Letters

Long Overdue

Guy Condon’s article in the June 24 issue, “You Say Choice, I Say Murder,” is long overdue. Prolife Americans need an aggressive response to proabortion America. We need to say we consist of evangelical Christians, Roman Catholics, Jews, atheists, African-Americans; we all unite to say abortion is murder, and we won’t rest until this killing stops.

Brian K. Anderson

Bayonne, N.J.

The point of Condon’s article seems to be that prolife forces should use more acceptable language to gain a wider audience. He should also understand that good rhetoric needs to be good history as well. Until 1860, abortion was legal in this country under common law until quickening, the point at which a pregnant woman can feel the movements of the fetus. If Condon and others would be as factual as possible, it would help people like me who want to be visibly antiabortion, but are driven to a conditional prochoice position out of embarrassment over many antiabortion statements and harsh attitudes.

Steve Armitage

Lancaster, Calif.

The day is coming when a generation will ask us why we didn’t break the law in order to save lives even as German citizens were asked after W.W. II why they permitted the murder of millions of Jews even though it was legal.

Joyce Smith

Kamiah, Idaho

More marketing, less theology?

Your June 24 cover story, “Church Growth Fine Tunes Its Formulas,” makes the point that the church-growth movement is becoming widely accepted in conservative evangelical and mainline church circles. The connection between people in the pews and numbers of dollars is a very cold, hard reality in any church.

My concern with the movement is that it prompts the question, “What is the difference between the Christian church and any other business that makes use of telemarketing, demographic, and other mainstream corporate resources?” Are we saying the church is a business just like any other business—only our message is different? If this is so, possibly pastoral training should lean heavier in the direction of marketing, business, and advertising skills and less on theology, biblical scholarship, and pastoral counseling classes.

Rev. David Coffin

Trinity Lutheran Church (ELCA)

Malinta, Ohio

The article confirms the death of the Holy Spirit in many Christian congregations. Christian formalism has crucified Christ in the Spirit as Judaism’s legalism did in the flesh. And so, the Judeo-Christian tradition marches on.

Larry N. Black

Cookeville, Tenn.

Public schools not the issue

Ken Sidey’s editorial “The Hazards of Choice” [June 24] appears to have the level of a CT position paper. I hope an adequate response will be forthcoming. The “support” of public schools is not the issue. It is the need to bring about change in an establishment that has successfully resisted such—even following a decade of reports, investigations, and panels on all levels.

It is not realistic to believe that most public-school students will choose to go elsewhere if they are receiving a good education in their local public school. When Christian families choose to home school or send their children to Christian schools, another issue is addressed about the philosophy of education. Secular and Christian education are built on different foundations.

Rev. Lauren D. Rhine

Red Hill, Pa.

For a discussion of the pros and cons of voucher systems and “parental choice” proposals, see the articles beginning on pages 26 and 27 of this issue.—Eds.

Why should children of poor Christian parents be held hostage in a public-school institution while “The future of public education in America is at a crisis”? Why not both lend some help to parents and improve the public-school institution? It can and should be done. The voucher concept is one way to start the process.

Al Vanden Bosch

South Holland, Ill.

Thanks to Sidey for one of the few, perhaps only, editorials in an evangelical publication to reach a degree of even-handedness regarding the public schools. I am encouraged to raise my voice in an effort to bring Christian teachers into public schools, defend those who are there, and urge Christian schools to lay off the public-school bashing or be more honest in the use of statistics to bolster their points of view.

Christian teachers I know don’t “abandon ship” when faced with higher than 50 percent rates of homeless, broken-home, and abused children in their classrooms. Today, is there a needier place to minister? Christian schools use a great deal of ink to spread achievement-score results in proclaiming how much better they are. Not mentioned is that homeless kids don’t go there; that their students are virtually all from stable, complete, education-supporting families; that when Special Education or Chapter I activities are indicated, the public schools provide them.

Perhaps it is time for a Christian view that public schools are not all hell holes; allowing them to go broke is neither Christian nor socially responsible.

Mark Freer

Prof. of Education, University of Idaho

Moscow, Idaho

Rationalizing “justice love”

Thank you so much for the editorial [May 27] about the U.S.A. Presbyterians, “Eros Deified,” by James R. Edwards. This really brought into focus how easily Christians are deceived by the idea that the Bible’s time-proven principles can be outdated and there can be some new philosophy like “justice love.” I especially appreciated his distinction between agape love and eros love. Agape is clearly the type of self-less love God most often refers to in the Bible. Focusing totally on fulfilling the desires of eros-type love and ignoring agape love that compels us to take responsibility for our actions makes it easy to rationalize this “justice love.”

Kecia Klob

Woodstock, Ga.

Your coverage of the proposed rewrite of Christian sexual ethics by the Presbyterians missed only one vital point: If the author had been following the battle for right relationships under God here in Canada he would have seen a terrible parallel.

The United Church of Canada prepared a document almost as offensive as the one described. The church responded so strongly that the document was dropped. Dropping the document did not end the story. The officers of the church arranged an ad hoc colloquium and drafted a much less inflammatory document that contained all the essential elements of the progay agenda. Indeed, the procedures at general council went so smoothly that it is difficult to believe the whole process was not orchestrated, with the offensive document and the retraction staged to assure passage of the policy. I doubt that the officers of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) are unaware of the success of this tactic in their sister church in Canada.

P. M. Webster, M.D., FRCPC

Toronto, Ont., Canada

Northern’s bold step

I read with interest the News article in the May 27 issue regarding seminary tuition. I am pleased to inform you that the Board of Trustees at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary voted in July 1989 to offer full-tuition scholarships to all American Baptist master’s-level students. This was a bold step for our board and done with similar reasons to those expressed in your article. The church needs and deserves the very best leadership available. Northern Seminary wants to do everything within its power to make certain that no person with outstanding potential for leadership is prevented from receiving an education.

Ian M. Chapman, President

Northern Baptist Theological Seminary

Lombard, Ill.

Our Lord’s tears

I wept as I read Walter Wangerin’s account of his black son’s acceptance of the “real world” [“The Education of Matthew Wangerin,” May 27]. What can we say when Christians sacrifice luxury to “go and tell,” yet cannot accept their African brothers and sisters worshiping in the pew next to them? Our Lord must look down and weep when those he called to model his teaching cannot open their hearts to all men.

Leah Martin

Los Angeles, Calif.

Wangerin’s words touch the emotions within my heart. The truth of his words have reached into our home, the experiences of our family, the lives of our teenagers. I encourage you to have him write more often.

Clarence H. Eisberg, Pastor

St. Paul’s Lutheran Church

Merced, Calif.

Central to Christian orthodoxy

In your issue of May 27, John Stackhouse’s review (Geisler vs. Harris), “Evangelical Fratricide,” has maligned the person and work of Norman Geisler. Equally adept at speaking for a prolife rally at a shopping mall parking lot in Southern California or addressing the baleful effects that the Enlightenment has had on modern theological thought at Harvard Divinity School, Geisler has well served the body of Christ for 40 years.

Yes, Geisler occasionally uses colorful and hyperbolic language. Since when does this nullify intellectual content? Many of us feel the issues Geisler raises are not “specious” but impact the doctrine central to historic Christian orthodoxy.

Ralph MacKenzie

San Diego, Calif.

Stackhouse is to be commended for seeing beyond the controversy and identifying the core of the issue. It is clear from Scripture, as Harris meticulously points out, that Christ’s resurrection body is of a different nature than his previous body. Even Geisler must concede this fact. As Stackhouse correctly observes, the differences between Harris and Geisler are far above the level at which orthodoxy is established.

However, Stackhouse refers to the survey of ETS members conducted by Geisler containing questions his colleague Gary R. Habermas calls “confusing.” While the answers of nearly 90 percent of respondents may be “simplistic,” one must consider the 75 percent of ETS members who chose not to respond. Could that choice have been made, at least by some, because of the nature of the survey? Perhaps by not answering the survey questions, these silent members were actually saying “no,” thus agreeing in part with Harris and affirming their acceptance of his orthodoxy.

Randy Packer

Pierceton, Ind.

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