Free Republic

The Gift of GabIntroduction I want to take this occasion to write a bit about free speech, the importance of free speech, and the consequent importance of Gab. I am writing as one who has already transferred over to Gab, and I would encourage you all to do the same. Get your thinking sorted out on these free speech issues, and the biblical basis for it, and then make your way over. There may be some sluggishness in the sign-up because of how many people are getting woke to the woke and who are trying to do the same thing....

In the aftermath of the horrific shooting in South Carolina, a cry has arisen calling for the Confederate flag that flies on the capitol grounds in South Carolina to be taken down. Russell Moore has joined in the call, and I have been called out on Twitter to do the same. Let me explain my reasons for declining to do so — I am declining to say anything about it, one way or the other. There are three reasons. First, as I explained in another post after another shooting, it is unseemly to politicize these horrors when the families are...

The uproar on the left over the Hobby Lobby decision has an explanation. That explanation is that we have allowed our understanding of what is meant by rights and liberties to become badly degraded. In fact, to simplify, the common understanding of rights has gotten into a condition of extreme labefactation. So to speak. The left tends to think of political rights in terms of stuff — the right to affordable housing, the right to health care, the right to contraception, and so on. Conservatives tend to think of political rights in terms of non-interference — the right to free...

I really should say something about outrage-fest that has mostly concluded over in the NBA and its environs. Clippers owner Donald Sterling got himself banned from NBA games and practices for life, and was fined 2.5 million dollars, because he managed to insinuate himself onto some audio, the playing of which audio proved to the world that he was in fact a racist jerk, not to mention a bounder and cad. It is difficult to summon up any sympathy for that kind of guy, and so why bother? No sympathy at all, at least not from this quarter. The fact...

A lot of noise has been generated by Vladamir Putin’s negative stance on homosexuality, and by the (falsely so-called) moral posturing and preening in the West as we resolve (courageously!) to be represented at the coming Winter Olympics in Sochi by homosexual athletes. That’ll show him. Actually, it won’t show him anything. What makes Putin tick? What’s his game? What is he up to in all this? His basic ideology—after Putinism—is nationalism. He is therefore not interested in developing an international consensus on exploring sexual identities. He would be if something like that could be played out to Russia’s advantage,...

Jason Stellman, author of Dual Citizens, and prosecutor of Peter Leithart in his trial in the Northwest Presbytery of the PCA, has tendered his resignation from the ministry of the PCA. You can read his letter here. The two cited reasons are his loss of faith in sola Scriptura, along with his abandonment of sola fide. First, as is so common with such things, he fails to state accurately the position is supposed to be abandoning. He says, “I have begun to doubt whether the Bible alone can be said to be our only infallible authority for faith and practice.”...

Note that it does not require a mandatory three, but rather a permissible three. Just as a polygamist at heart might voluntarily opt to limit himself to one spouse (for various reasons of his own), there is absolutely no reason in the logic of our relativistic and floundering marriage laws to require him to limit himself to one. Keep in mind also that this logic is obvious enough to those who have been pushing for homo marriage. They are foolish, not stupid. They have only denied it for practical political reasons — so as to not give us a legit...

Jonathan Merritt published a critique of Doug Wilson this morning on his Religion News Service. For younger readers, who might not remember the Federal Vision (FV) controversy, Wilson is the leader of the de facto denominational home of the FV, the Communion of Reformed and Evangelical Churches. Despite the fact that the CREC has the word “Reformed” in its title, it is not a recognized Reformed communion. It is not a member of nor does it qualify to join the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council (NAPARC). It is essentially a boutique denomination that orbits around Moscow, ID the headquarters of...

As Christians continue to process the ramifications of the Supreme Court’s supreme arrogance on the same sex mirage issue, one of the things we must continue to remember to do is review the basics. This of course will include constantly reviewing what the Scriptures explicitly teach on the matter of same sex sexual activity, but it is also important for us to go a layer beneath all that. We also need to keep reviewing what the Bible teaches about the nature of man’s nature, and the nature of man’s choices. A hidden driver in a lot of what is going...

A commenter in the earlier post about Exodus International is checking to see if I am ashamed of Leviticus 20:13 yet, which I am not. But before proceeding, let me quote that verse in full. “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them” (Lev. 20:13). This passage is the Word of God, and before moving on to how we are to receive and apply it today, let us — by which I mean all Christians...

Schizophrenia is no less schizophrenia if one of the voices happens to be talking sense. Hard schizophrenia is no less difficult if murderous insanity is linked up tight with weird, pathetic, and arbitary scruples. In fact, if such an arbitary pattern is applied long enough, one may detect a method in the madness. I am talking about our erratic public policy when it comes to protecting human life. Gosnell is a disgrace because he killed babies in this spot instead of the officially-approved that spot. As one observer noted, he is apparently being charged with murder because he enjoyed himself...

No one should be surprised at the announcement that women are now going to be serving in combat roles in the U.S. military. This has been heading toward us for a long time, and the only thing surprising about it is that so many people are surprised. Now the only thing that stands between your daughter and involuntary combat service is a determination by some president (or other) that we need to return to conscription, followed by one court decision. There are three points to be made about this in response. First, opposition to this monstrosity is a function of...

Our office has been asked for a statement from Douglas Wilson on the news that he has been formally uninvited from delivering the prayer at President Obama's Second Inauguration. This controversy, as many know, revolves around the fact that Pastor Wilson made a joke a number of years ago in a sermon about how Brian McLaren's theology was gay enough to be made conga queen at the Fire Island Fruit Festival. When the AP asked Pastor Wilson about the joke, he had forgotten about it completely. When the tape was played, Pastor Wilson laughed all over again, and said he...

Lee Habeeb recently wrote a piece here for National Review Online, in which he was encouraging Christians to engage winsomely with our surrounding culture, and to make our peace with the way some things were going. He used the example of gay marriage in the civil sphere. David French wrote a very fine response here, but the money quote is below. "It took me a long time to realize the following truth: No matter how compassionate, charitable, winsome, and kind you are, if you oppose the sexual revolution you are the enemy." And this is precisely why Christians need to...

We, of all people, ought to know better. "Progress" gave us modern medicine, liberal democracy, the internet. It also gave us the guillotine, the Gulag and the gas chambers. Western intelligentsia assumed in the 1920s that "history" was moving away from the muddle and mess of democracy towards the brave new world of Russian communism. Many in 1930s Germany regarded Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his friends as on the wrong side of history. The strong point of postmodernity is that the big stories have let us down. And the biggest of all was the modernist myth of "progress". What is more,...

The Church of England just recently said no to women bishops. There were howls of outrage from all the predictable quarters, for whom such a troglodyte move is just smack-the-forehead baffling. Now I can understand a vote against women bishops as a preliminary move to try to undo the ordination of women priests. And I can understand a vote for women bishops as the next logical step after having established the practice of ordaining women priests. What I don't get is the affirming the ordination of women priests and opposing them as bishops. The pig, once swallowed by the python,...

Indonesian publisher Gramedia Pustaka Utama burned hundreds of copies of a book that called the Prophet Muhammad a pirate and a murderer on Wednesday following protests by the hard-line Islamic Defenders Front. The books were burned outside the Bentara Budaya cultural hall in the Kompas Gramedia complex in Palmerah, West Jakarta. Company president director Wandi S. Brata oversaw the book burning, along with several Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) officials, including deputy chairman Ma’ruf Amin. The book, “Lima Kota Paling Berpengaruh di Dunia” (“Five Cities that Ruled the World”), was pulled from Indonesian book stores on June 9. The text, written...

"On one level, Americans, together with all sinners, are not nearly as generous with their resources as God is with us. The triune God overflows throughout the created order, and abundance is the name of the game. So, in learning the disciplines of giving, we are not trying to reach a certain specified amount, but are rather trying to learn how to imitate the divine heart. And in this regard, Americans certainly have a long way to go. But there is another way of asking this question, and that is on the horizontal level. How does American generosity stack up...

Democrat from 5th District runs to represent the 7th By DEE-ANN DURBIN The Associated Press 7/8/2004, 12:38 p.m. ET WASHINGTON (AP) — Douglas Wilson wants to represent Michigan's 7th District in Congress, but when he looks out the windows of his Oakland County home, he doesn't see the 7th district. That's because it's 70 miles away. Wilson, a 40-year-old paramedic, is one of three Democrats running for the party's nomination in the Aug. 3 primary and the only one who lives outside the district. Wilson lives in Oxford, Mich., which is part of U.S. Rep. Dale Kildee's 5th District. But...