Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

It seems to me that in the biological process of human gestation where more than 25% of all conceptions end in spontaneous abortions that to insist that a fertilized egg has the same standing as a newborn infant and that the termination of any pregnancy in the first trimester is tantamount to murder is anti-intellectual and possibly disingenuous.

I also regret that the Church and Christians insist on claiming to know the mind of Christ in partisan political debate – i.e. Catholics for McCain or Catholics for Obama or Catholics against Joe Biden.

At the end of the day I think we need a little more humility and a lot more listening in this debate over abortion

Some thoughts, questions...
There is no doubt that the church has implicitly and explicitly made serious errors in the past and has stood courageously as well. But “the church” in this statement remains an abstract concept. Usually it is as individuals – often nurtured by communities – who made courageous stands, such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer or Franz Jägerstätter.

How about freedom of conscience?

Where is the OUTRAGE that nearly 9 MILLION! children in these United States of America go without healthcare? And what of the over 40 million adults – most of whom have jobs, by the way – who go without health care?

And how about the rest of the world?

Thursday, August 21, 2008

August 21, 2008

I am blogging from a new, undisclosed location
as of today. Very interesting and significant.

I just finished a book by an author new to me: Being Consumed by William T. Cavanaugh. I am waiting for inter-library loan to secure me two of his other books- Torture and Eucharist and Theopolitical Imagination.

To get the most critical comment out of the way – I wonder if the book is cobbled together from previously written unconnected pieces? It has that feel. That being said this book is an important contribution to the theological critique of capitalism or, as I prefer to call it, neoliberalism.

Maybe there are some Western Christians who think our modern economy is independent of theology, ideology, or history. Either it is ahistorical or is a natural organism evolving according to natural law. Neoliberal-capitalism, the free market, the ability to purchase anything you can afford - but preferably cheap stuff - that you can tire of and discard, then go out and purchase more of it is the natural way of the world; how God intended it. Can’t everybody do this? Doesn’t everybody want to do this? Isn’t this the very definition of human freedom? Cavanaugh doesn’t think so.