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Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Coincidence?

A couple of days ago a flier was distributed in the neighborhood. It was very clever. It seemed at first glance to be from the Home Owners' Association, although it wasn't, and it stated that the next day this business would be replacing mailboxes in the neighborhood--and would replace yours also for a reasonable price.

Well when we all left for work the next morning, someone had taken a baseball bat to the majority of the mailboxes in the neighborhood. It was impressive just how thorough they had been. Ours got dented, but it was sturdier than others. The folks with armored mailboxes didn't have a dent or a scratch.

Sunday, July 20, 2008

The Dark Knight: A courageous film

As a student of political theory, I was impressed by the way The Dark Knight approached many critical dilemmas of human political existence. What price can be placed on the value of human life? Is it ever right to commit the injustice of killing one man so that others may live? How must governments and citizens respond to terrorists who hold their lives--and their moral values--hostage?

The Dark Knight approaches these questions practically, and answers them without simplifying them. There are no perfect solutions, and often perfect justice is unattainable in a world of unjust men. But this movie teaches us to hope that people can be inspired to act in a decent and even altruistic way.

A strong political subtext was also inevitable, given the themes of terrorism and citizens who are weary of a constant struggle with evil. This film courageously insists that even in a world weary of conflict, evil must be opposed at any price.

Currently Reading
Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar: Readings on Courting and Marrying (The Ethics of Everyday Life)
see related

Thursday, June 26, 2008

ROFL!

Bill of Rights or Bill of Goods?

By JAMES TARANTO

"The [Supreme] Court would have us believe that over 200 years ago, the Framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons," Justice John Paul Stevens writes in a brave dissent in District of Columbia v. Heller, the just-decided case striking down the federal district's near-total ban on firearms.

Stevens is right. Who are they trying to kid? And yet a razor-thin majority of the deeply divided justices expect the American people to swallow this hoax. Supporters of this so-called right to keep and bear arms claim that it dates to 1791. (That faux precision is a nice touch--not 1790 or 1795 but 1791.) A bunch of dead white males are supposed to have gotten together and assembled something called a "bill of rights." The more extreme exponents of this view claim that the so-called bill limits the tools available to elected officials not just with regard to firearms but a whole host of other things: "freedom of religion," "freedom of speech," "cruel and unusual punishment," etc., etc.

Read the whole article here.

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Some related verses.

And the LORD said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?"
(Job 1:8)

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.
(Job 1:20-22)

Then his wife said to him, "Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die." But he said to her, "You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?" In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
(Job 2:9-10)

"'See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.
(Deu 32:39)

I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior. I declared and saved and proclaimed, when there was no strange god among you; and you are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "and I am God. Also henceforth I am he; there is none who can deliver from my hand; I work, and who can turn it back?"
(Isa 43:11-13)

I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.
(Isa 45:7)

And the LORD said to Job: "Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it."
(Job 40:1-2)

Then Job answered the LORD and said: "I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. 'Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?' Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
(Job 42:1-3)

Then came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and ate bread with him in his house. And they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the LORD had brought upon him. And each of them gave him a piece of money and a ring of gold.
(Job 42:11)

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will...
(Eph 1:11)