In today’s populist, racially-charged “social justice” movement in America, I see the shadows of the Cultural Revolution in Critical Race Theory (CRT), and in the ideology that inspired this movement. For those unfamiliar with CRT, it is the idea that American law, society, and institutions are inherently racist. Whites are born racist because of the cultural domination by White people in furthering their own economic and political power at the expense of “people of color.”—Lili Tang William … [Read more...]
Social Justice vs. Biblical Justice: A Timely Book on a Perennial Topic
In 2018, Dr. E. Calvin Beisner published Social Justice vs. Biblical Justice: How Good Intentions Undermine Justice and Gospel. In his usual scholarly fashion, Beisner analyzes the arguments of the social justice movement that have become especially popular in the last decade. After Beisner covers what some Christians say is a Biblical principle on wealth redistribution and equalization, with short sections on The Sabbatical Year Law (p. 12), The Jubilee Year Law (14), the sharing of goods at … [Read more...]
Video: Remember the Past, or Be Condemned to Repeat it
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” wrote the philosopher George Santayana in 1905 in The Life of Reason, part of a series on Great Ideas of Western Man. The interwoven “woke”/social justice/critical race theory/anti-racism movement of our day seems determined to wipe out America’s and Western Civilization’s (once called Christendom) past. If it succeeds, we shall indeed be condemned to repeat it—complete with its nearly universal evils of slavery, oppressive … [Read more...]
Troubled by “Social Justice” and the “Woke” Movement? Here’s Help!
“Social justice.” Who in America today isn’t aware of how controversial that term is? It’s at the center of a movement that is turning this country upside down. Call it the “Woke” movement, or “Woke Progressivism,” or “Cultural Marxism” with its “Critical Race Theory,” “Critical Gender Theory,” or just plain old “Critical Theory”—by whatever name, it’s tearing apart families, churches, and the nation as people line up on opposite sides of a very basic question: What does it mean to do … [Read more...]
Back On! Cal Beisner Oklahoma Event Friday Feb. 19
One of Dr. Beisner's speaking engagements is back on! The event will be Friday, February 19, at Liberty Southern Baptist Church, 1616 S. Jackson St., Enid, OK, 7 p.m. CT. The topic is “Climate Change and Fossil Fuels: What Is a Christian to Think—and Do?" … [Read more...]
What is the antidote to ‘Wokeness’?
Evan Sayet’s The Woke Supremacy provides answers we cannot afford to ignore. Political comedian Evan Sayet says he has long dedicated himself to conserving and promoting the American values that have given him freedom and allowed him to pursue his life of liberty and happiness. His new book, The Woke Supremacy, lays out the history and characteristics of “Wokeness.” However, in failing to examine the origins of this totalitarian intolerance, he misses the critical difference between … [Read more...]
A Sad Tale of a Wealthy Millennial’s Moral Confusion
This article was originally published in the American Spectator where it remained in the top 5 articles read multiple days in a row. A few years back my wife heard a young woman share that she had felt guilty for being able to go out to dinner with friends in Chicago because she knew her mother, in South Africa, was struggling to scrape together her own supper. When she had told her mother this during a phone call, her mother had rebuked her. “How dare you spit in God’s … [Read more...]
Why Is the Cornwall Alliance Offering a Booklet on Social Justice?
About a month ago I was among the earliest signers of a public statement that has since gained widespread attention and even stirred up controversy, the Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel. Some people wonder why I signed. Their curiosity grows in light of the Cornwall Alliance’s offering my booklet Social Justice vs. Biblical Justice: How Good Intentions Undermine Justice and Gospel, to our friends this month. Why would we do that? I understand the question. It’s not clear at first why … [Read more...]
Climate Litigation in a Topsy-Turvy World
Last month federal magistrate judge Thomas M. Coffin ruled that a lawsuit filed on behalf of 21 children and teenagers seeking damages from the federal government for its failure to fight climate change (enough) could go forward. His decision surprises many legal scholars, but Michael B. Gerrard, Director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law (I can't resist the temptation to refer to King Canute!) commented, It is the first time a federal court has suggested that government may have a … [Read more...]
Hayward Slam Dunks Sachs
Economist Jeffrey Sachs directs the Earth Institute at Columbia University. He's also led the way in the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals--a high-sounding program to end poverty that depends largely on redistributing wealth from the West to the Rest with an obligatory but ineffectual nod toward the need for governmental reform and economic development in impoverished countries handicapped by corrupt leadership, progress-stifling political structures, and social mores that undermine personal … [Read more...]