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Table of Contents - Fall 2004
Should Ethics
Come First? I am upset. We live in a day when ethical issues bombard us—same-sex marriage, stem-cell research, war in Iraq, Enron-type corporate greed, lawsuits over Ten Commandments monuments, and even the Rev. Jerry Falwell telling Southwestern Seminary students in a chapel service how to vote. The crisis in ethics is widespread. Roman
Catholics struggle with revelations of clergy sexual abuse and church cover-up,
Episcopalians react to the elevation of a practicing homosexual priest,
Presbyterians and Methodists are divided over the ordination of gay ministers,
and the Southern Baptist Convention prohibits women serving as pastors.
Christian Citizenship Marvin Griffin first voted in a
federal election in 1944. He paid the required $1.75 poll tax in
“I never miss voting,” says the
81-year-old pastor of A constitutional amendment in 1964 and a Supreme Court ruling in 1966 killed the poll tax because it was seen as an impediment to voting, but many people still do not vote. Voting is one of the cornerstones of
citizenship in a democratic nation. And good citizenship is one of the
cornerstones of the Christian life, especially among Baptists.
The Greatest Divide In the Not all. Bishop could have called his
article on the churches, “The Greatest Divide.” There, least of all, do people
evidence openness, humility, and readiness to hear viewpoints with which they
might disagree, even when these are voiced by fellow-believers. To do our own
framing, let me suggest an experiment for those who attend worship
(non-attenders can easily get reports from experimenters). In the polite
company of fellow-believers, on church premises, whisper words such as “Bush”
or “Kerry,” “Democrat” or “Republican.” Thereupon, if you are not met with
spite or spit, go on to the second part of the experiment: voice support for
one party or candidate and reject the other. The custodian will clean up your
broken glasses or other debris left over from the smashing that will follow.
A Fight For
Souls, Votes © Like a staccato drumbeat, the images flashed on a giant screen before a convention hall filled with 8,000 ardent Baptists. “We are at war” exclaimed one burst of text interspersed between photos of Osama bin Laden, Tim McVeigh, Bill Clinton wagging his finger and George W. Bush praying. “Evil will be great on the earth,” the messages continued. “We are at war for the souls of men, and they are counting on us.” The
promotional video, shown at last month’s meeting of the Southern Baptist
Convention, was meant to inspire support for missionary work. But its political
subtext was unmistakable in this presidential election year. The Power of
Public Theology With similar emotion and energy, we pledge our allegiance to the nation and confess our faith in the one true God. Whether these two loyalties collaborate or collide is a matter of utmost importance and never more so than when a nation is at war. It is therefore a good time to remember the Barmen Confession of 1934. It was promulgated, not by
gathered synod or official delegates, much less by patriarch or pope. On the
contrary, the good work was done by ordinary ministers assembled on the banks
of the “Theological Clarification of
the Three Degrees
of Separation In 1893 a preacher came to town and stirred up folks against liquor. In his wake they prohibited church people from drinking, of course, and also from selling any form of alcohol. They went further, refusing membership to those who rent property to a saloon, who deposit money in a bank that loaned money to the liquor business, who sell insurance to any person in the liquor industry and, finally, “who live in part or in whole on money collected from any person directly or indirectly connected with the whiskey business. Even that was not enough:
they chastised “any Mayor or Common Council or other Officers that grant
license to any person engaged in the manufacturing, buying or selling of
intoxicating liquors.”
Separation of Church and State
After the War of Independence from The First Amendment provided that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” In 1948, the Supreme Court in McCollum v. Board of Education, U.S. 333, applied the Establishment Clause to invalidate a state law. Perhaps the most forceful explanation of
the First Amendment is in the unanimous decision of the Supreme Court in 1947
in Everson v. Board of Education: “The Establishment of Religion Clause
of the First Amendment means at least this:
Updated Friday, December 24, 2004 |
Note: In response to last month’s articles on “Same-Sex
Marriage,” two of our readers/writers have contributed the articles below to
increase our dialogue on this subject. As noted at the bottom of page two, all
articles express the views of the authors and not necessarily the views of CET
or the editor.
A Pro-Marriage Amendment to the
Constitution In the last
hundred or so years, the I remember the first time I used the word “pregnant.” I was quickly told not to use that word, but to say the girl was “p-g.” If someone filed for divorce because of an adulterous spouse, we said that the person had “biblical reasons” for divorcing. It was a very self-righteous and self-justifying to be “biblically” correct about one’s divorce. In the 1960s, our country went the other
way with the “sexual revolution” and “free love,” which meant that people now
talked openly about what had, in fact, been going on for millennia. Baptist Ethics
and the Marriage Amendment Just across In How the
Painted Bunting Was Created I met Marcus and Lucy Rogers during Creative Week at Laity Lodge this summer. I smiled. God has not lost His touch when it comes to creating beauty! He pulled out all the stops when He made these two. Marcus, an attorney from
Lucy is a tall,
willowy, strawberry blonde . . . astonishingly beautiful. She radiates beauty
and love. She is a perfect “10.” Book Reviews
Change I have a couple of friends who wake up every morning trying to think of things to change that day. No matter how well things have worked in the past, no matter how smoothly things are running now, and no matter how the status quo is humming along, their nostrils flare with the prospect of changing everything. Today if possible. If not today, then tomorrow for sure. Certainly no later than Friday of this week. Just run over anybody who gets in the way, or fire them, whichever comes first. But do get on with the change. Me? I just hate change. One of the best things about God, it seems
to me, is caught in a wonderful old hymn, “Abide With
Me,” one stanza of which closes, “O Thou who changest not, Abide with me.”
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