Am I a good person?

I enjoyed reading the novel, Revolution 2020 by Chetan Bhagat.
It chronicles the story of three Indian youth as they struggle with exams, romance, careers, success, and personal identity. The backdrop is India's highly competitive education system.

Bopal and Raghav face the intense pressure associated with the slim chance of getting into one of the highly selective IIT's [Indian Institutes of Technology]. [500,000 students take an exam for 10,000 places].
Their exam performance and rank defines not just their future career prospects, but also their personal identity and worth.

Bopal fails to make the cut and never goes to university. But, later he is involved in setting up a private college, under the patronage of a corrupt local politician. The story highlights the level of corruption and expediency associated with the establishment of some of these private colleges.
By some measures Bopal is very successful, proudly owning a Mercedes and living in the luxurious bungalow for the Director. But, two things he does not have he pines for. One is the heart of Aarti, the common love interest and childhood friend of both Bopal and Raghav. Only in the last pages of the novel do we see the second thing Bopal yearns for: to be told "you are a good person".

Where does this yearning for moral affirmation and acceptance come from? How can it be satisfied?
Are the words of another frail and flawed human enough? Or can only God counting us a righteous be sufficient?

Did King David understand economics?

I have always found the following Old Testament story rather obscure and confusing

¹⁷ And David said longingly, “Oh that someone would give me water to drink from the well of Bethlehem that is by the gate!” ¹⁸ Then the three mighty men broke through the camp of the Philistines and drew water out of the well of Bethlehem that was by the gate and took it and brought it to David. But David would not drink it. He poured it out to the Lord ¹⁹ and said, “Far be it from me before my God that I should do this. Shall I drink the lifeblood of these men? For at the risk of their lives they brought it.” Therefore he would not drink it. These things did the three mighty men.

1 Chronicles 11

Why didn't David just drink the water? Wasn't it an insult to the valiant men to "waste" it?

My son and I have just started reading The Economics of Honor: Biblical Reflections on Money and Property by Roelf Haan.

I found it quite intriguing that Haan begins his book discussing the above story. He make the point that David truly understood the true cost of the water. He felt he had to show God and those around him that he understood that and challenge their thinking,

From a Biblical perspective, economics should not be based on what is cheapest or most efficient for a individual. It is not all about the "rational" decisions of individual consumers who are maximising their "utility functions". Goods and services need to be "priced" and appreciated according to their true cost and value.

Bill Gates on three myths about poverty that affluent Westerners promote

When you are one of the wealthiest couples in the world, what do you put in your annual Christmas letter?

In their annual letter Bill and Melinda Gates rebut three myths that keep people poor:

1. Poor countries are doomed to stay poor
2. Foreign aid is a big waste
3. Saving lives leads to overpopulation

It is worth reading in full. The best line concerns 2.

There is a double standard at work here. I’ve heard people calling on the government to shut down some aid program if one dollar of corruption is found. On the other hand, four of the past seven governors of Illinois have gone to prison for corruption, and to my knowledge no one has demanded that Illinois schools be shut down or its highways closed.

Does the Pope understand economics?

I am not sure this is the most important question.

I have seen some recent criticism of recent pronouncements by the Pope concerning the world economic system. Some claim he does not really understand economics and free markets. I am not sure that is the real issue. Politicians and business leaders would really prefer it if the church confined itself to purely "spiritual matters". The real underlying issue is idolatry, as well captured by this cartoon from The Economist.

The legacy of Ian Barbour

Ian Barbour died this past Christmas Eve. He is arguably the person most responsible for the study and teaching of "science and religion" becoming significant in universities. His 1966 book Issues in Science and Religion laid the groundwork. It gave a comprehensive survey of the major issues and different perspectives on them. Barbour was better equipped to do this because he had both a Ph.D in physics and a B.Div. and then taught both physics and religion subjects at Carleton College, one of the leading 4-year undergraduate colleges in the USA.

Of particular note was Barbour's four-fold typology for relating science and religion:

• Conflict 
• Independence
• Dialogue
• Integration

Wikipedia mistakenly claims that Barbour "coined the term `critical realism'". The term and the associated philosophical perspective actually arose before Barbour was born! The 1920 book Essays in critical realism: a co-operative study of the theory of knowledge was co-authored by a group of prominent American philosophers. This history is nicely recounted in the wonderful book Barth and Rationality: Critical Realism in Theology by D. Paul La Montagne.

Over the years I have found many who are enamoured by Barbour and his contributions. I am not. He considered that the scientific issues [and particularly evolution] forced one to embrace process theology. It have never been able to understand his arguments. In his book Science and Religion: An Introduction, Alister McGrath gives a helpful summary of Barbour's views [pp. 208-9, first edition]

The key aspect of process theology which Barbour appropriates is the rejection of the classic doctrine of God's omnipotence: God is one agent among many, not the Sovereign Lord of all. ... process affirms "a God of persuasion rather than compulsion .. who influences the world without determining it". Process theology thus locates the origins of suffering and evil within the world to a radical limitation upon the power of God. God has set aside (or simply does not possess) the ability to coerce, really only the ability to persuade. Persuasion is seen as a means of exercising power in such a manner that the rights and freedom of others are respected.... process theology thus calls into question "the traditional expectation of an absolute victory over evil."....... 

Barbour argues that the evolutionary process is influenced by - but not directed by - God. This allows him to deal with the fact that the evolutionary process appears to have been long, complex and wasteful.....

To me this rejection of the sovereignty of God is just plain old heresy.

As McGrath points out Barbour himself acknowledges some inadequacy of process thought, particularly with the way it treats the inanimate world. Barbour claims "A vanishingly small novelty and self-determination in atoms is postulated only for the sake of metaphysical consistency and continuity." To me this just shows the silliness of aspects of process thought. I see no reason, either scientific or theological to entertain the idea that atoms have a "self" or "will".

Biologist and Christian

Tom Ingebritsen was a Biology Professor at Iowa State University when he became a Christian. On the Emerging Scholars blog he has started a nice series of posts about he came to integrate his life as a scientist and a Christian.

We have become just like our parents!

This is a great line in the movie The Company You Keep. It is a fictional story based on aging student radicals from the 1960s who have been on the run from the FBI for more than thirty years.

It is good entertainment but features some excellent scenes where the former radicals wrestle with what they have become, and how some of them compromised their ideals.



In this scene one former radical answers "Would you do it again?"

Although the story is fictional the beginning reminds me of the case of Katherine Ann Power. She was on the FBI's Most Wanted List from 1970, but in 1993 turned herself in after living for two decades in Oregon under a different identity. I think I remember that her story featured on the cover of Time magazine. Her therapist convinced Power to give herself up, for the benefit of her own mental health. [As a trivial aside, her therapist is the mother of the notorious Courtney Love, widow of Curt Cobain.]