On appeasement

    He was a good man, a humane man. He had seen what war was. He had seen the casualties from gas, the long lists of the dead and missing. He had seen the flower of manhood—a generation of his countrymen—cut down and heard the cries of the widows and the bereaved, as the extent of the war’s disaster exceeded the wildest initial estimates. So when the opportunity to avoid another war—too terrible to contemplate—presented itself, he embraced it regardless the cost, thinking that his most honorable course was to spare his nation the horrors of war. He was doing his duty, the best he knew how to do for his country.
    But history has savaged the reputation of Neville Chamberlain. Whatever the virtues of his humane domestic policy, his quiet rearmament of Great Britain, or his overall skill and good sense in navigating the political seas of his time, his premiership has become characterized entirely by his policy of appeasement towards Hitler, at Munich in 1938, as a way to prevent or avoid war in Europe. Judged by even the most liberal standards, the “peace for our time” that he announced upon his return from Munich was shockingly short—merely 11 months for the United Kingdom, even less for the luckless Czechs. See here the prize he brought home from Munich, in exchange for the Sudetenland, to which Chamberlain had no rights at all: document.
    Chamberlain was greatly praised by most of his countrymen at the time, blinded perhaps by desire for peace and fear of war. Were they grasping at straws? Was the cold calculation of Europe’s true situation too bitter to be contemplated? True prophets are without honor in their own country, at least until the catastrophe has actually fallen. Whatever the case, Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler illustrates, in terms that seem impossible to miss, that appeasement never works, because the kind of person who demands to be appeased will always demand more. Such was the case for Chamberlain, who decided upon a policy of appeasement despite the abundance of historical examples advising against it. So it is today.
    With that, Chamberlain’s record and reputation have been consigned to a kind of political-historical hell, based entirely on that one mistaken policy in dealing with Hitler at Munich, unjust as that may be. Nevertheless, a more generous historical appraisal in the future seems as unlikely for Chamberlain as for Pontius Pilate.
    Let him who has ears, hear.

What's necessary

No one would require that one even understand, let alone believe in, salvation by grace through faith in order to be saved by grace through faith. In the matter of personal salvation, "by grace through faith" is the "how"; being saved by grace and receiving the gift of faith is the thing itself. Of course, the truth of the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith is taught is Scripture (Eph. 2:8-9 in particular) and is the subject of many catechetical statements and theological works: it is part of coming to know God. Protestants will mostly affirm it as an essential doctrine, at least in the sense that, if one actively believes the converse, one's Christianity is suspect. On the other hand, if one is a new Christian, the lack of any fixed belief in the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith is a sign only of the need to study further the acts of God in the Bible, not of any defect in one's salvation.

    If this can truly be said of so mighty and nearly universal a doctrine as salvation by grace through faith, namely, that it is not essential for salvation, what should we say of lesser doctrines, say, for instance, the theory of the Atonement?

Blame Game

I understand that Mrs. Clinton and her allies have been searching for someone to blame for her having lost the presidential election. Well, the hunt is over. The burden of concealment has become too much to bear. So, I confess; it was me. I am solely to blame for Mrs. Clinton's election loss. I did it. Now can we move on?

The Righteousness of God

"For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith."--Romans 1:17

Whole books have been written about the phrase, "the righteousness of God," as though, pregnant as it is with meaning, its meaning remains mysterious. And so, one may search out the covenants, inquire into the moral impeccability of God, and ponder the way righteousness is imputed, all without exhausting, or even penetrating the full meaning of the phrase. But C. I. Scofield, in his footnote on Rom. 3:21, wrote that the righteousness of God is nothing else than Jesus Christ. On one level, at least, this is incredibly liberating: we need not inquire into the theological background of God's righteousness (though one may profitably do so) to understand what St. Paul has written. We need look no further than Jesus Christ to understand God's righteousness fully. Jesus is the emblem, the evidence, and the embodiment of the righteousness of God.

The desire to save money on health care (as a nation) is the foolishest wind from the limbo of vanities, whence I would gladly return it.

The Judgment of Jonah by Jacques Ellul
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The theological perspective of Jonah: a miracle play was strongly influenced by The Judgment of Jonah, by Jacques Ellul. I highly recommend this little book to all who want to understand the book of Jonah. Ellul's message is no less than this: the story of Jonah is a metaphor for the Gospel; the person of Jonah is both messenger and message, like Jesus; and Nineveh is the world and our hearts. So, thanks to the forgotten friend who first recommended this book to me.

View all my reviews

Marriage?

Contrary to common report, the court did not change the definition of marriage in the recent Supreme Court ruling. That is ultra vires, beyond the powers of the court, or any court. Can the court make red into blue by declaring it so, or can it reverse the rotation of the earth by so ruling? What changed was the qualifications for obtaining a marriage license, a commodity provided by the state, enabling the couple to qualify for certain benefits provided by the state. The latter, though overlapping in one sense, has in another sense nothing whatsoever to do with the former.

So, be calm: marriage has not changed at all.