C.S. Lewis’s message to “Da Vinci Code” fans

Here is the real harm of these modern conspiracy theories: They may appeal to our emotions, but they violate our common sense. They reject reason, just as surely as they reject revelation. “I do not wish to reduce the skeptical element in your minds,” Lewis explained. “I am only suggesting that it need not be reserved exclusively for the New Testament and the Creeds. Try doubting something else.”

Last week I finally got curious enough to commit to reading the Da Vinci code. I guess the final straw was when my mother-in-law said that the book bothered her. Having recently read “Misquoting Jesus” and found new vibrancy to my faith, I am actually looking forward to this journey.

Sometimes when I read criticisms of the Gospels I feel I am being seduced by a subconscious urge to believe that there was unattached biographer taking notes for some future religion. When in reality the Gospels are God inspired stories that are inseparable as being both human and divine inspired. If the Gospels were perfectly correlated, we would only need one and we would undoubtedly start clamoring for a set of laws like the Sharia or the Jewish laws to order our lives. Yet this lack of divine perfection in the Gospels mimics one of the great attractions of Jesus. He was both human and divine. I have no doubt that he endured all of the pain and frailty of being human even though he could have used his divine nature to choose a less painful path. Yet his human existence is an essential part of his story. His human nature allows us to build a relationship with him in the way we are most comfortable with. Jesus is approachable because he was human. God on the other hand is a bit enigmatic and touching or seeing God is even more of a problem. As an example Moses had his problems talking with God. It is not hard for me to do a personal inventory of myself and declare that Moses was a much better man at talking to God then I will ever be. Ultimately I will need a little help. The human nature of Jesus allows me to approach him and his divine nature allows me to take the next step and develop a relationship with God. Yet this is still not enough! Although my mind and heart are willing, I am wise enough to realize that I am not strong enough to do this alone. I will need friends who will encourage me when I am weak and help me back on to the path when I stray. The journey and the friends you bring with you are just as important to God as the destination. This is the great hope of the Gospels.

Although the “Da Vinci Code” will probably entertain and challenge me, I feel the common sense of the Gospels will again prevail.

I have added a widget plugin to post the Verse of the Day on my blog page. To those offended by me pushing religion down their throat I am sincerely sorry because I have been there. Please either ignore it or look at it as wisdom from a history book.

However if God has a plan to jumpstart your faith then there is little I can do about it. My recommendation is to get over it and get on with it. Waiting to find what is behind Door B is not a good idea. God has a sense of humor but I don’t think you will like it!

Actually it was my wife who wanted to watch the Ten Commandments so my son and I went along. Last night we actually skipped 24 to watch it! However, my wife did not make it. She got about five minutes into watching it and figured out that she wasn’t going to make it. So she went to bed. We could of given up, too. Instead we ended up discussing the movie as we watched it. I pulled out my NIV Study Bible to check what it said about the events. We looked at the map and the best guess at the route taken by the Jews in the Exodus. His class at school had recently reviewed the Old Testament as part of their survey of major religions. He remembered seeing part of the original Ten Commandments movie in class so he had a few questions. We could see where the movie used some artistic license. Overall I liked the movie and I thought it did a good job of following the written version in the Bible without being boring. It is a nice complement to the “original” version and the written version in Bible.

An inspired piece of apologetics:

You write that you disagree with the Catholic Church’s positions on divorce and remarriage, birth control, abortion, homosexuality, and the male priesthood. May I suggest that you bracket these convictions for a moment and consider a more fundamental question: Is the Catholic Church who she claims to be? This question must be asked and answered before you can reasonably address the specific teachings of the Catholic Church, for if the Catholic claim is true, then you will be forced to reconsider your present beliefs.

I don’t know if I buy the inquirer’s letter…but Al Kimel is awfully impressive in his answer. Read the whole thing.
H/T Julie.

UPDATE: I am currently reading Catholic Matters, which Kimel mentions toward the end, and I highly recommend it. It’s a terrific read. Not at all pedantic. Friendly and warm is what it is. It’s in The Bookshelf, too.

[Via The Anchoress]

I am not Catholic but I found Kimel’s response probes my belief structure.

This week I set up parental controls on my son’s use of World of Warcraft. My son is fourteen years old and has become somewhat obsessive about playing it. I believe that setting up and recognizing boundaries by both the parent and child is an important part of instilling values into the child. I believe that a teenage boy needs some pretty large boundaries if he is to develop the right instincts of what it is to be a man. Part of the reason for the large boundaries is to “encourage” him to try stuff and make mistakes. The general idea is that he makes his mistakes when he is young. Hopefully, his mistakes will be small. The key boundary for me was for him to complete his homework on time and do well in classes. I want him to do well in class for his sake not mine. My wife has a slightly different opinion on this subject. She wanted him to complete his homework before nine o’clock and to be in bed asleep by ten o’clock. That is how she approached homework when she was younger. Well, her plan does not work for my son. He is a natural “night owl” and her natural desire to be control him has antagonized their relationship.

This week I finally had enough of the discussions. I had been encouraging him to find a middle ground with his mom for several weeks now but he had become more resolute in that he was “right”. The stubbornness of both of them being “right” left me very frustrated. When he missed an assignment at school this week and the teacher called us, I had my opportunity. I set up a schedule for when he could play the game. I had been discussing implementing parental controls for several days but he did not want to discuss it. I had my problems getting it set up and had to call the folks who support World of Warcraft for help. He was a little surprised when it kicked him off for the first time. He was even more surprised when he found out that he could not play the game during his free periods at school. He argued with me a bit about this schedule being so unfair but he knew he had lost. One friend at school tried to talk me out of parental controls but when I mentioned I thought I should call his Dad and offer to help him set up parental controls, he immediately became respectful and quiet. My son and I finally talked about him doing the little things to keep his mother from being a “crazy” woman. He complied and my wife was impressed. She thought he had all of a sudden become more sensitive and respectful to her wishes. As a good faith measure on my part I released parental controls on Friday. He is on spring break now. He knows that I can place parental controls on at any time so we will see if I need to put them on or threaten to put them on at the end of spring break.

Donald Sensing from One Hand Clapping had the results from this quiz in his blog so naturally I was curious how I would do. To some degree I was not sure how I would score. My belief structure seems like a patch quilt at times. I am definitely a work in progress. Most of the time I am happy with where I have come from, where I am at today, and where I am going to spiriturally. At times I yearn for a doctrine to embrace fully even though I understand the problems with borrowing other peoples beliefs. So here’s my score.

You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan. You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God’s grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavly by John Wesley and the Methodists.

What's your theological worldview?
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Vatican paper on gays reveals split – insider.washingtontimes.com

About 30 percent to 50 percent of the Catholic priesthood is estimated to be homosexual. The document calls homosexuality a “disordered” state, adding that no one with “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” might be ordained.

I do not know where they got this information but I bet this scares the average Catholic on multiple levels. If 5% of the population is homosexual than the disproportionate amount of homosexuals becoming priests is alarming. On the tip of every parents tongue we will be questions like, “Why are there so many homosexual Catholic priests?” and “Why are there so many priests who are perverts?” Despite many signs of acceptance of homosexuals by society, the heterosexual population is uncomfortable with homosexual church leadership. We accept the people but not the behavior. Unfortunately there is a lot of child molestation that appears to be linked to a priest’s problems with sexuality and celibacy. For the Protestants this reaffirms that the Catholic pride over celibacy is getting in the way of evangelism. I will continue to argue that if a man has some ambivalence about his sexual identity, becoming a Catholic priest is the wrong place to go.

Zenit News Agency – The World Seen From Rome

I was pondering the debate over evolution and intelligent design over the last couple of days. I am not sure why I was doing it. Last night my wife and I got into a discussion on evolution and the Big Bang Theory. Whew, that was scary! Today I did a little research on intelligent design and found this.

The Pontiff concluded, exhorting his listeners to allow themselves “to be awakened by this Word of God” and invited them to pray that “he clear our minds so that we will be able to perceive the message of creation, inscribed also in our hearts: The beginning of everything is creative Wisdom and this Wisdom is love and goodness.“

The best resource for intelligent design information is at the Access Research Network. Despite what other people might think I think that the “scientific discussion” of evolution and intelligent design increases our understanding of both. The “Cambrian Explosion” is a pretty fascinating evolution question. This question and others will probably lead some young people to try, figure out these paradoxes, and ultimately improve the theory of evolution.

My son put up quite a fuss about going to church yesterday. He is fourteen and he tried to convince me that if I allowed him to stay home he would complete his homework. I am about 99% confident that if I allowed him to stay home he would have spent the entire time either sleeping or playing video games. I am old but not senile. So we went to church. When I got him in the car I started talking to him why he needs to go to church. This is about as close to preaching as I want to get. He switched the subject to evolution and Genesis. He probably thought that would throw me off but I didn’t mind. If that is a subject that bugs him, we can talk about it. I told him I did not know all the answers but here is how I have navigated the murky waters between science and theology. He had several questions but he seemed to be pretty happy with my answers. In a subtle way I was challenging him to come up with his own view on the subject.

Our church does a really nice job making the messages entertaining and educational. Best of all since he views this church as fun, he listens. So it was not too hard to talk to him about applying what you heard in your own life. I believe that all teenagers have a moral compass. Unfortunately if they do not pull the compass out and check it occasionally they do not know where to find it when they need it.