Why Social Justice is Evil

  "And the word was made flesh and dwelt among us...full of grace and truth." John 1:14

  "...of some have compassion...save with fear, pulling them out of the fire...." Jude 22-3

  It is hard for a me to take social work and programs seriously. No matter how "Christian" the whole "compassion for others" tag-line sounds, it still doesn't change the fact that much of what passes as social "work" and/or "justice" in the modern West is essentially linked with two enemies of the Christian Faith. One is liberal politics and its necessary destruction of all traditional values and truths (esp. Christian values and truths). The other is the diabolical Social Gospel, which redefines (re: replaces) Sin as poverty and racism and Redemption as legislation and lobbying. In sum, the former seeks the destruction of Christian essentials while the latter completely perverts the Gospel; thus, both are the enemies of the Christian Faith, and yet both seem to be necessarily ancillary to having "compassion" for "the least of these." This is why social justice (as it currently stands and is defined) is evil.

  Obviously, we need to understand (and unashamedly assert) what people really need, i.e., salvation from the wrath of God against Sin. This post, however, will strive to address other fundamental flaws (other than, though building off of, the two mentioned already) in current social work paradigms by doing some demolition work against the word most used (and thoroughly abused) by social advocates: compassion. It is my hope that this demo work will help redefine social justice away from its evil contexts and connections and restore it to its proper place as a work of holiness.

  Compassion devoid of reason and common sense is not compassion but rather the worst kind of cruelty, unleashing further hellish effects by its good intentions. Yet we in the West seem struck with a curious malady that deems all acts of thoughtful contemplation and consideration (i.e., critical thinking) as hesitation, and hesitation is deemed as heartless indifference. Thus, many fly into the fray, helping one and  damaging a hundred. We seem to have truly forgotten that grace and truth must work in tandem, and those who would make them foes commit a most egregious and unnecessary divorce. This erroneous separation is one of the first misunderstandings that must be purged from compassion: compassion is not the enemy of truth; there is no compassion without truth.

  Such a separation between compassion and truth does not exist in Scripture. On the contrary: "[Love] rejoices in the truth" (I Cor. 13:6b). What business have we to claim compassion at the expense of truth? What right have we, in pursuing social "justice," to support and enforce programs and/or legislation that does damage to nations and morals? In addition, the great need of man is answered in the blood of God spilled at Calvary in Christ, and not in freshly upholstered furniture, affirmative action, or no child being left behind. Why would we dare assert otherwise? We must not sacrifice truth on the altar of sentimentalism, which is all our "compassion" is without the truth.

  The issue of sentimentalism is the other misunderstanding that must be purged from compassion. Compassion is not sentimental; it is heroics in action. For many, the way that "compassion" has been presented by social advocates is a highly soft picture (weeping children, sad music, and guilt-trip inducing lectures by some pious social worker with shiny eyes). Thus, compassion, is viewed as sentimental, i.e., a great welling up and overflow of shallow emotions produced by some external stimuli. Consequently, many  can see compassion as synonymous with weak or even weakness. To have compassion seemingly means to have a complete breakdown in the face of emotional propaganda. Thus, many average people (esp. men) find it hard to get involved in "compassionate" programs or ministries because they see such things as weak and shallow.

  The solution to this is to return to viewing compassion as a type of heroics. Rather than an effect caused from without, it is now caused from within, from the righteous disposition that comes from the indwelling Holy Spirit. True compassion is not a result of outer stimulatiuons but rather from inner righteousness, an inner and innate grasping of right and wrong coupled with the desire to see the right prevail. Compassion is not about feeling sorry for people because the sight of their plight momentarily affects our emotions; rather, it is a "pulling them out of the fire," a heroic rescue initiated by the Spirit of God from within. Compassion that is not based on that fire will fizzle out eventually. Compassion is not to end in tears and pity, and it especially is not supposed to end in liberal politics or Social Gospel. Compassion ends in rescue and nothing less. Perhaps if we let people know this, more would flock to help.

  Christ, of course, is our example. He took the greatest plunge into the fire when he became flesh and dwelt among us (Phil. 2:5-7). He did not lobby for appeals; He came to us "full of grace and truth." Not half and half, but both burning at full capacity without apology or contradiction. Look at the woman at the well (John 4): Jesus simultaneously offered her the water of life with one hand and exposed her immorality with the other. He is neither afraid nor ashamed to offer people grace and call them sinners (for who needs grace more than a sinner?).

  A fear of the truth, of calling people sinners, or being "divisive," are all enemies of true compassion. True compassion is the work of holiness in that it either (a) pulls sinners out of the fires of Hell or (b) produces the fruits of the Spirit, which are of the character and quality of God. That is why social justice (again, as it currently stands and is defined) is evil, because it does not have God. Its liberal leanings either debunk Him or relegate Him as an irrelevancy, while its Social Gospel leanings pervert His image into a lobbyist and legislator rather than Savior and Lord. As Christians, called to imitate Christ (who is God), we must redeem social justice from its currently evil contexts and connections. We must redefine what we mean by "compassion" and reassert the true Gospel of Christ.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2009

Prelude to a Larger Post: Newman on Faith, Reason, and the Supplanting of Objectivity

The following is from the fourth section of the second discourse in The Idea of a University (for clarity's sake, I have broken the section into paragraphs and added emphasis where necessary):

     The religious world, as it is [now beginning to be] styled, holds, generally speaking, that Religion consists, not in knowledge, but in feeling or sentiment. The old Catholic notion, which still lingers in the Established Church, was that Faith was an intellectual act, its object truth, and its result knowledge. Thus if you look into the Anglican Prayer Book, you will find definite credenda as well as definite agenda; but in proportion as the Lutheran leaven spread, it became fashionable to say that Faith was, not an acceptance of revealed doctrine, not an act of the intellect, but a feeling, an emotion, an affection, an appetency; and, as this view of Faith obtained, so was the connection of Faith with Truth and Knowledge more and more either forgotten or denied. At length the identity of this (so called) spirituality of heart and the virtue of Faith was acknowledged on all hands. Some men indeed disapproved the pietism in question, others admired it; but whether they admired or disapproved, both...found themselves in agreement on the main point, viz., in considering that this really was in substance Religion, and nothing else; that Religion was based, not on argument, but on taste and sentiment, that nothing was objective, everything subjective, in doctrine.

     I say, even those who saw through the affectation in which the religious school of which I am speaking clad itself, still came to think that Religion, as such, consisted in something short of intellectual exercises, viz., in affections, in the imagination, in inward persuasions and consolations, in pleasurable sensations, sudden changes, and sublime fancies. They learned to believe and to take for granted that Religion was nothing beyond a supply of the wants of human nature, not an external fact and a work of God. There was, it appeared, a demand for Religion, and therefore there was a supply; human nature could not do without Religion. [...] Thus Religion was useful, venerable, beautiful, the sanction of order, the stay of government, the curb of self-will and self-indulgence, which the laws cannot reach; but, after all, on what was it based? Why, that was a question delicate to ask, and imprudent to answer; but, if the truth must be spoken, however, reluctantly, the long and the short of the matter was this, that Religion was based on custom, on prejudice, on law, on education, on habit, on loyalty, on feudalism, on enlightened experience, on many, many things, but not at all on reason; reason was neither its warrant, nor its instrument, and science had little connection with it as with the fashions of the season, or the state of the weather.

     In this second discourse of The Idea of a University, John Henry Newman argued for the presence of Theology to be taught in the universities, his final reason being that Theology is the "queen of the sciences" because it gives us knowledge about God, who is the source of all things, including reason and the laws of the universe (Discourse III, Sections 8-9). In this fourth section, he outlines what he sees as a heavy trend in the culture regarding religion (esp. the Christian religion) and consequently Theology, viz., all religious/spiritual matters are subjective and emotional in essence rather than objective and rational. Such a dichotomy should sound familiar: the whole of Modern Christendom (esp. the Emergent Church) is infected with this fashionable religious sentiment, i.e., spirituality is a result of our own subjective experiences rather than an objective truth (like God's revelations, both general and special).

     I quote Newton as yet another setup for my own thoughts on Christianity's answer to the post-modern objection, i.e., there cannot be an absolute truth because all we can know are our own subjective experiences, and they are too varied and complicated to be summed up under an essential quality. In other words, there is only emotional subjectivity and no rational objectivity; there is only the infinite ocean with no stars in the sky (except of our own making). I hope to answer this objection with what I see as the truly Christian answer, i.e., the ocean is infinite, but so are the stars in the sky.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2009

Prelude to a Larger Post: Oswald Chambers on the Whole and the Particulars

From the December 9th entry of Still Higher for His Highest:

If you take all the manifestations of God given in the Old Testament you find them a mass of contradiction--now God is pictured as a Man, now as a Woman, now as a lonely Hero, now as a suffering Servant--and until we come to the New Testament these conflicting characteristics but add confusion to our conception of God. But immediately we see Jesus Christ, we find all the apparent contradictions blended in one unique Personality.

Oswald is here hinting on a point that I hope to expand on in the very near future. One of the objections that our post-modern world has against absolute truth is that if there really was an essential, absolute reality to things, then things would be simpler. As it is, the presence of complications and complexities negate the possibility of any such essential, absolute reality. The particulars are too vast for any whole to encompass them (I dealt with a similar issue last year).

The big mistake that Christianity (esp. Emergent Christianity) has done in response to this claim is to agree with it and then try to maintain (re: redefine) the Christian Faith in the midst of it. I'm telling you right now, it cannot be done: essential, absolute realities are absolutely essential for Christianity to be Christianity. Take those away, and Christianity goes away as well. What is left in such a situation is slightly moral, incredibly trendy, and boasting a "Christian" veneer. It is not, however, the Christian Faith whereby men can be saved.

What Oswald points out (and what I plan to greatly expand on later) is the groundwork for a truly Christian response to the post-modern objection. That response is this assertion: Complexity and "apparent contradictions" amongst the particulars do not necessarily negate the presence of an essential and absolute whole. This is because the whole is great enough to encompass all the myriad of particulars into itself. The error that modern/post-modern types make is assuming that the essential, absolute realities or qualities are necessarily simple. I believe the proper Christian response is to assert that they are not simple; rather, they are infinite. The essential whole is just as vast (if not more so) than the various particulars.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2009

Against Vulgar Professionalism (A Warning)

I understand a need for formality and presence when in certain situations. I would like to distinguish, however, between a "professionalism" that is a result of maturity and a "professionalism" that is a result of inhumanity.

When I would administer PRAXIS tests for my school (sort of a ACT for teachers), I am required to read verbatim to a room full of adults the test instructions written within the associate supervisor manual. The very first paragraph even says, "I am required to read these instructions and I cannot deviate from them." Each time I would read that particular line, I would quickly add, "So don't hate me." This lone addition would in turn result (without fail) in a distinct murmur of laughter from the test takers and a subsequently relaxation of the room's somewhat tense atmosphere.

Once, however, after I administered such a test, I was rebuked (not at all rudely) by a fellow associate who stated that I must avoid such humorous addendums in the future in order to maintain a sense of "professionalism" during test administration. Though my naturally amicable nature inclined me to initially approve of their sentiment, in truth I vehemently disagreed with it. If that is what "professionalism" is, then professionalism is for the birds; or better yet, for the machine, for only a machine can vomit any recitation without inflection or addition.

I am not a machine, nor do I address (in a test administration or any other aspect of real life) other machines. Speaking specifically to the test administration, I am a human addressing other humans who are currently in an environment of immense pressure and tension caused by (1) a test that holds their careers in its hands and (2) being in a room full of strangers. Nothing breaks such awful tension more than a sense of communion with other humans, and laughter is communion.

Thus is what I call vulgar professionalism, and I am defiantly opposed to it because it is a mechanistic adherence to inhumanity and therefore must certainly be a severe damage and detriment to one's soul. If your "professionalism" reveals a mature and advanced mind, capable of an acute awareness to environment or human needs and the communion that can address them, then you are guilty of no transgression. If, however, your "professionalism" reveals the machine, take heed to yourself and amend your ways. You continue at your own peril and the peril of others.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2009

Against Emergent Doctrine (A Tidbit)

Faith is not doubt. It is the certainty of that which is, for the moment, empirically unprovable ("the evidence of things not seen"). I cannot (as of yet) empirically prove the existence of God, but I have no doubts about His existence. This certainty is based on (1) His objective revelations and (2) my subjective experiences (with my subjective experiences seen in the light of His objective revelations).

-Jon Vowell

L'Engle and the Dehumanizing Effects of Victimhood

From Madeleine L'Engle's book Walking on Water:

Sin, that unpopular word again. The worse things get, the more we try to rationalize and alibi. When we do wrong we try to fool ourselves (and others) that it is because our actions and reactions have been coded into our genetic pattern at the moment of conception. Or our mothers didn't understand us. Or they understood us too well. Or it is the fault of society. Certainly it is never our fault, and therefore we have not sinned.
[By] such dirty devices, any shred of free will left in the human being is taken away. If I do wrong, I may do it unwittingly, thinking I am doing something for the best; but if it turns out to be wrong, I have done it, and I must bear the responsibility. It is not somebody else's or something else's fault. If it is, [then] I am less than human.

Behold the Modern Man

Spoken by Malcolm Muggeridge from the book "Seeing Through the Eye: Malcolm Muggeridge on Faith":

It has become abundantly clear in the second half of the twentieth century that Western Man has decided to abolish himself. Having wearied of the struggle to be himself, he has created his own boredom out of his own affluence, his own impotence out of his own erotomania, his own vulnerability out of his own strength; himself blowing the trumpet that brings the walls of his own city tumbling down, and, in a process of auto-genocide, convincing himself that he is too numerous, and labouring accordingly with pill and scalpel and syringe to make himself fewer in order to be an easier prey for his enemies; until at last, having educated himself into imbecility, and polluted and drugged himself into stupefaction, he keels over a weary, battered old brontosaurus and becomes extinct.

Keep Your Enemies Closer

It is my fervent belief that in order to properly engage error and heresy as critical thinking, engaging Christians, we must have a proper perspective on what those hostile to Christianity actually think. Although there are plenty of books by Christians that explain what they think, sometimes it's better to hear it from the opposition's own mouth. Thus, I submit to you the following comment left on a Christian blog that I stumbled across. I have never heard such a vehement atheistic attitude stated so concisely and precisely. Read carefully, and listen to what is being said:

"It doesn't matter what Hitchens said to you because your mind is made-up, slammed shut. But Hitchens pointed out that the Bible is full of errors, bad science, dangerous dogma and is a man-made and socially constructed book. Anyone who claims to get their morals from this highly immoral book is themselves highly immoral and likely very dangerous, not to mention superstitious and childish. Hitchens opponent was reduced to a babbling idiot and a liar, in other words he was exposed as a typical undereducated fundamentalist wacko. It's pretty obvious Hitchens is a smart guy and this Williams guy is an idiot. This is why debates like this are so rare. The Christians always lose them and look foolish even to many of their own. But not closed-minded people like [you].

"It is not accidental that Christianity regards pride as a major sin. A man of self-esteem is an unlikely candidate for the master-slave relationship that Christianity offers him. A man lacking in self esteem, however, a man ridden with guilt and self-doubt, will frequently prefer the apparent security of Christianity over independence and find comfort in the thought that, for the price of total submissiveness, God will love and protect him.

"In exchange for obedience, Christianity offers salvation, that there is something to be saved from. Christianity has nothing to offer a happy man living in a natural intelligible universe. If Christianity is to gain a motivational foothold, it must declare war on earthly pleasure and happiness, and this, historically, has been its precise course of action. In the eyes of Christianity, man is sinful and helpless in the face of God, and is potential fuel for the flames of hell. Just as Christianity must destroy reason before it can induce faith, so it must destroy happiness before it can induce salvation.

"The fundamental teaching of Jesus-the demand for conformity thus gives rise to a fundamental and viciously destructive teaching of Christianity: That some beliefs lie beyond the scope of criticism, and that to question them is sinful, or morally wrong. By Christianity declares itself and enemy of truth and of the faculty by which man arrives at truth-reason."

Thus is the spirit of atheism. Thus is where the battle lies. Prepare yourselves against them, my friends. Know your God, know your Bible, know your faith, because they obviously have no clue what Christianity really is.

Real Racial Reconciliation

Last Thursday evening, I was sitting in on a lecture about atheism when I nearly exploded out of my chair with excitement. My reasons for this is that, without warning, one of the speakers (a professor at my college, who I will dub Dr. P) demonstrated real racial reconciliation. In speaking about the origins of atheism, Dr. P launched into the logical consequences of atheism, specifically nihilism. While talking of nihilism, Dr. P (who is black) addressed the black people in the audience: "I do not want colored people to think that nihilism is a white problem. I have spoken before on the 'nihilism of the hood'." He then went to demonstrate how urban gang mentality is directly related to nihilistic thinking, and then brought his point home with an example of "nihilism of the hood" by referencing the Lester Street Murders. After he made his point, the whole audience, white and black alike, sat unified in our minds and hearts in regards to nihilism and atheism.
That is real racial reconciliation, and I here defiantly post it as testimony against all previous logic in regards to racial reconciliation. Real racial reconciliation is not the continual awareness of and making others aware of the racism that divides us. Real racial reconciliation is the continual awareness of and making others aware of the commonalities that unite us. Any racial reconciliation effort that does not base itself on that logic will lead its followers hopelessly into side eddies, or into further racism (for how reconciled can we get if we are constantly reminded that we still hate each other?).

Harry Potter: Not anti-Christian, just a-Religious

I am not a Harry Potter fan, "not" in an indifferent sense as opposed to a negative sense. I do not hate the books or movies; I've just never read or seen them. Therefore, it is hard for me to have a conclusive opinion on the subject since I am on the outside looking in. I know many Christians do not like him (like the Witchcraft Repackaged crowd), and others write practical apologetics for him (like the Looking for God in Harry Potter crowd). My standing is more like Greg Koukl; I'm suspicious of both sides, nowhere near convinced that he is either an evil or a God-send.
However, I still find interesting discussions on him to be quite fascinating and thought-provoking. Check out this Time magazine article (of all places) that I found from July of last year. It put another, more interesting, possible reason for Christians (or anyone) to be less than enthusiastic about ol' Potter boy. Take it for what you will. I find it stimulating:

Who dies in Harry Potter? God
by Lev Grossman

"Joanne Rowling has three fancy houses and more money than the Queen, but she still doesn't have a middle name: the K. is just an empty invention, added for effect when she published her first book. Starting with that first letter, she has orchestrated a sustained dramatic crescendo unlike anything literature has ever seen. By selling 325 million books in 66 languages, she has almost single-handedly made the case that the novel can still be a global mass medium. With the fifth Harry Potter movie opening on July 11 and the seventh and last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, coming at midnight on July 21, the crescendo has reached a grand climax.
"Rowling's work is so familiar that we've forgotten how radical it really is. Look at her literary forebears. In The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien fused his ardent Catholicism with a deep, nostalgic love for the unspoiled English landscape. C.S. Lewis was a devout Anglican whose Chronicles of Narnia forms an extended argument for Christian faith. Now look at Rowling's books. What's missing? If you want to know who dies in Harry Potter, the answer is easy: God.
"Harry Potter lives in a world free of any religion or spirituality of any kind. He lives surrounded by ghosts but has no one to pray to, even if he were so inclined, which he isn't. Rowling has more in common with celebrity atheists like Christopher Hitchens than she has with Tolkien and Lewis.
"What does Harry have instead of God? Rowling's answer, at once glib and profound, is that Harry's power comes from love. This charming notion represents a cultural sea change. In the new millennium, magic comes not from God or nature or anything grander or more mystical than a mere human emotion. In choosing Rowling as the reigning dreamer of our era, we have chosen a writer who dreams of a secular, bureaucratized, all-too-human sorcery, in which psychology and technology have superseded the sacred.
"When the end comes, where will it leave Harry? He'll face tougher choices than his fantasy ancestors did. Frodo was last seen skipping town with the elves. Lewis sent the Pevensie kids to the paradise of Aslan's Land. It's unlikely that such a comfortable retirement awaits Harry in the Deathly Hallows."

My further thoughts on this same idea can be found at the bottom of this blog article.