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The Modern Economic System

There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest - what we call investment - is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed on forbidding interest (or 'usury' as they called it), they could not foresee the joint stock company, and were only thinking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said. That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not. That is where we want the Christian economist. But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life.

- C. S. Lewis

Those stupid cell phones. (Instapundit)

Pajamas Media: reporting on the Secular Islam Summit. Video interviews here.

We are secular Muslims, and secular persons of Muslim societies. We are believers, doubters, and unbelievers, brought together by a great struggle, not between the West and Islam, but between the free and the unfree.

We affirm the inviolable freedom of the individual conscience. We believe in the equality of all human persons.

We insist upon the separation of religion from state and the observance of universal human rights.

We find traditions of liberty, rationality, and tolerance in the rich histories of pre-Islamic and Islamic societies. These values do not belong to the West or the East; they are the common moral heritage of humankind.....

We say to Muslim believers: there is a noble future for Islam as a personal faith, not a political doctrine;

to Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, Baha’is, and all members of non-Muslim faith communities: we stand with you as free and equal citizens;

and to nonbelievers: we defend your unqualified liberty to question and dissent.

Before any of us is a member of the Umma, the Body of Christ, or the Chosen People, we are all members of the community of conscience, the people who must chose for themselves.

VOM, Uzbekistan:

VOM sources report police burst into a church in Qarshi ("Karshy") on February 25, 2007, confiscated literature and demanded to know who was funding the church. Police also brought video cameras to video tape the worship service. When police started to film, Pastor Sergei Shandyvayev did not panic, but simply continued the worship service. After the service finished, the officers shut the doors and began to question the believers gathered there, especially asking why they had become Christians. Pastor Shandyvayev's church is not registered with the Uzbek government. The Christians expected to be summoned to court for a hearing. Pray God gives Christians in this area wisdom and protection as they face persecution. Pray they might even have opportunities to witness to police and court officers as they are questioned.

The Evangelical Outpost looks at morality and the market. Blessed Economist has also been talking about this a lot lately.

Gene Redlin with more on the fight against global warming gobbledygook.

Stephen Hawking

I've always had a sort of inexplicable liking for this guy, perhaps because of the heroic combination of handicap and genius. He just always seemed to me the right sort of scientist. Instapundit reports that he's receiving a free, zero-gravity ride out of Cape Canaveral.

Peter H. Diamandis, chief executive of Zero G, said that "the idea of giving the world's expert on gravity the opportunity to experience zero gravity" was irresistible.

Now there are a good many things which would not be worth bothering about if I were going to live only seventy years, but which I had better bother about very seriously if I am going to live for ever. Perhaps my bad temper or my jealousy are gradually getting worse - so gradually that the increase in seventy years will not be very noticeable. But it might be absolute hell in a million years: in fact, if Christianity is true, Hell is the precisely correct technical term for what it would be.

Tech Update:

• Google Reader is now handling my ravenous RSS needs: Newsgator just proved too slow. Make sure and check out the snappy keyboard shortcuts.
• I'm finding Amazon wish lists quite useful. It's a more streamlined way of keeping track of things than putting them in your "later" cart. And it goes a long way towards soothing that ungodly "I have to buy it right now" feeling.
• I finally got my other email account routed into Gmail. Well worth the 3 minutes.
  

The cost of kids: I'm not sure whether to be disgusted or depressed. Surely makes one appreciate the priceless heritage of sanity. (HT: Instapundit)

Verily, verily, Caedmon's is recording! Andrew Osenga has the wrap on the week, and the band has a new little splash site dedicated to the project.

I am actually listening to these songs we recorded. I haven’t done that since share the well,and before that long line of leavers. that was me, Cliff/the boring guy in the hat that can’t write songs or think very good.

(Thanks to Peter for the tip.)

Just in from LVMI:

Daycare providers allow unqualified parents to care for children!

Gee whiz.

I don't like the sound of this.

This is actually rather handy: a look at which Poliblogs (think: poliwogs,) use the fewest offensive expletives. The best part? You don't even have to know what they are!

I added a few of the best (lowest) scoring sites - from both the left and right - to my feed list.

(HT: Instapundit)

On forgiveness:

To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.
This is hard. It is perhaps not so hard to forgive a single great injury. But to forgive the incessant provocations of daily life - to keep on forgiving the bossy mother-in-law, the bullying husband, the nagging wife, the selfish daughter, the deceitful son - how can we do it? Only, I think, by remembering where we stand, by meaning our words when we say in our prayers each night 'Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us.' We are offered forgiveness on no other terms. To refuse it is to refuse God's mercy for ourselves. There is no hint of exceptions and God means what he says.

Making-Ripples has some comments and a roundup on the stock market and the state of Chinese banking.

Our economy and the economy of China are increasingly entwined, and the bright and shining Chinese economy is built on an appallingly unstable banking system.

Here's a cool tip via KP of The Christian Mind about searching faster in Firefox:

Preferrers of Firefox and the ESV may be interested in this tip on how to use your address bar as a command line to go directly to the ESV text.

1. Go to http://www.gnpcb.org/esv/.
2. Right-click in the search box and choose “Add a Keyword for this Search.”
3. Enter a Name of your choice and the Keyword “esv” into the box that appears.
4. Enter “esv” followed by a passage in the address bar to go to that passage.

(HT: ESV Bible Blog)

With features like this I wonder why it took me so long to switch from Internet Explorer!

Instead of using the site linked in the post, I headed over to Bible Gateway and rigged a few searches, using the version acronyms as the keywords. Pretty slick stuff.

This is a new one! (Via Steve Scott)

VOM, India:

Andra Pradesh: Pastor Goda Israel was missing after attending a prayer meeting on February 17, 2007. His family and church members reported his disappearance to the police, but they did not take any action. After three days, Pastor Israel's body was found in a Canal. Pastor Israel was a pastor for more than two churches. Pray God comforts his family, church members and also that the truth will be investigated and reported regarding his death.

Karnataka: There has been more violence against Christians in Karnataka. Police recently harassed believers demanding to know the location of the leader of a prayer ministry. The police alleged he was a terrorist from Sri Lanka. Police officers severely beat three Christians when they could not tell the Christian leader's location. Police gave them a strict warning and wanted them to turn the pastor in. Pray God will heal the injured believers as they receive treatment in a hospital. Ask for withdrawal of the accusation that the pastor is a terrorist and for God to open a way for this Christian leader to work peacefully in this area.

Orissa: Christians continue to face persecution in Eastern India. On February 22, 2007, radical Hindu forces demolished a church which was under construction in the Niladeri Bihar slum. Christians living in the slum are being intimidated and threatened by the radicals. Pray for protection and boldness as Christians in India face uncertain times.

Chhattisgarh: It has been brought to our attention that in last week's prayer update on India, only 30-35 Hindu extremists attacked a pastor's conference in Raipur, Chhattisgarh on February 2, 2007. The conference was attended by 80 delegates including four foreigners. The attackers stole two laptops, four mobile phones, three digital cameras and 15000-16000 rupees (about $350 US dollars). Thank you for your continued prayers for Indian Christians

Still watching the immigration issue: here's some interesting statistics that, if true, confirm some of my suspicions. (Hat Tip: PJM)

WORLD on the YouTube censorship case.

UPDATE: More nail-head-hitting commentary here.

From the latest National Geographic (March 07, p. 123) :

Primordial in appearance, the great hammerhead is actually one of evolution's most advanced sharks.

Hmmm!



Image courtesy of bsactravelclub.co.uk