Liberal Democrats President on Healing and the ASA

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Peter Kirk

People are sometimes surprised that I can be an evangelical and charismatic Christian and also a member of the Liberal Democrats. After all, they say, the Lib Dems support all kinds of anti-Christian policies like abortion and gay marriage. Well, that is true, but they have a greater number of policies that I can and do support – and there were even more of them until they were abandoned by a leadership that seems over-anxious to get cosy with the Conservatives. But I digress here from my main theme.

So it is good to know that, although the party leader Nick Clegg MP is an atheist, the party president Tim Farron MP is a Christian, as is the party’s deputy leader Simon Hughes MP.

Tim Farron is also Vice Chair of Christians in Parliament, and in this capacity one of the three signatories of an interesting letter to the Advertising Standards Authority concerning the HOTS Bath controversy, as reported by Gillan Scott.

It is hardly a surprise that Tim Farron has come in for some criticism such as this, within his own party and elsewhere, for signing the letter. So I thank the Church Mouse on Twitter for a link to an article which Tim Farron has written for Liberal Democrat Voice, entitled The ASA and me – a response. In this response he distances himself from the letter he signed:

It’s not a well-worded letter – the reference to the ASA providing indisputable evidence is silly, and the implication that people should seek faith healing at the expense of medical intervention is something that I just don’t believe in. For what it’s worth, I also think that the Fabrice Muamba reference is crass. So on all those fronts, I should just say sorry and not bother defending myself. I shouldn’t have signed that letter as it was written …

Where does the letter imply that “people should seek faith healing at the expense of medical intervention”? As far as I can tell everyone in this controversy has rejected that suggestion.

But Tim Farron continues by reaffirming his opposition to the ASA ruling, not permitting any claims that God can heal physically. He gives these reasons:

a) The ASA genuinely do a brilliant job, but they really aren’t appointed to be the arbiter of theological matters, I think they’ve overstepped their remit
b) As a Christian I believe that prayer helps – although my belief is that God mostly heals through medicine, surgery and human compassion and ingenuity.
c) Freedom of speech – an organisation that makes a faith based claim that is clearly subjective (in the same way that a political party makes subjective claims) should be able to make those claims within reason.

I completely agree, except that I would go further than saying “prayer helps”: I believe that God can and does heal today, sometimes apart from medical or other intervention, but medical help should also be sought where available.

So well done, Tim Farron, for sticking to your position and witnessing to your faith, even in the den of liberal and democratic lions.

American Baptism, Democratic and Republican

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Peter Kirk

Archdruid Eileen offers a perceptive comment:

In America, it seems to me, you can tell politicians apart by the age at which baptism takes place. Broadly, I reckon, Democrats baptise children and Republicans baptise adults.

This is really an aside in her post A Guide to English Christianity, which led her creator to tweet “*leaves country*”. But America will be no safe haven for the writer after that comment.

But is this correlation true? It certainly seems to tie in with my experience. Among my limited number of American friends, those from mainstream denominations, who generally baptise children, tend to be on the political left, whereas the Baptists and Pentecostals who only baptise adults tend to be on the right. I would suppose that the latter tend to be more individualistic, in both politics and religion, and to be Republican, whereas a stronger sense of society and corporate identity could be linked to both baptism of children and Democratic politics.

However, the rule doesn’t seem to work for recent Presidents and presidential candidates. Bill Clinton is a Democrat and a Baptist; George W. Bush is a Republican and a Methodist (former Episcopalian). Barack Obama fits the bill as a Democrat from the paedo-baptist United Church of Christ, but he was personally baptised as an adult in that denomination (which incidentally implies that he is not a Muslim). Of Obama’s four current Republican challengers, two are paedo-baptist Roman Catholics, although Newt Gingrich has been baptised as an adult, not once but twice; one, Ron Paul, is a Baptist who baptises children – at least his own five; and one, Mitt Romney, accepts only adult baptism, in its distorted Mormon form. So, it seems, Eileen’s rule is followed better by the ordinary people than by their leaders.

A Breakthrough on Paul and Women (1 Timothy 2:8-15)

Posted on March 23, 2012 by Peter Kirk

Trace James, of Studies in Grace, offers an interesting post A Breakthrough on Paul and Women. (Thanks to ElShaddai Edwards on Twitter for the link.) He writes:

It is not very often that I experience a real breakthrough in biblical studies. Perhaps that is because I do not have very many “problem passages,” texts where I think I know what a text says but I disagree!

Yet, here is such a text: I Timothy 2:8-15! The passage where we all “know” Paul the apostle instructs Timothy to forbid women from teaching because Adam was created before Eve, because Eve was deceived first (before Adam) and because women have better things to do, that is, to give birth to and to take care of babies!

But the interpretation which Trace comes up with is diametrically opposed to this one. This is because he asks the right questions:

Anyone who has ever taken classes from me knows the importance of context in reading the Bible. Every bible book was called forth by an occasion and was continually preserved and re-copied because it continued to speak powerfully to new generations even when the contexts had changed. So what context might help us to understand the above passage in a new way?

Trace looks at the likely context of what Paul wrote to Timothy, including the background of proto-Gnosticism. Read his post to see the course of his argument. This may be new to Trace, but it is not entirely new to me. However, it is a clear and concise statement of this way of looking at the passage. It provides a convenient and freely accessible resource for rebutting the position that in this passage Paul intends to forbid for ever all women from teaching.

Trace concludes

that Paul had no problem with female teachers any more than Jesus did and that the problem under discussion is rebellion, not women as teachers.

I agree.

“Miracle man” Muamba dead then alive – Doctors amazed

Posted on March 22, 2012 by Peter Kirk

Footballer Fabrice Muamba now seems to be recovering slowly, although he is still in intensive care. See this video for the latest report. Along with most of the nation, I thank God for this remarkable answer to prayer.

The amazing thing in this case is that, after collapsing during an FA Cup tie, he is said to have been dead for as long as 78 minutes, with his heart not beating. Even doctors have used the word “dead”. For all of that time people were giving him a variety of medical treatments – and others, even players on the pitch, were praying for him. But it was only after well over an hour that the medical team was able to restart his heart.

The BBC Health Correspondent, Nick Triggle, asks, Can you be dead for 78 minutes? He writes:

The more details that emerge about Fabrice Muamba, the more amazing his story becomes.

The latest has seen the Bolton footballer labelled the “miracle man”.

Nevertheless, he explains, it is possible, though rare, for someone to live again after being dead for this long, with paramedics unable to find any signs of life. Of course one might say that Triggle has to say it is possible because it has happened, in at least this one case.

In this case Muamba was receiving the best possible medical treatment and was also being prayed for. So it is impossible to say whether the prayer played any part in his return from the dead, or in his subsequent recovery.

But this does raise the question of what happens in cases where apparently dead people are raised by the power of prayer alone, when no medical treatment is available, or when doctors have stopped treating the patient as dead. In recent years there have been many reports of such healings, most controversially in connection with the ministry of Todd Bentley. Now I accept that there are serious issues here in that there is no independent verification of many of the reports coming out of the Lakeland events. But there does seem to be a common pattern among most of the reported raisings of the dead by prayer: that they usually happen within an hour or two of death.

So could it be that all or many of the genuine cases (and I assume here that at least a few are genuine) of people being raised from the dead through prayer are similar to that of Muamba? A person’s heart has stopped, probably for some medical reason. There may have been repeated attempts to start it again, but these have failed. As the BBC suggests in Muamba’s case, there may have been some residual activity in the heart, but no regular beat. Then, after an hour or two and in response to prayer, the heart has started to beat again, and the person has come back to life. Well, something like this happened in Muamba’s case, although we don’t know what if any different treatment he received when he arrived at the hospital.

So, am I suggesting a naturalistic explanation of reanimation by prayer, that people spontaneously rise from the dead, and there is only a coincidental link with prayer? Not really – although maybe the dead wake up more often than is realised, only to freeze to death again on a mortuary slab. But I am suggesting that the power of God can touch a heart which is still, but maybe not completely dead, and start it beating again. Yes, a miracle, but perhaps one which does not go as completely against the scientific worldview as some might think when they hear talk about the dead being raised.

"Miracle man" Muamba dead then alive – Doctors amazed

Posted on March 22, 2012 by Peter Kirk

The BBC Health Correspondent, Nick Triggle, asks, Can you be dead for 78 minutes? He writes:

The more details that emerge about Fabrice Muamba, the more amazing his story becomes.

The latest has seen the Bolton footballer labelled the “miracle man”.

Murdoch company accused of killing old woman

Posted on March 21, 2012 by Peter Kirk

Rupert Murdoch is in enough trouble here in the UK, mainly with the phone hacking scandals involving his newspapers. But I don’t think any of his UK companies have been accused of causing anyone’s death.

But that cannot be said about his American companies. The US news channel Fox News, which he owns, has now been directly implicated in the death of an old woman, by inciting her to reject the medical treatment which she needed – as reported by Karoli at Crooks and Liars and by Fred Clark at Slacktivist (thanks to James McGrath for the latter link). The old lady’s daughter wrote:

FOX News killed my precious mother, Hallie. She watched FOX religiously. And when she fell ten days before she died, she refused to go to the doctor because, “I don’t want Obamacare to get all of my information! she declared …

It seems that this old lady believed many of the deliberate lies which were being put forward by the Fox News anchor, lies directed at President Obama and at his health care policy. She appears to have thought that if she had accepted medical care, following her fall, her medical information and her money would have been sent to Islamic extremists. This is of course completely false, but a reasonable deduction from the lies told by Fox News.

Like Fred Clark, “I wouldn’t say Fox News is directly responsible for this woman’s death”. But, assuming that the facts as reported are accurate, I would suggest that the Fox campaign of disinformation about Obama and his policies gives them a measure of responsibility, in this case and in any other similar ones.

And, just as Rupert Murdoch should accept personal responsibility for the phone hacking at the News of the World, and probably at other newspapers he owns, he should also accept personal responsibility for all of the consequences of the lies told by Fox News.

BBC: Pray for sick Muamba, it might help

Posted on March 19, 2012 by Peter Kirk

In the light of the controversy about advertising claims that God can heal today, it was interesting to see that even the generally secularist BBC has published an article suggesting that prayer for physical healing may well be effective. The BBC Home Editor, Mark Easton, has written an article Prayers for Muamba. This is about the Premier League footballer (i.e. soccer player) Fabrice Muamba, who was taken ill during a match on Saturday, and remains in a critical condition.

Easton writes:

Have you prayed for Fabrice Muamba today? His family are exhorting the country to believe in the power of prayer, and I suspect many millions of Britons, whether they have faith or not, will have felt moved to offer a silent appeal to an invisible power asking that the young footballer pull through.

The front page of today’s Sun newspaper is devoted to the headline “God is in Control” below the subheading “Praying for Muamba”. …

Easton continues with a summary of scientific studies on the effectiveness of prayer, going back to Sir Francis Galton in 1872 – but not mentioning the study I recently posted about. He notes a 2007 literature review from Arizona State University:

The study looked at 17 previously published papers and found that “patients who received intercessory prayer demonstrated significant improvement” in seven of those. However, there were questions about the validity of some of the research and the evidence was not sufficient for “prayer” to meet the criteria required for an “empirically supported treatment” in the United States.

(If the Advertising Standards Authority had acted properly in response to the HOTS Bath claims, they would have appealed to a study like that one rather than simply refusing to consider any claims of physical healing.)

Nevertheless, Easton concludes by encouraging his readers to pray for Muamba:

Whatever you might think about its links to a supernatural being, intercessory prayer is a straightforward way for an individual to focus the mind on their capacity to think nice thoughts. Anyone can close their eyes and make a wish that bad things do not happen. Right now, Britain is praying that Fabrice Muamba makes a speedy and full recovery.

Not exactly how a Spirit-filled Christian would put it, but nevertheless it is quite something for the BBC to publish even this. Indeed I can’t help wondering if someone will complain about it to the Advertising Standards Authority. But it seems clear where public opinion lies on this one.

Let us pray together that God touches Fabrice Muamba and restores him quickly to full health and strength. Amen.

Gay Marriage: A Philosophical Perspective

Posted on March 19, 2012 by Peter Kirk

Gay marriage is an area of current controversy which I have avoided commenting on recently, so far. But I have been tempted out of silence by reading an interesting philosophical perspective on this issue by philosopher and theologian John Milbank: Gay Marriage and the Future of Human Sexuality. This was published in Australia, although Milbank is a professor at the University of Nottingham here in the UK. Thanks to Roger Mugs and Matthew R. Malcolm for the link.

This is an important article giving a profound criticism of the concept of same sex marriage. But it is one which is difficult to summarise. Milbank considers some difficult issues such as whether marriage is fundamentally a religious or a societal institution. He looks at “The logic of homosexuality” and at “Children, kinship and the grammar of society”. Here is how he finishes the latter section:

From this it follows that we should not re-define birth as essentially artificial and disconnected from the sexual act – which by no means implies that each and every sexual act must be open to the possibility of procreation, only that the link in general should not be severed.

The price for this severance is surely the commodification of birth by the market, the quasi-eugenic control of reproduction by the state, and the corruption of the parent-child relation to one of a narcissistic self-projection.

Once the above practices have been rejected, then it follows that a gay relationship cannot qualify as a marriage in terms of its orientation to having children, because the link between an interpersonal and a natural act is entirely crucial to the definition and character of marriage.

The fact that this optimum condition cannot be fulfilled by many valid heterosexual marriages is entirely irrelevant, for they still fulfil through ideal intention this linkage, besides sustaining the union of sexual difference which is the other aspect of marriage’s inherently heterosexual character.

He continues by asking some significant questions:

the Church needs already to face the fact that it is quite likely to lose this debate, even if it should still try to win it. But if it does lose it, then how should it respond?

… it is surely worthwhile for Christians at least to tarry for a while with the more radical secular notion that really the state has no business regulating human sexual relations at all. …

I think that this radical position should be refused, on the grounds that it is desirable that the state give every possible legal and fiscal encouragement to marriage as a key institution of social bonding. And for the same reason Christians cannot remain satisfied with the argument that specifically heterosexual marriage remains possible for them through the agency of the Church.

However, it becomes a useful foil in the event of the universal advent of gay marriage. For then, instead of banging its head against a cognitive brick wall, the proper response of the Church should be to deem marriage under civil law a failed experiment and to resume its sacramental guardianship of marriage as a natural and social condition.

Here we face the question of whether, after the legalisation of gay marriage, the churches and other religious bodies can any longer be considered by the state as legal marriage brokers – as they are today in the UK but not in many other countries like France, where religious people must undergo both a religious and a civil registration.

Milbank seems to come close to an affirmative answer to the latter question, that the church should withdraw from the legal side of marriage. But he draws back from this conclusion, and ultimately offers nothing more than advice for the promotion of “a traditional Church wedding”. Well, one should not expect philosophers to propose public policy, or even church policy. But these are certainly important considerations for those whose task it is to decide and implement such policy.

It seems to me that the only coherent way ahead, in a world which does not fully accept Christian teaching on marriage, is to make a clean distinction between the societal and religious institutions. Indeed this is already the case in very many countries. But currently in English law, and I think in the law of the USA, there is no such legal distinction. It would be a long and difficult journey to disentangle the religious from the secular. But I see it as the direction in which we need to be heading.

For this idea I should thank the late novelist, lawyer and law reformer A.P. Herbert. I remember the TV broadcast of one of his Misleading Cases, probably The Tax on Virtue which was first shown in 1968, based on a 1933 short story. In this story, a man finds that his wife has to pay more tax on her significant income than she would have done if she was unmarried. So to reduce their tax liability the couple get a divorce, then are publicly reconciled and remarried in the Church of England – but conveniently fail to sign the register, so that they are not legally married and can claim separate tax allowances. Herbert certainly knew his English marriage law. But would the church have considered this couple legally married? If so, perhaps there really is already a legal distinction between religious and secular marriage.

Rowan Williams to leave “impossible” job

Posted on March 17, 2012 by Peter Kirk

I don’t intend to write much about the departure of Rowan Williams as Archbishop of Canterbury. As some of my readers will remember, I have in the past (in fact in 2007) called for his resignation. I am not now rejoicing that he is going, but I do think he has made the right decision, and that it might have been better for him to resign earlier. However, I will resist the temptation to give this post a title like “Better late than never”.

I am glad that the Church Mouse has broken his silence to post Farewell Rowan, tempted by a tweet from myself and no doubt by many other encouragements. But Mouse’s post is very positive about Rowan. Much of this is justified, as indeed

his time as Archbishop has been an impossible one.

He has at least managed to avoid open schism in the Church of England and in the Anglican Communion. But, to provide a balance to the hagiography, I added my own comment, which I am copying here, for wider circulation and for the record:

Thank you for breaking your silence on this matter. But I don’t see the need to extend the convention of not speaking ill of the dead to those who have merely announced their resignation. In many ways Rowan has been an excellent Archbishop. But I still think he failed to show the kind of pro-active leadership which was needed, especially around the 2008 Lambeth Conference. True, he had an impossible task, but I think a stronger leader would have brought about a better outcome.

So can a new man keep the Anglican Communion together and begin to heal the huge fault lines within it? If anyone can, I would think it is John Sentamu – not least because he is the only tipped candidate who is not white British. Or will the new man preside over the Communion’s formal dissolution? If so, I suspect that Rowan will go down in history as the archbishop who allowed it to happen.

Rowan Williams to leave "impossible" job