Does Sex Ed Undermine Parental Rights?

by Robert P. George and Melissa Moschella –
Imagine you have a 10- or 11-year-old child, just entering a public middle school. How would you feel if, as part of a class ostensibly about the risk of sexually transmitted diseases, he and his classmates were given “risk cards” that graphically named a variety of solitary and mutual sex acts? Or if, in another lesson, he was encouraged to disregard what you told him about sex, and to rely instead on teachers and health clinic staff members?

That prospect would horrify most parents. But such lessons are part of a middle-school curriculum that Dennis M. Walcott, the New York City schools chancellor, has recommended for his system’s newly mandated sex-education classes. There is a parental “opt out,” but it is very limited, covering classes on contraception and birth control. [Read more…]

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Five Thoughts on Vocation

Vocation Life Christianity by Timothy Dalrymple –
Last night I had the occasion to share some thoughts on the theology of vocation.  One of the greatest legacies of the Protestant Reformation, the doctrine of vocation has fallen on hard times.  In the midst of economic crisis, in the midst of public pressures to private and compartmentalize our faith, and in the midst of a church-wide reexamination of the proper ways and means of cultural influence, the church must recover its theology of vocation.  As I was preparing to offer my thoughts, I came across two passages I found inspiring.  The first comes from Gene Edward Veith (from a special issue of the Journal of Markets and Morality), provost at Patrick Henry College (and a blogger).  The emphases are mine:

Christians today urgently need to revive their commitment to whole-life discipleship. Millions of churchgoers are “Christians” for a few hours every week. Christianity is something they practice on Sunday morning rather than a way of life. The withering of discipleship is one of the gravest threats facing the church today.

One of the main causes of the problem is that churches and seminaries have disconnected discipleship from everyday life. Too often, pastors and professors talk about one’s “walk with God” and “stewardship” almost exclusively in terms of formally religious activities such as worship attendance, Bible study, evangelism, and giving. As important as these activities are for every Christian, they will never take up more than a tiny percentage of life for those who are not in full-time ministry. The largest portion of life—work in the home and in jobs—is excluded from the concepts of discipleship and stewardship. [Read more…]

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Frank Schaeffer Slides into Political and Religious Apostasy!

Frank Schaeffer leftist by Dr. Don Boys –
Frank Schaeffer is a pathetic figure. Son of famous, dedicated Christian leader Francis Schaeffer, he has declared his distaste for his father’s activities in the service of Christ. Frank has apostatized from his and his Father’s theology and politics as revealed in a recent television interview to promote his new book while at the same time bashing Christian authors for making gobs of money with their books! In that interview he declared that “Nobody is damned or going to Hell,” Christians are haters for being critical of abortion and gay rights; and “salvation is a journey.”

He added, “Atheism may be absolutely correct, or Buddhism may be. I could be completely wrong about theism.” Moreover, Dawkins, Hitchins, and Harris “could be right”! He declares that “Right Wing Christians” are “far more dangerous than the Dawkins [atheist] group.” Question: Why hasn’t Frank’s church brought him up on charges of heresy? Is his pastor as big a phony as he is? [Read more…]

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The Pursuit of God’s Peace in an Anxious World

God Trinity Light of World by Fr. Joshua Makoul –
The world in which we live is an anxious one, rife with fear and doubt. Economic markets rise and fall, employment fluctuates, conflicts erupt in unexpected places, and each year seems to bring a threat of some new virus that threatens mankind. We are all continuously faced with events outside of our control. As time passes the future takes on greater uncertainty. Indeed, it is often our struggle with uncertainty that plagues our spiritual life and gives birth to fear and worry.

Our society today has seen a dramatic spike in what psychologists call anxiety disorders. Many who struggle with these conditions wrestle with trusting, with uncertainty, with not having control. Not all who struggle with fear and worry, however, have a “disorder,” for such struggle is universal and comes with living in the world. There are many secular treatments and potential remedies for anxiety. As Christians we have all these, and much more, at our disposal in our fight against fear and anxiety. To the challenge of not having control, we have the ultimate answer and solution: God is in control. Those who deny God’s existence or who do not turn to Him in their lives, deny themselves the greatest treatment for fear, anxiety, worry and doubt. Our God offers us something that the world cannot give us, and that is His peace. [Read more…]

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Who Will Save New York? Herman Cain?

Radical Liberals Leftists by Richard F. Miniter –
I’ve just had my fourth grown son move his employment or business from New York State to Virginia. A fifth had already moved to Colorado. A daughter and three grandchildren are still here both working and living. For how long I don’t know because my son-in-law’s situation is fluid and the school taxes they pay on a home he rebuilt from the ground up with his own hands is more money each year than the purchase price of my first house forty odd years ago, not two minutes walk away. More money than a lot of people make today. More money than many senior citizens have to live on.

“I’m single and tired of paying more than half my income in taxes” my last son to move south grinned, “so I decided to let you and Mom shoulder the New York state public school teacher’s retirement fund all by yourselves.” [Read more…]

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Jobs and Deficits: The Moral Equation

Rev. Robert A. Sirico
Rev. Robert A. Sirico
by Rev. Robert A. Sirico –

The Genesis account of creation tells us that from the beginning, humanity was created to work. God puts Adam in the garden to “work and watch over it.” The Scripture provides an insight into our nature: We are all, man and woman, called into this life to find our vocation, the work that is uniquely ours and contributes to the flourishing of the wider community.

This explains why we are naturally so troubled about what appear to be merely economic problems: intractable unemployment and the various schemes put forth by policy makers to spur job creation. But behind the question is the reality that we naturally prefer people to be productive contributors to our economic life.

How we accomplish that is the subject of the debate over our unsustainable budget and debt trajectory. Do we choose those policies that make room for more freedom in the market, unleashing the creative potential of the American worker, business owner and entrepreneur? Or do we default, once more, to political and bureaucratic measures that require heavier burdens of taxation and regulation? [Read more…]

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The Austerity Myth: Federal Spending Up 5% This Year

Government Spending 2000-2011by John Merline –
When Republicans took control of the House in January, they pledged to make deep cuts in federal spending, and in April they succeeded in passing a bill advertised as cutting $38 billion from fiscal 2011’s budget. Then in August, they pushed for a deal to cut an additional $2.4 trillion over the next decade.

Some analysts have blamed these spending cuts for this year’s economic slowdown.

But data released by the Treasury Department on Friday show that, so far, there haven’t been any spending cuts at all.

Higher Spending, Deficits
In fact, in the first nine months of this year, federal spending was $120 billion higher than in the same period in 2010, the data show. That’s an increase of almost 5%. And deficits during this time were $23.5 billion higher. [Read more…]

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Don’t drink the Kool-Aid

Marcia Segelstein
Marcia Segelstein
by Marcia Segelstein –
In the not too distant past, traditionalists theorized that when it came to raising children, the answer was to retreat from the world. Use private or parochial schools. Or even better, homeschool. Raise up a generation of kids who would change the world by trying to raise them outside the world.

To some degree, I concur. Homeschooling and using Christian and other private schools are great options for those who have the time and resources.

I’ve spoken to many parents of young children who are absolutely convinced — even if using public schools — that their kids will be immune to un-Christian and anti-Christian influences. They’ll be able to infuse such strong values in their kids that they won’t be infected by the culture.

I know it works for some, and more power to them. But it doesn’t work for everybody. Not by a long shot. Like it or not, parents can’t control every aspect of their children’s lives: what they’ll overhear at baseball practice, what they’ll see on TV at a neighbor’s house, or on a computer screen while on a playdate. Peer pressure isn’t a fanciful concept: it’s real. [Read more…]

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Wall Street Occupiers Urged to Target Churches

Frank Schaeffer leftist by Mark Tooley –
Franky Schaeffer is the son of the late, highly influential evangelical thinker Francis Schaeffer​ , who helped shape the modern conservative evangelical movement. The son boasts he was himself a co-founder of the Religious Right. But he since has denounced Christianity as “stupid,” writes bitter tell-all books about his parents, and ferociously attacks conservative religionists as the virtual root cause of all American evils.

A blogger for The Huffington Post, young Schaeffer is now faulting religious conservatives for facilitating Wall Street greed. He’s imploring the Wall Street Occupiers to “protest the root source of America’s tilt to the far unregulated corporate right.” For Schaeffer, the next logical step is to demonstrate “outside mega churches, Evangelical publishing houses, [and] religious organizations that lead the ‘moral’ crusades against women and gays and all the rest.”

Will the Wall Street Occupiers heed Schaeffer’s frenzied call and next park their tents, blankets and anti-capitalist placards in the parking lots of suburban mega churches? It seems unlikely. But Schaeffer’s demand fits with the crazy Left’s sometime fixation on demonizing opponents based on class and religion. [Read more…]

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