george mcdonald

Let us in all the troubles of life remember —that our one lack is life— that what we need is more life — more of the life-making presence in us making us more, and more largely, alive. When most oppressed, when most weary of life, as our unbelief would phrase it, let us bethink ourselves that it is in truth the inroad and presence of death we are weary of. When most inclined to sleep, let us rouse ourselves to live. Of all things let us avoid the false refuge of a weary collapse, a hopeless yielding to things as they are. It is the life in us that is discontented; we need more of what is discontented, not more of the cause of its discontent. Discontent, I repeat, is the life in us that has not enough of itself, is not enough to itself, so calls for more. He has the victory who, in the midst of pain and weakness, cries out, not for death, not for the repose of forgetfulness, but for strength to fight; for more power, more consciousness of being, more God in him...

via josh harris

"If you make doctrine the main thing, you are very likely to grow narrow-minded. If you make your own experience the main thing, you will become gloomy and critical of others. If you make ordinances the main thing, you will be apt to grow merely formal. But you can never make too much of the living Christ Jesus. Remember that all things else are for his sake. Doctrines and ordinances are the planets, but Christ is the sun. Get to love him best of all."

--Charles Spurgeon

birthing a sermon (ortberg)

Birthing a Sermon
A step-by-step guide to bringing the text alive.
by John Ortberg

Garrison Keillor, on A Prairie Home Companion, tells about Uncle Cal, a deacon at the church in fictitious Lake Wobegon. Uncle Cal evaluates his pastor's preaching this way: "It's a lot of, 'On the one hand this, on the other hand that.' He never comes out straight with it. Many a Sunday I've walked away with no idea what he said. He never puts the hay down where the goats can get it."

Yes, there are some preachers who have a lot of hay, vast amounts of exegetical information. They're theologically aware. They like to study ancient languages. They have the hay, but they don't know what the goats are talking about or thinking about. And what's worse, they don't know that they don't know the goats. Often they don't even like the goats. They would prefer not to be around goats. They forget that the first test of good teaching is not what the teacher has taught; it's what the learner has learned. They have all this wonderful hay, but they forget that they are stewards of getting hay to goats.

But there are also preachers who know the goats, and who are very clever at being able to attract lots and lots of goats. They can hold the goats' attention, but they have no hay. They have nothing of substance. It's all superficial stuff. And what's worse, they don't know that they don't have any hay.

As preachers and teachers, our job is to get the hay down where the goats can get it. That means immersing ourselves in Scripture and great writing and deep thoughts. But it also means becoming a student of the goats: learning what moves them, what their questions are, and what gives them hope.

Sermon preparation is a complex process. When I think about constructing a message, I use the metaphor of having a baby, because I believe the stages are quite similar. There's the initial conception, which is often quite a lot of fun. Then there is gestation, which is increasingly difficult. Next, there's the delivery, which can be a combination of euphoria and intense pain. And finally, there are some post-delivery details.

CONCEPTION
As I conceive a sermon and decide what to preach, I find it helpful to think in terms of whole series.

Think in series. Preaching a series allows you to go into greater depth in the text, and spending several weeks on one theme allows the teaching to be absorbed more thoroughly. I recently finished a six-month series on the book of Acts, and it was wonderful to be immersed in the early church. I think one mistake preachers often make is to cycle through material too fast. Just saying something once doesn't mean it will sink in.

Doing a series also gives you momentum. It makes your research more efficient, and spares you the Monday morning question of "What am I going to teach on next week?" It also helps give you balance, teaching through the whole counsel of God. Those things happen more readily when you plan your series in advance.

I usually try to think in terms of four-month cycles. The church year generally falls into cycles of September through December, then January through Memorial Day, and then the summer months. Each of these seasons has a different feel. If you're thinking of a series that brings a greater intellectual challenge, the fall might be best, since people are just fresher. During the summer vacation season, people tend to be in and out, so it's good to do a series that doesn't make people feel lost if they've been gone for a couple of weeks.

Gather input. I've found it really helpful, for each series, to use a focus group. I invite eight to ten people to meet for several hours, and I ask them to prepare ahead of time.

I ask them to develop a couple of themes they would like to hear addressed, and I ask them to come with detailed ideas: a title for the series, titles for individual messages, what texts I ought to use, what topics or questions ought to be addressed, even potential outlines. I also invite them to come up with resources, illustrations, programming ideas, and music for the entire service.

Group collaboration is important because other people have questions I don't have, creative ideas that won't occur to me, resources I don't know about, and sins and struggles that are not on my list. People love to be part of this process.

When people feel they're getting to speak into what's being preached, there is high built-in motivation to participate.

GESTATION
After coming up with the series concept, I try to clarify, for each individual message, the big idea.

Clarify the big idea. Whether the series is going chunk by chunk through texts, or is a more topical series, it's enormously helpful to clarify the big idea of the message as early in the preparation process as possible. Doing so streamlines the research and writing process.

We live in a day where we know more about the Bible than any generation that has ever lived. Translations, commentaries, and background information are abundant. Today's challenge is managing the information flow and not being overwhelmed by it. If I'm not clear on where I want the message to go, the information could manage me.

There are usually multiple messages that could be preached from the same text. A friend of mine is a musician. He said in the musical trade they have a saying, "You've got to put it somewhere. If you wait till you're perfectly on pitch, you will never open your mouth to sing. So you got to put it somewhere." The same is true of preaching: you've got to put it somewhere. So decide where you intend the message to go.

Of course, prayer is a huge part of this. Ask, "God, what is it that I need to be talking about? What's at stake here?"

The answer to that question becomes the basis for your sermon introduction. In a good sermon, the introduction almost always answers this question: Why is it urgently important that we talk about what we're going to talk about? If you cannot answer this question, then you are giving the wrong message.

Research the topic. After conceiving the series and clarifying the big idea, the next step is to research the topic. Find a few good writers and spend your time reading them in depth. In my opinion, going deep with one good commentary is far better than skimming seven mediocre commentaries. It's tempting to build a vast library, but instead, look for the good stuff. Avoid the temptation to ride the information flood.

I also make use of researchers. These can be volunteers. I guarantee you have people in your church who would love to do research for you. Some of these people are really introverted and don't know where to plug in. But every church has them. It takes a little time to invest in them to help them understand what you need. Sometimes you will want certain important statistics, or case studies, or potential illustrations. Tell them what will help you.

Know your goats. The other side of my research isn't textbook stuff, it's "knowing the goats." I ask, "What's everybody talking about this week?" Is there a current event that helps communicate what I want to say? What questions are people wrestling with?

When I begin the actual writing process, I think about particular people who might be in the audience: someone who just went through a break-up, someone who just got accepted at college, someone who just lost a job, someone who struggles with a sexual addiction and is scared to death someone else is going to find out.

I picture them in my mind. Everybody has a need. Never write for a faceless crowd.

DELIVERY
Delivery begins with the writing process, because that is when you flesh out what you are going to say and how you are going to say it. When it comes to sermon writing, generally there are two problems. Some preachers love the research stage but hate the writing, and they start writing too late. Others don't like doing research, so they move way too fast to the writing part. Figure out where you fall in that range, and push yourself in the other direction.

Identify and outline your structure. I don't think there is one magic structure. The goal of preaching is to build Christ in people. Any method that does that and treats the text with integrity is acceptable. The test of a sermon is not what people remember, it's whether their life is transformed as a result.

Structure, however, is like a skeleton. Without a skeleton, the sermon lacks shape and strength. Sometimes the structure is an exoskeleton (and the structure is obvious); sometimes it's an endoskeleton (not so obvious), but it's there. The key is that the structure allows the sermon to unfold in a dynamic way.

In Homiletics: Moves and Structures, David Buttrick says the structure of a message should proceed in a series of moves, similar to people having a conversation. In a conversation between just two people, the moves can happen quite fast.

But when talking to a large group of people, you need to carefully think through how you're going to transition from one move to the next. I've discovered that if I'm having a hard time crafting a transitional sentence, it's often because I'm trying to make the wrong move, not because I'm bad at writing transition sentences.

Another key question: What requires dwelling time? If it's important, you usually need dwelling time. If it's complex, it requires dwelling time. Dwelling might involve repetition, restatement, or illustration. It might require an image or a metaphor.

If something is quite complex but needs to be unpacked, I will often use humor. Humor has a way of bringing people back with you. It gives them a little energy. Other times I'll just tell folks, "Okay, the next five minutes is going to be kind of complex, so I need you to stay with me."

Narrow your focus. What if you have something that is quite complex and requires dwelling time, but it's not the most important thing you have to say? Shrink it down to size.

This is so hard. Once you've written something, you get attached to it. This is true of every preacher. We're tempted to spend too much time on secondary material.

The same applies to stories and illustrations. What is the number one law in real estate? "Location. Location. Location." It's exactly the same in preaching. You hear somebody preaching and they tell a story. It's a fabulous story. People laugh at it. They cry at it. It works great. And you think, Oh, man, I've got to tell that story next week. But next week you tell the story, and it falls flat.

Why?

Because what worked wasn't the story. It was the story in location. "A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver." But it's an apple of gold in a setting of silver only if it's apt. The great temptation is to think the power comes from the story itself, when in reality the power comes from its context.

Use rich imagery. As I work with a text, I look for images that can become key in people's lives. One example: David hiding in the cave of Adullam.

What kind of image is a cave? A happy image or a sad image? You want to ask not only about cognitive content in a text, but about the emotional freight of the image. A cave is dark; it's sad; it's scary. You don't have to say all of that; the image does that.

David is hiding in a cave. We're all going to spend some time in a cave. But what David doesn't know is that God does some of his best work in a cave. You play that out as you preach: how David alone finds God, how God meets with him, and how David encouraged himself in the Lord. Then you shift to your audience: "Some of you are in a cave right now. It's a bankruptcy. It's a divorce. It's a whatever. What you need to know is that God does some of his best work in caves."

I also look for ways to weave together the ancient world and our world. For example, think about Samson. I live in California, and I want my audience to get a picture of what Samson was like. He was a judge. He was incredibly strong, maybe a body builder. He's a glamorous guy; women want to be with him. He becomes the political ruler. Anybody come to mind?

Californians are seeing a Samson named Arnold. All of a sudden they don't know if they're in Jerusalem or Menlo Park, because the world of the Bible and their world have been brought together.

Nail the takeoff and landing. The two most important parts of any message are the beginning and the end. Of those two, which would you say most preachers work harder at developing well? Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it's the beginning. But the sign of a really skilled preacher is a conclusion that's as well thought-out as the intro.

I think it's a chronological thing, the way our minds are wired. A preacher is so aware of what it's going to feel like at the beginning that we force ourselves to put most of our preparation there. A good introduction will create a sense of urgency in the listener. We think, Well, once I get the plane up there, I'll find a place to land it. But you can squander all the power of your message if you don't know where you're going. If you begin with the end and work backward from there, you will build to something that is going to make a difference.

For every message, make sure you work as hard on the conclusion as you do on the intro. Know where you will land the plane!

POST-PARTUM
When a baby is born, it is given a score that indicates its overall health at birth. In the same way, it is important to evaluate a message by gathering feedback from several sources.

In the early stages, a form is helpful, so you can ask a few others to write down what would be most helpful to you. Here are some starting questions:

Was the exegesis accurate and on target?

Was the message logical and clear?

Did the illustrations work?

I also ask my evaluator if I've communicated clearly on the following three questions that I use as I begin my preparation each week:

What do I want people to understand?

What do I want people to do?

What do I want people to feel?

Next, my evaluation includes a question about delivery. Do I have habits that are distracting? How were my voice and my pacing? Preacher who are gifted at this will know when the room needs energy, and they can also read how much silence the room can sustain. They use the whole range of inflection, cadence, and silence to keep attention.

Once you have people who know you well doing the evaluations, you won't necessarily need a form. I think it's good to restrict the number of people who evaluate you. Utilize a few people whom you respect and are there for you. A friend once told me that the kind of people we need are those who say (in effect), "You're not as good as you think you are, and I believe in you."

Post-partum depression? For me this sermon preparation takes at least 15 hours, and that's after years of practice. If all this sounds like a lot of work, it is. But it's worth it. For me, giving a message that doesn't connect is about the most painful thing in the world, and I cannot bear that pain. So my extensive sermon preparation and evaluation process is not a necessarily a spiritual thing; it's just pain avoidance!

But I believe that preaching is so important that we must do our best to get the hay down where the goats can get it.

listening for the whisper

How to break the addiction to spectacle.
Mark Galli | posted 9/20/2007 09:18AM

We love the wind, the earthquake, and the fire. As the football season gets underway, we are reminded of our fascination with such signs and wonders, with spectacle. Watching a game in a massive stadium pulsating with the energy of 100,000 fans makes us feel alive. We may decry the hype surrounding football—especially the Super Bowl—but nonetheless we find ourselves drawn to the bright fireworks, nervous camera work, gigantic specimens of athleticism, sexy cheerleaders, roaring crowds, and excited announcers whose voices suggest that what is going on down on the field is history-making stuff.

Naturally enough, we try to bring earthquake, wind, and fire to church. God is the god of life, after all. We should feel it, no? This, of course, is one of the draws of megachurches, which, because of their size, can do mega-things. Bumper-to-bumper cars streaming into the parking lot. People eight or ten abreast rushing to get a good seat. The voices of thousands raised in song. Lights, video, booming bass and pounding drums, projection screens making it all literally bigger than life—it all adds up to a powerful spectacle.

I, like most Americans, am a sucker for spectacle. I've gone to my share of religious extravaganzas—from Christmas programs to evangelistic crusades. I'm actually a fan of the megachurch in many, many ways. And I dare say that an Easter vigil I attend each year at my church is indeed spectacular! There is something wonderful about sitting with a large crowd of fellow believers praising God. It harkens to the kingdom of heaven, the vision of the 144,000 worshiping the Lamb (Rev. 14:1-3). What could be better than that?

And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him (1 Kings 19:11-13).

The problem with spectacle, especially religious spectacle, is that the steady, repeated, raucous noise will eventually make us hard of hearing. And that will make it impossible to hear God's normal tone of voice. He is not usually found in earthquake, wind, and fire, but in the small whisper, heard only by those who enter with Elijah into the dark cave.

This whisper is difficult to hear in the din of our culture and religious life. It is also frightening to even to try to listen for it, because to do so we must, like Elijah, enter the dark cave from whence the whisper emerges. That means stepping into mystery.

When you try to practice Elijah-like spirituality, says the author of The Cloud of Unknowing, you will at first

feel nothing but a kind of darkness about your mind, or as it were a cloud of unknowing. You will seem to know nothing and feel nothing except a naked intent toward God in the depths of your being. Try as you might, this darkness and this cloud will remain between you and your God. You will feel frustrated, for your mind will be unable to grasp him, and your heart will not relish the delight of his love.

Withdrawal from the noise and glitter of religious spectacle sounds like a formula for spiritual suicide—how am I going to even experience God without the pounding of the music and electricity of the crowd and inspirational message of the dynamic preacher? "But learn to be at home in this darkness," says this author, "For in it, in this life, you hope to feel and see God as he is in himself, it must be within this darkness and this cloud."

Why does God come in the whisper, in the darkness, through a wayward Middle Eastern nation, in the vulnerability of a Bethlehem baby, and the lonely groan of a crucified rabbi?

So that we will abandon all our preconceived notions of divinity, so that we will be left possessing nothing but our ignorance, so that we won't confuse God with cultural idols, so that we will be ready to meet the true God.

"Now God is beyond all that exists," writes Orthodox theologian Vladimir Loski. "In order to approach him, it is necessary to deny all that is inferior to him, that is to say, all that which is. If in seeing God one can know what one sees, then one has not seen God in himself but something intelligible, something which is inferior to him. It is by unknowing that one may know him who is above every possible object of knowledge."

Regularly retiring to the dark cave, to the fearful quiet of silent prayer and mediation, to listen to the whisper is the first step in breaking free from addiction to religious spectacle. It is the first step on the path to unknowing. I grew up reading bumper stickers that described conversion with the phrase, "I found it." This should be matched by another many miles down the spiritual road: "I lost it." That darkness opens up whole new vistas for us, and gives us the ears to hear the whisper.

dining with alice waters

September 19, 2007
Lunch With Alice Waters, Food Revolutionary
By KIM SEVERSON

WHEN Alice Waters is coming over to cook lunch, the first thing you do is look around your house and think, I live in a dump.

Then you take an inventory of the pantry. The bottles of Greek and Portuguese olive oil, once a point of pride, suddenly seem inadequate. And should you hide the box of Kellogg’s Raisin Bran and jettison those two cans of Diet Pepsi?

At the end of the afternoon, when the last peach was peeled and my kitchen was stacked with dirty pots, it didn’t really matter. Ms. Waters was either too polite or too distracted to mention what was in my cupboard. It turns out she travels with her own olive oil, anyway. And homemade vinegar. And salt-packed capers.

Ms. Waters had agreed to spend a hot September day shopping with me at the Union Square Greenmarket and schlepping back to my first-floor apartment in brownstone Brooklyn to make lunch.
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The menu was dictated by two things: the market’s offerings and the recipes in her forthcoming book, “The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons and Recipes From a Delicious Revolution” (Clarkson Potter, October).

The book is more to Ms. Waters than an instructional guide. It is her attempt, through recipes, to save the American food supply. She wrote it because she still believes a plate of delicious food can change everything.

“We’re trying to educate young people and show them how to use that lens of ingredients as a way to change their lives,” she said. “Otherwise, it would be just another cookbook.”

The book is Ms. Waters’s ninth since she started Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, Calif., 36 years ago. Unlike the others, the new book does not use the name of the restaurant. It reads more like an organic “Joy of Cooking,” designed to instruct novices on how to make a perfect vinaigrette but also intended to be as essential to experienced cooks as the final Harry Potter installment was to 12-year-olds.

“Food can be very transformational and it can be more than just about a dish,” she said. “That’s what happened to me when I first went to France. I fell in love. And if you fall in love, well, then everything is easy.”

(Currently, Ms. Waters is not in love, though she longs for “a good pal to be in the world with.”)

By all measures, Ms. Waters should be relaxing at this point in her life. She is 63. She has held court with princes and presidents. A year ago, with some prodding from her partners at the restaurant, she pulled back from the daily work at Chez Panisse. Now she is trying to become better at leveraging her role as the high priestess of the local, sustainable food revolution.

Although she is enthusiastically mocked in some circles for the impossible goals she articulates in a wispy cadence, chefs who once sniffed that her methods were more about shopping than cooking now agree that the heart of great food is selecting the best ingredients.

So why does Ms. Waters still seem so restless, so unsatisfied, so unrelentingly demanding that she can’t show up at someone’s house and trust that they might have the right olive oil?

Because true, radical change — a country full of people who eat food that is good for them, good for the people who grow it and good for the earth — is simply not coming fast enough.

She is dismayed by the presidential candidates and said she has vowed not to vote for anyone who does not talk about the awful state of the food system.

Her pioneering Edible Schoolyard project, in which schoolchildren grow their own lunch and teachers use gardens for science lessons and recipes for social studies, is thriving in Berkeley, has been planted in New Orleans and may expand to Pittsburgh and Brooklyn. But in more than a decade the concept has not permeated the nation’s thinking on education.

Although many school districts are trying to improve the food they offer, the results have been unsatisfying, she said. It’s useless to coat frozen chicken nuggets with whole-wheat bread crumbs and fill vending machines with diet soda. Only a complete and radical reform will do, and it must be led by the president of the United States.

“These are little Band-Aids,” she said. “The whole body is bleeding and we must stop it. We simply must.”

A revolution in how we eat means respecting food and the people who produce it, she said. In her world, every aspect of this revolution, be it related to agricultural policy, the environment or obesity, must begin with a plate of lovely, locally produced food and work backward from there.

She’s also concerned about whether the Slow Food organization, which began with protests of a McDonald’s in Rome, will ever become as influential here as it has been in Europe. Although she has helped the United States organization grow to 171 chapters since its inception in 2000, she would like Slow Food and the concept of eco-gastronomy to be as much a part of the political discussion as foreign policy.

Earlier this year Ms. Waters announced an ambitious gathering called Slow Food Nation, planned for next May in San Francisco. She wanted it to be the Woodstock of food, drawing people from around the country. Slow Foodies would erect architect-designed street restaurants and green kitchens serving low-cost food. There would be a film festival and, if all went well, the dedication of a wholesale sustainable farmers’ market on a city pier.

Much of the work of raising the estimated $5 million budget fell to Ms. Waters, who is not great at it. And like many of her visions, it ran up against the reality-based system under which much of the world operates. So, earlier this month, the Slow Food organization decided to do a little less.

“We all looked at each other and said, Why don’t we just do a picnic?” Ms. Waters said.

That kind of compromise — a word she hates — is rare.

“I am an optimist of the first order,” she said. “I just got dipped in Berkeley in 1964 and I believe.” Of course, now she envisions a national picnic, maybe, with a blanket that stretches across the country. (The Slow Food organizers who will be doing the work are scheduled to meet this week to determine exactly what the public event will look like.)

Ruth Reichl, the editor of Gourmet, said the remarkable thing about Alice Waters is that she simply doesn’t stop: “She’s relentless in that way revolutionaries are.”

Ms. Waters’s biggest flaw, Ms. Reichl said, is that she doesn’t always take advantage of her strength and that she still operates in an old-fashioned, Berkeley kind of way. For example, Ms. Waters wants Farm Aid to hold a concert in San Francisco, working with Slow Food. To help make that happen, she mailed a handwritten note to Willie Nelson’s wife, Annie.

“She is a major power who still operates in a lovely, minor way,” Ms. Reichl said.

Which is probably why she was in my kitchen, stumping for her book like a first-time author.

The book is deceptively simple. As she writes, “Good cooking is no mystery.” Most recipes seem to be built on salt, black pepper, olive oil, fresh herbs and garlic. But they have to be specific kinds, like chunky gray sea salt for boiling water. “If you are not buying the right ingredients, this is going to taste like any other food,” she said.

The attention to detail is maddening and enlightening. She offers lovely notes on cooking eggs, and her passage on serving fruit for dessert is so thoughtful and useful it reads like gospel. She devotes a page and a half to making bread crumbs properly.

But in parts of the book she veers past purity to madness. Halfway into a recipe for gazpacho, while soaking ancho chili, grating tomatoes and mashing it all in a mortar and pestle, you start to look at the blender with longing.

Ms. Waters doesn’t like machines much, although she is partial to the toaster oven. She doesn’t use a computer and has only cursory knowledge of her cellphone. She wrote the book largely by dictating her notes to Fritz Streiff, her longtime co-writer, and collaborated with Kelsie Kerr, who has cooked at Chez Panisse, and Patricia Curtan, who also illustrated the book.

But she knows almost all the recipes by heart, which made it easy to figure out lunch.

Walking through the Greenmarket with her is an exercise in excess. She has never met a fresh herb she didn’t like, and I still have plenty of hyssop in my refrigerator to prove it.

Her good friend Doug Hamilton, a film director and producer, came along to help carry our reusable cloth shopping bags. He was a godsend. When you visit farmers with Alice Waters, you come home with a lot of stuff.

Farmers kept trying to give her baskets of food, but she insisted on paying because she believes contributing money to family farmers is a moral obligation. (In this case, The New York Times paid for everything.)

People literally started shaking when they realized they were shopping next to Alice Waters. When she offered to visit the Queen’s Hideaway, a homestyle restaurant in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, the owner, Liza Queen, waved her off, already nervous at the thought of it.

“Please don’t,” Ms. Queen said. “If you come in, we’d probably lose it.”

Back at my place Ms. Waters insisted we unpack and spread out everything on the dining room table, to take stock of what we had and to make a plan. It took almost every dish, basket and bowl I had.

Ms. Waters just sat with it all for a while. When things become discouraging, she said, she dreams of escaping to Sicily to sell produce from a little table that might look just like this one. Then she called her daughter, Fanny Singer, to tell her how pretty it all looked.

Once that was over, we got down to cooking.

Ms. Waters may not call herself a chef, but the girl can cook. She quickly pared small, late-summer artichokes and braised them in olive oil, thyme and water. She simmered sausage-shaped La Ratte potatoes and blanched three kinds of beans.

She threw the eggs into a strainer, then submerged them in the blanching pot, timing it so beautifully that the yolks just barely hung together when we sliced them open.

We warmed some olives with chili, olive oil and garlic while she got busy whisking her own personal stash of olive oil into what would become the centerpiece of the meal, an aioli made with garlic she smashed with salt in my mortar and pestle.

Truthfully, she’s a little messy in the kitchen. She’s firm, too. She chastised me for not having a spider to dip out the blanched vegetables. And she made me start a compost bucket, even though I have precious little dirt around my patio and a continuing battle with thuglike squirrels.

What ended up on the table was a platter of vegetables and eggs with heirloom tomatoes she deemed way too watery, all to be dipped into a big bowl of that glimmering green aioli. We heated some olive bread in the toaster oven and brought out a little plate of lemon cucumbers Mr. Hamilton had cut up.

It was a simple and beautiful thing.

Then she got up, sliced some peaches into a bowl with perfect late-season strawberries and blueberries she said reminded her of times she spent as a child in Maine. Over it all, she poured a syrup made by cooking down sugar, water and golden raspberries.

It was a hot day, so we headed into the air-conditioning to drink lemon verbena and mint tisane. She was sweaty, splattered and, she told me, quite happy to have been surrounded by good food all day. Because that’s how change starts.

“This kind of little gathering in the backyard is what reinforces our dedication,” she said. “That we can do something simply and easily with an unlikely group of people and all be in the same place because of the food on the table is how it happens.”

Her literary agent and her book editor eventually picked her up. I went to the back porch, ignored my urge to crack open a Diet Pepsi, and tried to figure out where I was going to put the compost pile.

researchers say many languages are dying

By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, Associated Press Writer Tue Sep 18, 7:45 PM ET

WASHINGTON - When every known speaker of the language Amurdag gets together, there's still no one to talk to. Native Australian Charlie Mungulda is the only person alive known to speak that language, one of thousands around the world on the brink of extinction. From rural Australia to Siberia to Oklahoma, languages that embody the history and traditions of people are dying, researchers said Tuesday.

While there are an estimated 7,000 languages spoken around the world today, one of them dies out about every two weeks, according to linguistic experts struggling to save at least some of them.

Five hotspots where languages are most endangered were listed Tuesday in a briefing by the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages and the National Geographic Society.

In addition to northern Australia, eastern Siberia and Oklahoma and the U.S. Southwest, many native languages are endangered in South America — Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Brazil and Bolivia — as well as the area including British Columbia, and the states of Washington and Oregon.

Losing languages means losing knowledge, says K. David Harrison, an assistant professor of linguistics at Swarthmore College.

"When we lose a language, we lose centuries of human thinking about time, seasons, sea creatures, reindeer, edible flowers, mathematics, landscapes, myths, music, the unknown and the everyday."

As many as half of the current languages have never been written down, he estimated.

That means, if the last speaker of many of these vanished tomorrow, the language would be lost because there is no dictionary, no literature, no text of any kind, he said.

Harrison is associate director of the Living Tongues Institute based in Salem, Ore. He and institute director Gregory D.S. Anderson analyzed the top regions for disappearing languages.

Anderson said languages become endangered when a community decides that its language is an impediment. The children may be first to do this, he explained, realizing that other more widely spoken languages are more useful.

The key to getting a language revitalized, he said, is getting a new generation of speakers. He said the institute worked with local communities and tries to help by developing teaching materials and by recording the endangered language.

Harrison said that the 83 most widely spoken languages account for about 80 percent of the world's population while the 3,500 smallest languages account for just 0.2 percent of the world's people. Languages are more endangered than plant and animal species, he said.

The hot spots listed at Tuesday's briefing:

• Northern Australia, 153 languages. The researchers said aboriginal Australia holds some of the world's most endangered languages, in part because aboriginal groups splintered during conflicts with white settlers. Researchers have documented such small language communities as the three known speakers of Magati Ke, the three Yawuru speakers and the lone speaker of Amurdag.

• Central South America including Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Brazil and Bolivia — 113 languages. The area has extremely high diversity, very little documentation and several immediate threats. Small and socially less-valued indigenous languages are being knocked out by Spanish or more dominant indigenous languages in most of the region, and by Portuguese in Brazil.

• Northwest Pacific Plateau, including British Columbia in Canada and the states of Washington and Oregon in the U.S., 54 languages. Every language in the American part of this hotspot is endangered or moribund, meaning the youngest speaker is over age 60. An extremely endangered language, with just one speaker, is Siletz Dee-ni, the last of 27 languages once spoken on the Siletz reservation in Oregon.

• Eastern Siberian Russia, China, Japan — 23 languages. Government policies in the region have forced speakers of minority languages to use the national and regional languages and, as a result, some have only a few elderly speakers.

• Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico — 40 languages. Oklahoma has one of the highest densities of indigenous languages in the United States. A moribund language of the area is Yuchi, which may be unrelated to any other language in the world. As of 2005, only five elderly members of the Yuchi tribe were fluent.

The research is funded by the Australian government, U.S. National Science Foundation, National Geographic Society and grants from foundations.

theurapeutic gospel

The Therapeutic Gospel

By David Powlison

What may be the most famous chapter in all of western literature portrays the appeal of a "therapeutic gospel."

In his chapter entitled "The Grand Inquisitor," Fyodor Dostoevsky imagines Jesus returning to sixteenth century Spain (The Brothers Karamazov, II:5:v). But Jesus is not welcomed by church authorities. The cardinal of Seville, head of the Inquisition, arrests and imprisons Jesus, condemning him to die. Why? The church has shifted course. It has decided to meet instinctual human cravings, rather than calling men to repentance. It has decided to bend its message to felt needs, rather than calling forth the high, holy, and difficult freedom of faith working through love. Jesus’ biblical example and message are deemed too hard for weak souls, and the church has decided to make it easy.

The Grand Inquisitor, representing the voice of this misguided church, interrogates Jesus in his prison cell. He sides with the tempter and the three questions the tempter put to Jesus in the wilderness centuries before. He says that the church will give earthly bread instead of the bread of heaven. It will offer religious magic and miracles instead of faith in the Word of God. It will exert temporal power and authority instead of serving the call to freedom. "We have corrected Your work," the inquisitor says to Jesus.

The inquisitor’s gospel is a therapeutic gospel. It’s structured to give people what they want, not to change what they want. It centers exclusively around the welfare of man and temporal happiness. It discards the glory of God in Christ. It forfeits the narrow, difficult road that brings deep human flourishing and eternal joy. This therapeutic gospel accepts and covers for human weaknesses, seeking to ameliorate the most obvious symptoms of distress. It makes people feel better. It takes human nature as a given, because human nature is too hard to change. It does not want the King of Heaven to come down. It does not attempt to change people into lovers of God, given the truth of who Jesus is, what he is like, what he does.
THE CONTEMPORARY THERAPEUTIC GOSPEL

The most obvious, instinctual felt needs of twenty-first century, middle-class Americans are different from the felt needs that Dostoevsky tapped into. We take food supply and political stability for granted. We find our miracle-substitute in the wonders of technology. Middle-class felt needs are less primal. They express a more luxurious, more refined sense of self-interest:

* I want to feel loved for who I am, to be pitied for what I’ve gone through, to feel intimately understood, to be accepted unconditionally;
* I want to experience a sense of personal significance and meaningfulness, to be successful in my career, to know my life matters, to have an impact;
* I want to gain self-esteem, to affirm that I am okay, to be able to assert my opinions and desires;
* I want to be entertained, to feel pleasure in the endless stream of performances that delight my eyes and tickle my ears;
* I want a sense of adventure, excitement, action, and passion so that I experience life as thrilling and moving.

The modern, middle-class version of therapeutic gospel takes its cues from this particular family of desires. We might say that the target audience consists of psychological felt needs, rather than the physical felt needs that typically arise in difficult social conditions. (The contemporary "health and wealth" gospel and obsession with "miracles" express something more like the Grand Inquisitor’s older version of therapeutic gospel.)

In this new gospel, the great "evils" to be redressed do not call for any fundamental change of direction in the human heart. Instead, the problem lies in my sense of rejection from others; in my corrosive experience of life’s vanity; in my nervous sense of self-condemnation and diffidence; in the imminent threat of boredom if my music is turned off; in my fussy complaints when a long, hard road lies ahead. These are today’s significant felt needs that the gospel is bent to serve. Jesus and the church exist to make you feel loved, significant, validated, entertained, and charged up. This gospel ameliorates distressing symptoms. It makes you feel better. The logic of this therapeutic gospel is a jesus-for-Me who meets individual desires and assuages psychic aches.

The therapeutic outlook is not a bad thing in its proper place. By definition, a medical-therapeutic gaze holds in view problems of physical suffering and breakdown. In literal medical intervention, a therapy treats an illness, trauma, or deficiency. You don’t call someone to repentance for their colon cancer, broken leg, or beriberi. You seek to heal. So far, so good.

But in today’s therapeutic gospel the medical way of looking at the world is metaphorically extended to these psychological desires. These are defined just like a medical problem. You feel bad; the therapy makes you feel better. The definition of the disease bypasses the sinful human heart. You are not the agent of your deepest problems, but merely a sufferer and victim of unmet needs. The offer of a cure skips over the sin-bearing Savior. Repentance from unbelief, willfulness, and wickedness is not the issue. Sinners are not called to a U-turn and to a new life that is life indeed. Such a gospel massages self-love. There is nothing in its inner logic to make you love God and love any other person besides yourself. This therapeutic gospel may often mention the word "Jesus," but he has morphed into the meeter-of-your-needs, not the Savior from your sins. It corrects Jesus’ work. The therapeutic gospel unhinges the gospel.
THE ONCE-FOR-ALL GOSPEL

The real gospel is good news of the Word made flesh, the sin-bearing Savior, the resurrected Lord of lords: "I am the living One, and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore" (Rev. 1:18). This Christ turns the world upside down. The Holy Spirit rewires our sense of felt need as one prime effect of his inworking presence and power. Because the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, we keenly feel a different set of needs when God comes into view and when we understand that we stand or fall in his gaze. My instinctual cravings are replaced (sometimes quickly, always gradually) by the growing awareness of true, life-and-death needs:

* I need mercy above all else: "Lord, have mercy upon me"; "For Your name’s sake, pardon my iniquity for it is very great";
* I want to learn wisdom, and unlearn willful self-preoccupation: "Nothing you desire compares with her";
* I need to learn to love both God and neighbor: "The goal of our instruction is love that comes from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith";
* I long for God’s name to be honored, for his kingdom to come, for his will to be done on earth;
* I want Christ’s glory, lovingkindness, and goodness to be seen on earth, to fill the earth as obviously as water fills the ocean;
* I need God to change me from who I am by instinct, choice, and practice;
* I want him to deliver me from my obsessive self-righteousness, to slay my lust for self-vindication, so that I feel my need for the mercies of Christ, so that I learn to treat others gently;
* I need God’s mighty and intimate help in order to will and to do those things that last unto eternal life, rather than squandering my life on vanities;
* I want to learn how to endure hardship and suffering in hope, having my faith simplified, deepened, and purified;
* I need to learn to worship, to delight, to trust, to give thanks, to cry out, to take refuge, to hope;
* I want the resurrection to eternal life: "We groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body";
* I need God himself: "Show me Your glory"; "Maranatha. Come, Lord Jesus."

Make it so, Father of mercies. Make it so, Redeemer of all that is dark and broken.

Prayer expresses desire. Prayer expresses your felt sense of need. Lord, have mercy upon us. Song expresses gladness and gratitude at desire fulfilled. Song expresses your felt sense of who God is and all that he gives. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound. But there are no prayers and songs in the Bible that take their cues from the current therapeutic felt needs. Imagine, "Our Father in heaven, help me feel that I’m okay just the way I am. Protect me this day from having to do anything I find boring. Hallelujah, I’m indispensable, and what I’m doing is really having an impact on others, so I can feel good about my life." Have mercy upon us! Instead, in our Bible we hear a thousand cries of need and shouts of delight that orient us to our real needs and to our true Savior.
GOOD GOODS, BAD GODS

Properly understood, carefully interpreted, the felt needs make good gifts. But they make poor gods. Get first things first. Seek first the Father’s kingdom and his righteousness, and every other good gift will be added to you.

This is easy to see in the case of the three particular gifts offered by the Grand Inquisitor’s therapeutic gospel. It is a good thing to have a stable source of food, "bread for tomorrow" (Matt. 6:11, literally). All people everywhere seek food, water, and clothing (Matt. 6:32). Our Father knows what we need. But seek first his kingdom. You do not live by bread alone, but by every word out of his mouth. If you worship your physical needs, you will only die. But if you worship God the giver of every good gift, you will be thankful for what he gives; you will still have hope when you suffer lack; and you will surely feast at the endless Banquet.

A sense of wonder and mystery is also a very good thing. But the same caveat, the same framework, applies. God is no wizard of Oz, creating experiences of wonder for the sake of the experience. Jesus said "no" to making a spectacle of himself in the midst of temple crowds. His daily faithfulness to God is a wonder upon wonder. Get first things first. Then you’ll appreciate glory in small ways and large. In the end you will know all things as wonders, both what is (Rev. 4) and what has happened (Rev. 5). You will know the incomprehensible God, creator and redeemer, whose name is Wonderful.

Similarly, political order is a good gift. We are to pray for the authorities to rule well, so that we may live peacefully (1 Tim. 2:2). But if you live for a just society, you will always be disappointed. Again, seek first God’s kingdom. You’ll work toward a just social order, enjoy it to the degree it’s attainable, have reason to endure injustice. In the end, you will know unutterable joy on the day when all persons bow to the reign of the true King.

Of course, God gives good gifts. But he also gives the best gift, the inexpressible Gift of gifts. The Grand Inquisitor burned Jesus at the stake in order to erase the Gift and the Giver. He chose to give people good things, but discarded first things.

The things offered by the contemporary therapeutic gospel are a bit trickier to interpret. The odor of self-interest and self-obsession clings closely to that wish list of "I want_____." But even these, carefully reframed and reinterpreted, do gesture in the direction of a good gift. The overall package of "felt needs" is systematically misaligned, but the pieces can be properly understood. Any "different gospel" (Gal. 1:6) makes itself plausible by offering Lego-pieces of reality assembled into a structure that contradicts revealed truth. Satan’s temptation of Adam and Eve was plausible only because it incorporated many elements of reality, continually gesturing in the direction of truth, even while steadily guiding away from the truth: "Look, a beautiful and desirable tree. and God has said that the test will reveal both good and evil, with the possibility of life not death arising from your choice. Just as God is wise, so you the chooser can become like God in wisdom. Come now and eat." So close, yet so far away. Almost so, but the exact opposite.

Consider the five elements we have identified with the therapeutic gospel:

1. "Need for love"? It is surely a good thing to know that you are both known and loved. God who searches the thoughts and intentions of our hearts also sets his steadfast love upon us. However all this is radically different from the instinctual craving to be accepted for who I am. Christ’s love comes pointedly and personally despite who I am. You are accepted for who Christ is, because of what he did, does, and will do. God truly accepts you, and if God is for you, who can be against you? But in doing this, he does not affirm and endorse what you are like. Rather, he sets about changing you into a fundamentally different kind of person. In the real gospel you feel deeply known and loved, but your relentless "need for love" has been overthrown.

2. "Need for significance"? It is surely a good thing for the works of your hands to be established forever: gold, silver, and precious stones, not wood, hay, and straw. It is good when what you do with your life truly counts, and when your works follow you into eternity. Vanity, futility, and ultimate insignificance register the curse upon our work life – even midcourse, not just when we retire, or when we die, or on the Day of Judgment. But the real gospel inverts the order of things presupposed by the therapeutic gospel. The craving for impact and significance – one of the typical "youthful lusts" that boil up within us – is merely idolatrous when it acts as Director of Operations in the human heart. God does not meet your need for significance; he meets your need for mercy and deliverance from your obsession with personal significance. When you turn from your enslavement and turn to God, then your works do start to count for good. The gospel of Jesus and the fruit of faith are not tailored to "meet your needs." He frees from the tyranny of felt needs, remakes you to fear God and keep his commandments (Eccl. 12:13). In the divine irony of grace, that alone makes what you do with your life of lasting value.

3. "Need for self-esteem, self-confidence, and self-assertion"? To gain a confident sense of your identity is a great good. Ephesians is strewn with several dozen "identity statements," because by this the Spirit motivates a life of courageous faith and love. You are God’s – among the saints, chosen ones, adopted sons, beloved children, citizens, slaves, soldiers; part of the workmanship, wife and dwelling place – every one of these in Christ. No aspect of your identity is self-referential, feeding your "self-esteem." Your opinion of yourself is far less important than God’s opinion of you, and accurate self-assessment is derivative of God’s assessment. True identity is God-referential. True awareness of yourself connects to high esteem for Christ. Great confidence in Christ correlates to a vote of fundamental no confidence in and about yourself. God nowhere replaces diffidence and people-pleasing by self-assertiveness. In fact, to assert your opinions and desires, as is, marks you as a fool. Only as you are freed from the tyranny of your opinions and desires are you free to assess them accurately, and then to express them appropriately.

4. "Need for pleasure"? In fact, the true gospel promises endlessly joyous experience, drinking from the river of delights (Ps. 36). This describes God’s presence. But as we have seen in each case, this is keyed to the reversal of our instinctive cravings, not to their direct satisfaction. The way of joy is the way of suffering, endurance, small obediences, willingness to identify with human misery, willingness to overthrow your most persuasive desires and instincts. I don’t need to be entertained. But I absolutely NEED to learn to worship with all my heart.

5. "Need for excitement and adventure"? To participate in Christ’s kingdom is to play a part within the Greatest Action-Adventure Story Ever Told. But the paradox of redemption again turns the whole world upside down. The real adventure takes the path of weakness, struggle, endurance, patience, small kindnesses done well. The road to excellence in wisdom is unglamorous. Other people might take better vacations and have a more thrilling marriage than yours. The path of Jesus calls forth more grit than thrill. He needed endurance far more than he needed excitement. His kingdom might not cater to our cravings for derring-do and thrill-seeking, but "solid joys and lasting treasures none but Zion’s children know."

We say "yes" and "amen" to all good gifts. But get first things first. The contemporary therapeutic gospel in its many forms takes our ‘gimmes’ at face value. It grabs for the goodies. It erases worship of the Giver, whose greatest gift is mercy towards us for what we want by instinct, choice, enculturation, and habit. He calls us to radical repentance. Bob Dylan described the therapeutic’s alternative in a remarkable phrase: "You think He’s just an errand boy to satisfy your wandering desires" (from When You Gonna Wake Up?). Second things are exalted as servants of Number One.

Get first things first. Get the gospel of incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and glory. Live the gospel of repentance, faith, and transformation into the image of the Son. Proclaim the gospel of the coming Day when eternal life and eternal death are revealed, the coming Day of Christ.
WHICH GOSPEL?

Which gospel will you live? Which gospel will you preach? Which needs will you awaken and address in others? Which Christ will be your people’s Christ? Will it be the christette who massages felt need? Or the Christ who turns the world upside down and makes all things new?

The Grand Inquisitor was very tender-hearted towards human felt need—very sympathetic to the things that all people everywhere seek with all their heart, very sensitive to the difficulty of changing anyone. But he proved to be a monster in the end. There is a saying in mercy ministries that runs like this, "If you don’t seek to meet people’s physical needs, it’s heartless. But if you don’t give people the crucified, risen and returning Christ, it’s hopeless." Jesus fed hungry people bread, and Jesus offered his broken body as the bread of eternal life. It is ultimately cruel to leave people in their sins, captive to their instinctive desires, in despair, under curse. The current therapeutic gospel sounds tender-hearted at first. It is so sensitive to pressure points of ache and disappointment. But in the end it is cruel and Christ-less. It does not foster true self-knowledge. It does not rewrite the script of the world. It creates no prayers or songs.

We must be no less sensitive but far more discerning. Jesus Christ turns human need upside down, creating prayer. He is the inexpressible Gift of gifts, creating song. And he gives all good gifts, both now and forever. Let every knee bow, and let everything that has breath praise the Lord.

David Powlison teaches and counsels at the Christian Counseling & Education Foundation’s School of Biblical Counseling and at Westminster Theological Seminary. He is also the author of numerous articles and books and the editor of The Journal of Biblical Counseling.

July/August 2007
©9Marks

dwebb

i've got faith in the bank and money in my heart
i've got a calloused place where your ring used to be, my love
i've traded naked and unashamed
for a better place to hide
for a righteous mask, a suit of fig leaves and lies

i thought the cattle on a thousand hills
was not enough to pay my bills
and i fell in love with those who proved me wrong
and now i want a broken heart

now there's a great padlock
on the place where i was free
and i'm feeling bad from swallowing that key
now i work real hard but i mostly call in sick
of a broken back from the ground fighting back at me

i cannot look you in the eye
so i check the knots on my disguise
'cause i fell in love with fashion in the dark
and now i want a broken heart

i've got alibis for every crime
a sbustitute to do my time
'cause Your heart breaks enough on both our parts
nso now i want a broken heart
now i want a broken heart
now i want a broken heart

why are we here? (boston globe)

Opinion/Ideas
Why are we here?
Colleges ignore life's biggest questions, and we all pay the price

By Anthony Kronman | September 16, 2007

In the past few weeks, tens of thousands of young men and women have begun their college careers. They have worked hard to get there. A letter of admission to one of the country's selective colleges or universities has become the most sought-after prize in America.

The students who have won this prize are about to enter an academic environment richer than any they have known. They will find courses devoted to every question under the sun. But there is one question for which most of them will search their catalogs in vain: The question of the meaning of life, of what one should care about and why, of what living is for.

In a shift of historic importance, America's colleges and universities have largely abandoned the idea that life's most important question is an appropriate subject for the classroom. In doing so, they have betrayed their students by depriving them of the chance to explore it in an organized way, before they are caught up in their careers and preoccupied with the urgent business of living itself. This abandonment has also helped create a society in which deeper questions of values are left in the hands of those motivated by religious conviction - a disturbing and dangerous development.

Over the past century and a half, our top universities have embraced a research-driven ideal that has squeezed the question of life's meaning from the college curriculum, limiting the range of questions teachers feel they have the right and authority to teach. And in the process it has badly weakened the humanities, the disciplines with the oldest and deepest connection to this question, leaving them directionless and vulnerable to being hijacked for political ends.

But the encouraging news is that there is, today, a growing hunger among students to explore these topics. As questions of spiritual urgency - abortion, creationism, the destruction of the environment - move to the center of debate in our society, America's colleges and universities have a real opportunity to give students the tools to discuss them at a meaningful level.

What our society now desperately needs is what it once had: An alternative approach to a college education that takes these matters seriously without pretending to answer them in a doctrinaire way.

For this to happen, teachers of the humanities must reconsider the nature and value of their work, and confront the ways in which the modern research ideal has deformed it. That will require real boldness on their part. But the stakes are high.

The question of life's meaning is a worry of the spirit. Our colleges and universities need to reclaim their authority to speak to the subject, in a conversation broader than any church alone can conduct. The beneficiaries, in the end, will be both their students and the culture they will inherit.

Before the Civil War, America's colleges were small institutions with religious roots, training students for the higher professions of medicine, teaching, ministry, and law. Only a fraction of Americans attended college, and the education they received was based on beliefs whose truth was taken for granted. The Puritan divines who founded Harvard College in 1636 understood their task to be the education of Christian gentlemen, schooled in the classics and devoted to God. They knew the answer to the question of what living is for, and saw that their students learned it.

In the years after the Civil War, however, American higher education underwent a fundamental transformation. Thousands of American educators had gone to Germany earlier in the century to pursue advanced study in their fields, and they returned with a new conception of what institutions of higher learning were for. The German university of the 19th century was based on a novel assumption with no precedent in the history of education. This was that universities exist primarily to sponsor research - that their first responsibility is to provide the space, books, and other resources that scholars need to produce new knowledge.

In the 1860s and '70s, a handful of older American colleges, including Harvard, began transforming themselves into research universities, and a number of new schools, such as Cornell and Johns Hopkins, were established to promote research. The research ideal began to gain influence in every area of study and teaching. Faculty divided into departments, and then into more specialized units of work. Departments of philosophy appeared for the first time, followed by departments of English. In 1893, the department of biology at the University of Chicago was reorganized into five departments of zoology, botany, anatomy, neurology, and physiology. At the same time, the religious premises of antebellum education were called into question, in part as a result of the new scientific spirit encouraged by the research ideal. Increasingly, our colleges and universities, especially the most elite, became secular and specialized institutions.

In the process, the world of higher education assumed the shape it has today. Graduate schools were created; scholarly journals were established to publish research. Centralized control of funds for research became increasingly important. College teachers were expected to have some specialized knowledge of a particular discipline. And students were expected to specialize too, by "majoring" in a particular subject.

In the sciences, the adoption of the research ideal has produced astounding results. Our knowledge of the natural and social worlds, and ability to control them, is a direct result of the modern system of academic research.

In the humanities, however, the legacy of the research ideal has been mixed. We know vastly more today than we did even 50 years ago about the order of Plato's dialogues, the accuracy of Gibbon's citations, and how Benjamin Franklin spent his time in Paris. But the research ideal has excluded the question of life's meaning from serious academic concern as a question too large, too unformed, too personal, to be a subject of specialized research. A tenure-minded junior professor studying Shakespeare or Freud or Spinoza might re-inspect every scrap of his subject's work with the hope of making some small but novel discovery - but would be either very brave or very foolish to write a book about Spinoza's suggestion that a free man thinks only of life, never of death; or about Freud's appealing, if enigmatic, statement that the meaning of life is to be found in work and love.

As this new vision of higher education took hold in America, faculty members ceased to think of themselves as shapers of souls. Today's students are thus denied the opportunity to explore the question of life's meaning in an organized way, under the guidance of teachers who seek to acquaint their students with the answers contained in the rich tradition whose transmission was once the special duty of the humanities.

It has also put the humanities in the shadow of the natural and social sciences. Judged by the standards of these latter disciplines, research in the humanities is bound to seem less conclusive, less accretive, less quantifiable. In philosophy, one can reasonably claim that there has been no meaningful progress since Plato. For a physicist to say the same thing about Newton would be absurd. Teachers of the humanities who judge their work strictly from the standpoint of the research ideal condemn themselves to an inferior position in the hierarchy of academic authority and prestige.

Conservatives who bemoan our schools' disengagement from spiritual questions often point a finger at political correctness, a stifling culture of moral and political uniformity based on progressive ideals. But to blame political correctness reverses the order of causation. The culture of political correctness is only a symptom, a discouraging response to a larger sense of directionlessness in the humanities.

Multiculturalism, anti-colonialism, and insistence on race and gender as organizing principles of study are an expression of the anxious search for a new and morally honorable role for the humanities once their older role as guides to the meaning of life lost its credibility. It is that older role we now need to recover.

Can the meaning of life be studied independent of religion? There are many who doubt that it can. They say that any program of this sort must rest on religious beliefs, which have lost their status as a source of authority in higher education. But that is a mistake. For even after the rise of the research university, with its secular and scientific culture, there were humanists who believed that the question of life's meaning can be studied in a disciplined but nonreligious way. Their approach gives us a model to follow today.

One of the most forceful proponents of this view was Alexander Meiklejohn, a distinguished professor of government and constitutional law, and the president of Amherst College from 1912 to 1924. Meiklejohn insisted that undergraduate education be more than a preparation for a career. He thought it vital that students also explore what he called "the art of living," the spiritual question of how they ought to live their lives. He defended the idea of spiritual seriousness in a nonreligious age, and thought it could be studied without dogmatic commitments.

In the first half of the 20th century, many colleges and universities had programs that sought to implement Meiklejohn's ideal. Most have disappeared, though some survive today. At Reed College in Oregon, freshmen are required to take a yearlong humanities course, for which they prepare by reading Homer's "Iliad" the summer before. Columbia University has a core curriculum consisting of four courses devoted to the masterpieces of Western literature, philosophy, music, and art. At Yale, where I teach, incoming freshmen can apply to the Directed Studies program, which begins in the fall with Herodotus, Homer, and Plato, and concludes in the spring with Wittgenstein, T. S. Eliot, and Hannah Arendt. These programs differ in many ways, and inevitably reflect the culture of their schools; some are mandatory and others, like Yale's Directed Studies, are elective. But despite their differences, all rest on a set of common assumptions, which together define a shared conception of humane education.

The first is that there is more than one good answer to the question of what living is for. A second is that the number of such answers is limited, making it possible to study them in an organized way. A third is that the answers are irreconcilably different, necessitating a choice among them. A fourth is that the best way to explore these answers is to study the great works of philosophy, literature, and art in which they are presented with lasting beauty and strength. And a fifth is that their study should introduce students to the great conversation in which these works are engaged - Augustine warily admiring Plato, Hobbes reworking Aristotle, Paine condemning Burke, Eliot recalling Dante, recalling Virgil, recalling Homer - and help students find their own authentic voice as participants in the conversation.

These are challenging works. But they are accessible too, and an 18-year-old with some curiosity about life will find much that is inspiring in them: the great battle scenes of "War and Peace," and Tolstoy's meditations on the insignificance of the individual in history; Descartes' invitation to his readers to doubt everything they think they know, at least once in their lives; Arendt's account of Eichmann on trial, and her chilling description of the "banality of evil"; Virgil's Aeneas and Jane Austin's Emma, both in love, but with more on their minds.

Though critics have attacked "great books" programs as a kind of indoctrination into a European-dominated intellectual canon, the students in my Directed Studies class respond in the opposite way. They become rambunctiously independent. For they learn that the greatest minds in the world are on their side - or aren't, and feel entitled to quarrel with them. A college freshman who has read Descartes, and who crafts her own reasons to reject his invitation to doubt, is on her way to an independence of spirit that is surely one of the conditions to living a meaningful life.

For our humanities departments to make room for this kind of study again, they need not repudiate the research ideal. Much would be lost if they did. But they can insist that teachers in these fields equip themselves to guide their students in an exploration of life's meaning, which can be done with confidence and honor only if the research ideal is acknowledged to have limits.

There are hopeful signs this will happen. The tide of political correctness is receding on our campuses. There is an increasing demand among undergraduates for courses that address the big questions of life, in all their sprawling grandeur, without reticence or embarrassment. At Harvard, Michael Sandel's famous course on justice, which explores the meaning of the concept from Aristotle to Mill and beyond, draws hundreds of students each year. Ten percent of the freshmen at Yale now apply to Directed Studies - more than can be admitted.

Most importantly, perhaps, the great upsurge of religious fundamentalism outside our colleges and universities is a sign of the growing appetite for spiritual direction. These movements can be a source of danger and division, and intellectuals may mock and despise them, but teachers also ought to see in them the energy that will drive the restoration of the question of life's meaning - and, with that, of the humanities themselves - to a central place in our colleges and universities. The fundamentalists have the wrong answers, but they've got the right questions. We need to learn to ask them again in school.

Our culture may be spiritually impoverished, but what it needs is not more religion. What it needs is an alternative to religion, for colleges and universities to become again the places they once were - spiritually serious but nondogmatic, concerned with the soul but agnostic about God.

Much depends on this. America's entire leadership class now goes to college - something that was not true a century ago. Infusing higher education with a new and vibrant humanism will produce benefits not only for the future leaders of government and business, but for society at large: A richer and more open debate about ultimate values; an electorate less likely to be cowed into thinking that only the faithful have the right to invoke them; a humbler regard for the mystery of life in a world increasingly dominated by technocratic reason.

The most immediate beneficiaries of any such revival, however, would be the young men and women in school today. Instead of offering a disorganized reprieve between the hard work of high school and the challenges of a career, their college education will endow them with priceless materials for a lifetime of struggle with the most important question anyone ever asks.

When this happens, a place in fall's freshman class will be the prize it ought to be.

Anthony Kronman is Sterling Professor of Law at Yale and author of "Education's End: Why Our Colleges and Universities Have Given Up on the Meaning of Life."

wow mr. mahaney

yes

C.S. Lewis understood hell, not as a place where God locks people out of heaven, but as a dungeon that we lock ourselves into and that we as a Church hold the keys. I think that gives us new insight when we look at the parable of Lazarus or hear the brilliant words with which Jesus reassures Peter: “The gates of Hell will not prevail against you.” As an adolescent, I understood that to mean that the demons and fiery darts of the devil will not hit us. But lately I’ve done a little more thinking and praying, and I have a bit more insight on the idea of “gates.” Gates are not offensive weapons. Gates are defensive—walls and fences we build to keep people out. God is not saying the gates of hell will not prevail as they come at us. God is saying that we are in the business of storming the gates of hell, and the gates will not prevail as we crash through them with grace.

-Shane Claiborne

blessing

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart. May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace. May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain in to joy. And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done. (From a Franciscan Benediction)

church thoughts

The Church may be a whore, but she’s my mother. - luther


ouch. where are my loyalties?

flickr set

polar bears!!

wowww

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pinkberry esque?

Vanilla Frozen Yogurt Recipe

Heidi notes: First off, remember it is important to use good-quality whole-milk yogurt. The version in David's book is Vanilla Frozen Yogurt. This time around I skipped out on the vanilla, opting for straight, bright white yogurt with the sweetness playing off the tang of the yogurt. I also used slightly less sugar than called for here, more like 2/3 cup - but you can go either way depending on what you like.

3 cups (720g) strained yogurt (see below) or Greek-style yogurt
3/4 cup (150g) sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional)

Mix together the yogurt, sugar, and vanilla (if using). Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved. Refrigerate 1 hour.

Freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.

To make 1 cup (240g) of strained yogurt, line a mesh strainer with a few layers of cheese cloth. then scrape 16 ounces or 2 cups (480g) of plain whole-milk yogurt into the cheesecloth. Gather the ends and fold them over the yogurt, then refrigerate for at least 6 hours. So, for the above recipe start with and strain 6 cups of yogurt.

Makes about 1 quart.

hahahaha

Faith for the Man He'll Become

Faith for the Man He'll Become
by Carolyn McCulley

This is a shout-out to all my younger sisters in Christ. Let's sit down and have a boy chat for a minute. There's something I've learned over time that I'd like to pass on to you.

We'll begin with your wedding dreams. How would you describe the man you want to marry? What would he be like as a husband, father, and provider?

If you've had numerous godly male role models in your life — your father, pastor, boss, family friend, uncle, small group leader — you may already have a mental picture based on the qualities you appreciate in these men. You may see some of the husbands and fathers in your church and think to yourself that you'd like to marry a man just like them. Those are great aspirations to have! But first you may need to talk to their wives.

Why? Because these women didn't marry the husbands they have today. Typically, they married less seasoned men. Thanks to the Holy Spirit's refinements over time, as well as the feminine counsel, influence, and encouragement of these wives, their husbands are different some 20-plus years down the line.

Now take a look at the young men you know. Can you see them with eyes of faith? Like trees in springtime with an impressionistic haze of buds, the potential for growth is strongly evident but it's not yet fully realized.

So here's what I want to impart to you: There is a learning curve to a man's leadership as a husband and father. The qualities you can see in a 50-year-old man's life were developed over 50 years. There are 25 more years of growth ahead for the 25-year-old man before it's fair to compare them. While you are called to be discerning about the characters of the men you befriend or court/date, you also have a part in encouraging these men to grow. In fact, that's part of your learning curve as you prepare for being a wife.

What am I talking about? Let's look at two examples.

A Trajectory

One day, my friend Kyle announced an important revelation: "I recently realized that I've been looking for a girlfriend, instead of a wife. I've been presuming on marriage, instead of preparing for it."

Now 23, Kyle had always assumed that one day he'd get married. But he wasn't intentionally preparing for his role in a God-glorifying marriage. Instead, he found he had a pattern of presuming upon his interest in a specific woman (before courtship), instead of preparing himself to lead and serve a wife. Kyle found he would prematurely invest in that friendship and take steps to grow toward this woman, instead of taking steps to grow toward God while holding his interest and hopes loosely.

This insight came about as he studied the Bible and talked with other men about what masculinity looks like in the Scriptures. Now he is taking steps to help him achieve his long-term goals of a godly marriage and family. Currently there are two areas he's assessed a need for growth. The first is his money management, so Kyle has developed a budget to track his expenditures and investments. The second area is preparation for fatherhood. Though he lives with his family, he is not exposed to many children. That's why he signed up to serve in children's ministry, where he is not only caring for children on a weekly basis, he is also watching how other men there interact with children. It challenges him to grow in faith, he says. He wants to be a consistent gospel-centered example for these children. In addition, he is meeting regularly with accountability partners to confess sin, pray for one another, and check on each other's spiritual growth.

My job as Kyle's friend is to encourage him in this endeavor by both pointing out any positive changes I observe and praying for him as a brother in Christ. Kyle is pursuing a trajectory of godliness that should prepare him for a fruitful future. This kind of intentionality is what young women should be looking for — the initial efforts that young men make as they respond to the requirements of masculine servant-leadership described in the Bible.

The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God's church? He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil. Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. And let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. (1 Timothy 3:1-10 ESV, emphasis added).

This list of virtues obviously refers to the qualities required for church leaders, but elsewhere in Scripture they are also required of all believers. That's why this compact list presents trustworthy standards by which we can evaluate men. Are they cultivating these character traits? Are they trying to be purposeful? Are they trying to grow in self-control? Are they respectable? Are they hospitable? (I don't mean that they throw ten-course dinner parties. I mean, do they make people feel welcome — are they observant of the needs of those around them?) And so on, right until the last point: Have they been tested? Testing doesn't mean that these men have performed flawlessly on each and every character trait listed above, but that they have allowed examination through accountability and have gained the approval of others around them for their commitment to pursuing spiritual growth.

Honestly, though, when we are attracted to a man, we can be a bit dazzled by him and not as objective as we need to be — a normal reaction. Therefore, watching a man's commitment to the Bride of Christ is going to help us discern how he will interact with an earthly bride. We really should want to marry men who love one person more than they love us — Jesus. And if they love Jesus, they are going to love His bride. Does the Bride of Christ get consistent attention and time from this man? Does the Bride of Christ receive his financial support? Does the Bride of Christ benefit from a consistent relationship, or does this man only show up in church sporadically? Does he want to sacrifice his leisure time to serve the Bride of Christ through participating in her ministries? Does he love the Body of Christ by caring for a wide variety of her members — or is he only interested in meeting the more attractive, eligible members? Is he faithful to the Bride of Christ or does he hop from church to church and meeting to meeting?

And ... can the same be said of us?

The Influence

God has given women a position of influence, encouragement, and counsel. This happens in varying degrees in all of our relationships. Entire books have been written on this subject, but I will defer to the concise description of a godly woman's example and influence found in 1 Peter 3:1-5 (NIV, emphasis mine):

Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful.

The Lord has given women the opportunity to be holy influencers. Unfortunately, many of us try to influence change through the barrage of our words (read: nagging, whining, manipulating) rather than through the purity and reverence in our attitudes that is built upon a gentle trust in God's ability to change people. Again, entire books have been written on this subject and I can't begin to unpack that thought in this short column. But I will leave you with the testimony of another friend of mine.

Jared is in his late 20s and has been in a courtship for a few months. He is intentionally pursuing this relationship with marriage in mind, but he is not yet sure if this is definitely what God has for them. No matter the outcome of this particular relationship, Jared has already noticed the positive influence his girlfriend has upon him.

"When I'm with Bethany, I realize she spurs me on toward Christlikeness," he said. "She is quick to confess sin, doesn't hold a grudge, and engages me in true fellowship — not just entertaining conversations. I don't mind being entertained, but what sticks with me is what she brings up when she talks about God."

Like Kyle, Jared has been preparing for marriage over the last few years. He has grown in his career and his ability to provide for a family, he has pursued accountability, he has taken on leadership roles in his church, and he has initiated other courtships. Bethany's example, however, has also inspired another important revelation about their relationship. Jared has noticed that whenever he begins to feel uncertain about the direction of their relationship, it is directly correlated to the status of his relationship with God. Whenever he has begun to be perfunctory or slipshod about his personal devotions, he also becomes uncertain about the courtship. His relationship with God profoundly affects his relationship with Bethany. But God uses Bethany's example and faith to inspire him to keep going. It is an exchange of grace.

At this writing, neither knows what God has for them in their future. Whether or not they marry, the Lord has used this relationship to spur a brother and a sister toward godliness. By the grace of God, they are each building on the learning curves of servant-leadership and (to coin a phrase) "encourager-followership." It is a solid trajectory for a fruitful future — one that requires of eyes of faith and trust toward God to see.

Copyright © 2006 Carolyn McCulley. All rights reserved. International copyright secured.

just for fun

crannnnn actually sounds kind of cool to me.

and, sweet! http://public.research.att.com/~ttsweb/tts/demo.php

tchicahgo!!





http://blurbomat.com/archives/2006/10/31/how-to-turn-an-ordinary-photo-into-an-extraordinary-photo/

Shadow mission = authentic mission hijacked by ego

The term “Shadow Mission” feels heavy, like a lump in my throat, like a rock landing with a thunk. Before even the definition, I think each of our own Shadow Missions flash before our eyes, whether we’re willing to admit it to ourselves, let alone anyone else. I know in an instant what mine is. Do you?

The Shadow Mission is the authentic mission hijacked by my ego and my woundedness. If John’s is “talkative boy wins acclaim,” mine is something along the lines of “funny girl eats, drinks, and is merry.”

At my worst, I’m a bad stand-up comic/short order cook/tap dancing monkey who glosses over the realities of life in favor of keeping the party going and keeping the laughs coming. I want life to be a wide-open celebration, each day shimmering and glowing with life and beauty…but ten degrees off from that makes me frantic and shallow and disconnected from pain, my own and anyone else’s. Because I know this about myself, I work hard at, well, working hard. I practice silence and writing and pursue deep conversations, not because those things are natural to me, but because I need them like I need vitamins to keep me healthy.

One of God’s greatest gifts to me is that I have several Mordecai voices in my life. My husband and the men and women in our house church are on to me every time I tiptoe over to that lesser, shallower version of myself. They look me in the eye, and tell me to get back to work, to get back to depth, truth telling, and focus, to get back to life as I was meant to live it. Thank God for them. Who is Mordecai in your life?

What can you do today that will take power from that Shadow Mission? What ways of living will keep you close to God’s dream for your life and increasingly far from the seduction of the Shadow Mission? What conversations could you have even today that could make things right, even if they haven’t been right, inside of you or at your church or in your marriage, for a long time?

What person comes to mind as John talks about the pastor that isn’t here this year? Is there someone in your community whose life is littered with warning signs and red flags? Are you willing to be a voice of honesty in his or her life?

Or are there things that people have been trying to tell you for years that you’ve chosen not to accept? As you scroll through hard conversations you may have dismissed in the moment, are there patterns you’d rather not see, but in the quiet moments, recognize as true? Is there a shadow you’ve been unwilling to face?

more:
http://ryanday.wordpress.com/2007/08/10/session-7-john-ortberg-a-leaders-greatest-fear/
http://ordinary-radical.blogspot.com/2007/08/john-ortberg-leadership-summit-debrief.html
http://www.jonathanhopson.com/?p=134
http://spin.willowcreek.com/c/blogs/leadership/archive/2007/8/11/chris-brooks-responds-to-session-7.aspx

The story of Esther

The king had no vision to die for. His shadow mission was ego driven where everything was about him. He surrounded himself with people who supported him. They appeased the leader.

The greatest challenge of a leader is to find the truth tellers. People who ask questions.

When a leader is presented something that helps his shadow mission, he will not challenge it. No matter how ethical or moral it is/isn’t.

When was the last time you spent in prayer and fasting for your mission?

John’s shadow mission - Self idolatry & winning approval

What’s your shadow mission?

Soloman - Pleasure
Jonah - Escape
Simon in Acts 8 - spectacular ministry

A shadow mission is very closely related to your gifting. A shadow mission is hijacked by my ego & my wounds. And there’s no Jesus in it.

What is the shadow mission of your church?

Who is Mordecai in your life? Who is ready to challenge you when you’re ready to sell yourself short and follow your shadow mission?

Boldness, intelligence, & timing of Esther is incredible.

Haaman’s shadow mission was more.
More wealth, power, applause, honor…more.
Shadow mission - A chronic sense of soul dissatisfaction.
Haaman’s wife played into his shadow mission.

You are where you are for a reason. It may not be as dramatic as Esther’s, but it is eternal. Have you come to grips with your shadow mission?

Who knows, but maybe you are where you are, doing what you are doing, for such a time as this. You need to not only know what your shadow mission is, but let God perform open heart surgery on you. Let God heal you and restore you.

interesting

MOVING ON
By JEFF ZASLOW



Are We Teaching Our Kids
To Be Fearful of Men?
August 23, 2007; Page D1

When children get lost in a mall, they're supposed to find a "low-risk adult" to help them. Guidelines issued by police departments and child-safety groups often encourage them to look for "a pregnant woman," "a mother pushing a stroller" or "a grandmother."

The implied message: Men, even dads pushing strollers, are "high-risk."

Are we teaching children that men are out to hurt them? The answer, on many fronts, is yes. Child advocate John Walsh advises parents to never hire a male babysitter. Airlines are placing unaccompanied minors with female passengers rather than male passengers. Soccer leagues are telling male coaches not to touch players.
[photo]
A Virginia public-service ad that angered fathers'-rights groups.

Child-welfare groups say these are necessary precautions, given that most predators are male. But fathers' rights activists and educators now argue that an inflated predator panic is damaging men's relationships with kids. Some men are opting not to get involved with children at all, which partly explains why many youth groups can't find male leaders, and why just 9% of elementary-school teachers are male, down from 18% in 1981.

People assume that all men "have the potential for violence and sexual aggressiveness," says Peter Stearns, a George Mason University professor who studies fear and anxiety. Kids end up viewing every male stranger "as a potential evildoer," he says, and as a byproduct, "there's an overconfidence in female virtues."

In Michigan, the North Macomb Soccer Club has a policy that at least one female parent must always sit on the sidelines, to guard against any untoward behavior by male coaches. In Churchville, Pa., soccer coach Barry Pflueger says young girls often want a hug after scoring a goal, but he refrains. Even when girls are injured, "you must comfort them without touching them, a very difficult thing to do," he says. "It saddens me that this is what we've come to."

TV shows, including the Dateline NBC series "To Catch a Predator," hype stories about male abusers. Now social-service agencies are also using controversial tactics to spread the word about abuse. This summer, Virginia's Department of Health mounted an ad campaign for its sex-abuse hotline. Billboards featured photos of a man holding a child's hand. The caption: "It doesn't feel right when I see them together."

More than 200 men emailed complaints about the campaign to the health department. "The implication is that if you see a man holding a girl's hand, he's probably a predator," says Marc Rudov, who runs the fathers' rights site TheNoNonsenseMan.com. "In other words, if you see a father out with his daughter, call the police."

Virginia's campaign was designed to encourage people to trust their instincts about possible abuse, says Rebecca Odor, director of sexual and domestic violence prevention for the state health department. She stands by the ads, pointing out that 89% of child sex-abuse perpetrators in Virginia are male.

Mr. Walsh, host of Fox's "America's Most Wanted," began advocating for missing children in 1981, after his son was killed by a stranger. He knows some men are offended by his advice to never hire a male babysitter. But as he sees it, if a teenage boy wants to experiment with sex, you don't want him using your kids.

"It's not a witch hunt," he says. "It's all about minimizing risks. What dog is more likely to bite and hurt you? A Doberman, not a poodle. Who's more likely to molest a child? A male."

Airlines use similar reasoning when they seat unaccompanied minors only with women. They are trying to decrease the odds of a problem. Certainly, many men would be safe seatmates for kids, but sometimes, especially on overnight flights in darkened cabins, "you have to make generalizations for the safety of a child," says Diana Fairechild, an expert witness in aviation disputes. Airlines have had decades of experience monitoring the gender of abusive seatmates, she adds, quoting a line repeated in airline circles: "No regulation in aviation takes effect without somebody's blood on it."

Most men understand the need to be cautious, so they're willing to take a step back from children, or to change seats on a plane. One abused child is one too many. Still, it's important to maintain perspective. "The number of men who will hurt a child is tiny compared to the population," says Benjamin Radford, who researches statistics on predators and is managing editor of the science magazine Skeptical Inquirer. "Virtually all of the time, if a child is lost or in trouble, he will be safe going to the nearest male stranger."
• Email: Jeffrey.Zaslow@wsj.com.