Okay, here’s proof positive that the Jesus and Mo artist is reading this website:
h/t: Ray
Jesus ‘n’ Mo(hler)
July 9, 2010 • 2:11 pm
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
You forgot to include the note at the bottom of the cartoon:
Yep, the cartoonist directly hat tipped you…
So THATS’s what h/t stands for!
(I wondered if J&M read BioLogos, but that was too silly to contemplate.)
Ha — I missed the direct link back to WEIT.
Anyway, I suspect he/she is a regular here.
It’s a great comic, isn’t it?
“reading”, yeah. *nudge*nudge*wink*wink*
@ Sili
Exactly what I was thinking 🙂
I’m not buying it, mostly because Jerry only highlights some of the Jesus ‘n’ Mo cartoons. If he linked to every one, that would make sense, it would be a self-plug. If he linked to none, it would be modest. But linking to a few? What does he think that is his own best work or something?
Nah. It’s probably just somebody who frequents the various popular freethinker website. I mean, I run into the same people in the comments on a lot of these sites, so no surprise someone who followed this community would also be a WEIT reader.
Tssssssss. Jerry is not author. I know who author is. He is not so deeply under cover that no one in the universe knows who he is. And he’s a he; there’s no need to keep saying he/she; he makes it clear he’s a he when he comments at J and M. And of course he reads freethinker websites! Whaddya think, he’s just some random nerd who draws badly?!
Well of course you know who the author is. You’re the bartender.
Well quite.
Well, I don’t know who it is (except that it’s not Jerry), and I usually say “he/she” or “she/he” when the identity is unknown.
My hat is off to whomever write the comic.
PC Ray
I know, but now you know, so you can say “he.”
:- )
It’s a shame that the barmaid is still banned over at the Inter-sock-tion. I, for one, would like to see the Cavity Creeps answer her questions about UA, and to apologise for generally shitty behaviour over the last year.
I also would like a pony.
I want a pony too!
While the methods of BioLogos, and their need to speak sonorously to each other is hard to stomach, lets take a second to recap what they’ve done, since April:
1. They somehow got the former president of the Evangelical Theological Society and pooh bah OT scholar, Bruce Waltke, to say on film that Christians who don’t accept the reality of evolution, are in danger of becoming “a cult” because they are detached from reality – this would be analogous to getting Charlton Heston say gun control has merits.
2. The Orlando Reform Theological Seminary to fired Waltke, and exposed the fact that the official position of 1/3 of the religious colleges in the USA, forbid a person from saying that “humans evolved”.
3. As a result of this controversy, and the profile and reputation of the people at BioLogos, and their success at lining up support, Dr. Albert Mohler, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, the flagship school of America’s largest protestant denomination, gave a speech in which he called “BioLogos” the “locus classicus” of the crisis in the church (quote):
This would not be one of those tough questions Christians ask, if these questions were not being posed to us by those who assume that general revelation and indeed the book of nature is presenting to us something in terms of compelling evidence, compelling evidence that is so forceful and credible that we’re going to have to reconstruct and re-envision our understanding of the biblical text.
We need to think more deeply about this. The BioLogos website has just even in recent days focused its attention on the direct rejection of biblical inerrancy. Understanding that any rendering of the bible as inerrant makes the acceptance of theistic evolution impossible. Certainly implausible. Kenton Sparks writing on that website suggests that, intellectually, evangelicalism has painted itself into a corner—that we have put ourselves into an intellectual cul-de-sac with our understanding of biblical inerrancy. He suggests that the Bible indeed should be recognized as containing historical, theological and moral error. Peter Enns, one of the most frequent contributors to the site, suggests that we have to come to the understanding that, when it comes to many of the scientific claims, historical claims, the writers of scriptures were plainly wrong.
I’d like to suggest that this is one of the most significant “post Dover” developments in the discussion about faith and science in America.
This speech by Mohler is one of the most important round ups of the issue, and it is a direct rebuttal to everything Mooney has said about New Atheism.
BioLogos, is not an “accomodationist” group, they are a Christian group, who advocate against biblical inerrancy.
Mooney is an “accomodationist” because he believes non believers should not criticize believers.
What is going on at BioLogos is a legitimate theological discussion of the meaning of the Bible – to the extent that it moves religious opinion away from insanity, and makes it a little less wrong headed – it has done great work for the cause of science, and by Mohlers testimony, is one of the worst enemies of religion.
what I meant was 1/3 of the seminarians in the USA attend schools which are “confessional” – and attend the institution subject to their agreement with the official doctrine of the school forbids “theistic evolution” … that is why they HAD to fire Waltke – he violated their “confession”.
Of course this is a small # of schools (most seminaries are fine with evolution) but they enroll most of the students.
I feel it would help undermine Mooney’s frame, if we forced him to confront the fact of the “official policy” of the institutions. Until these schools wither, or change their doctrine, Mooney’s point is objectively false. They officially forbid the integration of science and faith.
You make many good points, but I have to respectfully disagree.
BioLogos is trying to make two things live together that, according to the largest Protestant denomination in the US, are irreconciliable.
That is accomodationism.
And they are a Christian organization as well. The two are not mutually exclusive.
I take your point.
I’m confused about what accomodationism is, and I stated the above as if I knew.
I think however, if we could distinguish between Mooney’s point, which seems to be “don’t say things that offend the deeply held convictions of believers”.
and
the debate between believers about their deeply held beliefs.
I do take your point, the two things are not exclusive.
The use of the term however to “label” people who are interested in how to advance the cause of science and reason, I see as problematic. But my mind is open and I didn’t mean to state it so dogmatically.
Can non believers praise the efforts of Collins and Giberson without agreeing with them … ie, it is good that you are in a position to interact with Mohler, because we can only laugh at him.
thanks.
Good points again.
I can praise the efforts of Collins when he takes a stand for what is based on evidence. But I can’t when he contadicts it.
Consider this: he talks a lot about “sole” and “free will”. A lot of the work debunking these claims was done at…guess where. The NIH.
Which is why I think he is an accomodationist: picking and choosing certain scientific findings that can somehow mesh with a certain doctrine, (wilfully?) ignoring those that can’t.
Fair enough, but is it true that we seem to have a hard time actually praising Collins for his work? (can someone correct me if I’m wrong, and prominent critics of religion, have indeed praised Collins)?
Collins, has created a crisis in the evangelical church because he is attacking it from within.
Mohler makes it clear – there is a threat “outside” (secularism, and the New Atheists as the most extreme example of this)but external threats are helpful to him in a circle the wagons kind of way.
Internal threats however, really keep him awake, the reason that he is making this speech, and the reason that it matters, is that he makes it clear that the attack from within is the real threat, and he has to get his hands dirty to combat it, by killing off his own.
Mohler just sends his proxies to fight Dawkins, or says dismissive things about him, but Collins and BioLogos have locked in on him, and they are picking off his monks, attacking his base of support and causing panic, rather than solidarity.
This is really big stuff …
Lastly, along the lines of “You are Not Helping” … I’d like to ask, if Dawkins et al, loudly praised Collins for his courage in confronting the madness in the evangelical church, it would not hurt Dawkins at all.
Collins isn’t going to stop fighting for his interpretation of the bible because Dawkins agrees with him on certain points (ie of course the bible should not be read literally).
Great, exciting stuff. Really landmark progress if you ask me.
Francis Collins Peace Be Upon You.
These are some excellent points.
I do think there is a difference between the flavor of accomodationist who seeks harmony between faith and science (which is their perogative), and the flavor of accomodationist who seeks primarily to criticize those who don’t see such a harmony. Mooney seems to pretty exclusively focus on the latter these days, which is why we all can’t stand him.
Biologos seems to do a little of both, and you have an excellent point that since it is from “inside” the evangelical establishment, that gives it a unique power. I’m not sure it really substantively changes any actions/reactions to Biologos — their nonsense is still nonsense, regardless of the effect it may be having — but it’s a fresh perspective.
As far as the scenario of Dawkins or someone like that praising Biologos, I agree it wouldn’t hurt Dawkins, but I’m not sure it would really help anything either. It might even hurt Biologos’ “from-the-inside” mission.
I think your point is taken, though, that we could ease up a bit on the criticism of BioLogos given that in at least some respects they are our allies.
thanks for that link, I don’t think the New Atheists would hurt BioLogos, by praising them.
Everything prominent Atheists could do to draw attention to their work – Francis Collins wants to clean out the Augean Stables. We should hand the man a shovel and cheer him on.
You can’t underestimate the gift of Albert Mohler … the more he talks about how light might not be a constant, and how the earth is young and how science can’t make up its mind … the more he self destructs.
Stan McCrystal of Atheism … we need a BioLogos surge.
There are some good points.
Yes, it may be that BioLogos will have some good effects. It may or may not be part of a reaction to atheism moving the Overton window.
None of that matters when it comes to what James Sweet discuss, prerogatives. Accommodationism, however wrong headed has its prerogatives. So have we, and pointing out the problems are one of them.
You don’t have to praise parts of a movement that tears the movement asunder, in fact there is very little praiseworthy in that. You don’t have to cheer on a divisive movement, in fact there is very little cheerfulness in the phenomena.
We can however find it useful; useful idiots are legion. Good enough for me.
Sorry, off-topic… but I must scream for a moment…
I’M EMPLOYED AGAIN! STARTING MONDAY! HOORAY FOR ME! WOOOOO-HOOOOOO…
*Crash… thump… wobble wobble… clunk… ouch*
(Sorry, I shouldn’t have stood up on my bar stool…)
Congratulations! BTW do you get paid in bananas?
Gorillas like papayas even more than bananas. (How do I know? Because they go for the papaya first, of course.)
Thanks to this insight, we know what the spectrum of sin looks like! In sin units, Planck’s constant is simply 1 sin*s, with the frequency of sin determined by:
which is what we observe in the sin background of the big bang:
We also know the spatial frequency of sin to great accuracy!
But that would make spherical harmonics (“harmony of the spheres”) a sinful phenomena.
Also, the greatest sin would be larger than the observable universe. Subject to cosmic variance, we would never really learn of it, it being a constant of life but never comparable with other volumes. Is it truly an effective sin in such a case?
I’¨m not sure that this theology makes much sense. … oh, wait, it must be alright then!
Groaning? The universe should buck up, for crying out loud.