The Christian Mind - A Review

I picked up Harry Blamires’ 1963 book, The Christian Mind expecting to find an early entry into some of the worldview dialogues that have unhelpfully afflicted certain corners of conservative Christianity. While I still believe the term worldview can be helpful, it has, in certain circles, been coopted by a technique of applying simplistic categories and teaching people to argue against them as a way of apologetic debate. The result of that reductionistic development has been largely unhelpful in developing Christians and evangelizing the lost. However, thankfully, The Christian Mind is a robust appeal to a thick Christianity that resists the corrosive influences of secularism.

Blamires begins the book by diagnosing the problem: there are too few Christians who think distinctly from the secular world. The church, by and large, has a few bastions of thought and topics but no recognizable network of integrated thinking. Thus, the book opens up with a striking declaration: “There is no longer a Christian Mind.”

He explains that there are Christian influences in the world and that there are differences between elements of the Christian life and the world: “There is still, of course, a Christian ethic, a Christian practice, and a Christian spirituality.” As important as these things are, however, they fall short of the all-encompassing, unifying beauty of the Christian mind. On the whole, Christians have been better catechized to think like the modern world than as biblically saturated Christians.

According to Blamires, there are six marks of the Christian mind: (1) Supernatural Orientation; (2) Awareness of Evil; (3) A Unified and Concrete Conception of Truth; (4) Acceptance of Authority; (5) Concern for the Person; and (6) A Sacramental Outlook.

Each of these categories must be expanded and filled with explicitly Christian meaning, but the outline is helpful. Someone who denies the possibility of miracles and the truth of at least the miracle of the resurrection cannot be meaningfully Christian. A person who denies the reality of sin and evil cannot know repentance for their own sin, and thus cannot be a Christian. One who believes truth is subjectively determined and that there is not objective truth cannot be said to be Christian in any serious way. An individual who cannot abide the authority of Scripture and, to some degree, of the traditional theology of the Church, cannot be counted a member of those who think as a Christian. Those who do not value people as individuals and show concern for their spiritual and physical well-being do not show the marks of a Christian mind. And, finally, those that deny the goodness of creation are not thinking like Christians.

To be clear, one can fail at some of these categories and still be in Christ, though there are categories that are necessary for salvation. Blamires’ point is not to figure out who is and who is not a Christian, but rather to point out the characteristics of a mind that is shaped by authentic Christianity.

It would be a mistake to consider these one at a time, as well, since a broader emphasis of the book is the unity of the Christian vision of the world. But it is a unity that has at least these six attributes.

Blamires’ vision of the Christian mind is worth recovering, because he is calling Christians to think more faithfully and consistently. It would be a beautiful thing for Christians to lead the world in promoting beautiful art, thoughtful fiction, and an illuminating critique of the world around us.

An interesting facet of Blamires’ depiction of the Christian mind is that he does not argue for unanimity on prudential arguments. The Christian mind transgresses thought categories that we typically apply, like “liberal” or “conservative,” and individuals who are embodying the Christian mind fully may arrive at entirely different conclusions based on their reasoning.

In fact, the book is highly critical of those who think politically rather than as Christians first, he writes, “They will think pragmatically, politically, but not Christianly. In almost all cases you will find that views are wholly determined by political allegiance.” But, he also notes that even in 1963 it was difficult to find a conversation about the issues that matter that was truly Christian. Blamires is highly critical of the supposed virtue of loyalty, as a result of this thought pattern:

Loyalty may be said to be evil in the sense that if any action is defended on the grounds of loyalty alone, it is defended on no rational grounds at all. “I do this out of loyalty to my party” is irrational and amoral unless is it consequent upon, “My party is operating wholly and in every particular for the benefit of the human race.” “I do this out of loyalty to my leader” is irrational and amoral unless it is consequent upon, “My leader’s character, or purpose, or policy, is such that it ought to be supported.” Loyalty is in itself not a moral basis for action. Loyalty to a good man, a good government, a good cause, is of course a different matter. But in these cases, where one stands by a man, or a government, or a cause, because it is good, one is standing by the good. The basis of action in these cases is moral in that one is serving the good; and thus the concept of loyalty is redundant. One can therefore say fairly that whenever the virtue of loyalty is quoted as a prime motive or basis for action, one has the strongest reason for suspecting that support is being sought for a bad cause.

The book is filled with this sort of clear reasoning, which makes it helpful and worthwhile, especially in our turbulent times of constant chatter and questionable allegiances. This is the sort of volume that should remain in print and be read widely and deeply by Christians seeking to live faithfully for Christ in our present world.

The Christian Mind: How Should a Christian Think?

By Harry Blamires

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For the Life of the World - A Review

Miroslav Volf is a theologian that is always worth reading. Even when his conclusions are disputable, they are typically drawn from careful reason and charitably expressed. His latest book, coauthored with Matthew Croasmun, is no exception.

For the Life of the World: Theology That Makes a Difference takes a critical look at the discipline of theology and how that field of study often misses the mark. In particular, the authors are critiquing the all-too-common reduction of theology to a cloistered, academic exploration. The thesis of this book is that theology ought to be done for the good of the world.

This book uses the term theology to refer to a range of disciplines that includes systematic theology, biblical theology, biblical studies, ethics, and other disciplines that naturally belong in a seminary or a divinity school.

In part, this book is another reflection on the shallow mind of our age. Too many people expend their numbered days chasing after frivolous goals without asking what is worth striving for. Volf and Croasmun argue that there is such a thing as “the good life” and that the function of theology is to explore what that looks like and communicate it to others.

However, theology is in a sort of existential crisis, as are many academic disciplines, because it has become more interested in scholarly navel gazing than fulfilling the purpose for which the theology was originally designed.  For some, theology has become a pure science that is studied for its own sake. Other see theology primarily as a means of gaining power and advocating for their favored groups. When these things become the primary goal of theology, they distort its actual purpose, which is to explore God and discover truth about the world.

The authors explore major themes in theology, including the study of God, redemption, etc. There are many valid themes for theology, but Volf and Croasmun argue that, ultimately, the main theme of theology should be human flourishing and should lead to “robust descriptive work oriented toward an actionable, livable normative vision of human flourishing.” This seems an honest and helpful assessment, since orthodoxy and orthopraxy are both essential attributes of the proper Christian life.

By making claims to truth and particularity, Volf and Croasmun leave the door open for criticism they are insufficiently broadminded. However, they take on this anticipated criticism by noting that pluralism is, to some degree, a desired end, since true faith is not social conformity by a personal response to the goodness of God. In addressing this topic, they open up the most interesting point for debate. They argue that the Christian life is improvised like an ellipse around two foci: Christ and one’s vocation and location. They state that there are multiple different ellipses that can develop that are all “valid” and that flourishing Christians will look differently based on a different vocation and location.

To a certain degree this is unquestionably true. The life of a first century Christian will, without doubt, look radically different from our own in a number of ways. The way faithfulness is demonstrated will vary based on circumstances. Even between contemporaries, there will be differences. For example, my wife’s faithful Christianity will look different than mine due to our different vocations. At the same time, Volf and Croasmun offer an analogy without noting that the goal of the Christian life should be to make our orbit as circular as possible. There may be multiple “valid” options for the Christian life, but not all are necessarily equally good.

In the same chapter, the authors help explain the why some models of Christianity diverge more significantly from Scripture. They represent the relationship between the Life of Christ, which is the source of Christianity, and Ordinary Christians with a series of circles connected by arrows. The error in their model is found by differentiating the Life of Christ from the Bible and arguing that the Life of Christ influences the Bible, the Church, and Theology in different ways. This is a fundamentally flawed picture of theology, since the Life of Christ can only be mediated to the Church and theologians through the Bible, since the Bible is the only valid record we have of the Life of Christ. Volf is orthodox, and often very helpful, but this distinction helps understand why he and, often to a much greater degree, others find it possible to oppose the “True Jesus” to the rest of Scripture. The model leads to the possibility of prioritizing a part over the unity of the whole of the Bible.

The latter chapters of For the Life of the World offer encouragement for the theologian to live a life that reflects his or her theology and focused on helping others to live rightly before God. They more succinctly define theology here as “a way of life seeking understanding.” Such an approach helpfully breaks down the possibility of theology as pure science.  The authors are also careful to anchor their call to theology in a love of God that perceives truth as something concrete that ought to be presumed. Thus, pursuing love, peace, and joy as ends of theology cannot lead to vice indefinitely because these virtues are normed by truth founded in God.

This volume is a helpful book for amateur and professional theologians. Its value can be seen in their concluding sentences: “But though we are theologians for God’s sake, we are not theologians for God’s benefit. God doesn’t need theology. If anyone needs it, human beings do. Let us be theologians for the sake of the life, the true life, of the world.”

For the Life of the World: Theology That Makes a Difference (Theology for the Life of the World)

By Miroslav Volf, Matthew Croasmun

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Note: I received a gratis copy of this volume from the publisher with no expectation of a positive review.

We Have Forgotten

We have forgotten that it is possible to be wrong without animus. This is why society is so terribly unforgiving.

We have forgotten that it is possible to disagree without despising. This is why our friendships are so fragile, sparse, and transient.

We have forgotten that it is possible to forgive without retribution. This is why the quest for social justice often turns to mobs and unrelenting abuse.

We have forgotten that it is possible to be correct without being in control. This is why politics has become the supreme interest in society.

We have forgotten that it is possible to be right about some things and wrong about others. This is why the list of acceptable voices from history continues to diminish.

We have forgotten that it is possible to be different without being degraded. This is why attempts to find equality lead to eradication of excellence.

We have forgotten that it is possible for cost and value to be different. This is why conspicuous consumption is still rampant.

We have forgotten that it is possible to be new without being better. This is why our hunger for more goes unabated and ancient books go unread.

The Insanity of God - A Review

“Is Jesus worth it?”

That is the question that Nik Ripken’s book, The Insanity of God: A True Story of Faith Resurrected drives his readers to ask. It’s a story that Christians in a Western context should ask themselves regularly, realizing that the costs of following Jesus are so much lower in our context than in many others around the world. Ripken’s book is a reminder of the huge cost so many believers are paying for their faith, and that, without question, Jesus is worth it.

The book begins by telling part of Ripken’s story. He came to Christ as a teenager from a dysfunctional family and immediately felt called to ministry. After attending a Christian college, where he met his wife, Ruth, he landed in seminary. After getting married and graduating, the Ripkens pastored several churches in the United States until they felt an unmistakable call to cross-cultural missions.

Their story is not atypical among young missionaries. They fell in love with the people at their first assignment, but could not remain there. For the Ripkens the problem was a low resistance to Malaria that threatened the lives of the whole family. After spending some years working in one of the black districts in South Africa (prior to the end of Apartheid), they felt called to go someplace where the gospel had not been or, at least, where it was not readily available.

So, the Ripkens began to serve as relief workers in Somalia during that bloody civil war. This opened Nik’s eyes to the horrific persecution meted out on Christians in many Muslim nations. When the Ripkens lost a son, in part due to lack of sanitation and adequate medical conditions, it led them to ask that fundamental question: “Is Jesus worth it?” It also led them to begin to ask questions about how to help Christians undergoing persecution thrive.

Approximately half the book is dedicated to the Ripkens, which is a worthy read. The latter portion of the book focuses on what the Ripkens learned from persecuted Christians.

After a furlough, Nik began to journey around the world to places like the former Soviet Union, where the persecution had just recently been lifted. The stories he tells of the cruelty applied to pastors and lay people are agonizing, but there is an unmistakable power in those stories that remind readers that Jesus is worth any price we could possibly pay.

Then, when Ripken spent time in China and in some Central Asian countries where persecution threatens the daily lives of Christians, the stories of courage, faith, and perseverance emerge with breathtaking clarity and compelling power. Jesus is worth it. These people know it. We too often forget it.

The Insanity of God tells important stories about the persecuted church. These stories do not lead to voyeurism, however. Instead they offer a compelling and convicting call to pray for the persecuted church and to use our freedom to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ.

For American Christians caught in the belief that church is a nice extracurricular activity, or a place where they can go to learn some morals, The Insanity of God is a wakeup call that the gospel is worth any cost. Our primary concern in life should not be when our next luxury vacation is, but how we can more effectively live for the name of Christ.

The Insanity of God: A True Story of Faith Resurrected

By Nik Ripken, Gregg Lewis

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Creation and New Creation - A Review

The doctrine of creation has largely been swallowed whole in evangelical and fundamentalist circles by questions of the age of the earth. For example, theology texts like, L. S. Chafer’s Systematic Theology, Charles Ryrie’s Basic Theology, and Elmer Towns’s Theology for Today deal with the creation as a question of origins. For Chafer, this discussion is embedded in a chapter about the doctrine of man, rather than in a standalone chapter. Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology has a chapter on the doctrine of creation, but the questions he seeks to answer are, “Why, how, and when did God create the universe?”

These are not unimportant questions or unworthy of discussion. However, the age of the earth and the exact time that it took God to make something from nothing does not exhaust the depth of the doctrine of creation by a longshot.

In a recent book published by Hendrickson, Sean McDonough does a masterful job highlighting the importance of the doctrine of creation, especially as it relates to the new creation. He rightly recognizes that God’s first creation project was always intended to simply continue into his future creation project, with ongoing creation (or providence) in the middle.

The book is divided into nine chapters. Chapter One shows how closely the new creation is connected to the account of the original creation. The second chapter deals with the nature of God as creator, since it is vital to understand his nature to recognize the distinctions between him and what he has made. In Chapter Three, McDonough presents various theories why God made the world. In the fourth chapter, the topic of the relationship of time to the created order is considered.

Chapter Five considers the nature of creation ex nihilo, in particular evaluating the relationship of God to his creation. In the sixth chapter, McDonough discusses the influence of Plato’s dualism on the Christian tradition’s understanding of creation. In Chapter Seven, the question of how creation was made is considered. This leads McDonough to consider the place of humans within creation in the eighth chapter. And, in Chapter Nine, the beauty of the world and its value for God and as a testament to God’s goodness comes to the fore.

Creation and New Creation: Understanding God’s Creation Project is largely an expository book. McDonough presents a survey of Christian thinking, digesting theological writing from Irenaeus to Karl Barth. The overall position McDonough presents is well within the boundaries of Christian orthodoxy, and he handles those on the fringes fairly with appropriate criticism.

The most significant aspect of this book is that it serves as a reminder to Christians that creation is not something that happened at some hotly debated point in the past. Rather, creation began when God spoke all things into existence out of nothing, but it is ongoing as he sustains the world by the power of his word, and will eventually be brought to perfection in the new creation when all things are made new. This has been God’s plan from the beginning and it is so much bigger than an argument over the number of hours in a day, the compatibility of scientific theories of origins, and a discussion of human origins.

Connecting creation to new creation emphasizes the telos of this world. God intended his handiwork of a purpose, and it is trending in a particular direction. His will cannot be foiled. This is a liberating reality. It frees us to delight in the goodness he has created while looking forward to the beauty of the renovated creation, once the sin has been purged. This book is an important one, particularly for evangelicals, seeking to remediate the lack of vigorous treatments of creation in our tradition.

Creation and New Creation is a valuable book. McDonough writes well and demonstrates that he has done extensive research. This is a volume that will be best suited to people with theological training or extensive reading in their backgrounds. Those that are equipped to engage with it will find it well worth their while.

Creation and New Creation: Understanding God's Creation Project

By Sean M McDonough

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NOTE: I received a gratis copy of this volume from the publisher with no expectation of a positive review.

Social Media Justice and the Gospel

One of the common complaints against Christianity—what Tim Keller calls defeater beliefs—is that a good God…a loving God…would not judge sin and wouldn’t punish it if he did. He would just wipe it away and forgive it without judgment. We are taught by culture not to like violence, so we like to believe that a just God would also be non-violent.

Miroslav Volf, a theologian at Yale and a Croatian who had personal experience with the gross injustices of ethnic cleansing and genocide in former Yugoslavia argues that a God who punishes evil through judgment is necessary to keep people from seeking revenge:

If God were not angry at injustice and deception and did not make a final end to violence––that God would not be worthy of worship. . . . The only means of prohibiting all recourse to violence by ourselves is to insist that violence is legitimate only when it comes from God. . . . My thesis that the practice of non-violence requires a belief in divine vengeance will be unpopular with many . . . in the West . . . [But] it takes the quiet of a suburban home for the birth of the thesis that human non-violence [results from the belief in] God’s refusal to judge. In a sun-scorched land, soaked in the blood of the innocent, it will invariably die . . . [with] other pleasant captivities of the liberal mind.

Our belief in a God who violently judges sin is necessary to restrain our hearts from desiring immediate and exorbitant revenge on the people that seek to do us harm. This is why Habakkuk calls for the judgment of the Lord in chapter 2 of his short book, rather than trying to settle all of the scores with his own hands.

In fact, in the history of Christianity, some of the worst evils that have been perpetrated in the name of Christ have been caused by people not trusting into God’s justice, but trying to bring about their own version of justice in their own time.

Social Media Justice

As Christians living in a world that celebrates injustice, often presenting it under the cloak of goodness or true justice, we find ourselves given a tool to announce our disapproval of everything bad. Thus, we think, we can stand against real injustice, even if it only via posts or tweets.

This is the mentality of the social media warrior. In fact, in our age, the digital assaults on people’s reputations that are perpetrated in the name of injustice are not much different that murder. The goal of many social media warriors is to destroy the life of their victims, but without the shred of mercy that actually killing them would entail.

An example of this is the recent brouhaha over the interaction between the Native American activist Nathan Phillips and a boy from a parochial school. That case itself has turned into a Rorschach test for your political position, so I will leave that unending debate over who was right (if anyone) in that situation to others.

However, what we should not miss is that there was an instantaneous urge to crush, smash, and destroy by those that hated the look on the boy’s face in the initially miscaptioned photo. To be clear, the opposite reaction could have been obtained from the other side if an activist wearing a charged political slogan had been caught in a pose that could have been represented as disgust, smarminess, or disrespect of one of the political right’s favored populations. The problem is not left vs. right, it is the urge to destroy.

And there were calls for destruction. Based on questionable interpretations of the event, which were driven largely by an inflammatory caption on a photo posted by a bot Twitter account run out of Brazil, people who consider themselves good and just and consistent in their pursuit of justice were calling for assault and even execution of the child in the photo. There were dozens of physical threats made against the school itself. All of this in the name of justice. Again, when the tables are turned, there are voices on the right that are just as nasty in their pursuit of justice.

This is exactly the sort of “justice” that Habakkuk is warning against: Justice that is really unjust because it is brought about in our way by our hands, instead of according to God’s judgment.

Conclusion

I believe in a God of judgment because it is the clear expectation of the authors of the Old and New Testaments. The need for a just God of judgment reinforces my belief in the God described by the Bible. The rise of the social media warrior with his virulent, destructive cruelty in the name of justice reminds me why Christianity must be true, else we have no hope.

We need a just God who will make the wrong things right. That is part of the gospel. Just as is the fact that salvation is available for all who believe in accept the power of the atonement to cover our sins, and put faith only in that for our final redemption. God is just. Our attempts to force justice in this world will bring about injustice. Thank God that he sent Christ to keep those who receive him, who believe in his name, from bearing the deserved wrath for our sins on our own shoulders. Thank God for being a God who is both just and gracious at the same time.

Scientism and Secularism - A Review

Depending on who you talk to, you may find yourself in a conversation with someone who thinks there is a fundamental conflict between science and Christianity. This typically happens on the fringes of both Christianity and the so-called scientific community. If there is a group of Christians who find science antagonistic toward their religion, it is often (but not exclusively) fundamentalists. And, beyond the realm of actual science, there are secularists the suppose that the information of science fundamentally undermines the tenets of religion.

Secularists who claim that science undermines fundamental religious claims are not, however, actually proclaiming the superiority of science. Instead, they are presenting a case for what is better known as scientism. According to J. P. Moreland, scientism is “the view that the hard sciences alone have the intellectual authority to give us knowledge of religion.”

In his recent book, Scientism and Secularism: Learning to Respond to a Dangerous Ideology, Moreland argues for a distinction between science and scientism. He also argues that scientism is fundamentally corrosive to society and leads people away from truth.

In popular culture, scientism has overtaken other religious systems as a dominant plausibility structure. In other words, it is how many people make sense of the world around them. Not only does this often displace belief in God, but it undermines the ability of those who hold to scientism to accurately evaluate competing, non-scientistic perspectives that might provide better access to truth.

Scientism has influenced several of the shifts our culture has witnessed in recent decades. The first is that it has taught people that science sums up the totality of accessible knowledge, while religion is blind faith divorced from reality. This myth may help people coexist, but it does much less to encourage the pursuit of truths that cannot be known empirically, much less fairly evaluate those that haven’t adopted the current orthodoxy of scientism.

A second shift caused by scientism is the pursuit of immediate gratification instead of honest pursuit of truth. All the truth that can be known is knowable by science. Scientism claims that all there is in this world is material. Therefore, there are no consequences to pursuing whatever comes easiest to hand.

That leads to the third major shift caused by scientism, which is the adoption of a minimalist ethics. This rejects the idea that there is a good or bad, apart from the apparent benefit or harm measured by surveys, metrics, and calculations. This, of course, leads to bad science, where those who expound the conclusions that naturally and obviously arise from their data can be ridiculed, ousted from tenured posts, and assaulted if their conclusions go against the presuppositions of the mob. If scientism is true, and measured harms provide the evidence of actions to avoid, then what is not measured cannot be wrong.

Moreland is right to note that scientism is a significant problem, and that it is pervasive in our culture. His book rightly shows how fake-science, which is what scientism is, leads to militant secularism. Therefor his book serves as a warning for Christians to identify the influences of scientism, particularly in their own homes, and root them out.

Scientism and Secularism is a book for Christians trying to figure out what is wrong with the world. How have we gotten to the place where there are intelligent people who will argue in public that all decisions must be made based on empirical evidence? Moreland traces some of the influences that led to the current situation, but, more significantly, he explains why scientism is wrong and even self-refuting.

At points this book is a little dense for the average reader. Moreland is communicating some complex philosophical ideas as clearly as can be, but there is a level of complexity in his arguments that cannot be reduced without detriment. This book will most benefit those who have some background and interest in philosophy. At the same time, if a reader is willing to plow through the sections where Moreland is a bit more technical, then there is much to be gained for the educated laity. It offers both warning and antidote to a philosophical movement that is growing in strength and is threatening to displace both sound science and well-formed orthodox Christianity in the minds of many both inside and outside the church.

Scientism and Secularism: Learning to Respond to a Dangerous Ideology

By J. P. Moreland

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iGen - A Review

Every decade, it seems, we switch which generation we are concerned about. I don’t remember the criticism of my own generation—I came of age in a time without social media and was too busy doing what needed to get done—but the generational analysis around Millennials with criticisms of their work habits, desire for avocado toast, and general narcissism is recent enough and contested enough to be familiar to most people.

Now, Millennials are approaching middle age. One of them got elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the generation is rising to leadership in companies and governments throughout the United States. The generation of participation trophies will soon be in charge and the social experiment (without a control group) continues.

The next generation up, those born between about 1995 and 2012-ish are just now graduating college, so the analysis in the recent volume, iGen, by Jean M. Twenge, has potential to be helpful for pastors, parents, employers, and professors. Every generation is shaped by the environment it was raised and it can be helpful to discover both the influences that formed them and, statistically speaking, the tendencies we should expect to see from them.

The generation that is now reaching what used to be known as the age of adulthood is unique because they have been raised in a world where smartphones are prevalent. Thus, in this constantly evolving experiment we are running on our children, they are the first to have been immersed in social media, constant electronic contact, and the unique influences of having a supercomputer in their pockets all the time. This is a generation—even more so than the Millennials—that will likely never remember when books were the predominate means of research and dissemination of knowledge.

Twenge’s book is, on the whole, much more explanatory than argumentative. She is a social scientist attempting to explain trends without drawing judgment about what is good or bad. The only times she is overwhelmingly positive about the generation is when she discusses their narrow belief that absolute sexual libertarianism is a basic human right and that dissent to radical sexual revisionism are bigoted and must be stamped out. She seems delighted that the generation has little grasp of human history and looks forward to their presumed effect in rooting out religious orthodoxy from society. The only times she is negative is when discussing the effects that technology has had on the mental health of these young people.

Beneath the calm exterior of her writing, there are some trends that should concern parents and, hopefully, cause society to begin to question what we are doing to our children and work to ameliorate some of the damage thoughtless use of technology has brought about. The danger in using research like this is that it describes averages and not the individuals before us. However, as we look at a mass of kids in, say, youth group, or a generation being hired into our workplace, it can be helpful. At the same time, we must keep in mind that the average often does not describe the person in front of us.

On the front of good news, iGen or Generation Z appears to have more realistic views of work than Millennials. As I have witnessed for years, the Millennial generation tended to have higher expectations for flexibility from their employer and lower tolerance for expectations of cooperation, adherence to company policy, and production. According to the data, iGen appears to expect work to be hard and make demands that they will sometimes have to adapt to. Accompanying this trend, iGen appears to have better self-control of finances than the previous two named generations, with an emphasis on savings and modest purchases rather than extravagant pursuit of luxury. Those in iGen generally look for purchases by which they can build their identity, that show they are unique, rather than that they have wealth. Also in the way of positives, iGen tends to me more politically independent. Given the cancer that exists in both major parties, this bodes well for a shift in the political ecosystem. It also helps explain why a large number of iGen voters pulled the lever for Donald Trump—a political outsider—in the 2016 election. They supported independent, socialist candidate Bernie Sanders and, when he was out of the running, either stayed home or supported the other disruptor of the political status quo. We can question the results of their independence in that case, but in general it seems positive they aren’t accepting the poor political offerings we have.

There are also some items that are of critical concern for those who like civilization. Whatever the cause, this generation is highly focused on two competing concerns: atomistic individualism and safety. This is a generation that is getting fewer speeding tickets and getting pregnant less. Those things seem good, but the causes should give us cause for concern. According to Twenge’s analysis, iGen tends to get together less in person and be highly focused on minimizing risk. Girls aren’t getting pregnant as much because they aren’t having sex as much. They aren’t having sex as much because the app-dating ritual has reduced sex to an emotionless pleasure seeking ritual (highly attractive to young males) the outcome of which has been distorted by online pornography. In fact, online pornography is killing the “hook-up” culture because there is little need to actually go through the work of “Netflix and chill” when with a few clicks arousal and masturbation can be had without having to talk to anyone.

Less extra-marital and casual sex seems to be a positive, when considering concerns about STDs, single parent families, and cohesion of society. However, that trend is being achieved by a reversion away from human tendencies toward community and relationship. Twenge cites multiple studies and anecdotes that indicate members of iGen are avoiding even dating relationships until they feel they are absolutely secure financially. This is pushing the age of marriage into the 30s.

By pushing marriage later and later, we also see the rise of a generation that sees childhood extending through the 20s. That is a significant trend cultural commentators like Ben Sasse, Jonathan Haidt, and Twenge are all noting. Socialism is considered more favorable by young people in part because they have come to expect their parents to continue to support them well into what was once expected to be adulthood. Some social scientists claim this is a natural reaction to the rise in life-expectancy, but there are likely other contributors, as well.

iGen has been raised with comfort and safety as paramount concerns. We’ve shifted beyond helicopter parents to bulldozer parents. So, in many cases, iGen has been raised with almost no legitimate difficulties in their lives. In the attempt to squash bullying (a good move in general), society has classified every negative interaction as abuse, thus there is a generation that has rarely had to deal with conflict resolution and working with jerks.

One of the areas Twenge raises concern is in the way that iGen tends to deal with things they don’t like. They tend to seek out and expect “safe spaces”—because emotional safety is of significant concern—and believe that the feelings of individuals trump the rights of others. But they tend to rely on third parties to enforce their whims. Thus, many universities have Stasi-like reporting systems where students can anonymously report professors that offend them. And, as with the highly publicized events at the University of Missouri a few years ago, this generation will demand apologies and destruction of people that are not responsible for things they have determined to be offensive. The reality of the president resigning because non-students off-campus yelled racial epithets at students should concern those who like civilization.

One of the results of this Stasi-like mentality of reporting and attempting to destroy anyone and anything they find offensive through mob forces is the call out culture. Twenge does not cover this in detail, but it is one of the ways that social media has damaged this generation. What she does cover is the fact that iGen tends to be highly engaged on social media in harassing those that disagree with them, but does much less to engage in actual solutions to problems. They raise awareness well, but typically rely on others to enforce their demands. This protects them from real conflict, encountering opposing views honestly discussed, and considering compromise.

There are multiple causes for concern from this generation. Twenge tends to stay upbeat and positive, with a conclusion that seems altogether too perky for the book as a whole.

The most significant contribution of this book is to begin to show readers what smartphones and social media are doing to us as a society and begin to ask realistic questions about a) whether those things are good and b) how we can gain some of the benefits of technology without the negatives. Twenge offers some suggestions about limiting access to social media for teens and pre-teens and limiting electronic devices for young children. The majority of the solution, however, is left to the readers to develop.

Twenge’s book shows that, with respect of traditional forms of humanity, iGen has been damaged by smartphones and social media. Just as it was the adults who handed out participation trophies to Millennials, it has been the adults who have overprotected iGen and given them largely unfettered access to the internet. They didn’t start the fire, so we ought to seek to help them mature, not berate them for our failures.

Society, and particularly the church, need to ask how we will help them grow and mature, develop biblical virtue, and prevent future generations from being harmed by thoughtless adoption of technology.

iGen: Why Today's Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy--and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood--and What That Means for the Rest of Us

By Jean M. Twenge PhD

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The Fake Web is Ruining the Internet

Something is amiss in the futuristic, digital wonderland that is the internet.

Among the most obvious problems are the incessant arguments including those caused by trolls and those perpetuated by sea lions. Add that to the sheer magnitude of bots online, and we have a real problem that can lead to misery, confusion, and misdirection away from facts.

The possible paradise of the internet is turning out to be a myth. The democratization of information has made it nearly possible to discern what is true.

Marketplace Distortion

Consider the validity of marketplace ratings. While there are examples of faux reviews that are exceedingly humorous, like the ones for the Hutzler 571 Banana Slicer on Amazon, fake reviews make buying decisions harder. And that’s not the way it is supposed to work.

The ideal of online reviews is for people who have used the product to honestly review them. However, anyone who has tried to sort through the reviews on products in a major online marketplace will know that amid the real, honest reviews are dozens that appear to be made up. These often are very high or very low ratings (depending on whether the company or their competitor funded the reviewers) and include gratuitous typos, insufficient information, and information designed to mislead. So, a product may have hundreds of reviews, but the real ones with important criticism may have been diluted by fake reviews.

The prevalence of fake reviews in the online marketplace makes using reviews nearly worthless sometimes. Add that to the ability for sellers to revise listings of old products to newer ones, while bringing along their reviews, and you have a recipe for unhelpful confusion.

Another trend that is unhelpful with the democratization of information is the volume of websites that seem to indicate they are dedicated to product reviews, but which are really dedicated to trying to acquire revenue through affiliate traffic. For example, do an internet search on “best gifts for a 10-year-old boy, you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about. Someone trying to get suggestions for Christmas or birthday may want a blogger’s suggestions that their kids liked, but may only be able to find suggestions in click-through format designed to rake in money from another online marketplace.

Sometimes these offerings are helpful, but they accomplish the opposite of the intended purpose. When someone does a search online for creative suggestions, they are usually looking for something off the beaten path. However, these dozens of “product review” or “product suggestion” websites tend to all “recommend” the same dozen or so products, none of which they have any real knowledge of. (Full disclosure: I use affiliate links at the bottom of my book reviews and sometimes get a little money from them, but that is secondary to the actual review.)

The reality of the internet is turning out to be something less than the promise.

The Web Is Mostly Fake

According to a recent article from New York Magazine, we’ve passed the point where, by some measures, more than half of internet traffic is fake. Given that the next video you watch or next widget you buy may be recommended based on the programmed habits of a bot, this matters significantly. For those, like me, who spend time creating real content online—especially those who depend of traffic from YouTube or other traffic sites—that distortion can be disheartening and financially debilitating.

Because traffic generates traffic as we all chase the next cool thing, this fake traffic is distorting our culture. Is someone’s video really viral, or did they create or finance a bot army to give them clicks, help them trend, and push a somewhat novel but largely inane product into everyone’s feeds? The world may never know.

Given that a fair amount of news reporting—both traditional media and various internet outlets—is now mind-numbing reporting about trends on social media, the power of faking on the internet may have significant social implications. Is anyone really mad about the latest controversy? Or, was some minor infraction by a local official magnified by thousands of bots financed by someone who is either making money off of the clicks or gaining power by fracturing society? This is a powerful question that I don’t have an easy answer to.

One Proposed Solution

I do think, however, that we have the potential to curb some of the worst excesses in our own control by using self-control and changing our habits.

Perhaps the best solution to the problem is to use the internet in an old-fashioned way, with sustained patronage, long time relationships, and word of mouth recommendations. Major branded websites for news and information will likely remain significant, but to some extent we need to rely more on pseudo-social connections rather than search algorithms.

Used by CC 2.0 License. Photo by londonista_londonist.

For example, as a blogger well after the heyday of blogging, I think we need to bring back the blogroll. If someone likes my website, there is a decent chance that they will like the blogs I like, so I can let them know what and who I follow. That also means that I am vouching that I’ve watched/read enough of the content to know that it is real and not bot-generated.

In a world of depersonalized identities, we need to reorient toward personal connections, even if it is only virtually. The possibilities for deception are still higher, but bots are generally identifiable through their patterns of activity, real people are both more predictable and more erratic.

Conclusion

Much of the internet has become, for all intents and purposes, worthless. People are fake. Reviews are fake. Facts are fake. As we try to live life in a virtual age, taking advantage of the real benefits of the internet, we need to begin to reestablish habits that will make our experiences online more benefit than curse.

Virtues of Renewal - A Review

In a highly technocratic world, problems and solutions tend to be identified with mechanized events. Cars cause pollution, so electric cars will minimize it. Bad logging practices exacerbate hillside erosion, so a new landscaping practice will fix the problem. Soil quality is depleting, so a new synthetic fertilizer and gene-spliced plant will provide the harvest we need.

When used for the proper purpose, there is nothing wrong with technology. Indeed, there is much we should be thankful from technology. But the potentials of technological solution and the excitement of innovation has eroded the sense of character that would cause people to ask why we need those things in the first place.

In his latest book, Virtues of Renewal, Jeffrey Bilbro picks up on this theme by considering how Wendell Berry’s writing can shape the moral imaginations of readers to inculcate virtue that leads to environmental, social, and spiritual renewal. Bilbro, an associate professor of English at Spring Arbor University, sifts through Wendell Berry’s work in its several genres to see how the Kentucky farmer’s writing can help contemporary readers become better attuned to the patterns and forms of creation.

In seven chapters, the book covers a series of virtues: attention, gratitude, humility, hope, memory, fidelity, and convocation. These are not the virtues one typically finds in a list, but they do accurately reflect the categories in which Berry writes, so they are useful for this volume.

This is a helpful book, since it moves the reader to consider our modern lifestyle from a different angle. Berry is an odd thinker. He defies most common labels. He is too progressive to be a conservative, but too conservative to be progressive. He sometimes sounds like an evangelical, but then in another essay it is clear that he doesn’t fall into that camp. In the best sense, Berry is someone who has thought through things, and generally done so carefully, so that even when readers disagree with him, they can learn something.

Virtues of Renewal works at several levels. It is a well-written and well-researched book on a contemporary author. Bilbro does his literary criticism well. The book is also a call to rethink ecological stewardship and whole-life stewardship through the literature being analyzed, so it has a heavy dose of practical ethics. Most significantly, the book is a delight to read because the prose is carefully crafted and it points to something beyond its own pages.

One of the most compelling aspects of this book is that it channels Berry’s ethic of simply doing the right thing. Instead of focusing on trying to solve the world’s problems in one fell swoop, Berry argues that we should just do the good things that are close at hand. So often attempts to fix big things quickly lead to hypocrisy, abuse of power, and a loss of purpose. The localism that is romantically represented by Berry’s writing is helpful because it calls us back to the hard, messy, inconvenient fixes that are close by instead of the clear, but impossible solutions needed for the world’s big problems.

My quibble with this volume is Bilbro’s use of the phrase, “practicing resurrection,” to refer to redemptive activities in the world. He borrows it, I believe, from Berry. In principal, what he means is “doing restorative actions” or “working toward reconciliation.” Resurrection is a work that only God can do, so I prefer other ways of describing an impetus toward setting things right and living in balance with the world. It’s a small criticism, but worth noting.

Virtues of Renewal is a volume that environmentalists, those concerned with the erosion of social structures, and fans of Wendell Berry (often overlapping categories) will enjoy. Bilbro is a fine writer and this latest volume is no exception.

Virtues of Renewal: Wendell Berry's Sustainable Forms (Culture Of The Land)

By Jeffrey Bilbro

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NOTE: I received a gratis copy of this volume from the publisher with no expectation of a positive review.