Author: Lyle Duell

Lyle Duell is a christian businessman, minister and author. He is the author of "From Jesus to Religion", which is available on Amazon.

On Religion

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines, Religion

On Religion

I noticed in a number of Facebook posts a negative attitude towards reli-gion. I’m personally not a big cheerleader of big religion. In fact, I have written a book entitled “From Jesus to religion” that is not too flattering to wards much religion. However, I believe it to be an accurate and a fair appraisal of religion. (From Jesus to Religion).

Religion like all institutions of mankind is either good or bad or someplace in between. It is simply incorrect and unfair to say that all religion is evil. Yes, religion has its share of evil as all human institutions do. However, religious people still give the most to charities out of all of the institutions in the world. They provide a sanctuary for the poor and outcast of the so-ciety. They are the primary workers in nursing home visitation and workers at local soup kitchens and pantries. Statistics can be found in the book “Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism by Arthur Brooks”

The small congregation that I attend has given out thousands of dollars for fuel assistance and lodging to the poor. Religion has built the majority of our universities and hospitals to name a few, the Salvation Army, YMCA Habitat for humanity, numerous universities, and much more.

My conclusion is yes, religion has its bad apples and the reason it does is that the people that make it up are just human beings and unfortunately sometimes are terribly flawed. I’ll sum it up with the words of the apostle Paul “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” that includes the religious and nonreligious. In fact, we all fall short of our own moral standards. If you don’t it’s simply means that your standards are not high enough.

Just Say No

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines, One minute nonsense

Just Say No

The first word that most human say is the word “no”. It seems to be the first evidence of the human spirit declaring itself independent from others. When my kids first said no to me, my immediate response was to say, “don’t say no to me”. In saying that, I was teaching my children that the word no was a negative word, when in actuality it is a positive word. However, it seems that Americans have forgotten how to say no. We have forgotten how to say no to our spending, appetites and passions. We even have a political party that feel that they can score points if they can convince people that the opposite party is the party of no. Yet our nation is in financial trouble for not saying no and we have millions of individuals that are in financial trouble because they never learned how to say no. The truth is that the word no is a positive word that is actually a liberating word that leads to freedom. It is the word that liberates us from our negative self. The self that wants to say yes to its passions, attachments, addictions, and its rebel emotions. The art of saying “no” frees us to be truly human and empowers us to say no to the things which pull us down into our lower nature. As human beings we can even say no to our genes. In fact, we are the only creature that can say no. This ability to say no to our genes and lower nature sets us apart from all other creatures and is a reflection of the God that created us in his image. Maybe you have forgotten how to say no to your spending, appetites, and passions. Well, the answer is this, you need to practice. My mother once told me that practice makes perfect. Let me suggest that tomorrow morning, in fact every morning until you get it down, that you look in the mirror, kind of pucker up your lips and say “no” to the self which you see in the mirror, continual to do this until it feels normal.  By the way make sure you’re alone. Lyle

Systemic Racism

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines

Systemic Racism

 What is racism? Well in general it is a form of bigotry based on race or the color of one’s skin.  However, bigotry goes way beyond racism. Bigotry runs through class, social standing, and even your physical looks. Using this broad definition of racism as bigotry you could say that many kinds of behavior and beliefs could fall into the area of bigotry or racism. Let’s look at a few of the forms of bigotry that is often overlooked.

One form of racism and bigotry is when you look down upon another race or group of people feeling that they are somehow lesser human and therefore should be held less responsible for their behavior.  This is nothing more than the dehumanization of a class or a race of people. It is one of the most subtle forms of prejudice and racism because it pretends to have respect for those that are dehumanized. It is the hidden racism of the white middle-class liberal and progressives which is manifested when they refuse to hold some groups responsible for their behavior. Their behavior speaks aloud to the fact that they look at that particular group as inferiors.

The same thinking can be applied to the poor. Large numbers of middle-class and upper-class people look down on the poor and refuse them the dignity of work of any kind. The reason is their low opinion of the poor which they cleverly disguised by looking upon themselves as benefactors. They treat the poor like mindless idiots or little children. This can also be applied to how the professional class views the working class. Many put no value on the work or time of the working class while at the same time charging huge amounts and fees for their services. In this regard, what is said of the professional class could equally be said of the ruling and educational class.  

What is the truth about racism and bigotry? The simple truth is that we are all racist and bigoted. It’s a part of the human condition which has been bred into us by evolution and cannot be corrected without some very negative consequences, like a new inquisition or toxic political correctness. Man, by his very nature is tribal and therefore naturally suspicious of anyone outside of his tribe or that is different in any way. It is a part of the survival instinct and is what the whole system is built around. Like it or not all cultures big or small have their classes and hierarchies. Therefore, their own set of prejudices.

Some have suggested that a different political system say communism or socialism may eliminate racism or bigotry. If history teaches us anything it teaches us that political systems cannot deal with problems of existence well. There is no evidence from history that communism or socialism or any political system can deal effectively with bigotry. Because it will only take a few generations for any social system to morph into some kind of hierarchy system. All systems end up using force and political power to control people and as soon as that happens the bigotry and racism will start all over. Does this mean that we should not do anything about racism or try to correct it? No, it simply means that we should all be humble when it comes to this sin because most are guilty of it in some form or other.

This means that racism and all kind of bigotry are systemic to all cultures and nations. It does not take much thinking on the part of a person to realize that bigotry and racism are a self-evident truth that can only be denied by those that are bigots and racist or those that are ignorant of the human condition.

C.S. Lewis on God and Justice

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines

My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it? A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet. Of course, I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too—for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my fancies. Thus, in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist—in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless—I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality—namely my idea of justice—was full of sense. Consequently, atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be a word without meaning.

The Great Myths of Modern Men

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines, Revelation and Myth, Science

The Great Myths of Modern Men

‘The lawless man is produced by the spirit of evil and armed with all the force, wonders and signs that falsehood can devise. To those involved in this dying world he will come with evil’s undiluted power to deceive, for they have refused to love the truth which could have saved them. God sends upon them, therefore, the full force of evil’s delusion, so that they put their faith in an utter fraud and meet the inevitable judgment of all who have refused to believe the truth and who have made evil their play-fellow.”  The Apostle Paul

Before we can have a rational discussion on the subject of modern myths, we need to understand the terms and concepts we are using.  When I use the word myth, I am not referring to something false, but rather to a large explanatory story or narrative that gives us some insight into what stands behind the way we view the world.  In science, they are called models or paradigms.  In religion, they are called shadows, types, or parables.  In essence, myths are large metaphors that we use to talk about the things which we cannot see and yet believe are there.  They are believed to be the truths that point to the truth that stands outside of man’s grasp.  All true myths in some fashion and to some degree depict reality.  If this were not the case, they never would have been elevated to the place of myth.  With this in mind, we are ready to talk about the great myths of modern man.

To understand the making of the great modern myths we have to understand the time of the enlightenment in Europe which gave rise to the great myths of Western civilization.  The enlightenment was a time of great upheaval and change in the thinking of man.  The old authorities in every area of life were being challenged and being replaced.  Feudalism was being replaced with democracy, magic with science, capitalism with socialism and faith with atheism.

During this period there was a tremendous effort by the skeptics of enlightenment to move the masses away from religion. To do this, they would have to convince the masses that heaven could be created on earth by man, a transcendent God, and heaven up there was no longer needed.  If you recall mankind had once tried to build a tower to heaven, which ended with Babel[1].  If he could not storm the gates of heaven, he would simply build his own on earth, while shaking his fist in defiance at the God of the true heaven.

However, to storm the gates of heaven and bring heaven down to the earth mankind would need a huge resource of power.  He would need a machine that could replace God.  He found his machine in the creation of the modern state[2].  The state would be God walking on the earth creating heaven on earth, a heaven in which the God of heaven was no longer welcomed. In the new myth of the state it would be God who is banished from the new paradise not man. In this, we see the birth of the modern state and atheism, which are the two greatest myths of modern times.

In order for the modern state to become a god in the eyes of the majority of people, they would have to believe it had the power to save them and deliver them from the forces beyond their control. Forces like natural disasters, diseases, and the very forces of nature, even death.  In order to accomplish this, the state would need to have a mechanism to convince the people that it was the true savior and not religion. It would also need a discipline that could be used to support it. It found that discipline in the new field of science. It is self-evident that science and the state have grown together and are very much dependent on each other.  And since the time of the enlightenment the state has continued to annex more and more of the scientific enterprise for its own selfish ends. Its ending being ultimate authority and domination. In the last few decades, science has been increasingly controlled by the flow of money provided by the state to support its research.

 Another great myth of modern man is Darwinism. The thinking of the Western world has been controlled by the concept or myth of undirected evolution since the time of Darwin. In fact, it has become the dominating concept behind most science and thinking in general. For many, the concept is now a self-evident truth. To most, everything is getting bigger and better, moving from the simple to the more complex[3].  Of course, this concept fits well into the ideological concept of progress that was implanted in the minds of the enlightenment by Christian millennialism[4] and was the foundation on which they built the humanistic project of, replace the concept of heaven up there with heaven down here. It also fit well and supported the ideology of a capitalistic system, which was the prevailing economic ideology during the time of Darwin. Darwinism has always been strongly supported by the ruling class, which maintains its place through the educational system of the state.

You could say that Darwinism was the missing link that the humanist skeptics of the enlightenment (not science) needed to banish God from the earth[5].  They needed a theory of how things could be explained without an appeal to a deity. So the maxim was created that everything in the new discipline of science must be explained by natural causes without an appeal to a deity.  Of course, this sealed the fate of the new discipline of science as the weapon of choice for the skeptics and atheists to support and spread their non-belief or should I say their new belief.

However, true science was not created to banish God from the earth and many of the greatest scientists have been believers[6]. Science as a discipline is the study of nature and has little to say about the existence of a God who stands outside nature[7]. Science can make the statement that it has not found God in nature, which is a statement that theologians could make as well; on the other hand, many men of science can and do say that they see things in nature that seem to point to a deity who had organized all things.

To the thinking person and the person who truly understands science, science explains nothing it only describes things. It answers the “how” question not the “why” and “what” questions. For example, when it speaks about light it does not explain it but rather describes the way it behaves. Sometimes it behaves like a wave and sometimes it behaves like a particle, but these are metaphorical descriptions and do not tell us what light is. If we were to ask science to explain it, it could not without the aid of philosophy; in itself, it could only tell us what it does, not what it is.

What are the great myths?  They are the myth of the mega-state and its power to save mankind, the myth that it has the power to save which is the myth of modern science-ism.  It is the belief or myth that everything can be explained by a materialistic evolution explanation of reality alone. Evolution is surely a part of the circle of existence, but it is not the whole. It may help us with many how questions, but it never answers the why questions of existence and it is the why questions, which gives life meaning.

Given the above, the question must be raised, how much of the new myths square with reality, and how much are they an illusion?

[1] Babel means confusion. 

[2] Note “The Myth of the Machine” by Lewis Mumford.

[3] This view of evolution is not based on science and is believed by the masses.

[4] The Christian faith believes that everything is moving towards perfection and completeness.  This concept evolved in the West, into a strong belief in the concept of progress. Without the Christian faith the question must be raised are there any grounds for a belief in progress?

[5]  Of course, true science explains nothing it simply describes things. When it slips into explaining things, it ceases to be science and becomes philosophy or something else.

[6] To name a few: Nicolas Copernicus, Francis Bacon, Johannes Kepler, Galileo, Rene Descartes, Blaise Pascal, Max Planck and Albert Einstein.

[7] The US National Academy of Sciences has gone on record with the following statement: “Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes. Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.” Taken from “Who made God? Searching for a Theory of Everything” by Edgar Andrews.

Why Should I Believe in Darwinism?

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Biblical doctrines

Why Should I Believe in Darwinism?

What is Darwinism? Darwinism is a godless theory of evolution, which attempts to explain how the complexity of life forms came to exist on earth without direction or design. It postulates a non-directed form of evolution, which its supporters say is based on science. Many are attracted to it because on the surface it seems to support their atheistic or naturalistic worldview. In contrast to Darwinism, some believe that evolution is directed and progressive, which view leaves room for a deity or a force, which is directing evolution from the simple to the complex.

Why should I believe in Darwinism? The Darwinians will say because it is true. However, if you then ask them if they believe in truth you may get the answer, no, which would be the right answer for a consistent Darwinist or naturalist, for how could a well-developed monkey trust its brain to know anything for sure?[1] Of course, there are some, which believe in absolute reason though they reject an absolute God. Some of these folks who still trust their reason may still hold on to some resembles of truth. Yet, in the end, truth to them is simply what they believe, for nothing exists outside them, only space.  The real smart ones among them will tell you that we live in a matrix made up of quantum particles, and everything is an illusion. I wonder if this includes Darwinism.

Some Darwinians may say that I should believe in evolution because it is a scientific fact. Well, I do believe in evolution[2], however, I do not believe in the unknowable about evolution and that includes that it is non-directed. To make the statement that evolution is not directed you would have to get out of the system and look at from outside, which means you would be something other than a human being. The question of whether or not evolution is directed or non-directed is a metaphysical question that cannot be answered by science. One’s answer will depend on the assumption one brings to the question.

On top of this, there are some real questions as to whether or not Darwinian evolution in deep time can even be called a science. Deep time is like deep space; the thing they have in common is that we do not know much about either. There are a growing number of scientists who believe that it is impossible to apply the scientific method to much of the evolution theory, taking it out of the strict definition of being a science[3].

Now, my question to the Darwinians is what personal benefit would I get from believing in Darwinism versus other theories of evolution[4]? How would it enrich my life? Would it give my life more meaning and purpose? Would it help me to love and respect people more? Would it give me and the world a higher and loftier view of humanity? What good is it as a theory other than giving a materialist godless explanation of how the complexity of life was formed without a God? The only purpose that I can see in it is to give atheists an augment against God. but how can that be for the atheist who does not believe in the truth?

[1] Darwin had this concern: “With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, it there are any convictions in such a mind?” Letter to William Graham, Down (July 3, 1881), In the life and letters of Charles Darwin including an Autobiographical Chapter, edited by Francis Darwin (London: John Murray,  Albernarle Street, 1887), Vol. 1, 315-316.

[2] Evolution is a self-evident truth that we see going on in the barnyard all the time. The debate is about the extent and the how of it.

[3] Note “Deep Time” by Henry Gee.

[4] There is no research befits in believing in Darwinism over intelligent design. Both views allow scientists to do their research. This has been demonstrated by the history of science. Men on both sides of the debate have contributed to the body of science.

WHAT IS GASLIGHTING?

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Propaganda

WHAT IS GASLIGHTING?

(Author unknown)

The term originates in the systematic psychological manipulation of a victim by her husband in Patrick Hamilton’s 1938 stage play Gas Light, and the film adaptations released in 1940 and 1944. In the story, the husband attempts to convince his wife and others that she is insane by manipulating small elements of their environment and insisting that she is mistaken, remembering things incorrectly, or delusional when she points out these changes. The play’s title alludes to how the abusive husband slowly dims the gas lights in their home, while pretending nothing has changed, in an effort to make his wife doubt her own perceptions. The wife repeatedly asks her husband to confirm her perceptions about the dimming lights, but in defiance of reality, he keeps insisting that the lights are the same and instead it is she who is going insane.

We are living in a perpetual state of gaslighting. The reality that we are being told by the media is at complete odds with what we are seeing with our own two eyes. And when we question the false reality that we are being presented, or we claim that what we see is that actual reality, we are vilified as racist or bigots or just plain crazy. You’re not racist. You’re not crazy. You’re being gaslighted.

New York State has twice as many deaths from Covid-19 than any other state, and New York has accounted for one fifth of all Covid-19 deaths, but we are told that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has handled the pandemic better than any other governor. But if we support policies of Governors whose states had only a fraction of the infections and deaths as New York, we’re called anti-science and want people to die. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

We see mobs of people looting stores, smashing windows, setting cars on fire and burning down buildings, but we are told that these demonstrations are peaceful protests. And when we call this destruction of our cities, riots, we are called racists. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

We see the major problem destroying many inner-cities is crime; murder, gang violence, drug dealing, drive-by shootings, armed robbery, but we are told that it is not crime, but the police that are the problem in the inner-cities. We are told we must defund the police and remove law enforcement from crime-riddled cities to make them safer. But if we advocate for more policing in cities overrun by crime, we are accused of being white supremacists and racists. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

The United States of America accepts more immigrants than any other country in the world. The vast majority of the immigrants are “people of color”, and these immigrants are enjoying freedom and economic opportunity not available to them in their country of origin, but we are told that the United

States is the most racist and oppressive country on the planet, and if we disagree, we are called racist and xenophobic. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

Capitalist countries are the most prosperous countries in the world The standard of living is the highest in capitalist countries. We see more poor people move up the economic ladder to the middle and even the wealthy class through their effort and ability in capitalist countries than any other economic system in the world, but we are told capitalism is an oppressive system designed to keep people down. So, we

ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

Communist countries killed over 100 million people in the 20th century. Communist countries strip their citizens of basic human rights, dictate every aspect of their lives, treat their citizens like slaves, and drive their economies into the ground, but we are told that Communism is the fairest, most equitable, freest and most prosperous economic system in the world. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

The most egregious example of gaslighting is the concept of “white fragility”. You spend your life trying to be a good person, trying to treat people fairly and with respect. You disavow racism and bigotry in all its forms. You judge people solely on the content of their character and not by the color of their skin.

You don’t discriminate based on race or ethnicity. But you are told you are a racist, not because of something you did or said, but solely because of the color of your skin. You know instinctively that charging someone with racism because of their skin color is itself racist. You know that you are not racist, so you defend yourself and your character, but you are told that your defense of yourself is proof of your racism. So, we ask ourselves, am I crazy? No, you’re being gaslighted.

Gaslighting has become one of the most pervasive and destructive tactics in American politics. It is the exact opposite of what our political system was meant to be. It deals in lies and psychological coercion, and not the truth and intellectual discourse. If you ever ask yourself if you’re crazy, you are not. Crazy people aren’t sane enough to ask themselves if they’re crazy. So, trust yourself, believe what’s in your heart. Trust your eyes over what you are told. Never listen to the people who tell you that you are crazy, because you are not, you’re being gaslighted.

Sophocles said: “What people believe prevails over the truth.”

And that’s what the media are trying to exploit.

I would add to this…gaslighting by foreign actors (China, Russia, Iran…) who’s military could not unseat our global leadership position so our free press and freedom of expression are being weaponized…and we as Americans have NOT developed effective barriers, countermeasures, filters or policy to manage this form of warfare

Good Intentions the Source of Morality?

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Morality & Ethics

 

Good Intentions the Source of Morality?

I had a young friend tell me that humanity is mature enough that they no longer need religion for they have good intentions.  My reply was, where do you think good intentions and a sense of morality comes from?  Don’t they come at one level from our beliefs?  Do not beliefs need to be passed down from one generation to another and is not the mechanism that does that best is what we call religion?  Who do you think will have the best intentions towards their fellow human beings?  Those that believe that humans are just animals and no different from a bug, or those who believe that we were created in the image of God and therefore have ultimate worth?  I will take my chances with the latter.  I believe that the younger generation is living from borrowed values of a Christian culture which is quickly evaporating.  If I am correct there will be fewer and fewer good intentions coming from a good morality.

From a philosophical point of view, you cannot get an ‘ought or value’, from an ‘is or a fact’.  For example, explaining a high idea such as altruism does not make it a morality it simply explains the behavior.  There is a big difference between saying that giving food to the poor is kindness and that you ought to (morality) give food to the poor.  The latter carries a moral imperative and judgment.  The question is by what authority can you say ‘you ought to give to the poor’?  When you say ‘you ought to give food to the poor’ you are making ‘giving to the poor’ a moral or ethical imperative which is what morality and ethics is made up of.  However, you cannot get an ‘ought’ from a good fact.  You can only get a preference.  I may like giving to the poor but my liking of giving to the poor does not make it into a morality, only a preference.  You can say I prefer to give to the poor, rather than ignore them.  You are attempting to turn your preference into morality or an ethic when you say that you ought to give to the poor.  However, by what authority do you do this?  The only way to have morality, which is truly a morality, is a religion with a God, that has ultimate authority that can pronounce the thing as an “ought to”.

The above demonstrates why trying to make a morality will always end in authoritarianism with one man or one group imposing their so-called morality on others.  The reason is that they have no authority other than the state which itself is made up of mere men.  Only a morality formed by religion and the authority of an absolute deity has any ground in reason.  A personal morality grounded in preference is fictional and delusional.  It is the individual claiming to be deity.  More often than not it is for the purpose of covering up their own wickedness or lack of morality.

 

 

Liberalism And Christianity

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Liberalism, Progressivism

Liberalism And Christianity

“Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.” Jer 6:16

Before talking about some of the contrast between liberalism and Christianity we need to note some of the basic characteristics of liberalism. The first carnal doctrine of liberalism is the autonomy of the individual. It’s therefore, humanistic and not theistic because it begins with man and not God.  Its roots go deep in the soil of the atheistic enlightenment and surprisingly the Christian religion.  It makes the individual and Reason the ultimate authority and not God. It is a convoluted belief system that contains many religious and secular ideas that cannot possibly be reconciled In the real world if taken to their logical conclusions.[1] In the end liberalism because of its lack of authority always leads to making the state God. One of the fathers of the enlightenment Charles Hobbs said, “the state is God walking on the earth”. Ultimately, his remarks reflect the liberal view in general. If there is no God, raw power becomes the only authority.

Of course, like all ideologies and religions, there are various degrees in which people embrace this belief system of liberalism. First, there is the advanced liberals which are the furthest left and often embrace socialism or communism and are often hostile towards religion and traditional culture. They represent the liberalism of the French revolution. Whose mantra was “No king, no God”. In other words no authority. The other most common form or degree of liberalism is the classic view which is less hostile towards religion and may embraces capitalism to varying degrees. I think it would be fair to say that liberalism is the secular religion of western culture. A religion that has influenced all of us to some degree. However, like all false religions, its problems begin to surface at the extremes.  Two of these extremes are radical individualism and radical egalitarianism. Both of which will lead to the total collapse of all authority except for an authority forced on the populace by the state[2].

What about the failures of Christianity? The failures of Christianity were and are that it was not truly practiced. The failure of liberalism is and was that it is practiced too much. The madness going on in our culture is the result of the fruit of advanced liberalism and the chaos will only worsen until the state comes in and takes control. Liberalism dogma of unlimited human freedom and its propensity to want to fix the world at any cost will always lead to an authoritative and ill-liberal State.

Three other myths that have been created by liberalism is its faith in the goodness of humanity and its unfounded belief in continuous progress and the ultimate perfecting of the world in some future utopia, a belief it has inherited from a misunderstanding of Christian eschatology. The Christia message nowhere teaches that the world can or should be fixed by humanity. The best we can do is attempt to fix ourselves. And even that is near impossible. We need the help of God. If we have not learned that, it’s probably because we have not attempted to fix much of yourself.

I’m old and I have seen a lot of world fixers in my lifetime. Most of them have screwed up the world more than fixing it. It seems that all the world fixers that have ever existed all imagine themselves to be more intelligent and reasonable than everybody else. If true, you would think the world would be paradise. Unfortunately, there are large numbers of Christians that believe that the purpose of Jesus coming into the world was somehow to fix and perfect the world. when this happens  Jesus is usually reduced to nothing more than a moral teacher.

However, the world does have a system baked into it that is self-correcting to some degree. It is called death. Moreover, sometimes God intervenes and fixes things. Sometimes, He uses men to fixes a few things. Sometimes; he leaves things broken to remind us to look up.

[1] The greatest problem with liberalism is it’s a failure to deal with the rights of the individual and the rights of sociality to protect itself against the individual. Mills’s book on liberty fails to resolve the question and actually adds to the problem.[2] Like all atheistic systems, Mills’s had a hard time answering the question “By who’s authority”. Ultimately, he has nothing but the state and the deification of human reason.