Recent Viewpoints

Kerby Anderson Today is Labor Day. Although this day was set aside to honor trade and labor organizations, I believe it is a day when Christians can also consider how they view work and labor. The Bible has quite a bit to say about how we are to view work, and so I devote part of a chapter in my book, Making the Most of Your Money, to a biblical view of work. First, we are to work unto the Lord in…

Penna Dexter Who could miss the disturbing shift in how our society deals with gender confusion in young people? The consensus once was that it’s best to give children time for gender dysphoria to pass and — if it persists — to help them with their pain. Now medical professionals routinely agree with and affirm trans-identifying adolescents, allowing them to self-diagnose, and providing them with gender-bending drugs and surgeries. There are voices of caution and reason. The American College of…

Kerby Anderson Twenty years ago, a Democratic senator writing in the Washington Post criticized President George W. Bush for saying the US would do “whatever it took” to defend Taiwan. That senator is now our president. Joe Biden might have changed his mind since 2001. He certainly has changed his mind on other topics. China is different in 2021 than it was in 2001. Back then, the focus was on trying to bring China into the community of nations. Today…

Kerby Anderson Everyone has a bias because everyone has a worldview. But it is worth evaluating bias in others and in ourselves. Rob Jenkins provides an overview of certain forms of bias and provides examples of left-wing bias. He acknowledges that conservatives have bias, but finds that most of the examples of bias today come from one political viewpoint. Attention bias comes from choosing which information to prioritize. The example he uses focuses on the cries of “police brutality” that…

Kerby Anderson Yesterday I talked about envy and the irony of politicians using it to advance their progressive agenda. Today I would like to extend this discussion based on some of the insights from Anne Hendershott who writes about this in her essay and book. First, let’s distinguish the difference between greed and envy. In so many cases, people who are greedy may ruin their lives but not necessarily the lives of others. By contrast, envy can contaminate many more…

Kerby Anderson Years ago, I decided to put together a sermon that dealt with the subject of envy. I wasn’t sure I had ever heard a message on envy, even though it is considered one of the seven deadly sins. To be fair, I have heard messages on coveting, which is after all one of the Ten Commandments. Envy isn’t just a biblical subject. Envy is also a political subject. A quarter century ago, Doug Bandow (Cato Institute) wrote his…

Kerby Anderson American presidents often confront this painful lesson: They may have political plans but those plans often crash into political reality. This week was supposed to be the final orderly withdrawal of US troops and civilians from Afghanistan. Next month, Congress was to pass the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill. At least that was the plan. It is too early to tell how the debacle in Afghanistan will affect the Biden administration’s legislative goals. What is happening in Afghanistan might…

Penna Dexter The vaccine brought temporary relief from Covid anxiety. Now, as Covid’s Delta variant spreads, Americans — vaccinated and unvaccinated — have been shaken out of any comfort zone we thought we had attained. Breakthrough cases were supposed to be rare. So, it was jarring when it dawned on us that they’re not. Breakthrough cases were also said to be mild and not readily spread. But the Centers for Disease Control’s recent report on the Delta outbreak shows that…

Kerby Anderson A frequent phrase used these days is that we need “to trust the science.” But I have found that often “trust the science” really means “trust the model” which is not the same thing. Computer models are used to predict everything from the climate to the economy. Often, they are inaccurate. Asking legitimate questions about these models and their assumptions is appropriate and not “anti-science.” When I was in graduate school, many of us worked with professors who…

Kerby Anderson G.K. Chesterton once observed that, “When people stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing; they believe in anything.” Dennis Prager starts off with that quote to illustrate that nature has become a substitute god for many today. That’s not surprising. Many pagan religions had some form of nature worship. They worshipped the sun god, the moon god, or the goddess of fertility. Today there is a religious foundation to the environmental movement. We need to protect…

Kerby Anderson The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has issued its latest report and the media has dutifully raised the alarm level. The editors of the Wall Street Journal humorously described it this way: “The climate Apocalypse is nigh, humanity is to blame, and unless the world remakes the global economy, havoc and death are inevitable. Repent of your sins all ye who enter here.” They say that is only a mild overstatement of the media’s “fire-and-brimstone accounts” of this…