GLOBAL DECAY: Novak and Others Wrap It Up for Us

Everyone ought to be aware by now the Pope said something that upset a few fringe individuals on the despotic side of world history ... good writers and analysts have now had sufficient time to consider Benedict's remarks for what they really are and react to them.

A few of those follow ...

"Tune out the static and hear Pope's challenge to us all" [Michael Novak in the NY Daily News; a fine piece]

People are missing the point[Novak says]. The Pope just pulled off a triple play and they are still arguing about a single pitch early in the inning.

What the Pope was lecturing on, in his modest, quiet, careful way, was the crucial role of reason. His triple play consisted in using reason to get three different runners out at three different bases.

He told Christians and other religious people that reason is indispensable for disciplining religious faith. As he put it in an earlier lecture, it is important for reason to take the toxicity out of religion.

He told secularists, who define reason solely as science and limit it to empirical knowledge, that their grasp of reason does them an injustice by its narrowness. This tunnel vision cuts them off from many forms of human understanding and insight. It also prevents them from having reasoned conversation with that vast majority of the world's people who are religious. More ...

David Warren agrees with Novak ...

[Benedict] was saying that Reason -- let's give that a capital letter -- was the only ground on which we could discuss anything, since in matters of Faith, we are bound to disagree. But even our respective beliefs may be examined in the light of reason, and must be, if our dialogue is not to be a sham, an imposture, a dissemblance, a cheat. More ...

Former Archbishop of Canterbury has another take ...

Lord Carey said that Muslims must address "with great urgency" their religion's association with violence. He made it clear that he believed the "clash of civilisations" endangering the world was not between Islamist extremists and the West, but with Islam as a whole. More ... [H/T: Ron Ballew at RedBlueChristian]

In a similar but different way, Tony Blankley is somewhat in line with Carey (not the one who served in Viet Nam) ...

There is an historically fairly predictable pattern to the unfolding strategies and views of great wars. They often start with a morally ambiguous view of the enemy, a more limited conception of the war's magnitude and a restrained application of violent tactics.

Eventually, moral clarity is obtained, war objectives expand - often to grandiosity, and tactics become ferocious. More ...

And Coffin Anon,"-- intentional or otherwise --," offered his two-cents to the possibility of a global conflagration ...

During the speech, which comes on the heels of the media-generated controversy regarding Pope Benedict XVI's quoting of a text on Islam, Annan said, "insensitivity towards other people's beliefs or sacred symbols -- intentional or otherwise -- is seized upon by those who seem eager to foment a new war of religion on a global scale."

"Moreover, this climate of fear and suspicion is constantly refueled by the violence in the Middle East," he said. More ...

Others have different understandings of the aftermath ...

• Turkish gunman warns Benedict

• Muslims Vow War Against Christians H/T: Black Kettle

• Anyone who describes Islam as a religion as intolerant encourages violence

My own opinion is revealed in the message behind the message.

I am a Messianic Christian, I believe firmly in the soon Second Advent of the Lord Jesus Christ. As such, words have meanings to me that others might not see or agree with. But another quote of Coffin Anon from the speech linked above rings true for me about who is behind the mind-boggling global decay we've see since 9/11 ...

Annan sees the United Nations as the only solution to the world's woes. "Yes, I remain convinced that the only answer to this divided world must be a truly United Nations," he said.

This feeds nicely into the Lord's prophetic teaching's in Scripture regarding the End Times.

Annan, Benedict, Christianity, Global decay, Globalism,
Muslims, Pope, Pope's speech, Reason, Roman Catholics, UN