Dear visionaries,
Morning, everybody. How do?
Just a quick comment on John’s comment that a “local private college system” has been in essence removed from the tax rolls. Not quite true. If he is referring to the college I think he is, part of the reason we organized as a trust instead of a tax-exempt corporation has been demonstrated on this list time and again. Whenever the government allows an entity to keep its own money, this is not a gift from the government — unless there is an a priori assumption that the government owns everything, and we are all just renters. Is that the assumption here? If I am being taxed at a rate of thirty percent, is the government giving a gift to me of the remaining seventy percent? This simple distinction is beyond most progressives (who like coercion and who therefore tend to public service), and because we wanted to remain as free of government interference and entanglements as we could, we at New St. Andrews took the route we did.
Robert echoed John’s encomium on democracy and America, saying that “education” that was “free, open, public” and which provides “equal opportunity instruction” is “not something we should criticize.” Shut up with the criticism, for this is an open and free democracy! Where everyone has the right to express their opinion! And criticize whatever they wan.. . wait a minute.
On our sidebar topless debate, Stuart admonishes me for saying that behind every topless woman this last summer stood an abdicating, unloving father. He then reminds me that Jesus said, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” The quotation is from Matthew 7, and Jesus goes on to say that the reason for this is that you will be judged by the same standard you apply to others. He is teaching against hypocrisy and double standards — do not judge others for stealing when you are a thief, for example. He says that the judgment with which you judge you shall be judged. That He is not prohibiting discernment is plain from His teaching just a few verses down when He warns against false prophets, which come in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravening wolves. By their fruits you will know them, He says (v. 16). When a topless young women is insecure enough to behave in this way, I do not place the primary responsibility on the city council — “why did we not have a law?” The primary responsibility is with the parents, who obviously (by their fruits you will know them) did not love and care for their daughter enough to bring her up to respect herself and others.
“Apologetics in the Void” are repostings from an on-going electronic discussion and debate I had some time ago with members of our local community, whose names I have changed. The list serve is called Vision 20/20, and hence the name “visionaries.” Reading just these posts probably feels like listening to one half of a phone conversation, but I don’t feel at liberty to publish what others have written. But I have been editing these posts (lightly) with intelligibility in mind.