A Clear and Present Danger

Dialogue between a fictional president and the other kind.

FP: “You broke the law. You’re going to jail.”

OK:  “You are such a boy scout. You see everything in black and white.”

FP:  “Not black and white.  Right and wrong.”

OK: “I am not a crook.”

Oops, for some reason I keep reverting to that previous other kind of president.

The Slave is Our Brother

In a morning marked by the dissension and controversy about an increasingly unpopular war, I was pleasantly surprised to learn in church this morning the background of one of my all-time favorite Christmas songs, Oh Holy Night. Considering myself to be well-versed on the social aspects of the gospel, I was intrigued to hear that the song was written by a socialist wine-seller, the music by a Jew, and the English translated by an ardent abolitionist. The song premiered at midnight mass on Christmas 1847 in Roquemaure, France. Even though it was a very popular Christmas song in France, at one time it was banned for use in catholic churches. The problem with the song was that the author, Placide Cappeau, had became, according to one web-site, " a social radical, a freethinker, a socialist, and a non-Christian." The article goes on to say that later in his life, "he adopted some of the more extreme political and social views of his era, such as opposition to inequality, slavery, injustice, and other kinds of oppression." Certainly doesn't sound very Christian by many of today's definitions.

John S. Dwight translated it into English in 1855. Dwight was a Transcendentalist, a "commune"ist (see Brook Farm, MA), an abolitionist, and one of the foremost critics and proponents of classical music of his day. The song was very popular in the churches of the North during the civil war for obvious reasons.

There is a great deal of folklore which has been attached to the song. It is credited with being the song sung to begin the Christmas day truce of the Franco-Prussian War. It may have been the first song ever broadcast by radio. It was sung by me at one of my earliest public performances. (All right, it was at an 8th grade piano recital. The fact that they asked me to sing rather than play is indicative of my lack of skill at the piano. To paraphrase one of my favorite movie characters, "Eight years of piano down the drain.")

As we continue to debate the significant and not-so-significant issues of our day, it is good to stop and remember that "yonder breaks a new and glorious morn."

A small prophecy fulfilled

I make no claim to being a prophet, at least in the contemporary predictive sense of the word. But sometimes I do get something right.  A couple of years ago a told a friend, who was considering leaving the SBC because of the actions of the current leadership, to be patient.  I told him that the current leadership of the SBC cannot survive because they will self destruct.  When they no longer have "liberals" (can anyone tell me who those liberals were and where they are today?) to fight against they will start fighting each other.  We have already witnessed some opening salvos of the battle with the replacement of Ken Hemphill at SWBTS with Paige Patterson.  Now the trustees of the International Mission Board have stirred up a hornets nest with their passage of new selection guidelines.

Such “supposed pillars” of the “supposed conservative resurgence” as Morris Chapman and Wade Burleson (see Crusading Conservatives vs. Cooperating Conservatives: The War for the Future of the Southern Baptist Convention)  are greatly disturbed because the tactics which were used to “take of the convention and its agencies” are now be used to “take over the convention and its agencies.”  Somehow these men and there supporters still don’t understand that the take over of the SBC was never about theology. It was always about power.

Oh well, like my church history prof used to say, “If the SBC ever splits, go with the Annuity Board.”