Faith

A few weeks back Lisa noticed that one of the articles summarized in the current issue of The Week was written by David French. We knew a David French at Lipscomb, so she googled him and he's the same one. The column highlighted in The Week was in the National Review online discussing a recent survey of college faculty and titled "Bias Against Evangelicals on Campus? You Don't Say!." An excerpt:

For some time, the leftist academic establishment has responded to literally hundreds of stories about the violation of the fundamental rights of religious students with the argument that those stories are mere "anecdotes" and are not evidence of a wider problem. In recent years, however, the systematic studies have come pouring in, including studies showing dramatic political disparities in the classroom, dramatic drop-offs of faith practice during the college years, and now we see concrete evidence of sheer bigotry. Our nation's colleges and universities have a religion problem, and faithful students and professors are paying the price.

Turns out that David is a frequent contributer to the "phi beta cons" blog ("THE RIGHT TAKES ON HIGHER ED") on the National Review (an archive of his posts from the last 30 days is here). He appeared on The O'Reilly Factor back in May with a UCLA student who was embroiled in a controversy with Planned Parenthood (French writes about the controversy here). Last year he quit his job with the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, took a new job with Alliance Defense Fund, and joined the army reserve (he writes about it in the National Review here). David's wife is Nancy French of "A Red State of Mind" fame. David and Nancy are involved in the Romney campaign and the Tennesseans for Mitt and Evangelicals for Mitt web sites. It's been interesting to see what one of our college acquaintances has been up to on the national stage. I was curious to see if he's on Wikipedia, but not yet.

Jim Wallis of Sojourners organized the above-titled forum that was shown on CNN last night featuring Edwards, Obama, and Clinton answering questions about their faith and its relation to their presidential aspirations. David Kuo's take on the forum is here and on the Dems and faith in general is here. Andrew Sullivan's take is here. One of the more memorable moments for me was when Edwards, like most of the rest of us, couldn't bring himself to confess a specific sin. On the positive side, it was good that Edwards said this:

O'BRIEN: If you think something is morally wrong, though, you morally disagree with it, as president of the United States, don't you have a duty to go with your moral belief? EDWARDS: No, I think that, first of all, my faith, my belief in Christ plays an enormous role in the way I view the world. But I think I also understand the distinction between my job as president of the United States, my responsibility to be respectful of and to embrace all faith beliefs in this country because we have many faith beliefs in America. And for that matter we have many faith beliefs in the world. And I think one of the problems that we've gotten into is some identification of the president of the United States with a particular faith belief as opposed to showing great respect for all faith beliefs.

...as opposed to the "inject faith into policy" from Hillary and the "biblical injunction" for policy from Obama. I think I know what they meant (in Edwards words, their "...belief in Christ plays an enormous role in the way [they] view the world", but I like Edward's acknowledgment that there can be a big down side of the president wearing his faith on his sleeve and allowing it to shape policy rather than the constitution and the law and personal freedom and what's best for the country as a whole. The transcript is here. Here are the clips from YouTube (with poor quality audio that is out of sync with the video):

You thought football coaches decide who plays what position? Daniel Sepulveda, a punter drafted in the fourth round by the Steelers, thinks otherwise:

"I guess the first couple of years that I was the punter at Baylor, and started to realize and recognize that that's all I was going to be doing. I tried to sneak my way onto some special teams throughout my career and was able to do that at times. I really did enjoy it, but finally did settle in to where I knew that punter was the position that God would have me to be at."

Garrison Keillor reminds us that May 2, 1611, was the date that the King James Bible was first published. I was surprised to learn the following from Keillor:

The translators also deliberately used old-fashioned language. At the time they were working on the Bible, words like "thou" and "sayeth" had already gone out of fashion. Some scholars believe that the translators wanted to give the sense that the language in the Bible came from long ago and far away.

I'd be curious to learn what percentage of Christians still rely on the KJV. It must be a dwindling number. Growing up, only the KJV and ASV were accepted at my church. I remember when it was announced that the NKJV and NASB were also acceptable. The NIV was never acceptable. It probably isn't still.

An article of the same title by Eve Conant in Newsweek describes how war tests the faith of chaplains and regular soldiers in Iraq. A few excerpts:

Countless soldiers-not just chaplains-have struggled with how to reconcile a God of love with a God who allows the terror of conflict. For centuries theologians and philosophers have grappled with ideas of "just war": thou shalt not kill, but under certain conditions-to prevent wider bloodshed and suffering-slaughter by armies is acceptable. Many American soldiers in Iraq wear crosses; some carry a pocket-size, camouflage New Testament with an index that lists topics such as Fear, Loneliness and Duty. U.S. troops have conducted baptisms in the Tigris. They often huddle in prayer before they go on patrol. Not everyone is comfortable with this. About 80 percent of soldiers polled in a 2006 Military Times survey said they felt free to practice their religion within the military. But the same poll found that 36 percent of troops found themselves at official gatherings at least once a month that were supposed to be secular but started with a prayer.

Many chaplains think that war strengthens their belief and the spirituality of the troops they serve. "It is the trials of life that ultimately help us to grow in our faith," says Air Force Chaplain (Capt.) Trent Davis, who was deployed to Iraq in 2005. He recalls one soldier who wasn't much of a believer at home but decided to read a Psalm each day while deployed. The day the soldier started in his vehicle across the Iraqi sands was the day he read from Psalm 23: Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. "After that his faith grew much deeper," says Davis.

Many soldiers suffer spiritual doubts in war, but the stresses can be especially acute for chaplains. By ministering to men and women who are struggling to keep faith, many are forced to confront their own doubt again and again. Chaplains are unarmed, but they go where the troops go. They help in any way they can.

The article focuses on a particular chaplain, Roger Benimoff, and how his experience took him to the brink of unbelief. I can't imagine what war is like, how damagiig it is to the psyche. If you've got some time, read through the discussion about Christians and non-violence on Scott Freeman's blog. I'd like to have the same conversation sometime with folks at my church. A large fraction of the men, particularly from the older generation, spent time in the military. I think it would be really interesting to discuss just war theory and the principle of non-violence and military service with them.