St. Amant: “The historian can never allow the message of history to create historical facts. Nor can he ignore or distort those facts in the interest of his own bias.”1 Antiphon: “Be not so unjust; rather leave something for that other witness, Time, who aids the zealous seekers of eternal truth.”2 One of the primary […]
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Author: Rick Shrader
Chapter and Verse
In the area of morality we find exactly the same thing. Man cannot escape the fact of the motions of a true right and wrong in himself; not just a sociological or hedonistic morality, but true morality, true right and wrong. And yet beginning with himself he cannot bring forth absolute standards and cannot even […]
Our Moral Dilemma With Ethnic Cleansing
All the glorified technological achievements of Progress, including the conquest of outer space, do not redeem the twentieth century’s moral poverty. I am referring to the calamity of a despiritualizing and irreligious humanistic consciousness. Alexander Solzhenitsyn1 We are experiencing a moral schizophrenia in our country today. We have just been dragged, kicking and screaming, […]
The Wilderness Encroaches
Admitting that, when you first go to mingle with worldly scenes, you may intend not to be seduced from the path of duty; admitting that you at first possess sincerity, firmness, and courage; you will soon deviate from them. Those ideas of zeal and firmness against vice with which you enter into the world will […]
Speaking To Those Who Are Never Wrong!
Our existence is more real to us than the existence of anything else because the existence of everything else is evaluated in terms of its usefulness and attractiveness to our purposes. Everything is subordinate to our will. To do evil is to attempt to retain that perspective and relation to others. To refuse to do […]
The Hypocrite Finders
For we dare not make ourselves of the number, or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves: but they measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise. . . . . But he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. For not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom […]
Rewriting The Christmas Imperative
And he said, Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! For ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers. Woe unto you! For ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the […]
Christianity In The Dock
Do you really believe the masses will be Christian again? Nonsense! Never again. That tale is finished. No one will listen to it again. But we can hasten matters. The parsons will dig their own graves. They will betray their God to us. They will betray anything for the sake of their miserable jobs and […]
Are We Too Sophisticated?
Sophism: false argument, one intended to deceive. Sophist: captious or clever but fallacious reasoner. Sophistic: related to sophism. Sophisticate: sophisticated person, related to sophism. Sophisticated: worldly-wise, cultured, elegant, highly developed and complex. The Oxford Dictionary of Current English (1993) G.K. Chesterton wrote, “Mere light sophistry is the thing that I happen to despise most of […]
Polling For Moral Authority
Yet, within the Church as well as outside it, this perverted notion persists. Truth is conceived on a quantitative basis—no doubt under the influence of statistical reasoning and public opinion polls. It is being assumed that the more people there are with different opinions to contribute, the greater ‘truth’ will emerge from the mixing of […]