Around The Horn – 3.25.10

Can Christian Organizations Remain Christian in a “Tolerant” Age?
From Al Mohler: That question is the focus of a case soon to come before the U. S. Supreme Court.  Much is riding on this case. The same logic used against the Christian Legal Society in this case can be used to argue that any Christian organization, school, or institution no longer serves the community’s welfare if it holds such policies. How long before similar arguments are made against churches and Christian schools?

Finding Religion
We’ve received many comments in response to our latest series of maps of online representations of religion. Some were full of praise while others, well, weren’t.

10 Places You Don’t Want to Visit
In previous lists we have looked at amazing holiday destinations – today we are looking at the bottom ten; these are ten places you don’t want to visit! Having said that, maybe the curious would get a thrill from visiting some of these strange and dangerous places, but for most of us, reading about it is quite enough.

Reforms Big Lie
Amity Shlaes at Bloomberg writes: “So lie to me, lie to me, I’d rather have it that way.”  Every historic moment has its soundtrack, and passing U.S. health-care legislation is no exception. The song for this bill is “Lie to Me,” recorded by blues singer Brook Benton in 1962.  Benton’s song is a plea to the woman who cheated on him to lie to him about it and instead say everything’s fine. The tune came to mind while watching some voters applaud Democratic leaders as they promise that the new law will reduce budget deficits by $1 trillion.  “Just lie, lie, lie.”

Don’t Be Afraid
Russell Moore Writes: The United States House of Representatives just passed a health care reform bill that I and lots of other Christians opposed. Such legislation should concern us. There are some bad consequences for the weakest and most vulnerable among us, principally unborn children. But should it also concern us that so many of us are talking today about how afraid we are?

Praying About Health-Care Reform
From Mike Pohlman at The Gospel Coalition: But until that Day, and in light of that Day, keep us thinking with gospel-sanity… loving with Jesus’ compassion… serving with grace-full humility… and hoping with kingdom vision. So very Amen, I pray… we pray… in the name of our reigning and merciful King, Jesus.

When Self-help Doesn’t Help
A friend of mine was completely perplexed. He was trying so hard to be the loving husband, putting in place a strategy he had learnt through some Christian “self help” literature.  The advice, written by a woman, was about how men should respond to their wives in the midst of a fairly heated argument. Men were advised that a fairly typical male response of “going to their cave” when things were getting “hot”, would leave their partners feeling crushed, unloved and abandoned. So, before “leaving for the cave”, he should lovingly say to his wife “I know you’re really upset now, so am I.  I really love you and care for you and will come back and talk about this later.”

Super-Computer Simulations
Photo gallery

Counterfeit Gospels
In one of his books (co-authored with Tim Lane), How People Change, he identifies seven counterfeit gospels—-”religious” ways we try and “justify” or “save” ourselves apart from the gospel of grace. I found these unbelievably helpful. Which one (or two, or three) of these do you tend to gravitate towards?