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The Importance of the Protestant Reformation - Oct 31, 2026
On the last day of October in 1517, the Augustinian friar and Biblical
scholar Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses on the door of the Wittenberg
Chapel, challenging the Church to defend itself on each of 95 matters. Such a challenge would shake the Church,
beginning a huge movement known as the Protestant Reformation, a movement that
would quickly spread across Europe. By
the time this brought John Calvin into the movement (1530s) all of this was
undertaken not only to put easily readable Bibles (translated into the local
European languages) but also human affairs into the hands of the European
commoners ... that is, the sons and daughters themselves of our Heavenly
Father. Political authority as well as
theological authority would thus be challenged deeply by this amazing reform
movement, this Protestant Reformation. Our Constitution Protects - Not Prohibits - Religion - Oct 25, 2026
In the 1960s and 1970s, with the help of the ACLU, the
Supreme Court ignored the First Amendment’s guarantee of the people’s freedom
of religion ... by decreeing that prayer and the reading of the Bible were not
allowed in America’s public education.
Ultimately, it even declared that only Secularism could be offered as
America’s educational worldview. But
Secularism is no less a religion than the Christianity that the Supreme Court
was blocking ... religion simply being the understanding of a people about what
is true about life: how it works and why
it works that way. In any case, deciding
this religious debate is supposed to be the people’s jurisdiction ... not that
of some D.C. lawyers in black robes. A Republic and a Democracy Are Not Exactly the Same Thing - Oct 18, 2026
America of course is a democracy, governed by the Popular
Will ... that is, by the people themselves, or at least by their regularly elected
representatives. But it is also a
republic, a society built on a very strong foundation of Law, one which guides
a society in a particular direction, sets boundaries to shape needed social
action, and lays out clearly the rewards to be consequently shared among
society’s members. But those who
actually govern America face the challenge, in choosing particular political
strategies, how liberally they will interpret the Law. Their political choices can be very good, quite
necessary. But they can be quite bad if they fall under
the corrupting influence of political greed ... and they reinvent the Law solely for
personal or special group purposes, claiming this to be no more than deeply-needed
“political reform.” When that happens,
the republic and its laws simply crumble. At that point a society simply falls under the dictatorship of the powerful few, usually a self-selected ruling class.
The Roman Republic sets a clear example of the danger of just such a
development. It is important to point out that America itself was not born in 1776, but at that time merely took action to preserve its self-governing ways from a newly rising royal tyranny ... self-governing ways that had directed the colonies since their founding 150 years earlier. No, this was a War of Independence, not a Revolution. Actually, the only thing revolutionary about 1776 was the idea of a people actually ever succeeding in such an enterprise. Historically, that just never happened. But they were a people of most unusual spirit, fired up recently by a "Great Awakening" ... and thus most unwilling to give up their freedoms as Americans. Sadly, we today have lost sight of that powerful spirit underpinning our ancestors' very strong sense of independence ... their intent on keeping covenant with God to be not only a self-governing people, but to serve as a "Light to the Nations," showing the rest of the world exactly how God himself wants all humans to live personally, socially, and politically. Clearly, America needs today another such spiritual "Great Awakening" ... to get itself back on track as that Light to the Nations. Jesus Christ and Christianity Are Not Necessarily the Same Thing - Oct 6, 2026
Jesus was sent to show us the Way that God wanted us to live
... not to start some new form of religion with it chanting priests performing
religious rituals with incense and candles at an altar. True, early Christians came together to pray,
share meals, and hear talks (sermons) based on the writings of the early followers
of Christ’s Way. But they had to meet secretly
(not grandly), being persecuted horribly by both the Jewish and Roman
authorities. But then Rome got wise
politically and adopted Christianity as the religious underpinning of its
crumbling Empire ... changing Christianity deeply. But the Way of the early church was not
forgotten ... and New England was founded in an effort to put those 1st
century beliefs and practices back to life. The Tragic Decline of Middle America - Oct 2, 2026 The huge sector of American society that I term “Middle America” is on decline. Middle America centuries ago formed the foundations of a very democratic America, an America seeking not to build itself into some kind of overpoweringly rich social phenomenon, but instead contenting itself with the simple but wonderful securities of home, job and family. But those family foundations began to crumble as various “progressive” social changes came into play in the 1960s ... supposedly to free up women, Blacks, and the poor in general. But marriages soon proved to be impermanent, Black families fell apart, the national birthrate declined, and income merely widened greatly between the lower 50% of America society and the top 1%. But there is hope that the new Gen-Z youth is more than willing to try to get things back on a Middle American course again. Let’s hope so "A Republic ... If You Can Keep It" - Sep 27, 2026 Those were the words of Ben Franklin in explaining the new political system the authors of the AmericanConstitution had come up with in that long, hot, summer session in 1787. "A Republic." Okay. That was understandible. But "if you can keep it." What did he mean by that? Franklin, being an historian was well of the rise and fall of societies in history. And like the ancient philosopher Aristotle, he was well aware how much that depended on the strength of a society's moral foundations ... above all other political factors. And we was also well aware of how those moral foundations must stand above the self-serving reasoning of clever politicians. Constant bickering among the representatives to the constitutional convention at one point was getting the process nowhere. Finally, Franklin appealed to them to go higher ... in prayer to God. He remined them that God, not human reason, had brought them through what was a virtually impossible rebellion against the English king. Franklin's appeal had its desired effect ... and they did then come together. So ... what would Franklin feel and say if he could see where things stand today in this moral-spiritual matter? College Closings and the Humanities Decline - Sep 20, 2026
Most Sadly, for a variety of reasons, over the past ten years some 150
colleges and universities have closed in America, 40 to 50 of them
considered to have been Christian faith-based. True ... college
enrollment has been growing recently ... but as students head for
training for more technical fields of studies, ones designed to open
for them the doors of medicine, the law, the business world in general.
Meanwhile humanities programs have been cut back in response to
this trend. Sadly, the humanities was never intended to be about
a job (although the cost of a college degree makes such
business-mindedness understandable) but was designed for individuals
destined to play a broader role in leading their world to higher things
... from elementary teachers to pastors, to writers. This was not
about money but about service ... a moral-spiritual requirement
(especially in our leadership) to help America keep on track as a
"Light to the Nations."
A Muslim Youth Becomes a Christian Pastor - Sep 13, 2026
You might wonder what made my son-in-law Rimi into a Christian pastor,
when it was Serbian "Christians" that killed a number of Rimi's
Muslim family-members in the War in Kosovo. That is because
later, as a university student, an American professor teaching in
Kosovo showed Rimi a loving attitude in his work ... something missing
in a spiritually still
quite dark Kosovo. Rimi was challenged by this professor to see
what a personal relationship with Jesus Christ was all about. And the results
were amazing (which had nothing to do with Serbian "Christianity").
God then led Rimi forward as a ministering hand ...
as a young pastor and then as an academic theologian
as well ... and even as husband to my
daughter Rachel. And that pastoral work continues to move
foreward ...
beautifully. The 9/11 Double Tragedy - Sep 11, 2026 To
my way of thinking, the horrible events of 9/11 have a two-fold aspect
of grand tragedy. First of all it was the death of that
multitude of people at the hands of a small group of al Qaeda
terrorists. But It had a second tragic aspect ... when that
became the justification for us to head into Afghanistan to try to
remake the country as a pro-Western "democracy" ... which quite
predictably was a project not destined for success. And a
lot more people would die in the confusion. It takes a lot more than
military conquest to produce a democratic-minded people. Vietnam
should have made that quite clear. Visionary Versus Practical Reasoning - Sep 2, 2026 We are all born with the skill of human reason, a tool which has enabled us to work together to dominate this planet. But that skill requires us to be able to think higher than mere self-promotion, which is how we start out as babies. That
skill must be trained, disciplined and inspired by those that have gone
before us, or we are most likely to use that skill simply for rather
selfish reasons ... which does us as social creatures great harm.
Our Puritan Heritage - Aug 26, 2026 Puritan
New England went strongly against the feudal system that had the rest
of the Western (even Christian) world under the power of a handful of
very priviliged political and religious officials. The New
England settlement very purposefully placed sovereignty in the hands of
the common citizen. Indeed New England was well aware that it was
answering a covenant with God to serve as a City on a Hill, a Light to
the Nation ... to show the world how to live Christ's Way. |
