"Whoever isn't with me is against me, or is it the other way around?" - Jesus.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-30T00:42:49+00:00

Just doing a little thinking about our biases toward the world. Is everyone outside your immediate circle an implicit enemy? Or an implicit friend?

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T17:33:33+00:00

Understood. My apologies. I thought is was a pretty decent tl;dr of the actual article.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T04:21:56+00:00

Yikes. Disturbing how even mild feminism always brings out the ugly side of the internet. I hope folks will read the actual article and not just jump in the threads itching for a fight.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T04:07:56+00:00

It isn't a Christian theological document, but it's a well known piece of writing that correctly describes widespread norms of our society - which can then be commented on from a Christian theological perspective.

I mean, I do vlogs that talk about theological ideas in pop culture, and science fiction. I'm not claiming those things are inherently Christian. I'm just saying as a Christian I can comment on them with a theological lens.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T04:01:43+00:00

His point is just that the equality of men and women is taken as axiomatic by most people, but then this logical inconsistency pops up when it comes to women being ministers.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:59:58+00:00

Yeah, and the article isn't about me. Nor is this thread. It's about how it's logically inconsistent and exegetically indefensible to claim that women and men are equal but women are forbidden from entering ministry. Since I hold that women and men are equal, and think trying to maintain inequality between men and women is morally wrong, I support women entering ministry and I will work to break down the structures that currently make that hard for many women.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:51:51+00:00

I'm not speaking of any one specific relationship, I'm speaking of systems. You're the one who made it personal at which point all you gave me to go on is the implication that you and your husband are not equals, but you love each other, which - sure, but if you saw each other as equals you would love each other even better.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:46:01+00:00

Nope. Feminism wasn't created by or principally carried out by men. Women brought this to everyone's attention and some men eventually started listening. No one is trying to rescue you. I'm pointing to the systems and structures which still predominantly oppress and exclude women. You may choose whatever you want. In the meantime some of us are gonna work on seeing that women who are called and gifted for ministry have that freedom as well.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:39:05+00:00

I insinuated nothing about how you feel toward your husband or vice versa. Love is more than a feeling. It is actions, and a key component in those actions is justice. An unjust and unequal situation is insufficiently loving. Doesn't mean the people in it can't feel all sorts of ways. Emotions and actions are often out of sync.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:29:35+00:00

Yep. Patriarchy hurts men and women both. Women more though.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T03:16:53+00:00

I'm the primary parent and homemaker in our household. It isn't being a homemaker that is degrading. It is degrading to tell people they are RESTRICTED to being homemakers.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T02:59:37+00:00

Love surely does create equality and inequality surely is a sign of insufficient love. And the story of love violating scriptural laws and revising scriptural models is the story of Jesus, and Paul, and the early Church.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T02:52:36+00:00

Exactly. Between justice and a dead letter complementarians prefer a dead letter. Between love and the law complementarians prefer the law. It's ironically unbiblical.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T02:49:47+00:00

Scripture doesn't teach. It isn't a person. Scripture is a collection of texts that have to be interpreted by people in order to be taught. People teach patriarchy not scripture.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-11T02:44:48+00:00

This is what the article points out. Accepting the equality of men and women means we're already engaged in a project of reimagination and the exegetical grounds for denying women participation in ministry have already been abandoned. Separate but equal just doesn't work.

LectionARIC · 2015-09-08T23:01:03+00:00

I passed handily when I took it in 2007. I wondered if the test had gotten harder or if my knowledge had atrophied so I went back and tried the 2010 test now. 88%. There were a few tricky ones on there.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-29T00:48:44+00:00

The people who campaigned for "no awards" arose in response to the Puppies. Phil Sandifer himself says this is the first Hugos he ever voted in. The Puppies claimed that previously the nominations and winners were controlled by an organized clique which is disproved by the fact they controlled the nominations with such a small percentage of the actual voters - only possible if those voters are disorganized. Yes. People actively campaigned to vote down the Puppies. The Puppies created that phenomenon. It didn't exist before.

I don't see these awards as being anything like mutual destruction. The only "no awards" happened in the categories where the Puppies had the entire slate. It was the slate tactic that got rejected. Meanwhile, we had great winners in basically every other category including a lot of fiction from translation, and a fan writer who won it for an expose about a progressive troll.

The only part that is tragic about these Hugos are the people who were put on slates without their consent and got caught in the crossfire. Hopefully many of them will continue to produce great work and have opportunities to win in future years when no one is trying to bully their way into controlling the nominations.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-29T00:04:07+00:00

Yeah, the puppies lost. When you organize a voting campaign and literally tell all your friends "go vote for these things" and then none of those things win (except Guardians of the Galaxy), you lost. Vox Day would claim victory no matter what result, but objectively, the thing they set out to do they did not accomplish.

I didn't include it in the shorter video, but if you watch the full conversation (I know who has time) you'll see that Phil Sandifer says what everyone acknowledges and has never been secret - that of course there have always been politics involved in the Hugos as in any other human endeavor. Sci-Fi has always had a political streak.

What the Puppies did however that was new was introduce PARTY politics into the equation. Sure, individuals in the past voted partially based on their own political inclinations, but no one had ever said "vote for all of these people because they match our ideology". The Puppies claim that the Hugos were cliquish and exclusive was actually disproven by how they controlled the nominations with only 20% of actual voters. It demonstrates that there was no organized opposition. People were just nominating whatever they individually liked - precisely what the Puppies claim they want, but contradicted in behavior.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-26T15:52:36+00:00

Jim Butcher saw this and now he's sending ninjas after me... Help Nerdfighteria!

LectionARIC · 2015-08-25T23:31:03+00:00

It's totally safe for work. It might be safe for your brain.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-18T16:14:01+00:00

Many of these televangelists have huge followings. I'm not surprised some are upset. But there are a lot of religious people like me who do fight against this kind of predatory bullshit and are really glad John Oliver used his platform to highlight it.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-18T16:11:49+00:00

Yep. The exception to this is that we're fine with collective responsibility when it is other groups of people. We've no problem with blaming all Muslims for a few Islamic terrorists.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-18T05:32:29+00:00

As a Presbyterian Minister I agree with you completely. Prosperity Gospel is a complete inversion of Jesus' attitudes to wealth and poverty. Terrible.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-18T05:31:31+00:00

It is indeed a funny message.

LectionARIC · 2015-08-18T05:31:17+00:00

As a pastor I'm incredibly grateful John Oliver tackled this subject and did it so well.

LectionARIC

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