Those hateful, racist fundamentalists: Vanderleun goes looking for racism and hate in a broad swath of fundamentalist churches — and finds it in a most surprising place: Graven Images: Racist Fundamentalist Churches of America
Of course, you know, this means war: the intractable, insoluble problem of web standards and OS upgrades: no winners, no matter how they’re handled — Martian Headsets
It has been exceedingly difficult to discuss race in this nation for about 30 years, because anytime anyone - white or black - has tried to make a serious point, the word “racist!” is immediately flung out; lasting and damaging labels are instantly attached to people, and so everyone just shuts down. People guard their words and swallow provocative debating points - even if their aim is to generate a real, open and honest forum of ideas - because no one wants to be called a racist. This happened to Bill Clinton and to Bill Cosby; it happened to Rush Limbaugh and Geraldine Ferraro, and driving today I heard the word spat out at Sean Hannity. It happened to me, actually, last week, when I was called a “racist” on another blog for writing this; I was also deemed “hypersensitive” about being called a racist.
Bombed by grace: One common argument against the existence of God is the existence of evil: how can an all-powerful, all-good God permit evil? But the knife cuts both ways: without a good and merciful God, how can goodness arise out of unspeakable evil? Grace’s Great Raid
Well, there’s always at least one person who will listen to you …: Talking to yourself
What brilliant darkness now descends
To slay the weight which life doth rob
To bear the anguish undeserved
On frigid stone no glorious end.
The blazing lanterns light the night
As noble leaders drain the cup
To toast the end of ghost not known
And praise the triumph of blind sight.
What brilliant darkness now hangs deep
In hopeless end of fruitless dreams
In upper room no brightness cast
In lowered light a restless sleep.
The blazing lanterns light the night
As slumbered warriors wrap their cloaks
And starlight bathes the tethered beam
Where blood poured out in sacred rite.
What brilliant darkness now breaks bright
With light a sun can scarce reflect
To roll the stone which triumphs death
The lamps of countless souls to light.
The holidays are in full swing — which means a concerted effort to attain new heights of dietary excess, occasioned by an endless stream of convivial gatherings of family and friends. Einstein postulated that gravity has waves; such waves seem self-evident, making the bathroom scale increasingly inaccurate at certain times of the solar year.
This year, for a dinner for our church small group, I decided to have a wonderful chutney-glazed stuffed pork which I discovered last year at Easter, courtesy of a good friend who is an excellent cook. It was, by the estimation of an esteemed group of culinary critics (my family), the best pork they had ever tasted. I think I have to agree.
The dish begins with a full pork tenderloin. Our local Costco has these at surprisingly good prices - $17 for a full tenderloin (the entire psoas muscle, for those of you anatomically inclined). I cut this in half to make the length manageable in a roasting pan.
The tenderloin is a very lean cut, but has a tough fascial layer (tendon) running along one side. There is a plane between a thinner layer of sinew on the meat and the main tendon, so the thicker tendon can be separated fairly easily, leaving a thin layer of collagen on the meat.
Always use good surgical technique, of coarse: traction-countertraction, scissor tips in closed, then spread to separate and condense the loose connective tissue, which is then cut. Good kitchen shears or a very sharp knife are a must. The thin layer of attached collagen remaining will prove useful for the next maneuver — preparing the loin for stuffing.
With the tendon-side down, the loin is first bivalved along its center, nearly full thickness. The thin tendon helps hold the roast together with this deep cut. Now, in order to increase the size of the stuffing area — and give the finished meat an internal star pattern of stuffing — several cuts are made laterally at an angle from the center cut.
The first cut starts just below the center of each half, angled toward the cutting board. The next is angled parallel to the cutting board. The idea is to create angled wedges of meat, which will allow the loin to expand and form the sides of the star.
The roast should now lie flat, with triangular ridges running it’s length.
Now, on to the stuffing: I prefer to use fresh-baked baguettes from our local supermarket, sliced thinly and allowed to dry overnight (or in a warm oven for 20-30 minutes), then coarsely chopped in a food processor. Packaged stuffing is OK, but should not be seasoned.
Next comes the fruit — pears and apricots. Pour off the syrup from a large can of pears and save it, then chop the pears and apricots, sprinkle with allspice, then add to the stuffing. I sometimes add some fruit for color as well — blueberries, dried cranberries, or currants.
Now add some slivered almonds to the mix for crunch and texture, and blend.
To moisten the stuffing we introduce our next secret ingredient: chutney. Our favorite is Silver Palate Mango Chutney, which has a hefty dose of ginger, resulting in a bit of a “bite” — a wonderful blend of sweet and tangy. The chutney is thinned with some of the pear juice, and added to the stuffing mixture to bind it.
The moistened stuffing is then worked into the opened roast in generous amounts, which is then rolled in and tied with kitchen twine. Use a surgeon’s knot (double loop on the first throw) to prevent the twine from slipping.
The pork loin halves are then glazed with the chutney and placed on a rack in a large roasting pan. The oven is heated to 325 degrees, and basting is not necessary. Roasting time is a bit hard to predict — this roast took about 2 hours — but cook to an internal temperature of 160 to 165 degrees, using a good meat thermometer. Do not overcook! Domestically-raised pork has an extremely low risk of trichinosis (unlike wild game), and the parasite is killed at about 135-140 degrees, if not less. Overcooked pork is a dry abomination, suited only for snacks after waterboarding at Gitmo.
Preparing this roast may look like a production, but is actually quite fast, taking only about 30-45 minutes of prep time before it reaches the oven. It is excellent served with a garnish of crushed raspberries with sugar and lemon juice, or cranberry horseradish sauce.
So give it a whirl for your next holiday meal or guest dinner. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
Three men on a Friday, condemned to die. Ensnared by Roman justice, convicted, and sentenced to a lingering death of profound cruelty and excruciating agony.
The Romans knew how to do it right: execution designed to utterly humiliate its victims, and maximize their suffering–a public spectacle and object lesson to others about the foolishness of defying Roman authority. First used by the Persians in the time of Alexander the Great, and adopted by Rome from Carthage, crucifixion was so horrible and debasing a fate that it was not permitted for citizens of Rome. Victims hung for days, their corpses consumed by carrion.
Our knowledge of these three men is incomplete. Two are described in ancient texts as thieves, the other a preacher run afoul of religious leaders, delivered to the Romans under pretense of imperial threat. There should have been nothing unusual about this event: the Romans crucified criminals often, sometimes hundreds at a time. Yet these men, in this spectacle, were different: on these crosses hung all of mankind.
Two thieves and a preacher — an odd picture indeed. And even more peculiar: the most hated was the preacher. Taunted, insulted, ridiculed, reviled. A miracle worker, he, a man who supposedly healed the sick and raised the dead, yet now hung naked in humiliation and agony, unable to extricate himself from his dire circumstance. Even those convicted with him–themselves dying in unbearable pain and mortification — join the fray. Insulting the rabbi, demanding he set himself–and naturally, themselves as well–free. They know his reputation, yet selfish to the end, desire only their own deliverance.
But one thief is slowly transformed, in frailty considering his fate and the foolishness of demanding release when his punishment is just. And he marvels at the man hung nearby — why? Why does this preacher, unjustly executed, not proclaim innocence nor demand justice or vengeance? Why does he–amazingly–ask God to forgive those who have so cruelly and unjustly punished him? Why, in the extraordinary agony only crucifixion can bring, does he seem to have peace, acceptance, perhaps even joy?
His revulsion at the baying crowd, at the arrogance of his fellow convict reviling this man of character and grace, bursts forth in rebuke at him who ridicules: “This man has done no wrong!” Turning to the preacher, he makes a simple, yet humble, request: to be remembered. Only that. No deliverance from agony, no sparing of death, no wealth, prosperity, or glory, no miracles–only to be remembered.
The reply reverberates throughout history: “This day you shall be with me in Paradise.” A promise of hope, a promise of relationship, a promise of forgiveness, a promise of comfort, joy, healing, peace.
Three men on a cross. In these three men are all who have lived: two are guilty, one innocent. Two are justly executed, one unjustly. All three have chosen their fate: one thief to revile, ridicule, hate, blaspheme; one criminal to trust, to seek consideration and mercy from one greater; one man to submit to brutal and humiliating torture and death, willingly, for no crime committed — or for all crimes committed, everywhere and for all time. Yet only one promise given–to the one who, though guilty, trusted and turned.
Who was this man in the middle, this preacher? A charlatan, perhaps - but an impostor abandons his schemes when such consequences appear. Delusional, deceived zealot, or presumptuous fool? Such grace in agonal death is inconceivable were he any such man. What power did he have to make such a promise? What proof that the promise was delivered?
An empty grave. A promise delivered by a cavern abandoned, a stone rolled away. A gruesome death transformed into a life of hope, meaning and purpose for those who also trust.
Kunta Kinte, I found you!: Women who support legalizing prostitution are like moderate Muslims — everybody talks about ‘em, but nobody seems to be able to identify one. But, Lo! I’ve found one! Megan McArdle, it turns out, won’t turn tricks herself (”It’s not my bag, baby!”) … but thinks it’s fine if others do: What’s sauce for the goose.
This last demonstrates well the thin gruel which so often constitutes libertarian thinking on this topic — Megan’s one bright cookie, and very level-headed on many subjects (see this discussion of gay marriage, although she flinches in the end and stays neutral). She points out, on legalizing prostitution, the problem of the widespread social stigma against it:
… can we all concede that at least part of the reason that women do not want to be prostitutes is that there is a severe social stigma attached to women who are promiscuous, and particularly to women who rent their promiscuity to men — a stigma far, far greater than that which attaches to their clients? … If I’d grown up in a culture that thought of “prostitute” as a job like “CPA” (another job I’d hate), I probably still wouldn’t want to be one. But the fact that I am repulsed by the idea of turning tricks, having grown up in a society that thinks there’s something deeply wrong with turning tricks, is not actually proof that there is something deeply wrong with turning tricks. … Your gut is not a good replacement for reasoning from first principles.
So I need a better reason than “it’s icky” or “there’s something wrong with a woman who would do that” to justify either a moral or a cultural ban on the practice. … I’d take some pretty strong convincing that prostitution is so inherently damaging to society that we should declare war on it. I start with the principles that sex has equal moral significance when performed by a man or a woman; that it isn’t anyone’s business how many or what kind of partners you choose; and that government intrusion on private, voluntary exchange should be sharply limited to a) practices which produce demonstrable harm to third parties, and b) you can reasonably expect to control. This quickly leads me to “don’t you have something better to do than poke your nose into someone else’s hotel room?”
I’ve covered this topic at greater length here and here, and a full response would require more time than I have at the moment. But one can make a very robust case that taking the most intimate relationship between man and woman, the means by which we both bond parents together as one and engender our very future, and turn it into a crass, exploitive, often abusive business transaction, is well worthy of its “severe social stigma” (yes, even more so than being a CPA) and illegal status.
And there’s lot’s of times when you want the government in your bedroom or hotel room — say, when someone’s there to rape or attack you, or bags of money are being exchanged to bribe politicians, to name just a few. The integrity of our private lives is an extremely valuable part of freedom, but it is not absolute. Undermining our foundational dependence as a society on the integrity of marriage and the raising of children — although perhaps more subtle than others — is one reason to intrude, in the very specific instance of prostitution, into this realm.
In light of the snowballing interest in Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama’s minister and mentor, I am re-posting this essay from May 2007, when Hillary was the presumed nominee, and Obama just a charismatic wannabe.
Many are wondering whether the media is just cherry-picking a few outrageous sermons. My take? Nope, what you see is what you get — and what Obama’s been hearing — and following — for 20 years.
Courtesy of the Drudge Report, I was drawn to read a New York Timesarticle (login required) on Barack Obama,, his faith and conversion, and his pastor, Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr.
The article presented some interesting background on Mr. Obama and his church — a topic with which I had been previously unfamiliar. But what I found of greater interest was the broader perspective highlighted by the Times article regarding the role of religious beliefs in public figures, particularly politicians, and how secular political movements in the postmodern age use religion.
Not surprisingly, the New York Times — along with virtually all major media outlets — come across as pleasantly confused about the nature of religious conversion, particularly as it applies to Christianity. The focus of this article is on the theology and controversial teachings of his spiritual mentor Reverend Wright, who pastors Trinity United Church of Christ, and addresses its potential impact on Mr. Obama’s presidential candidacy.
My eye was drawn to the description of Reverend Wright, who is identified as:
… a dynamic pastor who preached Afrocentric theology, dabbled the radical politics and delivered music and profanity-spiked sermons.
Antennas pop up when someone alludes to Christian pastors with “Afrocentric” (or any other “-centric”) theology. Additional research quickly disclosed that Reverend Wright is indeed, shall we say, “controversial.” It appears that the good Reverend espouses a form of Christianity, so-called, which depicts America as deeply — and intractably — racist; which believes America to be a far greater threat to the world than murderous tyrants who slaughter millions; who believes there are two types of white Christians — those “who lynch people in the name of Jesus” and those “who ain’t got time to lynch people”; who, rather famously, after a fiery sermon about all the injustices which white America has promulgated on blacks, the poor, third world countries, women and children, and the usual litany of complaints about lack of healthcare, the homeless, etc. is quoted as saying, “God is tired of this shit!”
One wonders if God is also tired of ministers with potty mouths. Or tired of pastors who view their white Christian “brothers” as lynchers-in-waiting.
In short, Reverend Wright and his theology fall squarely on the radical left, racial-hating-and-baiting side of the political and religious spectrum.
As Seinfeld might say, “… not that there’s anything wrong with that!”
In yesterday’s post, I took to task a comment made by Jon Henke, from the always-excellent QandO blog, regarding his support for legalization of prostitution, which came up because of the Eliot Spitzer imbroglio. His comment was in essence a springboard for what I believe to be a flawed position held by many libertarians.
Jon was gracious enough to leave a comment on the post — which of course, has elicited a few more thoughts on my part. Jon stated:
I think you’ve completely misapprehended me. At no point did I suggest there should be no social rejection or approbation for his conduct. In fact, I think that’s precisely what should occur. The libertarian position is not that private behavior is beyond reproach, but that private behavior that does not hurt others (as in, “violate the rights of others”, not “make them feel bad”) should not be illegal.
I’m quite sure his adultery hurt his family emotionally, but we don’t imprison people for adultery. The fact that he paid for it, however, was not harmful. But that is what we have criminalized.
This idea that, because we don’t want something criminalized, we must not think it is bad is a frustrating misperception of libertarians. It’s doubly frustrating, because it’s not a difficult distinction to make.
Well, it is certainly easy to misunderstand a writer’s beliefs based on a brief reference to one of its tenets. And libertarianism itself would appear to be rather a loose and nebulous confederation of beliefs and policies, embodied in individuals ranging from solid centrists like Glenn Reynolds, to bright conservatives such as Jon, to fringe elements waiting for black UN helicopters gazing skyward in their camo fatigues. I have the utmost respect for Jon, and his blog is a daily visit for me because of its depth and breadth. Nevertheless, I do not believe I have misapprehended the libertarian position, as he stated it, on the subject of legalization versus mere social rejection or approbation. I’m well aware that many libertarians believe that certain behaviors which are in fact socially objectionable, perhaps even dangerous, but nevertheless should be legal, based on the principle of individual rights and minimalization of government intrusion.
Having said that, I believe Jon is also misapprehended my point — which is not that prostitution should be illegal because individuals were hurt rather than rights violated, but that the nature of prostitution is such that society is entirely justified in outlawing its practice as a defensive measure to protect the well-being of its citizens and its core foundational institutions such as marriage.
Society has many means, and many degrees of granularity, in determining what behavior is acceptable or dangerous to its collective well-being. Obviously, the force of law is a major component of this, carrying the weight of enforcement and even violence if required. But much regulation of social behavior starts at a far finer granularity: at the level of individuals, families, communities, and consequently is powerfully embodied when such conviction is widespread in a wider social consensus.
To encourage and enforce moral behavior — by which I mean both that dictated by transcendent moral absolutes, as well as that collectively determined to be undesirable for the good of society — restraint starts at the level of the individual, whose inner conscience and moral standards serve to constrain behavior which is judged to be wrong or harmful. This moral compass — as is understood by Judaism and Christianity — is an innate component of the nature of man. Those more secular might instead infer that, if such a code exists, it would be genetic or inherited, or inculcated from the experience and social mores of the parents during childhood for the benefit of the species. Morality at this individual level is a powerful determinant of human behavior — and no amount of civil law can substitute for such inner conscience or direction.
At a somewhat broader level, family and local community may collectively determine which behavior is desirable or to be censured, another powerful constraint working primarily through ostracization and exclusion from the community of those who fail to meet its standards. Once again, this may well occur outside of the framework of law, although it is often reflected in local community standards and regulation. The next level, encoded in community, state, and federal law, expands this restraint with the addition of ever more onerous penalties for aberrant behavior, throwing the full force of government behind its restraining intent.
My point in this somewhat extended musing is that constraint of behavior destructive to individuals and society is not purely limited to law, but occurs at many levels, and begins, and is rooted in, the individual moral conscience and the family and local community. And this, I infer, is what Jon and other libertarians hope to rely on when removing the admittedly heavy-handed arm to illegality.
When there is a widespread consensus in the larger community that certain behavior is unacceptable, and when a substantial majority of citizens concur with that consensus, then onerous or restrictive laws become far less important, as individual and community restraint function to inhibit socially and morally destructive behavior. In a perfect moral world, law would be unnecessary: it is required due to the inevitable human failure to meet even their own high standards, not to mention for those who will violate them regardless of, or due to lack of any such standards.
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The problem arises when a culture, such as ours, begins to erode and corrode the foundational moral and ethical principles of the individual, the family, and local community, increasingly relying on larger institutions such as government to mitigate the inevitable adverse consequences of such abrogation. Hence a culture which no longer has a moral consensus that extramarital sexual activity is harmful, for example, but instead views it as benign, tolerable, or even desirable behavior, will inevitably reap certain consequences (not the least of which is more of the undesirable behavior) — which will in turn bring about efforts to seek to control the resulting consequences through law and punishment. As we cease respecting rules at the individual level, we invariably multiply rules at the civic and governmental levels: the Law of Rules. As William Penn once said, “Men must be governed by God or they will be ruled by tyrants.”
In the case of prostitution, there is a growing segment of our society which, consistent with their general outlook on sexual activity, no longer views such activity outside of marriage as inherently wrong, and in fact considers it quite normal, perhaps even highly desirable. Such a viewpoint often rationalizes or minimizes any adverse consequences such behavior might incur, while simultaneously looking to society or government to mitigate the inevitable side effects thereof. Hence we tolerate and glorify sexual permissiveness while agitating ever more loudly for greater federal spending on AIDS research and STD prevention.
Jon’s conflation of prostitution and adultery tends to confuse two quite different entities. While certainly all sex with prostitutes for a married man constitutes adultery, most certainly not all cases of adultery involve prostitution. It is almost certainly true (without being able to cite specifics) that adultery, in fact, has been, or may still be outlawed in parts of the country. Nevertheless, few would maintain that such a law is a good idea — although they likely are instituted because of the perceived threat of adultery to the socially-important institution of marriage. Such a law, while well-intentioned, is clearly unenforceable — and unenforceable laws breed contempt for authority, as they are honored only in the breach. Much adultery is, by nature, between two consenting adults. This is not to minimize its potentially devastating impact on marriage — but simply to point out that both the man and the woman presumably enter into it volitionally and freely — there is no business contract involved. Such a relationship may well be devastating to the immediate relationships of each partner, and destructive to one or more marriages, but its effects, relatively speaking, are finite.
Prostitution, on the other hand is industrialized adultery. It is, pure and simple, a business transaction, whose sole purpose is the sexual gratification of the male. The relationship of the john and his whore — if you can call it a relationship — is inherently and essentially demeaning to the woman: she is nothing more than an attractive repository for the man’s (often aberrant) sexual desires. She is dehumanized, victimized, often brutalized, or murdered, as the nature of the act is not mutually respectful but inherently about dominance/submission: you pay your money, she does what you want — or else.
It is interesting to note that those in favor of legalized prostitution are invariably men – in what must surely be a vast and inherent conflict of interest. Women do not enter prostitution because they love sleeping with thousands of men; they do so out of extreme duress, due to severe financial hardship or drug addiction. Through legalization we are exploiting, at the societal level, those most vulnerable, saying their welfare matters nothing, their lives are expendable, their humanity is irrelevant to our “rights” and “freedom” to fulfill our basest desires. Where are the legions of women demonstrating and demanding the legalization of prostitution? Their absence — in our rights-obsessed culture — speaks volumes.
Say what you will about disdaining the action while embracing its legality in the name of “freedom” — legalizing prostitution effectively endorses slavery not freedom, and makes a powerful statement as a society, sacrificing the value, dignity, and well-being of the women entrapped in this hell of hedonism on the altar of our individual rights — of the individual rights of men and men alone. Prostitution serves as well an enormous pool of public health risk, transmitting countless instances of diseases which in many cases are incurable, which may have devastating effects on innocent third parties, such as AIDS, or HPV-related cervical cancer. There are abundant reasons to make prostitution illegal — but only one for its legalization: glorifying men’s right to exploit, abuse and often destroy women for their own selfish and destructive amusement.
Legalization of prostitution would do nothing to change the fundamentally abusive nature of its core transaction. By legalization, we are not simply saying that it is permitted because “no one’s rights are violated” — a highly disputable stance — but we are instead encoding in law the normalization of an exploitive, and socially harmful business transaction. This is not at all about outlawing something which “makes people feel bad” — but rather about throwing the weight of law and its enforcement behind protecting and enabling a profession which is highly destructive both to the women involved, the families of their patrons, public health, and perception of women on a cultural and social scale.
The stance of using the “violate the rights of others” justification for legalization of prostitution (or any like behavior) seems to me to rely on quite a fungible standard. Are the rights of a wife violated when her husband visits a prostitute? Even if the civil level, the marriage contract implies, if not explicitly states, that the marriage is intended for mutual love, manifested tangibly through the restriction and commitment of man’s natural libidinous tendency toward promiscuity into a monogamous sexual relationship for the welfare of his wife, their children, and implicitly society as a whole. This core value is reflected in the law, making adultery is a slam-dunk legal basis for divorce — an aspect encoded into its statutes long before our current insane permissiveness which allows any and all justifications for divorce.
Furthermore –as is abundantly evident in our contemporary society — the idea of “rights” is eminently malleable — as we see in the ever-expanding victimhood mindset, where the homeless have a “right” to a home; the jobless have the “right” to a job; a student has a “right” to admission to a school or a potential employee a right to being hired based purely on his ethnicity rather than any skill, talent, or preparation for a particular position. Furthermore, many human rights are not clearly spelled out in civil law: the right of a wife to expect her husband to be faithful; the right of children to have parents who care and nurture for them; right of employers to have their employees work honestly and productively for their pay; the right of all men and women to be treated with dignity. These rights arise not from civil law, but from moral law, from the inherent value placed on humans by their very nature and being. This is, it should be noted, predominantly a Western cultural notion, derived and its core from Judeo-Christian understandings of the nature of man and his value and worth as a creation of God. One need only look at cultures which do not cherish this understanding to see its invariable consequences: suicide bombers are glorified; gays are beheaded; entire classes are relegated to extraordinary poverty and deprivation because of their inferior birth status; people slaughtered simply because of the tribe of their birth or some thousand-year-old offense. Such cultures arise in large part because of their core view of human nature and their core understanding of God, which results in degrading the value of human life and the individual.
I guess this is a rather long winded way of saying that it is entirely within the society’s rights, in my opinion, to restrict private behavior on the basis greater than personal freedom and personal rights alone. I remain to be convinced that libertarianism’s passion for removing such legal restraints would not, in fact, be far more destructive to individuals and society than could be offset by any small advantage in individual liberty. We should be careful what we wish for, lest our pursuit of freedom devoid of respect for the exalted nature of the individual lead us to a place where there is no freedom to be found.
Dr. Bob is a physician in the Pacific Northwest, the fortunate husband of his wife of thirty years and father of three remarkable children. Blessed by the grace of God with the great privilege of knowing His Son, and having experienced the limitless depths of His mercy, patience and forgiveness, he desires to serve Him and others well.
... every now I find a new blog (new to me, anyway) and see something there so resonant and stirring that I can honestly say that I feel a thrill of excitement at the discovery ... Dr. Bob can surely write, but he can also think and feel, and he can write eloquently about what he thinks and feels ...
The doctor was indeed in touch with a number of important things that rise and fall within the soul of America, but can never die. The page contains the essays, ever growing in strength and clarity, of Dr. Bob ... Of those “voices rarely heard,” Dr. Bob's is among the best.
Dr. Bob ... is one of the smartest, most disciplined and most intense people blogging today. When he takes up a subject he makes it melt with the intensity of his concentration. The quality of his blog is perfect, and he is a person who won't settle for anything but the best. All of this, and good character as well. It's a rare and admirable combination.
This book reveals an extraordinary insight into the mind-set as well as the teachings of Jehovah's Witnesses, and provides a valuable reference to the cult apologist as well as laymen and pastors ... a long overdue treatment
The holidays are in full swing — which means a concerted effort to attain new heights of dietary excess, occasioned by an endless stream of convivial gatherings of family and friends. Einstein postulated that gravity has waves; such waves seem self-evident, making the bathroom scale increasingly inaccurate at certain times of the solar year.
Three men on a Friday, condemned to die. Ensnared by Roman justice, convicted, and sentenced to a lingering death of profound cruelty and excruciating agony.
Courtesy of the 
