Francis Schaeffer on Worldview Cohesion.

Since this meme has been making the rounds, I thought it would be good to include the entire quote. When he says, “the last eighty years or so,” he is speaking in 1981. I’m afraid many Christians have not yet grasped the idea that challenges we face are the result of a worldview divide.

“The basic problem of the Christians in this country in the last eighty years or so, in regard to society and in regard to government, is that they have seen things in bits and pieces instead of totals.

They have very gradually become disturbed over permissiveness, pornography, the public schools, the breakdown of the family, and finally abortion. But they have not seen this as a totality—each thing being a part, a symptom, of a much larger problem. They have failed to see that all of this has come about due to a shift in world view—that is, through a fundamental change in the overall way people think and view the world and life as a whole.

This shift has been away from a world view that was at least vaguely Christian in people’s memory (even if they were not individually Christian) toward something completely different—toward a world view based upon the idea that the final reality is impersonal matter or energy shaped into its present form by impersonal chance. They have not seen that this world view has taken the place of the one that had previously dominated Northern European culture, including the United States, which was at least Christian in memory, even if the individuals were not individually Christian.

These two world views stand as totals in complete antithesis to each other in content and also in their natural results—including sociological and governmental results, and specifically including law.

It is not that these two world views are different only in how they understand the nature of reality and existence. They also inevitably produce totally different results. The operative word here is inevitably. It is not just that they happen to bring forth different results, but it is absolutely inevitable that they will bring forth different results.

“A Christian Manifesto” in Francis A. Schaeffer, The Complete Works of Francis A. Schaeffer: A Christian Worldview, vol. 5 (Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1982), 423–424.

16 June, 202116 June, 2021

We Fell So Easily

Why the Church closures are are bigger deal than we want to admit.

Canadians who pay attention are noticing that there is a war against churches that stay open in spite of government mandates. This isn’t going to split the church in Canada, it already has. Many wonder why, when there are no Covid deaths traceable to worship, and maybe less that five Covid cases in all of Canada connected to worship, that the fines number in the millions and pastors are jailed.

I believe the behaviour of the civil government in this pandemic is designed to weaken Bible-believing churches and to pre-emptively rob them of their message.

Civil leaders are throttling up their push toward social change, and Bible-believing churches are a direct threat to that change.

Every major political leader affirms that “hate has no place in Canada.” They are pretty coy about defining hate, but it isn’t hard to parse:

1. If you are anti-abortion, you are sexist.

2. If you are anti sex-selective abortion, you are a racist.

3. If you reject Critical Race Theory, you are a racist.

4. If you doubt the rule of the state over all, you are a rebel.

5. If you are anti same-sex marriage, you are a homophobe.

6. If you are against women pastors, you are a misogynist.

7. If you are against the non-scientific notion that sex can be changed, transphobic.

8. If you teach against teachings of Islam, you are an Islamophobe.

(I used the negatives, “anti” and “against” to trigger all the right people. I hope that isn’t you. If this kind of writing bothers you, you are part of the problem.)

The above describes every church that takes the Bible seriously. If your church, your pastor, is faithful to Scripture, the labels sexist, racist, rebel, homophobe, transphobe, misogynist, and Islamophobe will all be applied.

This is why the government of Ontario and the government of Canada have attacked churches so viciously. Although they have the power to attack churches directly on each of the eight points above, they are far too cowardly to do so. They can speak of “hate” in general terms, but they are very reluctant to attach these monikers to actual churches and pastors. They will attempt, for instance, to try to make it illegal to criticize Islam, but it is far easier to just keep the church shut.

So instead, the churches are attacked over health. Who could argue with that? Well, Bible-believing churches and pastors certainly have disputed the value of lockdowns and closures, and continue to do so. The same Biblical commitment they have doctrinally and morally is demonstrated in the very plain fact that the state is not Lord over the church. We believe that and act upon it.

Churches that have Biblical stances on these points are the ones fighting the fines and imprisonments. I know of no church, pastored by a woman, who is remaining open. I know of no United Church of Canada, or Convention Baptist of Ontario and Quebec that remains open. There may be churches associate with the Gospel Coalition that are open, but the leadership is in full submission to the state.

Churches that question Biblical authority are the most likely ones to remain closed.

When pastors faithfully preach the whole counsel of God, they will preach that the Gospel transforms, converts, and will undermine the state-religion of humanism. They will teach that homosexuals can be converted. They will teach that same-sex marriage is a lie. They will preach that abortion is murder. They will teach that Islam is a false-religion.

But is this not hate, according to our Prime Minister?

None of this will be acceptable in the new Canada, a nation that is being constructed by humans with no reference to the God that created them.

The institutional church in Canada has received a mortal blow. It is soon to be illegal to try to convert a homosexual away from that sin. Then, to name any behaviour as sinful. Today, Christian business people must participate in same-sex marriage. Our taxes pay for abortions, our schools are indoctrination centres for Critical Race Theory and the sexual revolution. We complied when it was demanded that our worship cease. Now do we think we’ll stand when we are told we must not preach a message contrary to that of the State?

We fell so easily.

2 June, 20212 June, 2021

For the Sake of the Children, Keep the Schools Closed

“Chris Selley: Doug Ford has seriously harmed Ontario’s school kids. Now he has to fix it

Premier Doug Ford wants a ‘consensus’ among experts on the question. That’s a bit like asking Canadians to agree on a favourite colour”

This article is correct in calling out the fact of massive sadness and depression among young people, and by placing the blame upon governments and their enablers. This has been a disaster.

Where it misses the point, by far, however is the insistence that children are depressed to the point of suicide because they are not in school. Children have seen every major family gathering cancelled, missed birthdays and holidays, all under threat of arrest.

Kids don’t really know the nuances between criminal behaviour and bylaw infractions. They are told they could be responsible for the sickness or death of loved ones if they hug or even visit. They’ve seen their parents’ stress through job loss, loss of joy in living, loss of future plans.

There is plenty of depression and sadness to go around when schools are in session. This article perpetuates the myth that school provides essential socialization. Children should be much happier to be with family than they are in school, but the family is under state-induced stress to a level that hasn’t been experienced in many years. We are entering a new dark age, and the children know it.

Children see the absurdity of social distancing and mask theatre. They have been fed fear, and submission to the fearful, to a toxic level. Children see that there is something wrong with the hypocrisy of governments that either reward or punish behaviour based upon group identity. They are keenly aware of basic unfairness.

None of this will be solved by reopening the schools, especially if their teachers treat them like germ infested vermin. The teachers’ fears will be clear.

This article also skirts over the matter of toxic ideology in the school system.

Ideologically, the authority over the family assumed by modern educators is merely evil at best. The state-run and separate schools submits the interests of the family to that of the school, the “co-parents” of the child, so that the child is taught that the normal family isn’t the norm, and kids are bullied into accepting the unacceptable: transgenderism and same-sex marriage. But these two examples are but illustrations of the larger problem of a pretended neutral and secular education system. Marxist economics and Critical Race Theory must be added to this list as well.

No Christian child should be made to feel ashamed of their faith, but this is the intent of the curriculum in many cases.

All education indoctrinates—that is normal. But what is wicked is when it is done without any admission on the part of the educators that they are doing so. Modern state-run education operates from an explicitly anti-Christian worldview. In the name of inclusion, diversity, and secularism, state schools claim an objectivity and neutrality that cannot exist. Education is never neutral. So with the authority of the system comes the authority to declare Christ to be dethroned. The modern education system is a meta-narrative that explains all else.

To fight this depression, we must stop (today) doing the things to their world that brings it on. They need to know that they are safe at home, and that schools will not contradict, demean, and defeat the values they are taught at home. Their parents need to know that they can plan for their birthday and holidays. Children need to know that they can drop and see grandma without fear of bringing her death.

It is already assumed that a child as young as 12 can consent to transition from their sex to one that will never be their sex. This is with the school’s encouragement and intervention, and without parental knowledge or consent. How can parents be certain that an injection will not be administered to their child without their permission?

Sending kids back to school right now, given the above, is a ticket to their long-term and certain misery.