North Western Winds

I did this quiz, Battleground God , from The Philosopher's Magazine a while back and was reintroduced by Johnny Dee at Fides Quaerens Intellectum today. And since Andrew, Peter, Ben and I have been tossing around various ideas about religion, I thought this would be great to share. You answer about twenty questions designed to see if your views about God are consistent. Unlike the What Religion Are You? quiz from Saturday, this one is more logical, rigorous and fair. It does not suppose any answer is right or wrong, but only tests to see if you have contradicted yourself. I did pretty well, with no direct hits and only one "bullet to bite." See the instructions for explanations, and have fun! There are more games on the site, which I have not tried as yet.

Standard hard left slander. Anyone who disagrees is a racist because it's the most hateful word we can think of. That, and we don't know how to debate. Or have the patience and persistence to do so. Maybe the argument is more convincing when you've been stoned for fourty years. It wouldn't be a protest without tinfoil hat Jew bashing, would it? These pictures and more are from Paul at Ravishing Light , who I hope will forgive my posting these without asking first. I wanted to get them up quick while they're current. These guys are the loud 30%. I'm sure my American friends are familiar with them, and will recognize that they do not speak for Canada, but only for themselves. If they really were representative, we'd be under a majority Marijuana Party government. Since we're not...

New blog! Before Dawn is done by Pete, who is Andrew's brother. Andrew's blog is Bound by Gravity . It appears that I now have twice the trouble on my hands...

Long funny post at Wicked Thoughts . You know you're a liberal when...

I wonder if Flynn would (aka Simon) submit the following to the ADL : the words racist and bigot. It is plain that they are used to direct hate towards people with conservative views. The terms "racist" and "bigot" have become powerful weapons used against conservatives. Sometimes they are justified. Sometimes they are not. They are, however, always effective - which explains their overuse. As conservatives it is important to recognize that when we fight Islamic fundamentalism we aren't fighting Muslims any more than we are fighting women when we oppose abortion. Do not allow liberals to shame us into submission. I doubt it. Firstly, Flynn himself likes to hurl these words about, confident that he knows precisely what they mean and that he could never misuse them to score cheap points. Secondly, the terms do have a real meaning, which his poisonous attempt to defame the flag Canada flew in WWII is in danger of diluting. Let's just say that he gets his...

For those who are not Catholic, I'll have to explain. Today is the first day of Advent , the four weeks of waiting for Christmas. If you have an Advent wreath, today is the day you bring it out of the closet. The first day of Advent is also the first day of the Liturgical year in the Catholic church, when we begin a new cycle of readings for the next year. In lay terms, Advent might be called the official start of the Christmas season. Why do we need someone to tell us that? Well, if more people followed it, we might not have to put up with neighbors having Christmas lights up on November 14th, as I observed recently (those folks had their tree up too! Argh!). It's a minor thing, true, but it is helpful in keeping the seasonal commercialism at bay, and keeping the focus on the gift that is at the heart of the season. It is also a time of cleaning house, and examining if we are doing everything we can to be worthy of that gift. From today's reading : Let us then t...

Life, Liberty and all my limbs This one is for my Libertarian leaning readers. And for Shannon at Shenanigans , who appears to be in danger of advocating both positive and negative interpretations of freedom. I doubt that was intended, and I'm going to try and illustrate the problem as gently as I can. In her post on a pharmacist's right to sell or not sell birth control, she says: If I did not succeed in getting my [birth control] prescription filled, I would inform them [the store owners] that in the future I would be taking my business elsewhere. I would be extremely annoyed at the inconvenience, and I would tell all my friends how annoyed I was and encourage them to shop elsewhere. What I would not do, however, is demand that the government-sanctioned body responsible for regulating pharmacists force this particular pharmacy to fill my prescription. I would not presume I have the right to demand that a private business person be forced by law to do what I want. ...

Been there, done that. From Cox and Forkum .

More from Dallas Willard : The morally good person, I would say, is a person who is intent upon advancing the various goods of human life with which they are effectively in contact, in a manner that respects their relative degrees of importance and the extent to which the actions of the person in question can actually promote the existence and maintenance of those goods. The person who is morally bad or evil is one who is intent upon the destruction of the various goods of human life with which they are effectively in contact, or who is indifferent to the existence and maintenance of those goods . Being morally good or evil clearly will be a matter of degree and there surely will be few if any actual human beings who exist at the extreme ends of the scale. (An interesting but largely pointless question might be how humanity distributes on the scale: a nice bell curve or...what?) Here, I submit, is the fundamental moral distinction: the one which is of primary human interest,...

Back to weightier things. I found this essay by Dallas Williard and I'm certain it will bore the heck out of my non philosophically inclined readers, but I think this is a very important point: naturalism is inconsistent with any kind of ethics. The best it can do is Utility, and in that scenario anything can be justified "if it works." Nothing is out and out wrong . In practice I think few people actually subscribe to this, even when they say otherwise. If you were to rob or hurt them to better yourself, or even if you gave the money or property to widows and orphans, I think it is almost certain that people claiming ethical utility would be outraged. I've used emphasis to help anyone skimming to find the key points quickly. Naturalism staggers back and forth between physicalism (materialism) as a general ontology or first philosophy, and outright physicsism or scientism (which need not take the form of physicsism)--often, though not always, trying to der...

You scored as Lust . Lust 44% Wrath 38% Gluttony 31% Pride 25% Envy 19% Sloth 19% Greed 6% Seven deadly sins created with QuizFarm.com Saturdays are for quizzes. I think I knew this already. Which is why I don't need any help in finding it.

You scored as Catholic . Welcome to the One, Holy, CATHOLIC, and Apostolic Church! You my Friend are a Catholic. You have a strong sense of something outside of yourself and feel drawn to answer profound questions to satisfy your desires. You recognize that truth isn't self-centered or about inventing something new, but rather following the road map of your heart to a bigger picture. You are probably baptized. Catholic 90% Christian 70% Jewish 60% Buddhist 40% Cult 40% Anarchist 15% Religion created with QuizFarm.com Also via Happy Catholic This was an interesting quiz! I'm very interested in seeing how some of my blogging friends do. Any takers?

Mountains! Where is your dream place? brought to you by Quizilla Via Happy Catholic

If you're not reading Eternity Road, you really out to give it a try .

I was shocked this morning when we were called to a brief meeting. It wasn't the meeting, we have those once a week. It was because the only item on the agenda was that one of my co-workers had passed away yesterday. Ross had been away from work for, I don't know, a month or so. He had skin cancer and was getting treatment was all I heard. There was a card passed around for him when his friends at work heard he was getting down on his prospects. His sister had passed from the same thing. I signed it and I expected to see him not too long after that because he wasn't old or unhealthy looking the last time I saw him. He was probably in his fourties. He came to our office after spending some time in another location for the same company, doing a different job. I remember spending a week with him, training him, and I remember how swamped he felt. He wasn't sure he'd stay. But stay he did. He thanked me for the training long after it was done. I'm now on the li...

I really ought to steer clear of more left leaning blogs, even if they are Canadian. They make my head hurt. A few more are continuing to take a run at the Red Ensign group for (what else, these are not very original people) being racist. This time they are being slightly more sophisticated. Two that I'm aware of rightly point out that there are Canadian racist groups who are attempting to lay claim to the Red Ensign and use it as their own version of the Confederate flag. One of our two critics has done some digging and says that it was Canada's flag for only X number of years, until we got our current one. Even if he has his facts right, and he might, it boggles my mind why he should stoop to allow official government acts to define what is and is not Canadian. There are more things outside government than in; are they not real? As for me, I take it that the people of Canada come first. We have a government to do governmental things- above all, to defend the nation. Tod...

The Ballad of Nick and Theresa The tempest between Nick Packwood (the Flea) and Theresa Zolner got me to thinking, which is always dangerous. I have also had disagreements with bloggers. The Raving Atheist comes to mind (funny, I've never actually heard from him directly). Ben and I appear to disagree about everything, but do like and respect him, and I know that there is a great deal of common ground. Andrew and I have also had a civil disagreement, one that has proven to be quite entertaining (for me, anyway). On my own blog I think that the back and forth of opinion is one of the best things going on. That's what I made it for . I respect that other bloggers may have different goals for their blogs, and there's no reason why those shouldn't be valid. The facts in this particular case, as near as I can tell, are that Theresa tried to engage Nick on the subject of his not infrequent posting of various female models on his site. Nick did not want to talk ab...

It will please my readers to know that the Raving Atheist and I have worked out our differences. It occurred during a nice chat that, fortunately, was caught for posterity by a passing cartoonist . For some unknown reason, he chose to depict me as the pink balloon. See also here and here . Hat Tip: Mark Shea

From Catholic Exchange , more on the U.S. election. The leftists thought they were on the ascendancy; that Christians were a dying breed with little chance to shape the culture. They thought that Hollywood and media were creating a new America where the views of Whoopi Goldberg and Michael Moore were becoming mainstream. That is why Bush’s victory troubles them more than Ronald Reagan’s victories, even though Reagan was at least as conservative as George W. Bush. When Reagan was elected in the 1980s, the leftists in the media and the academy were not yet fully in control of the institutions where they were labored. They did not expect to get their way back then. They understood that they were still the young upstarts, the proponents of the 1960s counterculture’s and new Left’s understanding of America’s role in the world. The Clinton victories at the polls changed the equation; led them to believe that their time had arrived, that they were the new establishment that would drive t...

And forgiveness Pat Buchanan wrote to Jeff Jacoby and defended President Bush for asking God to forgive Yasser Arafat. Jacoby had criticized the president for doing so. He says of the incident: [M]any readers defended Bush's reaction. One of them was Pat Buchanan, who replied to my column in one of his own. He began with a jab at the presumption of "columnists who know the mind of God." Then he wrote: "In defense of President Bush, if that was his first reaction to Arafat's death, it bespeaks a Christian heart. As a boy in World War II, I was taught by Catholic nuns that while permissible to pray for the death of Hitler or Tojo, it was impermissible to pray for their damnation. That was hatred, and hatred is a sin." Buchanan is undoubtedly voicing the Catholic response, which often scandalizes those not familiar with it. It is not unique to Catholics, however, most people who have at least some Christian scruples are familiar with it. Jacoby, how...

Well, it's official. The Raving Atheist has put NWW on his " Hate List ." I can only take that to mean that he hates me for daring to question him. Must be pretty fragile, as most zealots are. I wonder how he defines tolerance? Oh, it's like this: "A hate site is one which explicitly attacks a person or group based upon race, gender, sexual orientation or creed." It certainly takes all kinds to make this world go around since I have never done such a thing. RA, meanwhile worships Sam Harris, who thinks merely being religious might be grounds for the death penalty. Give me a friggin' break.

Nothing good comes easy Bumf Online lead me to this touching picture from Veterans Day in the U.S. Here's three essays on why the sacrifice is worth it. The Chaldean archbishop of Kirkuk says: "We have a government now that is setting up elections, and those who want to run for government can do so, freely," he explained. The archbishop said that the "war being fought by the terrorists is senseless." If they want an "open, modern and democratic Iraq" they "can register to vote, negotiate with the new government, and use the instruments of dialogue," he stressed. Convinced that the elections in January "will be a starting point for a new Iraq," the prelate observed that instead " Western newspapers and broadcasters are simply peddling propaganda and misinformation ." "Iraqis are happy to be having elections and are looking forward to them because they will be useful for national unity," he ...

"Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence" is probably my favourite hym in church. It has a haunting melody and it sets quite a tone. The words are here, and the melody can be heard here (it even works in Firefox, because the page uses Media Player instead of QuickTime, for which, it seems, there is no Firefox plugin as yet). I did not know before today that the words and the music originated independently . The words go back to the 4th century, while the tune is from 17th century France. Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence Let all mortal flesh keep silence And with fear and trembling stand Ponder nothing earthly minded For with blessing in His hand Christ our God to earth descendeth Our full homage to demand King of kings, yet born of Mary As of old on earth He stood Lord of lords, in human vesture In the body and the blood He will give to all the faithful His own self for heav'nly food Rank on rank the host of heaven Spread...

It's a busy weekend, what with the Grey Cup and a lot more going on, but I find myself with a few moments in which I can quickly respond to some questions raised by Andrew at Bound by Gravity . Argument 1 : And if free will is only an illusion anyways? What if God-given free will is an illusion as well? What basis do you have to claim that our so-called "free will" is authentic? Since you are the one claiming that naturalistic free world is less authentic than god-given free will, I belief the burden of proof lies with you. Well... I would respond that the theory that we are all unknowing, unthinking, immoral robots has the virtue that you claim - it has some ring of coherence to it. I grant that. But if you were to "win" our debate on that theory it would be a Phyrric Victory . Our debate, not to mention our very existence, would be quite meaningless. I find that quite unattractive. You could say that you believe this and live this, but if it is true you coul...

I recall that when Ronald Reagan died, there was an almost universal outpouring of support for the 'great man.' I use the scare quotes not because I disagree with the sentiment (I think Reagan was one of the great presidents of the 20th century), but because an awful lot of people saying he was great are liars. Well, maybe they aren't liars exactly. Maybe they changed their minds about him. But if that is the case, we should be hearing stories about how people came to recognize that Reagan was not a buffoon actor, but a brave, disciplined and intelligent man. There was very little of that. I point this out because what happened in the wake of Reagan's funeral was no fluke. It is happening again, in regard to the recent war in Afghanistan. Victor Davis Hanson in NRO writes: ... after the recent and mostly smooth elections, Afghanistan has slowly disappeared from the maelstrom of domestic politics, as all those who felt our efforts were not merely impossible but absu...

I came home today to find that one of my posts last night triggered a small debate between two of my readers. Andrew and Julie managed to play nice and I hope it'll stay that way. I'm saying this not because I doubt these two can remain civil, but because the topic that came up - Atheism - can be quite divisive, and I have never articulated my ideas about how I police my comments. You didn't know they're checked? Well, they are. Disagreements are fine as long as everybody is polite. You can argue strongly, but curses and insults will be deleted. The focus should be on the ideas. The post that got things rolling was the one linking to The Anal Philosopher, where he argued that theism can't reasonably be linked to stupidity . I was drawn to the post out of exasperation with some of the stuff that is coming out of some people who really, really don't like President Bush. If you don't like him, that's fine. You'll get another chance to make your appea...

Right now no one knows precisely how it came about that a U.S. Marine was filmed shooting a captured enemy in Iraq. It is under investigation and we ought to let more information come forward before leaping to a decision. It should also be observed that very few of us know one thing about combat in the 21st century. So it stands to reason that we ought not to flap our holes about it, based on a few seconds of film whose context is at the moment mere heresy. Even when information comes out, most of us will lack any first hand context in which to evaluate it. That does not mean that we can't ever judge. It just means we ought to take our time about it, and do so with caution and charity (towards all sides). There doesn't seem to be a day that goes by when I don't read comments on the web by people who think U.S soldiers ought to brought to Brussels and charged with 'war crimes' because they happened to say something exuberant and nasty about people who are trying t...

"You must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss". Your romance is Casablanca. A classic story of love in trying times, chock full of both cynicism and hope. You obviously believe in true love, but you're also constantly aware of practicality and societal expectations. That's not always fun, but at least it's realistic. Try not to let the Nazis get you down too much. What Romance Movie Best Represents Your Love Life? brought to you by Quizilla The funny thing is that I've never even seen the movie.

Lovely commentary here from Keith Burgess-Jackson, also known as The Anal Philosopher : Is there any evidence that religious people are less intelligent than nonreligious people? I’ve never seen any. Some of the greatest thinkers in the history of humankind have been devout theists. Thomas Aquinas was a theist. Isaac Newton was a theist. René Descartes was a theist. Immanuel Kant was a theist. William James was a theist. Ludwig Wittgenstein was a theist. What are we to say of these people: that they’re stupid? But we know on independent grounds that they were the opposite of stupid. They were fabulously intelligent. They were brilliant. I’ve been teaching philosophy of religion for more than twenty years. I can assure you that theists hold their own in intellectual contests with atheists. If they didn'’t, or couldn’'t, there would be nothing for me to teach. Read some Aquinas if you don’t believe me. He'’ll run intellectual circles around you. In my discipline, philosop...

Only Liberals whine, in full-on sincerity, that everybody ought to be above average. Wait. Think. Hey! So it comes as no surprise that they can't get their pants on about the subject of IQ either, as Steve Sailer at The American Conservative points out: Still, as politically incorrect as cognitive tests have become, colleges and the military have not dropped them. They are simply too useful in sorting large numbers of applicants. Nor have people stopped talking privately about IQ—especially liberals, who seem to believe, with deepest sincerity, both that IQ is an utterly discredited concept and that liberals are better than conservatives because liberals have much higher IQs . The winning quote is here: Democrats’ denunciations of the president’s IQ bemuse me because Bush strikes me as a lazy but clever and unscrupulous operator who, ever since he quit drinking in 1987, has contrived to get whatever he wants out of life... “In the president’'s lon...

"I just went to see 'The Passion of the Christ,' a film as bad as an LSD trip which shows once again that also in the sewers of Christianity collective daftness just leads to mud." Y'know, I can't say that I like that statement by Theo van Gogh , but would never occur to me to call for his murder because I was offended. I see everyone as working on their relationship with God. Some people appear to have more work cut out for them than others. I'm also aware, however, that people work under constraints that are invisible to my eye. For those reasons, I leave it to God and the individual to sort out the relationship. Why would God need a fatwa ? If he wanted it done, is there any doubt that he'd get it done in his own way, and in his own sweet time? That goes for Sony and Tom Hanks too.