Vision
Evangelical Atheism
Atheist John Gray exposes the folly and fear of the new “evangelical atheists” in “What scares the new atheists” (The Guardian, 3 March 2015). In short, the likes of Sam Harris and Daniel C. Dennett are so exercised against religion because they fear that religion – especially Christianity – is on the rise throughout the world. If this is true – and Mr. Gray is inclined to think it is – then it poses a threat to the atheists’ claim that science alone can serve as a basis for a liberal society. But even the idea of a liberal society, morality based on liberal values, is a form of faith, as Mr. Gray explains, and cannot possibly be grounded in the work of science. Indeed, the work of science itself borrows from basic assumptions of the Christian worldview in order to prosecute its endeavor. Mr. Gray is content for religion to have a place in society, even a prominent one, and to attract others by example and persuasion, if it can. He regards the evangelical atheists as deluded about the nature of science, humankind, and morality, and as less than forthcoming about the religious nature of their own program. His is a voice of Gamaliel amid the hubbub and ruckus of secular propagandizing and bullying.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/03/what-scares-the-new-atheists

Disciplines
Writing
What’s to become of writing, now that everyone’s a writer and words are the very air we breathe? That’s the question Tom McCarthy addresses in “The death of writing” (The Guardian, 7 March 2015). The writer’s task would seem to be a simple one: “You look at the world and you report on it. That’s it.” The problem for the writer today, however, is the problem faced by the English major whose job it is to write ad or branding copy for the corporation that employs him: “the point is that the company, in its most cutting-edge incarnation, has become the arena in which narratives and fictions, metaphors and metonymies and symbol networks at their most dynamic and incisive are being generated, worked through and transformed.” The company pipes the tune, and these days the Internet and all its writers are the company. Today we are smothered in data, the very suffusion of which challenges the need for and vocation of the writer. A writer today must be aware of the mood and atmosphere of the company, but if he hopes to contribute anything other than company-speak, he’ll need to practice an alchemy of creativity and communication that meets the company’s demands even as it undermines its legitimacy and points toward new horizons of experience and truth. Such writing, it seems to me, can only succeed if it maintains an “under the heavens” rather than an “under the sun” perspective and agenda.

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/mar/07/tom-mccarthy-death-writing-james-joyce-working-google

Teaching Science
Jeffrey Mervis reports the shocking news that many U.S. biology teachers are “wishy-washy” about teaching evolution (“Why many U.S. biology teachers are ‘wishy-washy,’” Science, 6 March 2015). Apparently, science teachers in America’s secondary schools aren’t being as clear as the science establishment would like them to be about evolution being a fact. And not just a fact – which even the staunchest Bible-believer can admit – but the explanation and engine of the cosmos. Apparently teachers consider evolution a “controversial topic” and prefer not to address it head-on. They “lack the necessary knowledge, conviction, and role models to teach evolution properly.” One survey indicated that, in spite of the best efforts of science teachers, “religious faith” remains a strong alternative view for many students. What’s wrong with these people who “routinely disregard solid scientific evidence in forming their views” about evolution? One report concludes, “Young preservice teachers are already on a path that is likely to lead to evolution instruction that falls short of the expectations of the leading scientific organizations.” Horrors! Clearly something has to be done to break out of this “cycle of ignorance.” But what? “Getting [teachers] to understand evolution is not simply a matter of having them take more science courses.” How about holding a gun to their heads? Or requiring a loyalty oath? Or holding their children hostage? As earnest and energetic as secular evolutionists have been about making evolutionary theory the explanation of life and the cosmos, they just don’t seem to be all that convincing. Could it be that something within the young teachers themselves doesn’t resonate with the religion of evolution? 

Outcomes
Art
Certain New England museums of art, responding to a precipitous decline of interest in the arts by 18-45 year-olds, may be asking the wrong question. According to Elizabeth Devlin, writing in Art New England, curators and boards are asking how they can re-interest this constituency in the arts and, more specifically, in their museums (“Courting the Young Patrons,” March/April, 2015). Museums are creating special organizations and activities to woo young people into friendship and patronage. As the current generation of supporters dies, cultivating a generation to replace them has taken on emergency dimensions. But the question how to woo and win this age group may not be the right one. Should we not rather ask why this age group shows so little interest in the arts? Here at least part of the blame falls to public education, which treats the arts as unimportant for learning a trade and becoming a contributor to our technological and service-based economy. Unless we train the young in their heritage we cannot expect them to appreciate it, much less love and support it. Christian educators, listen up.

Social Media
The Internet is making us into a different kind of people, narcissists who are manipulated by images, sucked into meaningless information, marketed to incessantly, and who measure our significance in terms of “friends” and “likes.” That, at least, is the danger Julia Ticona and Chad Wellmon see in some applications of social media. Writing in the Spring 2015 issue of The Hedgehog Review, the authors explain the different ways social media are perceived by those who use them and those who own them (“Uneasy in Digital Zion”). The former are simply looking to connect, while the latter want to create a public universe, where private lives no longer exist and everyone’s information is available to aggregate, archive, and sell. Social media can be useful, but, without a more defined ethic to govern their use of people’s data, they can also be harmful, tools wielded against us, robbing us of our privacy, altering our true identity, and jeopardizing our freedoms. Are we too-easily manipulated and transformed by tools that titillate and tease us while they play on our vanity for their own commercial and pecuniary interests? Is this what life is coming to under the sun?

Envoi
An Unseen Energy

An unseen energy pervades the air
this crisp, still winter morn, sustaining all
existence. Barren, sleeping trees stand tall
because of it; the day breaks bright and fair,
responding to its ancient power. The ground
holds firm, and oxygen in just the right
amount swirls in my lungs. The gathering light
of day reveals the splendor all around
me that, but for this presence everywhere,
would dissipate, dissolve, desist, and be
no more. No ear can hear, no eye can see
this fearful, gracious presence, but it’s there.
    The heart of faith alone can recognize
    what otherwise escapes both ears and eyes.

T. M. Moore