Tag Archives: creation

Owl Rights

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I was reading my son to sleep with a night time book about owls.

OwlsStoryThe story mentioned that owls are protected under U.S. laws. Sure enough, with a little googling, the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act protected many species, and owls were added to that treaty in 1972. The precise language states:

Unless and except as permitted by regulations made as hereinafter provided, it shall be unlawful at any time, by any means or in any manner, to pursue, hunt, take, capture, kill, attempt to take, capture, or kill, possess, offer for sale, sell, offer to barter, barter, offer to purchase, purchase, deliver for shipment, ship, export, import, cause to be shipped, exported, or imported, deliver for transportation, transport or cause to be transported, carry or cause to be carried, or receive for shipment, transportation, carriage, or export, any migratory bird, any part, nest, or egg of any such bird, or any product, whether or not manufactured, which consists, or is composed in whole or in part, of any such bird or any part, nest or egg.
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I am neither an owl-ologist, nor the son of one, but it seems to me that it is not a stretch to recognize the great lengths we go to in protecting owls based on a 1972 law. I am dumbfounded, therefore, that one year later we would aggressively attack and murder unborn babies in 1973’s Roe v. Wade.

I am against terminating pregnancies because there are self-evident truths woven into the fabric of our universe that prohibit the taking of innocent and defenseless life. More fundamentally, as a Christian I believe these unborn human beings are made in the image of their Creator, and their sacred life should not be extinguished prematurely.

But suppose you disagree with me (in spite of all the evidence, and ultrasound images!, to the contrary) that fetuses are not human beings, merely reproducing tissues; pre-human life. Fine. Could we at least work toward agreement that fetuses deserve the same rights and protections as owls?

Apologetics from Colbert

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Can you learn to do Van Tillian apologetics from watching The Colbert Report?(HT: Reformed Forum)

SC got a lot of great one liners in, including a terrific set up for his last line. Though the entire show is on the chin, it was also a profound demonstration that something ≠ nothing. Further, the way Krauss was willing to speak in hushed/awed tones of “what we now know from quantum mechanics,” it is easy to see everyone worships something (and has presuppositions to boot).

Who was Van Til?

Here’s an old post from my old blog on Van Til’s ideas, with several quotes and pictured charts (though apologies in that it is hard to read):
A Van Til in the Hand is Worth A Kant and Hume in the Bush

Cowper: Whom the Truth Makes Free

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He is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves beside. There’s not a chain
That hellish foes, confederate for his harm,
Can wind around him, but he casts it off
With as much ease as Samson his green withes.
He looks abroad into the varied field
Of nature, and, though poor perhaps, compared
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight,
Calls the delightful scenery all his own.
His are the mountains, and the valleys his.
And all the resplendent rivers. His to enjoy
With a propriety that none can feel,
But who, with filial confidence inspired,
Can lift to heaven an unpresumptuous eye,
And smiling say—”My Father made them all!”

– William Cowper, The Winter Morning Walk
(HT: JB)

Art Can Glorify God Because of the Goodness of Creation

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Art can glorify God because of the intrinsic good of creation, not because it has some transformative, redemptive power to usher in spiritual redemption… Poorly written novels — no matter how pious and edifying the behavior of the characters — are not good in themselves and are therefore not really edifying.

@WhiteHorseInn
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