Ethics: Annulment

I’ve always been a little bit skeptical about the concept of annulment. It honestly always sounded to me like just the Catholic version of divorce, and some anecdotal stories I’ve read reinforced that belief. But I also knew I had never given it much serious attention as a concept. Having recently read two columns on the subject, I thought we could talk about the ethicality this way of handling marriage termination.

Links:
Annulment (Wikipedia)
Catholic annulment (Wikipedia)
Annulment in the law (Expert Law)
Annulment Q&A (Catholic)
Annulment Q&A (Law)
Divorce (Catholic Encyclopedia)
Divorce in the civil jurisprudence (Catholic Encyclopedia)
Annulment based on fraud part 1, part 2 (Findlaw)

Casas Por Cristo

If your or your church has been thinking about a simple short-term mission trip, I have one for you. Casas Por Cristo is this really cool charity that facilitates American teams building houses for low income families in Juarez, Mexico. The trips normally take 3-4 days (depending on how many people you can bring) and cost a total of $4100 for materials for the 12-18 people you bring (so around $250-350 a person). If you register by April 10, Casas will reduce that by $500 to just $3600! They work through the local church in Juarez, and it’s pretty common for churches who do this once to keep sending groups every year after they first participate. So, for more information on how your youth group, men’s group, or church group could do something like this, visit GivingForALiving.com or call 1(800) 819-8014
.

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Reyes/Camacho Family----------------Vazquez/Pena Family

One of our listeners emailed me these pictures of the conditions in Juarez, where he used to live. The conditions are even more extreme than I knew yesterday! Pay attention to the "houses" you see in the backgrounds.

Various Current Events

EU moves to protect persecuted Christians (C Post)
Utah bill would criminalize illegal abortions (C Post)
Utah bill would criminalize illegal abortions (NYT)
From churchgoer to church arsonist (NYT)
Coffee party develops (NYT)
Obama supports schools that fire bad teachers (NYT)
Obama angers unions on school stance (Wash Post)
Camrys not in the recall also had problems (NYT)
Electronic billboards distraction (NYT)
How Milton Friedman saved Chile (WSJ)
Guns and the states (WSJ)
Family attempts suicide over global warming fears (Daily Mail)
It’s not too late to save “normal” (LAT)
Sex addiction divides mental health experts (LAT)
Give the Olympics a permanent home (NYT)
Peoria considers 4-day work week (AZR)
Matt Damon feels let down by Obama (NY Daily News)
Dems reach deal with Bunning (Politics Daily)
Illegal to be a Jew in Mass.? (Towhnall)
FDIC to test principal reduction vs. foreclosure (Wash Post)
Gun fans cheer Starbucks (Fox News)
Gun case presents quandary for SCOTUS (Wash Post)
New study links violence to video games (USA Today)
Islamic scholar issues anti-terror fatwa (BBC)
MA Senate ok’s new testing for elderly drivers (Boston Globe)
Toyota complaints after recall fix applied (LAT)
Fed proposes credit card penalty limits (USA Today)
Woman threw hot coffee at meter maid (Boston Globe)
Muslim woman refuses body scan at airport (London Times)
Gitmo releasee now Taliban commander (Fox News)
White teachers removed for mocking black heroes (CNS News)
Atheists swap porn for Bibles (CBS)
Pregnant bartender fired from strip club (JonathanTurley)
Jim Bunning: Why I took a stand (USA Today)

Wacky Wednesday--We Shouldn't Wait in Line

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Survival of the fittest is how we got here, not survival of the earliest to arrive.
~This sort of artificial equality is essentially unnatural.
~Only suckers wait in lines.
~Even people who otherwise might wait in lines don’t wait when there’s a merge lane, for instance. ~All kids know by nature that lines are a problem. Just look at how hard it is for them to do this.
~Unwillingness to wait in line stems primarily from diminished enthusiasm. Just think about it, the people who want it most should go first, not the people who arrived earliest because their lives are so dull they have that much free time.
~If lines are so important, why isn’t cutting them illegal?
~Some people are slow or inept or want to buy too much. Why should the rest of us have to wait for them?
~Line mentality is the same as tenure mentality. How’s that working for us?

Wacky Wednesday--It’s Good To Be Politically Correct

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Every culture has taboo subjects. It doesn’t necessarily matter what the taboos are, at least in the sense that it’s important for people to know that some things are off limits.
~This gives clear boundaries to our thoughts and our discussions.
~The notion that everything should be questioned or that every idea should be entertained might be fine for college students, but not for general society all the time, especially not for kids.
~Historically marginalized or oppressed people should not be held up to criticism and scorn.
~White, male, Christian culture is and long has been imperialistic, and you’ll notice they’re the ones complaining about this the loudest.
~Politeness is an essential social skill, and PC is just politeness in a multicultural context.
~We have a range of social taboos that most conservatives accept including against blasphemy, lewdness, and profanity. Why these and not other taboos?
~If we can use language as neutrally as possible so as to not demean and also so as to include people in the conversation without poisoning their identity from the outset, isn’t that a good thing? Isn’t that a Christian thing?
~Reducing people to stereotypes not only is unkind but it limits their ability to participate fully in society if such boundaries are allowed to persist.
~If current language use is a barrier to people treating others with dignity and as human beings, then forcing them into uncomfortable language use will also force them into uncomfortable and beneficial social attitudes and interactions.
~What we really are trying to do is to get people into the habit of talking like those who love the groups or categories they are discussing rather than like those who hate them by their identity.

Links:
Political Correctness (Wikipedia)

Theological Tuesday

~Brian Godawa: Word Pictures
~Jesus in the Garden: Obedience
~Are Christian bumper stickers a good idea?
~Should Christians listen to Dennis Prager?

Links:
Brian Godawa's website
Hollywood Worldviews by Brian Godawa

Ethics: Strategic Mortgage Default Revisited

We recently did a show on the subject of the ethics of abandoning a home because your mortgage is so much greater than the equity of the house. My view was clear and adamant that doing this out of financial opportunity rather than out of necessity is morally unacceptable because you made an agreement. But having read several articles on the subject recently, I wanted to talk about it some more with you and see whether this same stance is still appropriate.

Links:
Underwater, but will they leave the pool? (NYT)
Underwater and not walking away (Paper) (Brent White)
Citi to let distressed homeowners stay 6 months (USA Today)
No help in sight, more homeowners walk away (NYT)
Duplicity in mother of all mortgage walkaways (MSNBC)

Email exchange:
Below is a rather lengthy email conversation I've been having with a friend after last night's show. I decided to post it here instead of just in the comments section mostly because that would take too long (breaking it up into chunks small enough to post) and because I think it's probably interesting enough that I'd like you to see it more easily. So, here:

Andrew,
My schedule has changed so I haven't heard you as much lately. I happened to tune in tonight while you discussed the ethics of abandoning a house. I was really baffled by the conversation.

What I heard was something like this. "Well, you signed a contract with lots of caveats in it, so if you go with the caveats rather than paying for the house, why would that be wrong?" I would imagine in a world of non-Christians that would be a perfectly suitable approach. "Well, the bank approaches it that way, so why shouldn't I?" But from a Christian perspective, I don't even get the question.

Why do we sign contracts? Are we signing contracts to buy a house on the premise that it will make us better off financially and if it doesn't we're free to ditch it, or are we signing the contract on the premise that we'll pay for the house? And why are there caveats in contracts? Are they there because the bank wants to be nice? "Yeah, we know that it might be better for you to get out of this, so we'll give you options." Or are they giving you a disincentive to bail? Do you genuinely believe that contracts are complicated because the bank knows you might want out, or are they complicated because too many people fail to pay?

The person with whom you were speaking/agreeing said, "Of course, if you walk, you'll lose reputation and credit score" with which you agreed. I would think that this alone would answer the question. We are commanded to let our lights so shine before men that they would see our shrewd business practices in weaseling out of a contract that isn't in our favor and glorify ... oh, wait, that's not right. No, we are supposed to represent Christ. We are supposed to be people of integrity. What, for instance, is a "credit score"? It is a financial number that is used to quantify your economic integrity. "Can this guy be trusted?" A hit on a credit score (especially because we choose to default on a loan) is a blatant response: "No!"

Jesus told us to avoid swearing (no, not saying naughty words, but promising ... you know, like signing contracts and such) because we should be people of such integrity that when we say "Yes" we mean "yes". No one signs a house contract with the idea of "maybe". We are promising to pay. Shouldn't we let our "Yes" be "Yes"?

I cannot see a case where someone abandons a home, skips out on payments, stiffs a creditor, and we come away saying, "Now, that is a fine example of Christian virtue." Is abandoning a house moral? Yes, of course, as long as you define "moral" as " conforming to a standard of right behavior of the culture". But we're not held to that morality. We're held to something else. Even if it hurts.But, hey, that's just me.

Stan
http://birdsoftheair.blogspot.com/

Stan,

I like your insight about the credit score as reputation.

I also like your application of letting your light shine.

I don’t see you dealing here with the question of Arizona law specifically being designed to protect you in abandoning your mortgage. Nor do I see you dealing with the question of banks making predatory loans at 35:1 price to rent ratios and adjustable rate loans that depend on people being able to refinance them later as the price of the property goes up. I also don’t see any consideration of the sales approach that “your house is your best investment and will always go up in value.” If a bank loans you money on a commodity which it has a realistic expectation will be worth much less in the near future without warning you of its knowledge, is that still a loan you owe for or is that fraud? Is that predatory lending?

I’d also like to get your take on the question of whether the 15 or 30 year loan isn’t usurious and contrary to the concept of the year of release in Deuteronomy 15. We don’t allow people, for instance, to sell themselves into slavery precisely because we think that some (even voluntary) transactions are unacceptable with the concept of human dignity. Is a home mortgage in this same category? I don’t know, but let’s just say that at the moment I’m highly suspicious.

See, I think the Bible is very careful about restricting the rights and privileges of the wealthy (what is a bank?) against the ordinary citizen, especially the poor one. As a matter of fact, I think the best solution here would be that banks would allow people to walk away without having to foreclose (as Citi has recently started doing, even with letting people stay for a time and offering $1000 in relocation costs).

If the value of housing had simply gone up and up, we naturally wouldn’t be having this conversation. And certainly I’ve often said that people are foolish for believing that you can buy a car and it depreciates while you enjoy the benefit of using it whereas you can buy a house, enjoy it, and still make a profit. But that’s the sort of thinking banks have historically encouraged and profited from encouraging. It’s just not obvious to me that things are as simple as you say (or as I said six months ago, virtually identical to you) nor that banks are currently shouldering their fair share of the burden of the collapse in the real estate market.

By the way, your description of “stiffing a creditor” is fairly well-crafted loaded language. The loan is secured by the house, right? So the creditor in making the loan is saying, “you get the loan and repay it, or else I get your house.” He’s also making a sort of bargain in requiring this security as opposed to merely a promise. If I say to my son, “Do the dishes.” I expect him to do them. If I say to him, “Do the dishes or else you don’t get dinner,” and he says, “Well, I’m not hungry anyhow,” I can’t be all that surprised that he took a deal I offered him. Any time a deal is presented as a trade, the moral obligation is automatically lower than a deal presented merely as goodwill or honor.

I think your most compelling point is about whether we could ever look at someone who walked away from a mortgage electively (not in real need) and praise it as a great example of Christian virtue. I actually know someone who is considering precisely this so that he can relocate to a poor area of town to do ministry with the money he will save. I know someone else whose condo went from $120 K to $24 K (he still owes over $100K). He has bought a foreclosure and intends to just give back the keys to the condo. Now, is he being financially wise under the circumstances? Is he practicing the virtue of looking out for his own family? Or is he just a deadbeat who’s breaking a deal and ruining his Christian reputation? I know he has agonized over the question. Is the bank behaving Christianly if it refuses to negotiate down the loan? What if it tries to foreclose on a house when someone just can’t pay, especially under the ordinary circumstances of increasing prices? When Zaccheus came to know Christ, he gave away half his fortune and paid anyone he had cheated 4X what he took. Paul told Onesimus to return to his master, but he also told Philemon to be kind to his reunited slave. But Jesus was rebuking the Pharisees over the widow’s mite. He most certainly was not praising them for standing by and allowing her to be abused by their teachings about tithing. I worry that we have emphasized so much the idea of maintaining honor as a matter of pride that we are creating a situation which perpetrates financial abuse through moral leverage.

I strongly prefer a society where people pay their debts and honor their word, obviously. I also prefer a situation where the people who own their homes outright aren’t the ones who suffer most from their prior responsible behavior. (Remember that I actually own a home and rent our one here, so I’m speaking as a person most likely to be adversely affected by another round of devaluations.) But banks have essentially built on the personal pride aspect of home ownership developed over the 20th century even as they allowed and profited from pure housing speculation. When a speculator lets a house go because it’s financially foolish to keep it, that’s just business. When a homeowner has been trained to think of himself as a housing speculator (on his own house), suddenly he’s a cad for doing the same thing? Financial transactions always entail risk and they are made for the purpose of profit. Should homeowners not be allowed to cut their losses of equity already paid? Shouldn’t banks have been more careful to get enough down on the loan to make even a market collapse (to 15:1 for instance on value to rent) still a good deal for them? Who should take the brunt of the responsibility and the pain here? “Be a good Christian, just endure, it’s your cross to bear?” How sure are you that’s Biblical advice? Have homeowners been swindled? That’s a strong view to take, but if that were the conclusion, things start to look far less obvious.

The thing I’m getting at, Stan, is that this is significantly more complicated than you are saying. Although, again, I completely understand the impulse to reduce it to a simple moral prohibition since that’s what I thought as recently as a month ago. So, I don’t expect you to be persuaded necessarily. And I don’t expect myself to not be persuaded out of my current view. I may well be wrong. There’s certainly something compelling about the simplicity of your view. But there’s a lot more discussion that needs to happen beyond, “Don’t be a deadbeat. Keep your word.”

Thanks for the conversation and pushing me to think about this more. I will continue to do so, especially because I’m not sure about my own view and it does seem contrary to fairly clear traditional ideas.

May I post your comments on the website?

Andrew,

If my comments would be of value, feel free to post them on the website.

I do have a question. The question of predatory lending, the morality of banks, and all that keeps coming up. I wonder if we are allowed to determine what is genuinely ethical based on sinners, or are we supposed to determine what is ethical based on what is right? (By the way, no one is obligated to buy a home with 35:1 price-to-rent ratios and adjustable rate loans. We aren't obligated to buy a home at all.

I'm wondering the reverse question as well. If a bank wrote a loan with the reverse language in it -- "We may, at any time, choose to no longer fund your loan. If housing prices continue to rise and we determine that it would be more economically in our favor to foreclose on the house and resell it, we may. We will incur xxx penalties for doing so ..." -- how many people would sign that loan?

Okay, more than a question. #3: You said that if people did this (let's assume a lot of highly moral people saw it the way you are describing -- a wise and ethical move), it would have catastrophic effects on everyone. It's okay (ethical), though, if only small numbers do it?

Oh, and, hey, I have a question from ignorance. You may or may not know. When a house is funded for purchase, a bank pays a sum on behalf of the buyer for the house. Some money has changed hands. When I sold my condo in CA, their bank paid off my loan (and then some). So when a home buyer buys a house from a builder, for instance, the bank gives the builder the money on behalf of the buyer and then waits for the buyer to repay that loan. Now ... the house that originally cost $200k is now worth $100k and the buyer walks. The builder is holding $200k from the transaction. The bank can get $100k in the foreclosure. Doesn't the bank lose $100k? (I know, I know, there are payments and interest and all, but I'm just asking about where the money goes and who loses in a foreclosure.) It seems as if someone has to lose something somewhere. Who is it? (It seems like that should be part of the ethical question.)

I know the rules. No email conversations. I don't expect a reply. And that's good because I'll just assume I won! (I'm kidding.) I just can't see determining what is right from the evil that others do ("Is the bank behaving in a Christian manner?" No, of course not! Should I expect them to?) or solely based on what is economically wise. Oh, and thanks for the compliment. I pride myself on "fairly well-crafted loaded language" without going too overboard. ;)

(Oh, by the way. If we are talking about a bank like Citi who allows -- even encourages -- people to do so, it's another ball game.)

Stan,

Your first comment is a false dichotomy, again with loaded language. “Either learn from sinners or do what is right?” You’re trying to be cute, but it’s not so helpful.

Agreed that no one is obligated to buy a house in the first place, but we still say that some voluntary acts are still illegitimate. Or are you suddenly for gay marriage and prostitution?

The question of reversal is better put this way: How many banks would agree to loan a mortgage knowing that a borrower who saw his house decline far enough could simply walk away from it with only a credit score penalty as a consequence and the bank would get the home as collateral? I put it to you that this is precisely the deal every bank accepts when it makes a loan, and they know it. They’re just hoping that the prices won’t go down so much and that even if they do people will still pay nevertheless, just as borrowers are hoping they go up and they can continue to pay. How many buyers would have bought homes in 2005 (or refinanced them along the way) if they had any realistic expectation of losing 50% of the value over the next three years? 10-15%, sure. But 50%? I doubt anyone would have.

I agree with your concern about the collective effects being bad. But I also wonder how much farther housing prices could drop (along with people leaving ownership for rental) before the rental market really started to surge, thereby driving home buying back up. Such interactions are very complicated, and even I don’t pretend to grasp them all. It’s possible that a massive wave of walkaways wouldn’t even have much net effect over a few years, but again, I’m no expert. Then again, it’s not always good analysis to imagine what would happen if everyone did this. Kant isn’t a great guide in all cases. I, for instance, never buy a new car and I almost never buy new clothes. If everyone did either of these, the resale market for clothing or cars would eventually go away. So I’m clearly parasitic upon other people’s financial foolishness with clothes and cars. Does that make my thrift wrong?

Another wrinkle to all of this is the existence of mortgage insurance which compensates a lender in the case of a default, and it’s been my understanding that some banks aren’t willing to do some short sale deals precisely because of the availability of mortgage insurance. Also, I believe carrying homeowner’s insurance is another requirement for mortgages, precisely because the bank wants assurance that uncompensated destruction of the asset is not a likely outcome.

Absolutely the issue of who is losing money is a part of this equation. I’ve been working on the presumption that the bank is the primary loser. And the idea that they would seem to be taking all the loss on their side also bothers me. But so does the interest they charge and their overall pattern of seemingly usurious profit ($200,000 interest over 30 years for a $100,000 house makes me ill to consider).

Again, I want to reiterate that there is a nice clear visceral sense that if you can pay the debts you freely incurred, you should do so. I certainly share the gut instinct that the more financially secure someone is, the less justified they are in walking away from a ridiculous mortgage. Similarly, I expect you share the notion that if a person is in trouble, the more severe the trouble the more acceptable this option becomes morally, just like bankruptcy as an extreme case. So there’s something funky in the idea that people in trouble have moral justifications that others do not, but that’s often the way of things. I can’t get free food from the government because I earn too much, for instance.

Aside from the Biblical questions of abuse and lending and release (which you didn’t comment on), I think my two big observations are that the loan is collateralized with a particular thing and that the deal most people think they made in their head (I made a deal with this particular person to get a house and then pay for it) is far more simplistic than the actual legal contract the 50 pages of papers represent and the subsequent sale of slices of that mortgage to secondary investors. I’m just not sure that our moral intuitions for simple interpersonal promises fit the reality of this highly complex situation.

Is a guy who can pay his mortgage and does pay his mortgage morally better than a guy who can pay but abandons it to better himself financially? I’m generally inclined to say he is. What if following that path becomes really harmful to him or his family, even though he could theoretically do it? I’m more inclined to say he is not.

Andrew

Miscellaneous Monday

Some things I’m thinking we might discuss:

~Olympics
~Study on connection between brain region and spirituality
~Freakonomics on abortion link to crime decrease
~Iran getting the bomb
~Religious discrimination in Great Britain

Various Current Events

Global warming update (Walter Williams)
Whose body is it? (John Stossel)
Navy announces co-ed subs (CNS News)
DADT violates current law (CNS News)
WH ignores criticism of religious czar (CNS News)
Sen Brown branted turncoat for jobs vote (CNS News)
Central Falls fires every teacher (Providence Journal)
Falsely accused still on sex abuse lists (LA Times)
Toyota tried to cut costs on recalls (LA Times)
Obama tops Bush at ducking reporters (Wash Times)
New credit law has new traps (WSJ)
How credit reform affects you (USA Today)
Bill favors married couple in adoption (AZR)
Canadian nuclear scientist vanishes (Fox News)
Cash for appliance clunkers (USA Today)
290 House bills neglected by Senate (The Hill)
Key Dems say public option dead (The Hill)
Fearing Obama, states loosen gun laws (NYT)
Execs can’t win in testifying (LAT)
God gap impedes US Foreign Policy (Wash Post)
Parental notification of drunken college kids (Wash Post)
Do killer whales belong in theme parks (CS Monitor)
Austin and the danger of IRS hatred (Findlaw)
Toyota’s problems still large after hearings (AP)
Hero teacher stops gunman (CBS)
Study: faith relieves depression (Wash Times)
Questions for Mr. Toyoda (NYT)
School overrules mom on lunch lesson (WPBF ABC 25)
Napolitano calls Ft. Hood terrorism (Fox News Blogs)

Wacky Wednesday--Burqas make sense

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Saves money on clothing. No shopping sprees to explain later.
~Acknowledges that the moral and sexual atmosphere is at least as important and dangerous as the physical atmosphere (weather conditions)
~Tell me you’ve never walked down Mill Avenue and thought to yourself, “Gosh. Maybe those Muslims are onto something.”
~On burqa boulevard, how do you tell who are the prostitutes?
~Catering to the natural understanding of men’s visual system for sexuality.
~The way most women dress constitutes sexual assault.
~Don’t you just sometimes wish you could turn off the sexualization of all society?
~Millions of women who wear them believe in the practice.
~Do we have a problem with women being too concerned with their looks in America today? Or with older women being treated as a spoiled piece of produce merely because of their age?

Wacky Wednesday--Judges shouldn't be impartial

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Look at the Supreme Court, these four justices tend to always see things this way and those four justices tend to always see things that way, and they all claim to love the law and the Constitution equally. Are they lying or are they human?
~Only a person completely inexperienced with the law would believe something as naïve as that judges even can be impartial
~Do you want humans or do you want machines?
~The law itself is often too impossibly complex to even know what it definitively says.
~The law is a process you have to go through in order to find out the result. Many times, it can’t be known ahead of time or outside the actual running of the process.
~Justices and law professors and attorneys all will admit amongst themselves that judicial impartiality is the exception rather than the rule, but this doesn’t mean that the law is broken or that the law isn’t fair. It simply means that people have completely unreasonable and naïve expectations about what law ever could be.
~Zero tolerance policies are the illegitimate offspring of too much interest in achieving a completely dehumanized and robotic legal process.
~People only perceive judicial partiality when the results are not what they desire. People almost never accuse verdicts they like of being the result of “judicial activism.”
~The law must be somewhat ambiguous or else we wouldn’t even have judges in the first place. ~Think about the simple admission that we need expert judges in order to have trials and appellate courts and what this means for the premise that the law is clear, simple, and obvious.
~Judicial impartiality is a lot like Plato’s Noble Lie. A useful myth that helps the lower classes to believe the system is more fair and stable than it may in fact be.
~We don’t believe that journalists can be unbiased, nor teachers, nor ministers, nor even Olympic judges. Why is it that we suddenly believe in the existence of some super-human category of person who can transcend his own humanity once he puts on a silky black robe and ascends a wooden pulpit?

Links:

Thomas, Sotomayor, and the Noble Lie (Findlaw)

Sotomayor and the myth of JI (Everyday Ethics)

Why do judges wear black? (Fascinating pictures)

Theological Tuesday

~John H. Walton: The Lost World of Genesis One
~Should Christians listen to Dennis Prager?
~What aspects of Christianity couldn’t be made up?
~Are Christian bumper stickers a good idea?
~Was Paul serious about not knowing anything but Christ and Him crucified?
~Did Job really exist?
~Do you believe places have spiritual mojo?
~Does God know your sins?

Links - John H. Walton
Book: The Lost World of Genesis One (Amazon)
John H. Walton (Wheaton College)
Other books by John H. Walton (InterVarsity Press)

Ethics: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell

President Obama has pledged to end this policy which his Democratic predecessor, President Clinton, first put in place in 1993. The short version is that service members may be gay, but they may not openly reveal their sexual orientation to others nor may anyone ask them about their sexual orientation. Sexual acts between service members who are not married are already prohibited. So the question is whether it would be a good, right, or helpful thing to allow gays to serve openly in the military.

Links:
DADT (Wikipedia)
Efficacy of DADT (pdf) (Joint Force Quarterly)
USC 10, paragraph 654 (Cornell Law)
John McCain on DADT (Weekly Standard)
Don’t change DADT (Weekly Standard)
Gays in the Militaries (WSJ, available in full here)
Fornication and the UCMJ (Blog)

What, Exactly, Are Social Skills?

We always hear this vague idea that it’s important for people (especially children) to develop social skills. They are apparently so important that acquiring them is often used as a justification for public (or private) schools over against the general academic superiority of home schooling. But talking about whether they matter last week made me start wondering exactly what they are. This is important for any discussion of various educational objectives, but I think getting clarity on social skills is also necessary for anyone simply parenting children. So, today, I’d like to just get a better picture of what social skills are (as compared with, say, physical skills or intellectual skills).

Various Current Events

Pilot crashes plane into IRS building (Fox News)
The Stimulus, one year later (GOP)
Half of all kids receive food stamps (AFP)
Life-long criminal dies on death row (AZR)
SBC down, Catholics up in attendance (C Post)
British Christian loses discrimination case (C Post)
Billboard alleges racism in abortion (C Post)
Boston program pays women to reform (B Globe)
Climate chief admits no significant warming in 15 years (Fox)
Top US climate official resists warming questions (CNS News)
USPS wants reduced delivery, Congress balks (Wash Post)
Tarmac penalties cause cancellations (USA Today)
Charter school demand causes lotteries, wait lists (Denver Post)
Pro-life billboards appeal to blacks (Denver Post)
Eco-friendly funerals becoming popular (Newark Star-Ledger)
Houston votes to fire teachers if test scores low (Houston Chron)
Mt. Vernon statement released to public (CNS News)
Mt. Vernon statement
Woman threatened protester, cancels abortion (Duluth News Tr)
Georgia school cheating scandal (NYT)
Vegetarian diet harms environment more (NYT)
Obama: no right to privacy on cell phone location (CNet)
UC Irvine’s free speech problems (LAT)
Genetic testing leading more to avoid having kids (USA Today)
Global warming scam unraveling (Wash Post)

Wacky Wednesday--You Should Keep Your Faith To Yourself

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Faith is such a personal thing. What works for you may not work for everyone.
~When you go sharing your faith with others, you’re playing doctor and sharing the prescriptions he gave you with a totally different person.
~It often irritates other people to hear you talk like this.
~Sharing your faith makes you have to live up to the standards you say you advocate.
~It can get you fired.
~It can ruin relationships
~It’s offensive to imply that your faith is better than someone else’s faith, especially when you can’t prove it.
~It’s arrogant to think you’ve got such a privileged view of the truth.

Wacky Wednesday--Social Skills Don’t Matter

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Would you say it’s a sin to not have them? Are socially inept people sinning?
~Can you be successful without them?
~Is it a good thing to be a people-pleaser? I thought we were supposed to please God, not men.
~Social skills are just manipulative tactics to get people to like you regardless of whether you deserve it.
~Character matters a lot more than personality.
~Other people’s opinions don’t matter.
~There are surely times where serving God will entail making others hate you.
~If you aren’t persecuted, you aren’t a disciple of Jesus.
~Given how many people don’t have them, it would be absurd to say that there’s something defective about people who don’t have them.
~Does God go around trying to get others to like Him?
~Did people like Jeremiah? Jonah?
~People without social skills have the luxury of knowing that anyone who actually does love them loves them for who they are, not for their people-pleasing act.

Theological Tuesday

~Interview with William M. Struthers—“Wired for Intimacy: How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brain.”
~What percentage of your decisions should God get?
~Was Paul serious about not knowing anything but Christ and Him crucified?
~Did Job really exist?
~Do you believe places have spiritual mojo?
~Does God know your sins?

Links:
Wired for Intimacy by William M. Struthers
Bill Struthers’s blog

Various Current Events

Obama open to raising taxes (NY Daily News)
Cubs deal criticism irks Mesa major (AZR)
Autism study released (AZR)
Skeptics fault UN climate panel (NYT)
Iran’s two-edged bomb (NYT)
Gays in the militaries is a non-issue (WSJ)
Audi’s Gorewellian Super Bowl Ad (LAT)
Study: vegetative patients have brain activity (Life News)
Why homicide rates declined in early 2009 (HNN)
NOW complains of violence in Tebow ad (Wash Examiner)
Focus got what it wanted from Tebow ad (USA Today)
Audi’s “green police” ad offends who, exactly? (CBS)
Blizzard hinkeys climate change announcement (WSJ)
Will boomers bust Social Security? (CNBC)
Poverty remark stirs CO Dems’ anger (Denver Post)
Military to discipline 6 officers in Ft. Hood case (Fox News)
AL Planned Parenthood clinic on probation after sting (Fox)
Iran shuts down Gmail, provides own alternative (Fox)
Over 1,500 CA inmates released early (LAT)
Toyota may redesign push-button ignition (LAT)
Free speech clashes with fight against terror (NYT)
DC shuts down for record 4th straight day (Wash Post)
CITI lets distressed homeowners stay for 6 months (USA Today)
Conservatives mock Gore on snowstorms (Politico)
Climate change debate hot during deep freeze (NYT)
Study finds lack of civic learning in college (Wash Times)
AZ quits Western climate endeavor (AZR)
Sen Inhofe’s family builds igloo for Al Gore (CNS News)
Best-selling author, screenwriter denounces Avatar (CNS)
Planned Parenthood: sex ed for 10-year-olds (CNS)
Administration not responding to Ft. Hood questions (CNS)
Police debate using family DNA to ID suspects (CNS)
Freakonomics abortion research criticized (WSJ)
US would reap billions from $1 cigarette tax hike (Reuters)
Atlanta’s yellow line angers some Asians (Fox News)
Evangelist sues mall for removing him (Fox News)
Michelle Obama links obesity to national security (CNS News)
Iran email/Google access down on eve of protests (AFP)
The CO2 lie (IBD)
Who’s behind TX church fires? (CS Monitor)
Focus: Tebow story over 760,000 hits (Chr Post)
Ditching social networks to reclaim time, privacy (USA Today)
Why are liberals so condescending? (Wash Post)
All teachers fired at underperforming school (Providence Journal)
Illegals down 1 million (Wash Times)
Yes, Internet use does lead to depression (Daily Mail)

Wacky Wednesday--We Shouldn’t Presume People Innocent

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~It teaches bad theology, and people learn to think they aren’t sinful unless they do something wrong.
~Presuming people innocent means that a lot of guilty people will roam the streets freely only because the State can’t make their case within all the Byzantine rules of legal procedure.
~Why do we have the phrase, “He got off on a technicality?” Here’s a hint. It’s not because our legal system always gets the bad guy.
~Presumption of innocence means that whenever people are truly innocent, they still carry the stigma and stain of having been tried. If people had to prove their innocence, then when they win a trial everyone would know they are much better than merely “not guilty.”
~So this lets evildoers get away with their crimes and indirectly taints anyone who is accused of one but is innocent.
~If you’re truly innocent, what do you have to be afraid of at a trial?
~The existing evidence that they have been accused, are standing trial, have hired (presumably) a lawyer, and a grand jury has indicted them means that a rational person would have to be a fool to presume them innocent.
~Freedom is a privilege, not a right.
~Everyone’s guilty of something anyhow, most of which we never get punished for. Even if you’re not guilty of this particular thing, you probably deserve a serious punishment for something else.
~If sinners deserve hell, why not at least recognize that citizens all deserve jail. If we don’t incarcerate them all, still the ones who do get thrown in jail don’t really have anything to complain about.

Links:
Presumption of innocence (Wikipedia)
History of presumption of innocence (Talkleft)
Guilty Men (UCLA)

Wacky Wednesday--We Shouldn’t Celebrate Valentine’s Day

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~It’s origins go back to a Roman sex festival to the demigod Lupercus.
~It’s just another example of the commercialization of everything.
~It makes people who are single or recently singled feel great pain.
~If we’re going to have a “Love Day,” it should be agape, not eros, we commemorate.
~Do we really need more emphasis on sexual desire in America?
~The very notion that you can schedule passion into your planner on a particular date is contrary to the essence of genuine passion.
~When did “I bought you something” and “I love you” become synonymous?
~You can’t win on Valentine’s day. If you buy something, it’s expected. If you don’t, it’s a tragedy. ~It’s become a lose-lose day of misapplied entitlement thinking.
~Like mother’s day and father’s day, this holiday is primarily a benefit to women, and hence a burden on men. Where’s the reciprocity?
~Where, exactly, in the Bible does it tell us to celebrate Valentine’s Day?
~It just means more Victoria’s Secret ads.
~The very notion that you can schedule passion into your planner on a particular date is contrary to the essence of genuine passion.
~Romance is just a distraction to the real projects near to God’s heart.
~Celibacy is upheld as an ideal in several parts of the Bible, and until we have national celibacy day, I’m not going for Valentine’s Day either.

Theological Tuesday

~Michael Guillen “Can a Smart Person Believe in God?”
~Spencer has a question.
~Was Paul serious about not knowing anything but Christ and Him crucified?
~Did Job really exist?
~What percentage of your decisions should God get?
~Do you believe places have spiritual mojo?
~Does God know your sins?

Ethics: Loving Your Neighbor As Yourself

I suppose most all of us know the two great Commandments: Love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and to Love your neighbor as yourself. In fact, I suppose we’ve heard these so often that, in some sense, we’ve almost become numb to them. So, tonight I thought it would be interesting to take some time and ask the question: What would it really look like to love your neighbor as much as you love yourself?

Ads You Actually Remember

It’s customary in the wake of the Super Bowl to talk about which ads were the best and the worst. But the real test of memorability is not whether you can recall an ad within 24 hours of seeing it in a venue where you are predisposed to purposely pay extra attention to the advertising. The real test of memorability is whether you recall an ad at a much later time, perhaps more than one year (or five years) later. Moreover, it’s not enough to merely remember the ad, but for an ad to succeed, you must be able to remember enough connected information to take action on the product or service if you wanted to at that later date. So, trying to put aside the very influential power of ads you’ve seen recently and/or frequently, which ads are memorable enough to you that you know them even years later?

Links:
Super Bowl 2010 Ads (Video)

Various Current Events

A crime theory demolished (Heather MacDonald) (WSJ)
Haiti arrests 10 Baptists over child rescue (Christian Post)
Case stokes Haiti’s fear for children (NYT)
Strong on zeal, thin on knowledge (Christianity Today)
LaHood scares Toyota owners (CBS)
LaHood backtracks on statement (CBS)
WH: No conflict in LaHood’s gaffe (CBS)
Study says abstinence programs may work (Wash Post)
Case for abstinence education (Heritage Fdn)
IPCC embarrassed again (Telegraph)
AZ may ease gun laws (AZ Republic)
Phoenix to tax food 2% (AZ Republic)
New DPS director critical on speed cameras (AZ Republic)
CA bill would protect clergy who won’t marry gays (SF Chronicle)
MA adds brushing to preschool regimen (NYT)
Scott Brown sworn into Senate (CBS)
Lancet retracts paper linking vaccine to autism (Wash Post)
An online reality show about abortion (Wash Post)
How accurate is Punxsutawney Phil? (CS Monitor)
Gallup poll, America is conservative (Gallup)
Warner: Jesus brought me here (Christian Post)
Atheists upset about Mother Theresa stamp (Christian Post)
TN school board OKs Bible standards (Christian Post)
PETA wants robot instead of Groundhog (CS Monitor)
Deficits are serious (NYT)
Verdict against vigilantism (NYT)
Playing to learn (NYT)

Wacky Wednesday--Certainty is bad

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~Certain is the opposite of being open-minded, and we all know it’s good to keep an open mind.
~Uncertainty is the precondition of faith. So if you have certainty, you can’t have faith.
~Certainty alienates skeptics because it inclines you to not take their doubts or questions seriously.
~Certainty means being committed to something, and when you’re committed to it, you are psychologically motivated to not delve into things that may undermine your commitment.
~Certainty overstates things you can’t prove.
~It’s unscientific to be certain because it’s not open to revision.
~Fanaticism is just a less generous way to describe certainty.
~How can you reconcile humility with the arrogance of certainty? Shouldn’t a humble person, aware of his own failings and limitations, be more prone to admitting that he might be wrong about some things, even big things?
~If everyone adopts a position of certainty about things they disagree over, how can you ever reconcile?
~If different people are certain of incompatible things, well, at least some (if not all) of them have to be wrong, right?

Wacky Wednesday: Football Should Be Banned

Note: Before reading the following arguments, please understand that they are not what I believe. On Wednesdays, I deliberately argue for wrong ideas, challenging my listeners to call and defend the obvious right answer, which is usually far harder than one would expect. This is a summary of what Wacky Andrew will be arguing, not a representation of what real Andrew believes.

~We say we hate the injuries, but that’s like saying that NASCAR fans hate crashes. We love the hits, even if we hate the hurts.
~Increased padding leads people to play and hit even harder because they think it’s safer to do so. ~This is a classic case of moral hazard.
~The sort of damage you find in players’ brains is very similar to the sort of damage you see in the brains of boxers.
~It's violent, just like the Coliseum.
~Look at how the money corrupts the sport. It cultivates misguided hope for millions of minority teens who see the big bucks instead of the academic slow way to success.
~Bad people get a huge stage to influence children.
~Association with alcohol.
~It causes marital dischord because so many women don’t and won’t like it.
~It’s racist. How many blacks play and how many blacks coach or own teams?
~Football is not a properly conceived game. You can dominate the clock and even the yards but still not win.
~Any game with such a wide array of fouls isn’t well-crafted.
~It’s so much wasted time. 14.5 minutes of actual plays in the course of 3-4 hours.
~It distorts your view of reality by having distinct time frames.
~They play on Sundays, which is the Sabbath.
~One final thought: Go Daddy.

Links:

Football too dangerous? (Time)

A lifetime penalty (Time)

Football’s pious pioneer (Christianity Today)

Football head injuries (article index) (NYT)

Rugby versus football (USA Rugby)

Theological Tuesday

~Ron Moore, host of “The Journey”

~Should we use “He” or “They” when talking about God?

~Was Paul serious about not knowing anything but Christ and Him crucified?

~Did Job really exist?

~Do you believe places have spiritual mojo?

~What does the second great Commandment mean?

Links - God: “He” or “They”

Elohim (Catholic Encyclopedia)
Jehovah (Yahweh) (Catholic Encyclopedia)
Adonai (Catholic Encyclopedia)
Hebrew names for God (Hebrew 4 Christians)
Is Elohim singular or plural (Unveiling-Christianity)

Ethics: Comparing People to Hitler

Every once in a while, someone decides that the best way to make a point is to compare someone to Hitler (or to Nazis). This happens with disturbing regularity in politics, but I happened to read an article the other day which did it with Jay Leno and the NBC late-night jockeying drama. This raises the ethical question for me of whether it’s ever a good idea to compare people to Hitler (or Nazis).

Links:
NBC will regret appeasing Leno (WSJ)
This is everybody’s fault but mine (Mises Institute)
Godwin’s law (Wikipedia)
Reductio ad Hitlerum (Wikipedia)

Most Memorable ATS Topic

We’ve been on the air for five years (plus three weeks), and we thought it would be interesting to hear from those of you who have been listening regularly (or even you newbies) about what moments or topics have stood out the most to you in listening to the show. One thing that I find fascinating in talking with people is to hear what sticks in people’s minds, and it is almost never the things I would predict. So, I fully expect to be shocked by what I hear today. And if you just want to email me, please do so.