Stand Firm

Christians at Risk: Turkey

2013-06-19T16:58:06Z

All those LibProts who are so exercised about the state of the Christian community of the Holy Land (which is appalling, largely if not exclusively because of the way the Muslim majority in the West Bank has marginalized and dhimmitized it) need to turn their attention to Turkey. Raymond Ibrahim, writing at PJ Media, offers a variety of examples of how the accelerating Islamization of Turkey is effecting the country’s Christians, including pressure on the government to turn Byzantine Christianity’s greatest monument, Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, into a mosque (it is currently a museum). Here’s another example that nicely demonstrates the lengths to which Islamists will go to get their way, reality be damned:

[T]he existence of the oldest functioning Christian monastery in the world, 5th century Mor Gabriel Monastery, is at risk. Inhabited today by only a few dozen Christians dedicated to learning the monastery’s teachings, the ancient Aramaic language spoken by Jesus, and the Orthodox Syriac tradition, neighboring Muslims filed a lawsuit accusing the monks of practicing “anti-Turkish activities” and of illegally occupying land which belongs to Muslim villagers. The highest appeals court in Ankara ruled in favor of the Muslim villagers, saying the land that had been part of the monastery for 1,600 years is not its property, absurdly claiming that the monastery was built over the ruins of a mosque — even though Muhammad was born 170 years after the monastery was built.

It may seem as though these people live in an alternative universe, but unfortunately for Christians who live in Turkey, their power is all too real, and growing. Our brethren there, and throughout the Muslim world, desperately need our prayers to find a way to deal with and minister to the societies in which they live.

Photo Essay of Muslim Brotherhood’s trashing of Cairo

2013-06-18T14:43:18Z

Robert Johnson’s pictures and their disturbing explanations are in a May 23rd report to Business Insider.

What a mess. Seeing is believing. Johnson had to seek refuge with organized criminals just to save his photo gear from street freebooters.

People sometimes scoff at Islam as “driving people back into the 7th century.” In Cairo, the Muslim Brotherhood drives people back into situations that Jesus encountered in his earthly ministry:

Prostitution is often the only option left to “summer brides” and other unfortunate women. The women in this photo turned to prostitution after their husbands abandoned them and their children. They now make a living any way they can.

Paying for Other People’s Stuff

2013-06-17T22:53:18Z

That’s what Americans United for Separation of Church and State is arguing for in a brief filed with the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. According to a press release excreted by AU today, someone refusing to pay for something that someone else wants is the same as denying them the right to purchase it themselves. Really:

Americans United for Separation of Church and State and its allies have told a federal appellate court that for-profit businesses cannot use religious liberty arguments to deny their employees access to contraceptive coverage.

In a friend-of-the-court brief, Americans United, along with the American Civil Liberties Union, Anti-Defamation League and an array of religious groups urged the U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Columbia Circuit to uphold the Obama administration’s contraceptive mandate, which requires most businesses to provide workers with health insurance that includes no-cost birth control.

“Religious Right interest groups are trying to advance the idea of ‘corporate conscience,’ even though there is no such thing,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director. “No corporation has the right to deny an employee access to birth control just because the boss is against contraceptives.”

The case, Gilardi v. Sebelius, was brought by Francis and Philip Gilardi, two Roman Catholic brothers who own two Sidney, Ohio-based companies that process, package and transport produce. They are represented by the American Center for Law and Justice, a Religious Right legal group founded by TV preacher Pat Robertson.

Given that Pat Robertson has nothing to do with the ALCJ, and hasn’t for years, that last is simply for scare purposes. Here’s the real crock: Pretty much anyone who has ever used or sought birth control knows that it is dirt cheap. For all intents and purposes, there is no one in the United States who cannot pay for it, especially if they have a job. The lowliest burger flipper makes enough to be able to spring for contraceptives without significantly effecting their standard of living. Yet AU has the gall to say that unless the government gets its way, and all employers are forced to offer health insurance that pays 100% for birth control, that means that those employers are “denying access” to their employees.

This novel approach to the idea of rights has some potentially fascinating uses. Can I force my employer to buy me a computer? Without it, I will not have access to the Internet, and thus be deprived of my free speech right to make snarky comments about AU on a blog. Can I force my employer to buy me a gun? Without one, I can’t exercise my Second Amendment right to bear arms. Can I require my employer to buy me a home alarm system? Without it, I can’t be secure in my home as the Fifth Amendment requires. Can I make my employer pay for a house for my mother-in-law in Florida? Otherwise, she’ll have to move in with me, a clear violation of the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

You get the point. The idea that because one may have a right to purchase and use a product has never meant that a third party can be forced to pay for you to do so. Americans United’s argument is just so much twaddle—not to mention advocacy of the trampling of the First Amendment, and that ever-pesky freedom of religion thingy.

California Court of Appeal Denies ECUSA’s Writ Petition

2013-06-17T19:53:33Z

One of the longer-running cases brought by ECUSA in California is the Fresno lawsuit against former Episcopal Bishop John-David Schofield over the real property, bank accounts and other assets that belong to the (now) Anglican Diocese of San Joaquin. Readers who would like the full chronicle of events, and background for understanding where we are now, may consult the links on this page.

Most recently, I had written about the Fresno trial court’s denial of ECUSA’s motion for summary judgment / summary adjudication here, and then again here when that decision became final. Subsequently, I noted that ECUSA and its rump diocese and bishop had filed for a writ of mandate with the Fifth District Court of Appeal, whom they asked to reverse the ruling of the trial court.

Now, this morning comes word from the appellate court that it has summarily denied ECUSA’s petition—without further briefing, or hearing. This is the fate of over 90% of such petitions for extraordinary relief. The appellate court is reluctant to interfere with the process of going to trial, and will do so only when absolutely necessary to avoid having to try the case all over again.

In this case, the Court of Appeal evidently saw no harm in allowing the present case to go to trial, which is currently scheduled for January 6, 2014 in front of a jury. Stay tuned for more developments.

Sweet lyrics and you can goose step to it!

2013-06-17T14:29:56Z

One of Sunday’s pastoral visits was to a terminally ill kid.

Driving home, I punched on the contemporary hot hits station to unwind. Yeah, lots of silly dreck there, but some fun tunes and, like I say, trying to unwind before getting home.

So what comes on? A freaking, full on political anthem passing as a pop tune. Here’s a taste of Maclemore:

The right wing conservatives think it’s a decision
And you can be cured with some treatment and religion
Man-made rewiring of a predisposition
Playing God, aw nah here we go
America the brave still fears what we don’t know
And God loves all his children, is somehow forgotten
But we paraphrase a book written thirty-five-hundred years ago
I don’t know…

...And that Holy Water
That you soak in
Has been poisoned
When everyone else
Is more comfortable
Remaining voiceless
Rather than fighting for humans
That have had their rights stolen
I might not be the same
But that’s not important
No freedom ‘til we’re equal
Damn right I support it

Now I’m no DJ but let me roll the clock back just a few decades to sample another pop lyricist. Horst Wessel was a Nazi SA (the old Brownshirts) street thug. The German Communists had their own toughs, and one of them shot Horst Wessel dead. The Nazis turned him into a popular martyr to advance their party’s power. In a real stroke of luck, Wessel had penned a tune, and the Nazis took it right to the top of the German charts as they solidified power. Here’s some of that song. A bit of similarity to something you read above, nicht wahr?

The flag on high! The ranks tightly closed!
The SA march with quiet, steady step.
Comrades shot by the Red Front and reactionaries
March in spirit within our ranks.
Comrades shot by the Red Front and reactionaries
March in spirit within our ranks.
Clear the streets for the brown battalions,
Clear the streets for the stormtrooper!
Millions are looking upon the swastika full of hope,
The day of freedom and of bread dawns!
Millions are looking upon the swastika full of hope,
The day of freedom and of bread dawns!

You get the demonic enemy persecuting the noble marchers. You get the promise of a better day for all once the cause triumphs. You get the assertive, get-outta-our-way ‘tude.

In fairness to Maclemore, he spends a good chunk of his song protesting the routine homophobia in the lyrics and lingo of the rap subculture. And he’s trying to reconcile the Christian message of love with his desire to affirm same sex unions - he even quotes I Corinthians 13 at the end of the song. He’s clear that God is real and good but that the church is misrepresenting it’s head when it comes to same sex marriage. That’s a line of argument most Christians hear from time to time. It isn’t unusual.

While I don’t insist that the world agree with me on everything, the horror that made me pop in a disc and shut out his song wasn’t about his position on gay weddings. It was my immediate recall of the Horst Wessel Lied.

We are in deep weeds when political marching anthems are our pop tunes. When political ideology and causes are our recreational listening. This doesn’t end well.

For All The Fathers Out There Raising Kids

2013-06-16T14:33:48Z

Yes yes, I know that parents are not *solely* or even primarily to serve as friends with their children. But that is what you someday hope for, long long in the future. And there’s something to be said for a Dad playing with his boy—or his girl, as the case may be.

Happy Father’s Day!

America’s Coming Demographic Disaster

2013-06-15T23:47:08Z

That’s right. We just aren’t having enough babies. It’s this amazing, amazing change in what is really the central fact of the human condition. Throughout recorded history people have always had—not always but almost always had enough people, enough babies to sustain themselves, to sustain their civilizations and their populations. In fact, throughout most of recorded history people have had more than enough to sustain. In fact, the populations have grown, but beginning in 1968 in American and the Western-industrialized countries, fertility rates dropped off the table. They fell by half in a matter of years. By 1973, America was below the replacement fertility rate and by the mid-1970s all of the West was. This was really interesting. This was a sort of calamity in many ways, but it was a subject of academic interest, but then as the professional academics and demographers were studying it they noticed that fertility decline spread to the rest of the world as well. So today, 97% of the world’s population lives in a country where the fertility rate is declining. Global population is going to peak, we believe, sometime in the next 50 or 60 years, and is then going to begin shrinking. For the first time in human-recorded history, population will shrink, not because of famines, not because of war or disease or pestilence, but because people simply can’t be bothered to have enough children.

Interesting subject. You can read the entire transcript here.

Sex and Jihad – the Failure of Modern Hermeneutics

2013-06-15T05:59:39Z

Over the past few weeks I’ve been slowly coming to the conclusion that there is a massive similarity in the way our society is handling the two “religious” questions of homosexuality and violent Islam. In both areas there has been a singular failure to read religious texts as they were intended to be read and to understand how they were intended to be applied. As our Western world turns both to the Bible to understand what it says about sexuality and to the Qu’ran to understand what it says about Jihad we see clear evidence of this malaise.

Perhaps you would not have put these 2 subjects together - sex and jihad. Let me try and persuade you otherwise.

Sex and reading the Bible

By now most of us are familiar with the standard revisionist approach to the question of sexual ethics in the Bible. Clear prohibitions are “uncertain” or “relate only to cultic prostitution” and so on. As we move into the New Testament it’s common to assert that Jesus had nothing to say on the subject. There’s not really anything new that’s been written in the past 20 years or so and yet the same tired arguments are rolled out.

There are, of course, corresponding answers. Readers will be interested in the extensive writing of Robert Gagnon in this area - lots of good material there. I also have a lot of time for John Richardson‘s What God Has Made Clean. At the heart of much of this debate is the key question “how do we read these texts today?” i.e. what is our hermeneutic?

While the Post-moderns have a lot to answer for, one thing they taught us well is to take care when we read any text. Post-modernism comes in for a kicking in many areas (and rightly so, slippery thing that it is) but the original Post-moderns were often very good readers who we can learn a lot from. No less so when they read the Bible. Paul Ricoeur makes a telling observation on Biblical hermeneutics when he refers (Essays on Biblical Interpretation (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980) 52) to,

Jesus Christ himself, exegesis and exegete of Scripture…

It’s a brilliant turn of phrase. Jesus is the exegesis (the correct reading) of the Bible and, at the same time the exegete (the correct reader) of the Bible. He is the lens through which we read everything in the Scriptures and He gives us the definitive reading. As a result the answer to all theological questions pass through Him (and, we might add, through His cross - but that’s another discussion). And all of a sudden we realise that there is a consistent way of reading the Bible that makes sense of all those allegedly difficult passages - Jesus is the key. Everything written beforehand points inexorably to Him and to what He came to do. He provides the interpretive grid for everything we read in the Bible and, at times, speaks authoritatively Himself on that same Bible. We therefore understand that much of the Old Testament does not stand alone but points to and is fulfilled in Jesus and His life, death and Resurrection. This is not a strange novelty but long understood and, of course, affirmed regularly in the New Testament.

Answering this same question, Tim Keller helpfully notes:

Once you grant the main premise of the Bible—about the surpassing significance of Christ and his salvation—then all the various parts of the Bible make sense. Because of Christ, the ceremonial law is repealed. Because of Christ the church is no longer a nation-state imposing civil penalties. It all falls into place. However, if you reject the idea of Christ as Son of God and Savior, then, of course, the Bible is at best a mish-mash containing some inspiration and wisdom, but most of it would have to be rejected as foolish or erroneous.

That last sentence is worth noting in and of itself. Liberal “Christianity” shares the same hermeneutic that the rest of our culture has because it shares the same base assumption - that Jesus is not the Christ, the Son of God and Saviour as traditional readings of the Bible have understood Him. There is a common foundation of unbelief that underpins the common approach to the Bible.

We see this worked out in the key issue itself, human sexuality. Jesus is the exegesis in that He presents Himself as the Bridegroom of the His bride, the church (so Matt. 25:1 et seq., Mark 2:19 = Luke 5:34, John 3:29). In doing so He draws upon frequent similar language in the Old Testament where God portrays Himself as the loving faithful husband of His bride, His people (so Isa. 62:5, Jer. 3:1, Hos. 3:1 etc.). The New Testament Apostolic authors also take up the same theme (e.g. Eph. 5:22 et seq., Rev. 19:7 etc.). The correct reading of those OT texts finds their fulfilment in Jesus and He Himself makes that clear. And He speaks clearly on the topic of human sexuality too, citing Genesis 2:24 as the definitive created order for human sexual expression:

Mark 10:6-9 “But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

There is a clear trajectory in all of this, the hermeneutic isn’t hard to understand. What is clear, however, is that not liking the obvious conclusion of that hermeneutic leads people down strange paths of inconsistency and, frankly, just poor reading.

Jihad and reading the Qu’ran

So what does all this have to do with Islam and Jihad? Simply put, our Western culture exhibits exactly the same deliberately blind lack of any understanding when it approaches another tricky “religious” topic, this time the question of the validity of Islamic “terrorism”.

A few weeks ago 2 men murdered a British soldier on the streets of Woolwich in the UK. Here’s one of the men’s explanation for what he did, filmed immediately after the atrocity. (Caution - some disturbing images)

And here the transcript of what he said (except for the [bracketed section] which I have corrected) with citations from the Qu’ran referenced,

The only reason we have killed this man today is because Muslims are dying daily by British soldiers. And this British soldier is one. It is an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. By Allah, we swear by the almighty Allah we will never stop fighting you until you leave us alone.

So what if we want to live by the Sharia in Muslim lands? Why does that mean you must follow us and chase us and call us extremists and kill us? Rather you lot are extreme. You are the ones that when you drop a bomb you think it hits one person? Or rather your bomb wipes out a whole family? This is the reality.

By Allah if I saw your mother today with a buggy I would help her up the stairs. This is my nature…

We [are forced by the Koran in Surah At-Taubah ... many many Ayah through the] Koran ... we must fight them as they fight us. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

I apologise that women had to witness this today but in our lands women have to see the same.

You people will never be safe. Remove your governments, they don’t care about you. You think David Cameron is going to get caught in the street when we start busting our guns? You think your politicians are going to die? No, it’s going to be the average guy, like you and your children.

“So get rid of them. Tell them to bring our troops back so we ... so you can all live in peace. So leave our lands and we can all live in peace.

“That’s all I have to say. Allah’s peace and blessings be upon you.

We’ll return to this in a while.

What has been noticeable in the response of politicians in the UK, mirrored by the mainstream media, is the general consistency of argument that this murder (while initially labelled as “Islamic terrorism”) is not representative of Islam or has no grounding in Islam. Prime Minister David Cameron said,

This was not just an attack on Britain – and on our British way of life. It was also a betrayal of Islam – and of the Muslim communities who are give so much to our country.

There is nothing in Islam that justifies this truly dreadful act.

and the Muslim Council of Britain had this to say,

Eye-witnesses suggest that the murderers made Islamic slogans during their heinous action and were thus motivated by their Islamic faith.

This is a truly barbaric act that has no basis in Islam…

Nothing in Islam to justify this act.

No basis in Islam.

The problem is that it’s simply not true. But that’s not to say the question isn’t complicated.

Islam has a messy and, quite obviously, violent history. From the very beginning Islam has been blatantly expansionistic. Rather than being a “religion of peace” it is a religion of submission. In fact that’s what the word Islam means; “submission” - submission to Allah. As you read through the Qu’ran this much is perfectly obvious - the rule of Islam, the Caliphate, is a very earthly kingdom that was instituted in the early decades and then centuries of it’s existence at the point of the sword once the opportunity for persuasion had failed,

When Muhammad first began to receive “revelations” from God, in 610, he lived in Mecca, a major center of polytheistic worship. As he preached his monotheistic message, he encountered indifference and then growing resistance. Over 13 years, persecution against him and his small band of followers eventually became so severe that they finally left Mecca and emigrated to Medina (then known as Yathrib) about 220 miles to the north.

In Medina, Muhammad gathered many followers—along with political and military power. After eight years of raids and battles, he conquered Mecca and instituted Islam in place of the city’s polytheism.

According to Firestone, “Muslim scholars came to the conclusion that the scriptural verses regarding war were revealed in direct relation to the historic needs of Muhammad during his prophetic mission. At the beginning of his prophetic career in Mecca when he was weak and his followers few, the divine revelations encouraged avoidance of physical conflict.”

After the intense persecutions that caused Muhammad and his followers to emigrate to Medina, however, they were given leave to engage in defensive warfare. As the Muslim community grew in strength, further revelations broadened the conditions under which war could be waged, “until it was concluded that war against non-Muslims could be waged virtually at any time, without pretext, and in any place.”

The later verses, known as the “Sword Verses” (9:5 and 9:29), were considered by Muslim scholars to have cancelled the previous verses mandating kindness and persuasion. Expansionist jihad became the explicit norm.

That this was believed amongst the early Muslims, those closest to the original events, is evident from the pattern of the next few centuries:

In one sense Islam brought peace, but it was an enforced peace at threat of death. The submission of Islam was extended as wide as possible.

At this point we need to observe that, just as with the Bible, there is a question of hermeneutics here. When do the “sword verses” apply? Is it right to consider Islam now permanently in the “Medina” stage (ie expansionary or in control in a land) or are there some Muslims who are “in Mecca” (ie in a minority in a strange land)? Of course, for many Muslims living in the West the situation is far more “Mecca” than “Medina” and yet the “Medina” paradigm still exists in one important sense which we will now turn to.

The chapter of the Qu’ran containing the “sword verses” cited above is well worth reading in full. In particular it has these texts,

5. Then when the Sacred Months (the Ist, 7th, 11th, and 12th months of the Islamic calendar) have passed, then kill the Mushrikun (see V.2:105) wherever you find them, and capture them and besiege them, and prepare for them each and every ambush. But if they repent and perform As-Salat (Iqamat-as-Salat), and give Zakat, then leave their way free. Verily, Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.

...

28. O you who believe (in Allah’s Oneness and in His Messenger (Muhammad )! Verily, the Mushrikun (polytheists, pagans, idolaters, disbelievers in the Oneness of Allah, and in the Message of Muhammad ) are Najasun (impure) . So let them not come near Al-Masjid-al-Haram (at Makkah) after this year, and if you fear poverty, Allah will enrich you if He will, out of His Bounty. Surely, Allah is All-Knowing, All-Wise.

29. Fight against those who (1) believe not in Allah, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger (4) and those who acknowledge not the religion of truth (i.e. Islam) among the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians), until they pay the Jizyah with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.

...

122. And it is not (proper) for the believers to go out to fight (Jihad) all together. Of every troop of them, a party only should go forth, that they (who are left behind) may get instructions in (Islamic) religion, and that they may warn their people when they return to them, so that they may beware (of evil).

123. O you who believe! Fight those of the disbelievers who are close to you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that Allah is with those who are the Al-Muttaqun (the pious - see V.2:2).

There are also these to take on board, from Surah 2.

178. O you who believe! Al-Qisas (the Law of Equality in punishment) is prescribed for you in case of murder: the free for the free, the slave for the slave, and the female for the female. But if the killer is forgiven by the brother (or the relatives, etc.) of the killed against blood money, then adhering to it with fairness and payment of the blood money, to the heir should be made in fairness. This is an alleviation and a mercy from your Lord. So after this whoever transgresses the limits (i.e. kills the killer after taking the blood money), he shall have a painful torment.

179. And there is (a saving of) life for you in Al-Qisas (the Law of Equality in punishment), O men of understanding, that you may becomeAl-Muttaqun (the pious - see V.2:2).

It’s well worth bearing in mind that these verses were given when Islam was in it’s ascendancy. According to some Islamic sources well over a third of the Arabian peninsula was already under their control. They are certainly “later” texts and so abrogate much of what has come before when Islam was on the defensive in the “Mecca” years. It’s not my intention here to enter into a detailed analysis of the texts (instead I point the reader to pieces such as this which provide a comprehensive assessment of such ayah).

Here we see a major basis for Islamic violence against others and, in particular, for much Islamic anger with the West (and indeed with some of their own leaders) today. Despite the command of 9:28, unbelievers have “come near Makkah” (in Saudi Arabia) and done so at the invitation of the King of Saudi Arabia. The stationing of Western troops in Saudi Arabia in 1990 in response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait caused no small crisis in the Kingdom and led to Al Quaeda denouncing King Saud’s government and leaving the country.

What is important to realise, then, is that for many Muslims the unbelievers in their Muslim lands (Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Afghanistan) are in the “Medina” context. Islam rules in those places and so the unbelievers fall under the rule of the “sword verses”.

With all this is mind, we can return to the question of what the Woolwich killer had to say and whether we ourselves can say that their actions “have no basis in Islam”. I think at this point it’s easy to argue that the actions of the Woolwich killers, while truly barbaric and even denounced by much of their own community, have a solid basis in Islam by any reasonable reading of the Qu’ran. The appeal to “an eye for an eye” (the principle of equality seen in 2:178 and reiterated in 5:45) is on the basis that “Muslims are dying daily by British soldiers”. If Surah 2:178 is to be taken seriously by a devout Muslim then what we saw on the streets of Woolwich is an entirely logical outcome. It is interesting, also, to note the demeanour of the man in the video footage. He is obviously agitated, the adrenaline still pumping through his body, but there is a deliberate calmness about him. When he says “if I saw your mother today with a buggy I would help her up the stairs. This is my nature…” I have no reason to disbelieve him. His apology that women had to witness the event was no charade.

And yet, despite this, he calmly and deliberately chose to behead a British soldier in broad daylight and then to rush armed police when they arrived. It was an entirely rational considered act and in his brief statement he explain the rational consideration that had led to it - he had read his Qu’ran and done what it told him to do.

Sex and Jihad - the lessons of hermeneutics

So what can we learn from all this? Modern readers of texts quite often are really bad at it! In both cases the ignorance of the text’s own trajectory and internally-explained hermeneutic leads to the imposition of a framework that is alien to the text itself and causes the poor reading. In the case of the Bible and sex it ignores both what Jesus has to say and what explanatory resolution He brings to the deep question of the relationship between Old and New Testament. In the case of the Qu’ran there is not even the slightest evidence of an attempt to grapple with the Medina/Mecca question nor to explain the “sword verses”. Instead all we get is the recurrent mantra of “Islam is a religion of peace” despite the quite obvious Qu’ranic and historical evidence to the contrary. It betrays a quite sophomorically blinkered approach to the whole subject matter.

Christians need to bear all this in mind as we enter into discussion and debate amongst our community. We simply cannot assume that our culture’s understanding of religion and particularly Christianity is built upon some actual intellectually-honest knowledge. It’s not just the new (pop) atheists who read this way, although they are particularly guilty since so many of them claim to have knowledge about things they are clearly ignorant about, but more widely so many of those we are reaching out to simply don’t know what we’re talking about but will often fill their ignorance with our society’s assumptions.

We can react with frustration and anger at this or, perhaps, see it as a unique opportunity.

For someone like me who grew up in the church and learned true stories out of the Bible from a very young age, there’s something quite refreshing when I meet someone who hears the Bible (and particularly the gospel narratives) for the very first time. That wonder and amazement is a real encouragement to us as we see people’s eyes and hearts open up, particularly as we get to then explain about the Lord Jesus Christ.

More generally we therefore need to take every opportunity to explain what difference Jesus makes to the big questions of life - starting with the public questions about sex and then moving on to the core matters of the gospel (a link which the Bible itself, as we have seen above, makes clear).

And for the same reason I think we ought to try and find a way to urge greater honest engagement with the questions of Jihad in the Qu’ran. That’s important because without proper understanding of these things the West will never get to grips with a meaningful response to Islamic terrorism. More importantly, a society that reads a text like the Qu’ran properly will also be a society that reads the Bible properly and therefore come to a better understanding of Jesus Himself whose kingdom (we ought to add in a discussion like this) is truly one of peace and not of this world.

Farmer Wins One Against Government Over-regulation

2013-06-14T15:47:31Z

I’m not a raw milk drinker, but I’m happy for these people, and the farmer. More over at Blue Grass Bulletin:

Amish Dairy Farmer Vernon Hershberger won an important battle in court against the milk lobby funded government of Wisconsin. Hereshberger had formed a co-op which consisted of about 200 people who wanted to purchase and consume raw milk. The state charged Hershberger with crimes and tried him.

No News from Texas; Sad News from Virginia

2013-06-14T16:41:46Z

As of today, June 14, the Supreme Court of Texas has yet to issue its opinion in the Fort Worth direct appeal brought by Bishop Iker and his co-trustees of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth. Such decisions are normally released on Fridays, although toward the end of the term the Court also releases some decisions earlier in the week. For those who would like to monitor the page where any opinion will appear, here is the link.

This same day brings unhappy news, however, from the Supreme Court of Virginia, which has entered a one-page order denying the petition of The Falls Church for a rehearing. In doing so, it leaves intact the troubling decision which I discussed in this previous post. The opinion, however, is based almost entirely upon (a misreading of) Virginia law, and so the grounds for review by the United States Supreme Court are virtually nil. For churchgoers in Virginia, the problems created by the Supreme Court’s interpretation of a State statute will be for the Virginia legislature to address and resolve.

Whether the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia can continue to maintain all of the properties handed to it by the Virginia Supreme Court is still an open question. And what the Diocese decides to do with those properties will speak more clearly about its priorities than anything that could be written at this point. For the Anglicans, however, the way is now clear for them to go forward, in a new beginning.

Let the Episcopal Diocese, in other words, pick up the pieces of the wreckage it has made of the Episcopal faith in Virginia. And let the Anglicans continue to adhere fast to the faith once delivered to the saints. The proof will be in the fruits which each produces.

Believing The Islamic Lie

2013-06-14T13:08:50Z

Interesting stuff from Information Warfare, where there is more:

This is not a sudden and unexpected outburst of Moslem violence against non-Moslems and Moslems considered heretical. It is normal and at the root of Islamic terrorism. While this violent behavior represents only a small number of Moslems, it is a large minority (from a few percent of a population to over half, according to opinion polls). Moreover, the majority of Moslems has not been willing, or able, to confront and suppress the Islamic radicals that not only spread death and destruction but also besmirch all Moslems. This reveals a fundamental problem in the Islamic world, the belief that combining righteousness with murderous tactics is often the road to power and spiritual salvation. Throughout history, when these tactics were applied to non-Moslems, they often failed. The non-Moslems were unfazed by the religious angle and, especially in the last five hundred years, were better able to defeat Islamic violence with even greater violence. Thus, until quite recently, the Moslems fought among themselves and left the infidels (non-Moslems) alone. But after World War II that began to change.

Naturally, this began to show up first in the Middle East. During the Lebanese civil war of 1975-1990, Christian and Moslem Arabs fought bitterly over political, cultural, and, ultimately, religious differences. The capital, Beirut, was divided into Christian and Moslem sections by the Green Line. The name came from the fact that in this rubble filled no man’s land only grass and weeds survived. And that the line on a ceasefire map was drawn in green. There have been a lot more Green Lines since then. Few realized it at the time but this war was but the first of many major conflicts between Christians and Moslems in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Many of the earliest Moslem converts were Christians. And many of the people Moslem armies unsuccessfully sought to conquer were Christian. The original Crusades, which modern Moslems portray as Western aggression, were actually a Western attempt to rescue Middle Eastern Christians from increasing Islamic terrorism and violence. But Islam as a political force was in decline for several centuries until the 1970s. Then things changed and they continue to change. Fueled by oil wealth and access to Western weapons and technology, Islamic radicals saw new opportunities. Islam was again on the march and few have noticed the many places where it was turning into religious war with Christians and other non-Moslems.

In Asia we have a Green Line between India and Pakistan. Inside India many Moslem communities remain and feelings aren’t always neighborly. Indonesia and the Philippines suffer growing strife between Moslems and non-Moslems. Malaysia has fanatical Moslems persecuting more laid-back ones and non-Moslems in general. China has a large Moslem community that generates an increasing amount of violence. Russia and America have formed a curious partnership to deal with Islamic-based terrorism coming out of Afghanistan and Pakistan. In Chechnya Russia faced Islamic-inspired violence all alone in the 1990s.

Africa has a rather dusty Green Line, south of the semi-arid Sahel region. Many African nations are split by increasingly sensitive religious differences. The Moslems are in the north, Christians and animists in the south. Nigeria, Egypt, and Sudan are among the more violent hot spots at the moment. When the Moslem Somalis stop fighting each other they will return to raiding their Christian and animist neighbors to the south.

The Annual Birthday Request

2013-06-14T12:50:20Z

If you’re looking for some *excellent* politically conservative places to donate money, please take note of Erick Erickson’s annual birthday request.

Another California Judge Denies Summary Relief to ECUSA (Updated)

2013-06-14T03:34:21Z

[UPDATE 06/14/2013: I can now report that Judge Reed affirmed her tentative ruling at the close of the hearing on ECUSA’s motion this morning. The case now goes to trial, which is scheduled for late July.]

Last month I wrote about the litigation lottery in California, in which a Kern County judge ruled against two Anglican parishes (St. Paul’s in Bakersfield, and St. Michael’s in Ridgecrest) that as a matter of law, their attempt to disaffiliate from ECUSA was invalid, while a Tulare County judge ruled—on the same set of facts—that there were disputed issues about the withdrawal of St. John’s, in Porterville, which would require a full trial. The previous post provides all the background you will need to understand today’s tentative ruling by a second Tulare County judge—this time in favor of St. Paul’s, in Visalia, also denying summary judgment to ECUSA on the same basic set of facts.

Using a formula that is by now well-tested in the California courts, the plaintiffs—Provisional Bishop Talton and his rump diocese—made the same arguments that worked with the judge in Kern County:

Here, Plaintiffs contend the Episcopal Church’s rules do not permit parishes to disaffiliate from the church and, as such the Diocese of San Joaquin and St. Paul’s Parish remain admitted as part of the Episcopal Church despite Defendants’ actions and claim of disaffiliation. Plaintiffs further assert that the members, vestrymen, and rector who claim allegiance to the Anglican Church have disaffiliated themselves (but not the parish) from the Episcopal Church by taking the actions that they did and they have no authority over parish affairs or property. Thus, Plaintiffs allege the transfer of property out of trust for the benefit of the Episcopal Church was without authority and is invalid. As a result, Plaintiffs contend Defendants are now improperly precluding members of the Episcopal Church from exercising control over parish property.

They relied upon the same California cases, too: cases from Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego Counties in which the departing parishes, unlike those in San Joaquin, did not have the permission of their bishop to disaffiliate. But Judge Reed saw through their claim that those cases were dispositive:

In particular, unlike the prior cases, here there is at least a reasonable inference that St. Paul’s Parish received valid permission from the bishop of the Diocese of San Joaquin to disaffiliate the parish from the Episcopal Church as permitted by the diocese’s canons. Further, there is sufficient evidence to support Defendants’ contention that after disaffiliation, the vestrymen of the parish retained authority to amend the parish’s corporate articles and bylaws in order to effectively transfer title of parish property to the Anglican Church.

Judge Reed explains the importance of Section 20.01(g) of the Canons of the Diocese of San Joaquin, and for this once, turns the tables on ECUSA by saying that it never objected to that Canon:

As to the issue of the parish’s right to disaffiliate from the church, it is undisputed that Canon XX, section 20.01(g) of the Diocese of San Joaquin has been an adopted canon of the diocese for many years, and that the plain language of section 20.01(g) allows for disaffiliation of the parish upon the written approval of the bishop of the diocese.

Plaintiffs argue that section 20.01(g) is invalid because Episcopal Church rules do not allow for a parish to disaffiliate. They base their contention upon church rules that indicate parish canons may not conflict with church rules and that parish property is to be held in trust for the church. However, the evidence before the court does not show that the Episcopal Church has objected to section 20.01(g) in the past, or taken any action to remove it from the diocese’s canons. Moreover, other church rules appear to give broad authority to bishops, such as Episcopal Church Canon II.6 which authorizes a parish to encumber parish property with consent of the bishop.

After years of hearing courts say that dioceses and parishes never objected to the Dennis Canon before the current disputes arose, this opinion comes as a breath of fresh air, by turning the same point against ECUSA.

Judge Reed goes on to find triable issues of fact with respect to the manner in which Bishop Schofield gave his permission to the parishes, and with regard to the authority of the parish to amend its constitution and bylaws after the disaffiliation took place. Then she administers the coup de grâce to the Plaintiffs’ chief argument:

Lastly, the court disagrees with Plaintiffs that Defendants’ actions were ineffective based solely upon the determination of the Episcopal Church as the highest ecclesiastical authority, and that the matter is now a non-justiciable fact. Clearly, the court is cognizant of the restrictions on civil courts interfering with internal affairs of religious organizations under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. In resolving property disputes, the court must take care not to adjudicate questions of religious doctrine. (Schofield v. Superior Court (2010) 190 Cal.App.4th 154.)

However, under Schofield the trial court is to resolve a property dispute without reference to church doctrine if it can. In doing so, the court is to apply neutral principals of law which include the First Amendment rights of individuals and corporations; legal principles governing transfer of title; the law of trusts and corporations; general principles of corporate governance; and governing documents of the diocese and church, to the extent such documents establish trust relationships and specify corporate powers. (Schofield v. Superior Court, supra, 190 Cal. App. 4th at p. 163.) Here, given the numerous material issues and facts in dispute, it is apparent that resolution of the parties’ property dispute must be resolved at trial after considering the applicable documents, and not based solely upon the Episcopal Church’s determination.

This point is a huge one in favor of the Anglican diocese and its parishes. Ever since the Fifth District Court of Appeal handed down its decision in the Schofield case, ECUSA and its attorneys have been trying to make much of a single sentence in that opinion, when the Court stated: “The continuity of the diocese as an entity within the Episcopal Church is likewise a matter of ecclesiastical law, finally resolved, for civil law purposes, by the Episcopal church’s recognition of Lamb as the bishop of that continuing entity.” (Emphasis added.)

The technique of ECUSA’s attorneys has been to try to get California judges to read that highlighted phrase as though it said: “as a civil entity under California law”—i.e., to buy into the sham that the rump diocese is still the same legal entity under California law that voted to amend its Constitution in December 2007 and thus withdraw from the Episcopal Church (USA).

But that is not what the Court wrote. In fact it was responding to one of our arguments on behalf of Bishop Schofield, namely, that the rump diocese lacked the right to claim it was a genuine diocese of ECUSA, because it had not properly noticed its organizing convention, and because General Convention had never formally admitted it into union. Thus what the Court said was: “ECUSA may, as an ecclesiastical matter, decide to recognize whom it pleases as one of its dioceses, and that determination (of “ecclesiastical law”, not the California civil law) was not open to question or attack in the civil courts.”

And that is just how the Fresno Superior Court read the Schofield decision when it denied ECUSA’s second motion for summary judgment last month. Thus we now have the weight of a second California superior court judge behind the correct reading, which will not hurt Bishop Schofield one bit.

Finally, we should hear any day now from the Court of Appeal itself. Refusing to accept the decision of the Fresno trial court, ECUSA and its rump diocese filed a petition with the appellate court in which they asked it to say what it meant, and set the trial court straight. If, as usually happens in such interlocutory matters, the appellate court declines to interfere, and allows the case to go to trial first, then ECUSA will just have to wait until the eventual (and inevitable) appeal to see if it is reading the Schofield decision correctly or not.

Back in Visalia, we shall have to await the oral arguments tomorrow morning before Judge Reed to see whether or not she makes this tentative ruling her final one. I will report an update here when I have one.

In Other News, the Sky is Orange

2013-06-13T22:05:46Z

Antonios Kieropolous is the Associate General Secretary for International Affairs and Peace at the National Council of Churches. I would like to warn all of his friends and co-workers to stay away from him for a while. If the report by Nathaniel Torrey of the Institute on Religion and Democracy is correct (and I have no reason to think it isn’t), there’s serious lightning in Kieropolous’ future:

In a conference on poverty and free markets hosted by St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary and the Acton Institute, Dr. Antonios Kieropolous, the Associate General Secretary for International Affairs and Peace at the National Council of Churches (NCC), claimed that the NCC is not “a left-oriented organization.” Kieropolous, himself an Orthodox Christian, continues:

“I will say some people, and even some leaders in the NCC, some churches as churches may be considered progressive, but when you have a mix of Orthodox to African-American to mainline American Protestant groups, it is not altogether a left-of-center organization. The organization has never taken a position on anything that is contrary to Orthodox theology or to the Orthodox churches.”

Kieropolous added that this accusation of leftism stems from the NCC historically involvement with opposition to the Vietnam War, Iraq War and “sensible” immigration reform. Additionally, He claims the NCC is maligned for its “insistence on a fair shake for the Palestinians even as we support Israel.”

I read this to my cat, and this was her response:

Yeah, me too.

You win or you die

2013-06-13T11:49:49Z

If I could get “Our Allies” in both the political and Episcopal worlds to get *one political principle* it would be this one. The continued naive cluelessness from conservatives in our country and in various smaller organizations [like TEC] being eaten alive by revisionist parasite ideas continues to astound me. Most of us simply do not have discernment, and we continue to act “as if” something is not true that is true. That thing is well-described in this political theory article I’ve linked to over at RedState and from which the below is excerpted. Time after time after time, Our Allies act as if our opponents are one way, when in fact they are the other way entirely. You can’t act or think or write or discern effectively when you’ve completely and totally misunderstood the nature of your opponent or his future actions and responses. It’s fine to be beaten. It’s fine to be bloodied. It’s fine to lose. It’s fine to be triumphed over by winning opponents and completely humiliated. It’s even fine [or less awful, anyway] to give up and say “we lose, we will go to our caves now.” But for God’s sake, please don’t be a stupid idiot about the nature of your opponent while you are being beaten to a pulp. If you are going to “get killed” in today’s America, please don’t die saying “but I don’t understand why he’s being so mean to me—I thought the game was a different one than the one I am presently enduring.” You can even say “I surrender and abase myself before you as the victor” but please do not say “what? I thought you were a tolerant and loving person. Why are you hitting and kicking me? I thought we all agreed to play by the rules of a civilized society.”

This article’s explanation of this principle is so important that I won’t be posting a single thing beyond it today.

Those who can accept the horror of the Red Wedding might appreciate the point it makes about the dangers of blind idealism in a brutal world where cosmic justice is not swiftly meted out to villains. (There are a lot of absolute S.O.B.s still waiting for a comeuppance, several thousand pages into the “Game of Thrones” novels, plus one S.O.B. who seems to be in the process of growing a conscience, and might therefore be best equipped to conquer the world.) Robb’s downfall involved putting personal satisfaction ahead of his clear duty. He wanted to seize the throne in a desperate rebellion, but he thought he could bypass some unpleasant realities of the office he assumed.

In a Disney movie, it would all have worked out fine. The story would have been filled with sympathetic characters who shared the modern audience’s disdain for the instruments of feudal authority, including arranged marriages. These characters would have been the clear heroes of the story, and they would have prevailed. Love and tolerance would have conquered all.

Not to overstretch the themes Martin expounds in his books, but there is something for the student of modern politics to glean from the way one character sums up the overall conflict: “When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die.” We don’t literally die when we lose power struggles in the more civilized modern West, and our families are not slaughtered beside us. Our political culture admires idealism, or at least claims to, and just about every politician presents himself or herself as a deeply principled idealist.

But still… the game has high stakes, and the quest for power has rules – unfair rules, administered differently for the two major American political parties, and every third party that seeks a place on the national stage. Good intentions do not suspend these rules. Kind and decent people get chewed up and spit out by the system. Look at what happened to all those energetic outsider candidates who ran in the 2012 presidential election. It’s just not enough to be an enthusiastic outsider with some bright ideas. It is necessary to run a tight race, attend to the ground game, and avoid self-destructive mistakes.

In other words, the requirements of power must still be obeyed. Those who believe their good intentions or persuasive charisma can change the game tend to suffer for their hubris, even when they are decent people with fine ideas. It’s even worse when they convince themselves there are some depths their opponents would never sink to, some rules they would never, ever break – the way Robb Stark never dreamed his host would violate the rules of hospitality at a noble wedding. There’s nothing sadder than the sight of a bewildered candidate standing on the sidelines, waiting for the election “referees” to throw a penalty flag that never comes.

Hewn People

2013-06-12T17:58:50Z

“What shall I do with you, O Ephraim? What shall I do with you, O Judah? Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away. Therefore I’ve hewn them by the prophets; I’ve slain them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light. For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” (Hosea 6:4-6)

Have you ever been hewn by God’s word? Have you ever felt God cut you open during a sermon? Good. God hews and slays through his word. But here’s his purpose? “I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice…” He wants to bring you home. He uses his word to take cold, dead, hearts, cut them open, and make them tender again.

How does hewing and slaying do that? The same way a cut from surgeon’s scalpel brings healing to a failed heart. God’s word, sharper than any scalpel, pierces to the soul, dividing to joint and marrow, uncovering the thoughts and intentions of your heart.

Until you see and feel in your bones that you’re very far gone. Until you believe that your sacrifices and offerings, the good works you’ve piled up over the course of your life mean nothing and will get you nowhere because you’re full of pride, full of self—full of love for things that are not God and cannot save—until you hear that cutting word, and that word applies to each and every one of us—you have no hope.

But if today you hear this word and believe it, and know that there’s no cure in Syria, no cure from Rimmon, no cure in Binghamton, no cure in yourself, but only in the Great Physician, Jesus, the Word of God who has come to save sinners, if you hear that, and go to him, he will heal you, he will save you and come to live with you and in you. And then you will see that God slays you with hard words so that his Word can heal you.” From a sermon on the healing of Naaman

Wednesday Palate Cleanser:Heracleion Photos: Lost Egyptian City Revealed After 1,200 Years Under Sea

2013-06-12T16:37:21Z

Such amazing and beautiful pictures—from the Seriously For Real blog:

Known as Heracleion to the ancient Greeks and Thonis to the ancient Eygptians, the city was rediscovered in 2000 by French underwater archaeologist Dr. Franck Goddio and a team from the European Institute for Underwater Acheology (IEASM) after a four-year geophysical survey. The ruins of the lost city were found 30 feet under the surface of the Mediterranean Sea in Aboukir Bay, near Alexandria.

I Am Not Rushing To Judgment On Edward Snowden

2013-06-12T13:33:51Z

A slightly different perspective on the NSA security issue from RedState, where there is more:

Others have made the false equivalence between the USPS and what the NSA did, except the NSA mined private data from private entities. Americans who use the postal service do so knowing that they are submitting their information to a government-run entity that will see their location, partner in discourse, and deduce the nature of the correspondence (wedding invite? Christmas card?). They’re absolutely not the same thing.

The idea that Americans are innocent until proven guilty is woven into the DNA of our civil liberties. What we’re told by lawmakers and their apologists is that their pansified way of dealing with threats, the choking political correctness, their outright impotence means that we as free citizens must shoulder the burden of limited privacy rights by way of a program that has no demonstrable record of success. Make no mistake, that’s what this is: because of political correctness we all get profiled. The expectation of privacy is now suspicious. If you want privacy that must mean you’ve something to hide. It’s lazy enforcement of law. It’s lazy preemption. It’s offensive.

I am entitled to my privacy. I’ve a right to be secure in my effects, my correspondence, unless law enforcement can produce probable cause and a warrant to violate my privacy. If we were all using government-run forms of communication wholly subsidized by American taxpayers, I could better see an argument for federal monitoring.

But we aren’t.

So I don’t.

Trust and Taps

2013-06-12T13:28:15Z

Today I’m posting a couple of different perspectives on the NSA security story, this one from Erick Erickson over at RedState, where there is much more:

The coming year will see Republicans and Democrats alike fight over this issue. Rand Paul will make it a campaign issue for his Presidential race. How to balance national security and privacy is no easy thing. While we should all be willing to show some sympathy, if disagreement, with Presidents Bush and Obama and the difficult balancing act they have faced and continue to face, we would not be in such a spot at this time had the present Administration not so badly let its own bureaucrats misbehave.

Even those of us who might err on the side of security over privacy must now concede it is time to consider recalibrating the balance. The constitutional rights of American citizens in the United States should be abridged only ever so carefully.

For conservatives, there must be one last note — the Guardian, Glenn Greenwald, and Edward Snowden should not be made heroes. Glenn Greenwald is not “anti anti-terror” as the New York Times portrays him. He is deeply hostile to the United States and routinely sides with every bad actor on the planet when their interests conflict with the United States. The Guardian is no better.

And Edward Snowden, who fled to communist China after leaking, like Bradley Manning before him, shows millennials probably cannot be trusted with the mature responsibility of supporting and defending our nation. His was not a courageous act. His was an act of sabotage and ego whereby he decided to be judge, jury, and executioner of an intelligence program that violated his sensibilities, but maybe not the constitution. Then he leaked it to a man and organization deeply hostile to the United States before himself fleeing to a communist nation, praising that nation’s support for free speech.

What is Going on With the ACNA and the Filioque?

2013-06-12T02:09:27Z

According to the ACNA’s Provincial Meeting Journal, the most recent draft liturgies reduce the filioque to a footnote. Joel Wilhelm does an admirable job (as usual) of summarizing:

ACNA’s Provincial Meeting Journal is out and it shows ACNA talking out of both sides of its mouth on the filioque, a doctrine central to all of Western Christendom. The draft liturgies in this document contain a Nicene Creed that reads:
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father.
The footnote to this reads:
The filioque clause “and the Son” may be added here. It is not included in the text above for ecumenical purposes, in accordance with the 1978 Lambeth Conference, though the ACNA does not disagree with the theology of the filioque.
So you can do whatever you want, say the filioque or not, because ACNA wants to be ecumenical with a church that explicitly violates Article XXII of the 39 Articles. And how do you not disagree with the theology of something and then drop it anyway? Additionally, dropping the double procession from the Creed violates Article V:
Of the Holy Ghost.
The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.
Are the ACNA bishops also going to change the Articles by fiat? What ACNA is doing with proposed changes like this is driving Classical Protestants away from it - not a good move…read more

Not a good move at all. The ACNA claims to “wholeheartedly embrace” the Jerusalem Declaration which states:

“We uphold the Thirty-nine Articles as containing the true doctrine of the Church agreeing with God’s Word and as authoritative for Anglicans today.”

The ACNA’s own Theological Statement declares:

“We receive the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion of 1562, taken in their literal and grammatical sense, as expressing the Anglican response to certain doctrinal issues controverted at that time, and as expressing the fundamental principles of authentic Anglican belief.”

If the current draft liturgy becomes the final draft liturgy it will be difficult if not impossible to reconcile what the ACNA claims to believe with what she professes in worship. And, apparently, we will sacrifice our theological coherence in order to achieve a deeper relationship with various Orthodox churches. I wrote about the problems inherent in such motivations back in 2010. I’ll end with a quote from that piece:

“With their insufficient view of the extent and effect of the fall on human nature and their resulting soteriological deficiencies, I am not at all interested in a rapprochement with the Orthodox (especially after Metropolitan Jonah’s characterization of Calvinism as heresy at last year’s synod). But even more importantly, I think it crucial in a culture beset by religious pluralism to confess that the Holy Spirit does not come to indwell apart from being sent by Father through the Son. I certainly understand that the word “procession” is problematic and I think a compromise with regard to that word would be possible, but the inclusion of the filioque clause affirms the relational role of the Holy Spirit both within the Godhead, within the Church, and between the Church and her Lord and it secures the principle that without the Son one cannot be related to God through the Spirit. And so I think we must keep it, even in the context of ecumenical worship.”