Greedy And Stupid, Destroy The World--Stephen Hawking To Larry King -- RT
• Obama: "We Have To Twist Arms When Countries Don't Do What We Need Them To" -- RT
• Anti-Semitism Is Back. Will You Stand By Or Stand Up -- Huffington Post
• American Muslims Show Humanitarian Islam -- Huffington Post
• Istanbul Airport Attack: 36 Dead, 147 Injured, Turkish Officials Say -- CNN
• Mississippi Allegedly Shot An Unarmed Man And Let A Police Mutilate His Groin --  Think Progress
• Cleaning Up America's Backyard: The Overthrow Of Guatemala's Arbenz -- Huffington Post
• Obama Admin Approved Over 1,500 Offshore Fracking Permits In Gulf Of Mexico And Mainstream Media Has Ignored It -- Desmog
• Official: Airport Attackers From Russia, Central Asia -- Yahoo News
• Iraqi Officials: 91 People Killed In 2 Bombings In Baghdad -- Yahoo News