Imagine the Quaker
an erstwhile mirror site for weblog on newquaker.com
archives | newquaker.comSaturday, September 27, 2003
Are these guys trying to pull an L. Ron Hubbard? It would seem that the Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins writing duo's Left Behind series is beginning to take on a life of its own. I use the novelist and Scientologist founder as a caution to Christians who would take what is humanly manufactured and animate it, giving it a deceptive, iconic, religious life. If you think it can't happen again, just go to James Redfield's Celestine Prophecy site, where his pagan novel The Celestine Prophecy is expressing itself in its own new-age spiritual movement.
And, hmm, this sure seems to be where the Left Behind Prophecy Club is also headed. The club is a website focusing on End Times prophecy and "breaking news" by LaHaye, Jenkins, and other proponents of a pre-Tribulation rapture. With their "Interpreting the Sign" newsletter you too will be able to read the End Times signposts with the virtuosity of, say, Jack Van Impe (well, maybe not).
The popular 1995 Left Behind: A Novel of the Earth's Last Days was the first of a now eleven-novel series, with sales of over 55 million copies. Its distinct End Times theology has a diffusive cultural inertia, and it's been a publishing cornucopia for Tyndale House Publishers, spawning movies, videos, calendars, collectibles, greeting cards, T-shirts, audio books, music, a LeftBehind.com newsletter, children's games, screensavers, "win stuff" contests—I mean, really, could the return of Jesus Christ get any more exciting?
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 2:45 PM
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
Prof. Robert A. Pape's Op-Ed piece in the September 22nd New York Times tends to confirm every Christian's root conviction that violence is the wrong response to violence, although Pape speaks as a social scientist and not as a believer. For the past year he has been building a database of "every suicide bombing and attack around the globe from 1980 to 2001," and from the 188 cases he's tracked, his "data show that there is little connection between suicide terrorism and Islamic fundamentalism, or any religion for that matter." The common, strategic aim of the suicide bombers is primarily to drive out foreign military forces and influences from their homeland. The usual frenetic military responses, he finds, tend only to encourage more attacks.
His recommendations for the US are intuitive and certainly worth repeating:Now, admittedly, we did not need social science to confirm our peace testimony and conviction that we, a liberal democracy, are wrong to repond to terrorism with commensurate violence: but it is reassuring to know that science can at some point catch up with us."For the United States, especially in light of its growing occupation of the Persian Gulf, it is crucial to immediately step up order and immigration controls. In the medium term, Washington should abandon its visions of empire and allow the United Nations to take over the political and economic institutions in Iraq. And in the long run, America must move toward energy independence, reducing the need for troops in the Persian Gulf. Even if our intentions in Iraq are good, our presence there will continue to help terrorist groups recruit more people willing to blow themselves up in the war against America."
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 10:43 PM
"Christian America! Is it a reproach on the form of our discipleship that the exhibition of actual suffering for Jesus on the part of those who walk in His steps always provokes astonishment as at the sight of something very unusual?"
So declares the narrator near the end of Charles M. Sheldon's In His Steps, which is the real inspiration for the bracelet-wearing "WWJD" proponents of the contemporary What Would Jesus Do movement. He wrote the book in 1896, read it in weekly installments on Sunday evenings at his Central Congregational Church in Topeka, Kansas, and at the same time arranged for its printing in serial form in the religious weekly "Chicago Advance." Due to incorrect copyright filing, however, the inspirational fiction went immediately into the public domain, so the pastor rarely benefited financially from its popular national and international printings. [My print version is a paperback by Barbour Publishing, Inc., 1984, which I picked up for 50 cents at the annual book sale in Hamilton, NY, on a sunny day a couple of weeks ago.]
What I find so striking about In His Steps is its weird timelessness—its message seems as relevant today as it was when he wrote it a century ago. And, too, is the relevance of the story's setting: a wealthy American church whose description could match any worship setting in any mainstream denomination in the US today. I was expecting, after 100 years, that his account of church life in the US would be dated and foreign. I think I was more shocked than disappointed. So much in America changes; so little in America changes.
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 12:00 AM
Sunday, September 21, 2003
Howard Dean is asking for contributions to beat the $35 million that George W. Bush's "Rangers" and "Pioneers" have managed to collect for the president this quarter. With 411,000 Americans now behind Dean, he may very well reach that amount—and much more. I think his call for money is appropriate and could certainly help to decide the election.
What I mean is this. For the past several presidential elections, we have seen candidates come and go on the basis of how much campaign money they've raised, and there may indeed be a direct correlation between how much money is raised and who gets to sit on the presidential throne. Witness, for example, the 2000 election: Al Gore's cumulative campaign contribution receipts totaled $133,108,037 versus George W. Bush's $193,866,253, and this doesn't include money collected for the ridiculous recount situation. We know who won that contest. [See PoliticalMoneyLine®] Going back two elections, to the contest between George Bush (Sr.) and William Jefferson Clinton in 1992, the numbers are also striking: Bush had a total of $100,510,119 versus William Jefferson Clinton's $115,261,535 [PoliticalMoneyLine®] and we know who won that election.
Now I admit that this is really all wild speculation and hardly a piece of science, but I do detect a trend here. My fear is that at some point in the future voters may just say, "Hey, why not decide the election solely on the basis of how much money the candidates collect!" Then the one with the most money wins: after all, that is how the American political system seems to be working now. If only we could convince the candidates to give the money—all of it—to charity at the end of the race.
As I've said before, until we can overcome Duverger's Law by revising our national election system, we will always end up with two-party contests in the US. You can send your contribution to Dean's election campaign online at Dean For America.
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 8:18 PM
© Merle Harton, Jr. All rights reserved. Biblical references are NIV® unless otherwise noted.
