Too Much Middle Earth?
To coin a phrase. I could hardly believe my ears. My friend’s statement stunned me: he told me he had just read the four Tolkien novels for the tenth time.
Maybe he does it from force of hobbit; I don’t know. But this I do know: I could never read all four books ten times.
“Each new reading gives new insights.” he told me breathlessly, wiping his perspiring hands on his Gollum sweatshirt. “I have insights into Frodo and the orcs and Gandalf that have just made my soul flutter with excitement!”
Let me hasten to say that I have read the four novels and enjoyed them. In fact, I was the first in our family to bring them home and read them. I must confess, though, that I sometimes forgot who some of the characters were, or where the action (or lack of it) was taking place (or not taking place). I will also confess that I skipped all of the poems, songs, and excursions into endless genealogies. This probably explains why I never had any fluttering insights. I lost my way somewhere in the middle of the final war, and I was relieved when they stopped fighting and started cleaning up the shire.
But read all four books ten times?
My reply is similar to that of Thoreau when a Concord citizen asked him if he wanted to read the newspaper: “No. I read one once.”
I may miss several valuable insights by neglecting Frodo and his friends, but I’ll take my chances. Meanwhile, several shelves of great books are before me, and I feel strongly inclined to heed their call.
Care to join me?
EUTYCHUS X
Homosexuality Editorial
Your editorial “Homosexuality: Biblical Guidance Through a Moral Morass” (Apr. 18) surely fell short of a biblical standard. Scripture gives us every assurance that we can “Cast your cares upon Him, for He careth for you.”
How could you conclude that God will not remove a sin from our life if we give it to him! Homosexuality is sin in its ugliest form. Surely my God is able to overcome such a thing. Your article is the poorest example of God’s mighty power that I have ever read.
REV. THOMAS D. BAUDER
Union Grove Baptist Church
Union Grove. Wis.
To say that a homosexual cannot be cured from his/her condition by a conversion experience is to leave the back door open to all kinds of improper thinking. This sounds to me like excusing the poor “Christian” homosexual from truly seeking total deliverance by the power of the Holy Spirit. The article was interwoven with modern nonbiblical thinking, even though a weak attempt was made to quote Scripture.
P. FRED FOGLE
Delavan, Wis.
Let me first commend you on the sensitivity with which you approached the subject of homosexuality. I must admit it surprised me that you were as open-minded and understanding about the problem as you were! I’m sure this column will receive many letters of hostile criticism and I congratulate your courage.
But it seemed to me that what you said was a paradox. While you were willing to accept the pragmatic realities that gays are usually no more in control of their orientation than are righthanded people in control of their dexterity, you are unable to look at Scripture a second time to attempt to reconcile a biblical view of the problem with a pragmatic understanding of it. The implicit theme of the Scriptures throughout is that God is love, justice, and mercy in balance with each other. Justice does not bring condemnation to someone for behavior that is not competely within the range of human control, as you have admitted that homosexuality is. Love and mercy certainly do not condemn it either.
I believe you are naive to assume that most persons, even with God’s help, can be strong enough to reman celibate indefinitely. I believe it is up to the church to make provision for permanent homosexual commitments for our people who are caught in this double bind, instead of challenging them to do the unrealistic, the impossible, and indeed the unnatural.
JOHN W. HOWELL
Colgate Rochester/Bexley Hall/
Crozer Theological Seminary
Rochester. N.Y.
Let’s not be guilty of patting the sinner on the back and telling him his sin doesn’t matter as he draws ever closer to the gates of hell. Sin is sin and sin is heinous wherever, and in whatever form, it is found. Sin is antithetical to the righteousness of our God and his Christ. Let’s not minimize its ugliness for the sake of pseudoesthetics in human relations. “Rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith” (Titus 1:13).
K. L. RIDGE
Charlotte, Mich.
It is clear that homosexuality is one of the major issues that faces the church in these last years of the twentieth century. Unless the church can deal with its own sin in relation to homosexuality, it will be weaker in the twenty-first century, and untold numbers of gay men and women will go to hell—and it will be our fault.
JOHN EARLE HEDRICK
Mesquite, Tex.
Sane Writing
Thank you for publishing the article “No Return to Eden,” by Peter Wilkes (Apr. 4). It is the first sane piece of writing about the nuclear industry that I have seen in a Christian magazine. Other articles I have read in Christian publications too often start off saying that the nuclear industry is at fault and that we should avoid any further growth of it. Mr. Wilkes shows that with the proper controls, the nuclear industry is needed.
REV. JOHN STEPHENSON
Northwest Saskatchewan Territorial Mission
The Presbyterian Church in Canada
Buffalo Narrows, Sask.
Wilkes left certain widely held errors unchallenged when he sought to justify centralized agribusiness in the U.S. by asserting that the harvest “will go to feed a hungry world.” While it is true that the U.S. is a net exporter of food to Western Europe, and until recently. Russia, the truly hungry segment of the world actually receives less food from us than it exports to us in the form of such crops as coffee, sugar, and bananas. (These are grown on land that could otherwise produce badly needed food for the hungry in those nations.)
Only a fraction of our centralized industrial society is needed to fulfill human needs: most of it goes to fulfill our wants. This concentration of power is not only unnecessary, but also undesirable, since centralization gives sinful people the irresistible opportunity to oppress the weak, and the economic and military power to do so on a large scale.
DARRELL J. HARTWICK
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, Mass.
Unfortunate Artwork
I am disappointed and disturbed by the unfortunate artwork that accompanied Marvin Wilson’s perceptive article. “Christians and Jews: Competing for Converts?” (Mar. 21). Whatever it may have been intended to do, the key figure used in the artwork does not reflect the subject of the article or the author’s intent in writing it.
The Fagin-like figure in this illustration has appeared and reappeared with the most negative meaning possible in anti-Semitic literature in Germany, Russia, France, the Arab States, and the U.S. for close to a century. Its use here diminishes the value of the article. I am unable, because of this artwork, to share copies of the article with Jewish friends.
What this artwork may suggest to some belies your publication’s repeatedly expressed positive position on Jewish-evangelical relations.
BELDEN MENKUS
Middleville, N.J.
Tragic
Your proposal that conservative evangelicals should involve themselves in the Consultation on Church Union (“Selective Obedience Is Disobedience.” Editorial, Mar. 21) would result in a reversal of much of what true evangelicals stand for. It is not news that some who consider themselves evangelicals are following this sad road to unscriptural ecumenism. But that CHRISTIANITY TODAY should recommend it is tragic.
You say that this would display the “visible unity of the body of Christ.” By what definition of the body of Christ? Surely we cannot accept that one who denies his deity and other fundamentals is a true member of his body? Unity at that level does not exist, nor should it. “What fellowship hath light with darkness?” (2 Cor. 6:14). True believers should indeed recognize one another, but to meet together in a display of nonexistent unity with unbelievers would not only be inappropriate, but dishonest.
RICHARD WINCHELL
Wheaton. III.
Stands Out
I have just completed reading the March 21 issue of CHRISTIANITY TODAY, and I must congratulate you on a publication that stands out “above the crowd” for its clarity and informative content. I believe this is the first time I have actually read through every article in a magazine, only to find one more interesting and enlightening than the other!
Special note should be made of the article “Peddling the Power and the Promises.” by D. G. Kehl, and the information from the CT-Gallup Poll as presented by Walter Elwell. They are both powerful and dynamic articles which cut to the heart of the issues in a logical and concise manner. What a pleasure to read for information and enjoyment at the same time!
All in all, I must indeed express my gratitude to all associated with CHRISTIANITY TODAY for providing me with a realistic, religious view of the world as it is today from a Christian perspective.
SUSAN J. SHAW
Professional Business Women’s Association of Florida
Miami Beach. Fla.
