Pro Rege Papers

There is another prevalent view today that is seriously in error. Along with Pelagianism this philosophy also attempts to give man an excuse for not trusting God. The idea: subjective realism.

Subjective realism says that there are no absolutes. There is no absolute law, no absolute values, no absolute morals, etc. In other words, standards are in the eye of the beholder.

This leads to all kinds of abuse by the majority. The majority decides what is right and wrong. That’s why pure democracies are not Biblical or fair.

People can also take this and say that you can’t have any real truth. You just look at things and make conclusions, but nothing is really the truth. Therefore you can do whatever you want, believe whatever you want, and live however you want.

The root of this philosophy is destructive to the foundation of any culture, and it is becoming more and more influential.

There is a movie out in theaters this week, and it’s called The Wild. This film comes as another attempt by Hollywood in recent years to try to create a funny, family-oriented film. Like usual, they have not succeeded.

Hollywood’s concept of humor is very limited. To them, the only things that are funny are body functions and bathroom humor. Scriptwriters can’t think beyond those things for some reason. Hollywood has lost the sense of humor that makes things truly funny, and creates such comedians as Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Cosby, Victor Borge, and to some extent, Dave Barry.

To me, humor basically consists of making people think about something in a way that they have not thought of it before. It takes something ordinary, and makes it different or emphasizes a part of it that thing that you have not thought of before.

A recent, good example of this is the recent movie Hoodwinked. This film, produced by an obscure company, and directed by a stand-up comedian; takes the simple, well-known story of Little Red Riding Hood, and changes it and develops it into a hilarious tale. The director wanted to produce something that went against the trend of bathroom humor, and stood out as truly funny. It doesn’t have all the gaudy effects of overdone animation, but manipulates the scenes to convey the well-designed plot line.

Go see this movie.

Hollywood needs to come out of its bubble and realize what real humor is, what real plots are, and essentially what a real movie is.

Now there’s a touchy subject. Welfare was introduced in the ’30s by FDR. The idea was that poverty would disappear in America by just throwing money at it. By taxing the rest of the country, they could redistribute the wealth to the poor. Despite the good intentions, the program does not work well. Poverty is still around, people are staying poor, and jobs are still lost. And no, the solution is not to throw more money at the system.

The word “welfare” only means (in this sense) the aiding of poor or unemployed citizens. It doesn’t mean necessarily that the government administers that aid. In older times, that’s what welfare meant: the aiding of private citizens by other private citizens, or groups of them. This usually worked very well, until you had a situation like the Great Depression where practically everyone was poor. The sources of aid that had done the job in previous situations were no longer available, or just exhausted. In this case, I think it is all right for a government to step in and aid its citizens, using money that has been saved up for such emergencies. That’s another example of what I spoke about before with regards to socialism being appropriate in emergencies. The problem occurs when the government continues to assume its role as the big daddy of everyone after the emergency has passed. It doesn’t work, and there are many problems that have come up, are coming up, and many more that likely will come up.

Here are a few:

The welfare agents don’t know the private situations and backgrounds of the people they serve. They can’t understand each personal case because they usually aren’t from the area. Thus, they can be deceived by some shady people into giving money away.

The welfare system puts an extra, unneeded burden on the people.

Welfare also promotes a kind of laziness, and unwillingness to work or get out of the present situation. Instead of the alcoholic working for his liquor, the government now pays for it with the money of hardworking people. That makes sense. People who would otherwise work hard to get out of poverty now don’t have as much of an impetus to do so. “There’s time, Uncle Sam will pay for it.” You see the effect in New Orleans. I’m not saying that all poor people are a bunch of lazy slouches who sit around watching TV, and sipping beer. What I am saying is that welfare is not good for getting people out of poverty, off the rolls, and into productive roles in society. It does not accomplish its primary function of eliminating poverty.

As I said in my second paragraph, welfare used to be distributed by private citizens who understood the needs of the particular people (and believe it or not, their needs do not begin and end with money). The voluntary organizations also helped a great deal in fulfilling the need of the poor and unemployed.

There are many stories of people who got off welfare and speak of it as an addiction. They say that welfare doesn’t help the people; it only compounds the problem. I tend to agree. People need other things besides money.

Okay, so the justice system in California still works and has a little integrity. I just found out that the California Supreme Court overruled an Alameda judge’s decision to ban the high school exit exam. The decision will reinstate an exit exam that 1/10 of the California students couldn’t pass on the first try. However, the decision is being appealed.

The people who are against the test say that it discriminates against students who are learning English or are poor. But the thing is; if they don’t know English, then they should learn it before they are awarded a diploma. If you don’t know English, you’re not going to get very far in this country. (By the way, that’s a good thing) You should not give a Hispanic student some false sense of security by handing him a high school diploma, if that diploma doesn’t mean anything. You are failing a student if you just rush him through the grades, and then send him off to college with a good luck wish.

All that a high school diploma means right now is that you spent 12 years of your life in classroom, not that you actually learned anything. I’m not saying that you didn’t learn anything, just that there’s no way to know. Students today cannot fail a course; it’s impossible. That’s bad.

If students fail the test or a course, they should study hard, not sue the state. Even if that means staying in a grade for a longer period of time than a year. That’s right, I actually said that. Those things used to happen in this country when there was accountability, unlike today.

Again, we need to restore meaning to a high school diploma. We need to get back to the old days when an 8^th grade education was enough to get by in life. Right now, the 8^th grade exit exam would probably not be passed by most of our seniors. That needs to change. A high school diploma used to be respected. These people who are against the test are against the students, not for them.

There is a widely accepted viewpoint among secularists (and some “Christians” too) that in my opinion has its roots in Pelagianism. It is related to the sociopath, psychopath, and other interesting trail theories. The idea basically says that man’s sin is a result of his environment, or the bad influence of society. In other words, you’re not responsible for you’re actions; it was your bad childhood, etc.

Pelagius was a 4^th century heretic who said that sin is not inherited from Adam, as traditional Christianity taught, but that it is a result of the bad influence of people around you. Augustine was one of the major opponents of Pelagius, and succeeded in showing the church the error of that viewpoint from the Bible. The Bible clearly teaches inheritance of sin and total depravity. (See 1 Cor. 15:22, Gen. 6:5, and many more)

This viewpoint has influenced many things, including the public school system. The mentality behind the institution of public schools was that by forcibly putting a child into a “good” setting, they could change the child and create a perfect world without sin. Change the environment, and you’ll change the kid. It obviously didn’t turn out that way. (Ever heard of Columbine?)

This idea plainly contradicts the doctrine of total depravity that is proven by the second. Which one of us can truly say honestly without his conscience being killed that he does not sin? Even when you isolate a child with no outside, “corrupting” influence, he will still be a sinner when you look at him the next time. Toddlers disobey their parents when they don’t even understand what that means. The idea of a utopian society is completely faulty.

Many of the frivolous lawsuits, murderer defenses, and criminal excuses today come from this mentality of, “I’m not responsible,” and, “It was the neighborhood I grew up in.” Hence, criminals are pardoned, murderers declared insane, and bad people excused. Those pleas are just convenient excuses invented by modern man in rebellion against God.

Sin comes at birth from Adam as a characteristic of being human. If you’re not sinful, you’re not human; that’s the sad truth for man since the fall. There’s only one way out of the judgment of God for sin, and that’s through Christ.

In California on May 12, a judge recently rejected a high school exit exam that is required for 12^th graders too graduate. There have been many challenges to this program since its conception by Jack O’Connell, the Superintendent of Public Instruction. He drafted this requirement so that public schools (in my opinion across the country) could regain their lost reputation as credible academic institutions among the world. But at its first year of operation, it was shot down.

Here is the requirement and a summary of the test from the Los Angeles Times:

This year’s 12th-graders were the first class to face the testing requirement, which includes a section of eighth-grade math and another of ninth- and 10th-grade English. Students are required to answer little more than half of the questions correctly and can take the test multiple times. Students with learning disabilities were exempted from the test.

This apparently was too much for some parents to handle their kids going through. A suit was filed against the state by Arturo Gonzalez. The basic complaint against the test is that it discriminates against poor and minority kids who apparently can’t study.

The argument is decimated by many holes. The whole purpose of the test is to restore meaning a high school diploma. These people make it seem like everyone is supposed pass the test. If it’s a test, (and an easy one at that) then some students will fail. I sympathize, but they shouldn’t ruin everyone else’s reputation just because they didn’t pass. The whole point of the exam is to filter out those who aren’t as educational from those who are. If everyone passes, the test is irrelevant.

There are many, many stories of poor people who succeeded out of tough situations to rise in the academic realm. One thing distinguishes them: they studied fervently. If the “poor, minority, unprivileged students” wanted to succeed in passing high school and moving on with their life, they would study. It’s not like the test is impossible.

It’s time to restore the dignity of a high school education. (Or an 8^th grade education for that matter) The way to do that is to raise standards of graduation.

With the recent immigration conflict, it’s good to know that we’re not alone in immigration troubles. Countries in Europe and the West generally are experiencing an influx of illegal aliens from the third world.

In Europe particularly, Muslims are coming in from the Middle East and beginning to te the Continent. The lack of motivation, morals, and conviction of secular Europeans is being replaced by the radical determination and of Muslims. Muslims, who have the solidarity of a radical religion, are overwhelming Europeans, who don’t have any solid foundation to stand on. The secular populations of Europe are shrinking with the decreased emphasis on family. But Muslims, who believe in a family and are against abortion and the like, are slowly gaining the upper hand in the population. It’s scary to think what could happen in the democratic nations of Europe if Islam gets in control. They don’t realize that the mindset of Muslims is completely opposed to Western values.

Another interesting thing, however; is that nobody seems to ask the question, “Why do we have the huge influx of immigrants, but the other nations of the world don’t?” I mean, you don’t see people lining up to emigrate to Cuba, China, or Iran. You just don’t. Why? It’s because they are opposed to freedom, and ultimately, because they have rejected Christianity. Which nations have the problem with illegal aliens? The ones that are historically Christian. These countries tend to be wealthier and more encouraging toward freedom. Why? It’s because Christianity urges people to move forward, to work hard in this life, to explore God’s creation, to fill the earth and multiply, etc. (Ever heard of the Protestant work ethic?) The Bush administration does not understand that without a Christian basis, democracy does not, and will not work.

Christianity is necessary for a Western culture’s survival. Why? It’s because Christianity gave rise to Western culture. Without the values that Christianity brings, many of our institutions would fall. Marriage requires commitment. Business requires honesty and hard work. Democracy and free governments require an equal measure of honesty along with commitment, morals, and good will. The nations that don’t have these things have lost, or don’t have a Christian foundation in society.

We didn’t get to be the most powerful nation in the world for no reason.