Rod Dreher says Dennis Prager calls NeverTrumpers "prissy" and "self-involved", and takes it personally

Prager also makes the shopworn “Georgetown cocktail party” criticisms, accusing Never-Trumpers of being too prissy and self-involved to embrace Trump . . ..

But Prager never says that, here. Which tells you a lot about Rod Dreher.

In fact, Prager doesn't name names, but Dreher calls Prager's arguments "farcical" and "delusional" in addition to being "shopworn", here.

Take that, you big nasty man!

On top of feeling a little unmanned by the big Jewish conservative, Dreher never mentions one of those arguments, that NeverTrumpers have "a utopian streak".

Which isn't surprising because that's a main recurring theme in the criticisms of Dreher's Benedict Option.

So, why aren't anti-Trump conservatives jumping for joy?

I have come to believe that many conservatives possess what I once thought was a left-wing monopoly — a utopian streak. Trump is too far from their ideal leader to be able to support him.

Best not to address it while you're otherwise busy misrepresenting your enemy.

The old fool knows the world long in vain

Uncle Billy can't remember something important

 

 

What, start at this! when sixty years have spread

Their grey experience o'er thy hoary head?

Is this the all ... observing age could gain?

Or hast thou known the world so long in vain?

-- John Dryden

Memory shows humankind to be conservative by nature

The memory is perpetually looking back, when we have nothing present to entertain us: it is like those repositories in animals that are filled with stores of food, on which they may ruminate, when their present pasture fails.

-- Joseph Addison (1672-1719)

The solution to all of life's problems

 

PARODY OF THOMAS WARTON

Hermit hoar, in solemn cell,

Wearing out life's evening gray,

Smite thy bosom, sage, and tell,

Where is bliss? and which the way?

Thus I spoke, and speaking sighed--

Scarce repressed the starting tear--

When the smiling sage replied,

'Come, my lad, and drink some beer'.

-- Samuel Johnson

Immoral clarity: Ivy League PhD Black Widow of abortionists admits to murdering the unborn

It is hard to believe that such evil is tolerated in our midst. If it were still a decent country this woman would be arrested, tried, convicted, and hung by the neck until dead, like Irma Grese of Nazi infamy. But it's not a decent country, is it?

Here she is, in a transcript from a secret recording:

Lisa Harris, medical director at Planned Parenthood of Michigan, says pro-choice proponents should just admit that abortion is murder. “Let’s just give them all the violence,” she says. “It’s a person. It’s killing. Let’s just give them all that.” She also jokes about trying to pull a decapitated head out of a patient. “Our stories don’t really have a place in a lot of pro-choice discourse and rhetoric, right?” Ms. Harris says. “The heads that get stuck that we can’t get out. The hemorrhages that we manage. “You know, those are all parts of our experience,” she says. “But there’s no real good place for us to share those.”

Poor thing has a hard day at the office and no shoulder to cry on, just like everyone else.

The kingdom is so imminently arriving not even immediate burial must interfere

And Ananias hearing these words fell down, and gave up the ghost: and great fear came on all them that heard these things. And the young men arose, wound him up, and carried him out, and buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what was done, came in. ... Then fell she down straightway at [Peter's] feet, and yielded up the ghost: and the young men came in, and found her dead, and, carrying her forth, buried her by her husband.

-- Acts 5:5ff., 10

And he said unto another, Follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou and preach the kingdom of God.

-- Luke 9:59f.

Immediate burial in South Florida these days starts at about $2,000

Over 100 billion served, in the afterlife

Pay attention to your feelings: They're trying to tell you the universe is cold and dark and almost at a standstill, as you will be

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here feel we but the penalty of Adam,

The season's difference; as the icy phang,

And churlish chiding of the Winter's wind,

Which when it bites and blows upon my body,

Ev'n 'till I shrink with cold, I smile and say,

'This is no flattery: these are counsellors,

That feelingly persuade me what I am.'

-- William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act II, Scene 1 

Imaginary appearances

 

 

Imaginary appearances offer themselves

to our impatient minds,

which entertain these counterfeits,

without the least suspicion of their cozenage.

-- Joseph Glanvill (1636-1680)

Repentant ashes

There is no malice in this burning coal;

The breath of heav'n hath blown its spirit out,

And strew'd repentant ashes on its head.

-- William Shakespeare, History of King John, Act IV, Scene 1

Gallup's list of moral evils grows 14% more acceptable in 2017 than when first surveyed

Here.

The average acceptability of the list of evils was 42% when first asked but is 48% in 2017. The 6-point rise represents an increase of 14%.

"Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness."

-- Luke 11:35

We've been doomed before

Now, brandish'd weapons glitt'ring in their hands,

Mankind is broken loose from moral bands.

-- John Dryden

The scrupulous repetitiousness of wicked devotion

"Here is born the river sacred to the destinies of Rome"

Thou art wickedly devout,

In Tiber ducking thrice by break of day,

To wash th' obscenities of night away.

-- John Dryden

US Christians under thirty endorsing suicide bombings 0%, Muslims 15%

Pew, here.

People who want more Muslims here are nuts, or evil haters of their fellow Americans, or anti-American, or maybe a combination of these. Note how many young Muslims refused to answer the al-Qaeda question compared with the other questions.

Like Luke's Jesus, Matthew's also taught that his generation would pay for sin in apocalyptic judgment

There is no dying sacrificially for the sins of his generation in any of this.

It would make little sense for the gospels to persist in this prediction of imminent final judgment, settling scores from the foundation of the world, when Paul's gospel of Christ dying for sins had already won the day, unless the gospels are not as late as many suppose. Paul's interpretation had penetrated mainly the thinking of the passion narratives of the gospels. So the coexistence of the two interpretations of the teaching of Jesus speaks to a date before 70, before the destruction of the temple.

Jesus' is obsessed throughout the gospels with "this generation" as the focal point for God's final intervention in human history. What matters to Jesus is true repentance, not sacrifice.

The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here. The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here.

-- Matthew 12:41f.

Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets . . . Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.

-- Matthew 23:32ff.

The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation, and condemn them: for she came from the utmost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here. The men of Nineve shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

-- Luke 11:31ff.

Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers: for they indeed killed them, and ye build their sepulchres. Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute: That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation; From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

-- Luke 11:48ff.

How strange, and wonderful, that changeable mother earth gives birth to mothers, and fathers, who are not

The parents share incubation, changing duty daily for over a month.

Th' air doth not motherly sit on the earth

To hatch her seasons, and give all things birth.

-- John Donne

How to seem a saint

Then thus I cloath my naked villany

With old odd ends, stol'n forth of holy writ,

And seem a saint when most I play the devil.

-- William Shakespeare, Richard III, Act 1, Scene 3

A chaos of individualism

'Tis with our judgments as our watches, none

Go just alike, yet each believes his own.

-- Alexander Pope

Like orthodoxy, heresy delivers little in the way of observable improved condition

 

 

As for speculative heresies, they work mightily upon men's wits; yet do not produce great alterations in states.

-- Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

On the utility of heresy

Till Arianism had made it a matter of great sharpness and subtlety of wit to be a sound believing Christian, men were not curious what syllables or particles of speech they used.

-- Richard Hooker (1554-1600)

A rogue's epitaph

 

 

Reader, if any curious stay

To ask my hated name,

Tell them, the grave that hides my clay

Conceals me from my shame.

-- Samuel Wesley (c. 1662-1735)

To resist or not to resist, that was a question

Don't resist the evil one (μὴ ἀντιστῆναι τῷ πονηρῷ) -- Matthew 5:39

     But deliver us from the evil one (ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ) -- Matthew 6:13, Luke 11:4

     But I ask that you keep them from the evil one (ἀλλ᾽ ... ἵνα τηρήσῃς αὐτοὺς ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ) -- John 17:15

    The Lord is faithful and will guard you from the evil one (... φυλάξει ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ) -- 2 Thessalonians 3:3

Resist the devil (ἀντίστητε τῷ διαβόλῳ) -- James 4:7

One of the greatest scientists ever was a Protestant

"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts" – Richard Feynman, atheist, Jew, theoretical physicist, Nobel Prize winner in 1965

Catholic Archbishop of Philadelphia praises pope's anti-fanaticism and Athanasius all in the same breath

Charles Chaput, here.

It's always amusing to listen to fanatics have their cake and eat it too.

The pope can travel to Egypt and "speak eloquently against religious fanaticism" while these priests never consider that their own vows of celibacy just might be a sign of an extreme obsession of their own. Muslims who kill in the name of their religion are fanatics, they say, but Christian clergy who won't be fruitful, multiply and contribute new lives like normal people do somehow get a pass. There is active killing, but apparently not passive. Mortal and venial anyone?

Anyway, to the mind of Chaput the pope visiting Egypt suggests Athanasius, 4th century bishop of Alexandria, whom Chaput without the slightest whiff of embarrassment holds up as someone who zealously lived his faith, believed deeply, and courageously stood against the whole blasted heretical world. His name became attached to a creed which anathematized Arians, etc., condemning them to "everlasting fire". Wow. Nothing to see in the way of fanatical there, no sir. Move along. 

Religious founders are by definition fanatics. They have to be in order to be successful at founding something. That's why we remember them and follow them. Some are worse than others (I'm talking about you, Muhammad), which is to say some are better than others (your choices are any, except Muhammad). The also-rans in the competition don't found whole new world religions. Typically they become "saints" or their equivalents. Like the rest of us, they have mixed human natures, with some admirable qualities and frankly, some not so admirable, either in their own lives or because the law of unintended consequences yielded something awful from what they taught or from an understandable misunderstanding of what they taught. You know, like jihad, or pacifism, communism or apocalypticism.

Generally speaking, the more fundamental they are, the more kinda mental they are.

So a Paul of Tarsus tamed the wild beast who was Jesus, and a Martin Luther tamed the wild beast that was Paul. And now the Western world, at least, is a sort of circus of tamers.

But there's no one yet to tame Muhammad.

Pope Francis: In communism he found the same aspect of the social he found in the doctrine of the Church

To paraphrase Oswald Spengler, there is no contradiction between Roman Catholic social doctrine and Bolshevism.

Pope Che, quoted here:

“She often read Communist Party texts to me and gave them to me to read. So I also got to know that very materialistic conception. I remember that she also gave me the statement from the American Communists in defense of the Rosenbergs, who had been sentenced to death,” he has said. Learning about communism, he said, “through a courageous and honest person was helpful. I realized a few things, an aspect of the social, which I then found in the social doctrine of the Church.” As the archbishop of Buenos Aires, he took pride in helping her hide the family’s Marxist literature from the authorities who were investigating her. According to the author James Carroll, Bergoglio smuggled her communist books, including Marx’s Das Kapital, into a “Jesuit library.”

Unbeliever excommunicated from Science Mike's church for unbelievers

The following comment stream was deleted from here today by Science Mike.

Priceless!

The intolerance of religion is eternal, especially heretical religion.

The problem with Science Mike is that he seems to want to put a ring fence around Jesus

He hasn't seriously considered whether Jesus' teachings in fact promoted war, apathy and immorality.

Here, from his Axioms About Faith:

Jesus is AT LEAST a man so connected to God that he was called the Son of God and the largest religious movement in human history is centered around his teachings. EVEN IF this is all Jesus is, following his teachings can promote peace, empathy, and genuine morality.

What is every year of a wise man's life?

 

 

A censure and a critique on the past.

-- Alexander Pope

Paul claimed his gospel was not mediated by flesh and blood, but he must have heard something at Stephen's stoning

But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. ... But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood: Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother.

-- Galatians 1:11f., 15ff.

Before this conversion, Luke puts Paul in Jerusalem keeping the coats of those who stoned Stephen for his long proclamation of the gospel and corresponding indictment of Israel:

Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord, And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet, whose name was Saul. And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep. And Saul was consenting unto his death.

 

-- Acts 7:57ff.

How do you consent to something the details of which you are not aware?

An instance of justification, without a cross, without a bloody sacrifice, without a Messiah, without baptism, without the Lord's supper, without the Sinner's Prayer, without a priest, without resurrection from the dead, without works, without faith, without belief, without knowledge, only remorse!

δεδικαιωμένος

And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.

I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

-- Luke 18:13f.

Man is the worst of all animals when sundered from law and justice

When devoid of virtue man is the most unholy and savage of animals, and the worst in regard to sexual indulgence and gluttony.

-- Aristotle, Politics, 1, 1253a

And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

-- Genesis 6:5

. . . for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth;

-- Genesis 8:21

Jesus was killed because he taught that his generation was uniquely guilty and had to pay with its own blood for sins immemorial

Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute: That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation; From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

-- Luke 11:49ff.

The interpretation is wholly in keeping with one Jewish interpretation of the suffering servant of Isaiah 52f. as referring to the Nation of Israel itself and not to an individual. Since Christians adopted the latter view, Luke's testimony to this point of view flies in the face of the subsequent Christian understanding, to which Luke himself is also witness in Acts 8. But Luke shines as an historian in this capacity, as in so many other instances, uniquely preserving interpretations, traditions and sayings of the Lord which when taken together appear to leave an incoherent mess, but when properly analyzed and appreciated preserve what we believe to be the historical Jesus' original eschatological message. According to that interpretation, the Son of Man would descend with God's armies of angels to exact from Israel the penalty of sin, the Temple would be destroyed, and all who had not repented would perish. The idea that Jesus came to die for sins is wholly alien to it.