“The stereotype of a fully rational and objective ‘scientific method,’ with individual scientists as logical (and interchangeable) robots, is self-serving mythology,”[1] argued Stephen Jay Gould. Gould (1941–2002), who served as professor of geology at Harvard and New York University, stated that “no factual discovery of science (statements about how nature ‘is’) can, in principle, lead us to ethi [...]
The Children of God (COG), a cult founded by David (Moses David) Berg, used sex as an intoxicant to keep the cult together. Homosexuality, lesbianism, incest, and group sex were all legitimized by the COG cult. Berg’s daughter, Deborah (Linda Berg) Davis, writes in The Children of God: The Inside Story, of how her father justified his perverted view of sex because he first perverted Scripture. He [...]
It’s been said that you can tell a book by its cover. You can also tell a book by those who endorse it. Consider Alan Dershowitz’s Blasphemy: How the Religious Right is Hijacking our Declaration of Independence.[1] The book is endorsed by at least two high-profile published atheists (Steven Pinker and Sam Harris), the president of the ACLU (Nadine Strossen, who speaks to atheist groups and may be [...]
As you know, American Vision rarely asks for donations. And when we do, all of the donations we receive go 100% to ministry projects and not to staff salaries. Like most Americans, however, many of you are cutting back over concerns about our slowing economy and the upcoming presidential election. We’re not. Now is the time to recapture ground that has been lost to liberals. There’s no better time [...]
In Late Corporation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints v. United States (1890), the Supreme Court declared: “It is contrary to the spirit of Christianity and the civilization which Christianity has produced in the Western world." In an earlier decision that year, the court declared in Davis v. Beason that “Bigamy and polygamy are crimes by the laws of all civilized and Christi [...]
On a flight to New Mexico last year, the in flight movie was Fracture (2007). It starred Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling. Hopkins had killed his wife, and while all the circumstantial evidence pointed to him, there was no actual physical evidence to link him to the murder. The detectives and the prosecutor, played by Gosling, looked at all evidence over and over again and could not figure out how [...]
The New York Times is known by the slogan and masthead logo as “All The News That’s Fit To print.” A more accurate slogan would be, “all the news we say is fit to print.” But even this isn’t quite right. For the Times and every other newspaper and magazine, it’s all the news and our opinion about that news that’s fit to print. Christians have fallen into the trap set by secularists that facts and [...]
The next time you hear someone predict environmental doom, remember Paul R. Ehrlich. In his book The Population Bomb, first published in 1968, Ehrlich made a number of predictions about the future of our planet based on a faulty understanding of population growth and food supplies. Ehrlich’s projections were not new. Thomas Robert Malthus (1766–1834), a British political economist and mathematicia [...]
The following comment was in response to my article “Trying to Account for the Invisible in the Atheist World”: “Atheists claim that only physical things exist.” Straw man argument. You set up a bad foundation so you can tear it down. And if morality in your argument can’t come from atheists, then explain the Christian worldview of the morality of slavery in the Bible. Claiming that only “ph [...]
From March 28–30 I was speaking at the Cincinnati Homeschool Convention. I was amazed to hear how so many people in attendance have been influenced by the work of American Vision. It was humbling to learn that our work has changed so many lives, especially in the area of a comprehensive worldview. Their previous fragmented worldview came into sharp focus once their eschatology changed. There is a [...]
A battle is going on among Southern Baptists and evangelicals in general over the global warming hypothesis. The real battle is between those advocating stewardship and those pushing for government to control our behavior in the belief that global warming is man-made rather than part of weather cycles. For example, so far 2008 is not turning out to be a good year for global warming certainties, es [...]
We almost never get visitors to our house, unless we invite them. When someone pulls into our driveway, it’s to use it as a turnaround. This Saturday, a shiny new SUV rolled up the driveway and a smartly dressed couple got out and came up to the door. As I suspected, they were Jehovah’s Witnesses. There’s a Kingdom Hall not far from our house. I was surprised to see them. Word usually gets around [...]
A report has shown that 25% of teenage girls have a sexually transmitted disease. Surprised? We shouldn’t be. After it was learned that Eliot Spitzer, the former governor of New York, had been going to prostitutes for the past six or ten years, Alan Dershowitz, his former professor at Harvard, came to the governor’s defense. “I feel terrible for Eliot and his family,” Dershowitz said. “But I feel [...]
Christians begin with the presupposition that God created the universe and created man as a special creation different in kind from both inanimate and other animate creations. In fact, man is so special, the Bible tells us, that he is the very “image of God” (Gen. 1:27). One of these image attributes is the existence of the mind, the ability to think rationally (Col. 3:10), and to act in ways that [...]
For those you who don’t know much about history, the Manhattan Project, the nickname for “Manhattan Engineer District,” was a secretive program under the authority of the Army Corps of Engineers to develop the first nuclear weapon. The project was deemed necessary because of fears that the Nazis were planning a similar program. The mission began small in 1939 but eventually employed more than 120, [...]
Have you ever been in a debate with someone who asks for evidence for this or that particular issue, and after giving the evidence it is dismissed as not being relevant? Facts do not speak for themselves. “Facts do not come with interpretation tags, telling us how to view them. . . . Both sides haggle over the facts. Both sides search for new facts to add to their arsenals. Both sides raise accusa [...]
Like I mentioned in yesterday’s article, atheists are coming out of the woodwork. For a few days, I’ve been corresponding with “John.” Here’s my latest response: Dear John, First year philosophy stuff is right. You know as well as I do that there is no single “philosophy.” One of the best explanations of Philosophy I’ve heard is, “A course where you learn why the previous philosopher was wrong.” I [...]
Recently I have received a number of emails from atheists. This isn’t unusual since American Vision publishes a number of books refuting common atheist arguments, and I’ve written a few articles on the subject as well. American Vision will be publishing two new books refuting atheist arguments in the next few months. One will be an answer to Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion and the other to Chris [...]
In the Foreword to Tony Campolo’s new book Red Letter Christians, Jim Wallis tells a story about a secular Jewish country-music songwriter and disk jockey who told him that a new social movement was being birthed as a result of Wallis’ God’s Politics and other “social-conscience” books (listen to my radio show on this topic). Here’s how Wallis tells it: “I love your stuff and have been following y [...]
Many Christian organizations and churches exist exclusively as spiritual fire houses. When they see a fire, they send a fire engine to douse it. They then return to the fire house to polish the fire engine awaiting another call. There is certainly a need for fire engines and fire houses. But there is no real community if there are only fire houses. For the most part, a fire house is inactive. [...]
