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Apologia Report 18:23 (1,159)
June 20, 2013
Subject: "No principled reason … to single out religion for protection"?
In this issue:
APOLOGETICS - educational opportunities from RZIM
ETHICS - has John le Carré's fiction abandoned relativism?
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM - beware the Nones
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PLEASE NOTE: We're taking some time off. The next edition of AR is scheduled for the week beginning June 30.
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APOLOGETICS
We're thankful that Ravi Zacharias International Ministries continues to grow. Their May letter to supporters announced that RZIM's Oxford Center for Christian Apologetics "finally has its own building in Oxford." The work there is very well received: "The average number of students applying to seats available for the university is 2 to 1 and in some instances rises to 4 to 1. For OCCA the ratio is 20 to 1. The highest number of applicants to Oxford University applying in proportion to available spots is for the OCCA."
For those who cannot attend classes in person, next year RZIM plans to launch an online apologetics curriculum headed up by Drew McNeil. <www.ow.ly/m4fZc>
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ETHICS
When does one draw the line between trusting God with unbearable circumstances by abstaining from rule-bending on the one hand, and working toward the "greatest good" of the day on the other? Consider the practices of Bible smuggling, civil disobedience, protective elimination (the removal of anything considered morally dangerous), and other activities in which individuals appeal to a higher law in order to avoid another.
Looking for a conversational tool for discussing ethics with non-Christians? Of fiction author John le Carré's latest novel, reviewer Olen Steinhauer begins: "'I have a theory which I suspect is rather immoral,' George Smiley said in John le Carré's 1974 classic, 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy' [1]. 'Each of us has only a quantum of compassion. That if we lavish our concern on every stray cat, we never get to the center of things.' This concept of necessary, if lamentable, sacrifice in the face of the Soviet monolith helped define the espionage masterpieces of the cold war. ...
"Times changed. ... The old sacrifices - of lives, and of our own ethics - became less necessary. Many critics grew irritated. What happened to the particular pleasure of John le Carré's moral relativism?
"'A Delicate Truth' [2], like most of le Carré's recent novels, feels like a rebuttal to George Smiley's theory. How many stray cats can we allow to be snuffed in order to reach our ends? Or, as le Carré put it ... 'How far can we go in the rightful defense of our Western values without abandoning them along the way?' ... Fifty years later, 'A Delicate Truth' suggests that [any innocent person] would be too much of a sacrifice. ...
"Here is le Carré with the gloves off, turning his back entirely on George Smiley's old stray cat theory and aiming his dagger at those who would twist Smiley's words for their own purposes. Is this what we've done with our cold war victory? ...
"By the end of 'A Delicate Truth,' you either share his anger at the injustices between its covers, or you don't. If you do, then you're one of le Carré's people. If not, you're one of Smiley's. It's up to you to decide which one is more worthy." New York Times Book Review, May 5 '13, p1, 10. <www.ow.ly/m4nKr>
See also: <www.ow.ly/mcMXE>
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RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
"Religion and Public Life in America" by R.R. Reno, Editor, First Things <firstthings.com> -- credits the Nones (i.e., those who self-identify as having no religious affiliation) as representing the greatest threat to America's religious liberty. In his first paragraph, Reno explains that "the Left believes society will be best served if Christians are limited in their influence on public life. And in the short run this view is likely to succeed. There will be many arguments urging Christians to keep their religion strictly religious rather than 'political.' And there won't just be arguments; there will be laws as well. We're in the midst of climate change - one that's getting colder and colder toward religion."
Citing "recent court cases and controversies," Reno describes "the ministerial exception, which allows religious institutions wide latitude in hiring and firing their religious leaders. It's in the nature of legal arguments to be complex and multi-layered, but ... the Obama administration's lawyers made a shockingly blunt argument: ... that there should be no ministerial exception. ...
"Concerns about the autonomy of religious institutions are also at work in the Obama administration's tussle with the Catholic Church...." Reno reports on how the secular Left opposes religious colleges and charities by seeing them as not directly under the control of churches. He ties this to the Obama administration's progressive way of thinking that "economic life should be under the full and unlimited control of the federal government."
Reno identifies "the unifying feature of contemporary challenges to religious freedom - the desire to limit the influence of religion over public life. In the world envisioned by Obama administration lawyers, churches will have freedom as 'houses of worship,' but unless they accept the secular consensus they can't inspire their adherents to form institutions to educate and serve society in accordance with the principles of their faith. Under a legal regime influenced by the concept of public reason, religious people are free to speak - but when their voices contradict the secular consensus, they're not allowed into our legislative chambers or courtrooms. ...
"What we're seeing today is a secular liberalism that wants to expand the prohibition of establishment to silence articulate religious voices and disenfranchise religiously motivated voters, and at the same time to narrow the scope of free exercise so that the new secular morality can reign over American society unimpeded.
"This shift in legal thinking on the Left reflects underlying religious trends. As the religious character of our society changes, so do our assumptions about religious freedom. The main change has been the rise of the Nones. ... And Nones are heavily represented in elite culture. A great deal of higher education is dominated by Nones, as are important cultural institutions, the media, and Hollywood. ...
"As the Nones have emerged as a significant cohort, the committed core of religious people has not declined and in fact has become unified and increasingly battle tested. ...
"These two trends - the rise of the Nones and the consolidation of the committed core of believers - have led to friction in public life." Reno notes that in the last presidential election, "For the first time in American political history, the winning party deliberately attacked religion" by striking God from their platform.
"[T]he Nones ... at 24 percent of all Democrat and Democratic-leaning voters have become the single largest identifiable cohort in the liberal coalition.
Authors "at elite universities are serving an important ideological purpose by using their academic authority to discredit Christianity, whose adherents are obstacles.... Books by these elite academics reassure the Nones and their fellow travelers that they are not opposed to anything good or even respectable, but rather to historic forms of oppression, ignorance, and prejudice.
"I cannot overstate the importance of these ideological attacks on Christianity. ...
"By 'accommodating' rather than counting Notre Dame and other educational and charitable organizations as religious employers, secular liberalism can target them in the future, as they have done to Catholic adoption agencies that won't place children with homosexual couples."
Reno quotes a recent book [3] by University of Chicago professor of philosophy and law Brian Leiter: "'There is no principled reason,' he writes, 'for legal or constitutional regimes to single out religion for protection.' Leiter describes religious belief as a uniquely bad combination of moral fervor and mental blindness, serving no public good that justifies special protection. More significantly - and this is Leiter's main thesis - it is patently unfair to afford religion such protection."
Anticipating the question "What can be done?", Reno offers a threefold strategy focusing on the culture and the courtroom, noting that "We must meet the challenge by showing that religion is indeed special. Religious people are the most likely Americans to be involved in civic life, and the most generous in their charitable contributions." By contrast, "Nones ... tend to outsource their civic responsibilities and charitable obligations to government in the form of expanded government programs and higher taxes.
"There is another, deeper argument that must be made in defense of religion: It is the most secure guarantee of freedom." Indeed, "religion gives us a place to stand outside politics, and without it we're vulnerable to a system in which the state defines everything, which is the essence of tyranny." Imprimis, Apr '13, <www.ow.ly/m4khs>.
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SOURCES: Monographs
1 - Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, by John le Carré (Penguin, 2011, paperback, 400 pages) <www.ow.ly/m4oDK>
2 - A Delicate Truth, by John le Carré (Viking, 2013, hardcover, 320 pages) <www.ow.ly/m4omx>
3 - Why Tolerate Religion?, by Brian Leiter (Princeton Univ Prs, 2012, hardcover, 192 pages) <www.ow.ly/mcMvG>
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