Another Pen for Western Culture

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Doing Church in the Information Age

Once upon a time, the person in a community likely to be the best educated, the best informed, and certainly the best orator (to use the nomenclature) was the local priest or parson. He was the man you looked to not only for Biblical wisdom but for insight about the day's events. Not only were many of our nation's founders either in the ministry or educated for the ministry, but local pastors led the members of many Colonial churches to take up arms against the King. Many of them joined the battle--including the two "fighting parsons" pictured here.

It's different today. Modern church members are often as well-educated as their pastors (or similarly degreed, anyway). And as for the news of our day, it would seem lay people in general have more time for reading and interpreting widely-sourced news than their pastors. My pastor is a busier man than most. He can't possibly spend the kind of time on the net or listening to talk radio that I can. Nor can he spend all his time reading books. And frankly--what pastor would want to? My pastor once told several of us that he had remodeled the office and removed the built-in bookshelves of the prior pastor. He tapped his laptop. "I've got all the books I need, right in here." I was chagrined, having forever dreamed of built-in bookshelves. But rabid bibliophilia (doesn't it sound like a disease?) is not a prequisite for effective ministry. Frankly, my own bookishness is a hindrance as often as it helps at church. (For every Sunday school lesson enriched, there's a committee meeting where everyone thinks I'm crazy because I don't share their priorities. Thank you, Neil Postman.)

Then there's the massive proliferation of other ministries. Everyone in Houston can listen to half a dozen Christian radio stations, and two Christian television stations--even without cable or satellite systems. Surely you could listen to fifty sermons a week if you were so inclined. And with the internet, you can listen to sermons all day, every day. And you can hear the very best in church music, new worship, old worship, or whatever you want. There's James Dobson, Chuck Colson, Janet Parschall, Chuck Swindoll, Hank Hannegraff, Beth Moore (can't forget her) and dozens and dozens of others on radio and TV and internet outlets 24/7. And there are Christian movie reviewers (Movieguide now has at least one competitor), "family coaches," financial ministries, health and diet experts, experts on preschool, or caring for aging parents (somebody send me a link--ha!), experts on guiding your child's education, whether home-schooled or otherwise, and many more.

But after a week immersed in this sea of information--listening to great speakers, great music, reading the best analysis and the best books, having deep and heavy discussions on the web--where writing the occasional 'comment' may take longer than we allow the pastor to speak--arriving at church on Sunday, it might be easy to shrug your shoulders after the sermon and say, "Oh, well. That left me sort of flat."

And it occured to me--why do we come to church? To hear a great message? Do we expect the pastor to beat out the competition in a world saturated with information? To be more entertaining, more insightful, more passionate, but more dispassionate, more everything--than whatever else we've taken in all week? Is that fair? Is it possible? (Could Beth Moore even live up to that?)

John Eldredge makes it clear: We come to church to fellowship with other believers and to commune with and learn how to love Jesus. We come because we are not autonomous, disconnected people who can pick whatever's most interesting, as if going to church were just another channel on the tube, another bookmark taking you to another distant website. Instead, we are part of a body. And you can't take that lightly. Not just the larger body, but the local one to which you have been called--even if it has seemed dull lately. We stand or fall as a body. We reap what we sow as a body. God's reasons for church attendance do not include being over-stimulated by exciting sermons. If you've read much of the Bible, you know the excitement is knowing God and having a changed life. It's not about the reading experience. Same with sermons.

We need to love our pastor(s). Pray for him. And be thankful for him, whatever his weaknesses. The gospel ministry is no more about impressing people with deep insights or flowery oratory than marriage is about non-stop passion, or a career fulfilling and perfect every single day. Pastors are given to the church to teach us and equip us for ministry. Not to impress us with their education, brilliant rhetoric, or insightful commentary on the events of the day. Often such concerns have more to do with entertainment than sanctification. Consider them blessings when they come, but do not expect the preacher to be more entertaining--or even more insightful--than everything else out there. No one is that good all the time. Not in an information age.

And enjoy the wealth of information at your fingertips--but don't get so saturated in the ubiquitous media that you lose touch with relationships. What matters in life is the people, the ones you know well, and the ones you fellowship with across the aisle. Church is about building your life, your character, and your relationships, both with people, and with Christ. Go there, expect Him to hear your worship and to touch your life (whether you realize it or not) and be blessed. We would all be wise to give our pastors a break. Stop expecting them to dazzle us with profundities. Sometimes the simplest and shortest message is the one you most need to hear.

Saturday, January 28, 2006

Since You Asked...

Okay, so no one asked. But that's me in the 'photo.' In 1997 I was driving to my job as an English teacher (grades were due!) and was rear-ended by a cement truck. I was stopped for a turn, he was going 50 (I had passed him previously). I was out for half an hour, then woke to paramedics telling me great news: "You won't be going to work today. You've been in an accident."

For some reason that was funny. "All right! Rescue 911!" (I actually said that. You know, Boy Scouts train for years for this sort of thing--now it was my turn.) Soon I was strapped to a board, clamped into a cervical collar, and loaded onto a helicopter. I was sad I couldn't see Houston as we flew to Hermann Hospital (where Dr. Red Duke pioneered the use of helicopters for emergency transport).

Things continued to be funny in various ways, but the pain became unbearable. Long story short, I had--as both my nurse mother and medical student brother suggested--a subdural (Latin for beneath the skull) hematoma (L. for bloody mess). It's visible in the picture--the pool of blood collecting around the skull between 9 and 11 o'clock. You can also see the wavy center line that becomes straight in the smaller apres-surgery film at right (you can also see staples and other hardware I care not to explain here). The hematoma caused increasing numbness and interesting but mild paralysis on my left until surgery, three weeks after the wreck. Two weeks more and I was back at work. (See also the staples in the bottom photo--too bad they were gone by the time I returned to the high school. The kids would have loved that.)

In the end, the whole experience was a blessing. I found it fascinating and even fun in ways (I've always loved being on stage), and I knew it was an adventure I would be talking about for years. I felt sorry for my family and friends--some of whom suffered a terrible fright when the hospital--20 miles and a dozen hospitals away, a place for only the worst trauma cases--called and, thanks to privacy laws, would say only that I had been in an accident "and he's talking." I felt pretty good, all things considered, and was dismissed the next day. (Later, another hospital discovered the hematoma my loved ones had speculated about from day one.)

The greatest thing was realizing in a new way, that even when I was not driving defensively (I never saw it coming--one minute I'm waiting to turn, the next I'm talking to the paramedics), God was watching out for me, defending me and protecting me. Seeing the car in a junk yard later that week was remarkable too. It had been rear-ended, pushed into the next lane and hit head-on by another car doing 50-something, then crumpled underneath the massive cement truck the way bulls climb over each other in a pen. Seeing the car was like whittling on your own coffin. But it was touching too, and all these pictures are actually part of an album I put together. (Here I raise my Ebeneezer, RB.)

The whole thing was special because God just loved me and took care of me and blessed me every sweet day between February 24 and April 1, 1997.

There is no adventure like walking with the Master. Amen? But it means walking through the storm, standing up to enemies and emporers, and carrying that cross up the long road to the Hill of the Skull. And it's sweet fellowship with the Master. Can you imagine that--joining Him, walking by His side? Can you imagine the privilege of suffering with Him? Of being asked to take part in the fellowship of His sufferings? Now that's sweet fellowship.

Thursday, January 26, 2006

Why Democracy?--Question 2 from Bob A., age 18

Bob A., previously introduced as "Johnny Public," poses the following multi-farious question. Please help me assemble some sort of answer. (Rome wasn't built in a day, and an Amish barn-raising takes the whole town, and I can't reassemble the cathedral that is Western Civilization alone.) I've edited this a little, but left it mostly hairy and complex. In response to my asking what could be better than democracy, Bob writes:

There is monarchy, which history has shown is far less cruel than democracy. prior to world war one, no states were democratic, with a few exceptions such as athens, the roman republic, the u. s., and the french republics. after that, most states have been democratic, and there has been a tremendus increase in taxation, inflation, (real) interest rates, legistlation, ideological war and genocide, and immorality. democracy has been the fountain head of every form of socialism, notably that of nazi germany and soviet russia, not to mention the roman empire. the democratic revolution of france was also particularly brutal. this is consistent with the theory of government.

kings have a perpetual monopoly on the ability to plunder and loot their realm, and can pass that along to their children, so they have an incentive to preserve the value of their rule and not engage in reckless behavior such as excessive taxation and war. democratic rulers have exactly the opposite incentive. in order to be relected, politicians must engage in redistributing wealth, ideological war, useless legislation, and whatever else the voters want (or that they can dupe them into thinking they want). in other words, the incentive of politicians is to loot the country as quickly as possible, because what they don't loot now, they won't be able to in the future. the other alternative, which i think best, is anarchy (that is, the lack of a state). this in various degrees has worked in ancient america, ancient iceland, and modern somalia. the most notable example is ancient ireland.

in theory, though, the state is simply unnecessary, because it provides no service which couldn't be provided more efficiently by the free market. it is a law of economics that monopolies are never more efficient than competing companies. utilitarian arguments are morally flawed if they violate natural principles of justice.

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Question from Young John Q. Public.

I know a precocious student of 16 whom I will call "Johnny." He gave me permission to post a question he e-mailed me--because I promised that I had smart friends who would like to help. And here's the thing: Johnny asks huge, earth-shaking sorts of questions that require answers that may be beyond me. If you can help, please leave Johnny your thoughtful comments. (And be nice!)

hello. i think that the biggest problem at the moment is the state. speaking of which, why do you support the constitution? why does anyone have the right to compel others to obey a document they've never signed or consented to?

Sunday, January 22, 2006

Movie Review: 'End of the Spear'--90

Great movie--I say that without hesitation. This won't be like the Left Behind movie (no offense) whose production company was sued by Tim LaHaye for making a crummy film.* I think this movie is well-made and one of which the Christian community can be proud.

The story is powerful. Here's how Al Mohler introduces it:

The End of the Spear is a retelling of the story of the martyrdom of missionaries Nate Saint, Jim Elliot, Peter Fleming, Roger Youderian, and Ed McCully by Waodani tribesmen in Ecuador in 1956 -- and many Christians have been eagerly awaiting the film's release.

This is one of the classic narratives of Christian missions. Eventually, the widows of these five missionaries led the majority of the Waodani to faith in Christ, ending decades of tribal killings. Steve Saint, the son of Nate Saint, maintains a ministry among the Waodani even now, after having been "adopted" by Mincaye, the very tribesman who killed his father.

The story of the five missionary martyrs and their families has been recounted in several books and films -- most famously Elisabeth Elliot's two books, Shadow of the Almighty and Through Gates of Splendor. Generations of young evangelicals have drawn courage and inspiration from these testimonies, and the larger story of the evangelization of the Waodani people.

Again, great film. I liked the score, the sweeping shots of the jungle from the air (filmed in Panama), the characterization of the tribal people (though as in every movie, they were too fat to fool anyone who ever actually lived in the jungle eating speared monkeys. The male actors, more Spanish than Indian, had obviously been shaving very closely to look more authentic--but I just kept seeing those thick Basim whiskers and wondering when and where and how and why they shaved every morning). One great element was the portrayal of various relationships, especially between Nate Saint and his son, and between Mincaye and other members of the tribe as they wrestle with how to handle the outsiders.

My criticisms were few: (1) The film made it appear that the widowed missionary wives just naturally moved in with the Indians who speared their husbands, as if they were all neighbors and the whole thing some sort of misunderstanding. The film does show the Indians arguing privately about killing the women too, but there's no sense of how terrified these women must have been, and how difficult a choice it must have been for them. There is little shown of the bitterness and hostility some of the women must have struggled with. I realize they were missionaries--but they were human too. Moving in with and loving those people was at least as heroic and as remarkable as what their husbands had done. After 50 years, isn't it still the courage and self-less love of those women that inspires us all? And isn't that what finally reached the warring tribesmen? Yet the film slips past this amazing, agonizing, soul-searching as if it were no decision at all.

(2) I know from an interview I watched that Steve Saint practically grew up with the tribe--or spent several years living among them anyway. In the movie, it seems he's among them for at most six or eight weeks before returning to the States--where he will remain for forty years. Steve had learned their ways and established meaningful roots among the tribe that made it easier for him to bring his own family to Ecuador years later, but that was not clear.

(3) Finally, as an adult Steve learns who killed his father. In the movie he is handed a spear and he shouts and acts as if he will kill the man. In reality, I am sure--without verifying it--that did not happen. When a man has lived among a people as missionary, always knowing that the men of the tribe had killed the men of his "tribe," he has put away the sword long ago. The scene was written for cinematic effect, but seemed exaggerated to me. The same could have been accomplished had he held the spear, had a brief dark look in his eyes, and through two or three flashbacks remembered the times as a child when he was the most hurt and angry over the death. When the flashbacks end, he breaks the spear over his knee. "End of the spear," he says, or something a bit more subtle. But as it is, seeing the missionary act as he does in the film was just weird to me.

(4) Chad Allen was cast as Nate Saint and as Steve Saint. That was odd too--the boy grows up and magically turns into his father. This was made more complicated by the fact that the tribal people did not appear to have aged at all. Instead of aging them, the director showed us that forty years had passed by covering them in pancake makeup. But there's a bigger problem with Chad Allen. You should see the movie anyway; pay the money and feel good about it. But for a little more on the Chad Allen controversy, click on Al Mohler.

*(Such action is not very charitable, but consider--an author can sell movie rights to any of a flock of suitors. They'll pay an initial cost, then a percentage of profits. A bad film not only hurts the writer's credibility, but can cost him a great deal of what he might have made had he sold his rights to someone else. But then, there's caveat emptor.)

Basim and Smelly Bloggers

I know ya'll know this--but I wanted to officially welcome Basim (back?) to the blogosphere. Basim is actually the second stinky blogger whom I can claim to have smelled. I've seen lots of others--thanks to y'all posting photos--but Dennis and Basim are unique: the only bloggers I've met face-to-face, "seen, touched, and handled." And smelled. Not that I can describe the scent. But its definitely something you can't get on the internet, yet (Hallelujah). Oh--and I met Kelly years ago--but she says the blog is Carter's.

Welcome Basim.

Saturday, January 21, 2006

Do you Believe in Big Government?...

. . . Big enough to take your house away? Not only did patriots build this nation (and a few others) on a commitment to the sanctity of private property--but Marx called private property the original sin that caused all our modern woes. (Marx's Eden was primitive collectivism, his fall was the advent of private property, and his redemption the wholesale destruction of private commerce and the bourgeosie--you and me--in favor of an all-powerful State.)

Personally, I prefer a government that respects private property, taking it only for an essential public purpose, like schools, roads, hospitals. Not Wal-Marts. What the Supreme Court did this summer was apalling. I have written about it previously. But I like what's going on outside the New Hampshire home of David Souter. Just wish they'd launch similar actions at the homes of the other four justices who think the government should be able to take your property any time it wants to redecorate, the same way my wife shifts chairs and sofas around. The city wants you out and a strip center in? Who can stop them now? (Of course--sensible states like Texas have already passed their own laws limiting this ridiculous power.) Anyway, they're making progress with the Souter action.

An interesting point: a critic says you just don't go around attacking a Justice because you disagree with the decision. But this is no attack. It's just a run-of-the-mill condemnation action, you know? I'm with the activist, who says his action is in the tradition of the Boston Tea Party. I agree. The decision is way outta' line.

Insulating Souter from the results of his decision puts me in mind of another book on the Wish List: Do as I Say, (Not as I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy. The author explains that when conservatives are hypocrites--which they are often--they hurt themselves and their families. But when liberals are hypocrites what happens? They make more money, they drive better cars, they pay less taxes, they hire competent workers regardless of race--in other words, they benefit themselves. Liberal hypocrisy is actually good for you.... and good for Souter if he can keep his house.

Friday, January 20, 2006

The Chocolate City.

"End of the Spear" Opens Today


I'm hearing good things about this incredible true story of murdered missionaries and the families that never gave up on the savage Ecuadoran tribe. (Jim Elliott, husband of Elizabeth Elliott, was among the dead.)

Cal Thomas reviews the film here.

Remember, opening weekend is critical in the movie business....

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

You've got to read Nancy Pearcey.

Pearcey Report

Francis Schaeffer meets Matt Drudge.

Saturday, January 14, 2006

Les Miserables is Great Literature, (or 'the Phantom of the Opera,' This Ain't).

Surfing the net with the kids, we stumbled across a bit of news. After twenty years on stages in London, Paris, Tokyo, New York, New Orleans--and touring companies throughout the nations, Cameron Macintosh has decided to take the musical production to the movies. That's great news. I'm sure I'll disagree with various casting, editing, and staging decisions. But right now the kids are watching the video of the "concert" which is costumed but generally unstaged. They are so fascinated. I'd love to be able to show them a movie.

What I haven't written about is how much I love this book. It is my favorite novel--and I love quite a few. But this one stands alone. Not for its poetry, nor its concise prose (I'm not a big fan of the 50-page essays on the battle of Waterloo, for example, or the fact that you meet the main character on page 60.) But if you are patient and take the book for what it is, remembering the French Romantic context, the saga will get into your blood.

I can explain what I like about Victor Hugo's master- piece in simple terms. It's the plot: Great heroes, great villains, and an amazing story of redemption. Les Miserables is a parable: the amazing story of powerful figures who give all that they have to rescue wretched lives who can give them nothing in return.

Consider:

1. Jean Valjean's misery begins when he is imprisoned for 19 years after stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister's starving children.
2. When Valjean is released a hardened criminal, he robs the first person to give him a room for the night, a priest. The next day he is caught with the priest's table silver, but the priest insists it was a gift--and complains that Valjean "forgot" the priest's huge silver candlesticks and shoves them into the man's bag (more than a few of the first 100 pages are spent explaining how generous the priest is, keeping to himself only two prized possessions--his candlesticks). After the gendarmes leave, the priest insists: "I have bought your soul for God." Soon Valjean meets Christ.
3. Eight years later, Valjean is a rich inventor-mayor, successful and living under an assumed name, when in plain view of a police inspector he knows from days in prison, Valjean lifts a huge cart off a man who has been crushed by its weight. In doing so, he risks not only extraordinary physical injury, but also "blowing his cover" by allowing the inspector to discover the mayor's unmatched physical strength. Indeed the inspector confronts the mayor, insisting no one he has ever known could do what the mayor did--except an unnaturally-strong fugitive who long ago broke parole and disappeared.
4. When the inspector explains to the mayor that he has finally found the missing Valjean and the man will be returned to prison in a matter of days, the real Valjean--after much soul-searching--reveals his true identity as ex-con 24601, thus giving up his wealth and position to prevent the imprisonment of a man he is sure is probably a no-account criminal anyway.
5. Valjean, now on the run, slows down long enough to rescue Cosette, the suffering child of Fantine--formerly a worker in Valjean's factory. Valjean will spend the next eight years raising her as his own, an anchor that frequently brings him close to being re-arrested.
6. Valjean stumbles across student-rebels who have located a spy, Valjean's old nemesis, the inspector Javert. Valjean convinces the students to release Javert into his hands, and he subsequently releases Javert, proving his own integrity once again, much to the distress of Javert.
7. When Cosette falls in love for a student in Paris named Marius, Valjean is filled with an irrational hatred. Cosette has become all that Valjean loves in the world, and he can't imagine sharing her with anyone. Nevertheless, when Marius is injured at the barricades, Valjean--a man of extraordinary physical strength--takes Marius on his back and climbs with him into the famous Paris underground. Thus carrying his 'enemy,' Valjean travels miles across the city in the dark, wet underground. At one point, he is followed by someone he thinks is the police inspector, Javert. But Valjean presses on through water so deep his lips are submerged and he can breathe only through his nose. Finally, he comes out on the other side of town, by now praying for the life of Marius.

God gives all He has to rescue those who can give Him nothing in return. Les Miserables is an extended metaphor: a parable of redemption.

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Thoughts on Dating & Courtship.

Many of you have read this before--and I didn't write it. But it's very good. This has little to do with western culture, but "e" just says it so well--in that elliptical, stream-of-conscious way of hers..... (...) ;-)

e said...

my momma says..."love isn't enough...if you can live without that person...then you should...if you can't...then don't"...i remember feeling like her...like there wasn't a person in the world who would really love me for everything that i am (and everything that i'm not)...the pretty parts and the not so pretty parts...and that was when i realized that that longing was too big for any man to fill...and it would have been too much...and he would have ended up not being enough for me...no matter who he was...so i turned to jesus...and he proved sufficient beyond my wildest dreams...he filled me up so full i started spilling on all of my friends...and then i met someone recently...who is totally imperfect...sweet as all get out...and just enough...because i'm not looking for him to do god's job in my heart...if i had not come to that place before i met him...he would be just like everyone else i ever dated...but he isn't a necessity...i didn't need someone to validate me or make me complete...he is this gift i get to open and discover...he's a man...he's the icing on the cake...but if i hadn't let jesus for the last 2 years meet me in my lonely places...the abandoned places...the places like this girl you love is experiencing right now...then i am confident that robb wouldn't have been enough...and it wouldn't have been his fault...if you really want to love her well... encourage her to be in that place with jesus...and let him love her...because the love she needs is more than you have to give...no matter how amazing you are...or how much you love her...he is more amazing...and his love is more perfect than yours...you never know...he may wrap her up and give her to you...

Props to E and J.H.

Monday, January 09, 2006

Alito's First Day

Elsewhere I posted comments about Alito's confirmation hearings--and the 1960s. . . .

Sunday, January 08, 2006

Culture-lite.

What do I have in common with C.S. Lewis, Louisa May Alcott and Madeleine L'Engle?
An interest in literature with Christian themes? No, silly. A birthday, what else? (I missed Jonathan Swift's by one day--299 years and one day.)

Click here to see who has your birthday.

(And happy 109th today, Paw Paw!)

Thursday, January 05, 2006

Can Western Civilization Survive?

The following article is excellent--and inspired the new blog title. It's written by a prescient Canadian who explores what many believe is the greatest threat to the survival of Western Civilization. Think it's collapse is impossible? By one objective measure we may be already on the way . . . .

The article is long--but it is worth some time. In fact, it's worth reading twice.

Read it or print and read later.

Wednesday, January 04, 2006

Quiz Yourself on Recent Movements--and a Great Book.

(This is a review I wrote last year.)

Guess Who Entered the Human Rights Campaign? A Review of Freeing God’s Children: The Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights, by Allen D. Hertzke. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.

TRUE OR FALSE?

October, 2000. In support of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, Bill Bennett gives a speech in a Senate caucus room and the next speaker reads a supportive statement from Gloria Steinem. One observer notes, “Bill Bennett and Gloria Steinem and Chuck Colson and Gloria Feldt are all saying the same thing.”

Good Friday, 2001. Michael Horowitz, Republican think tank director, and Joe Madison, African American radio personality, chain themselves to a fence at the Sudanese embassy in Washington (to protest that regime’s support of a growing slave trade) and are arrested, then call on Johnnie Cochran to defend Horowitz, and Ken Starr to defend Madison. Fearing publicity, prosecutors drop the charges.

Late in 2000. Pope John Paul II, U2’s Bono, and Pat Robertson join the campaign to provide debt relief to impoverished third-world countries. “Tightfisted Republican Senator” Phil Gramm threatens to filibuster the legislation. Pat Robertson asks viewers of the 700 Club to contact Gramm and demand he remove his hold on the legislation. Gramm promptly does just that.

Also in 2001. Kweisi Mfume and Al Sharpton join Jesse Helms, Henry Hyde, Dick Armey, and various evangelical leaders in calling for tough U.S. action against the NIF of northern Sudan.

Spring of 2003. Sudan violates its cease-fire agreement, causing the Midland Ministerial Alliance to deliver a letter to the Sudanese embassy under the letterhead “Hometown of President and First Lady Laura Bush.” The letter explains that the group has been documenting NIF atrocities for five years and “flouting of the law will have devastating consequences for the regime.” The letter gets the attention of the government of Sudan.

May, 2002. New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof calls evangelicals the nation’s “newest internationalists,” saving lives “in some of the most forgotten parts of the world.” Some go so far as to label evangelicals the “foreign-policy conscience of conservatism,” rescuing Republican foreign policy from a takeover by big business.

* * *

All of the above statements are true. Surprised? If these unlikely alliances are news to you, you are not alone. This remarkable human rights movement has been all but ignored by the media. But the astonishing lack of coverage by the press has at least served to avoid giving away the ending of Allen Herztke’s Freeing God’s Children: the Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights. This movement has martialed the efforts of thousands of people all over the United States: feminists, Jews, Episcopals, Catholics, African American activists, modern-day abolitionists, and organizations as diverse as NOW, Amnesty International, the Campaign for Tibet, and the Southern Baptist Convention. Hertzke’s book tells the story of these unlikely alliances. As he notes, Washington is known for strange bedfellows (a phrase Hertzke avoids for much of the book) but Washington has rarely seen such pervasive alliances of generally adverse parties.

Freeing God’s Children is Hertzke’s response to a challenge put to him seven years ago by Michael Horowitz, senior director at the Hudson Institute and (as Hertzke describes him) a catalyst for this new human rights movement. Horowitz, formerly of the Reagan White House, challenged Hertzke, professor of political science and director of Religious Studies at the University of Oklahoma, to chronicle the nascent movement by diverse Americans to press human rights around the world. That movement has revolutionized U.S. foreign policy and brought extraordinary changes to the conditions of suffering peoples the world over.

Hertzke became a “participant observer” in January, 1998. He admits the obvious bias such involvement might create, but would have it no other way. Where outsiders (myself included) have reported on this movement by describing one of its parts, like the blind prophets who touch only part of the elephant, Hertzke comprehends the whole animal, and his striking book paints the most only complete picture available. Hertzke’s insider status also lends his writing greater immediacy. Indeed, his reports of various backroom meetings read like official minutes—or at least the pithy notes of one in attendance. A turn to the end notes confirms he was there. This first-person narrative elevates an already good story to the status of a thinking man’s page-turner.

The professor’s book, marketed for a general audience, is scholarly nonetheless. Hertzke interviewed some 50 individuals, many on multiple occasions, and he fills the book (and almost a thousand end notes) with a range of facts and sources that is staggering. The eight chapters average over 120 notes each. (A word to the publisher: chapter four’s notes are mis-numbered between nn.56 and 85.) The book also includes an index and various tables, graphs, and photos. I imagine Hertzke would have us read his book as a work of political science, one providing both context for and analysis of a remarkable movement. But this book reads first and foremost as the story of a movement. And that is as it should be. It is the story that will commend this book to readers of the world, not the cogent analysis. The narrative is remarkable, telling the story of an unusual coalition of liberals and conservatives, passionate people who managed to put aside deeply felt animosities to fight for the freedoms and the lives of thousands. In a few short years, that fight has seen unprecedented success, and Hertzke’s meticulous research documents that story in fascinating detail.

The story begins in the late 1980s as the fall of Soviet Communism combined with other factors to increase religious persecution around the world. It ends (for Hertzke’s purposes) in 2004 with the better-late-than-never enforcement of the Trafficking Victims Act (enacted in 2000), leading to the freeing of thousands of international sex slaves. As he tells the story, Hertzke examines the movement in the context of political theory. And such analysis is warranted and insightful. But I could not shake the feeling that what really excited the writer was the movement itself, not the implications such a movement has for the movement theory crowd. When Hertzke writes—albeit briefly—to his peers in political science circles, it is distracting. It’s not that the analysis is uninteresting or without merit. It’s simply so much less interesting than the epic saga documented in the larger work.

Hertzke’s thesis is that the movement is making a difference by waging war over human rights abuses that would otherwise have been ignored. As he puts it, the movement “is filling a void in human rights advocacy, raising issues previously slighted—or insufficiently pressed—by secular groups, the prestige press, and the foreign policy establishment.” Hertzke supports this argument with compelling evidence, illustrating that each of the movement’s campaigns have included three hallmarks: (1) a massive and slighted humanitarian tragedy, (2) engagement by the faith-based movement in alliance with others, and (3) pressure on the U.S. government to exercise more international leadership to stem abuses. These efforts have resulted in tough congressional legislation, robust executive action, and new international cooperation.

The book opens by explaining that recent years have seen a global resurgence of religion. This growth has touched all faiths, though Christianity may have grown the most. In fact, while Christianity is on the decline in Western Europe, it has grown so much around the world that it can no longer be described as a “white man’s religion.” The majority of the world’s Christians, indeed, are females of color. In fact, Christianity is no longer even a western religion. (Hertzke cites sources estimating that 70 percent of evangelicals now live in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.) But this return to religion, particularly a religion that teaches the equality of all in the eyes of God, presents a threat to the despots of the world. Believing that Christian churches helped topple Soviet Communism, China announced in 1992 through its state-run press: “If China does not want such a scene to be repeated in its land, it must strangle this baby while it is still in the manger.” Dozens of other nations soon joined China in bloody attempts to eradicate unwanted religions, and by 2000 it was estimated that “36 percent of the world’s population live in places where religious freedom is fundamentally violated.”

Enter Michael Horowitz, Nina Shea, Rabbi David Saperstein, the New York Times’ Abe Rosenthal, and “a cohort of fervent members of Congress,” including Chris Smith (R-NJ), Frank Wolf (R-VA), Tony Hall (D-OH), in the House and Joseph Lieberman (D-CT), Don Nickles (R-OK), and Sam Brownback (R-KS) in the Senate. These and a coalition of dozens of Jewish and Christian organizations and hundreds of committed men and women drafted and supported competing bills. But the coalition faced powerful opposition. Democrats and many in the human rights establishment were afraid to support a bill backed by such prominent evangelical leaders as Charles Colson and James Dobson. And Republican support was spotty because so-called “free-trade Republicans” could not stomach the threatened removal of non-humanitarian aid from nations deemed the worst persecutors. Worse yet, the Clinton White House promised to veto either bill. Then it happened: with the end of the 1998 Congressional season approaching and both bills doomed to failure, coalition members compromised, quickly amending, then solidly supporting one bill. Two months later, the International Religious Freedom Act passed both houses unanimously and was signed into law by President Clinton.

The International Religious Freedom Act radically altered the landscape for U.S foreign policy. It requires the President to address violations of religious freedom before engaging violating nations in more diplomatic activities, and it requires the State Department to annually collect and publish a mountain of data on the status of religious freedom in every foreign country. Presidents from both parties have proven reluctant to do either, and in the hands of an unwilling administration, both efforts might be compromised. But the law’s master stroke was the creation of an independent and bi-partisan commission. The commission makes its own report and makes policy recommendations to the president. Unfettered by concerns about diplomacy and politics, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has done remarkable work since its inception in 1998. The story of the Commission and of the law that created it is amazing indeed, and Hertzke devotes half his book to that process.

But there’s more. When the International Religious Freedom Act was passed, a huge coalition of willing workers was left in its wake. Many of these were motivated by a sense of religious calling, and though new to human rights advocacy were ready to do more. So Horowitz and others took the reins of the movement and pointed it at Sudan, where troops have been capturing and selling human slaves for years, a profitable alternative to their primary business of genocide. I recently mentioned the Sudanese slave market to my otherwise well-informed lawyer-colleagues. Not only had they heard nothing about the scourge of modern slavery, they were so skeptical about its existence, they insisted on seeing Hertzke’s book for themselves. Fortunately, Freeing God’s Children includes dozens of photos, and one shows Christian Solidarity International’s John Eibner purchasing slaves in Sudan so his organization might set them free.

Hertzke offers interesting explanations for the lack of press coverage generated by these struggles. Many in the press have not adjusted to new realities following the fall of Soviet Communism, and when politically liberal Jews, conservative evangelicals, and Catholics joined together to fight international human rights abuses, the press was unwilling to report on alliances it could not see through cold-war lenses. Others in the press may not yet understand the role religion plays in international conflicts, and many disregard all religious motives as either part of the problem or as simply irrelevant. A more cynical theory says of the press corps that when human rights are violated, it’s not news unless the oppressor is white. For some in the media, oppression by non-whites is less evil somehow, more tolerable because it is being done not by some colonizing empire, but by the locals, noble savages that they are. Whether Hertzke shares this view of the press is not clear, but the evidence supporting such a conclusion is persuasive.

The new religiously-motivated human rights coalition sees oppression differently. Not only did the coalition succeed in getting the Sudan Peace Act passed, but it kept pressure on the Sudanese government, forcing it to maintain its cease fire—thus ending a 20-year civil war and the slaughter of millions of Southern Sudanese. In addition to its efforts in Sudan, what began as a battle to end international religious persecution has since turned the world’s attention to North Korean atrocities, to international sex slavery, resulting in the passage of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, to international debt relief, relieving the burden on impoverished third-world countries, and to the domestic plague of prison rape, resulting in the Prison Rape Elimination Act. At each stop along the way, new members flocked to the coalition and its rapid growth continued.

This work is comprehensive. As a scholar, Hertzke is content to take his time, to examine and catalog each fact. But somewhere along the way, the tiles recede and an extraordinary mosaic appears. The big picture here is astounding, as so many diverse groups put their differences aside to fight for suffering people they will never meet. And the largest of these groups is composed of American evangelicals, a body few associate with global human rights. This is a case of truth being stranger, or more miraculous, than fiction. Given the opposition this movement has repeatedly faced, its many successes have often been seen as nothing short of providential. Hertzke shares such a view, and it lends his writing an affectionate tone, making even the minutiae compelling. In this story, it is not the devil, but God who is in the details.

This book is one-of-a-kind, the sine qua non on the subject. Without it, the uninitiated cannot fully comprehend current human rights struggles. Freeing God’s Children is a systematic chronicle of a profound and effective movement. This book is as deep as Washington politics gets, and as broad as any spy thriller, taking the reader to Burma, Israel, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran, Pakistan, Tiananmen Square, and dozens of other far-flung locales, along with one extraordinary stop in Midland, Texas. Hertzke’s book is an attempt to sing an epic song. Hertzke sings it well. But unlike epics of old, this is the tale of not one but dozens of previously unsung heroes, people of every political and religious persuasion, who have shown amazing tenacity in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Where most would shrug and say, “Oh, well, I tried,” the men and women in these pages seem incapable of giving up.

No book on human rights would be complete without tales of suffering victims, and this one includes dozens. But the part of me that stares at car accidents wanted to read more, though such is not Hertzke’s purpose. (Helpfully, he names other books filled with such accounts—stories that must be told if Americans are to continue to fight for victims a world away). But the book ends with a tale of one life redeemed. Laneh, a child of six, was rescued from sexual slavery in a Cambodian brothel. Her life has been changed forever. This story is part of a larger essay on the future of the movement, and is some of the best writing in the book. Hertzke enjoys the material and the book ends with a tone and a tale that—after the 300 pages that precede it—is hopeful, cathartic, moving. The dispassionate scholar has finally unpacked his bags, carefully set out the contents, and put down his outline. Hertzke ends where most of his subjects have been for a decade, working and writing from the heart.

* * *

If you have read this far, congratulations (and thanks!). The book is available here--where I officially donated this review to Amazon.com. You know how badly they need a little pro bono reviewing....

Monday, January 02, 2006

Other Bests of 2005


1. Best fiction book: KITE RUNNER.
2. Best new hobby: BLOGGING.
3. Best new way to waste time: SEE #2.
4. Best trip: San Francisco and surrounding.
5. Most inspiring moment in nature: Being surrounded by GIANT SEQUOIAS, trees over 300 feet tall (30 stories) and 1,500 to 2,000 years old.
6. Most expensive problem: a tort reform measure that I agree with--but it killed my job, and those of at least 200 buddies of mine.... (It was SO fun!)
7. Favorite indoor family times: Watching Little House on the Prairie on DVD. We're on season five, and the kids LOVE it. We love it for the great, often expressly Biblical messages.
8. Professional disappointment: Despite a few powerful connections in D.C., we failed to get a review published that I had written on a very serious and important book, Freeing God's Children. I had warm e-mail exchanges with editors at National Review, Weekly Standard, Human Events, etc., but the review window had passed. (Maybe I'll post it, now that there's #2....) (Oh, and there's that job hunting thing.)
9. Biggest prayer request for myself: to be a GOOD STEWARD. Those are the words, and it encompasses a lot. But it's generally a concern about finances.
10. Most visible answered prayer: more sweetness on the home front.
11. Most interesting Christmas gift: at present, the huge basketball goal which I just assembled myself (8.9 billable hours), complete with 153 moving parts, a spring-loaded rim, a fiberglass backboard, and height adjustments from 7.5' to 10'. (But this stack of books is awesome, too!!)
12. Gift that almost got a squeal out of me: a book from Dennis--I'd been hunting for it for over a year--STIFF: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, by Mary Roach.
13. Hank Hill problem: my lawn was lush and green and splendorific, till the fungus got to it.
14. Most painful thing of 2005: indifference, what else?
15. Favorite past-time of 2005: from the NL playoffs on, the kids and I played so much baseball. It's been a blast. (But it's all basketball now.)
16. Chronic health problem: ALLERGIES. Ask your doctor about Claritin. (I saw his stash there next to his passport.) Ol' Loratadine used to be a miracle drug, but not so much anymore.
17. Greatest blessing that didn't happen: We were unable to locate anyone with whom to share our home after the massive Katrina evacuations. We contacted three families, but it was not meant to be. One family had all their stuff sent over, we rearranged our lives, we moved out of the master bedroom so they could have their own bed and bath with privacy, but they got nervous and moved into a hotel before we ever met.

Enough of listmania. Were I to sum up the year, I might give it a negative rating, overall. Maybe an 80 (when I was a teacher an '80' meant you got a 'B' but you probably didn't deserve it). I'm just too optimistic to go lower, not without a death in the family. But we have the hope of heaven, too. And that changes everything. Making the list above reminds me of a great many things I didn't like about 2005, and most of them are ongoing. They're no one's fault, really, just transitions, changes. God brings you to a new place and things can seem hard. And I guess I could wallow in it. (Wallow--you know that's a metaphor that makes the wallower a pig, a hog wallowing in the mud and loving it.) Anyway, I might complain, but when I look at 2005, it's not like a picture on a calendar. It's a window. When I look through that glass darkly, I'm reminded that every single tear, every little complaint I may have, is an opportunity to store up treasure in Heaven. And I can't complain about that at all. Heaven is real life. Heaven's your real home. And getting there, this life recedes the way a dream dies with the coming of the day. So, on balance, 'twas a fine year. Some earthly rewards, some heavenly. I'm brave enough to wish I had more of the heavenly. No--it's not brave. Just knowledge. The certainty of Heavenly rewards makes me want more. But that's another post. Still, one of my favorite books ever is Joni's Heaven: Your Real Home. That book can change your life. (Didn't reread it in 2005, but went to it again and again as a reference.)