All posts by Phil

Non-fiction, Uncategorized

First Thanksgiving in Virginia, Elite Evangelicalism, and Everything Decays

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Phil Wade

I hope everyone here, there, and elsewhere has had a happy Thanksgiving. I realize this is an American holiday, but it’s just one more way you should allow America into your hearts and lives for your own and your country’s flourishing. I’m talking to you, United Kingdom. You never should have let all the good people leave your empire, you sick tyrant.

Okay, what else have we got?

First Thanksgiving: “After a rough two-and-a-half months on the Atlantic, [the Margaret, a 35-foot-long ship with 36 settlers and crew] entered the Chesapeake Bay on November 28, 1619. It took another week to navigate the stormy bay, but they arrived at their destination, Berkeley Hundred, later called Berkeley Plantation, on December 4. They disembarked and prayed.”

Ben Franklin: In a new biography, D. G. Hart presents Benjamin Franklin as an example of a “spiritual, but not religious” American Protestantism. “As much of a cliché as pulling himself-up-by-his-bootstraps is, his wit and striving say as much about Protestantism as it does about American character.”

Cultural Elites: Carl Trueman is thankful for David French‘s articles supporting the Respect for Marriage Act. “Elite evangelicalism is clearly making its peace with the sexual revolution and those of us who will not follow suit are destined for the margins.”

The Ends of History: Michael Bonner has written a defense of civilization. “All this is to say that the ‘whole new world’ we were promised in the 90s is much like the old one, only worse. The theory of irreversible progress seems increasingly implausible. It seems that anyone of any walk of life or partisan stripe could agree with Livy that ‘we can bear neither our vices nor their remedies’.”

Education: Can Christian Higher Education Stay the Course? “I could rattle off a litany of universities that remain under the auspices of Mainline Protestant denominations but where an effort to think Christianly beyond the bounds of theology is foreign to its educational mission and has been for a long time.”

Non-fiction, Religion

Is There a Homogeneous ‘West’?

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In 1958, humor rag Punch published an essay by C.S. Lewis called “Revival or Decay?” in which Lewis criticized broad-brush assessments of his day–the same assessments people still make. Here’s his closing paragraph.

Is there a homogeneous ‘West’? I doubt it. Everything that can go on is going on all round us. Religions buzz about us like bees. A serious sex worship–quite different from the cherry lechery endemic in our species–is one of them. Traces of embryonic religions occur in science-fiction. Meanwhile, as always, the Christian way too is followed. But nowadays, when it is not followed, it need not be feigned. That fact covers a good deal of what is called the decay of religion. Apart from that, is the present so very different from other ages of ‘the West’ from anywhere else?

Music

Sunday Singing: Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

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“Come, Ye Thankful People, Come” performed by the OCP Session Choir

This Thanksgiving hymn was written by a rector of Aston Sandford, Buckinghamshire, England, named Henry Alford. He seems to have been one of those accomplished scholars who wrote many hymns, taught many students, and passed into history mostly unnoticed. The tune to this hymn was written by George Elvey for another piece, “Hark! The Song of Jubilee.”

  1. Come, ye thankful people, come,
    raise the song of harvest home:
    all is safely gathered in,
    ere the winter storms begin;
    God, our Maker, doth provide
    for our wants to be supplied:
    come to God’s own temple, come,
    raise the song of harvest home.

2 All the world is God’s own field,
fruit unto his praise to yield;
wheat and tares together sown,
unto joy or sorrow grown:
first the blade, and then the ear,
then the full corn shall appear:
Lord of harvest, grant that we
wholesome grain and pure may be.

3 For the Lord our God shall come,
and shall take his harvest home;
from his field shall in that day
all offenses purge away;
give his angels charge at last
in the fire the tares to cast,
but the fruitful ears to store
in his garner evermore.

4 Even so, Lord, quickly come
to thy final harvest home;
gather thou thy people in,
free from sorrow, free from sin;
there forever purified,
in thy presence to abide:
come, with all thine angels, come,
raise the glorious harvest home.

Blogs, Socials, Non-fiction, Reading

Let’s Just Say I Know What I Know, Midwestern History, And Truthful Jokes

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It’s easy to overgeneralize, and when someone is battle-scarred, he may overgeneralize combatively.

I worked at a men’s conference in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, several years ago, during which a speaker made some mildly controversial points in an aggressive manner. I think this man felt he was under attack because he lacked support for his work. He probably had to argue for his point of view, if not the reality of his experience (it was on the fringe). “Nobody knows what’s happening,” he’d say. “Why doesn’t anyone see this?” he might ask. And at least one time, that question would have been answered with the fact that many of those in the room knew saw what he saw. We agreed. We didn’t need to be persuaded, and we weren’t fighting him on that point.

Too many of us are willing to say no one is talking about something important, when the truth is we only know something of what’s being discussed in our small circle, including the limited amount of news we can consume. The noise or silence on select social media can convince us that everyone is or isn’t talking about something.

The solution, of course, is humility. We know what we know, and even that could be wrong. We walk on to the best of our knowledge coram Deo.

Midwesterners Unite: A review of a new history of the American Midwest. “In contrast to prevailing clichés and the modern platitudes about backwardness, sterility, racial injustice, and oppression, an in-depth look at the history of the American Midwest reveals a land of democratic vigor, cultural strength, racial and gender progress, and civic energy — a Good Country, a place lost to the mists of time by chronic neglect but one well worth recovering, for the sake of both the accuracy of our history and our own well-being.”

Reading: Contrasting styles, subjects, and tones can act as palate cleansers between books. “They have to be short, they have to be relatively undemanding, and if it’s a re-read, so much the better.”

Satire: The head of the Babylon Bee talks about writing jokes that smack of the truth and the blowback his company has received from media outlets. “The absurd has become sacred only because it hasn’t been sufficiently mocked.”

English-American-Scottish Words: George Grant has an audio piece on the clash of words between the English speakers of America, Britain, and Scotland.

Theater: “Excuse me, sir; are you with the show?”
“Well, let’s just say I’m not against it.”

Photo: Old gas station, Odebolt, Iowa. 1987. John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

Music

Sunday Singing: A Christian Home

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“A Christian Home” sung by the congregation of Grace Community Church, Sun Valley, California

Here’s a relatively new hymn set to an older and familiar tune. It’s a song of trusting the Lord with all our cares, fears, and responsibilities. I think of it as a Thanksgiving-themed song, but giving thanks is only implied.

Lord, “be thou the center of our least endeavour.
Be thou our guest, our hearts and homes to share.”

Barbara B Hart wrote the words to “A Christian Home,” or “O Give Us Homes Built Firm Upon the Savior,” in 1965. I can find nothing biographical on Hart except her year of birth. Perhaps her publisher, Singpiration Music or The Benson Company, will tell us about her one day.

The tune is “Finlandia” by Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957), which is also the melody for the hymn “Be Still, My Soul.” Sibelius wrote his tone poem in 1899 for the Finnish Press Pension Celebration, “a thinly veiled rally in support of freedom of the Finnish press,” according to Britannica.

The words are under copyright, so I won’t reproduce them here, but they are reproduced in the video along with additional verse, the third one, that isn’t in the Trinity hymnal I use for reference.

Authors, Blogs, Socials, Bookselling

Comfort in Christ, Acceptable Sins, and Fantasy Nihilism

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This afternoon, I was wishing for comfort food, blankets, and books. It’s been a long week. Will I take my fatigue to the little comforts around me and drink too much coffee, or will I remember my weakness before the Lord? Will I console myself with my gifts or with the Giver? (There’s a phrase that’s probably said in a pulpit somewhere at least once every Sunday.)

A child may not have a penny in his pocket, yet he feels quite rich enough if he has a wealthy father. You may be very, very poor, but oh! what a rich Father you have! Jesus Christ’s Father is your Father. And as He has exalted His own dear Son, He will do the same for you in due time. Our Lord Jesus is the firstborn among many brethren and the Father means to treat the other brethren even as He treats Him. Your Father has made you one of His heirs—yea, a joint heir with Jesus Christ—what more would you have?

Charles Spurgeon, in a sermon delivered Sept. 17, 1899

And what links do we have today?

Wendell Berry: “The public certainly retains a keen sense that some actions and attitudes are wrong, and public figures often condemn particular offenses with totalizing ferocity. As Berry notes, the ‘old opposition to sin’ remains, but he worries we have narrowed the acts that count as sin. He warns that ‘nothing more reveals our incompleteness and brokenness as a public people than our self-comforting small selection of public sins.'”

Fantasy nihilism: “HBO has succeeded in identifying popularity and prestige with immorality. Things that could not have been shown in prime time 20 years back are now the only prime time fare there is.”

Graham Greene: In 1950, author Graham Greene was stuck on an America-bound ocean liner with a reporter who shoved a mic and camera in his face. The reporter was Jack Mangan, who was working on his ABC TV series “Ship’s Reporter.” Dwyer Murphey shares a video and some details.

Reading: Need a device to help you read several volumes without requiring you to move? Consider this design by Italian military engineer Agostino Ramelli: the bookwheel.

Bookstores: Booksellers adapt to new customer patterns. “We like having browsers, but we don’t depend on it. This idea that a person is going to come to a bookstore and browse, it doesn’t sustain the business now.”

Jokes are evil? Here’s a YouTuber who talks about writing and breaks down comic book stories and select movies to learn more about writing well. Last month, he riffed on an issue of X-Men: Years of Future Past to discuss a theme in that story, that jokes are evil.

Photo: Texaco gas pumps, Milford, Illinois. 1977. John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

The Press

Repeating, Not Reporting – How the Press Has Lost Credibility

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James David Dickson remembers an old story of something D.C. Mayor Marion Barry Jr. said in front of a gaggle of reporters to make the point that what passes for reporting is largely just repeating what officials or newsmakers have said without comment or reflection.

Headlines like “Except for Murders, City is Safe, Mayor Says” are a credibility killer for the news business.

We expect politicians to be full of beans. We then expect the media to correct them. We don’t expect the press to thoughtlessly print whatever was said.

Music

Sunday Singing: Life High the Cross

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“Lift High the Cross” sung by the congregation of Lookout Mtn Presbyterian, Lookout Mtn. Georgia

I don’t know how familiar American Christians are with today’s glorious hymn. It was written in 1887 by Englishman George W. Kitchin (1827-1912) of Christ Church, Oxford, as a festival-style hymn, and revised in 1916 by Englishman Michael R. Newbolt (1874-1956) into what we sing today.

It remains under copyright, so I’ll link to the song sheet so you can read or sing along with the orchestra in the video above.

Authors, Blogs, Socials, Coffee, Tea, Drinks, Poetry

Will We Overcome by Faith, Remembering Poetry, and the Importance of Librarians

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Graham Greene’s The Power and the Glory begins in a Mexican state that has outlawed the church and attempted to drive Christianity out of its culture. Priests have been executed. Churches have been repurposed or destroyed.

The first section contrasts two priests. Both are despicable, but one deeply believes God made him a priest and that duty is irrevocable. Even when he wants to run away to save himself, he turns back at the call of duty. The other, Padre José, is a priest in name only.

In one scene, José is walking alone between grave stones and interrupts a family burying a child. “They had been quite resigned until he had appeared, but now they were anxious, eager.” They are familiar with and resigned to the patterns of death, but when they see José, they remember their hope. They beg him to pray for their daughter, saying he could trust them not to say anything to the authorities.

“But that was the trouble–he could trust no one.” He fears one of them will naturally tell someone else, and he will be found. The family has more faith than he does. All he can do is tremble in the grip despair has on him.

Believer, it doesn’t take a murderous state to press you into fear that sharing or expressing your faith publicly will get you condemned. Mere criticism can do that, but God is greater and calls us to overcome the world and our own pride by being transformed by the knowledge of him.

Poetry: In this old blog post, Patrick Kurp shares an anecdote of Shirley Hazzard talking with Graham Greene about remembering lines of poetry.

Coffee: A rambling post on coffee, writers, and books. Camus asked, “Should I kill myself or have a cup of coffee?” Did that man say anything worth hearing?

Book Blogs: Are these the 50 best book blogs of 2022? How could they be? We aren’t on the list.

Librarians: “A Good Research Librarian Can Help You Find Information You Didn’t Even Know You Needed” (via Books, Inq)

Photo: B.P.O.E. Elks Lodge, Alturas, California. 1991. John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

Religion

Happy Halloween, You Filthy Animal

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Here are a couple holiday ideas for you to consider when you can get a moment’s peace tonight.

Professor Collin Garbarino notes the connection Halloween has to Celtic paganism is largely, if not entirely, speculation. “The Celts didn’t write stuff down, and the Romans who did write stuff down didn’t give us much reliable information about the Celts or their religion.” But we do have a solid record of All Hallow’s Eve and All Saints’ Day.

The Protestant Reformation had political ramifications as well as religious ones, notes Professor Adam Carrington. Sola Scriptura supported the rule of the written law and public education so everyone could read the Bible for themselves. “The equality of human beings before God naturally bolstered ideas of human equality in the political realm. This enhanced arguments that the people should be the ultimate human authority since no person was born, or otherwise made by God, superior to another.”

Stay safe out there.

And also this artwork of Nazgul by Anato Finnstark.