Heavensmydestination

The quality of mercy!

2012-01-29T19:13:00.000Z

"Son of David, have mercy on me!"
Mark chapter 11 and verse 48 ESV

There is no doubt that at the heart of all things genuinely Christian- the way of true righteousness, there is this quality of mercy. So that in mercy God sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ to show His mercy to a world in an utter state of rejection of Him. He offered Himself up. So that the Christian faith is of what He has done for us and not the other way round. Our adoption by Him into His family with all the certainty and other benefits that brings depends then solely on His having come into the world as a child, His work on the Cross and His resurrection from the dead and not on what we can do for Him.

That quality of mercy truly understood and adopted brings change and without which there has not been any change! As it is this quality of mercy that rings such a change, it unites all those who have accepted such terms of peace for they then each have a faith of equal status with everyone else's who likewise have accepted His terms of peace.

This incident in this story in the Gospel of Mark is part and parcel of telling us just this. It is about a blind man Bartimaeus whom Jesus heals. But in these words of his we see such a message revealed,

"Son of David, have mercy on me!"

Mark chapter 11 and verse 48 ESV

Jesus stopped and called him.

God's merciful call to a call for mercy!

Available and free.

The time machine, the loss of memory.

2012-01-27T22:48:00.002Z

It is not always easy to know how to use your time wisely and many things can press in on you to do. One certain thing is that in no time at all it is just gone and you wonder where to?

It is good if you can have a variety of experiences in a normal week. I very much enjoyed seeing an elderly widowed client in the one just gone mainly because although I am paid well for my time I felt that I was of great help to her, and it was also a privileged opportunity to hear of her life and of some of her life experiences. It was sobering to hear of her being married for forty years and then fifteen years ago losing her husband and of the adjustments that this required. As she explained, she has had her family around her and some very good friends. It is a moving to hear of time passing by so fast like a time machine.

On Thursday evening we spent some time with a Korean family. When you attend a Korean home, it is normal and expected that you should take your shoes off. I am generally offered some slippers. When you expect the custom, it is no problem to comply. There were many good things about the evening but one was the tea and the coffee cake that we were presented with at the start. I have not had coffee cake for some time, not since my mother died almost fifteen years ago.

But the comment of the week must be some remarks that came out of an exchange I had with a friend at a Christian meeting. I was reflecting on some painful experiences and how as you get older you look back and see their number growing because of the passage of time. He immediately reminded me that that may be true but a good thing about getting older is that sooner than you think your memory starts to fade and you can't remember many of them anyway. You cannot be disturbed by them anymore because you just cannot remember many of them. Very true!

I have to admit that to cap it all, whilst my wife and daughters were away on a short break I watched some more of the BBC's series "Merlin". I enjoyed it.

Govt. Mitch Daniels formal Republican response to the president's State of the Union address.

2012-01-25T23:21:00.001Z

The problems are mathematical and the solutions are practical.

A private economy that begins to grow and grow jobs.

Opportunity for all!

We must unite to save the safety net...an affordable safety net...devoted to those who need them most...coming generations denied to stop sending the wealthy the benefits they do not need!

To bring Americans together...the language of unity...us as a free people...we might pick the wrong light bulb...no longer up to the job of self-government...America is still the world's premier land of opportunity..government to serve the people and not supervise them...

Iran, not another 1st World War slaughter, for the Fordaw mountain strains in strength!

2012-01-25T23:02:00.001Z

I have to confess I have a soft spot for the Iranians even though I know that if I sought to live out my Christian faith in their land I am likely to be killed. Likely to be killed, likely to be killed- just think about that for the moment, likely to be killed!

If an Iranian comes here to the UK to live and lives out his faith here, he will live, he will live, he will live and for that I am grateful for my country and so many things about it. The dignity to live, oh that the Iranians might turn and live!

For as things stand, unless they do, there is going to be an almighty conflagration there in the Middle East and soon, and let me tell you this, they may take a whole lot of people with them but they risk annihilation. Please, God no!

This is a regime that has been at war with the West since 1979 when Khomeini came to power. This is a regime that has threatened to wipe Israel off the map, that appears impervious to reason for to them the Mahdi is due soon to bring about the apocalyptic end of days and that is what many are intent on facilitating. The failure to recognise the mortal threat that is the current leadership of Iran will I am sure turn out to be the folly of follies. For in the nether world of phantom regressive cowardly diplomacy here too much in the West there is no enemy, there is only blindness and we shall all have to pay for that!

The Iranians we understand have built at Fordaw a secret nuclear plant inside a mountain!

Governor Mitch Daniels and the State of Indiana, a message to the Republican leadership?

2012-01-24T22:30:00.000Z

Government does not create jobs, at best it creates the right conditions!

Hour of Newt - The Editors - National Review Online

2012-01-24T22:14:00.000Z

Hour of Newt - The Editors - National Review Online

The BBC's adaptation of Bird Song by Sebastian Faulks; a masterful film portrayal!

2012-01-23T23:17:00.003Z

This film's mention of the town of Amiens reminded me of my recent discovery of a book signed by my wife's grandfather whilst he was convalescing in a hospital in Amiens in the First World War. He had been gassed in the trenches on the front line.

I read the book Bird Song many years ago. I remember most about the sheer grit and courage of the frontline British troops and their officers, but most of all the "underground rats" of the British army tunnelling under the German positions in order to blow them up.

The presence of Isabell Azaire and Stephen Wraysford in the family is a masterpiece of atmosphere, tension and detachment even if their relationship unnecessarily lays bare that ritualised vision of love as just pure lust, although in the end it tried to come over as more sophisticated. The souless detachment of each of them crying out for something even if they were not quite sure what it really was crosses over seemlessly to the de-humanised condition of the men on the battlefield trying to survive and who in the end find something of meaning in the company of one another.

I may not for some time watch such a string of scenes so poignant and yet haunting as the slow walk of the Sergeant to find Wraysford's body lain out on the battle-fields ready to be buried. The use of light and colour in the sky and the terrain, the rows of men, the sad detached desolation of the scenes and yet the understated but more powerful for it discovery that he was still alive, just in time, awoken from his sleep! The sense of hope it arose, the tears, the lifting up of his seemingly still lifeless body of clay and yet still warm. If Wilfred Owen had survived the War, maybe he would have rewritten part of his poem "Futility" after seeing this scene, for it was there in that field where it was not too hard to stir this clay of a cold star?

Futility

By Wilfred Owen

Move him into the sun
Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields unsown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.

Think how it wakes the seeds
Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs so dear-achieved, are sides
Full-nerved, still warm, too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth's sleep at all?

Newt Gingrich come back kid! Lazarus only rose from the dead once!

2012-01-22T20:30:00.002Z

A not surprising outcome given his fiery and thoroughly convincing sessions on the television. Romney is looking increasingly starchy, too hardened and isolated from the common man and his associated support by the Republican establishment will increasingly not go down well.

Gingrich has been written off a couple of times and he may well go down in history as the "comeback kid", slow off the blocks but there, real time.

Will he win?

Who knows?

I think Santorum is a bigger threat than many would understand and appreciate, if he can get his funding in place! Yes, Rick it is about family as the natural building blocks of society and not village then town then city as spoke Hilary Clinton! Just reflect for a moment how close he got to Romney, a shock indeed!

Go get it Rick!

Humility by Jonathan Edwards

2012-01-22T20:08:00.001Z

Humility

by Jonathan Edwards-

Humility may be defined to be a habit of mind and heart
corresponding to our comparative unworthiness and vileness
before God; or a sense of our own comparative lowness in His
sight, with the disposition to a behavior answerable thereto.

A truly humble man is sensible of the small extent of his
knowledge, and the great extent of his ignorance, and of the
small extent of his understanding, as compared with the
understanding of God.

He is sensible of his weakness, how little his strength is,
and how little he is able to do.

He is sensible of his natural distance from God,
of his dependence on Him,
of the insufficiency of his own power and wisdom;
and that it is by God's power that he is upheld and provided for;
and that he needs God's wisdom to lead and guide him,
and His might to enable him to do what he ought to do for Him.

Humility tends to prevent an aspiring and
ambitious behavior among men.

The man that is under the influence of a humble spirit is content
with such a situation among men, as God is pleased to allot to
him, and is not greedy of honor, and does not affect to appear
uppermost and exalted above his neighbors.

Humility tends also to prevent an arrogant and assuming behavior.

On the contrary, humility, disposes a person to a condescending
behavior to the meekest and lowest, and to treat inferiors with
courtesy and affability, as being sensible of his own weakness
and despicableness before God.

If we then consider ourselves as the followers of the meek
and lowly and crucified Jesus, we shall walk humbly before
God and man all the days of our life on earth.

Let all be exhorted earnestly to seek much of a humble spirit, and
to endeavor to be humble in all their behavior toward God and men.

Seek for a deep and abiding sense of your
comparative lowness before God and man.

Know God.

Confess your nothingness and ill-desert before Him.

Distrust yourself.

Rely Only On Christ.

Renounce all glory except for Him.

Yield yourself heartily to His will and service.

Avoid an aspiring, ambitious, ostentatious, assuming, arrogant,
scornful, stubborn, willful, leveling, self-justifying behavior;
and strive for more and more of the humble spirit that Christ
manifested while He was on earth.

Humility is a most essential and distinguishing trait
in all true piety.

Earnestly seek then; and diligently and prayerfully
cherish a humble spirit, and God shall walk with
you here below; and when a few more days shall have
passed, He will receive you to the honors
bestowed on His people at Christ's right hand.

The radicalisation of the middle class.

2012-01-21T09:56:00.001Z

It is not difficult to understand what is oft referred to in our media here in the UK as the "squeezed middle class"; it is a phrase that can equally apply to the position in the US.

There is an elite, often very rich but not necessarily so that appear to have disproportionate power over our institutions and I suppose if it was a benevolent elite with a degree of common sense ethics and rationale reasoning power, their outcomes might not be quite so noticeable. But instead, it's raison d'etre is a view of life, that has at it's forefront the survival of the fittest and the ethics of self-interest and in these are the seeds of their own destruction.

And yet there is a large group of what are oft described as the "underclass" who have been ill-served by that elite and positively demeaned in my view. The educational system that many are forced into has rid itself of "aspiration", has sought to politically brainwash us and re-write our history. So that when the inevitable results arise, that is, little social mobility and too often an ignorance that defies imagination they are told, it will be alright Jo, for all you need to do is live on welfare benefits. Hard work and self-effort is passe!

As a consequence the middle classes are paying for this buffonery and idiocy. We are not any longer in it together, we are each for his own and then things really start to unravel. Perhaps the worst aspects of all this are the attempt by such an overclass supported by the underclass to demean and attack the very values that have kept Britain over many centuries able to hold their heads up at least sufficiently not to sense that we are on our way out. The collapse of faith and family, continually egged on by a hypocritical political class many of whom claim some kind of faith that is often rotten to the core has as a result radicalised and increasingly so many of those in the middle classes. This is essentially what happened in Franco's Spain if you read the right history books on the subject. The socialist total solution combined with the power of the then Soviet Union brought Spain and many of the middle classes in Spain into the political war and the outcome was bloody and nasty and who in the end won?

We are entering dangerous times, for if the current momentum continues to trash the values of hard work, faith and the family, if the growing injustices of a free for all of immorality continue then the middle classes will continue in their radicalisation and those who otherwise are regarded as responsible members of society, paying their taxes and seeking peace and harmony will see that justice, judeo-christian justice is far more important than much of that! And so government be warned. You sit upon the precipice of an enormously fragile state and we suggest you think again?

Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum: who just edges it in South Carolina?

2012-01-20T17:53:00.002Z

It is not difficult to be reasonably impressed with the way in which Newt Gingrich holds his own in the "bear bating" ring of national politics, in fact I will go so far as to say that he is almost endearing in his ability to spring back and keep going. If you want someone to steady the ship and keep ploughing forward under fire then he could well be your man.

Of course, it is upsetting to hear that he is on his third marriage and of the claims of his second wife and for some that will be a decider. But for me whilst not that good, it primarily complicates the choice rather than throwing him out of the race. There is a side to me that likes to see a politician who is at times inconsistent (for surely he could well be open to persuasive reason) and can still make his stand and frankly no one is perfect even though we are made to think that that should be the norm at times! His biggest strength is his long period as a career politician combined with his intellectual abilities and experience at the highest levels of government. His weakness is that he has so many ideas it becomes impossible for him to be consistent and predictable enough to enable his governance to be really strong, for what direction is he going in?

So, to Rick Santorum.

Quite frankly, I am impressed, with his intellectual ability, his commitment to conservative values and consistency and whilst not as experienced as Newt he has that Senatorial role behind him and that ability to come from behind and win! But the problem lies in the extent of any libertarian values. For there is a case for being a Christian and accepting certain libertarian values and I am sure that he would accord to many of them. But, it will not always be easy to see that for there is that compassionate rhetoric and heart that just cannot sweep up the poor into the rhetoric of ideological principle. But that is just my point and why he should be President. He will support enough libertarian values and yet have that flexibility of heart and mind to drive through a more virtue driven republican programme. So, at present he has my vote and I would commend him to you.

ZENIT - Secularism in Sweden; some Utopia that?

2012-01-20T13:59:00.001Z

The whole article speaks for itself.

http://www.zenit.org/article-34107?l=english

".....Per Bylund, a Swedish fellow at the Von Mises Institute, once described the all encompassing power of the state thus:

"A significant difference between my generation and the preceding one is that most of us were not raised by our parents at all. We were raised by the authorities in state daycare centers from the time of infancy; then pushed on to public schools, public high schools, and public universities; and later to employment in the public sector and more education via the powerful labor unions and their educational associations. The state is ever-present and is to many the only means of survival -- and its welfare benefits the only possible way to gain independence."

Yet this social engineering has had dire consequences. Few European countries have witnessed such a rapid decline in the institution of marriage, nor such an expeditious rise in abortion. During the 1950s and first half of the 1960s, the marriage rate in Sweden was historically at its peak. Suddenly, the rate started dropping so quickly that it saw a decrease of about 50% in less than 10 years. No other country experienced such a rapid change....."

Recep Erdogen's Government, yet another 20th Century.....?

2012-01-18T22:51:00.002Z

The former head of the Turkish Armed Forces, Gen. Ilker Basburg has since the 5th January 2012 been put in jail without a charge laid at his door and joins nearly 300 other military officers who have remained in jail for years, without a single conviction to date, on conspiracy to overthrow the AKP, the Justice and Development Party.

The Turkish Journalist Union reports that in the region of 100 journalists have now been arrested and are in prison, few of whom have been convicted of anything.

The Turkish Human Rights Association has revealed that of the 128,000 people currently imprisoned in Turkey only 48% have been convicted of any crime.

And this is a Nato member country!

What does such a government stand for?

I leave you to hold your breath and utter the words that you wish to use in this context:

..................................................................................................................................

The information for this article was derived from an article at National Review by Alex Alexiev at this address.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/288343/turkey-nato-s-open-prison-alex-alexiev

Hillsong- Mighty to Save

2012-01-18T17:56:00.000Z

Britain’s Chief Rabbi Defends Christians

2012-01-17T17:41:00.001Z

Britain’s Chief Rabbi Defends Christians

This is a stunning piece since we see Britain's Chief Rabbi defending Christians persecuted around the world.

All I can say to him, is this.

Thank you.

And to ask him this question?

Would you like a stint as Archbishop of Canterbury for it is not difficult to conclude that you might do a better job at defending Christianity than the present incumbent since you may well believe more than he does of what historical Christianity stands for?

I Have a Shelter, Sovereign Grace Ministries.

2012-01-16T22:00:00.000Z

Christ the Word Incarnate.

2012-01-16T21:38:00.000Z

"Christ is the Word incarnate, the very centre and object of our faith, and our access to and understanding of Him and what He has done has been preserved first and foremost in words that God himself has disclosed, the Scriptures, that is the Bible. This is why the exposition and application of it's texts are so crucial. However, we live in an Age when even amongst certain evangelicals there is a decreased confidence in objective truth and an emphasise increasingly instead on such matters as incarnational living and community which can too often be really about biblical illiteracy and then over time the inevitable starts to happen and the so-called new enlightened form of christianity starts to become indistinguishable from the culture around however immoral it is from that Scriptural perspective."

Our length of days; David's soul and Psalm 139, verse 16.

2012-01-15T13:47:00.002Z

This Psalm is a truly intimate portrayal of the deep relationship David had with His Lord. Once lets it's truths soak in and be absorbed by your soul and you will not be the same again. For to know how much God is involved in the minutiae of our daily lives and why it is that He can be- because of who He is, is in itself restoration enough of what it means to be human and loved.

But today it is to two particular verses that I turn. Psalm 139 and verses 15 and 16.

"My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.

Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them."

To know this is to know that you are special.

To know that all the days that there will be for you have already been settled even before there were any, is mindbogglingly wonderful; it is reassuring and of great comfort. You will not pass from this earth one moment too late or one moment too early. Thank God for that! There is no one else who has control over my life, over your life contrary to what it may seem and anyway who would want such a responsibility? Only surely someone who knows all, is present everywhere, and is all powerful and yet is gracious, full of mercy, compassionate and just.

This is our God, and thank God our times are in his hands.

To grieve, really truly!

2012-01-13T22:51:00.001Z

One of the worst things about real grief is it's terrifying dislocation and disorientation. You can cry so much that eventually there just isin't anything left in your body to feel.

Life is a grieving process, whether it is about failures, the loss of people or things that have become so dear! And infused with a sense of injustice and unfairness, the darkness can be overwhelming.

Are we not mere mortals, waterfilled places?

No, fortunately, for we can know deep within the loss of love.

Ron Paul for President? His libertarianism, a quote from Charles Krauthammer

2012-01-13T17:51:00.002Z

"....Put aside your own view of libertarianism or of Paul himself. I see libertarianism as an important critique of the Leviathan state, not a governing philosophy. As for Paul himself, I find him a principled, somewhat wacky, highly engaging eccentric. But regardless of my feelings or yours, the plain fact is that Paul is nurturing his movement toward visibility and legitimacy.

AdvertisementPaul is 76. He knows he’ll never enter the promised land. But he’s clearing the path for son Rand, his better placed (Senate versus House), more moderate, more articulate successor.

And it matters not whether you find amusement in libertarians practicing dynastic succession. What Paul has already wrought is a signal achievement, the biggest story yet of this presidential campaign...."

From his article at National Review today entitled "Ron's Big Second". Here is the address:

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/287986/ron-paul-s-big-second-charles-krauthammer

The incoming night sky, sight and time, a fast becoming loss!

2012-01-12T22:50:00.000Z

My wife affectionately, excitedly called me to look out at the incoming night sky- the sheer beauty of a multi-coloured mix, in the way! I could barely pull myself away from the intensity of my moment and latest legal theorem!

But I did, just that!

Even then I could barely afford a moment, for sight and time were in short supply! But the infusion of those brief breathless draughts of that view had their way, wresting me from the cloistered vaults of soundless thoughts! I had to stop, to breathe and to find my way to the surface of the sanity of that day!

My life came jolting back again!

Life's many tortures, our ultimate ends!

2012-01-11T23:03:00.001Z

You just do not know what is around the corner?

Someone dear to you receives bad news about her health; you hear of a family whose son is splitting up from his wife; someone else is diagnosed with breast cancer and is about to be operated on, your own body feels it's deterioration daily:- more than enough to remind you of our frailty as human beings and to draw out that inner sense that this all feels profoundly unnatural, this moving towards deterioration and the ultimate physical end of all of us, death!

But we can also in these situations experience all kinds of kindnesses from others as we receive their love in support. We can be thankful for the life that we have had and do still have, and for many revel in the hope that there is a life to come when we shall be changed into our new body. We can of course also pray and also sing; sing of all that we have and all that we have been given, of the mercy of a life undeserved, profoundly creative and profoundly destructive! I am reminded of the Second Letter of Paul's to the Corinthian Church, chapter 5 and verses 1 to 10.

Our Heavenly Dwelling

1 For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 2 For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, 3 if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. 4 For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5 He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

6 So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, 7 for we walk by faith, not by sight. 8 Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. 9 So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. 10 For we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.

English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.

David Galula; the North African Berbers, the loss of their land to Arab invaders centuries ago and more! An article by Anne Marlowe at Tablet Magazine.

2012-01-09T19:59:00.002Z

David Galula’s Counterinsurgency Ideas Used in Iraq and Afghanistan – Tablet Magazine, an article by Anne Marlow, revealing much about the Berbers of North Africa here at this address!

David Galula’s Counterinsurgency Ideas Used in Iraq and Afghanistan – Tablet Magazine

This is a unique insight amongst other things into the Berbers of North Africa particularly in Algeria with the potential to draw from it a number of lessons from the conflict there and an attempt to raise a parallel with American success or failures in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Anne Marlow the writer draws upon the writings of a Tunisia-born Jew and French officer who fought the Berbers in Algeria who apparently pioneered the counterinsurgency warfare still used in Iraq and Afghanistan. Anne is a visiting fellow at the Hudson Institute, is the author of a biography of David Galula. She blogs at World Affairs. Her Twitter feed is at @annmarlowe.

I found some of the statistics fascinating and they speak for themselves!

Here take a look at this part.

"...The “Berber Spring” of 1980, which culminated in a bloody government crackdown, was the point of no return for the Kabyle. In 1994 and ’95, 10 million Kabyles kept their children out of school to protest the Arab-only curriculum. Since 1981, autonomy or even independence for the Kabyle has been a popular, if not successful, cause.

There are at least three obvious points of tension between North African Berbers/Amazigh and Arabs. The first is over the historical fact of the Arab conquest. Every Berber I have met has told me that Amazigh were the original inhabitants of North Africa and that all of that land was once theirs. As one Libyan Amazigh told me, “I’m tired of hearing about the Palestinians and how the Jews took their land. What about how the Arabs took our land?”

There is also the fact that the official language of all the North African countries is Arabic—yet in Morocco 60 percent of the population are Tamazight or Berber-speaking, in Algeria 30 percent, and in Libya perhaps 10 percent. In most of North Africa, the Arabophone majority has suppressed or (in the case of Qaddafi’s Libya) outright prohibited the use of Tamazight, a language that is estimated to be anywhere from 2,200 to 3,000 years old; its tiffinagh script has more than 30 letters, differing somewhat from region to region, and some of them look like ancient Greek....

A prayer from Queen Elizabeth I's re-introduced 1552 Book of Common Prayer.

2012-01-08T10:57:00.002Z

" God, from whom all holy desires, all good counsels, and all just works do proeed; Give unto thy servants that peace which the world cannot give; that both our hearts may be set to obey thy commandments, and also that by thee we being defended from the fear of enemies may pass our time in rest and quietness; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen."

Friends Indeed | The Weekly Standard. "How and why the Jews have thrived in England." by Daniel Johnson.

2012-01-07T10:49:00.001Z

Friends Indeed The Weekly Standard

This is an interesting article which I am not in a position to evaluate except sketchingly but it is worth knowing about and considering. By and large it is positive about England and for that reason I am thankful and relieved!

Diane Abbott’s real offence is to deny children the best start in life - Telegraph by Graeme Archer

2012-01-07T10:17:00.002Z

Diane Abbott’s real offence is to deny children the best start in life - Telegraph

The full version of this Telegraph article at the web address above is a thoughtful but critical view of the comments recently made by Diane Abbott MP for Hackney North and of something of her political career. The part whch I find particulary compelling is his remarks about "received opinions" and his despising of "thought control" and it is encouraging to see how such remarks are beginning to surface and find more free reign in a society that has been hammered for years by many who would wish to destroy much of what makes it a place you want to live or come to. Here is the part.

"...So no, I won’t be flying a flag of sympathy for Miss Abbott. But neither will I join in the Two Minute Hate at her silly remarks. This fixation with labelling some expressions of social observation as racist, or an offence against some other legally defined protected category of human, is one of the most debilitating aspects of modern life. Where once we had received pronunciation, we now have received opinions. More than “received”: if you don’t repeat them, you will be publicly pilloried and made to pay a price. (Ask Adrian Smith, the housing officer who wouldn’t publicly support gay marriage and whose employer demoted him as a result.)

I despise such thought control. It is always, and everywhere, wrong. It is not the same thing as expecting civility in public discourse - alas, a foolish expectation in nihilist Britain. And just because the Left has sought for decades to subvert our culture, to control and destroy our institutions, partly through the deployment of language control (partly too with their refusal to judge real evidence of social breakdown), this does not mean that when a Leftist sins, we should redeploy the same weapon against her...."

Santorum, worth a good look!

2012-01-06T22:43:00.008Z

You know that the Republicans are on to something when Charles Krauthammer talks of Rick Santorum being a worthy challenger.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/287303/worthy-challenger-charles-krauthammer

In fact, I would say that he has a position that could well be a unifying force for many of the electorate and certainly enough to beat Obama; that of social conservatism. Much as we would all like to see something of the Ron Paul effect on the government of the United States, it is just not going to happen, at least not overnight and so we need someone who can offer the potential for change without throwing out the baby with the bathwater. For as Charles has said in the above article and I agree:

"But he isn’t just the last man standing. He is the first challenger to be plausibly presidential: knowledgeable, articulate, experienced, of stable character and authentic ideology."

Romney is not to be trusted on key ethical issues and neither also on the socialistic model of more and more state control. He has flip flopped too many times! Whatever you may think of his politics Santorum shoots straight from the heart and just speaks of authenticity and humaneness. He does seem to have the perfect opportunity to show the way, and he has that intellectual capacity to think and argue his corner and so lets look forward to a process that seems to be proving the cast members and bringing through those who are able to lead and stand up for common sense values and compassion. As Quin Hillyer has said today in National Review.

"The reality is that Rick Santorum’s instincts and intellectual choices consistently tend toward freedom."

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/287441/rick-santorum-conservative-stalwart-quin-hillyer

Democracy is working after all!

Rick Santorum's Iowa Caucas-Night Party; tribute to his wife and to his God.

2012-01-05T17:50:00.000Z

What is sustaining grace?

2012-01-04T22:11:00.002Z

John Piper's answer is:

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,
Nor flight from all distress, but this:
The grace that orders our trouble and pain,
And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/sustained-by-sovereign-grace-forever
By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: desiringGod.org

Michele Bachmann stands down.

2012-01-04T17:46:00.002Z

video platform video management video solutions video player

No not "modern" science, just science?

2012-01-03T17:51:00.000Z

"Science, no not "modern" science has achieved a credibility and prestige of a kind. Certainly amongst certain select elites who aspire to be involved in an intellectually coherent discipline, but for many reasons and not just for its share of intellectual plausibility. One key reason is because of its control on the levers of academic power. Whilst there have been immense practical successes there have also been enormous failures; for the discipline has been and still is too often linked to and has become an instrument of violence and hatred. Armed with a more extensive humility the proponents of science and particularly scientific materialism will serve the army of science far better. They will also cease the incoherence of jumbling it up with philosophical positions masquerading as scientific facts.

Many Christians who have become convinced that the account of creation days in the Book of Genesis is true have as part of that process and continue to do so, addressed apparent evidence of science for an alternative paradigm, in fact some might say they were for a long perod of their lives brainwashed by it’s absolutist call. That process involves, particularly for those within science, addressing both the evidence of science against and the evidence of science in favour and suggesting alternative hypothesis based on that evidence. That form of scientific investigation, and the definition of it’s breadth and embrace is in itself a troubling challenge, that is, is it an Einsteinian type of science or what? Such a scientific investigatory approach is as much the goal for those in the field of science who are also Christians as it is any other member of society and the fact that the science laid bear promotes in that scientist’s view the cause of the christian viewpoint does not change the evidence based nature of their enquiry, and therefore the science of their approach. The record of the science examined, addressed and analysed by many Christians is science, it is just that the extrapolations from that record are not appreciated by many. Since when anyway was a contrarian position no longer a scientific one? Ask the leader of North Korea."

The love of writing, a quote by Yu Hua in his book China in Ten Words.

2012-01-01T20:48:00.001Z

"Many years have passed since then, but my love of writing remains undiminished. All of us have countless desires and emotions that we cannot express, inhibited as we are by mundane realities and rational instincts. But in the world of writing these suppressed desires and emotions can find an unrestricted outlet. Writng tends to promote physical and psychological health, I feel, for it can make one's life complete. To put it another way, writing enables me to claim ownership of two lives, one imaginary and one real, and the relationship between them is like between sickness and health: when one is strong, the other is bound to fall into decline. So as my real life becomes more routine, my imaginary life is all the more brimming with incident."

By Yu Hua from his book "China in Ten Words" on pages 87 and 88.

His love of writing is clear although the relation between the two lives requires thoughtful consideration.

I have just recently read the book and reviewed it on an earlier blog.

The year ending 2011:- Senna, the film; Voice in the Wind by Francine Rivers; 2 Peter and more much more.

2012-01-01T12:52:00.004Z

I wonder what it is that will be first and foremost in your memory of this year now retired. Probably many things and maybe there are matters you cannot recall just now. It has been an interesting and challenging year.

I loved watching the film "Senna" and that has to be my favourite film of the year! Do watch it! Reading has been a much needed solace and I have read some great books. Francine Rivers book, "Voice in the Wind" will remain with me for a long time; just the sheer force of it's exhibition of the Christian faith in the life of Hadassah- I cried at the end and a book has not done that to me for a long time. Of all of the books of the Bible, Peter's Second letter has truly nourished my faith. I learnt so much from it's exposition and subsequently from dwelling on it, so much so that I suddenly realised how unteachable I had become and how I needed more humility to learn. And of course to Tim Keller I return for his book "King's Cross" was truly exceptional, not just for it's adherence to scripture but the way he brought so much of the Gospel of Mark alive and thankfully the Holy Spirit opened my heart to receive and apply it to my life.

My daughter coming around the corner to my office and telling me that she had passed her final medical exams was a wonderful moment. So too, writing and passing all three of my law dissertations in a few months, very rewarding. And I cannot leave out our two trips to Rock in Cornwall together and my other daughter telling us of her impending baptism. So, so so much to be thankful to God for.

I am too reminded of the challenge of living this life for me and so many across the globe, of the hatred and the love and of my longing for Christ to return. I can think of no better confessional statement than that from the Heidleberg Confession below, at this time of the year. I commend it to you and to your soul for the year ahead.

"Question 26. What believest thou when thou sayest, "I believe in God the Father, Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth"?

Answer: That the eternal Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (who of nothing made heaven and earth, with all that is in them; who likewise upholds and governs the same by his eternal counsel and providence) is for the sake of Christ his Son, my God and my Father; on whom I rely so entirely, that I have no doubt, but he will provide me with all things necessary for soul and body and further, that he will make whatever evils he sends upon me, in this valley of tears turn out to my advantage; for he is able to do it, being Almighty God, and willing, being a faithful Father."

China in Ten Words by Yu Hua

2011-12-30T16:00:00.001Z

Yu Hua, born in 1960 in Zhejiang, China is one of China's most gifted of writers. He lives in Beijing. This ralatively short book reproduced in New Caledonia typeface is his first work of nonfiction to appear in English; translated by Allan H. Barr when he taught English at Pomona College California. It looks intimately at the Chinese experience in the last several decades and in the process reveals starkly and candidly under a series of key words chapter headings the paradox of the Chinese way of life.

The ten words are:-

People; Leader; Reading; Writing; Lu Xun; Revolution; Disparity; Grassroots; Copycat; Bamboozle.

I am currently on my second reading.

He opens at the "Tiananmen Incident of 1989" re-living the experience of the "People" and taking you through the undergrowth of dialectic misinformation as best he can and on to the grittiest of exposures, consonant with authenticity and integrity; an exposure that centres on the "People". I shall be haunted by the image he portrays, for the heaving heat of their unity cascades one from the wonder of humankind to it's self-immolation.

Under the word " Reading" and at page fifty eight.

" What have these thirty years of reading given you?" I am sometimes asked. It is no easier to answer than to articulate one's reaction to a boundless ocean.

I did once sum up my experience in the following way: " Every time I read one of the great books, I feel myself transported to another place, and like a timid child I hug them close and mimic their steps, slowly tracing the long river of time in a journey where warmth and emotion fuse. They carry me off with them, then let me make my own way back, and it's only on my return that I realise they will always be part of me."

This experience is there for the taking as you read.

For those who love China and the Chinese people, for those even who know little of either, I would commend this movingly grievingly great but short literature. After referring to a line in a poem by Heine: " Death is the cooling night." which restored to him a childhood memory, "returning freshly washed, in limpid clarity, never again to leave him" he soulfully expresses the mysterious power of literature.

" If literature truly possesses a mysterious power, I think perhaps it is precisely this: that one can read a book by a writer of a different time, a different country, a different race, a different language, and a different culture and there encounter a sensation that is one's very own. Heine put into words the feeling I had as a child when I lay napping in the morgue. And that, I tell myself, is literature."

The words of this literature retain an identity of mysterious power for they say nothing and yet they say it all.

The New Old Europe - Victor Davis Hanson - National Review Online.

2011-12-29T11:08:00.002Z

The New Old Europe - Victor Davis Hanson - National Review Online

"...Like clockwork every few decades, some self-described European “visionaries” swear that the continent can either live in peace under utopian protocols or, more darkly, be united under one grand — and undemocratic — system, willingly or not. But for all the noble pretensions of the Congress of Vienna and the European Union — and the nightmarish spread of Napoleon’s Continental System and the Third Reich — and for all the promises of European-born fascism, Communism, and socialism, the result is always the same: disunion, acrimony, and infighting.

That schizophrenia is what we should expect from dozens of cultures and histories squeezed into too small a continentfull of lots of bright — and quite proud — people. Every new Europe always ends up as old Europe."

— Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author, most recently, of The End of Sparta, a novel about ancient freedom. © 2011 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

Christmas is over! Redeeming the time, movies, the Choir, Downton Abbey and the lost art of rest and recuperation!

2011-12-28T09:54:00.002Z

There is a visible sense of relief in me when Christmas is over!

This is not because I reject the celebration as a way for Christians to be reminded of the birth of Jesus Christ and the implications. I welcome that unequivocally. And I also recognise the cultural significance of a period when families, and generally large numbers of society can share an experience together for good. But I am relieved that the consumerist pressure cooker has spewed out of steam; the expectations of the time are put aside and the damacles sword of failure or success has passed- you may be thinking I feel persecuted by the time, not true!!!.

These more negative sides to Christmas have definitely weakened their hold over me over the years but the attempt to prise myself away from them is difficult for fear of being accused of being Scrooge or negative or an individualist and a party pooper!!! I suppose part of the solution is to offer imaginative alternative content, to make positive suggestions that address the values that you would prefer to see, to engage others in their ideas. This is much more difficult and like so often it is easy to address something's weaknesses but not always easy to institute change that satisfies.

This year at the start of December I decided to concentrate on the prayer of Mary the mother of Jesus (see my series on this) following her hearing from the Angel Gabriel and I have stuck with that and as the predominant Christian theme for me this Christmas it has been an encouraging one. I was encouraged some weeks ago by someone to watch films that had "redeeming qualities" about them and so took to watching some old "beauties". I have seen it in the past but I was able to get a coloured version of "It's a Wonderful Life", and although I did not find it as sad and moving as I did when I was a young boy, it was still a very pleasant and helpful film. I managed to introduce it to my daughters for the first time, just and they also enjoyed it. Another classic "redeeming" type film is "Penny Serenade" starring Cary Grant in black and white. It talks of the ups and downs of married life, the weaknesses of a husband's leadership, the concerns of his loving wife and although the acting is not always that good by Cary it is a film that flows with reality and life but in a thoughtful caring way. It is worth at least watching once in your lifetime. The "Choir" on BBC2 was an encouraging programme, much as I find it difficult to admit that there is anything good about the BBC, although if any family member is reading this I shall try hard to be helpful!!???? Taking the wives and girlfriends of servicemen who were on duty overseas and making them into a choir that was able to sing in the Royal Albert Hall in front of the Queen was a great achievement for Gareth and the women and was very uplifting and Melanie Phillips in a piece on the programme over the Christmas made some compelling points here. To enable these women to rise above their normal expectations and find their voices, their creative talents and engage it for the benefit of their families and many of us is a noble uplifting cause and worthy of this time of Christmas celebration. Britain is not yet dead!

But I shall end on the subject of Downton Abbey on ITV2. It has it's weaknesses but I have hung on in there, as apparently have many millions of others, and the two hour Christmas special really came good and particularly for romantics like me. The creation of the atmosphere of the times and the quality of the script were very good and I do think by and large they have chosen well with the actors. There were some memorable lines and the piece de resistance for me was the offer of marriage by Matthew to Lady Mary, yeh!!!! The perfect ending to the Christmas period, peace for us all!! I shall have to watch it again!

So with all this and more it has been a restful and recuperative time, and for some of us including me it is still going.

The art of rest and recuperation is never an easy one to master!

Keith Thomas at the London Review of Books and also Michael Wood; taking a look at the educational process- lean and mean years ahead!

2011-12-27T10:54:00.009Z

The London Review of Books has produced a bumper issue on the 15th December 2011. Several of the articles are very helpful starting points on subjects such as Haruki Murakami; the 1914-1918 World War; the book "Vanished Kingdoms: The History of Half-Forgotten Europe by Norman Davies" reviewed by Neal Ascherson and particularly the two on University education as they lay down useful arguments to analyse in favour of education for education sake. Access to them is currently free. Here they are.

Universities under attack by Keith Thomas at this address.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v33/n24/keith-thomas/universities-under-attack

"We are all deeply anxious about the future of British universities. Our list of concerns is a long one. It includes the discontinuance of free university education; the withdrawal of direct public funding for the teaching of the humanities and the social sciences; the subjection of universities to an intrusive regime of government regulation and inquisitorial audit; the crude attempt to measure and increase scholarly ‘output’; the requirement that all academic research have an ‘impact’ on the economy; the transformation of self-governing communities of scholars into mega-businesses, staffed by a highly-paid executive class, who oversee the professors, or middle managers, who in turn rule over an ill-paid and often temporary or part-time proletariat of junior lecturers and research assistants, coping with an ever worsening staff-student ratio; the notion that universities, rather than collaborating in their common task, should compete with one another, and with private providers, to sell their services in a market, where students are seen, not as partners in a joint enterprise of learning and understanding, but as ‘consumers’, seeking the cheapest deals that will enable them to emerge with the highest earning prospects; the indiscriminate application of the label ‘university’ to institutions whose primary task is to provide vocational training and whose staff do not carry out research; and the rejection of the idea that higher education might have a non-monetary value, or that science, scholarship and intellectual inquiry are important for reasons unconnected with economic growth...."

Must we pay for Sanskrit by Michael Wood at this address.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v33/n24/michael-wood/must-we-pay-for-sanskrit

"A couple of markers may help. We are all situated somewhere, even if we see ourselves as cosmopolitans emancipated from mere biography. I was a beneficiary of the old idealistic British system, a grammar-school boy who went to Cambridge in the 1950s when not too many people were so lucky. If we can’t afford such a system any longer because we wish to make a good education available to many more people – if that is our real reason and our real intention – then we have to think of proper new ways of funding it...."

Cry Aloud by Dr. Patrick Sookhdeo, International Director of the Barnabas Fund.

2011-12-26T10:29:00.004Z

This article by Dr Patrick Sookhdeo was first published in the January/February edition of Barnabas Aid. Copyright Barnabas Fund 2012. Reproduced by kind permission.

Cry Aloud

On 16 October 2011 an Egyptian Christian schoolboy was beaten to death by some of his Muslim classmates, apparently at the instigation of a Muslim teacher at his school in Mallawi, Minya province. Like most Egyptian Christians, Ayman Nabil Labib (17) had a cross tattooed on his wrist.

On that day, the teacher had asked him to cover it up, but Ayman instead revealed that he wore another cross around his neck under his shirt. The infuriated teacher is reported to have incited the other boys to attack their fellow student. By the time an ambulance arrived, Ayman was dead.

Egyptian police arrested and charged the two students, but not the teacher or any other
member of the school staff. Only three witnesses have come forward to make statements to the police. The parents of the other students are reported to be afraid of what the school might do to their sons if they made statements, as well as being afraid of the families of the two boys who have been arrested.

Barely three weeks earlier, a Pakistani Christian schoolgirl also faced a life-threatening
situation, simply because of a spelling mistake.

On 22 September Faryal Bhatti (13), a pupil at Sir Syed Girls High School in Havelian, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, was reprimanded and beaten by her teacher because she had misplaced a single dot in a word while answering a question on a poem about Muhammad. Her accidental slip turned the word naat, which refers to praise of Muhammad, into lanaat, which means “curse”. As news of the incident spread, Muslim protestors called for Faryal to be punished for her “blasphemy”. According to Section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code, the crime of defiling the name of Muhammad carries a mandatory death sentence. Faryal was expelled from her school, and she and her family have fled the area.

These shocking incidents cause us to rage against the violence and injustice meted out to innocent Christian youngsters. And they are but two examples of what our Christian brothers and sisters have to endure in so many parts of the world.

At the start of a new year, let us resolve to speak out for them. How can we be silent when such injustices are occurring? We must cry aloud for justice.

This new year brings with it both hope and foreboding. We believe in the Lord of history who holds this world in His hands, and thus we can face the new year with confidence. But also we see a rising tide of persecution, and we wonder what our fellow believers will be called to endure in the coming twelve months.

A year ago, in January 2011, the “Arab Spring” was initiated by the self-immolation of a desperate young man in Tunisia. As events unfolded in the Middle East, I wrote of my concerns that the Arab Spring might become a Christian Autumn in the region, or even a Christian Winter.

Sadly this has proved to be the case. Libya,freed from Gaddafi’s tyranny, is moving rapidly to become an Islamic state. On 22 October, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the leader of the Transitional National Council, emphasised the central role Islam will play in the new Libya: “We are an Islamic country. We take the Islamic religion as the core of our new government. The constitution will be based on our Islamic religion.” Jalili’s statement was greeted with approving cries of “Allahu Akbar” (“god is great”). He also said that laws contradicting sharia would be nullified, and specified that polygamy would be legalised.

Tunisia has already voted in an Islamist party, Ennahda, and it seems virtually certain that the Muslim Brotherhood will gain political power in Egypt when elections are held (due soon after the time of writing). The Iranian view of the upheavals in the Middle East, as not an Arab Spring but an “Islamic Awakening”, certainly seems to have been justified.

The rise of Islamism across the Middle East, and indeed the rest of the world, is accelerating. And Christians are caught in its wake. However, the West seems to have little concern for the plight of Christian minorities. The catastrophe of post-war Iraq and its horrendous effects on Iraqi Christians may well be replicated in Syria this year. The tragedy of a tiny and beleaguered Christian population in Afghanistan, with their even smaller refugee communities in Islamabad and New Delhi, has gained neither international attention nor any kind of protection by the West or NATO. Worse still, Western countries at this time are unwilling to give asylum to these small groups of Afghan Christians.

Long ago, another innocent and faithful believer made a passionate plea for justice. Job’s words come to us with devastating force,ringing down the centuries.

“I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment” (Job 19:7, KJV).

This is the experience of so many Christians today who live in conditions where their cries cannot be heard. But we who live in Western democracies will be heard if we cry out courageously and persistently. So we cannot be silent in the face of injustice against anyone. We must not be silent. For to be silent is to acquiesce in violence, injustice and unrighteousness.

In the 1990s I, together with the late Sheikh Zaki Badawi, the senior Muslim leader for the UK, stood against the oppression of Bosnian Muslims by the Serbs and also addressed the discrimination and racism of British society directed towards Muslims and ethnic minorities.

Now we must cry aloud again, for the needs and rights of our Christian brothers and sisters. Barnabas Fund was much criticised last year for speaking out on behalf of vulnerable and marginalised Christian minorities who cannot speak for themselves. But we will not be silenced, whether by fellow Christians, by Islamists or by governments. John Wycliffe, the 14th century English preacher who suffered great persecution for his initiative to translate the Bible into English, anticipated that he might die a painful martyr’s death but said,
“What! Should I be silent? Never! Let the blow fall; I await its coming.” We at Barnabas Fund will continue to cry aloud, whatever the cost, remembering Job’s glorious affirmation of hope in the midst of his suffering:

“I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth”
(Job 19:25, KJV).
“I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment”
(Job 19:7, KJV).

This article by Dr Patrick Sookhdeo was first published in the January/February edition of Barnabas Aid. Copyright Barnabas Fund 2012. Reproduced by kind permission.

Mary's foretaste of heaven, strengthened by God for her noble work of bearing Jesus!

2011-12-24T21:36:00.006Z

In this my final piece this Christmas I return to the song Mary sang after she had come to know that she was with child of the Holy Spirit; the Magnificat.

The Angel of the Lord, Gabriel had transformed her for he had brought to her the call and through him the presence, of God. And her heart submitted helpless before God's declared purposes and her already deep knowledge of Him. She was now in a state of electrified wonder. She was experiencing worship, for who God is had come to her and enveloped her consciousness and spirit; for He had brought to her the embrace of His love, strengthening her for the road ahead.

This is what she said in the Gospel of Luke Chapter 1, verses 46 to 50.

46 And Mary said,
"My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever."

In this revelation of God to her and in her example in responding, we are reminded too of the effects of experiencing the presence of God through Jesus in time and space. The result is worship of Him and all that He is. This too is the heritage and home of those who obey His Word and seek His presence through prayer, the discovery of and desire for worship of Him. For the faith of so many down the thousands of years testifies of this truth that to know God through Jesus is to know and experience God's presence as through His Holy Spirit in us we worship Him.

May God bless you and keep you this Christmas and for evermore!

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.

2011-12-23T22:37:00.002Z

21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." The gospel of Matthew chapter 1 and verse 21.

We have seen the immense pain that Joseph must have felt when learning of Mary's pregnancy but he showed that rare fortitude and did not waiver from the guidance of his integrity. This was met by God with the remarkable intervention of the Angel. This was to be no ordinary birth, his name would be Jesus and He would save His people from their sin!

It is difficult to understand and sympathise with a position that maintains the goodness of human beings. There is much to be grateful for; we are all made in the image of God and the light that enlightens every man has come and remains in and though His people. But to disagree with the basic Christian view that all have fallen short of the standards that God has set for mankind is a negligent myopia and reckless. That position, for which each of us are responsible, means that we are destined for a life, an everlasting life separated from our God. Why else would He Jesus be sent and come, why else would the very essence of his coming be centred as here described on dealing with that problem, our rejection of our Maker. He came to bear the just punishment for our rejection of our God His father and he did that in His body on the Cross. He must be a true man because the justice of God requires that the same human nature which has sinned should pay for sin. He must be a righeous man because one who himself is a sinner cannot pay for others. He must be true God so that by the power of His divine nature He might bear in His human nature the burden of God's wrath. This is Jesus who came to save His people from their sin.

On 16 October 2011 an Egyptian Christian schoolboy was beaten to death by some of his Muslim classmates, apparently at the instigation of a Muslim teacher at his school in Mallawi, Minya province. Like most Egyptian Christians, Ayman Nabil Labib (17) had a cross tattooed on his wrist.

On that day, the teacher had asked him to cover it up, but Ayman instead revealed that he wore another cross around his neck under his shirt. The infuriated teacher is reported to have incited the other boys to attack their fellow student. By the time an ambulance arrived, Ayman was dead.

Egyptian police arrested and charged the two students, but not the teacher or any other
member of the school staff. Only three witnesses have come forward to make statements to the police. The parents of the other students are reported to be afraid of what the school might do to their sons if they made statements, as well as being afraid of the families of the two boys who have been arrested.

This is but one example of the desperate effects of sin, there are endless more and the nature that breathes such enmity towards others is within all of us. Jesus came to seek and to save the lost. We should not be surprised!

(The above record of events comes directly and verbatim from an article entitled "Cry Aloud by Patrick Sookhdeo, first published in the January/February edition of Barnabas Aid. Copyright Barnabas Fund 2012 and with their kind permission. The full version of that article I will file shortly.)

"Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit." Prostrated by this eternal verity!

2011-12-21T18:01:00.010Z

The Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 1 and verses 18 to 20;

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. 20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

Joseph must have been stymied by what appeared as his fiance's immorality and wondered what was going on; why me? We know that he was guided by his integrity to find the way through this personal tragedy. The lot is cast into the lap as it says in the Book of Proverbs in the Bible but "the decision is wholly from the Lord". We should maintain the integrity of our confession of faith and seek what God wants as we consider and decide on what to do about the issues we might face, seeking to reflect the God who is there!

This remaining true to ourselves before God will help us to find the right way, the old paths, the good way. Oh the majesty of discovering His Will for our lives, just as Joseph did! Joseph could be spoken to by God through the Angel for He would listen and that is the real honour he was given.

The message he received "turned his world upside down", that what was conceived in Mary was of the Holy Spirit. For Mary was bearing Jesus, God incarnate, Immanuel, God with us. A message of utter incredibility; a total humbling of the human psyche and the bankrupting of much of human logic. The affirmation that is of both the humanity of Christ born of Mary and of the deity of Christ that Jesus is God.

How can this be, for it is?

And in Church history both the Councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381) bore testimony that this was non-negotiable! One person Jesus possessing two natures, without confusion or division.

This Christmas I cast myself on the ground in humility submission and adoration at this knowledge, of which I am persuaded and privileged. Thank you Jesus for coming, thank you my Saviour!

How I pray that you, too may also share in this worship this Christmas!

Joseph's mercy; pointing the way and reflecting so much of the heart of what the Christian faith is!

2011-12-19T22:31:00.022Z

The Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 1 and verses 18b to 19; Joseph

18b Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

Reflect for a moment on what appears an inauspicious start to the coming of the long prophesied Messiah! Engaged to Joseph, a commitment to marry, she is found to be expecting a child! And yet here was this man Joseph resolving only "to divorce her quietly". A "loving act of gracious dealing" in circumstances where at the very least he must have been sorely wounded and hurt. The whole incident echoes the time in Jesus later ministry when a crowd gathered to stone a woman caught in the act of adultery. Jesus turned around and said let him who is without sin cast the first stone. And of course no one could!

There can always be a loving controlled dealing with something that is wrong and there can also be instead an arrogant, myopic and destructive atomisation of the very same matter, whether that be at the physical, emotional or spiritual level. But Joseph points the way, for we see his restrained abhorrence of sin; in this decision his patience and mercy, his just reaction and his goodness. Hallmarks, too, of true Christian faith, reflecting much of the beauty of who God is.

He showed forth mercy justice and goodness, which enabled the way to be so clearly opened for someone who is and would be called " Mighty God", to emerge out of this seemingly dire situation. We see in his treatment of this woman, his attempts to preserve her honor and respect her, a foretaste of the love of Christ, the drawing open of the way for the coming of Jesus, the name that is above every name!

We should seek to be merciful just and good even amidst seeming dishonour and failure!

Not everything is as it may seem but we can be guided by our integrity.

Muslim Brotherhood has Western liberals, media fooled | The Examiner | Op Eds | Washington Examiner by Herbert London

2011-12-19T22:01:00.001Z

Muslim Brotherhood has Western liberals, media fooled The Examiner Op Eds Washington Examiner

This is yet another perspicacious piece by Herbert London of Hudson Institute fame. If there was ever a piece that graphically highlights the weaknesses of democracy, this is it. It is the same problem that the authorities found themselves in in Algeria years ago, locked into a system that delivers into the hands of the Muslim brotherhood it will not be long before theocratic totalitarianism follows and woe betide anyone who disagrees never mind any issues of truth.

Prime Minister’s King James Bible Speech - Number 10

2011-12-19T17:45:00.000Z

Prime Minister’s King James Bible Speech - Number 10

The Birth of Jesus Christ; oh for a thousand tongues to sing, my great redeemer's praise!

2011-12-18T19:37:00.001Z

The Birth of Jesus Christ; the gospel of Matthew chapter 1 and verses 18 to 25.

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. 20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:

23 "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel" (which means, God with us). 24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, 25 but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

A hymn by Charles Wesley

O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing
O for a thousand tongues to sing
my great Redeemer's praise,
The glories of my God and King,
the triumphs of His grace.

Jesus! the name that charms our fears,
that bids our sorrows cease,
'Tis music in the sinner's ear,
'tis life and health and peace.

He breaks the power of cancelled sin,
He sets the prisoner free.
His blood can make the foulest clean;
His blood availeth for me.

He speaks, and listening to His voice,
new life the dead receive.
The mournful, broken hearts rejoice;
the humble poor believe.

Hear Him, ye deaf; His praise, ye dumb,
your loosened tongues employ.
Ye blind, behold your Saviour come;
and leap, ye lame, for joy.

My gracious Master and my God,
assist me to proclaim,
To spread through all the Earth abroad,
the honours of Thy name.

Reality and the loss of soul; Xue Jinbo's death in police custody and the fishing village of Wukan.

2011-12-17T21:43:00.005Z

We remember at this time and pray for the family of Xue Jinbo, killed in police custody and the villagers of the fishing village of Wukan in Southern China, Guandong Province resisting the encroachments of seeming unscrupulous land grabbers for farmland development. They but ask for redress through the proper channels.

We remember and pray for them for we are not islands but all are members of the one human family and as such they too are our brothers and sisters, flesh and blood, made in God's image.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/15/world/asia/chinese-village-locked-in-rebellion-against-authorities.html

Welcome to family life, an old rooster and a young chick!

2011-12-17T19:47:00.001Z

I saw this at a friend's house today and it made me smile!

The Hundred Years’ German War - Victor Davis Hanson - National Review Online

2011-12-15T19:13:00.002Z

The German people are to be admired and not demeaned for their hard work and efforts. If through laziness we seek utopia unfortunately we deserve to reap the whirlwind or we should change. Kicking or screaming we shall have to. This is an excellent article from an excellent writer!

The Hundred Years’ German War - Victor Davis Hanson - National Review Online

Victor Davis Hanson who wrote this piece is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author, most recently, of The End of Sparta, a novel about ancient freedom. © 2011 Tribune Media Services, Inc. Here are the final few paragraphs of what he said at the above address.

"....Can poor European adolescents really obey their rich German parents? Berlin in essence has now scolded southern Europeans that if they still expect sophisticated medical care, high-tech appurtenances, and plentiful consumer goods — the adornments of a rich American and northern-European lifestyle — then they have to start behaving in the manner of Germans, who produce such things and subsidize them for others.

In other words, an Athenian may still have his ultra-modern airport and subway, a Spaniard may still get a hip replacement, and a Roman may still enjoy his new Mercedes. But not if they still insist on daily siestas, dinner at 9 p.m., retirement in their early 50s, cheating on taxes, and a de facto 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. workday.

Behind all the EU’s eleventh-hour gobbledygook, Germany’s new European order is clear: If you wish to live like a German, then you must work and save like a German. Take it or leave it."

Why marriage as we know it, in brief?

2011-12-15T13:22:00.001Z

"The unique complementarian nature of a covenant commitment between a man and a woman for life, equal and yet different, combined with the physical outworkings of that relationship as a product of natural law; in particular the potential to share together in the procreation of their children, gives that couple the maximal potential to be of help to each other, the opportunity to model unity between the opposite sex, and also to fulfill that unity with shared genetic outcomes. The promotion of such a shared union further supports; a key element of our ability as a world to sustain our existence-the ability to procreate, and a stable society for it operates under conditions that enable children to know and understand better from whom they have come by connection directly and genetically on a regular basis and across the generations thereby cementing better community social cohesion."

Hudson Institute Cultural Lexicon: China in Ten Words by Yu Hua: a review by Melanie Kirkpatrick.

2011-12-13T09:17:00.001Z

Hudson Institute Cultural Lexicon

Hudson Institute History, Ideology, and U.S. Climate Policy: Beyond the Orthodoxies of Left and Right

2011-12-13T09:03:00.000Z

Hudson Institute History, Ideology, and U.S. Climate Policy: Beyond the Orthodoxies of Left and Right

Nein! Non! No! Merkel, Sarkozy, Chaplin!

2011-12-12T22:50:00.000Z

Will this be Cameroon's Churchillian moment?

It may well be but in the end even the professional politician has to accept reality. Whatever you may think of the City of London and it's financial services industry, it is currently a core part of our national economic viability and to admit a process that would undermine it, would be a step too far even for him, and certainly for his party!

I am not so sure that in the end the forces of national annihilation in the levers of power are not too strong for this British Prime Minister who seems to have come good on this occasion.

We shall have to wait and see!

Celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights | First Things

2011-12-11T10:31:00.002Z

Celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights First Things

The re-definition of what it means to be human continues to find voice through the use of this Declaration, a far cry from what it ever was intended to be used for.

Kristina Olney who is a fellow of the John Jay Institute for Faith, Society, and Law and a native of Australia here at First Things sets out her case for what is really going on? Here is the end part of what she says.

"....The rationale behind the defamation of religions agenda was the same as the one behind the decision to censor the speech of Andrew Bolt and Dr. Van Gend in Australia and to arrest the “Ku Fu Fighting” singer in the U.K. The Orwellian effort to redefine human rights damages many real rights and betrays the legacy of the great United Nations declaration that was signed on this day."

The bankers windfall! The idiot's guide!

2011-12-11T04:38:00.004Z

So much of the institution of banking in the West has become in it's structure and symbiotic relationship with government a bastion of privilege and an expression of socialist fundamentalism rather than a reflection of any reasonable definition of capitalism at work. This pyrrhic socialist victory march has come from it's propagandist ability to appropriate the word "capitalism" to it's engine thereby "guerilla-fying" it's real goals, that is it's pursuance of it's relativist liberal warfare. If the process had succeeded, so the argument goes, then such socialism would have adapted and tamed the wild beast of capitalism. If it fails (currently) then it was all the fault of capitalism!

Just reflect on this as an illustration for the moment?

The profits, be they excessive or otherwise, of the financial services industry derive from a system whereby they are preserved by central government (State) intervention or fiat. Such a system ultimately encourages profligacy or recklessness for it is underpinned by a closed shop based on privilege. The privilege being that the normal forces of buying and selling, which without such government intervention, is premised upon the quality of the product or the need of the consumer, are set aside. So that the process becomes emptied of any driving force to keep prices down and thereby sufficiently control excessive profits.

And believe me, you and I pay for that ultimately through inflation.

So the State, with it's paternalistic motives (because we are not grown up enough yet)provides privileges for the few, who for a time appear to be providing opportunities (credit) for more of us and then BANG! It was all a charade for the trojan horse of credit loosening underpinned and still does a political programme of social engineering through state control and diasarms, distracts and debilitates us as individuals from the co-operative creativity and enterprise that sustains us long term. This route has become a honeypot for the privileged few with no incentive and that fails to expand the employment pool across Society egged on by the State.

So, where does responsibility for all this lie?

It lies with the State, in reinforcing and monumentalizing privilege for the few, who create paper jobs, and then for those who are "one of us". What else is the State capable of doing once it sucks up all the marrow, the fibre from us lot to implement it's utopic visions!

So when you see your grandmother's fixed rate pension moving down relative to the value of money and she is wondering whether to put the heating on, remember this, the deep symbiosis between the State and the bankers and ask yourself.

Who or what should be giving the real accounting?

If this is what we call capitalism, then language has lost all meaning?

2011-12-09T18:43:00.004Z

I had always understood that capitalism was about markets, and people co-operating and making individual choices and realising the consequences? Instead what do we see portrayed as capitalism? Rapid increases in the money supply through central organs of the State; dishonest banking practices that are not true custodial deposit taking institutions but use our money as if at the casino; excessive profits for many bankers; obsessive level trading; the apparently 1% objectionable rich; offshore tax havens, and most times associated with the "greed".

And yet why then do we have more state coercion than ever, more deprivation through the taxation of our hard earned cash, more and more attempts at state enforced social engineering and more than enough pooling of decisions to the centre for the arrogant technocratic few? Not much voluntary co-operation in all of that, and I can't see much fostering of individual choices and as to the freedom to respect one's conscience and to believe, in ever diminishing free fall?

There is much to be learned about political expression from the supply of money. When Labour came to power the money supply was in the region of £700 billion. It is currently almost 2.1 trillion, a tripling in 14 years. So much of that supply is channelled through the state, through the central bank via bankers! But why are we so trusting of the State and those bankers, why are we so willing to set up such a bottle-neck in the system to distribute the largesse? How can you expect a seemless release across the board of such funds to society at large, an appropriate prioritisation and degree of honesty to seek to benefit us all from just such a concentration of power and from there through a select few? That is surely the point! When such a money supply is concentrated into the hands of the technocratic few, who but the privileged few are likely to benefit? Can you blame them? We can but when self-interest is so prevalent within all of us why give them the levers of such economic power in the first place?

And who really suffers from this comprehensive concentration in the hands of the few, via the State and then the banking system. It is the common old working man or woman; without such distributive power, with less and less access to his own choices and their consequences. So that when all goes down hill we working men and women are left on the rack heap. Whoever is in power, by the use of such centralist methods and theories make the workers suffer for they have to pick up the pieces.

If capitalism is a government that takes more and more power from us; rips our hard earned cash from our pockets; tells us more and more how to live; debilitates our capacity to think for ourselves and reduces the incentives to any noble cause, then I say forget capitalism. But of course that is not capitalism, that is state funded socialism and communism. So don't give me that rubbish about the end of capitalism, we do not see capitalism at work we see the autocratic State thinking it is- playing God.

For this is my point.

What body can ever have the omnipotence, the omnipresence and the omniscience to know how best to rule our lives. None, and without the humility of that recognition in government we shall continue to rue the day when we accepted this type of democratic experiment.

If this is capitalism, then it is dead and so is democracy, too!

Cameron adrift, dragged kicking and screaming!

2011-12-09T17:43:00.000Z

It is not and it cannot be in Britain's interests to accept another lot of fawning subservience to a technocratic elite led by Germany and to a lesser degree by France. It is not in their interests to have us on board in that way either. Strange how we so rarely hear about anything other than the German French Alliance! Let them go, let them have their roast beef, we will stick with out Yorkshire pudding any day.

They say you can never trust a Yorkshireman. Maybe true, maybe not but at least a lot of the time he says what he means, does what he says and he enjoys his cricket and yes, fair play! I had never identified Monsieur Cameroon with all of that but maybe I will reflect again after his use of this veto to reject this new robespierre of a Treaty.

I don't agree with a lot of what Monsieur Cameroon stands for and there would have been a clear connection between the decision he might have made and the imploding of the Conservative party but he has here at least made the right decision.

Rule Britannia, or rather what is left of our freedoms!

Am I practical? Never did gardening!

2011-12-08T13:15:00.001Z

My wife tells me that contrary to the impression that may have been left by my last blog, I never did any gardening. Not so sure about that?

I bow to her greater knowledge!!??

How thankful I am that she loves the garden or at least when she is helped from time to time by my supervisory efforts!

You know the phrase,

"An Englishman And His Garden."

Am I practical? Dun gardening!

2011-12-07T23:20:00.003Z

I don't do gardening!

I have to admit that some of my most pleasurable of hours are spent using my mind, usually studying something. I remember well at age 11 travelling with my parents to Singapore to live there for two years in the 60s. Although my father was not in the army I went to an army school, Bourne School and looking back I loved it. I even played rugby in the sweltering heat and came to enjoy my first Coke from the machine at breaktimes. But I had a lot of catching up to do and one such subject was Latin. My teacher gave me a pile of notes to read in my own time to practice. I would return from school in the evening and go through them painstakingly. By the end of the year I had caught up and was very successful in the exams. So you can see what I enjoy doing!

Double left click on each picture for an excellent larger version. Oh, I remember it well!

There have been some side effects to so much study over the years and one of them is that I don't do gardening! What I mean by that is I do not have a lot of practical skills. So when people say to me, do you do the garden, I say yes, I do. I manage it by paying someone else to do it for me. Isin't that the same thing?

Sometimes we just have to be honest with ourselves, accept the gifts God has given us and just appreciate others help, in this case paid help. As I said to one of my daughter's recently, we do earn money also to spend it on what we need!

That's my motto anyway. Dun gardening!

Egypt’s Descent - Mark Steyn - National Review Online

2011-12-06T17:24:00.001Z

Egypt’s Descent - Mark Steyn - National Review Online

An Afghanistani woman raped is forced to marry her rapist and we are fighting there in support of that regime!

Degrading treatment of women!

Egypt’s Sham Election - Daniel Pipes & Cynthia Farahat - National Review Online

2011-12-06T17:12:00.002Z

Egypt’s Sham Election - Daniel Pipes & Cynthia Farahat - National Review Online

All Egyptians deserve a democratic future, not just the winners, the achiles heel of the democratic experiment! We shall see whether the rights of minorities have any chance of preservation, nay improvement in Egypt as a consequence. I am afraid I doubt it but we shall see?!

This article attempts to cut through the nonsense written on this subject of these "democratic" elections in Egypt!

Military Wives Choir Sing

2011-12-06T11:39:00.001Z

What do you think? Not sure about the words but nonetheless the sentiment is worthy.

Kia Soul Hamster Commercial- Party Rock Anthem

2011-12-05T22:34:00.000Z

So, what is this all about, a sign of the times!

Robots without heart, only violence in their metal jackets. Asexual beings swaggering through their routine.

Am I supposed to buy the car?
My thanks to Kevin de Young

ECI Statement on Panetta and Gutman: The Blame Israel First Administration « Emergency Committee for Israel

2011-12-04T15:30:00.002Z

ECI Statement on Panetta and Gutman: The Blame Israel First Administration « Emergency Committee for Israel

In response to the recent criticism of Israel by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, Howard Gutman, today the chairman of the Emergency Committee for Israel, William Kristol, issued the following statement:

"Nobody believes President Obama when he claims, as he did last week, that he “has done more for the security of the state of Israel than any previous administration.” That’s because he hasn’t — and because President Obama and his administration keeps acting to weaken the security of the state of Israel.

For example: as reported in the Israeli press, the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, Howard Gutman — a top Obama fundraiser in 2008 — told a conference in Brussels this week that Muslim anti-Semitism “stems from the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.” Pardon us for retaining our belief that Muslim anti-Semitism in the Middle East predates 1967, and even 1948 — and in any case is the fault of the anti-Semites, not of the Jews.

At another conference, this one in Washington, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta surveyed the Middle East and discovered that at every turn, the Jewish state is to blame for problems in the Muslim world. Are there Arab uprisings that are bringing Islamists to power and endangering peace with Israel? Israel must placate the radicals. Are there constant provocations and taunts from Turkey’s Islamist government? Israel must beg for better treatment. Do Palestinians refuse to negotiate? “Get to the damn table,” Panetta thundered twice — as if Israel was refusing to talk, instead of the reverse.

Just about the only thing in the Middle East that President Obama hasn’t blamed Israel for is the Iranian nuclear program. But when it comes to this, too, instead of supporting crippling sanctions or preparing military strikes, the White House seems to spend more time deterring Israel from acting than deterring Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons in the first place. And the administration’s energy seems more focused on undermining Israel and those members of Congress pushing for a tougher approach to Iran, than in undermining the Iranian regime.

The Obama message is loud and clear: the world would be a safer, simpler, and more peaceful place if not for the troublesome Jewish state.

Ambassador Gutman’s comments were not way out of line with Obama’s worldview. Nonetheless, we expect he will be recalled because the Obama administration won’t want to expend political capital defending him. He should be recalled, of course. But what the events of recent days emphasize is that the problem is not with one ambassador or with one cabinet secretary. The problem is President Obama.”

Tebow’s Religion, and Ours - Daniel Foster - National Review Online

2011-12-04T15:23:00.001Z

Tebow’s Religion, and Ours - Daniel Foster - National Review Online

An athlete who believes, with authenticity!

News Bulletin, 2nd December 2011. Christian Institute.

2011-12-03T08:37:00.000Z

Can I sleep or can't I? Those waking hours.

2011-12-02T23:02:00.003Z

I wonder how many of us sleep really well, waking up refreshed and raring to go? Not many I suspect!

I remember a talk at the Lawyers Christian Fellowship early on in my legal career by John Knox, the then President. It was excellent and refreshing! He reflected on the heavy mental load that you can carry in life to the point of it affecting your sleep patterns. He began by fighting against dealing with the thoughts, the burdens of the day. In the end he found it better to run with them until they were resolved in his mind. This was his advice to us "young guns"! To run with the thoughts to resolve them as far as one could. To try to recover the composure, the peace, the calm of mind, to comfort the troubled brow.

There can be many reasons for not sleeping; ill-health, stress, challenges to te conscience, fear, getting older.

How should we try to react to this?

To be thankful for the sleep I do get and in those waking hours to try to use them well. Some music, a talk; to pray for those you love, for those in need, for the presence of Christ to be sensed in your very being. At times, I will venture downstairs for a drink!

To be satisfied with less and seek to draw out the good even from those waking precious moments of our lives!

There can be a kind of loneliness in such twilight hours that can be made, strangely, inspiring, too!

To celebrate Christmas; the birth of Jesus and Mary His mother's Magnificat.

2011-12-01T17:23:00.007Z

"Today, the first day of December 2011 is the start of that month that will bring together for Christians and many others a period within which to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. No, not a consumerist love fest, not a materialistic high-noon but yes a rejoicing that all those years ago He came! He who lives now in and through those who trust in Him for their salvation. So as I thought about what would set me on the best road of thought in pursuance of this celebration I turned to the Gospel of Luke and Chapter 1 for the story of His birth and not to be forgotten that magnificent record of pure and exhilarating joy from the faithful mother of Jesus, Mary. What a Magnificat, testifying to the presence of God, to the joy of service and to the glories of His character, God Himself, full of power and mercy. Magnificent!" Here it is, absolutely marvelously good news!"

The Birth of Jesus Foretold

26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, 27 to a virgin betrothed[b] to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. 28 And he came to her and said, "Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" 29 But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. 30 And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. 32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end."

34 And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?"

35 And the angel answered her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born[e] will be called holy— the Son of God. 36 And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. 37 For nothing will be impossible with God." 38 And Mary said, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her.

Mary Visits Elizabeth

39 In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, 40 and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41 And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, 42 and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! 43 And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

Mary’s Song of Praise: The Magnificat

46 And Mary said,

"My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever."

56 And Mary remained with her about three months and returned to her home.

Exit Barney Frank - The Editors - National Review Online

2011-12-01T14:11:00.004Z

Exit Barney Frank - The Editors - National Review Online

This is an interesting article on the subject of the career of career Congressman Barney Franks, soon to step down and the subject of the last video on this blog. They refer to him as the first openly gay member of Congress, then address his relations with the Freddie Mac and Fannie May debacle and finally the Frank-Dodd financial-reform legislation. Not a very flattering appraisal and some new insights for me. I draw attention to it particularly as I think his role in Congress over so many years is an important historical marker for good or bad. The editors of National Review are higly critical. It is not within my knowledge to know the extent to which they are right or not but his association with these two pieces of legislation are unavoidable and will continue to stand to judge him. Whether continuing like a damocles sword or not, we shall see!

These are some of the final words of the piece by the editors of National Review.

"From his relatively petty transgressions related to his personal life to his more consequential role in enabling Fannie and Freddie, Representative Frank personifies a great deal of what is wrong with American public life. Though a highly intelligent man, ....................... Republicans will not miss him. Neither should his Democratic colleagues, his constituents, or the American public that will be paying off the cost of his errors and those of his allies, with interest, for a great many years. ........................"

Krauthammer on Barney Franks; ouch!

2011-11-29T20:29:00.001Z

It may well be a foreign subject for the people of the United Kingdom but if you want to understand something of the heart of the financial debacle that has gone on in the US you have to look four square at what occured at Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae. It was a disaster and an example of what goes wrong when the State oversteps itself. Barney Franks for various reasons will be aligned with those organisations.

Keller on Marriage; soul mate or what?

2011-11-29T19:31:00.000Z

An excellent interview with the Rev. Timothy Keller of Manhattan’s Redeemer Presbyterian Church is here shown looking at marriage:

Germany, Germania, geronimo, much to savour and appreciate about modern German hegemony!!

2011-11-28T20:35:00.002Z

Let us just put aside envy for the moment; let us forget about the loss of lives in the two World Wars and focus for a moment on the current Germany. You just have to be impressed and with the Iron Lady, Angela Merkel, who has been prepared and still is prepared to say "NEIN!". She reminds me just so much of Margaret Thatcher in her heyday, whether the connection is welcome to her or not!

On behalf of Germany she will not allow money to be printed to bail out profligacy, ill-discipline, and what is in effect gigantuan arrogance from nations that think they can run roughshod through sound economic management and walk away free as a bird. And can one really blame her Government in Germany unless of course you resort to the argument that "if you cannot stop them join them" and we all know how stupid that is, or do we? I doubt if Monsieur Cameroon does from his liberal nihilist nest at 10 Downing Street! She is against allowing the ECB to become the lender of last resort and crippling her balance sheet with euro-bonds issuances, without reformation. Martin Luther lives!

And even if you are of a mind to focus on Germany's self interest, it is true that the low interest rates are further fuelling their exports. At least they have much to export and a work force capable of providing the backup!

Oh, the virtue of German prudence and hard work!

And if you don't like that lifestyle as so many of the European nations do not and want to resist the inevitable transfer of sovereignty to Brusselgermania when Germany might then really intervene to sort out this mess, you can always take to the door! And maybe some of these nations ought just to do that.

But please spare me, and stop blaming Germany. They are to be praised!

Scientists Behaving Badly - Jim Lacey - National Review Online

2011-11-28T18:00:00.003Z

Scientists Behaving Badly - Jim Lacey - National Review Online

More nails for the coffin of man-made global warming.

— Jim Lacey is professor of strategic studies at the Marine Corps War College. He is the author of the recently released The First Clash and Keep from All Thoughtful Men. The opinions presented here are entirely his own and do not represent those of the Department of Defense or any of its members.

Wives Speak Out, an article by Kathleen Nielson.

2011-11-27T12:00:00.001Z

Wives Speak Out

Kathleen Nielson serves as director of women's initiatives for The Gospel Coalition. She holds M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in literature from Vanderbilt University and a B.A. from Wheaton College. She speaks extensively at women’s conferences, and has directed and taught women’s Bible studies at several churches. She loves being involved with the community of Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Georgia, where her husband serves as president.

My Korean friend; my brother, a member of the same family!

2011-11-26T21:36:00.001Z

I have had such a rich experience these last two years getting know a family from South Korea.

One of my abiding memories will be those moments when I explained the creation of Adam and from Adam of Eve those thousands of years ago and thereby the logic of my position that he and I are therefor from the same family, inextricably linked. There was a kind of ethereal bonding that seemed to arise despite our different belief systems. He could see the possibilities of my position, suddenly in a flash. I poignantly appreciated the depth of the friendship that was and could be engendered as a consequence.

"Am I my brother's keeper?" said Cain to the Lord as he was made accountable to Him those many years ago. Yes, we all are each other's for we are all brothers and sisters from the same ultimate family and that is why what Cain had done was so tragic and such a travesty.

Whether you accept my premise or not, that is terribly powerful stuff! For there can be no reference in that premise to what divides us, only a positive assertion of our unique heritage. A revelation about the richness of the relationship we can have in the present with such links from the past and straightaway, to build upon!

As we met for the last time today my wife and I shared in their Korean food. We were able to enjoy the variety of tastes and rich Korean culture that that spread represented. As we did so I felt joy in my heart! Joy that we had got to know this family from Korea. Joy that truly he too was a brother of mine and as such and for much more we shall miss them all.

I had not appreciated so much what it means to have a true brother, but now I know!

The unseen suffering of so many in the face of such suffering! Only God knows.

2011-11-26T21:17:00.005Z

There were some moments early on in the week when a group of us were reflecting on the suffering, mainly physical of many of our friends around us, let alone elsewhere. It was not a pleasant survey because of course tinged with this is that instinctive question, why, O Lord, why?

There are many answers to that even if not complete ones but it struck me that there is more to this subject than a rational expose of logical arguments!

A friend of mine was in tears about his son!

You could appreciate why knowing his circumstances, the enormous cost it had been for him and his family over the last ten years; his son paralysed and on his back! And yet his eyes shone like the stars as he fought back the tears and talked of his faith in the Living God and of His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. And that spoke to me more than any rational intellectual answer could ultimately to the question why? For he more than anyone revealed the reality of his Saviour, the hope of glory living within Him through His Holy Spirit. That reality is true! That He Jesus is alive within him through His Holy Spirit, for why else could my friend and his wife have lasted this long, so resolutely, so lovingly, so purely and thankfully sacrificing their own health for the sake of their son?

Martin Johnson takes his stand about the England Rugby set up and those leaked reports.

2011-11-25T17:35:00.000Z

Praise for Rob Andrew. The Rugby Football Union, and clandestine Times Reports!

2011-11-24T20:27:00.001Z

There is so little of interest in the comments in the Times today on the subject of the clandestine disclosure of these reports on England's performance in the World Cup.

They are prefaced on the assumption that somehow the RFU and it's employees ought to have done a lot better and a lot more is expected of them. Maybe, but really, is that not to be expected in any organisation, especially one in so much flux as is the RFU? After all the performance and results of the England Rugby Team were not that bad given the inexperience of their much appreciated coach. The rugby journalists seem to think that we really mind that the outcome was not as good as it could have been, that we are surprised that there were man management problems. Far from it, they are to be expected and these things are often cyclical and need to be borne and learnt from.

So, what's news?

I am sure that Martin Johnson could have become even better at his job and learnt much from this experience but he is better served to move on at this time as my previous article on him expressed. Do I mind? Not really, since I remember his long and loyal and faithful service after so many years as a player and a captain and his work as a coach and his actions in this World Cup have done nothing to dissemble that view. In fact, his decision has heightened my sense of esteem for him.

Am I really that interested in the views of players? Of course their input is needed and to be evaluated but somehow to think that because they can put on the kit each game and play that their views are that important about what are in essence man management issues seems to me to be ridiculous.

And as for looking for Rob Andrew's scalp. Forget it! We support him, too and we don't want a scapegoating of a loyal servant to rugby in these British Isles over so many years. He can learn from this and can be helped to improve and that is the way forward.

Long live English Rugby!

What Is Constitutional Conservatism? - Yuval Levin - National Review Online

2011-11-24T09:11:00.002Z

This is a good piece by Yuval.

I have a growing appreciation for his work. He has that, too rare, intellectual capacity of saying something complex simply and cutting through the dross. He addresses the impact on power of both populism and technocracy mainly in the US and seeks to encourage the line of constitutionalism through moderating forms, as something based appropriately upon a "profound scepticism about the ability of any political arrangement to overcome the limitations of human reason and human nature".

It just rings true and makes sense.

It is well worthwhile reading the full article at this address- double left click the link!

What Is Constitutional Conservatism? - Yuval Levin - National Review Online

"This fall, liberals from the president on down have begun to grasp the scope of the political and intellectual disaster that the past three years have been for the Left. Their various responses to the calamity have tended to have one thing in common: immense frustration. But the different expressions of that frustration have been deeply revealing. They should help Americans better understand this complicated moment in our politics, and, in particular, help conservatives frame their responses. ......"

Brown's Iron Cross; saving us from the Euro.

2011-11-23T23:00:00.003Z

It is difficult not to be thankful to Gordon Brown, for all his manic idolisation of the Labour party vision that he had, for keeping us out of the Euro. For at least stopping Tony Blair's assault on the forces of moral conservatism at the revolving door of financial rectitude. He kept us from going into the Euro and that will go down in British history as his biggest achievement. Thank you.

Nonetheless, and unfortunately that is not the end of the story. We are still left with four profound and major problems for our economy. Putting aside our dependence on trade with Europe for the moment they centre on these issues.

We have a massive number of unemployed youth that have been trained to offer little by way of what we need right now. That is the fault of a decrepid spineless educational system besotted with politicised revisionism that has ruined the latest generational crop of young people now available to work, too many our feral youth.

Our manufacturing potential has been decimated early on during the Thatcher years and built on by successive governments in favour of financial and other services that we can either not support with the above workforce or have proved empty forms of employment.

We have so emaciated business by regulations and red tape. Who in their right mind would want to start a small business any more even if you had the necessary entrepreneurial skills and ideas? And it is entrepreneurship and business ideas in the small busness sectors that create jobs.

We have ceded to an environmentalist lobby that has used science, once respected, as a political tool to push agendas that are based on philosophical premises and greed. Now we are spending such vast sums in this country to meet the man made CO2 agenda that the poor are going to get a lot poorer and the select few a lot richer. This agenda has besmirched the name of science and is increasingly leaving the world's poor reeling with rejection and indifference and death. Those who have promoted this agenda should be held to account.

The only posterity for liberal relativism is it's total disregard for others.

Sarkozy on CNBC says there is a 30 trillion unsolvable problem in Europe.

2011-11-23T22:28:00.002Z

Sarkozy's half-brother, leader of the Carlisle Group casts some light on Europe's debt problems on CNBC. This is a key part of what he said.

"The math I'm working with is very simple. In the US banking sector, we had 3 trillion of wholesale funding that needed to be stabilized, got stabilized by the implementation of TARP which saw the US Treasury buy $212 billion worth of preferred in the banking sector to stabilize that $3 trillion, give our banks the time to work through their problem assets. In Europe, that $3 trillion is $30 trillion, so if you multiply the $212 by 10, you get the $2.12 trillion. In my view, the issues on the books of the European banks are bigger than the issues on the books of the US Banks. So if you want to stabilize that $30 trillion and in my view it's not that you want to, it's that you have to, you do not have a choice, you're going to have to be at least at 2.1 trillion and I suspect it may need to be more."

To stress or not to stress, that is the question!

2011-11-21T21:56:00.058Z

If you care, really care then there is a difficulty! How do you handle the onslaught of that sense of responsibility that flows out to others? When more often than not the most natural thing is to accede to and act upon it and you do so again and again.

There are no easy answers. There are principles of wisdom to connect oneself to, which might pull you back from the brink, oft times of over-stressing even collapsing under the pressure!

Learn to say no!

But expect to feel a failure as a result. To have a proper estimate of one's capacities is humble and thoughtful, thoughtful of those others who will benefit from your mercy and care when you are and should be available to help.

Take advice about your use of time!

For in an abundance of counsellors, it says in the Bible in the Book of Proverbs, there is much wisdom. Nurture and cultivate the kind of relationships that will try to be available to help you as you take on the weight and face the pressures of caring for others, who will listen and lend perspective and guide.

When you are in the midst of not coping so well, often feeling a failure there is so much to be grateful for, always.

You have a body that moves, a soul shaped and formed for you, the gift of smell, hearing, seeing, enjoying, feelings, and emotions, that ability to think and so much more.

And remember these words below from the Book of Ecclesiastes chapter 5 and verses 18 to 20 that have stood the test of time and say to yourself as you read them these French words,

" A votre sante et bon repas!"

18 Behold, what I have seen to be good and fitting is to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil with which one toils under the sun the few days of his life that God has given him, for this is his lot. 19 Everyone also to whom God has given wealth and possessions and power to enjoy them, and to accept his lot and rejoice in his toil—this is the gift of God. 20 For he will not much remember the days of his life because God keeps him occupied with joy in his heart."

Giving and receiving- beauty and joy!

2011-11-21T19:16:00.003Z

One of the greatest of joys is to give a gift or gifts to someone who wants to receive it. This is not as straightforward a point as it may seem for a key problem can be that the person involved may not be able to receive it.

It may be seen to be a threat to their independence, turning the whole process into something it was never intended to be: a poisoned chalice for both. And even if it is a helpful gift the manner in which it is received can be hard to take.

So why bother at all?

There are those whose generosity and humbleness of spirit can enable them to receive and enjoy what you offer for they know that there is beauty and joy in giving and receiving.

Nigel Farage's Rage. "What gives you the right?" Responsible or not from UKIP? There is much to admire about Germany.

2011-11-19T10:15:00.016Z

This is a demanding speech and said straight to some key players responsible for this Euro mess who looked exceedingly uncomfortable as a result. But is it responsible or is it more nuanced than this?

The problem we face in Europe is that with the exception of Germany every Western European nation is spending more than they earn. Unless there is a move away from an increasingly invasive entitlement mentality that demands in return the enfeebling of it's citizenry and a recovery of productivity and enterprise we are in deep trouble. This is one of the key reasons why Germany is still in such a dominant position for egged on by low interest rates it's export machine has fielded rapid fire throughout the world. With such a welfarist entitlement remedy everywhere in Western Europe families and individuals are having removed from them the very things that makes then feel dignity and self-worth. The provision that they can make for themselves and for their families. Instead, the State is becoming "the winner takes all". That is where the injustice is and that is what needs changing.

Sir Winston Churchill once said,

" The vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings, and the vice of socialism is the equal sharing of misery."

The problem with excessive debt is as the Chief Financial Officer of Royal Dutch Shell Simon Henry said recently that it can only be addressed by underlying economic growth and the conditions for that do not appear to be being created. This is the case too in the UK.

What do you think?

I am indebted to Herbert London and his article at this address in stimulating mine, entitled " The Legacy of the Social Welfare State" November 7, 2011
http://www.hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=publication_details&id=8475&pubType=HI_opeds,HI_Journal_Articles

An introduction to John Piper's new book, " Bloodlines". The horror of racism in whatever form!

2011-11-18T20:52:00.001Z

This is a stunning cinema piece introducing the book. It talks of the degradation and horror of racism and in opposition to racism of any kind the transforming power of the Gospel. John Piper is a godly man and full of surprises. Do watch it.

Bloodlines Documentary with John Piper from Crossway on Vimeo.

"Hope for the GOP - Conrad Black - National Review Online". A damascene performance by Conrad, light really does shine in darkness!

2011-11-18T16:58:00.001Z

Hope for the GOP - Conrad Black - National Review Online

To all you romantics out there, take a look at this:- a short but comical scene from the Cosby Show!

2011-11-17T22:17:00.005Z

This is a short excerpt from the Cosby Show and it is very funny. Each of the three husbands have agreed together secretly a bet to see who can give their wives the most romantic gift for under 25 dollars. The wives find out about the bet in advance and are determined to be unmoved and unimpressed with each gift. Some surprises and laughs in store! My thanks to Kevin DeYoung for the idea.

Skip to 5 minutes 20 secs.

Martin Johnson, a tribute to him although I am not so sure about the England rugby team.

2011-11-17T18:01:00.002Z

I am sorry to see him go.

I wanted him to succeed and I think his record as a coach is a good one. I enjoyed watching him as a player. But it is probably about the right time to leave to save that reputation untarnished.

He has left a team that can hold it's own but is nothing special in it's current structure. Only the privileged few will really know what went on behind the scenes, what the constraints were on him and the extent to which his inexperience as a coach affected the outcomes. It is hard not to reflect on the process of his appointment and the unlikelihood of real success with such a jump from playing to coaching. I don't think in principle it is wise to have a system that permits this. There is just too much involved in a coaching role that needs to be learnt before real performance at the highest level.

The England team to me lacked effective leadership on the field at key moments and seemed at times to have little if any heart. The lack of control of key players off the field on a reasonable perspective cannot fall at Johnson's feet but for me a really good coach may well have had a taming effect. When key players behave as some did there is little confidence that their eye is on the job and that they are there to win.

I always maintain that if England could only have the verve and heart of the Irish team we would see a different story.

I wish him well but as to England, let's face it, exciting times are unlikely in the near future!!

The Suffering King.

2011-11-16T22:52:00.001Z

" And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly." The Gospel of Mark, chapter 8 and verses 31 to 32.

This is exactly what happened.

The weakening of marriage and civilisational collapse.

2011-11-16T17:43:00.001Z

"...Civilization requires the regulation of human sexuality and relationships. No society — ancient or modern — has survived by advocating a laissez-faire approach to sex and sexual relationships. Every society, no matter how liberal, sanctions some sexual behaviours and proscribes others. Every society establishes some sexual norm.

Pitirim Sorokin, the founder of sociology at Harvard University, pointed to the regulation of sexuality as the essential first mark of civilization. According to Sorokin, civilization is possible only when marriage is normative and sexual conduct is censured outside of the marital relationship. Furthermore, Sorokin traced the rise and fall of civilizations and concluded that the weakening of marriage was a first sign of civilisational collapse.

The creative relationship between a man and women is biologically unique. Two of the most important things that come from traditional families are procreation and parenting. The basis of parenting is richly complemented and profoundly harmonised by the binding structures of familial interaction and association. The family takes on a generational dimension which ensures continuity that contributes positively to a communal social consensus. The child is linked in a long line of blood relations....."

This is a quote from the article "The Demise of Heterosexual Culture?" on November 16th, 2011 By Harry Templeton and can be found in full at this address.
http://www.anglican-mainstream.net/2011/11/16/the-demise-of-heterosexual-culture/#more-52789

Fanny Crosby- joy in suffering.

2011-11-15T20:43:00.000Z

Birmingham Is Not New York: 5 Cautions for Arts Ministry

2011-11-15T20:36:00.000Z

Birmingham Is Not New York: 5 Cautions for Arts Ministry

Anger Is Essential by Paul Tripp

2011-11-14T22:27:00.002Z

This is a good article and verbalises something that I feel deeply.

Some people say that it is something that happens to you as you get older and I am sure that may well be the case too often and for wrong reasons, be it impatience or frustration and more. But, it can also be as Paul here says for righteous reasons as you feel the intimidatory power of depravity all around and long for change not just in your own life and the complete redemption promised in God's Word, the Bible, which I am not ashamed of.

I suppose ultimately we must remember that Jesus is coming back and to take us to be with Him and in that we can rejoice.

Anger Is Essential

Paul Tripp is the president of Paul Tripp Ministries, a nonprofit organization whose mission statement is "Connecting the transforming power of Jesus Christ to everyday life." Tripp is also professor of pastoral life and care at Redeemer Seminary in Dallas, Texas, and executive director of the Center for Pastoral Life and Care in Fort Worth, Texas. Tripp has written many books on Christian living that are read and distributed internationally. He has been married for many years to Luella, and they have four grown children.

Mr Cameron, MP Patrick Mercer and the dis-enfranchisement of the Tory rank and file.

2011-11-14T14:24:00.005Z

Whatever may have been said by MP Patrick Mercer, it is clear that Mr. Cameron has lost the confidence of many in the rank and file of his party. I foretell that as things stand he will lose any near term general election for the Conservatives. In fact, even before that he may well lose the Conservative party whip!

In terms of both style and substance, it can only get worse.

The tortuous treatment of the Conservative MP Nadine Dorries in the House of Commons recently will go down as a wretched mistake nothwithstanding his apparent recognition subsequently of the damage it had done. Force feeding Conservative MPs through the lobbies on a three line whip to share in his own hypocritical policies about a referendum on Europe was a telling moment when he finally lost authority and he knows it.

So too, the recent refusal of the Government to remove the word "insulting" from the Public Order Act shows that they and their liberal party admirers are not to be trusted on the subject of freedom of speech. Why did he refuse? The pressure groups surrounding him are all too apparent to see. We are losing rapidly the semblance of a representative democracy and increasingly ceding power to small selective bands. And now we are also told there will be a consultation, not on whether marriage should be redefined but when it should be, as that is apparently the Conservative way. Take a long hard look at those around him writing his speeches and more.

My strong recommendation to Christians is to vote against this Cameroon party. It is beyond the pale!!

Karl Jenkins's music. Benedictus- The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace.

2011-11-13T22:02:00.000Z

Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.

I am not a Catholic as many of you will know and so the concept of the Mass is foreign to me but this rather haunting but very refreshing piece of music is uplifting and inspiring.

It is of peace.

We believe as Christians that the only real peace is in and though Our Lord Jesus Christ and that salvation is only in and through Him and His substitutionary atonement on the Cross.

A Christian Royal Marine's story of his physical suffering in Afghanistan on Remembrance Day.

2011-11-13T21:47:00.001Z

Simeon & Rebecca (full version) from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

Marriage and the covenant of love between a man and a woman?.

2011-11-12T11:16:00.000Z

It is at times difficult to accept that we have come to a point in our society where the concept of marriage between a man and a woman is even seriously questioned. It obviously is and of course we must respect the fact that others are entitled to advocate such a change, if they wish, even if I and others disagree.

It seems to me plainly rational to state that the availability of a man and a woman and particularly their mother and father with their very unique contributions and inextricable joint linkage throught the gene pool to them, must at the very least be an optimum balance for the nurture and well being of any child. It is certainly my experience after 27 years that that is the case.

Some would disagree I know and at the extremes they would disagree on the basis that there are no such affecting differences (fast becoming a mainstream political assumption) and who cares about genes, we are all from primordial soup anyway! My personal response to all that is one of utter disbelief and yet controlled effusion. I just do not accept that red is green and that green is red and if I am to be called a fool because of this then so be it, I would rather be a fool than an enemy of my mind and rationality and dare I say it my moral sense.

I just cannot also see how you can argue that it is not a normal expectation for a fellow human being to want to know from whence he/she came, even if it is to understand themselves better so that just on a social argument basis there is some support for my argument of the rationality of my position. Still what's reason if it stops you from doing what you want!!!!

I cannot help but musing that I am really operating in the wrong realm here when considering the opposing arguments. The essence of our opponents case seems to centre instead around the shredding of the link between the body and the rest of what makes you you, normally described as the soul or put another way the mind character and conscience. This is not necessarily the case but I have heard what in essence are such positions more and more. So that all you are then left with is what your body and desires flowing therefrom want. But of course, that is ultimately anarchy and narcissism extraordinaire where the essence of what it means to be a child becomes irrelevant and what matters is what you want, not the needs of the child.

"Supremacy of Chinese Is No Sure Thing" by Irwin Stelzer. Closures, millionaires and corruption.

2011-11-11T17:13:00.005Z

There is a piece originally in the Wall Street Journal Europe entitled,
"Supremacy of Chinese Is No Sure Thing" on the 9th November, 2011 by Irwin Stelzer. It can be accessed at either of these two addresses. It is a very interesting insight into China at present, obviously giving one side of the story.

http://online.wsj.com/article/irwin_stelzer.html

http://www.hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=publication_details&id=8480

It was only last night that I sat talking to a Chinese friend of mine whose home is in Southern China, Fujian province and he raised these points.

Many businesses in the South are closing due to the knock on effect of inflation and also the world recession.

Many of the new millionaires in China appear to wanting to live abroad and not stay in China, even Canada and the US.

Corruption is a constant challenge.

This article also gives us a very unique insight into the way things still are in China. Here is a part.

".....What does all of this tell us about the rise of the East and the decline of the West? That the East is getting relatively richer, and becoming more consequential in world affairs. That China has a long way to go before its citizens can attain the living standard of the average American. That its growth is by no means certain as rising production costs shift competitive advantage to other countries, a weak banking system and environmental issues put a brake on growth, and cultural and government forces operate against the development of an innovative business sector.

America's decline is relative but not absolute. And the declinists miss two important points. First, the relative positions of America and China are the result of policy choices, not some mysterious historical forces. Second, as Standpoint editor Daniel Johnson recently put it, they attach too little weight to America's demonstrated "powers of recuperation and renewal."

Herman Cain and Ann Coulter's view of David Axelrod and others from Chicago! Spare us the conference, for pity sake!

2011-11-11T16:58:00.000Z

It was good to see at the recent Republican television debate in the US the reaction of the audience to Herman Cain's responses to the questions about his relationship with his accusers. There was booing from those listening when he was asked at all on the subject and when he answered he received spontaneous applause!

We just cannot have a situation in a democracy where people are being "dispatched" from the public arena on the basis of "accusations". It is not relevant whether it is true or not, it just should not see the time of day. Those involved who accuse him should have followed the proper procedures and if they do not like the law as it stands they should have taken it up with their Congress representatives. Otherwise, it is rule by the mob.

Ann Coulter's views on the role or otherwise of David Axelrod are an interesting twist to the story and we shall see. Here are her comments.

http://www.anncoulter.com/columns/2011-11-09.html

I am somewhat disappointed by National Review and it's editorial policy on this story of Herman Cain. They cannot hide their lack of passion for the Herman Cain candidacy on the basis of his fitness for the job but there is something a lot deeper here that threatens their own credibility as a publication. You just cannot be seen to be giving any credibility to such a ruthless attack, which until now has been based on hearsay. You should instead show much more support for him in this period than they have done even if for no other reason that the principle is so crucial.

And finally, the prospect of a conference by the women to, I assume present a united front. I would recommend earnestly that they refrain. The prospect of four or more such women being seen to be up there demeaning an African American egged on by sections of the Press is not only gross but a terrible prospect!

The imagery of such an event would be enormously damaging to all of us!

William Lane Craig's Lecture at the Sheldonian and the empty chair; the no Dawkins no show!

2011-11-09T22:49:00.001Z

Is God a delusion?

The totalitarians extra-legal and extra-democratic intentions!

2011-11-09T13:24:00.002Z

"Thomas Frank thunders that attacking Ayers at this date is 'desperate and grotesque.' But if the historical dangers Ayers posed have receded, the political dangers of Ayers-ism remain. No experiment in self-government can accommodate the rule that those intensely committed to their own political ideals deserve extra-democratic powers to make the laws and extra-legal opportunities to break them. One way to keep hope alive about our experiment is to believe that the earnest and explicit rejection of participatory totalitarianism is a stronger, more durable political force that the cavalier, implicit acceptance of it. America, after all, really is a great country."

This is a quote from an article in the Claremont Review in the Summer 2011 issue, entitled "Days of Rage, Years of Lies" by William Voegeli. It is not an easy read but it makes some very interesting points.

William explains that the participatory democracy referred to in the above quote held the view that elected representatives ceased to be representative once they are voted in. True democracy in other words for participatory democrats "could not withstand the attenuation caused by delegating authority, and needed to be kept close to the citizens trying to determine the contours of their lives and communities." It soon enough William goes on to say came to mean getting rid of representative democracy, or to abolish the idea of leadership, or to do away with the normal requisites of a functioning organisation. It ultimately became, he quotes from Paul Berman in a 1987 review, a forum for demagoguery and chaos.

It is an interesting exercise to work out who such totalitarians are currently in our societies.

Not a very difficult exercise!