Recent developments on the doctrine of Antichrist

Maybe it's just me, but I never expected that the person making the biggest waves with his idiosyncratic views on the identity of the antichrist would be a homosexual tech billionaire married to another man. Nevertheless, Peter Thiel. I won't try to explain his views: use the interwebs search engine of your choice and you'll know as much as I do. I can't make heads or tails of said doctrine of the antichrist, so I fall back on what is in the original version of Westminster Confession of Faith 25.6.

In these United States, that paragraph was amended by deletion in 1789. Still, I can't help but agree with the deleted phrase, which reads,

[the pope of Rome] is that Antichrist, that man of sin, and son of perdition, that exalteth himself, in the Church, against Christ and all that is called God.

Sadly, many Christians read that statement through the lens of wild speculation fueled by dispensationalist (and tech billionaire) hermeneutics which raged through evangelicalism during the 20th and 21st centuries. Those of us who have heard one too many wild-eyed sermons filled with references to the Middle East are tempted to dismiss the original WCF 25.6 as more of the same, but I think that a grave mistake. Properly understood, it is a claim that the Roman Catholic papacy is a manifestation of the spirit of antichrist, which strikes me as objectively true. At least, it's objectively true if one accepts its doctrine of antichrist, which assumes that the antichrist is to be identified with the man of sin.

In his letters, the Apostle John tells us to beware of antichrists, which denies that Jesus is the Christ (1 John 2:18-22; 4:3; 2 John 7). One wonders how a person who denies Jesus is the Christ could possibly ever be accepted into any Christian Church of any denomination, as they all require assent to the Apostles' Creed ("And I believe in Jesus Christ..."). However, that mystery is cleared up if the antichrist is identified with "the man of sin" in 2 Thessalonians: "the man of lawlessness..., the son of destruction, who ... takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God" (2 Thessalonians 2:3-4). In other words, as the Westminster Divines seem to have understood it, the spirit of antichrist is to claim for oneself the place in the Church which only Jesus Christ can occupy. The Roman Catholic pope claims to be the head of the Church, taking the place of Christ as his "vicar" (assuming Jesus is not actively ruling his Church, leaving his office empty and needing to be vicariously filled). 

You don't have to agree with the exegesis of the relevant texts, but the original version of WCF 25.6 is clearly not crazy. Its doctrine is simple: to be antichrist is to take the place of Christ by proclaiming oneself the head of the Church. But on that definition, the pope of Rome is fairly obviously only one antichrist of many. 

The spirit of antichrist is in the world whenever a human being is declared or treated as though he were head of the Church.

While no congregation would formally declare that Jesus is not the Christ, more than a few act as though their pastor is the head of their local Church. Many of us have heard (or been told), "If you can't agree with the pastor, you don't belong in this congregation" (or words to that effect). In other words, this congregation belongs to the pastor: he is its head. These organizations may not be as large as the church of Rome, but surely these are also manifestations of the spirit of antichrist.

I suspect the widespread belief that the doctrine of "The Antichrist" is a subset of eschatology proper (that is, the literal last days) has led us to ignore John's warning: "as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come" (1 John 2:18). Many antichrists are abroad in our day, just as they were in John's. I think it entirely appropriate to label the pope of Rome as antichrist, and equally appropriate to label at least a few pastors of confessionally presbyterian congregations as antichrist as well.

In other words, let's use Bible words to describe what's going on in our congregations. Having done that, let us respond to what is going on in our congregations as the words of the Bible instruct us.

Genesis 14, 1 Timothy 2:2 & Our Prayers

  First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 

   –1 Timothy 2:1-4

I think it was D.A. Carson whom I heard observe that the kings in Genesis 14 are best thought of as small town mayors. Admah, Zeboiim and Zoar were cities, not nation-states, and their populations quite small when compared to the American cities with which we are familiar today. These were “cities” of well under a thousand persons in which everyone pretty much knew everyone else: the “king” was someone who had a real job and who you likely ran into around town. In other words, don’t think of the pomp of a Westminster Abbey coronation every time you read the word “king” in the Bible. As often as not, it’s merely a synonym for “leader of a government.”

Kings figure prominently in Scripture, especially in the Psalms and prophets. Kings are heads over nations and peoples, and often represent those who oppose our Lord, the one true King over heaven and earth. Hence our surprise when we find the apostles exhorting us to submit ourselves to these ungodly authorities (Romans 13) and even to pray for them (1 Timothy 2:1-2). Christians are to have a particular and benevolent interest in kings, no matter who they are, and perhaps especially when they are the wrong sort of king.

I learned this lesson in prayer the hard way on July 4, 2010, when I was preaching near Toronto in a Canadian Reformed Church. In blithe indifference to my nation’s Independence Day, my good friend Doug Vandeburgt led his congregation in prayer for Canada’s queen! While I was gravely shaken, the episode caused me to reflect upon how I had been leading and praying in public worship. I began being much more faithful to Paul’s admonitions in 1 Timothy 2 by praying for all who are in high positions.

Most congregations, I think, are reasonably faithful in this regard: I hear prayers for our nation’s leaders in nearly every Church I visit, even when the president in office would appear not to be the first choice of the average congregant in the room. But then I remember Genesis 14.

The problem with Americans is that they dream too big: they would rather fail to change the world than succeed in helping one neighbor. The problem with American Christians may be that they pray too big, failing to uphold their mayor, their township’s board of trustees, or the judge of the nearest municipal court before the throne of grace. If we are to love our neighbor, we certainly ought to pray for these kings and princes close to home.

You may have had the experience of praying by name for a missionary during worship services and only later meeting that person for the first time. You feel an immediate warmth toward and interest in that missionary; you want to know how the Lord has been answering her prayer requests; you feel drawn toward him in what can only be called a form of Christian love. Now imagine having the same experience when you go to traffic court and meet the judge.

Does that sound odd? Does it seem a little silly?

Consider: one of the most deeply peculiar aspects of the Christian faith, as even our Savior acknowledges, is the command to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:43-47). To pray for someone, of course, is to love that person. Only by loving our enemies can we begin to imitate the perfection of our heavenly Father who loves us (Matthew 5:48). Let’s be honest: we live in a culture in which many, including ourselves, are quick to cast aspersions on politicians and bureaucrats. If we think so poorly of them, then by Christian logic we should be praying for them so much the more zealously. If we love them before the throne of grace, perhaps our hearts will be disciplined to love them in person as well.

In point of fact, municipal officials, whether high or low, are infrequently our enemies or persecutors. They may very literally be our neighbors, and most of the time they are far more likely to be able to do good for our congregations and families than the President or a Supreme Court Justice of these United States. So let me make a practical suggestion: during your congregation’s evening service, pray by name for your municipality’s mayor or trustees or alderpersons. This will be good, and will certainly please God our Savior.

And who knows? As Christians, we may yet be free to lead peaceful and quiet lives. Our Churches may yet be godly and dignified in every way. And perhaps our kings and princes and municipal court judges may yet be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

Sea of Tranquility

 I'm surprised reviewers haven't made more of the book's chiastic structure, which, upon reflection, is just about the perfect design for a story built on the premise of time travel. Like Robert Heinlein's "All You Zombies," it ties up every plot point into a very neat bow at the end, and in that sense satisfies. Mandel's characteristic attention to character makes the entire experience wonderful.

Beyond the structure and simple reading experience, "Sea of Tranquility" seems to be Emily St. John Mandel's attempt to interrogate her own writing career. One of her main characters, Olive Llewellyn, is her doppelgänger, filling the same role Garp did for John Irving in "The World According to Garp." Perhaps some of my pleasure from reading this book came from how Mandel was able to draw in her previous novels, especially "Station Eleven" and "The Glass Hotel," and capitalize on all the good will stored up by them.

I don't know how "Sea of Tranquility" ranks in Emily St. John Mandel's bibliography: I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of reading it. I won't even invoke the "I was disappointed when it ended" trope because part of its triumph is its precisely crafted conclusion.

Grace to you & peace

 Between leaving full-time ministry and moving to another state, I've worshiped at a dozen or more confessionally reformed/presbyterian Churches over the last few years and have been surprised by how few include the apostolic salutation in their liturgies. For those who'd like a reminder, the apostolic salutation is that bit at the beginning of services when the preacher raises his hand in greeting and says something like "Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ." This greeting is modeled after the apostolic practice of beginning their New Testament letters with a salutation on behalf of the God who was inspiring the epistles they were writing.

(The apostolic salutation which is most often used is the one favored by the Apostle Paul, but can have as much variety as does the benediction, or blessing, which concludes the worship service.)

Simple ignorance of the historic practice of the apostolic salutation may explain its absence, but I think another factor could be confusion between it and the call to worship. The call to worship is a sentence (or more) from Scripture which commands the hearers to enter into God's presence and praise him. For those who don't give it too much thought, this divine command may seem interchangeable with a greeting from God.

Of course, even when it's practiced, the apostolic salutation can be confused with the benediction. I have seen it described in a bulletin as "God greets us with a blessing," and many pastors raise both hands when extending it. This is a fairly obvious error, sadly: a statement of greeting is not a blessing unless it contains the word "bless" or some synonym thereof.

Now that I've rather belabored the point and tried the gentle reader's patience, said reader may wonder whether a practice so frequently ignored and so easily confused with other elements of worship really deserves inclusion in every service. It can be supported by any number of arguments, but I am compelled by the nature of the office of Word and sacrament. In 2 Corinthians 5, Paul writes of his pastoral office, which he shares with his coauthor, Timothy, when he writes,

Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. (2 Corinthians 5:18-20)

Over the years, I've come increasingly to recognize the extent to which the minister of Word and sacrament is Christ's ambassador, particularly when leading worship. In prayer, he brings the message of the people to their God, and in preaching he brings the words of God to his people. This, quite obviously, is what ambassadors do. Therefore, the apostolic salutation is the ambassador from the Kingdom of God bringing a word of grace and peace from his King to the hostile world to which Christ the King has laid claim.

This brings to the fore another distinction between the benediction and the salutation. The benediction is a proclamation of God's blessing on his people, and therefore should only be pronounced in the context of Christian worship when the people of God are gathered together. The salutation is God's greeting, and as such it may be given to anyone and everyone. In Luke 2, the angelic messengers announced peace to the world in the birth of Jesus Christ; now Christ's ambassadorial messengers bring greetings of grace and peace through Jesus Christ to the entire world.

Whenever I am acting in my capacity as a minister of Word and sacrament, I greet my hearers with grace and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. After all, I am an ambassador of reconciliation and would be most glad if our encounter led to their embrace of the good news of Jesus Christ and his Cross. I hope all my ambassadorial brethren will likewise return the apostolic salutation to the beginning of every worship service.

Two houses (being the reason I wrote the first & second parts)

 As I wrote previously, the OPC's General Assembly, with its delegated representation, has the structural and institutional weaknesses of the United States Senate: this poses a great danger to the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Meanwhile, the PCA's General Assembly, which permits (at least nominally) a practically universal membership of all the Church's congregations and teaching elders, has the structural and institutional weaknesses of the United States House of Representatives: this poses a great danger to the Presbyterian Church in America.

Since the United States Congress was deliberately designed so that the weaknesses of each of its two Houses are compensated for by the other House's strengths, and since I have flogged ecumenism whenever and wherever I've been able, one might expect me to facilely suggest the two denominations merge and let their two General Assemblies balance each other out. However, the structure of presbyterian Church government will not allow for this simple solution.

Presbyterian governmental structure, gleaned from Acts 15 and other bits and scraps of relevant Scripture, is rather simple. It calls for a graded, or hierarchical, series of Church courts. A council of ruling and teaching elders governs each level, or manifestation, of the visible Church. (For what I mean by "the visible Church," see Westminster Confession of Faith chapter 25.) In both the OPC and the PCA, a session governs the local congregation, a presbytery governs the several congregations of a designated geographical region (also known as a "Regional Church"), and a general assembly governs the entire denomination. These courts necessarily relate to each other in a hierarchical fashion; to do otherwise would simply not be presbyterian. Therefore, a faithfully presbyterian form of Church government has no room for two Church courts which must cooperate with each other after the manner of the Houses of the United States Congress.

Nonetheless, there's a rather simple way to draw on the institutional strengths of the systems of representation of both the OPC and the PCA. Historically, and in several contemporary cases, presbyterian denominations have had another level of Church court: the synod. The synod is an intermediary court between the presbytery and the general assembly. It functions much as a presbytery does in overseeing the affairs of a designated geographical region within that of the larger denomination. Unlike a presbytery, however, the synod is not a court of original jurisdiction. Local sessions are responsible to oversee (and discipline when necessary) members of the congregation, and presbyteries oversee (and discipline when necessary) ministers of Word and sacrament. (Ministers are members of the regional Church, not the local Church.) Thus, in matters of Church discipline, synods are appellate courts only.

I suggest, then, that both the OPC and the PCA institute synods in their respective communions. These synods could have the universal membership of the PCA's General Assembly: every teaching elder and two (for the sake of argument) ruling elders from every congregation. On the one hand, this would broaden the range of perspectives of those overseeing the work of presbyteries, something the OPC desperately needs. On the other hand, the number of members at any given synod would not be so large as to make genuine debate impossible, which would address the problem of the PCA's General Assembly. 

Under my proposed system, commissioners to the General Assembly would be drawn from presbyteries according to some formula set forth in a Form of Government. This would bypass both the risk of synods bottlenecking representation and the risk of presbyteries favoring only a few particular men as their (virtually) permanent commissioners. This system would allow for easier practical functioning of the General Assembly (due to more manageable numbers) and providing for lighter dockets if more disciplinary cases can be resolved by synodical courts.

Our national government's structure is remarkably robust, designed to restrain untoward ambition and encourage healthy cooperation. Its genius is perhaps best demonstrated by the little-celebrated fact that it has endured despite the often foolish choices of legislator the American people make. While the general structure of presbyterian Church government is dictated by Scripture, presbyterians have a great deal of freedom to order its institutions according to the light of nature and Christian prudence. The institutional designs of the OPC and the PCA emerged at their foundings and were based on assumptions because the founders were focused more on doctrinal problems. Now is an opportune moment to take a deep breath and consider how better to order our two houses.

"two houses" by buckshot.jones is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Providing for one's household

 Legalism is a funny thing.

In the Christian context, "legalism" is the creation and enforcement of rules which are not grounded in the Bible. We often think of the legalist as a person who creates and imposes rules on others, but there is another legalist who is much more difficult to expose and reform. That is the legalist of the tender conscience, who sees no room for grace in God's Law and constantly fears he has fallen short of its measure. Either through reading the Bible as a stricter taskmaster than it is, or by falling prey to legalistic preaching, this Christian often seeks, but rarely finds, assurance of salvation.

Since shortly after ordination, I have served as a doctrinal correspondent for the Orthodox Presbyterian Church's website. People submit questions at opc.org, and one or the other of us is assigned to answer it. While nearly all of the questions we get are about Christian doctrine or how to exegete some point of Scripture, many of them have, as a subtext, a concern as to whether one has fallen short of God's commands. What follows is one such recent example.

  I’ve been asked to respond to this question you posted to the Orthodox Presbyterian Church’s website:

In 1 Timothy 5:8, the apostle Paul stated, "But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."
Would this passage apply to a man unable to provide health insurance for his family? The man is able to provide for the basic necessaries of life such as housing, food, and clothing, but doesn't make enough money to provide for health insurance. Should such a man consider himself worse than an unbeliever?

  This is a case where context is extremely important. 1 Timothy 5:8 is just one sentence in a much longer passage which, for the sake of clarity, I quote in part:

1Tim. 5:3  Honor widows who are truly widows.

1Tim. 5:4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents, for this is pleasing in the sight of God.

1Tim. 5:5 She who is truly a widow, left all alone, has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day,

1Tim. 5:6 but she who is self-indulgent is dead even while she lives.

1Tim. 5:7 Command these things as well, so that they may be without reproach.

1Tim. 5:8 But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

1Tim. 5:9  Let a widow be enrolled if she is not less than sixty years of age, having been the wife of one husband,

1Tim. 5:10 and having a reputation for good works: if she has brought up children, has shown hospitality, has washed the feet of the saints, has cared for the afflicted, and has devoted herself to every good work.

1Tim. 5:11 But refuse to enroll younger widows, for when their passions draw them away from Christ, they desire to marry

1Tim. 5:12 and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith.

1Tim. 5:13 Besides that, they learn to be idlers, going about from house to house, and not only idlers, but also gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not.

1Tim. 5:14 So I would have younger widows marry, bear children, manage their households, and give the adversary no occasion for slander.

1Tim. 5:15 For some have already strayed after Satan.

1Tim. 5:16 If any believing woman has relatives who are widows, let her care for them. Let the church not be burdened, so that it may care for those who are truly widows.

  In 1 Timothy 5:1-2, Paul introduces his subject by talking about our 5th Commandment duty to honor every person according their several statuses in life and their relations to us (see the Westminster Shorter Catechism questions 63-64, https://opc.org/sc.html). In 1 Timothy 5:17-21, he talks about how to relate to elders in the Church and those who persist in sin. It’s important to see that Paul is dealing here primarily with how we are to keep the 5th Commandment by treating everyone around us appropriately.

  In 1 Timothy 5:3-16, Paul talks about the Church’s duty to widows in the Church who do not have relatives who can provide for them (1 Tim 5:3, 8, 16). Apparently, the Church in Ephesus (1 Tim 1:3) kept a roll of widows the deacons would take care of (1 Tim 5:9), and Paul wanted to help Timothy make sure the congregation’s finances would not be overwhelmed (1 Tim 5:16). Indeed, he goes so far as to say that widows who can still remarry ought to: explicitly to guard themselves against idleness but implicitly to not burden the Church (1 Tim 5:11-15). So the context of 1 Timothy 5:8 is that Paul is telling Timothy that he and his congregation must be faithful to care for those who truly are needy; from that follows the necessary implication that Christians who are able to take care of needy relatives must also do so. (These are very important principles for any congregation with a healthy diaconate. My first ordained service was as a deacon, and this passage helped guide our work.)

  As in 1 Timothy 5:11-15, in 1 Timothy 5:8 Paul is not addressing ability as much as he is willingness. In other words, the man who is able to provide for a needy widow in his near or extended family (and it seems to me Paul particularly has in mind a man’s own mother or mother-in-law) but will not has denied the faith by refusing to carry out the 5th Commandment in one of its most obvious applications. Lest that seems a harsh judgment, we can make a comparison to the 7th Commandment (“thou shalt not commit adultery”), where the parallel sin would be to hire prostitutes. I believe most Christians would agree that such a person is “worse than an unbeliever” because he calls himself a Christian while refusing to repent of a remarkably obvious and heinous sin.

  I write all of that in order to say that I believe the premises of your question are incorrect. A man who is doing his best to provide for his family but falls short has demonstrated he is willing even though he is not able. Just as a godly widow who neither could provide for herself nor had family members who could help her could go to her Church’s deacons for help, so a family suffering from financial hardship should go to their Church’s deacons for help. This is right, Godly and Biblical. I am grateful to the Lord for making the office of deacon an ordinance for his Church; it has always been dear to me because it is a tangible expression of God’s love for his people.

  While this has been lenghty, I hope it’s been helpful to you. Please feel free to follow up if anything I’ve written requires clarification. I pray our God who provided his own Son as the atonement for our sins will provide you and yours with all that is needful for this life.

Two houses (being the second part)

 The United Stated Congress is made up of two houses: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The number of Senators is set by the United States Constitution: at two per state, there are 100. The number of Representatives was set by statute in the early 20th century, when it was realized things were getting out of hand and was accordingly capped far too late at an entirely unwieldy 435 (441 if you include non-voting delegates). 

This vast numerical disparity has led to very different styles of operation. The Senate, due to its relatively small size, gives each member opportunities to speak, debate and serve on important committees even while new to the institution. (In theory, this also allows senators to pursue regional agendas as avidly as ideological ones, but this feature has been waning as the type of candidate elected has tended to be increasingly partisan over the last couple decades.) In the House, seniority is everything and parties strive to maintain strict control over their members. There are just too many Congresspersons running around to let everyone have an equal voice in the chamber's operations.

Each house and its manner of doing business has its own strengths and weaknesses, most of which are dictated by necessity. The particular genius of the bicameral legislature is to ensure that those weaknesses never prove fatal because both houses must agree in order for legislation to pass. This system therefore allows us to benefit from each house's strengths without (necessarily) falling victim to its weaknesses.

This is all fairly elementary stuff that should have been covered in your high school civics class, if American high schools still taught civics. I bring it up not because I think you ignorant (after all, you're a reader of this blog, demonstrating thereby rare taste, refinement, education and, almost certainly, above-average height and physical attractiveness) but because it offers insight into the general assemblies of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Church in America.

The OPC's General Assembly is strictly capped at 155: its debate (supposedly) mirrors that of the U.S. Senate with lengthy speeches and much freedom for individual commissioners to pursue idiosyncratic agendas. Not so the PCA's General Assembly, which may include all teaching elders and two ruling elders from each congregation. (The "may" is emphasized because each commissioner must pay his own way and so it's never been the case that everyone who is eligible to serve at the PCA GA has actually registered to do so.) Given this rule, along with the fact that the PCA is over twelve times the size of the OPC, the PCA's GA is much larger than the OPC's and so tends to mirror many of the operational tendencies of the U.S. House of Representatives: commissioners voting according to group affiliation (however defined), less allowance given to debate, low tolerance for idiosyncratic agendas.

As with the two Houses of the United States Congress, each assembly's approach to its membership, and the concomitant operational style of each, has its own strengths and weaknesses. However, while we hope (often against hope, bitter experience and reason itself) that the weaknesses of each House of Congress will be negated by the strengths of the other, no such hope exists for the two General Assemblies. Because each is the highest court of its respective denomination, the rulings of the one cannot impact the other, and so each General Assembly, and the denomination it serves, may eventually fall victim to its own weaknesses. 

I offer this analysis for two reasons: first, I've not seen anyone else draw this comparison; and second, I have thoughts, to be offered at another time.

Two houses (being the first part)

 In one sense, all history is revisionist history in the sense that every new piece of historiography seeks to revise our understanding of that which we previously knew. There would be no point in writing a new biography of Abraham Lincoln, for instance, if one had absolutely no original insights to offer (other than as a cynical ploy to gain tenure at a university, but we will not speak of such things).

In that manner, and as one long exhausted by my homeland's willful ignorance of the felt experience of racism on our shores, I was intrigued by The 1619 Project's stated goal of reframing American history through the lens of the black experience. I found much of its contribution to the American historical project rewarding, but sadly, some of its least helpful arguments seem to have gained the most traction. The one which most irks me is the contention that the creation of a Senate alongside a House of Representatives was primarily a scheme to permanently  invest political power in slave-holding interests.

Really? A bicameral legislature because racism? Not because every European nation, including and especially Great Britain, which just happens to have been the nation of which the original 13 States were a part, has a bicameral legislature? (Not to mention Virginia, whose form of government was basically copied wholesale by the 1787 Constitution, which I am obliged to mention because I graduated from a Virginian public high school and university.) At this point, The 1619 Project goes from completely reasonable lower-case-r revisionism to 1984 memory hole upper-case-R Revisionism which is plausible only to those operating with utter ignorance of the foundations of our form of government. Which is to say, Americans who have attended elite private universities.

I am particularly irked because this narrative seems to have gained a great deal of traction with a class of Americans (i.e., Americans who live in overpopulated cities on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts) who are dismayed that states with remarkably few residents (looking at you, Wyoming) get just as many Senators as do California and New York. While my listening habits may be unusual, I'm hearing an increasing number of complaints that this arrangement is not only suspect (because racism), it is anti-democratic.

To which I can only say: That's the point.

The peculiar genius of the American experiment in self-government is not a bicameral legislature: everybody has one of those (except for Nebraska, about which the less said the better). Instead, it is in composing its upper legislative house not from a political/social class (as in Great Britain, about which the less said the better), but from a conscious recognition that political decisions are driven as much by lived experience as by ideology. Westerners understand the value of water in a way that easterners never can. (Having recently relocated from Colorado to Ohio, I am constantly appalled by how much water the locals here waste. It's as though they think it falls from the sky.) The House of Representatives gives full weight to our nation's massed populations, but the Senate exists to ensure that the majority cannot unilaterally impose its will on States in which they do not live.

That might frustrate those with majoritarian instincts, but as a citizen who remains sympathetic to my friends in the West, I think it a good thing. Along with the separation of powers, it not only makes us a republic, but the greatest Republic which this sad world has yet seen. 

And that is a very good thing.

His tithes & our offerings

I am not the first to note that the recent pandemic did a number on Churches and their worship services. Much attention has been paid to the problem of getting people back into sanctuaries and rebuilding relationships which became attenuated over months of social isolation. Equally of interest, in my opinion, is how concern about the 'rona impacted liturgical practices themselves. Ushers and greeters stopped shaking hands and passing out bulletins. Bulletins got bulked up with photocopies of songs because hymnals were put away to eliminate a point of contact. In many cases, celebration of the Lord's Supper was either suspended or traditional elements were replaced with itsy-bitsy factory-sealed personal-size portions of saliva-dissolvable styrofoam and purple-dyed sugar water. Passing the offering plate was replaced with exhortations to give online or drop one's tithe in a basket in the back of the auditorium.

Presbyterians understand that the sacraments are a primary means of grace (Shorter Catechism #88 uses "Word, sacrament and prayer" as shorthand for all the means of grace) and so communion has made a comeback right along with the return of "in-person worship" (a redundancy I never thought I'd utter with a straight face). However, passing the plate or bag or upturned baseball cap has not yet returned in many places. I think this is a mistake: the public and corporate offering of gifts is also an important means of grace, and we miss an element of worship when it is absent.

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church had a different iteration of our Directory for Public Worship when I was ordained as a pastor late in the last century; although the wording was different, the point was similar to the current "The bringing of offerings in the public assembly of God’s people on the Lord’s Day is a solemn act of worship to almighty God. The people of God are to set aside to him the firstfruits of their labors; in so doing, they should present themselves with thanksgiving as a living sacrifice to God" (OPC DPW II.B.4.a). When I was reading through the Directory in my early days of my pastorate, I realized that the giving of tithes and offerings fulfills a specific role in the liturgy's structure: it is the congregation's especial opportunity to give thanks. Since that realization, I usually inserted the offering after the confession of sin and declaration of pardon, as thanksgiving to God for Jesus Christ and his gifts is most appropriate at that point in the service. I now feel that a service without an offering lacks this note of thanksgiving.

Yes, one can have a thankful heart even if the liturgy does not include an offering. But by the same token, we always enjoy some sort of fellowship with God in Christ: that does not render unnecessary the Lord's Supper. It's time for sessions to bring back the offering so that we may all, as part of the worship service and with thankful hearts, present to God his tithes and our offerings.

Travel narrows the mind

 An oft-unmentioned benefit of travel and living in a variety of regions and climes is the opportunity to have one's prejudices and biases reinforced with new anecdotal and statistical evidence. Of course, one must first have worked oneself into an appropriately curmudgeonly state of recalcitrant grouchiness, which, thankfully, I have. Indeed, when I ask "How are you?" and the reply is "Can't complain," I usually respond "I bet you could if you tried."

Shortly after moving to the Greater Cincinnati Metropolitan Area, Thing 2 and I noticed something wrong with the sunrise: namely, it came much later in the morning than we expected. Studying a map, I eliminated being further north as a cause because Cincinnati and Denver are at roughly the same latitude. However, I suddenly realized that Cincinnati is relatively closer to the western edge of the Eastern Time Zone than is Denver to the western edge of the Mountain Time Zone. (Reread that last sentence until it makes sense; I promise it does.) Therefore, the sun rises and sets later in the day in Cincinnati than it does in Denver. A series of interviews with the native population of Ohio confirmed my hypothesis (because in this house, we believe in science).

This means, of course, that the Birthplace of Aviation most definitely does not need "more daylight at the end of the day," the oft-cited justification for Daylight Saving Time. Indeed, the pitiful schoolchildren attempting to cross busy streets every morning are in need of sunlight lest they lay down their lives for public education, but it has again been denied to them by the bolshevik scheme to mess with the nature of reality itself through mandating that all clocks "spring ahead" (even though it's still winter). If any of these United States should do away with this annual insanity, it's Ohio.

Stop the madness, save the children, and never again. Ohioans unite! You have nothing to lose except showing up an hour late to worship services once a year.