Frankly, he was my 4th favorite Monkee

Nonetheless, it's a little sad to learn Davy Jones died today. The Monkees' ouevre is much maligned, but stands up very well as an example of well-crafted 60s-era post-British Invasion pop. I'm not only not embarassed to be a Monkees fan, but take a perverse pride in my acquaintance with cuts deep into their catalog (largely acquired during high school, of course).

Yup: I'm still a believer.

Getting some clarity on "never again"

In a story entitled "Early Decision: Will new advances in prenatal testing shrink the ranks of Jews negroes girls babies with Down syndrome?," this week's Time magazine presents a sensitive and reasonable exploration of the decisions facing parents with a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome. That is, if "sensitive" and "reasonable" can be sanely applied to an article which never mentions the nowhere-more applicable term "genocide."

Why would Down syndrome babies not be wanted in our society? Because they won't grow up as smart as other people, that's why. What better reason to exterminate a class of people? At any rate, they certainly won't be bright enough to make the careful distinction between bad Nazi eugenics and good college-educated 21st-century American eugenics.

Let's just admit the obvious: the next time an American politician says "Never again" on Holocaust Remembrance Day, what he or she means is "Let us never again kill six million Jews in Germany in the 1930s and 40s." I'm glad we all learned that important moral lesson.

Life experience & academic degrees

Our great state's legislature is looking at ways to encourage state universities to award college credit to students for "life experience." To the extent schools recognize expertise gained in other environments which can be tested and demonstrated, I suppose I have no objection. But in my life experience, this variety of college credit is about something else entirely.

While in seminary, I remember an older student complaining that he had to complete the same course-load as all the other M.Div. students when he believed his longer-than-average life experience would better qualify him for the pastorate than his younger classmates. To a great extent, I agreed and agree with him, which is why I always advise young men interested in the pastorate to get a real job for at least a few years before beginning formal studies for the ministry. However, I believe my classmate erred in thinking greater maturity is the same thing as academic accomplishment. Presbyterians have high academic standards for ministerial candidates because we believe an educated clergy is necessary to rightly handle and preach the Bible. All the life experience in the world won't give you expertise in Greek, Hebrew, or systematic theology.

Granting college credit for "life experience" is, ultimately, an admission that the degree awarded is not a recognition of academic accomplishment, but instead a license to apply for a job. Consider the abysmal ignorance of the clergy in liberal protestant denominations, many of whom attended seminaries which grant credit for life experience. They are confident the Bible is not the Word of God in any truthful or meaningful sense, but lack the ability to even read the Scriptures in the original languages. If the "life experience" virus infects the public universities as well, what has long been de facto will also become de jure: graduates will have pieces of paper, but precious little learning.