a few predictions

What is happening in our world? Along with a few friends including primarily my boss, I've been speculating.

Current Status

The West is weak. Our moral fiber is thin. Globally, the populations of the erstwhile powers are declining. In Europe (and in the US, to a lesser degree), the indigenous populations shrink while populations of Muslim immigrants grow at a stunning rate.

China owns a massive portion of the debts of western nations. They are buying up mineral wealth, accumulating gold and diamond mines across Africa. The Chinese are flexing military muscles in the waters of the South Pacific and the skies of their airshows.

The Russian state is investing in revitalizing cathedrals. Russia is expanding its boarders, testing the resilience of the West. The response has been underwhelming. What can the EU really do?

An Islamic State has risen in the Middle East, uniting some Muslims by a religion rather than the geographic boundaries of a nation-state. Disenfranchised Islamists in Egypt have pledged themselves to the ISIS Caliph. They capitalize on military might (fear) and mineral wealth.

Prognosis

Add all these things up. What do you see? Here's a bit of a prediction:

1. When China has accumulated enough gold to weather the storm, it will call the debts of the west, creating a global economic tailspin that will sink the West.
2. The Caliph will invade and conquer and/or annex Europe with the support of the Muslim population.
3. Russia will unite its people in a war against Islam, and take back the former eastern block, 'saving' the people there from Muslim domination. They will have their version of the Crusades.
4. China will unite and dominate all of Asia that is not called Russia or India.
5. The US will sit by and shrivel up, unable to muster the moral courage or the military power in the midst of a broken economy to do anything.
6. India will also sit by, but will firmly resist invasion. An attempt to invade India would ultimately lead to China's downfall.
7. Russia, China, and the Caliph will one day wake up and find Brazil somehow standing among them, competing for dominance in a new world order.

Conclusion

My friends, now is the time to make friends for ourselves. Luke 16:8-9.

Come quickly, Lord Jesus.

Adoption Blog

Belinda & I are in the process of adopting, and are chronicling our adventure here: http://asonesadoptionjourney.blogspot.com/

The Price of Faith

Note: significantly edited shortly after posting. I may share 

Belinda is pregnant and little baby Liam's arrival is expected on January 3.

As of Dec. 1, we will no longer have health insurance.

This isn't a plea for help. We're going to be just fine financially. That's just my hook to draw your attention to a moral question that Belinda and I have had to wrestle with over the last months.

There is no health insurance plan renewing after August 1, 2012 in the state of New York which will not cover abortion-causing contraception in full. Let me put it succinctly:

 If you have a health insurance plan in New York, you are paying for abortions.

That I cannot stomach.

What do you think? Is this a moral dilemma for you?



For those who are freaking out, we've found an excellent alternative to health insurance in a Christian cost sharing program called Samaritan Ministries.

The Good

I've been delving deeper into concepts of medical ethics of late through my work at CompassCare, and we ran into this question: how do we know what is "good" for the patient at any point in the engagement between doctor and patient?

Dr. Edmund Pellegrino, widely considered the father of modern medical ethics, developed a quadripartite notion of 'the good:'

1. the medical good (what is the clinically best thing to do)
2. the patient's good (as perceived by the patient)
3. the human good (considering the whole person and human telos)
4. the spiritual good (based on the patient's and doctor's beliefs)

These are ascending concepts, such that each submits to all of those after them.

In considering this question, "what is good?" I've been considering how Dr. Pellegrino's notion (which, by the way, lines up implicitly with traditional medical ethics) could be expanded to consider all social interactions.

Notably, the doctor/patient engagement is different from typical social interactions, because all the power in the relationship is on one side. Nevertheless, there may be a similar filter:

1. the normative good (what is culturally expected or appropriate behavior)
2. the other's good (as perceived by them)
3. the human good (considering the whole person and human telos)
4. the spiritual good (based on the beliefs of the self)

Notice that there is no consideration of what is good "for me," the self, except perhaps in the meanest of the goods, the normative good. The self is considered only generally in the human and spiritual goods.

What is our process for considering actions in relationship? When we ask ourselves, "What is the next best thing for me to do in this relationship?" through what criteria do we pass our decision?

What are your thoughts?

OK, God. Now What?

Have time for a story? This is simplified version of a very complex one.

Belinda and I have been in the process of buying a house. We made an offer for a nice place in the city and very close to our church. The offer was accepted. We have a signed agreement.

We went to closing at the end of May, and told our landlord that we would be out of our current apartment by the end of June.

But when we got to closing, the seller wouldn't close. See, he still had a tenant in the house, and wasn't able to remove the tenant in time. So we agreed that he would have the tenant out by June 15, after which we would do a last walk-through, and then schedule closing.


June 15 came and went. Finally we heard from the seller, 'the tenant will be out July 1.' But he is not able or willing to give us any proof that it's actually true this time around. Well, that doesn't work. 


I talked with our landlord, and he already has a tenant lined up to take our place. The seller's real estate agent has listed the property as active again. It looks like we won't be getting the house after all, unless we pay our lawyer to take the seller to court for breach of contract and force him to sell it to us.


Suddenly, we've gone from purchasing our first house to needing to find a new place to live in the next 10 days. OK, God. What are you trying to teach us?


Our prayer is that God would be glorified. He has proven himself faithful in our lives over and over again. He is more faithful than sunrise; stronger than the storm. We know that he will provide. 

Fear into Confidence

If you haven't read my wife's recent post titled "Pregnancy," it will be worth your time. God is in the business of using our fears to help us trust him all the more.

local church - a misnomer

Belinda and I are contemplating buying a house, and as I am happily an idealist, that has led me through a whirlwind of philosophical questions.

We talk about being like the Good Samaritan. Help anyone you encounter on your path who is in need. But in choosing what house to buy and where, we are quite literally choosing which path we're going to be walking on. I want to be in a place where I can be a blessing to the most people.

One of our top priorities is proximity to our church. While many committed church-goers would consider this in a move, it's usually in the context of balancing commute times between workplace and school and church and family. Our radius is a bit tighter than "anything within a 20 minute drive." We already live within a mile, and we want to get closer.

I'm committed to the ideal of a local church that is actually local--one which makes a bigger difference to it's direct neighbors than some additional traffic on Sunday mornings.  The question is, if your church picked up and left town, would it's neighborhood notice? And if they noticed, would they be sorry to see you go?

Bluntly, I don't think the answer to that second question is yes for us--yet.

NYC Abortions

Some stats from the New York State Department of Health for pregnancy and abortion in NYC, 2010.

• There were 208,541 pregnancies in New York City in 2010.  They resulted in 124,791 live births and 83,750 abortions, a 40% abortion rate.
• Among non-Hispanic blacks there were far more abortions than births, 38,574 to 26,635, or 60%.   So for every 1,000 African-American babies born, 1,448 were aborted.
• Among Non-Hispanic black teens, the abortion rate was even greater - 5,956 abortions to 2,265 live births, or 72%.  For every 1,000 African-American babies born to teens, 2,630 were aborted.
• The abortion rate among teens as a whole was 63% - 12,139 abortions to 7,207 live births. For every 1,000 babies born among New York City teens 1,684 were aborted.
• 16% of all pregnancies in New York City - 14% of abortions - were with teen mothers.
• 54% of abortions were with mothers in their 20's;
• 30% of abortions were with mothers in their 30's or 40's;
• 14% of abortions were with married mothers.

Art

A thread lies down a narrow hall
We walk, we tiptoe along on
Adventure, with extreme risk.
With history in a mirror
And reality on our soles. 

One one side, painters paint great paintings
Of red. Broad, courageous portraits,
 Ruggedly handsome features, moustachio'd.

On the other, photographers flash photos
Of orgy. Absorption in self and appetite.

A thread, a string lies down a hall
Long and narrow. Great art advances
On a thread between frivolity and propaganda.
And only there, lies freedom.



This poem based on "Create Dangerously," a lecture by Albert Camus.

thoughts on homosexuality

My philosophy regarding homosexuality, homosexual marriage, government, abortion, birth control, the family, etc. are in a constant state of flux. Interesting conversation going on over at pseudoblog (Matt Marsh). I really appreciate Matt's ability to penetrate to the heart of issues and arguments.  His post and our exchange in the comments is worth a read, if you're interested in the subject.

The Sensate Culture

The following is a direct quote placed here for reference purposes only. The original can be viewed here:

http://satyagraha.wordpress.com/2010/08/19/pitirim-sorkin-crisis-of-modernity/

Sensate (Materialistic) Culture
The first pattern, which Sorokin called Sensate culture, has these features: 

• The defining cultural principle is that true reality is sensory – only the material world is real. There is no other reality or source of values.

• This becomes the ubiquitous organizing principle of society. It permeates every aspect of culture and defines the basic mentality. People are unable to think in any other terms.

• Sensate culture pursues science and technology, but dedicates little creative thought to spirituality or religion.

• Dominant values are wealth, health, bodily comfort, sensual pleasures, power and fame.

• Ethics, politics, and economics are utilitarian and hedonistic. All ethical and legal precepts are considered mere man-made conventions, relative and changeable.

• Art and entertainment emphasize sensory stimulation. In the decadent stages of Sensate culture there is a frenzied emphasis on the new and the shocking (literally, sensationalism).

• Religious institutions are mere relics of previous epochs, stripped of their original substance, and tending to fundamentalism and exaggerated fideism (the view that faith is not compatible with reason).

I cannot find a more fitting description of our current culture in the west. 

A Poem in Progress

I got to take a much-needed ROS this morning, and one of the takeaways was this poem. It's a condensation of a lot of my thoughts from the last month or so. I find that when I don't blog or write at lenghth in my journal for a period of time, the thoughts get more and more compacted in my brain, and finally explode in fragmented, poetic form.
This still needs quite a bit of work.

Their Currents Turn

That moment between time
A glimmer of a second
of existence of doubt
of suspension of disbelief.
The hard line of reality
Bends, Twists, Softens.

It was the best...  the worst...
Of was it at all?

10:58pm in the bathroom
in the dark to pee
before sleep the thought rises
like the return of a dream
from muddy water that
nothing is real.
The window; the toilet;
goosebumps.

Merrily merrily merrily merrily
I pinch myself and wake in pain
Staring into the confusion
Between night and day,
Unblind.

I am a bird alone on a roof
With seven thousand others
Singing to wake the world.

Blind captians lost at sea
What hope?
Still less for those who see
And seeing, dream.
The pain of the pinch to high.

O captain, uncaptained
Dream-life dreamer
In evening-shadow ship
What hope?

The mad unblind grope in darkness
Pinch-marked.
Some lulled or lynched
  To lose the name of Action
  Serial sleepers slayed with dreams instead
  Stoned seer, are you not entertained?
Some scream to wake the dead
  And how squirm the
  Seeing dreamers at their scream

But the screamers are mad, you know.
The screamers are all just mad.

The American Spirit

One of the attractions we saw on our recent trip to Disney World is the Hall of Presidents at Magic Kingdom. Strikingly patriotic. However, as I sat and watched and listened, and particularly as I looked around the room I was as equally saddened as I was grateful. Steve Burns of StartedByAMouse.com writes this:

The different moments portrayed in the attraction show that the main characteristic of America is its spirit. The American people have had the spirit to keep pressing on, whether in good times or bad, in peace or in war. Along each side of the theater are statues representing these spirits of America: adventure, compassion, discovery, freedom, heritage, independence, individualism, innovation, knowledge, pioneering, self-reliance, and tomorrow.

As I walked passed those spirits the last one before the exit struck me profoundly: individualism. As much as I love my country, and I do love her, the fact that we celebrate individualism as an essential aspect of the American spirit nearly brought me to tears.

And I had to admit, individualism is an essential aspect of our culture, at least today. Lord God, have mercy.

Tradition

I fear that protestants in general and evangelicals in particular have lost something sacred in their rejection of the traditions of the Church. Tradition is a tool like any other. We haven't stopped using hammers because someone used a hammer as a murder weapon once. Throughout the Scripture God consistently instructs his people to remember, to set up memorials, to celebrate feasts... developing traditions to pass on the great stories of God and his redemptive history to the following generations. We fear that traditions will become as rote and meaningless to us as the words of the liturgy are to lukewarm Roman Catholics. But the words of our sermons are just as meaningless to lukewarm evangelicals. Let's not throw out the baby with the bath water. Traditions do not create lukewarm believers. Lukewarm believers render traditions meaningless. I want to be a husband (and eventually a father) who continues and creates meaningful spiritual traditions for my family. But I'm not sure we need to reinvent the wheel... Christians have been celebrating advent and lent for centuries.

I'm not sure how this thinking will bear out for me practically, but I felt the need to get it down "on paper."

Liberty - A Human Right?

Human Rights are difficult. Let me just be clear that this post is more of an exploration than a conclusion. I'm interested in your thoughts.

R N W brought to light the question of whether Liberty is really a human right based on the Wagner quote in my previous post. Wagner indicates that only those who are self-controlled can breathe the air of Liberty without getting drunk on it and being "morally slain." We see this throughout history and in our own culture. When given freedom to do whatever they wish, and unconstrained by an "inner law" based on a Judeo-christian ethic, the people become increasingly enslaved to their desires and passions. As Plato said so long ago, pure democracy always ends in tyranny, because a government must great tighter and tighter regulations to control a people who will not control themselves. That is exactly what Wagner is saying, and what C.S. Lewis prophesied in The Abolition of Man.

But what does this have to do with Human Rights? Should we selectively withhold Liberty from those who are not self-controlled? In a sense we do this already; it's called prison. But is Liberty still a Human Right?

The Declaration of Independence is one of the most profound documents of our time. A true game changer.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The founding fathers are saying here that Liberty is a right by God's law, and cannot be given or taken away by government. In a sense, even if we wanted to take away someones Liberty, we really can't do it. See China. Mao's revolution was designed to control the people by forcing them to think a certain way. But he couldn't do it. It didn't work. [As an aside, it's interesting to note that China is now partnering with very capitalistic organizations like... WalMart. Why? What reason would a still-communist China have to bring the largest corporation on the planet inside its borders? To control the people. Consumerism is the great opiate of America, and it may just work in China too...]


Back to Human Rights. Alexander Hamilton makes an interesting point about liberty, rights, and government in Federalist No.1:

It will be equally forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgement, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.

This, in a letter that is arguing for the acceptance of the newly published Constitution. Hamilton argues on the same theme as Plato, which Wagner would later pick up, that the elevation of individual liberties above all else ends in tyranny.

I'm still circling the question. Is Liberty a human right?

Let's see what the Bible says. We know that mankind is depraved and rebellious, bent on evil (pursing not-God), and is thus deserving of Death (eternal not-God). In that sense, we have no "rights." Zero. The only human right before God is Death. There is nothing else we "deserve."
However, we also know that humans are created in the Image of God, and that Christ is the perfection and completion of that Image. This bears significant impact on the way we treat each other. God created you; in your face I see the image of my Creator. Therefore, out of respect for Him, I respect you. I respect your ability to make autonomous choices, and until proven otherwise, I respect your ability to control yourself. Liberty, I think is the right and responsibility of all humans to treat each other with justice. Liberty does not say, "Give me mine!" as secular humanism is teaching us today. Liberty is not an individual sport. True Liberty does not say, "I demand my freedom to do whatever I want. Respect me." it says, "I respect you, because God has made you free."

We must follow the example of Christ. He never stood up for his own "rights." Instead he freely gave them up and chose to wield his power on behalf of those who before God are powerless, without rights.

Liberty is Human Right. But to experience true freedom we must not demand Liberty for ourselves. Instead, we bow to the "inner law." We control ourselves out of deference to Christ and his image in others.

Thoughts?

Wagner on Liberty

I've been reading Plato's Republic and now Wagner's The Simple Life. Both reflect the immorality of man and the resulting tendency of democratic peoples toward tyranny. I want to share this Wagner passage at length (the entire work is available from Project Gutenberg), without further comment.

So it is with liberty. It is fatal or lifegiving according to the use made of it. Is it liberty still, when it is the prerogative of criminals or heedless blunderers? Liberty is an atmosphere of the higher life, and it is only by a slow and patient inward transformation that one becomes capable of breathing it.
All life must have its law, the life of man so much the more than that of inferior beings, in that it is more precious and of nicer adjustment. This law for man is in the first place an external law, but it may become an internal law. When man has once recognized the inner law, and bowed before it, through this reverence and voluntary submission he is ripe for liberty: so long as there is no vigorous and sovereign inner law, he is incapable of breathing its air; for he will be drunken with it, maddened, morally slain. The man who guides his life by inner law, can no more live servile to outward authority than can the full-grown bird live imprisoned in the eggshell. But the man who has not yet attained to governing himself can no more live under the law of liberty than can the unfledged bird live without its protective covering. These things are terribly simple, and the series of demonstrations old and new that proves them, increases daily under our eyes. And yet we are as far as ever from understanding even the elements of this most important law. In our democracy, how many are there, great and small, who know, from having personally verified it, lived it and obeyed it, this truth without which a people is incapable of governing itself? Liberty?—it is respect; liberty?—it is obedience to the inner law; and this law is neither the good pleasure of the mighty, nor the caprice of the crowd, but the high and impersonal rule before which those who govern are the first to bow the head. Shall liberty, then, be proscribed? No; but men must be made capable and worthy of it, otherwise public life becomes impossible, and the nation, undisciplined and unrestrained, goes on through license into the inextricable tangles of demagoguery.

Biblical Justice

Christ lived, died, and rose for me, a sinner powerless and without standing or station before a holy God. That is biblical justice: wielding power on behalf of the powerless. That is why I do my job and pursue excellence in it. That is why CompassCare exists. I am passionate about erasing the need for abortion because of what I believe about God.

Community - shining a light

In my experience--

I'm not sure how much my experience counts, but we live in a post-modern culture, where experience seems to be the only acceptable truth.

In my experience, there is nothing like a community of believers to shine the light of truth on the state of my soul, the depths of my depravity, and then to reawaken me to the hope of the Gospel and the amazing grace of our God.

I was reminded this morning of an old Ross King song (when did 2002 become old?) called Clear the Stage. One of the great lines is

Shine the light on every corner of your life Until the pride and lust and lies are in the open.

The context in the song is deep personal soul-searching, one-on-one with God. While that is certainly an absolute necessity, I found the light pointed at my sin this morning through relationships. And we know what "everything exposed to the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said: 'Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.'"

The light of Christ shone on me this morning through my brothers. Darkness cannot abide in the light.

Life Update a la Motor City News

I’ve had a recent rash of requests for an update a la Motor City News, so here goes…

When I sent the final episode of Motor City News I was preparing to move back to Rochester and get married. These I have accomplished!

The last 16 months have encompassed some of the biggest transitions of my life, and I think the perspective of over a year makes this much easier to write than a month or two—I won’t get bogged down in the details.

I learned important lessons of humility, rest, and patience on a trip to Jamaica. Since then, the project has floundered, and God has led Belinda and I to spend more time focused on the ministries we’re already a part of.

We had a wonderful wedding, and honeymooned in Puerto Rico.  Unforgettable, of course.

In August 2010 Belinda and I began unofficially taking on the responsibilities of Service Coordinators for our church, and have recently become part of the local missions committee with a focus of helping our church and its small groups connect and serve in our city.  In some ways, this is the beginnings of the fulfillment of a dream.

At the end of last summer Belinda began working in electrical engineering, giving me permission and freedom to spend time finding a career which I would enjoy.  A period of confusion and joblessness ensued. After a few months without success in finding a job in engineering or otherwise, I began working part time at an amazing little used bookstore (Small World Books—check it out if you’re in Rochester).  I started there in February.

By the middle of March God made it clear to us that Belinda should not continue working at Harris. After a lot of prayer and counsel, she put in her two-weeks. At that time all the job leads I had had dried up, and we expected to be without an income for a while.

But God provided. I got scheduled for a second interview for the day before her last day with an organization called CompassCare Pregnancy Services. They’d interviewed me months before for a COO position (which I was clearly not qualified for). After repeated attempts to follow-up, and receiving little feedback, I’d given up. Now I was being called back for a second interview.

In the preceding months as I’d been attending career fairs and the like I’d taken to introducing myself this way: Matt Sones, Mechanical Engineer. I want to change the world. The mission of CompassCare is to erase the need for abortion by turning a woman’s fear into confidence. Sounds a lot like changing the world.

I got emailed the job offer that night (the night before Belinda’s last day)—a position as Assistant to the President, since I matched the organization in values, but not the COO position in experience. I feel blessed beyond measure to say that at 25 years of age I am in my dream job.

In other news, Belinda and I are both involved in children’s ministry at church, and we’re co-leading the best small group ever—sometimes very challenging—the highs and lows of life can be oh so high, and dreadfully low. But we walk through them together with Christ behind, before, and beside.

Learning to be a husband is fun, hard, and rewarding. I am stretched more and more to forget myself. And I’m deliriously happy.

Current spiritual thought: evil is evil. It’s really, really bad. Terribly, awesomely, wickedly bad. And that’s what I was. I am so bad Jesus had to die for me. But I’m so loved that he was glad to (these thoughts significantly influenced by Denes House and Mike Donehey).

In Christ,

- m a t t

you always have the poor with you

Jesus said, "For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you wish you can do good to them; but you do not always have Me" (Mark 14:7).


It seems to me that our churches (in "our" I include constituents of the mid- to upper-class Western church). have a problem; namely, the poor are not with us. It's not that we intentionally avoid the poor (although that certainly is the reality in some cases), but rather that we do not intentionally seek out the poor.
Yes, many of the passages that have been mis-interpreted to form a doctrine of "social justice" are meant to apply to service of the poor within the Body of Christ. Yet how can we legitimately fulfill these commands if the poor are not with us? Can we legitimately call ourselves the Body? Our society has divided rich and poor by class, and divided class by geography. There's little interaction.
Now, I don't want to suggest that there is some conspiracy among GPS navigation programmers to keep the rich disconnected from the sights and sounds and smells of the American ghetto, but consider this personal anecdote:
Several weeks ago I was driving back to my apartment from the west, approaching Rochester on 490. There are two primary routes which I could take: around the city on the highway, or through the city (one of the highest crime areas). The highway or the hood. I generally choose to go through the city, preferring the more direct route. On this occasion, I had my phone's GPS navigation on, and it told me to take the highway. I decided to experiment. As I approached the exit my phone indicated it would take 15 minutes to reach home. I passed the exit, intending to take my normal city route. The computerized female voice said, "recalculating" in the most condescending tone imaginable ("you went the wrong way, you idiot"). The recalculation occured quickly and suggested that I get off at the next exit (less than 1/4 mile) and turn around. Now it would take me  16 minutes. I ignored that direction as well, and again heard "recalculating." This time, it showed my chosen route through the city, and predicted that it would take 11 minutes.

The whole incident occurred within a single minute of driving time. And I have to wonder, if my GPS is set to pick the fastest route, why didn't it take me through the city in the first place? Is it programmed to naturally avoid less savory neighborhoods?