*19 'We are all marked men and women today.'
Catholic Bishop Matthew Kukah of Sokoto, Nigeria, at the funeral Mass of recently murdered seminarian Michael Nnadi. Kuka lashed out at Resident Muhahhadu Buhari for failing to protect Christians from Islamist terror, saying the Muslim-majority north has become 'one large graveyard, a valley of dry bone, the nastiest and the most brutish part of our dear country'.
*38 While Washington fiddles (ukraine's Donbass region faces life-and-death fallout over impeachment.
A column of Russian trucks rolled to the border with Ukraine on Feb, 5 as US senators in Washington prepared to vote on whether to remove from office president Donald Trump. the Russian convoy carried ammunition, weapons, and military equipment - all to reinforce Russian-backed rebels and Russian units that in 2014 took control of eastern Ukraine.
Ukrainian Defense Ministry officials report the trucks crossed into the Eastern European nation, which gained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, near the village of Diakove in Luhansk. Much of Luhansk and Donetsk, a region known as Donvbass, essentially has become Russian territory with Ukraine's military forced to hold a 280-mile front line for six years.
Moscow has tested some of its latest weaponry in Donbass, while Ukraine's army relies on Soviet-era aircraft and outdated weapons. A January video clip showed one Ukranian unit using the M1910 maxim machine gun, a one-revolutionary weapon used in Imperial Russia before World War I.
That disparity is the forgotten centerpiece of Trump's controversial decision last year to withhold $400 million in military aid from Ukraine, T's willingness to condition that aid to Ukraine investigating his domestic political opponents threatened Ukraine's security. Democrats, by leaping to open an unbounded campaign to remove Trump. also showed their willingness to risk Ukraine's future.
Noone looking seriously at the Russian threat can cheer the Democrats' hapless conduct of impeachment proceedings. Nor can anyone applaud Trump's victory lap once the Senate acquitted him on Feb 5 - within hours of fresh Russian armaments rolling into Ukraine.
Ukraine lost much during the five-month Washington debacle. The Russian convoy signals that momentum toward a bilateral pullout from Donbass -spearheaded by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zenlensky - has ended. republicans and Democrats' bipartisan effort to maintain sanctions and diplomatic pressure on Russian may also be finished. Zelensky emerges from the impeachment melodrama a weaker leader, even though he was elected in a landslide last year. Trump and his lawyers have seen to that, touting Ukraine as a bad actor who let the United States down.
This emboldens Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose expansionist aims extend into other former Soviet states. Putin is likely to redouble efforts to control Ukraine and extend the Kremlin's reach into Europe.
Ukrainians already have paid a high price for Russian occupation in Donbass. More than 14,000 have died in the conflict. The region's economy has never recovered. To cash a monthly check, elderly pensioners take buses to cities outside the zone, as no banks have reopened since 2014. Authorities have outlawed non-orthodox religious groups, forcibly closing churches ,sizing property and making many religious activities illegal. 'You cannot serve a soup kitchen. you cnnot spread o receive humanitarian aid. There is no place to complain. There is no one to stand for them', sid mission Eurasia President Sergey Rakhuba.
1990 and 2020 (Examining how public opinion on abortion has changed in the last 30 years by Marvin Olasky)
*48 The printed signs they carried:
'Life is Winning'.
'Pro-Life is Pro-Woman'.
'Love them both'
'Choose love, choose Life'.
'We are the pro-Life generation'.
'Pro Life'.
'We are the pro-Life Generation'.
'Pro-freedom, Pro-life'.
'Babies lives matter'.
'I regret My Abortion'.
The handwritten signs they waved:
'She can have her baby and her dreams too'.
'I am a lifeguard: I believe in guarding all life'.
'Pregnancy is not a health problem'.
'human rights begin in the womb'.
'I was 16 scared and pregnant, but her life mattered too'.
'Doctor Said Abort. Parents Said No. I Love My Life'.
The crowd at the 47th annual march for Life on Jan. 24 was huge -100,000 was a reasonable estimate - and young. Thousands of students from Christian schools came wearing coats and beanies of many colors: blue, orange, black, and checkerboard. The march i attended in 1990 was smaller and older.
That year president George H.W. Bush phoned the march and offered abstract niceties. This year Donald Trump became the first president to speak in person at a march. he gave a passionate speech emphasizing his administration's pro-life successes, including the confirmation of '187 federal judges who apply the Constitution as written, including two phenomenal Supreme Court justices'.
Trump concluded with an'i love you all', and many in the crowd yelled, 'We love you back' or 'We love you, Donald'. it was a long way from his 1999 statement, 'I am pro-choice in every respect'. for the pro-life movement, 2020 is a long way from 1990, when abortions in the United States peaked at 1.6 million per year, and from 1995, when 56% of Americans called themselves 'pro-choice' (and only 33% said they were pro-life.) The number of abortions has fallen by almost half during the past 3 decades. The viewpoint split now, according to Gallup polling, is 46% 'pro choice (and 49 % pro-life. A May 2019 poll showed 38% of Americans favoring legal abortion in all or most circumstances, and 60% wanting it illegal in all or almost all circumstances.
*51 ...meanwhile, many ardent abortion advocates are no longer chasing the middle ground with the 'safe, legal, and rare' mantra of the 1990s. with increasing shamelessness they are ordering women to 'shout your abortion!'
and last month President Trump didn't stay in the oval office, at a safe mile away from the march for Life. He not only said all the right words and listed his baby-saving executive orders, but recognized the compassion that characterizes most of the pro-life movement:
'You stand for each and every day.
you provide housing, education, jobs, and medical care to the women you serve.
You find loving families for children in need of forever home.
You host baby showers for expecting moms.
you make - you just make it your life's mission to help spread God's grace.'
*70 NOT-SO-GREAT MOMENTS IN HISTORY The New Jersey schools turn to LGBTQ promotion instead of teaching important lessons about the past.
Starting in September, New jersey public schools will be teaching children in grades 5,6,8,10 and 12 about the great historical contributions of LGBTQ people to united States history.
What are these great historical contributions, you ask? Well, for example. that Barbra 'Babs' Siperstein was the first transgender person to serve on the Democratic national Committee. yes, it's true! you may have lived your whole life in deplorable ignorance, but your children will never again be deprived of this knowledge.
Nor that Siperstein's name is on legislation allowing trans people to change their birth certificates. (Which, come to think of it, sounds a lot like changing the past, a thing we once took a dim view of when Stalin air-brushed Leon Trotsky and Lev Damenev from photos of Lenin's speech at Sverdlov Square.)
Don't look for much detail about Lenin or Stalin in the new new jersey school curricula - or perhaps even about Washington crossing the Delaware. I mean, something will have to be sacrificed from the syllabus to make room for 'Babs'. Children's textbooks can only be so big.
The Garden State joins Illinois, California and Colorado in mandating that our pedagogical institutions henceforth teach the social, political, and economic contributions of men who like to have sex with me, women who like to have sex with women, folks who like to swing both ways, and those who have breasts and penises surgically removed or installed.
For myself, i struggle to see the relevance of what individuals do in their bedrooms to their accomplishments in the fields of management, finance, real estate, marketing, and civil engineering. Is the invention of a light bulb any more to be celebrated because it is made my someone who checks'gender-queer' on government forms.
Well, if that's how it is, then i say we go all the way and pass laws ensuring that let-handed people get their due acknowledgment.also, what are the great achievements of freemasons? Or freckled citizens? or redheads? Or tobacconists? or aficionadoes of fly fishing? Or makers of reflective orange street cones?
and when the pendulum has swung its furthest from priggish morality toward sexual 'liberation', let us update new jersey's educational materials to include the category of pedophile, that last of all civil rights victims. We'll rehabilitate tarnished British author Oscar Wilde, who pleaded heroically at his 1895 trial on charges of 'gross indecency':
The love that dare not spake its name' in this century is such a great affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and Jonathan, such as Plato made the very basis of his philosophy, and such as you find in the sonnets of Michelangelo and Shakespeare. it is that deep spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect. It dictates and pervades great works of art. ...it is in this century misunderstood, so much misunderstood that it may be described as 'the love that dare not speak its name', and on account of it I am place where I am now.
Beautiful sentiments, eh? so your children will be made to think, especially if they hear it in the fifth grade, then are told again in sixth grade, and are reinforced in the opinion in the eighth grade, 10th, 12th.. in vain you console yourself that only 'History will be infected; Teachers of math, music and science will be tutored by curriculum coaches to make their own disciplines more 'inclusive'.
Oscar Wilde is wrong about David and Jonathan, of course. and Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias says that before his untimely death, Wilde asked a friend and fellow pederast, (def- sex with a minor) says that before his untimely death, Wilde asked a friend and fellow pederast, 'In loving one of those boys, did you ever love any one of them for themselves? the friend replied, 'No, I never did'. Wilde said, 'Neither did I'.
I dare say you won't find that in a textbook in a high school in New Jersey.
*72 Misplaced blame - using 1619 for propaganda in 2020
As black history month concludes let's not forget the biggest historical gambit of the past year, the '1619 project' of The new York Times. Princeton historian Allen Guelzo's use of semicolons that he's an academic who normally doesn't scream.
Guelzo and many other scholars are complaining about the 1619 project, named after the tragic year slaves from Africa first arrived in Virginia. The project teaches that American's 18th -century founders fought a revolution 'to ensure that slavery would continue'. the project, in its own words, shows slavery was part of the brutality of American capitalism...low-road capitalism...winner-take-all capitalism...racist capitalism'.
as if there's not only enough hate-America teaching in public schools, some educators are jumping on this crooked-wheel bandwagon. Chicago public Schools announced that each of its high schools will receive 200-400 copies of the Times' glossy 1619 project publication, whereby students will learn that america relishes not only modernity and democracy but also 'barbarism...cruelty...totalitarianism'.
some backstory on the use of such loaded terms in a newspaper that once used understated prose: The Times has figured out a way to have both the appearance of moral principle and the accretion
( def - gradual external addition) of financial principal. while its editors and writers rage, rage against the Trump machine, the newspaper's decisive move further to the political left has won it many new readers and millions of dollars. the Times had already lost most of its conservative subscribers, so it alienated few as it picked up numerous Trump-haters.
last month prominent historians James McPherson, Gordon wood, Sean Wilentz, Victoria Bynum and James Oakes charged that the 1619 Project reflects'a displacement of historical understanding by ideology'. (def - the body of doctrine, myth, belief, etc., that guides an individual, social movement, institution, class or large group.) the NYT turned down their request for corrections. these and other liberal or moderate historians recognize the evil of slavery but stand against attempts to minimize not only its horror but its continuing effects.
Allen Guelzo's 2012 book Fateful Lightning: a New History of the Civil War &Reconstruction is a thoughtful account of the war and is aftermath, so i value his judgment: 'The 1619 project is not history: it is polemic,
(def - a controversial argument, as one against some opinion, doctrine, etc. ; a person who argues in opposition to another ; controversialist )
born in the imaginations of those whose primary target is capitalism itself and who hope to tarnish capitalism by associating it with slavery.
Guelzo said the NYT effort views 'slavery not as a blemish that the Founders grudgingly tolerated with the understanding that it must soon evaporate, but as the prize that the Constitution went out of its way to secure and protect. The times presents slavery not as a regrettable chapter in the distant past, but as the living, breathing pattern upon which all american social life is based, world without end'.
That's no exaggeration. The 1619 project is a case study in how, to a hammer, everything looks like a nail: 'Why doesn't the united States have universal health care? The answer begins with policies enacted after the Civil War. ...Slavery gave America a fear of black people and a taste for violent punishment. both still define our prison system. ...The sugar that saturates the American diet has a barbaric history as the 'white gold' that fueled slavery. ...What does a traffic jam in Atlanta have to do with segregation? Quite alot'.
So, given the many reasons we are disunited concerning health insurance, is the biggest one white fear that 'fee and healthy African-Americans would upend the racial hierarchy'? yes, we need criminal justice reform , but is the main problem that 'a presumption of danger and criminality still follows black people everywhere'?
Since my own Ph.D. is in american studies and I've written half a dozen american history books, i feel able to weigh in on this. seems to me we're seeing at NYT attempt to squeegee not only the present but the past as well, and drip what remains down the captive throats of teenagers forced to study a bigoted high-school curriculum.
Monday, February 24, 2020
Friday, February 21, 2020
2.21.2020 Christian Pro-Family Governments? (Old and New Lessons from Europe by Allan C. Carlson in Touchstone: a Journal of Mere Christianity (March/April 2020)
*31 Christian pro-Family Governments?
Old & New Lessons from Europe by Allan C. Carlson
As the catastrophic Second World War drew to a close in 1945, Christian politicians looked for ways to rebuild Western Christian civilization on the material and moral ruins of European states had been ruled by fascist or Nazi governments or conquerors during the prior ten years. sometimes by election, sometimes by military defeat, democracy had been repudiated. So, too, had the economic regime of classical liberalism resting on notions of contracts and unfettered competition, which had contributed to the disorders of the early twentieth century. and now, the Red Army was pouring into Eastern Europe - and perhaps beyond.
how might things be put back together?
Who might the extreme inequalities, recurrent depressions and social disruptions seemingly inherent to liberal capitalism be tempered?
who might the retreat from marriage and rapidly falling fertility be countered?
How might democracy be rebuild within a compelling moral framework?
Christian Democracy
An answer would be found in Christian Democracy. Its origins reached back, among Roman Catholics, to the Center party of old Germany, launched in 1858. Under the influence of Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler, the bishop of Mainz, this vision of social Catholicism rejected a 'capitalist absolutism' that threatened family life. It endorsed Christian labor associations that would shorten work days, deliver family-sustaining wages to fathers, and prohibit the labor of mothers and children in factories and mines. such ideas would help to frame the great Catholic social encyclicals Rerum Novarum and Quadragesimo Anno.
Among Protestants, similar goals animated the Anti-Revolutionary party of the Netherlands, founded by Reformed pastor ABRAHAM KUYPER in 1879.j The group's
*32 name reflected a fierce opposition to what Kuyper called the 'anti-Christian world power' of the French Revolution and its curious spawn: both socialism and atomistic capitalism, which shared a hostility toward Christian family life. Accordingly, like the Roman Catholics, these Dutch Protestants emphasized the protection of Christian marriages and homes from the anti-family incentives inherent in both forms of industrialism. For example, in a diatribe from exactly 150 years ago, pastor Kuyper denounced the 'gigantic merchants', the Walmarts or Amazon.coms of his day:
'(In the industrial order) no longer should each baby drink warm milk from the breast of its own mother; we should have some tepid mixture prepared for all babies collectively. no longer should each child have a place to play at home by its mother; all should go to a common nursery school.
Coming closer to our time: during the early 1940s, Christian Democratic writers such as Emmanuel Mournier, Etienne Gilson, and Etienne Bourne found new language to energize a radical Christian party to battle the inequalities and corruptions infecting modern European life, a 'hard' party, a party worthy of Christ. They denounced Communism for its materialism, its collectivization of all property,and its hostility toward revealed religion. They also rejected the atomism of 'bourgeois liberalism' for its 'indifference toward basic institutions such as the family'. Writing in Switzerland, economist Wilhelm Roepke urged that a rebuild Europe should rest on 'the natural solidarity of small groups, above all, the family'.
And so it happened...for about 20 years. Christian Democratic parties came to power in France, the Netherlands, Italy, and West Germany. These governments laid out the spiritual and political conditions that enabled a rapid, indeed, almost miraculous, economic recovery in Europe. They also shaped welfare states that were broadly supportive of traditional families - ones with fathers earning a 'family wage', mothers able to be at home full-time, and a relative abundance of children. Favored policies included child allowances, tax breaks for married couples, subsidies for family housing , and the mandatory training of schoolchildren in home economics: for the girls, sewing, cooking, and childcare; for the boys CARPENTRY, METAL WORK, and SIMPLE MECHANICS. and after 70 years of steady fertility decline,western European nations had marriage-booms and baby-booms of their own.
Western Entropy, Eastern Energy
So, what happened? Why did the Christian Democratic vision falter after 1965? In secular language: moral entropy. (def- a process of degradation or running down or a trend to disorder; CHAOS, DISORGANIZATION, RANDOMNESS) In Christian terms: Original Sin. The youthful energy and sense of positive Christian policy activism - dominant in the 1940s and 1950s - dissipated. recent achievements resting on religious belief and discipline, were taken for granted. Corruption crept in, most notably in Italy. By the late 1960s, the Christian Democratic parties of western Europe were - at best -pragmatic, bureaucratic, self-satisfied defenders of the status quo. They might have found ways to convey the excitement and heroism of their project to the next generation, but did not.
Principled Christian criticisms of the excesses of atomistic liberalism and capitalism disappeared. So when a new crisis of values hit the European lands in the late 1960s - often called there 'The Spirit of '68' - the Christian Democrats were stodgy, having become the prematurely old and discredited guardians of a new materialism. As a surging sexual-left then challenged the Christian family, the Christian Democratic parties caved in -first on contraception, then on abortion, and finally on marriage itself. By the key year 2000, the so-called 'Swedish model' had come to dominate the social policies of the European Union: the full deconstruction of marriage; the criminalization of the 'family wage' principle: state-financed attacks on one-flesh unions and natural human fertility; and the indoctrination of children into a new sexual paganism. Family dissolution and fertility decline returned - with a vengeance.
However, as Christian Democracy in Western Europe lost its focus and its motivating faith, it would find new energy in the East, among the nations that had shaken off the Communist tyranny in 1989-1991. At first, liberal parties did especially well in their elections, as Eastern Europeans yearned to obtain the liberties long denied them. Within a few years, though, they learned that the liberalism
*33 they had just imported from the West was not one of tolerance, harmony and moral order. Instead, it was the twisted version derived from the sexual revolution of the late 1960s: the liberalism of hedonism and self-actualization. it had quickly produced devastating effects on family life: soaring divorce rates; tumbling marriage rates and record low fertility.
So East Europeans eventually turned to christian Democracy for policy responses - in a harder version, though, one conditioned by sustained conflict with the partisans of the sexual revolution, both regionally and globally. accordingly, the focus this time has been much more directly on the family. for example, Christian Democratic parliamentarians from Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Poland, Lithuania, and Estonia met in 2005 and issued their 'Family First Declaration,' pledging:
'We will coordinate our efforts on behalf of the natural family, marriage and the intrinsic value of each human life so that the future Europe is Not associated any longer with the culture of death, institutionalized egoism,and population decline, but with the preservation of religious, ethical and cultural values that enhance virtuous life.
Fidesz In Hungary
The most successful of these political movements, though, have not used the 'Christian Democratic' label, partly, it seems, to avoid confusion with the compromised parties of the West. in Hungary,for example, the Christian, pro-family party is called Fidesz. Led by Viktor Orban, a convert to Calvinism, this party has advanced a Christian family policy, designed to support more and earlier marriages and to enable a rise in the nation's birthrate. With this vision front and center, Fidesz won huge electoral victories in 2010, 2014, and again in 2018, including constitutional supermajoriites. The party has since turned Hungary and the European Union upside down-to the consternation of the moral and sexual revolutionaries in Brussels.
Indeed, in a recent speech, one of Orban's colleagues -Katalin Novak, Minister for State for Family and Youth - opened with a PowerPoint image showing the then-current prime ministers of Germany, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Sweden. they shared one trait: all were without children. She then showed an image of the ministers (or cabinet member) serving om Hungary's current Fidesz government: all were married and all had children, an average of over three. She concluded: 'This is the principle difference between Hungary and the rest of the Europena Union.
Orban is commonly denounced in the Western media for his response to Europe's refugee crisis of 2015: he successfully put up a fence - and offered a reason. Orban reported that while Brussels has looked to Islamic immigrants as a solution to Europe's population decline, Hungary has taken a different course: by shaping 'a FAMILY POLICY WHICH ENCOURAGES THE BIRTH OF CHILDREN' so that playgrounds will 'echo with the happy cries of children' rather than with police sirens, and by RENEWING OURSELVES SPIRITUALLY'. He continued: 'HUNGARY WILL PROTECT ITS FAMILIES AT ALL COSTS, regardless of the opposition that may come from Brussels.'This restoration of what he calls 'natural fertility' is not just One national cause, but rather 'THE NATIONAL CAUSE...AND IT IS ALSO A EUROPEAN CAUSE; NOT JUST ONE EUROPEAN CAUSE AMONG MANY, BUT T H E EUROPEAN CAUSE.
Specifically, over the last decade, the Fidesz government in Hungary has implemented an amazing array of policies TO ENCOURAGE MARRIAGE AND FERTILITY: MASSIVE TAX RELIEF (most recently, stipulating that mothers of 4 or more children are exempted from income taxes For Life);
the forgiveness of student loan debt through the birth of children;
large subsidies for the purchase of a family home;
generous support for early childcare,including allowances for full-time parental care; and
marriage and birth bonuses.
These new programs represent a hefty 4% of Hungary's gross domestic product. (THE AMERICAN EQUIVALENT WOULD BE ANEW EXPENDITURE EACH YEAR OF A STAGGERING $800 BILLION IN DIRECT SUPPORT OF NATURAL MARRIAGE AND CHILDREN - more than the Pentagon receives!
*34 This is the new language and the fresh policy agenda o a Social Conservatism emerging in Europe within the social and moral vacuum left by the failure of both Communism and self-actualizing liberalism.
Law &Justice in Poland
A similar transformation has begun in POLAND, where the LAW AND JUSTICE PARTY is also pursuing a genuine Christian family policy. founded nearly two decades ago by the twin brothers Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Law and justice ruled the country in the early 2000s, with Lech elected president in 2005. Following his death in an air crash in 2010, his brother guided the party back into power in 2015. Law and Justice FAVORS MORAL LIMITS JON PRIVATE CORPORATIONS (some call it 'Poland capitalism'), SUBSIDIES FOR FAMILY FARMERS, and FIXING 'NATION AND FAMILY' as its guiding economic, social, and cultural values.The party FAVORS STRICT PROHIBITIONS ON ABORTION AND OPPOSES EUTHANASIA, IN VITRO FERTILIZATION, and THE WHOLE LGBT AGENDA, INCLUDING CIVIL PARTNERSHIPS. as Kaczynski explained in a recent speech, 'This danger is an attack on the family, and an attack conducted in the worst possible way, because it's essentially an attack on children'.
The party's flagship social program is called '500 plus'. Launched in 2016, this policy grants 500 zlotys ($130) pr month in cash support for a second and each subsequent child, without an income test.it has proven to be hugely popular. Poland's Liberal party hates '500 Plus' arguing that it is backward-looking and would wreck Poland's economy by encouraging mothers to droop out of the labor market. In fact, Poland's economy is booming, just as Hungary's is.
To discourage young Polish adults from emigrating to other parts of the European Union but instead to stay at home and start families there, Law and Justice has has also recently proposed eliminating income taxes for all persons under age 26.
Trending in the Right Direction
Are these family policies in Hungary and Poland throwbacks to the Communist past? Indeed, no. They are better seen as fresh, twenty-first-century expressions of the Distributist spirit, the political and economic program crafted through Christian inspiration by Hilaire Belloc and G. K. Chesterton about a century ago. Its ideas - the wide distribution of productive property among families; protections for family-scale agriculture, retain shops, and manufacturing; and tax policies that favor marriage, strong home economies and many children - will be familiar to any reader fo the old G.K.'s Weekly.
Are such policies having an effect? Have larger and stronger families emerged? in some ways, it is too soon to tell, since 'completed fertility' s demographers call it -takes years to manifest itself. Still, in both lands, the marital fertility rate -the key number here-has risen; in Hungary, by over 20%. The trend, at least, is now in the right direction. Christian family and sexual ethics- including their economic component - have been written back into law and policy again, and they may be working.
Certainly, as even critics will admit, Hungarian and Polish families are living better.
Something else is happening in Eastern Europe, as well: ORTHODOX CHURCHES ARE EMERGING AS ACTIVE PRO-FAMILY, PRO-LIFE ECUMENICAL ACTORS. ...the ruling Fidesz party in Hungary and the ruling Law and Justice in Poland -have another thing in common: both were hosts to major World Congress of Families events. Specifically, polish President Lech Kaczynske was the Honorary Chairman of the world Congress of Families IV, held in Warsaw in 2007, and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban was the host and keynote speaker for the World Congress of Families XI, held in Budapest in 2017.
Stoeckl's Confirmation
To explain further, and to be objective, I will draw several quotations and references from an academic essay appearing earlier this year in the Russian-language journal State Religion& Church. The essay is written by Dr. Kristina Stoeckl, director of the project on Postconciliar Conflicts at the University of Innsbruck, in Austria. I note that she is, in her personal political and religious views, not'one of us'; however, she is that rarest of modern academics: an honest scholar.
Prof. Stoeckl writes: 'I start this article with a narrative exposition of the Russian founding moment of
the WCF (World Congress of Family), based on first-hand archival material and interviews with the protagonists'. The year was 1995: the location was Moscow; the key protagonists were Anotoly Antonov, professor of sociology and demography at Moscow Lomonosove State University, and Yours Truly, Allan Carlson.
Stoeckl continues: 'The WCF promotes a traditional, patriarchal family model built around husband and wife untied in a marriage and their biological offspring. In the terminology of the WCF, this 'natural family' is 'part of the created order' and ingrained in human nature'. Correct.
She writes later on: 'I conclude that the American founders of the WCF have contributed to the emergence of moral conservative milieus in the former communist countries...(so that )the battle for traditional family values has spread from the US into Russia and into diffusion of ideas was one of mutual interest and reciprocity'.
Meaning: No Coercion In This Collusion! Again, Correct.
Prof. Stoeckl then notes that 'Carlson, a Lutheran, was (and still is) involved in the conservative Christian journal Touchstone, which has supported and covered the WCF since its beginning and actively promotes the cooperation and 'fellowship' of Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox'.
Correct.
And she then refers to on James Kushiner, who describes how conservative Christians from the three great Christian traditions have come together for mutual encouragement.Quoting Mr. Kushiner: 'The movement came to be known as 'the new ecumenism' and 'the ecumenism of the trenches'...a movement distinct from and in crucial ways far more effective than the official ecumenical efforts'.
Correct.
Professor Stoeckl argues that this new ecumenism (def - general, universal, pertaining to the whole Christian church) represented by the WCF 'has been especially effective in bringing several of the Eastern Orthodox communions out of their long quietism (def - mental repose, passivity) and ethnic ghettos into the global struggle over the family. this has been especially...and directly...true for the Orthodox churches of the Republic of Georgia, Moldova, and Russia...encouraged by World Congress of Family events in each land'.
Again, correct.
and she concludes: 'In a time (when) conservative Christians in the United States affirm that they have 'lost the culture war' ((and here she cites Rod Dreher's book), Europe seems to have become the new site of the culture wars between progressives and social conservatives. European and in particular Russian social conservatives do not seem to think of themselves as having lost the culture wars; The Have Only Just Stated Their Battles. And they feel rather emboldened as right wing populist parties across Europe have re-discovered Christianity'.
Correct, indeed!
Culture Wars Heating Up
To choose just one more prominent example: the former Northern League party of Italy received a mere 4% of the vote in the 2012 election, in which they ran primarily on an anti-immigrant platform. By 2018, however, the party had adopted a pro-family policy agenda that drew heavily on the Hungarian experience, and its vote total shot up to 18% and included, for the first time, many traditional Catholics. In an election for representatives to the European parliament held last June, the now relabeled League won 35% of the ballots, making it by far the largest party in Italy.
And the World Congress of Families, again, was there: the 13th congress was held just a few months earlier - in March 2019 - in the City of Verona, the home of Romeo and Juliet. The mayor of Verona and the governor of the province - both League members - were our formal hosts; Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, leader of the party, was a keynote speaker. The event attracted 25 European television networks and 500 other journalists. On Saturday of the event, about 20,000 transfeminists' and other LGBT activists marched in protest, with occasional outbursts of violence. On the next day, a Sunday, over 30,000 defenders of the natural family marched peacefully through the ancient streets of Verona.
So,even within the center of the European Union, the culture wars over family law and family policy are actually heating up...and maybe, just maybe, in some places the Christians are pulling ahead!
Old & New Lessons from Europe by Allan C. Carlson
As the catastrophic Second World War drew to a close in 1945, Christian politicians looked for ways to rebuild Western Christian civilization on the material and moral ruins of European states had been ruled by fascist or Nazi governments or conquerors during the prior ten years. sometimes by election, sometimes by military defeat, democracy had been repudiated. So, too, had the economic regime of classical liberalism resting on notions of contracts and unfettered competition, which had contributed to the disorders of the early twentieth century. and now, the Red Army was pouring into Eastern Europe - and perhaps beyond.
how might things be put back together?
Who might the extreme inequalities, recurrent depressions and social disruptions seemingly inherent to liberal capitalism be tempered?
who might the retreat from marriage and rapidly falling fertility be countered?
How might democracy be rebuild within a compelling moral framework?
Christian Democracy
An answer would be found in Christian Democracy. Its origins reached back, among Roman Catholics, to the Center party of old Germany, launched in 1858. Under the influence of Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler, the bishop of Mainz, this vision of social Catholicism rejected a 'capitalist absolutism' that threatened family life. It endorsed Christian labor associations that would shorten work days, deliver family-sustaining wages to fathers, and prohibit the labor of mothers and children in factories and mines. such ideas would help to frame the great Catholic social encyclicals Rerum Novarum and Quadragesimo Anno.
Among Protestants, similar goals animated the Anti-Revolutionary party of the Netherlands, founded by Reformed pastor ABRAHAM KUYPER in 1879.j The group's
*32 name reflected a fierce opposition to what Kuyper called the 'anti-Christian world power' of the French Revolution and its curious spawn: both socialism and atomistic capitalism, which shared a hostility toward Christian family life. Accordingly, like the Roman Catholics, these Dutch Protestants emphasized the protection of Christian marriages and homes from the anti-family incentives inherent in both forms of industrialism. For example, in a diatribe from exactly 150 years ago, pastor Kuyper denounced the 'gigantic merchants', the Walmarts or Amazon.coms of his day:
'(In the industrial order) no longer should each baby drink warm milk from the breast of its own mother; we should have some tepid mixture prepared for all babies collectively. no longer should each child have a place to play at home by its mother; all should go to a common nursery school.
Coming closer to our time: during the early 1940s, Christian Democratic writers such as Emmanuel Mournier, Etienne Gilson, and Etienne Bourne found new language to energize a radical Christian party to battle the inequalities and corruptions infecting modern European life, a 'hard' party, a party worthy of Christ. They denounced Communism for its materialism, its collectivization of all property,and its hostility toward revealed religion. They also rejected the atomism of 'bourgeois liberalism' for its 'indifference toward basic institutions such as the family'. Writing in Switzerland, economist Wilhelm Roepke urged that a rebuild Europe should rest on 'the natural solidarity of small groups, above all, the family'.
And so it happened...for about 20 years. Christian Democratic parties came to power in France, the Netherlands, Italy, and West Germany. These governments laid out the spiritual and political conditions that enabled a rapid, indeed, almost miraculous, economic recovery in Europe. They also shaped welfare states that were broadly supportive of traditional families - ones with fathers earning a 'family wage', mothers able to be at home full-time, and a relative abundance of children. Favored policies included child allowances, tax breaks for married couples, subsidies for family housing , and the mandatory training of schoolchildren in home economics: for the girls, sewing, cooking, and childcare; for the boys CARPENTRY, METAL WORK, and SIMPLE MECHANICS. and after 70 years of steady fertility decline,western European nations had marriage-booms and baby-booms of their own.
Western Entropy, Eastern Energy
So, what happened? Why did the Christian Democratic vision falter after 1965? In secular language: moral entropy. (def- a process of degradation or running down or a trend to disorder; CHAOS, DISORGANIZATION, RANDOMNESS) In Christian terms: Original Sin. The youthful energy and sense of positive Christian policy activism - dominant in the 1940s and 1950s - dissipated. recent achievements resting on religious belief and discipline, were taken for granted. Corruption crept in, most notably in Italy. By the late 1960s, the Christian Democratic parties of western Europe were - at best -pragmatic, bureaucratic, self-satisfied defenders of the status quo. They might have found ways to convey the excitement and heroism of their project to the next generation, but did not.
Principled Christian criticisms of the excesses of atomistic liberalism and capitalism disappeared. So when a new crisis of values hit the European lands in the late 1960s - often called there 'The Spirit of '68' - the Christian Democrats were stodgy, having become the prematurely old and discredited guardians of a new materialism. As a surging sexual-left then challenged the Christian family, the Christian Democratic parties caved in -first on contraception, then on abortion, and finally on marriage itself. By the key year 2000, the so-called 'Swedish model' had come to dominate the social policies of the European Union: the full deconstruction of marriage; the criminalization of the 'family wage' principle: state-financed attacks on one-flesh unions and natural human fertility; and the indoctrination of children into a new sexual paganism. Family dissolution and fertility decline returned - with a vengeance.
However, as Christian Democracy in Western Europe lost its focus and its motivating faith, it would find new energy in the East, among the nations that had shaken off the Communist tyranny in 1989-1991. At first, liberal parties did especially well in their elections, as Eastern Europeans yearned to obtain the liberties long denied them. Within a few years, though, they learned that the liberalism
*33 they had just imported from the West was not one of tolerance, harmony and moral order. Instead, it was the twisted version derived from the sexual revolution of the late 1960s: the liberalism of hedonism and self-actualization. it had quickly produced devastating effects on family life: soaring divorce rates; tumbling marriage rates and record low fertility.
So East Europeans eventually turned to christian Democracy for policy responses - in a harder version, though, one conditioned by sustained conflict with the partisans of the sexual revolution, both regionally and globally. accordingly, the focus this time has been much more directly on the family. for example, Christian Democratic parliamentarians from Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Poland, Lithuania, and Estonia met in 2005 and issued their 'Family First Declaration,' pledging:
'We will coordinate our efforts on behalf of the natural family, marriage and the intrinsic value of each human life so that the future Europe is Not associated any longer with the culture of death, institutionalized egoism,and population decline, but with the preservation of religious, ethical and cultural values that enhance virtuous life.
Fidesz In Hungary
The most successful of these political movements, though, have not used the 'Christian Democratic' label, partly, it seems, to avoid confusion with the compromised parties of the West. in Hungary,for example, the Christian, pro-family party is called Fidesz. Led by Viktor Orban, a convert to Calvinism, this party has advanced a Christian family policy, designed to support more and earlier marriages and to enable a rise in the nation's birthrate. With this vision front and center, Fidesz won huge electoral victories in 2010, 2014, and again in 2018, including constitutional supermajoriites. The party has since turned Hungary and the European Union upside down-to the consternation of the moral and sexual revolutionaries in Brussels.
Indeed, in a recent speech, one of Orban's colleagues -Katalin Novak, Minister for State for Family and Youth - opened with a PowerPoint image showing the then-current prime ministers of Germany, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Sweden. they shared one trait: all were without children. She then showed an image of the ministers (or cabinet member) serving om Hungary's current Fidesz government: all were married and all had children, an average of over three. She concluded: 'This is the principle difference between Hungary and the rest of the Europena Union.
Orban is commonly denounced in the Western media for his response to Europe's refugee crisis of 2015: he successfully put up a fence - and offered a reason. Orban reported that while Brussels has looked to Islamic immigrants as a solution to Europe's population decline, Hungary has taken a different course: by shaping 'a FAMILY POLICY WHICH ENCOURAGES THE BIRTH OF CHILDREN' so that playgrounds will 'echo with the happy cries of children' rather than with police sirens, and by RENEWING OURSELVES SPIRITUALLY'. He continued: 'HUNGARY WILL PROTECT ITS FAMILIES AT ALL COSTS, regardless of the opposition that may come from Brussels.'This restoration of what he calls 'natural fertility' is not just One national cause, but rather 'THE NATIONAL CAUSE...AND IT IS ALSO A EUROPEAN CAUSE; NOT JUST ONE EUROPEAN CAUSE AMONG MANY, BUT T H E EUROPEAN CAUSE.
Specifically, over the last decade, the Fidesz government in Hungary has implemented an amazing array of policies TO ENCOURAGE MARRIAGE AND FERTILITY: MASSIVE TAX RELIEF (most recently, stipulating that mothers of 4 or more children are exempted from income taxes For Life);
the forgiveness of student loan debt through the birth of children;
large subsidies for the purchase of a family home;
generous support for early childcare,including allowances for full-time parental care; and
marriage and birth bonuses.
These new programs represent a hefty 4% of Hungary's gross domestic product. (THE AMERICAN EQUIVALENT WOULD BE ANEW EXPENDITURE EACH YEAR OF A STAGGERING $800 BILLION IN DIRECT SUPPORT OF NATURAL MARRIAGE AND CHILDREN - more than the Pentagon receives!
*34 This is the new language and the fresh policy agenda o a Social Conservatism emerging in Europe within the social and moral vacuum left by the failure of both Communism and self-actualizing liberalism.
Law &Justice in Poland
A similar transformation has begun in POLAND, where the LAW AND JUSTICE PARTY is also pursuing a genuine Christian family policy. founded nearly two decades ago by the twin brothers Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Law and justice ruled the country in the early 2000s, with Lech elected president in 2005. Following his death in an air crash in 2010, his brother guided the party back into power in 2015. Law and Justice FAVORS MORAL LIMITS JON PRIVATE CORPORATIONS (some call it 'Poland capitalism'), SUBSIDIES FOR FAMILY FARMERS, and FIXING 'NATION AND FAMILY' as its guiding economic, social, and cultural values.The party FAVORS STRICT PROHIBITIONS ON ABORTION AND OPPOSES EUTHANASIA, IN VITRO FERTILIZATION, and THE WHOLE LGBT AGENDA, INCLUDING CIVIL PARTNERSHIPS. as Kaczynski explained in a recent speech, 'This danger is an attack on the family, and an attack conducted in the worst possible way, because it's essentially an attack on children'.
The party's flagship social program is called '500 plus'. Launched in 2016, this policy grants 500 zlotys ($130) pr month in cash support for a second and each subsequent child, without an income test.it has proven to be hugely popular. Poland's Liberal party hates '500 Plus' arguing that it is backward-looking and would wreck Poland's economy by encouraging mothers to droop out of the labor market. In fact, Poland's economy is booming, just as Hungary's is.
To discourage young Polish adults from emigrating to other parts of the European Union but instead to stay at home and start families there, Law and Justice has has also recently proposed eliminating income taxes for all persons under age 26.
Trending in the Right Direction
Are these family policies in Hungary and Poland throwbacks to the Communist past? Indeed, no. They are better seen as fresh, twenty-first-century expressions of the Distributist spirit, the political and economic program crafted through Christian inspiration by Hilaire Belloc and G. K. Chesterton about a century ago. Its ideas - the wide distribution of productive property among families; protections for family-scale agriculture, retain shops, and manufacturing; and tax policies that favor marriage, strong home economies and many children - will be familiar to any reader fo the old G.K.'s Weekly.
Are such policies having an effect? Have larger and stronger families emerged? in some ways, it is too soon to tell, since 'completed fertility' s demographers call it -takes years to manifest itself. Still, in both lands, the marital fertility rate -the key number here-has risen; in Hungary, by over 20%. The trend, at least, is now in the right direction. Christian family and sexual ethics- including their economic component - have been written back into law and policy again, and they may be working.
Certainly, as even critics will admit, Hungarian and Polish families are living better.
Something else is happening in Eastern Europe, as well: ORTHODOX CHURCHES ARE EMERGING AS ACTIVE PRO-FAMILY, PRO-LIFE ECUMENICAL ACTORS. ...the ruling Fidesz party in Hungary and the ruling Law and Justice in Poland -have another thing in common: both were hosts to major World Congress of Families events. Specifically, polish President Lech Kaczynske was the Honorary Chairman of the world Congress of Families IV, held in Warsaw in 2007, and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban was the host and keynote speaker for the World Congress of Families XI, held in Budapest in 2017.
Stoeckl's Confirmation
To explain further, and to be objective, I will draw several quotations and references from an academic essay appearing earlier this year in the Russian-language journal State Religion& Church. The essay is written by Dr. Kristina Stoeckl, director of the project on Postconciliar Conflicts at the University of Innsbruck, in Austria. I note that she is, in her personal political and religious views, not'one of us'; however, she is that rarest of modern academics: an honest scholar.
Prof. Stoeckl writes: 'I start this article with a narrative exposition of the Russian founding moment of
the WCF (World Congress of Family), based on first-hand archival material and interviews with the protagonists'. The year was 1995: the location was Moscow; the key protagonists were Anotoly Antonov, professor of sociology and demography at Moscow Lomonosove State University, and Yours Truly, Allan Carlson.
Stoeckl continues: 'The WCF promotes a traditional, patriarchal family model built around husband and wife untied in a marriage and their biological offspring. In the terminology of the WCF, this 'natural family' is 'part of the created order' and ingrained in human nature'. Correct.
She writes later on: 'I conclude that the American founders of the WCF have contributed to the emergence of moral conservative milieus in the former communist countries...(so that )the battle for traditional family values has spread from the US into Russia and into diffusion of ideas was one of mutual interest and reciprocity'.
Meaning: No Coercion In This Collusion! Again, Correct.
Prof. Stoeckl then notes that 'Carlson, a Lutheran, was (and still is) involved in the conservative Christian journal Touchstone, which has supported and covered the WCF since its beginning and actively promotes the cooperation and 'fellowship' of Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox'.
Correct.
And she then refers to on James Kushiner, who describes how conservative Christians from the three great Christian traditions have come together for mutual encouragement.Quoting Mr. Kushiner: 'The movement came to be known as 'the new ecumenism' and 'the ecumenism of the trenches'...a movement distinct from and in crucial ways far more effective than the official ecumenical efforts'.
Correct.
Professor Stoeckl argues that this new ecumenism (def - general, universal, pertaining to the whole Christian church) represented by the WCF 'has been especially effective in bringing several of the Eastern Orthodox communions out of their long quietism (def - mental repose, passivity) and ethnic ghettos into the global struggle over the family. this has been especially...and directly...true for the Orthodox churches of the Republic of Georgia, Moldova, and Russia...encouraged by World Congress of Family events in each land'.
Again, correct.
and she concludes: 'In a time (when) conservative Christians in the United States affirm that they have 'lost the culture war' ((and here she cites Rod Dreher's book), Europe seems to have become the new site of the culture wars between progressives and social conservatives. European and in particular Russian social conservatives do not seem to think of themselves as having lost the culture wars; The Have Only Just Stated Their Battles. And they feel rather emboldened as right wing populist parties across Europe have re-discovered Christianity'.
Correct, indeed!
Culture Wars Heating Up
To choose just one more prominent example: the former Northern League party of Italy received a mere 4% of the vote in the 2012 election, in which they ran primarily on an anti-immigrant platform. By 2018, however, the party had adopted a pro-family policy agenda that drew heavily on the Hungarian experience, and its vote total shot up to 18% and included, for the first time, many traditional Catholics. In an election for representatives to the European parliament held last June, the now relabeled League won 35% of the ballots, making it by far the largest party in Italy.
And the World Congress of Families, again, was there: the 13th congress was held just a few months earlier - in March 2019 - in the City of Verona, the home of Romeo and Juliet. The mayor of Verona and the governor of the province - both League members - were our formal hosts; Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, leader of the party, was a keynote speaker. The event attracted 25 European television networks and 500 other journalists. On Saturday of the event, about 20,000 transfeminists' and other LGBT activists marched in protest, with occasional outbursts of violence. On the next day, a Sunday, over 30,000 defenders of the natural family marched peacefully through the ancient streets of Verona.
So,even within the center of the European Union, the culture wars over family law and family policy are actually heating up...and maybe, just maybe, in some places the Christians are pulling ahead!
2.21.2020 'Christ Chapel at Hillsdale' (An architectural Sign of Mere Christianity) by Michael Ward ...in Touchstone (A Journal of Mere Christianity March/April 202
*29 Hillsdale College, Michigan, was founded in 1844 by Freewill Baptists. today, its denominational link with Baptists is no longer particularly evident, but unlike many institutions of higher learning that were Christian at their foundation and are now effectively secular, Hillsdale College is still robustly committed to the faith.
This commitment has recently been demonstrated by the construction of a new chapel at the heart of the college campus,named Christ Chapel and costing nearly $30 million...
In the course of the fundraising effort for the chapel, the president of Hillsdale, Dr. Larry Arnn, remarked, 'There has never been a great university that was not heavily concerned with the question of God. There has never been serious Christian practice that was not heavily concerned with learning. Christ Chapel will be a daily reminder of this central fact'.
I had the honor of delivering a convocation address at Hillsdale on the day of the ground-breaking ceremony for the chapel back in April 2017, and then again at the first convocation in the completed building in October 2019.
...(speaking of the interior design) 'there is no stained-glass in the main body of the building. However, those in search of color and iconography need only step into a small side chapel, were Christ's baptism and St. Michael defeating the devil are depicted in the windows.
There is no statuary, let alone anything Marian. However, there is some latin: the three main doors giving entry to the narthex are superscribed with 'Fides','Spes', and 'Caritas'...
In these and other ways the design of the chapel adroitly navigates some of the scandalous divisions among Christians. Protestants would, I think, feel most at home in the space, which is appropriate, given that they constitute the majority of the student body and that the chaplain, the Reverend Adam Rick, is an Anglican. However, non-Protestants would not feel that their own traditions or expectations had been completely disregarded, and since Catholics account for about 30% of the college personnel, this, again, is appropriate. the first mass celebrated in the chapel was held on the feast day of pope St. John Paul II, a few weeks after the official dedication had taken place.
*30 Justice Thomas's Remarks
At that dedication ceremony, the guest of honor was Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who noted in his address how, 'in this age of popular iconoclasm, building a chapel on a college campus is all but verboten'. (def - forbidden as by law) Hillsdale's decision to erect such a building was a bold declaration, he said, 'that faith and reason are mutually reinforcing...
Beginning in the early 1900s, many elite colleges and private universities began to face questions about the continuing relevance of religious instruction on campus. These questions would have surprised the founders of these schools, many of which were created in part for the express purpose of providing religious instruction. But as time went on and schools moved away from their religious roots, the relevance of religion to higher education was increasingly questioned and campus chapels, in particular, came to be seen as relics of a bygone era.
'With the completion of Christ Chapel, Hillsdale College has staked out its position in this debate, and its decision serves as an example for ll of us. The construction of so grand a chapel in 2019 does not happen by accident or as an afterthought. Christ Chapel reflects the college's conviction that a vibrant intellectual environment and a strong, democratic society are fostered, not hindered, by a recognition of the divine. Hillsdale College affirms with the writer of proverbs that 'the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight'. By constructing this chapel, the college upholds the continued importance of its Christian roots even as it respects the rights of each person to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience.
'Our country was founded on the view that a correct understanding of God and the human person is critical to preserving the liberty that we so enjoy. John Adams wrote, 'Our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other'. He recognized that the preservation of liberty is not guaranteed....Faith in God, more than anything else, fuels the strength of character and self-discipline necessary to ably discharge that responsibility.
'That is why I am so encouraged by the construction of Christ Chapel....Hillsdale College was founded on the understanding that the battle to preserve and promote freedom in our country will be waged in the hearts and minds of the people. Rather than shrinking from the battle, Hillsdale is rising to the occasion by investing in the intellectual and spiritual development of its students so they can provide God-honoring leadership to our country...
'Let this chapel be more than an impressive building.
Let it be a place where people enter the presence of a majestic God.
Let it be a house of prayer, of worship, of meditation, and of celebration before God.
Let it be a haven of rest for the weary,
a place of healing for the wounded,
a place of comfort for the grieving and
a source of hope for the despairing and forgotten.
Let it point to a day when the dwelling of God will be with men,
when God himself will wipe away every tear and mend every wound.
Let it stand as a bold declaration to a watching world
that faith and learning are rightly understood as complements
and that both are essential to the preservation of the blessings of liberty.
'Above all, let this chapel equip and inspire us to honor God in whatever he calls us to do,
for, as St. Paul wrote in the Letter to the Romans,
'From him, and through him, and to him are all things.
To him be the glory for ever. Amen'.
This commitment has recently been demonstrated by the construction of a new chapel at the heart of the college campus,named Christ Chapel and costing nearly $30 million...
In the course of the fundraising effort for the chapel, the president of Hillsdale, Dr. Larry Arnn, remarked, 'There has never been a great university that was not heavily concerned with the question of God. There has never been serious Christian practice that was not heavily concerned with learning. Christ Chapel will be a daily reminder of this central fact'.
I had the honor of delivering a convocation address at Hillsdale on the day of the ground-breaking ceremony for the chapel back in April 2017, and then again at the first convocation in the completed building in October 2019.
...(speaking of the interior design) 'there is no stained-glass in the main body of the building. However, those in search of color and iconography need only step into a small side chapel, were Christ's baptism and St. Michael defeating the devil are depicted in the windows.
There is no statuary, let alone anything Marian. However, there is some latin: the three main doors giving entry to the narthex are superscribed with 'Fides','Spes', and 'Caritas'...
In these and other ways the design of the chapel adroitly navigates some of the scandalous divisions among Christians. Protestants would, I think, feel most at home in the space, which is appropriate, given that they constitute the majority of the student body and that the chaplain, the Reverend Adam Rick, is an Anglican. However, non-Protestants would not feel that their own traditions or expectations had been completely disregarded, and since Catholics account for about 30% of the college personnel, this, again, is appropriate. the first mass celebrated in the chapel was held on the feast day of pope St. John Paul II, a few weeks after the official dedication had taken place.
*30 Justice Thomas's Remarks
At that dedication ceremony, the guest of honor was Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who noted in his address how, 'in this age of popular iconoclasm, building a chapel on a college campus is all but verboten'. (def - forbidden as by law) Hillsdale's decision to erect such a building was a bold declaration, he said, 'that faith and reason are mutually reinforcing...
Beginning in the early 1900s, many elite colleges and private universities began to face questions about the continuing relevance of religious instruction on campus. These questions would have surprised the founders of these schools, many of which were created in part for the express purpose of providing religious instruction. But as time went on and schools moved away from their religious roots, the relevance of religion to higher education was increasingly questioned and campus chapels, in particular, came to be seen as relics of a bygone era.
'With the completion of Christ Chapel, Hillsdale College has staked out its position in this debate, and its decision serves as an example for ll of us. The construction of so grand a chapel in 2019 does not happen by accident or as an afterthought. Christ Chapel reflects the college's conviction that a vibrant intellectual environment and a strong, democratic society are fostered, not hindered, by a recognition of the divine. Hillsdale College affirms with the writer of proverbs that 'the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight'. By constructing this chapel, the college upholds the continued importance of its Christian roots even as it respects the rights of each person to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience.
'Our country was founded on the view that a correct understanding of God and the human person is critical to preserving the liberty that we so enjoy. John Adams wrote, 'Our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other'. He recognized that the preservation of liberty is not guaranteed....Faith in God, more than anything else, fuels the strength of character and self-discipline necessary to ably discharge that responsibility.
'That is why I am so encouraged by the construction of Christ Chapel....Hillsdale College was founded on the understanding that the battle to preserve and promote freedom in our country will be waged in the hearts and minds of the people. Rather than shrinking from the battle, Hillsdale is rising to the occasion by investing in the intellectual and spiritual development of its students so they can provide God-honoring leadership to our country...
'Let this chapel be more than an impressive building.
Let it be a place where people enter the presence of a majestic God.
Let it be a house of prayer, of worship, of meditation, and of celebration before God.
Let it be a haven of rest for the weary,
a place of healing for the wounded,
a place of comfort for the grieving and
a source of hope for the despairing and forgotten.
Let it point to a day when the dwelling of God will be with men,
when God himself will wipe away every tear and mend every wound.
Let it stand as a bold declaration to a watching world
that faith and learning are rightly understood as complements
and that both are essential to the preservation of the blessings of liberty.
'Above all, let this chapel equip and inspire us to honor God in whatever he calls us to do,
for, as St. Paul wrote in the Letter to the Romans,
'From him, and through him, and to him are all things.
To him be the glory for ever. Amen'.
Tuesday, February 18, 2020
2.18.20 NO CROSS NO CROWN by William Penn (Intro by Ivan W. Martin)
*ix. The Editor's Note
This new edition of No Cross, No Crown is an is an entirely new translation of Williams Penn's original 2nd edition published in 1682. The English language has undergone tremendous changes over the last 300 years or so. In addition, even in his own day, Penn's frilly, repetitive style was very difficult for his readers to comprehend. Here is a sample of Penn's original wording in 1682:
'But alas! what is the reason that the cry is so common, Must we always dote on these things? Why most certainly it is this, they know not what is the joy and peace of it is this, they know not what is the joy and peace of speaking and acting, as in the presence of the most holy God that passeth such vain understandings (Eph. 4.18-20): darkened with the glories and pleasures of the god of this world (II cor. 4.4); whose religion is so many mumbling and ignorantly devout said words, as they teach parrots; for if they were of those whose hearts are set on things above and whose treasure is in heaven, there would their minds inhabit, and their greatest pleasure constantly be: and such who call that a burden, and seek to be refreshed by such pastimes as a play, a morrice- dance, a punchinello,
*x. a ball,a masque, cards, dice, or the like, I am bold to affirm, they not only never knew the divine excellency of God and his truth, but thereby declare themselves most unfit, for them in another world. for how is it possible that they can be delighted to eternity with that satisfaction, which is so tedious and irksome for 30 or 40 years, that, for a supply of recreation to their minds, the little toys and fopperies of this perishing world must be brought into practice and request?
Now, here is the same sample translated into Modern English:
But this is such a common complaint: 'Why must we always dwell on these things?' because many do not know the joy of being in the presence of God (Eph 4.18-20). this surpasses all vain understandings (Rom. 10.2) which are darkened with the glories and pleasures of the God of this world (II Cor. 4.4). if they were people whose hearts are set on things above (Col. 3.1-4), and whose treasure is in heaven (Matt. 6.20), then their minds would be in the right place. Those who call this a 'burden' and seek to be refreshed by vain pastimes have never known God and His truth. They are declaring themselves to be most unfit for Him in another world. For , how is it possible that they can be satisfied for eternity with what is so tedious and irksome for 30 or 40 years!?
The translators have done their best to preserve the sense of Penn's original meaning within his culture. Sometimes, wherever possible, they were able to retain actual words or phrases that came from his own hand.
There were 18 chapters in the 1682 edition, but the translators decided to combine the content of those chapters into 12 chapters by grouping them according to similar subject matter. Originally, Penn's Chapter 10 was entitled 'thee and Thou to Single Persons'. this chapter was deleted because it is now irrelevant for a modern audience. Regarding the use of pronouns, in English today, there is No distinction between 'thee/thou' and 'you'. but in Penn's day, the Quakers insisted that it was pride that
*xi.demanded that the word 'you' be used when referring to high-ranking officials, and 'thee' or 'thou' was to be used for persons of equal rank or those who were below one's rank.
we are assuming that William Penn, who was very familiar with his Bible, was quoting from the King James Version, which first appeared in 1611. In this new edition of No Cross, No Crown, all Scripture quotations are taken from the International English Bible (copyright 20122. all rights Reserved.). This is a new modern translation of the whole Bible. permission was granted by:
International Bible Translators, Inc.
P.O. Box 6203
Branson, MO 65615
*xiii About 2000 years ago, Jesus made a shocking statement to some so-called 'Christians' in Laodicea. Jesus sent a special letter to them through the Apostle John. It said, 'I know what you've done. You are not cold; you are not hot. I wish you were either cold or hot! Instead, you are lukewarm -not hot, not cold. So, I am going to vomit you out of my mouth'. Revelation 3. 15-6
I know what 'cold' means, and I know what 'lukewarm' means, but what does 'hot' mean? What did Jesus mean by that term?
Was the Apostle Peter 'hot' for Jesus? He thought so. On the night when Jesus was arrested, Peter claimed, 'Lord, I am ready to go to jail with you. i will even die with you! (Luke 22.33) But what happened later that same night? Three times he denied knowing Jesus (Luke 22.54-61). Later, after the resurrection of Christ, Jesus told him: 'I am telling you the truth, Peter, when you were young, you tied your own belt and you walked where you wanted to go. But when you get old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will tie you. They will carry you where
*xiv. you don't want to go'. (Jesus said this to show what kid of death would be used to bring glory to God.) a few years later, Peter's new-found commitment was put to the test when he was arrested by King Herod and Peter was going to be executed the next morning (Acts 12.1-19).
And, what about Paul? What kind of a man was he? When he opposed the little band of Jewish Christians whose 'heresy' about Jesus was starting to spread, Paul was certainly what we would call 'hot' (Acts 8;1-3! But he was 'hot' for the wrong thing. In fact, you could call him a fanatic. He wasn't satisfied with persecuting those 'non-conformists' in Jerusalem, he wanted to root them out in other cities, like Damascus which is about 135 miles northeast of Jerusalem. He got some letters from the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem to go up there and drag them back to Jerusalem for a trial. But something dramatic happened on the way - he met Jesus (Acts 9:1-19) And that experience changed his life forever!
Would you say that Paul was 'hot' for Jesus then? Yes , he was. Look how the Lord turned Paul's life around in Damascus (Acts 9.20-25!
So many times Paul was tested (II Cor. 11.22-33) He wrote a bunch of letters in prison. Just before Paul died, he wrote his last letter to young Timothy, his faithful companion. Paul said, 'For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have dept the faith. Henceforth, there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day. And not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing (II Tim. 4.6-8 KJV) Soon after that, the Romans chopped off Paul's head.
Jesus said, 'Be faithful, even if you must die. I will give you the Crown of life' (Rev. 2.10, KJV).
*xv. SOME INTERESTING FACTS
WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT WILLIAM PENN?
Did you know that...?
*He was way ahead of his time.
*He was once the largest, private landholder in America.
*He was America's first great champion of democracy and religious freedom.
*He set forth the democratic principles that served as an inspiration for the U.S. Constitution.
*As one of the earlier supporters of colonial unification, Penn wrote and urged for a union of all the English colonies. (This later became the United States of America!)
xvi. *He gave Pennsylvania a written constitution that limited the power of government.
*He guaranteed many fundamental liberties.
* He established a sanctuary in the New World that protected one's freedom of conscience.
*He offered equal rights to people of different races and religions.
*He spoke several languages.
*He insisted that women deserved equal rights with men.
*He provided for a humane prison system.
*He drafted a comprehensive plan for a United States of Europe.
THE POWER OF ONE
Those were some remarkable accomplishments for just one man! Although Benjamin Franklin usually gets more attention, it was William Penn who preceded him and deserves at least equal rank among the most remarkable men who have ever lived.
By creating Pennsylvania, William Penn set an enormously important example for liberty. he showed that people who are courageous enough, persistent enough, and resourceful enough Can live free.He went beyond the natural rights theories of his philosopher friend, John Locke and showed how a free society would actually work. He showed how individuals of different races and religions Can live together peacefully when they mind their own business. He affirmed the optimism of free people. Pennsylvania had many of the rights and liberties that would later be granted to the citizens of the United States after 1776.
What a life Penn lived! Was he an American? No, he wasn't. But he set the stage for what was to become America, a freedom-loving country. He visited his colony several times, but he ended up dying back in England. You see, he lived long before some of our founding fathers in America, like Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and Tom Paine. Our
*xvii. Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution would never have been written if it had not been for the influence of William Penn...But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
HIS PARENTS
Let's go back to the beginning of William's life. He was born on Oct. 14, 1644 in London, England and raised in the privileged Tower Hill section of town. Like most everyone else, his parents were Anglicans (English Catholic). His mother was Margaret Jasper, a widow of a Dutch sea captain. She was raised in Rotterdam, Holland as the daughter of an English business agent. And his father was Sir William Penn, Sr., who was seldom home because he lived on the high seas for years at a time, like his father before him. Penn Sr. was in great demand because he knew the waters around England extremely well. he could handle a ship in bad weather and always got the most out of his crew. he was eventually promoted to Admiral in the Royal Navy. And William Penn, Jr. was his only son, an only child.
Around the age of 12 in Ireland, at his father's castle, young William met a man named Thomas Loe who touched his heart with the simple message of Jesus. It was compelling. William never forgot that. About a decade later, he met up with Mr. Loe again. This time William started getting 'hot' for Jesus.
HIS TEEN YEARS
But William Jr. had a rebellious streak in his teenage years. At Oxford he didn't want to be forced to go to chapel or wear the church uniform. he got kicked out of school at the age of 17. This enraged his father. It was embarrassing. His father attacked young Penn with his cane and forced him out ohis home. But Penn's mother made peace in the family and
*xviii. allowed her son to return home. However, she quickly concluded that both her social standing and her husband's career could be threatened by her son's behavior. So at age 18, young Penn was sent off to Paris to get him out of the country, to improve his manners, and to expose him to another culture. You see, his father wanted the boy to be able to win favor in the court of King Charles II (1630-1685) (as he had done).
In France the boy attended the most respected French Protestant University. Wile there, he met Moise Amyraut, a Christian humanist who supported religious tolerance. He believed in free will (unlike the somber Puritans back in England with their rigid beliefs and crippling guilt). Penn studied with Amyraut for one year. Penn was encouraged to search for his own religious path. This encounter began to shaped his thinking about his fellow man. The extravagant display of wealth and privilege of the court of Louis XIV did not sit well with young Penn. He was also very uncomfortable with Catholic ritual. When William Penn, Jr. returned to England two years later, he was a handsome, sophisticated, well-mannered, young man...
*xix. for a while, the Admiral used his son as a special courier to deliver secret military messages directly to King Charles II. (1630-1685) That's how young William got to know the king so well. (That would be an important contact for him later.) He also became acquainted with the Duke of York, who would later become King James II (1633-1701).
In 1665 London was in the grip of the bubonic plague. Young Penn reflected on the intense suffering and the massive deaths. He noticed the way human beings reacted during the widespread epidemic. Penn wrote in his diary: "(This pestilence) gave me a deep sense of the vanity of this world, of the irreligiousness of the religions in it'. He noticed how the Quakers were very compassionate during those days, but they were regarded as criminals by the authorities. They were often arrested by the police and vilified. The Quakers were even accused of causing the plague! William Penn decided to become a Quaker.
IN THE TOWER OF LONDON
Soon after that time, William fell in love with Guliaelma Springett, and after a 4-year engagement they wee married in 1672. They had 7 children (but 4 of them died in infancy). She died in 1694 around the age of 50.
...This book, No Cross, No Crown, was written when William Penn was in prison! The king's men had had enough of Penn's troublesome, political pamphlets, and one in particular - The Shaky Foundation shaken. He was attacking major church doctrines of the Church of England. The Bishop of London ordered that Penn be held indefinitely, until he publicly recanted his written statements. The official charge was 'publication without a license' but the real crime was 'blasphemy' (as signed in a warrant by King Charles II) Young Penn also refused to swear an oath of allegiance to the king of England (because of what it says in Matt. 5.34). He wouldn't even take his hat off to the king as a sign of respect.
So, in 1668 the British authorities threw William Penn into the Tower
*xx. of London in an unheated cell in solitary confinement. He was threatened with a life sentence! But Penn was given plenty of paper and lots of ink to write a retraction of what he had said in The Shaky Foundation Shaken. but Penn said, 'My prison will be my grave before I will budge a jot, for I owe my conscience to no mortal man!'j That was when he wrote this inflammatory book, No Cross, No Crown. But they let him go after 8 months,and his conscience hadn't really changed. He is also famous for saying: 'Right is right , even if everyone is against it; and wrong is wrong, even if everyone is for it!' His protests against the state church and the government were just beginning.
Young Penn was sprung from jail because of his family's rank more than by his principles. His father called for him and said, 'What's wrong with you!? The Admiral was very upset by his son's actions. His father had hoped that his son's charisma and intelligence would win the young man favor in the court of the king. but now his plans for his son were crushed. Though upset, the old Admiral tried his best to reason with his son, but it didn't do any good. His father feared for his own position, tool His son was on a dangerous course which might be at odds with the crown! But young Penn was more determined than ever. So, Sir William Penn felt that he had no choice but to order his son out of the house and to withhold his inheritance!
Young Penn was now homeless. he lived with several Quaker families . Unlike the Puritans, the Quakers had No political agenda. But they sincerely believed that every individual was Equal under God. But this contradicted the absolute position of the royal family of England; the monarchy was though to be divinely appointed by God. In those days, all minority groups were treated as 'heretics' because of their principles and their failure to pay tithes to the Church of England. They also refused to swear oaths of loyalty to the King.
HIS LEGAL BATTLES
William Penn was arrested six times for speaking out courageously
*xxi. against intolerance. He was always advocating personal rights, property rights and religious rights. among the most famous of these arrests was trial for preaching on the street in 1670. )He was getting 'hotter' for Jesus.) But Penn had studied common law and courtroom strategy in London back in 1664, and he was quite capable of challenging oppressive, government policies in court. He was an eloquent speaker and a prolific writer. His penetrating insights into the very basics of English law are still taught in law schools today. it turns out that Penn displayed a towering legal mind, and he won several big lawsuits.
In this particular case, he pleaded for his right to see a copy of the charges which were being laid out against him and the laws that he had allegedly broken. But the judge, the Lord Mayor of London, refused, even though this right was guaranteed by English law. The judge was not presenting a formal indictment. Furthermore, the judge directed the jury to come to a verdict Without hearing the defense! Despite heavy pressure from the Lord Mayor to convict the man, the jury returned a verdict of'not guilty' When invited by the judge to reconsider their verdict and to select a new foreman, the jury refused. They were all sent to cells for several nights to mull over their 'decision'. The judge said to them, 'You shall go together and bringing another verdict, or you shall starve!' The Lord Mayor sent Penn to Newgate Prison on a charge of contempt of court . But the jury wouldn't change their decision. So the Lord Mayor sent the entire jury to the same jail, and he fined each of them one year's wages. from this brutal prison, the members of that jury fought their case. It was called Bushell's Case.
Two months later, the Court of Common Pleas issued a writ of Habeas Corpus (foot - This is a document which demands that a prisoner be given an immediate hearing or else be released )to set them free. They had managed to win the right for All English juries to be free from the control of judges. This case was one of the more important trials in British history. It shaped the future concept of freedom in America, too.
Then that same jury sued Lord mayor of London for false arrest. After that, the Lord Chief Justice of England, along with his 11 fellow-judges
*xxii. ruled unanimously that juries must Not be coerced or punished fo their verdicts. Finally, the right to a trial by jury was protected.
'THE HOLY EXPERIMENT'
In the meantime, with his father dying, young Penn wanted to see him one more time and to patch up their differences. But he urged his father Not to pay his fine and free him: 'I entreat thee not to purchase my liberty'. But the Admiral refused to let that opportunity pass by. The old man paid the fine, thereby releasing his son from jail.
Over time, the old man gained respect for his son's integrity and courage. The Admiral told him, 'Let nothing in this world tempt you to wrong your conscience'. Knowing that after his death, young Penn would become more vulnerable in his pursuit of justice, the Admiral reinstated William Penn, Jr's inheritance. so, the son suddenly came into a large fortune. This significant act not only secured his son's protection but also set the conditions for the founding of Pennsylvania. The Admiral wrote to the Duke of York (the successor to the throne), requesting from the crown that, in return for the Admiral's lifetime service to King Charles II, the royal family would promise to shield young Penn and make him 'a royal counselor'. They agreed to do so.
Later, with the blessing of both King Charles II and the Duke of York, William Penn presented his case for religious tolerance before Parliament, but it was rejected. So, conditions for minorities were deteriorating.
After this, Penn became convinced that religious tolerance could Not be achieved in England. He had dreamed of his 'Holy Experiment' in which he could establish a utopian, American colony where there would be a Guaranteed freedom of religion.
So William Penn, Jr. proposed a solution which would solve the dilemma - a mass emigration of English Quakers to the New World. some Quakers had already moved to North America, but the New England
*xxiii. Puritans were just as hostile toward Quakers as the Anglicans were in England. And some of the Quakers had already been banished to the Caribbean. In 1677, a group of prominent Quakers (which included young Penn)purchased the colonial province of West Jersey (half of t;he current State of New Jersey). with the New Jersey foothold in place, Penn pressed his case to extend the Quaker region in America. So, Penn went straight to King Charles II and asked for a charter. And, surprisingly, he got it. it happened on March 4, 1681.
The King of England granted an extraordinarily generous charter to William Penn, Jr. Young Penn had all rights and privileges as the sole proprietor. (He could do anything but declare war.) The following day Penn was jubilant. He wrote in his diary: 'It is a clear and just thing, and my God who has given it to me through many difficulties, will, I believe, bless and make it the seed of a nation'. (He continued to get 'hotter' for Jesus).
The charter provided for the territory west of the Delaware River and north of Maryland. There were already about 1000 people there - some Germans, some Dutch people, and a few native Indians. But there was no real government present. No doubt, the king thought that this was a good way to get rid of most of the dissidents that were causing him so much trouble in England.
The background behind this large purchase is interesting: William Penn, Sr. had served in the Commonwealth Navy during the English Civil War and was rewarded by Oliver Cromwell with land estates in Ireland. But the lands were seized from Irish Catholics in retaliation for an earlier massacre of Protestants. After Cromwell died, the royalists resurged. The middle class aligned itself with the royalists San Admiral Penn was sent on a secret mission to bring back exiled Prince Charles. For his role in restoring the monarch, Admiral Penn was knighted and gained a powerful position as Commissioner of the navy. the crown was re-established, but King Charles II still harassed and persecuted all religions and sects other than the Anglican Church.
Once the Penn family returned to England from Ireland, King Charles
*xxiv. II owed the Admiral a whole lot of money for helping to reinstate him as king. It was the Admiral's back pay. So a proposal was made for the king to pay off this debt. It was 16,000 pounds. The king cancelled this debt by transferring to him 45,000 square miles of land in the New World. That was bigger than all of England! (That tract of land is now eastern New Jersey , Delaware and Pennsylvania). William Penn, Jr. would become the largest, private landowner in American history. The king suggested that it should be called 'Pennsylvania' out of respect for Sir William Penn Sr.
So young William Penn received that special charter to be the proprietor of a new colony of Englishmen in the New World. On Nov. 8, 1682, he set sail on the ship called "Welcome" to go see it. The voyage took 8 weeks. Many of the passengers fell sick and died on the way. A compassionate Penn volunteered to help them. (He was getting 'hotter' for Jesus.) During that same year, he revised his book, No Cross, No Crown, which he had written when he was in prison back in 1668
THE NEW COLONY
William Penn was both idealistic and practical. He loved to soar, but he had the good sense to pull back, too. He was pragmatic. He worked hard to write The First Frame of Government, a legal basis for a free society. (It took over 20 drafts.) It was the first constitution. Amazingly, it Limited the power of government. And, through amendments, it allowed for peaceful change, but any amendment could only be passed by both the consent of the Governor and 85% of the elected representatives. and citizens had the right to own private property. This is some of the wording of that
xxv. historic document: 'Men being born with a title to perfect freedom and uncontrolled enjoyment of all the rights and privileges of the law of nature. ...No one can be put out of his estate and subjected to the political view of another without his consent.'
Penn himself would be the Governor, and there would be a Council of 72 members which would propose legislation, and then a General Assembly (up to 500 members), which could either approve or defeat proposed legislation. Each year, one-third of the members would be elected for 3-year terms. governor William Penn retained a veto over any proposed legislation. This form of government provided for virtually unlimited free enterprise, a free press, trial by jury, and religious tolerance. Back in England, the death penalty was given for 200 offenses, but Penn reserved the death penalty for only two crimes - murder and treason. He insisted on low taxes, too. He even suspended all taxes for a year to help promote settlements. The final version of their constitution which was adopted in 1701 lasted for 75 years, and it became the basis of Pennsylvania's state constitution (adopted in 1776).
Penn also drew up a detailed design for an entire city. It was going to be called 'Philadelphia' (which means, 'The City of Brotherly Love' in Greek). Under his direction, the city of Philadelphia was carefully planned and developed. Penn wanted to build a 10,000-acre city, but his friends thought that was overly optimistic. He settled for 1,200 acres to start with. Penn wanted 80-acre gentleman's estates to surround the core of the city. Each of these mansions was to be set apart by at least 800 feet from its neighbor and surrounded by fields and gardens - a sort of greenbelt that encircled the metropolis, like a modern suburb. strangely, there was no military draft. Quakers were pacifists.
People from everywhere flocked to Penn's new colony (Jews, Catholics, the Irish, the Welsh, Lutherans, some Dutch, Swedes, Finns, Mennonites, the Amish, Huguenots, Dunkers, Moravians, Pietists and Schwenkfelders/). Pennsylvania was developing into a successful 'melting pot'.
They liked Penn's concept of freedom very much. He advocated that
xxvi. 'all men are created equal'. Penn had a saying: 'MEN MUST BE GOVERNED BY GOD, OR THEY WILL BE RULED BY TYRANTS.' He wrote: 'No men...hath power or authority to rule over men's consciences in religious matters'. Penn guaranteed
free and fair trials by jury
progressive prisons
freedom of religion,
freedom from unjust imprisonment
free elections, and
a separation of powers.
The laws of public behavior that Penn laid out were rather Puritanical though - no swearing, lying,or drunkenness. 'Idle amusements' such as stage plays, gambling, carousing, masquerade parties, cock-fighting and bear-baiting were forbidden.
Penn vigorously marketed the colony throughout Europe in various languages. he wanted everybody to come to American. Penn was very convincing, too. He persuaded many emigrants from several nations to take the dangerous, ocean passage to settle in the New World. and he persuaded speculators to invest in property there. Penn planned to make money by selling tracts of land, and, although he was able to attract a good number of investors, he never realized the financial profits that he imagined.
DEALING WITH THE INDIANS
Who was this young, aristocratic governor? Was he a religious freak?after the building plans for Philadelphia had been completed and Penn's political ideas had been put into a workable form, he explored the interior of his colony.
He was a realist. He would not permit any white settlers to come into his lands until peace treaties with the Indians were in place. And, William Penn insisted on paying the Indians a fair price for their land - even if that meant buy the land three times over!
Penn befriended the local Indians, primarily the Delaware tribe.he even learned several different Indian dialects in order to negotiate directly with them without interpreters! Penn was tall, good looking, and very athletic. (Back in England he would often run 3 miles to school).Here in
xxvii. America he walked unarmed and unafraid among the Indians. They were impressed that he could outrun any of them. He always treated them with respect. He is famous for his 'Great Treaty' with the Indians. Penn's various treaties with most of the Indians lasted for 7 decades. the Indians were at peace with the colonists of Pennsylvania much longer than any other English colony because of Penn's fairness.
TROUBLE BACK IN ENGLAND
But thee were problems that needed his immediate attention back in England. He had to appear in court in 1684 against Lord Baltimore over a border dispute between their two colonies - Maryland and Pennsylvania. Lord Baltimore was controlling the territory south of Pennsylvania. Penn had not taken the simple step of determining exactly where the 40th degree of latitude actually was. Under Penn's charter, it was supposed to be the southern boundary of his land. But dissension arose between the two proprietors after Penn sent letters to several landowners in Maryland and that they didn't have to pay anymore taxes to Lord Baltimore.
And, the political climate in England was changing . Internal political conflicts there even threatened to revoke his Pennsylvania charter. William Penn was going to need to use all his charm and grace to persuade the king to release some political prisoners as well. Some of Penn's religious friends had been thrown into prison, and a few of them had even been executed. So, Penn intervened diplomatically with his old friend, the Duke of York (who was now named King James II after his brother King Charles II died in 1685). Penn saved quite a number of Quakers from the gallows.
The England of the 1690s was a tumultuous place , especially for an outspoken, liberal Quaker like William Penn. But he never backed away from a political fight. but his forthrightness was dangerous. Because Penn had supported James II (and James II (a Stuart king) was dethroned by
*xxviii William III and Queen Mary), Penn was automatically suspected of treason. He was arrested by the government. and, the British government seized his estates. Penn was eventually cleared of all charges but he was still tainted as a 'traitor'. for the next 4 years he was a fugitive in London, hiding everywhere in the slum sections. That is why Penn lost some control over his colony briefly from 1692 to 1694. And he received another setback. His dear wife 'Guli' died in 1694. It was his good friend John Locke who helped to restore his good name.
Almost two years later, William Penn married a much younger woman named Hannah Callowhill. His spirit revived. he was 52 years old, and she was around 25. She would give birth to 8 more children in a dozen years but the first 2 died in infancy.
GOVERNOR PENN RETURNED TO HIS COLONY
In 1699 William Penn returned to Pennsylvania, the English colony that he owned. Tod his delight, he found that it was flourishing - 18,000 people had settled there.Philadelphia, had now grown to a population of about 3,000 people. His previously-planted trees were everywhere. Philadelphia was now a big seaport. sometimes more than 100 trading ships were anchored in its harbor on any given day. The people enjoyed all sorts of imported goods that came from England.America was now a viable market for English wares. and, most importantly to Penn, religious diversity was succeeding. there was an educated work force and a high literacy rate. Many were learned in science and medicine. Banks thrived, but the province still had to turned a profit. Penn was too soft. He couldn't seem to collect the taxes which were due to him. people wanted to pay him in barter instead of cash. Merchants were much more interested in making money than in his pacifist theology.
But the Quakers were beginning to retreat from the mainstream of the colony. the budding commonwealth was becoming more and more
xxix. 'worldly' all the time. After Penn's death, Pennsylvania slowly drifted away from being a colony that was founded on religion to a secular state dominated by commerce. Many of Penn;'s legal and political innovations took root, however. 50 years after his death,the Pennsylvania Quakers withdrew from politics entirely. They were unable to run a pacifist colony without William Penn.
Unfortunately, during Penn's long absence from his colony, political squabbling had set in. Changes in local leadership had taken place. In what is now Delaware, Penn's Quaker government was not viewed favorably by the Dutch, the Swedish or the English settlers. Those people had no 'historical' allegiance to Pennsylvania. So almost immediately, they began petitioning for their own separate Assembly. in 1691 a man named George Keith also led a religious division, and this cause 'Pennsylvania' and 'Delaware' finally achieved their goal. the three southernmost counties were permitted to split off from'Pennsylvania'; and become the new semi-autonomous colony of 'Lower Delaware'. New castle was the most prominent, prosperous and influential city in that new colony, so it became their new capital.
Their 'Charter of Privileges' allowed the Assembly greater autonomy. This new charter governed the people until the American Revolution occurred.It effectively gave voters more power than Penn had by eliminating the Upper House (which represented mostly the wealthy class). also,Jews and non-Christians were bared from holding public office.
Back in 1696, the charter of William Markham(Penn's secretary and then governor of Delaware) had replaced the earlier Frame.However , when Penn returned in 1701, he revised that version of it. By the time Penn left in November of that year, the colony's assembly was elected yearly and enjoyed a more powerful position than the Governor, who, despite his veto power, was secondary in importance to their legislative body.
Penn yearned to remain in the New World,wanting to settle down in his beloved Pennsbury estate (up the Delaware River a little ways from
xxx. Philadelphia), but there were even more political problems back in England which forced his return there.So Penn went back home to face some very expensive legal battles. Some of his opponents were trying to convert his province into a colony directly ruled by the crown. But Queen Anne received Penn favorably, and he was able to retain his holdings in America.
THE LAST PART OF WILLIAM PENN'S LIFE
Penn's latter years were clouded by debt and illness. Penn had some surprises in store for him when he got back to England. Immediately he became swamped in financial and family troubles. His oldest son (William ) was leading a wild life, neglecting his wife and two children and running up huge gambling debts. Penn had hoped that this son would succeed him in America, but now Penn could not even pay his son's debts. And, Penn's own finances were in shambles. He had sunk over 30,000 pounds in America and received very little back except in the form of some bartered goods. Penn had also made many generous loans, but he couldn't collection them.
The end of Penn's life was a tragedy of betrayal. He never cared much about money, though he had lots and lots of it. He treated his Pennsylvania property as sort of a hobby. He was so immensely rich that he could afford to lose money on it. he was just too idealistic to bother himself with the details of business . Over the course of his lifetime, his settlements always lost money and William Penn subsidized them generously from his other assets. Although Penn exhibited a remarkable organizational talent, his management skill was mostly lax, his judgement of agents often proved too trusting and he permitted himself to be exploited by poorly-designed contracts which led to his eventual financial ruin. William Penn's sloppiness eventually caught up with him.
One of Penn's closest friends betrayed him. He was a fellow Quaker. his name was Philip Ford. ford embezzled very large sums from Penn's estates. Ford cheated Penn out of thousands of British pounds by concealing and
xxxi and diverting rents from Penn's Iris lands, claiming losses , then extracting loans from Penn to cover the shortfall. Penn never suspected that this was going on. Penn would often sign papers without even reading them. But one of the papers turned out to be a deed transferring All of Pennsylvania to Ford! Then Ford later demanded full rent from Penn!!
To make matters worse , after Ford died in 1702, Ford's widow (Bridget threatened t o sell all of Pennsylvania (to which she could prove that she had the title). Penn sent his son William to America to manage affairs but he proved to be just as unreliable as he had been in England.
At that time, there were considerable discussions about scraping Penn's constitution altogether. In desperation, Penn tried to sell the Pennsylvania colony back to the crown (before Bridget Ford got wind of his plan). However, because Penn insisted that the crown should uphold the civil liberties that had been achieved, he could not strike a deal with the king. Mrs. ford took her case to court. She succeeded in convincing the court to incarcerate William Penn. at age 62, Penn landed in debtor's prison! however, the court's sympathy reduced Penn's punishment to house arrest. when a group of Quakers arranged for Ford's estate to receive a payment for back rent, Penn was released form jail. Later, in 1708 Mrs Ford was finally denied her claim to Pennsylvania! The lord Chancellor ruled in Penn's favor.
His wife Hannah managed all of his affairs until he died on July 30, 1718. He was 73 years old. He died penniless. She was the sole executor of his estate. He was 73 years old. He died penniless. She was the sole executor of his estate. she became the De Facto governor of Pennsylvania.
after Hannah's death in 1726 the proprietorship (def- person who has exclusive right or title to something; owner).of Pennsylvania passed on to their three sons. Their names were John, Thomas and Richard. His sons renounced the Quaker faith and they made a big profit on the colonies after they inherited them. They lived an immoral life, releasing their
xxxii colonial agents to exploit Penn's former commitments with the Indians. their agents cheated them out of everything that William Penn had promised to them.
William Penn's family retained ownership of the colony of Pennsylvania until the American Revolution. at that time, the colony had grown to about 300,000 people. between 1740 and 1776, Philadelphia presses alone published 11,000 pamphlets, almanacs and books. And there were 7 newspapers. The city of Philadelphia was an intellectual center. The stage was set for American independence. in 1984 President Ronald Reagan by an Act of Congress declared William Penn an Honorary Citizen of the United States.
This new edition of No Cross, No Crown is an is an entirely new translation of Williams Penn's original 2nd edition published in 1682. The English language has undergone tremendous changes over the last 300 years or so. In addition, even in his own day, Penn's frilly, repetitive style was very difficult for his readers to comprehend. Here is a sample of Penn's original wording in 1682:
'But alas! what is the reason that the cry is so common, Must we always dote on these things? Why most certainly it is this, they know not what is the joy and peace of it is this, they know not what is the joy and peace of speaking and acting, as in the presence of the most holy God that passeth such vain understandings (Eph. 4.18-20): darkened with the glories and pleasures of the god of this world (II cor. 4.4); whose religion is so many mumbling and ignorantly devout said words, as they teach parrots; for if they were of those whose hearts are set on things above and whose treasure is in heaven, there would their minds inhabit, and their greatest pleasure constantly be: and such who call that a burden, and seek to be refreshed by such pastimes as a play, a morrice- dance, a punchinello,
*x. a ball,a masque, cards, dice, or the like, I am bold to affirm, they not only never knew the divine excellency of God and his truth, but thereby declare themselves most unfit, for them in another world. for how is it possible that they can be delighted to eternity with that satisfaction, which is so tedious and irksome for 30 or 40 years, that, for a supply of recreation to their minds, the little toys and fopperies of this perishing world must be brought into practice and request?
Now, here is the same sample translated into Modern English:
But this is such a common complaint: 'Why must we always dwell on these things?' because many do not know the joy of being in the presence of God (Eph 4.18-20). this surpasses all vain understandings (Rom. 10.2) which are darkened with the glories and pleasures of the God of this world (II Cor. 4.4). if they were people whose hearts are set on things above (Col. 3.1-4), and whose treasure is in heaven (Matt. 6.20), then their minds would be in the right place. Those who call this a 'burden' and seek to be refreshed by vain pastimes have never known God and His truth. They are declaring themselves to be most unfit for Him in another world. For , how is it possible that they can be satisfied for eternity with what is so tedious and irksome for 30 or 40 years!?
The translators have done their best to preserve the sense of Penn's original meaning within his culture. Sometimes, wherever possible, they were able to retain actual words or phrases that came from his own hand.
There were 18 chapters in the 1682 edition, but the translators decided to combine the content of those chapters into 12 chapters by grouping them according to similar subject matter. Originally, Penn's Chapter 10 was entitled 'thee and Thou to Single Persons'. this chapter was deleted because it is now irrelevant for a modern audience. Regarding the use of pronouns, in English today, there is No distinction between 'thee/thou' and 'you'. but in Penn's day, the Quakers insisted that it was pride that
*xi.demanded that the word 'you' be used when referring to high-ranking officials, and 'thee' or 'thou' was to be used for persons of equal rank or those who were below one's rank.
we are assuming that William Penn, who was very familiar with his Bible, was quoting from the King James Version, which first appeared in 1611. In this new edition of No Cross, No Crown, all Scripture quotations are taken from the International English Bible (copyright 20122. all rights Reserved.). This is a new modern translation of the whole Bible. permission was granted by:
International Bible Translators, Inc.
P.O. Box 6203
Branson, MO 65615
*xiii About 2000 years ago, Jesus made a shocking statement to some so-called 'Christians' in Laodicea. Jesus sent a special letter to them through the Apostle John. It said, 'I know what you've done. You are not cold; you are not hot. I wish you were either cold or hot! Instead, you are lukewarm -not hot, not cold. So, I am going to vomit you out of my mouth'. Revelation 3. 15-6
I know what 'cold' means, and I know what 'lukewarm' means, but what does 'hot' mean? What did Jesus mean by that term?
Was the Apostle Peter 'hot' for Jesus? He thought so. On the night when Jesus was arrested, Peter claimed, 'Lord, I am ready to go to jail with you. i will even die with you! (Luke 22.33) But what happened later that same night? Three times he denied knowing Jesus (Luke 22.54-61). Later, after the resurrection of Christ, Jesus told him: 'I am telling you the truth, Peter, when you were young, you tied your own belt and you walked where you wanted to go. But when you get old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will tie you. They will carry you where
*xiv. you don't want to go'. (Jesus said this to show what kid of death would be used to bring glory to God.) a few years later, Peter's new-found commitment was put to the test when he was arrested by King Herod and Peter was going to be executed the next morning (Acts 12.1-19).
And, what about Paul? What kind of a man was he? When he opposed the little band of Jewish Christians whose 'heresy' about Jesus was starting to spread, Paul was certainly what we would call 'hot' (Acts 8;1-3! But he was 'hot' for the wrong thing. In fact, you could call him a fanatic. He wasn't satisfied with persecuting those 'non-conformists' in Jerusalem, he wanted to root them out in other cities, like Damascus which is about 135 miles northeast of Jerusalem. He got some letters from the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem to go up there and drag them back to Jerusalem for a trial. But something dramatic happened on the way - he met Jesus (Acts 9:1-19) And that experience changed his life forever!
Would you say that Paul was 'hot' for Jesus then? Yes , he was. Look how the Lord turned Paul's life around in Damascus (Acts 9.20-25!
So many times Paul was tested (II Cor. 11.22-33) He wrote a bunch of letters in prison. Just before Paul died, he wrote his last letter to young Timothy, his faithful companion. Paul said, 'For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have dept the faith. Henceforth, there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day. And not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing (II Tim. 4.6-8 KJV) Soon after that, the Romans chopped off Paul's head.
Jesus said, 'Be faithful, even if you must die. I will give you the Crown of life' (Rev. 2.10, KJV).
*xv. SOME INTERESTING FACTS
WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT WILLIAM PENN?
Did you know that...?
*He was way ahead of his time.
*He was once the largest, private landholder in America.
*He was America's first great champion of democracy and religious freedom.
*He set forth the democratic principles that served as an inspiration for the U.S. Constitution.
*As one of the earlier supporters of colonial unification, Penn wrote and urged for a union of all the English colonies. (This later became the United States of America!)
xvi. *He gave Pennsylvania a written constitution that limited the power of government.
*He guaranteed many fundamental liberties.
* He established a sanctuary in the New World that protected one's freedom of conscience.
*He offered equal rights to people of different races and religions.
*He spoke several languages.
*He insisted that women deserved equal rights with men.
*He provided for a humane prison system.
*He drafted a comprehensive plan for a United States of Europe.
THE POWER OF ONE
Those were some remarkable accomplishments for just one man! Although Benjamin Franklin usually gets more attention, it was William Penn who preceded him and deserves at least equal rank among the most remarkable men who have ever lived.
By creating Pennsylvania, William Penn set an enormously important example for liberty. he showed that people who are courageous enough, persistent enough, and resourceful enough Can live free.He went beyond the natural rights theories of his philosopher friend, John Locke and showed how a free society would actually work. He showed how individuals of different races and religions Can live together peacefully when they mind their own business. He affirmed the optimism of free people. Pennsylvania had many of the rights and liberties that would later be granted to the citizens of the United States after 1776.
What a life Penn lived! Was he an American? No, he wasn't. But he set the stage for what was to become America, a freedom-loving country. He visited his colony several times, but he ended up dying back in England. You see, he lived long before some of our founding fathers in America, like Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and Tom Paine. Our
*xvii. Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution would never have been written if it had not been for the influence of William Penn...But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
HIS PARENTS
Let's go back to the beginning of William's life. He was born on Oct. 14, 1644 in London, England and raised in the privileged Tower Hill section of town. Like most everyone else, his parents were Anglicans (English Catholic). His mother was Margaret Jasper, a widow of a Dutch sea captain. She was raised in Rotterdam, Holland as the daughter of an English business agent. And his father was Sir William Penn, Sr., who was seldom home because he lived on the high seas for years at a time, like his father before him. Penn Sr. was in great demand because he knew the waters around England extremely well. he could handle a ship in bad weather and always got the most out of his crew. he was eventually promoted to Admiral in the Royal Navy. And William Penn, Jr. was his only son, an only child.
Around the age of 12 in Ireland, at his father's castle, young William met a man named Thomas Loe who touched his heart with the simple message of Jesus. It was compelling. William never forgot that. About a decade later, he met up with Mr. Loe again. This time William started getting 'hot' for Jesus.
HIS TEEN YEARS
But William Jr. had a rebellious streak in his teenage years. At Oxford he didn't want to be forced to go to chapel or wear the church uniform. he got kicked out of school at the age of 17. This enraged his father. It was embarrassing. His father attacked young Penn with his cane and forced him out ohis home. But Penn's mother made peace in the family and
*xviii. allowed her son to return home. However, she quickly concluded that both her social standing and her husband's career could be threatened by her son's behavior. So at age 18, young Penn was sent off to Paris to get him out of the country, to improve his manners, and to expose him to another culture. You see, his father wanted the boy to be able to win favor in the court of King Charles II (1630-1685) (as he had done).
In France the boy attended the most respected French Protestant University. Wile there, he met Moise Amyraut, a Christian humanist who supported religious tolerance. He believed in free will (unlike the somber Puritans back in England with their rigid beliefs and crippling guilt). Penn studied with Amyraut for one year. Penn was encouraged to search for his own religious path. This encounter began to shaped his thinking about his fellow man. The extravagant display of wealth and privilege of the court of Louis XIV did not sit well with young Penn. He was also very uncomfortable with Catholic ritual. When William Penn, Jr. returned to England two years later, he was a handsome, sophisticated, well-mannered, young man...
*xix. for a while, the Admiral used his son as a special courier to deliver secret military messages directly to King Charles II. (1630-1685) That's how young William got to know the king so well. (That would be an important contact for him later.) He also became acquainted with the Duke of York, who would later become King James II (1633-1701).
In 1665 London was in the grip of the bubonic plague. Young Penn reflected on the intense suffering and the massive deaths. He noticed the way human beings reacted during the widespread epidemic. Penn wrote in his diary: "(This pestilence) gave me a deep sense of the vanity of this world, of the irreligiousness of the religions in it'. He noticed how the Quakers were very compassionate during those days, but they were regarded as criminals by the authorities. They were often arrested by the police and vilified. The Quakers were even accused of causing the plague! William Penn decided to become a Quaker.
IN THE TOWER OF LONDON
Soon after that time, William fell in love with Guliaelma Springett, and after a 4-year engagement they wee married in 1672. They had 7 children (but 4 of them died in infancy). She died in 1694 around the age of 50.
...This book, No Cross, No Crown, was written when William Penn was in prison! The king's men had had enough of Penn's troublesome, political pamphlets, and one in particular - The Shaky Foundation shaken. He was attacking major church doctrines of the Church of England. The Bishop of London ordered that Penn be held indefinitely, until he publicly recanted his written statements. The official charge was 'publication without a license' but the real crime was 'blasphemy' (as signed in a warrant by King Charles II) Young Penn also refused to swear an oath of allegiance to the king of England (because of what it says in Matt. 5.34). He wouldn't even take his hat off to the king as a sign of respect.
So, in 1668 the British authorities threw William Penn into the Tower
*xx. of London in an unheated cell in solitary confinement. He was threatened with a life sentence! But Penn was given plenty of paper and lots of ink to write a retraction of what he had said in The Shaky Foundation Shaken. but Penn said, 'My prison will be my grave before I will budge a jot, for I owe my conscience to no mortal man!'j That was when he wrote this inflammatory book, No Cross, No Crown. But they let him go after 8 months,and his conscience hadn't really changed. He is also famous for saying: 'Right is right , even if everyone is against it; and wrong is wrong, even if everyone is for it!' His protests against the state church and the government were just beginning.
Young Penn was sprung from jail because of his family's rank more than by his principles. His father called for him and said, 'What's wrong with you!? The Admiral was very upset by his son's actions. His father had hoped that his son's charisma and intelligence would win the young man favor in the court of the king. but now his plans for his son were crushed. Though upset, the old Admiral tried his best to reason with his son, but it didn't do any good. His father feared for his own position, tool His son was on a dangerous course which might be at odds with the crown! But young Penn was more determined than ever. So, Sir William Penn felt that he had no choice but to order his son out of the house and to withhold his inheritance!
Young Penn was now homeless. he lived with several Quaker families . Unlike the Puritans, the Quakers had No political agenda. But they sincerely believed that every individual was Equal under God. But this contradicted the absolute position of the royal family of England; the monarchy was though to be divinely appointed by God. In those days, all minority groups were treated as 'heretics' because of their principles and their failure to pay tithes to the Church of England. They also refused to swear oaths of loyalty to the King.
HIS LEGAL BATTLES
William Penn was arrested six times for speaking out courageously
*xxi. against intolerance. He was always advocating personal rights, property rights and religious rights. among the most famous of these arrests was trial for preaching on the street in 1670. )He was getting 'hotter' for Jesus.) But Penn had studied common law and courtroom strategy in London back in 1664, and he was quite capable of challenging oppressive, government policies in court. He was an eloquent speaker and a prolific writer. His penetrating insights into the very basics of English law are still taught in law schools today. it turns out that Penn displayed a towering legal mind, and he won several big lawsuits.
In this particular case, he pleaded for his right to see a copy of the charges which were being laid out against him and the laws that he had allegedly broken. But the judge, the Lord Mayor of London, refused, even though this right was guaranteed by English law. The judge was not presenting a formal indictment. Furthermore, the judge directed the jury to come to a verdict Without hearing the defense! Despite heavy pressure from the Lord Mayor to convict the man, the jury returned a verdict of'not guilty' When invited by the judge to reconsider their verdict and to select a new foreman, the jury refused. They were all sent to cells for several nights to mull over their 'decision'. The judge said to them, 'You shall go together and bringing another verdict, or you shall starve!' The Lord Mayor sent Penn to Newgate Prison on a charge of contempt of court . But the jury wouldn't change their decision. So the Lord Mayor sent the entire jury to the same jail, and he fined each of them one year's wages. from this brutal prison, the members of that jury fought their case. It was called Bushell's Case.
Two months later, the Court of Common Pleas issued a writ of Habeas Corpus (foot - This is a document which demands that a prisoner be given an immediate hearing or else be released )to set them free. They had managed to win the right for All English juries to be free from the control of judges. This case was one of the more important trials in British history. It shaped the future concept of freedom in America, too.
Then that same jury sued Lord mayor of London for false arrest. After that, the Lord Chief Justice of England, along with his 11 fellow-judges
*xxii. ruled unanimously that juries must Not be coerced or punished fo their verdicts. Finally, the right to a trial by jury was protected.
'THE HOLY EXPERIMENT'
In the meantime, with his father dying, young Penn wanted to see him one more time and to patch up their differences. But he urged his father Not to pay his fine and free him: 'I entreat thee not to purchase my liberty'. But the Admiral refused to let that opportunity pass by. The old man paid the fine, thereby releasing his son from jail.
Over time, the old man gained respect for his son's integrity and courage. The Admiral told him, 'Let nothing in this world tempt you to wrong your conscience'. Knowing that after his death, young Penn would become more vulnerable in his pursuit of justice, the Admiral reinstated William Penn, Jr's inheritance. so, the son suddenly came into a large fortune. This significant act not only secured his son's protection but also set the conditions for the founding of Pennsylvania. The Admiral wrote to the Duke of York (the successor to the throne), requesting from the crown that, in return for the Admiral's lifetime service to King Charles II, the royal family would promise to shield young Penn and make him 'a royal counselor'. They agreed to do so.
Later, with the blessing of both King Charles II and the Duke of York, William Penn presented his case for religious tolerance before Parliament, but it was rejected. So, conditions for minorities were deteriorating.
After this, Penn became convinced that religious tolerance could Not be achieved in England. He had dreamed of his 'Holy Experiment' in which he could establish a utopian, American colony where there would be a Guaranteed freedom of religion.
So William Penn, Jr. proposed a solution which would solve the dilemma - a mass emigration of English Quakers to the New World. some Quakers had already moved to North America, but the New England
*xxiii. Puritans were just as hostile toward Quakers as the Anglicans were in England. And some of the Quakers had already been banished to the Caribbean. In 1677, a group of prominent Quakers (which included young Penn)purchased the colonial province of West Jersey (half of t;he current State of New Jersey). with the New Jersey foothold in place, Penn pressed his case to extend the Quaker region in America. So, Penn went straight to King Charles II and asked for a charter. And, surprisingly, he got it. it happened on March 4, 1681.
The King of England granted an extraordinarily generous charter to William Penn, Jr. Young Penn had all rights and privileges as the sole proprietor. (He could do anything but declare war.) The following day Penn was jubilant. He wrote in his diary: 'It is a clear and just thing, and my God who has given it to me through many difficulties, will, I believe, bless and make it the seed of a nation'. (He continued to get 'hotter' for Jesus).
The charter provided for the territory west of the Delaware River and north of Maryland. There were already about 1000 people there - some Germans, some Dutch people, and a few native Indians. But there was no real government present. No doubt, the king thought that this was a good way to get rid of most of the dissidents that were causing him so much trouble in England.
The background behind this large purchase is interesting: William Penn, Sr. had served in the Commonwealth Navy during the English Civil War and was rewarded by Oliver Cromwell with land estates in Ireland. But the lands were seized from Irish Catholics in retaliation for an earlier massacre of Protestants. After Cromwell died, the royalists resurged. The middle class aligned itself with the royalists San Admiral Penn was sent on a secret mission to bring back exiled Prince Charles. For his role in restoring the monarch, Admiral Penn was knighted and gained a powerful position as Commissioner of the navy. the crown was re-established, but King Charles II still harassed and persecuted all religions and sects other than the Anglican Church.
Once the Penn family returned to England from Ireland, King Charles
*xxiv. II owed the Admiral a whole lot of money for helping to reinstate him as king. It was the Admiral's back pay. So a proposal was made for the king to pay off this debt. It was 16,000 pounds. The king cancelled this debt by transferring to him 45,000 square miles of land in the New World. That was bigger than all of England! (That tract of land is now eastern New Jersey , Delaware and Pennsylvania). William Penn, Jr. would become the largest, private landowner in American history. The king suggested that it should be called 'Pennsylvania' out of respect for Sir William Penn Sr.
So young William Penn received that special charter to be the proprietor of a new colony of Englishmen in the New World. On Nov. 8, 1682, he set sail on the ship called "Welcome" to go see it. The voyage took 8 weeks. Many of the passengers fell sick and died on the way. A compassionate Penn volunteered to help them. (He was getting 'hotter' for Jesus.) During that same year, he revised his book, No Cross, No Crown, which he had written when he was in prison back in 1668
THE NEW COLONY
William Penn was both idealistic and practical. He loved to soar, but he had the good sense to pull back, too. He was pragmatic. He worked hard to write The First Frame of Government, a legal basis for a free society. (It took over 20 drafts.) It was the first constitution. Amazingly, it Limited the power of government. And, through amendments, it allowed for peaceful change, but any amendment could only be passed by both the consent of the Governor and 85% of the elected representatives. and citizens had the right to own private property. This is some of the wording of that
xxv. historic document: 'Men being born with a title to perfect freedom and uncontrolled enjoyment of all the rights and privileges of the law of nature. ...No one can be put out of his estate and subjected to the political view of another without his consent.'
Penn himself would be the Governor, and there would be a Council of 72 members which would propose legislation, and then a General Assembly (up to 500 members), which could either approve or defeat proposed legislation. Each year, one-third of the members would be elected for 3-year terms. governor William Penn retained a veto over any proposed legislation. This form of government provided for virtually unlimited free enterprise, a free press, trial by jury, and religious tolerance. Back in England, the death penalty was given for 200 offenses, but Penn reserved the death penalty for only two crimes - murder and treason. He insisted on low taxes, too. He even suspended all taxes for a year to help promote settlements. The final version of their constitution which was adopted in 1701 lasted for 75 years, and it became the basis of Pennsylvania's state constitution (adopted in 1776).
Penn also drew up a detailed design for an entire city. It was going to be called 'Philadelphia' (which means, 'The City of Brotherly Love' in Greek). Under his direction, the city of Philadelphia was carefully planned and developed. Penn wanted to build a 10,000-acre city, but his friends thought that was overly optimistic. He settled for 1,200 acres to start with. Penn wanted 80-acre gentleman's estates to surround the core of the city. Each of these mansions was to be set apart by at least 800 feet from its neighbor and surrounded by fields and gardens - a sort of greenbelt that encircled the metropolis, like a modern suburb. strangely, there was no military draft. Quakers were pacifists.
People from everywhere flocked to Penn's new colony (Jews, Catholics, the Irish, the Welsh, Lutherans, some Dutch, Swedes, Finns, Mennonites, the Amish, Huguenots, Dunkers, Moravians, Pietists and Schwenkfelders/). Pennsylvania was developing into a successful 'melting pot'.
They liked Penn's concept of freedom very much. He advocated that
xxvi. 'all men are created equal'. Penn had a saying: 'MEN MUST BE GOVERNED BY GOD, OR THEY WILL BE RULED BY TYRANTS.' He wrote: 'No men...hath power or authority to rule over men's consciences in religious matters'. Penn guaranteed
free and fair trials by jury
progressive prisons
freedom of religion,
freedom from unjust imprisonment
free elections, and
a separation of powers.
The laws of public behavior that Penn laid out were rather Puritanical though - no swearing, lying,or drunkenness. 'Idle amusements' such as stage plays, gambling, carousing, masquerade parties, cock-fighting and bear-baiting were forbidden.
Penn vigorously marketed the colony throughout Europe in various languages. he wanted everybody to come to American. Penn was very convincing, too. He persuaded many emigrants from several nations to take the dangerous, ocean passage to settle in the New World. and he persuaded speculators to invest in property there. Penn planned to make money by selling tracts of land, and, although he was able to attract a good number of investors, he never realized the financial profits that he imagined.
DEALING WITH THE INDIANS
Who was this young, aristocratic governor? Was he a religious freak?after the building plans for Philadelphia had been completed and Penn's political ideas had been put into a workable form, he explored the interior of his colony.
He was a realist. He would not permit any white settlers to come into his lands until peace treaties with the Indians were in place. And, William Penn insisted on paying the Indians a fair price for their land - even if that meant buy the land three times over!
Penn befriended the local Indians, primarily the Delaware tribe.he even learned several different Indian dialects in order to negotiate directly with them without interpreters! Penn was tall, good looking, and very athletic. (Back in England he would often run 3 miles to school).Here in
xxvii. America he walked unarmed and unafraid among the Indians. They were impressed that he could outrun any of them. He always treated them with respect. He is famous for his 'Great Treaty' with the Indians. Penn's various treaties with most of the Indians lasted for 7 decades. the Indians were at peace with the colonists of Pennsylvania much longer than any other English colony because of Penn's fairness.
TROUBLE BACK IN ENGLAND
But thee were problems that needed his immediate attention back in England. He had to appear in court in 1684 against Lord Baltimore over a border dispute between their two colonies - Maryland and Pennsylvania. Lord Baltimore was controlling the territory south of Pennsylvania. Penn had not taken the simple step of determining exactly where the 40th degree of latitude actually was. Under Penn's charter, it was supposed to be the southern boundary of his land. But dissension arose between the two proprietors after Penn sent letters to several landowners in Maryland and that they didn't have to pay anymore taxes to Lord Baltimore.
And, the political climate in England was changing . Internal political conflicts there even threatened to revoke his Pennsylvania charter. William Penn was going to need to use all his charm and grace to persuade the king to release some political prisoners as well. Some of Penn's religious friends had been thrown into prison, and a few of them had even been executed. So, Penn intervened diplomatically with his old friend, the Duke of York (who was now named King James II after his brother King Charles II died in 1685). Penn saved quite a number of Quakers from the gallows.
The England of the 1690s was a tumultuous place , especially for an outspoken, liberal Quaker like William Penn. But he never backed away from a political fight. but his forthrightness was dangerous. Because Penn had supported James II (and James II (a Stuart king) was dethroned by
*xxviii William III and Queen Mary), Penn was automatically suspected of treason. He was arrested by the government. and, the British government seized his estates. Penn was eventually cleared of all charges but he was still tainted as a 'traitor'. for the next 4 years he was a fugitive in London, hiding everywhere in the slum sections. That is why Penn lost some control over his colony briefly from 1692 to 1694. And he received another setback. His dear wife 'Guli' died in 1694. It was his good friend John Locke who helped to restore his good name.
Almost two years later, William Penn married a much younger woman named Hannah Callowhill. His spirit revived. he was 52 years old, and she was around 25. She would give birth to 8 more children in a dozen years but the first 2 died in infancy.
GOVERNOR PENN RETURNED TO HIS COLONY
In 1699 William Penn returned to Pennsylvania, the English colony that he owned. Tod his delight, he found that it was flourishing - 18,000 people had settled there.Philadelphia, had now grown to a population of about 3,000 people. His previously-planted trees were everywhere. Philadelphia was now a big seaport. sometimes more than 100 trading ships were anchored in its harbor on any given day. The people enjoyed all sorts of imported goods that came from England.America was now a viable market for English wares. and, most importantly to Penn, religious diversity was succeeding. there was an educated work force and a high literacy rate. Many were learned in science and medicine. Banks thrived, but the province still had to turned a profit. Penn was too soft. He couldn't seem to collect the taxes which were due to him. people wanted to pay him in barter instead of cash. Merchants were much more interested in making money than in his pacifist theology.
But the Quakers were beginning to retreat from the mainstream of the colony. the budding commonwealth was becoming more and more
xxix. 'worldly' all the time. After Penn's death, Pennsylvania slowly drifted away from being a colony that was founded on religion to a secular state dominated by commerce. Many of Penn;'s legal and political innovations took root, however. 50 years after his death,the Pennsylvania Quakers withdrew from politics entirely. They were unable to run a pacifist colony without William Penn.
Unfortunately, during Penn's long absence from his colony, political squabbling had set in. Changes in local leadership had taken place. In what is now Delaware, Penn's Quaker government was not viewed favorably by the Dutch, the Swedish or the English settlers. Those people had no 'historical' allegiance to Pennsylvania. So almost immediately, they began petitioning for their own separate Assembly. in 1691 a man named George Keith also led a religious division, and this cause 'Pennsylvania' and 'Delaware' finally achieved their goal. the three southernmost counties were permitted to split off from'Pennsylvania'; and become the new semi-autonomous colony of 'Lower Delaware'. New castle was the most prominent, prosperous and influential city in that new colony, so it became their new capital.
Their 'Charter of Privileges' allowed the Assembly greater autonomy. This new charter governed the people until the American Revolution occurred.It effectively gave voters more power than Penn had by eliminating the Upper House (which represented mostly the wealthy class). also,Jews and non-Christians were bared from holding public office.
Back in 1696, the charter of William Markham(Penn's secretary and then governor of Delaware) had replaced the earlier Frame.However , when Penn returned in 1701, he revised that version of it. By the time Penn left in November of that year, the colony's assembly was elected yearly and enjoyed a more powerful position than the Governor, who, despite his veto power, was secondary in importance to their legislative body.
Penn yearned to remain in the New World,wanting to settle down in his beloved Pennsbury estate (up the Delaware River a little ways from
xxx. Philadelphia), but there were even more political problems back in England which forced his return there.So Penn went back home to face some very expensive legal battles. Some of his opponents were trying to convert his province into a colony directly ruled by the crown. But Queen Anne received Penn favorably, and he was able to retain his holdings in America.
THE LAST PART OF WILLIAM PENN'S LIFE
Penn's latter years were clouded by debt and illness. Penn had some surprises in store for him when he got back to England. Immediately he became swamped in financial and family troubles. His oldest son (William ) was leading a wild life, neglecting his wife and two children and running up huge gambling debts. Penn had hoped that this son would succeed him in America, but now Penn could not even pay his son's debts. And, Penn's own finances were in shambles. He had sunk over 30,000 pounds in America and received very little back except in the form of some bartered goods. Penn had also made many generous loans, but he couldn't collection them.
The end of Penn's life was a tragedy of betrayal. He never cared much about money, though he had lots and lots of it. He treated his Pennsylvania property as sort of a hobby. He was so immensely rich that he could afford to lose money on it. he was just too idealistic to bother himself with the details of business . Over the course of his lifetime, his settlements always lost money and William Penn subsidized them generously from his other assets. Although Penn exhibited a remarkable organizational talent, his management skill was mostly lax, his judgement of agents often proved too trusting and he permitted himself to be exploited by poorly-designed contracts which led to his eventual financial ruin. William Penn's sloppiness eventually caught up with him.
One of Penn's closest friends betrayed him. He was a fellow Quaker. his name was Philip Ford. ford embezzled very large sums from Penn's estates. Ford cheated Penn out of thousands of British pounds by concealing and
xxxi and diverting rents from Penn's Iris lands, claiming losses , then extracting loans from Penn to cover the shortfall. Penn never suspected that this was going on. Penn would often sign papers without even reading them. But one of the papers turned out to be a deed transferring All of Pennsylvania to Ford! Then Ford later demanded full rent from Penn!!
To make matters worse , after Ford died in 1702, Ford's widow (Bridget threatened t o sell all of Pennsylvania (to which she could prove that she had the title). Penn sent his son William to America to manage affairs but he proved to be just as unreliable as he had been in England.
At that time, there were considerable discussions about scraping Penn's constitution altogether. In desperation, Penn tried to sell the Pennsylvania colony back to the crown (before Bridget Ford got wind of his plan). However, because Penn insisted that the crown should uphold the civil liberties that had been achieved, he could not strike a deal with the king. Mrs. ford took her case to court. She succeeded in convincing the court to incarcerate William Penn. at age 62, Penn landed in debtor's prison! however, the court's sympathy reduced Penn's punishment to house arrest. when a group of Quakers arranged for Ford's estate to receive a payment for back rent, Penn was released form jail. Later, in 1708 Mrs Ford was finally denied her claim to Pennsylvania! The lord Chancellor ruled in Penn's favor.
His wife Hannah managed all of his affairs until he died on July 30, 1718. He was 73 years old. He died penniless. She was the sole executor of his estate. He was 73 years old. He died penniless. She was the sole executor of his estate. she became the De Facto governor of Pennsylvania.
after Hannah's death in 1726 the proprietorship (def- person who has exclusive right or title to something; owner).of Pennsylvania passed on to their three sons. Their names were John, Thomas and Richard. His sons renounced the Quaker faith and they made a big profit on the colonies after they inherited them. They lived an immoral life, releasing their
xxxii colonial agents to exploit Penn's former commitments with the Indians. their agents cheated them out of everything that William Penn had promised to them.
William Penn's family retained ownership of the colony of Pennsylvania until the American Revolution. at that time, the colony had grown to about 300,000 people. between 1740 and 1776, Philadelphia presses alone published 11,000 pamphlets, almanacs and books. And there were 7 newspapers. The city of Philadelphia was an intellectual center. The stage was set for American independence. in 1984 President Ronald Reagan by an Act of Congress declared William Penn an Honorary Citizen of the United States.
Saturday, February 8, 2020
2.8.2020 THE END OF ALZHEIMER'S - THE FIRST PROGRAM TO PREVENT and REVERSE COGNITIVE DECLINE By Dale E. Bredesen, MD
PART ONE - The Alzhemer's Solution
CHAPTER 1 - Disrupting Dementia
*7 ...in the past targeting amyloid was supposed to be the golden ticket to curing Alzheimer's. it wasn't.
*9 ...(different thought-to-be cures are not...also...
'Alzheimer's is Not a single disease. sure, the symptoms might make it look like it is, but ...we discovered that there are three main subtypes of Alzheimer's.Our research on the different biochemical profiles of people with Alz's has made it clear that these three readily distinguishable subtypes are each driven by different biochemical processes. Each one require a different treatment...
*10 Alz disease can be prevented and in many cases its associated cognitive decline can be reversed...in my lab..culminated in the first reversals of cognitive decline in early Alzheimer's disease ) MCI (mild cognitive impairment) and SCI (subjective cognitive impairment) and its precursors, (def - something that precedes.
*11 ApoE4 (is short for apolipoprotein E; an apolipoprotein is a protein that carries lipids - ie. fats)is the strongest known genetic risk factor. Carrying one ApoE4 (that is, inherited from one parent) increases your lifetime risk of Alz to 30%, while carrying two copies (inheriting copies from both parents) increases it to well over 50% (from 50 to 90% depending on which study you read)
*12 ...there is a program that can reduce the risk
*13 ...the first ever scientific publication of a study, in 2014, reporting the reversal of cognitive decline in patients...with Alz.. or its precursors, thanks to sophisticated personalized protocol based on our... research on the neurobiology of Alz..Called ReCODE, for reversal of cognitive decline, the protocol not only achieved the reversal...in Alz and pre-Alz..but allowed patients to sustain that improvement.
*16 ...these discoveries show... that this devastating disease is the result of normal, healthy brain process that has gone haywire. That is , the brain suffers some injury, infection, or other assault...and responds by defending itself. the defense mechanism includes producing the Alz's-associated amyloid. Yes...the very amyloid that everyone has been trying to get rid of, is part of a PROTECTIVE response.
...In chapter 7, you'll learn about the tests that identify what is causing your cognitive decline or putting you at risk for it -who you may already be giving yourself Alz...The tests are necessary because the often numerous contributors to one person's cognitive decline or putting you at risk for it -how you may already be giving yourself Alz..the tests are necessary because the often numerous contributors to one person's cognitive decline are very likely different from the contributors to someone else's. these tests therefore give you a
*17 personalized risk profile, letting you know which factors to address to optimize improvement.
You will learn the rationale behind each test - that is, how the physiological parameter it evaluates contributes to brain function and Alz... Chapter 7 summarizes the tests involved in this 'cognoscopy' and explains the guiding principles behind them.
Chapters 8-9 explain what to do in response to the test results. These discuss the fundamentals that must be addressed in order to reverse cognitive decline and reduce risk of future decline:
inflammation
infection
insulin resistance
hormone and supportive nutrient depletion
toxin exposure and
of lost or dysfunctional brain connections(synapses).
the replacement and protection of lost or dysfunctional brain connections (synapses)
this is not a 'one size fits all' approach.
everyone's version of ReCODE is personalized, based on their test results:
your version will be different fro that of others because it is optimized to your unique physiology...
in chapters 10-12, I explain the keys to achieving the very best results and to sustaining that improvement. These chapters offer workarounds,not only to help you succeed in reversing cognitive decline, but also to address the questions and criticism that have been directed at this approach.
Since the advent of'modern' medicine in the nineteenth century, physicians have been trained to diagnose disease- for example, hypertenion or congestive heart failure or arthritis -and prescribes standard one-size-fits-all treatment, such as an antihypertensive for hypertension.that is slowly changing, as with precision cancer
in Chapter 10-12, I explain the keys to achieving the very best results and o sustaining that improvement. These chapters offer workarounds, not only to help you succeed in reversing cognitive decline, but also to address the questions and criticism that have been directed at this approach.
Since the advent of'modern' medicine in the nineteenth century, physicians have been trained to diagnose disease - for example, hypertension or congestive heart failure or arthritis - and prescribe a standard one-size-fits-all treatment, such as an antihypertensive for hypertension. That is slowly changing, as with precision cancer treatments in which the genetic profile of a patient's tumor dictates what drug to prescribe. The push for personalized medicine could bring us closer to
CHAPTER 1 - Disrupting Dementia
*7 ...in the past targeting amyloid was supposed to be the golden ticket to curing Alzheimer's. it wasn't.
*9 ...(different thought-to-be cures are not...also...
'Alzheimer's is Not a single disease. sure, the symptoms might make it look like it is, but ...we discovered that there are three main subtypes of Alzheimer's.Our research on the different biochemical profiles of people with Alz's has made it clear that these three readily distinguishable subtypes are each driven by different biochemical processes. Each one require a different treatment...
*10 Alz disease can be prevented and in many cases its associated cognitive decline can be reversed...in my lab..culminated in the first reversals of cognitive decline in early Alzheimer's disease ) MCI (mild cognitive impairment) and SCI (subjective cognitive impairment) and its precursors, (def - something that precedes.
*11 ApoE4 (is short for apolipoprotein E; an apolipoprotein is a protein that carries lipids - ie. fats)is the strongest known genetic risk factor. Carrying one ApoE4 (that is, inherited from one parent) increases your lifetime risk of Alz to 30%, while carrying two copies (inheriting copies from both parents) increases it to well over 50% (from 50 to 90% depending on which study you read)
*12 ...there is a program that can reduce the risk
*13 ...the first ever scientific publication of a study, in 2014, reporting the reversal of cognitive decline in patients...with Alz.. or its precursors, thanks to sophisticated personalized protocol based on our... research on the neurobiology of Alz..Called ReCODE, for reversal of cognitive decline, the protocol not only achieved the reversal...in Alz and pre-Alz..but allowed patients to sustain that improvement.
*16 ...these discoveries show... that this devastating disease is the result of normal, healthy brain process that has gone haywire. That is , the brain suffers some injury, infection, or other assault...and responds by defending itself. the defense mechanism includes producing the Alz's-associated amyloid. Yes...the very amyloid that everyone has been trying to get rid of, is part of a PROTECTIVE response.
...In chapter 7, you'll learn about the tests that identify what is causing your cognitive decline or putting you at risk for it -who you may already be giving yourself Alz...The tests are necessary because the often numerous contributors to one person's cognitive decline or putting you at risk for it -how you may already be giving yourself Alz..the tests are necessary because the often numerous contributors to one person's cognitive decline are very likely different from the contributors to someone else's. these tests therefore give you a
*17 personalized risk profile, letting you know which factors to address to optimize improvement.
You will learn the rationale behind each test - that is, how the physiological parameter it evaluates contributes to brain function and Alz... Chapter 7 summarizes the tests involved in this 'cognoscopy' and explains the guiding principles behind them.
Chapters 8-9 explain what to do in response to the test results. These discuss the fundamentals that must be addressed in order to reverse cognitive decline and reduce risk of future decline:
inflammation
infection
insulin resistance
hormone and supportive nutrient depletion
toxin exposure and
of lost or dysfunctional brain connections(synapses).
the replacement and protection of lost or dysfunctional brain connections (synapses)
this is not a 'one size fits all' approach.
everyone's version of ReCODE is personalized, based on their test results:
your version will be different fro that of others because it is optimized to your unique physiology...
in chapters 10-12, I explain the keys to achieving the very best results and to sustaining that improvement. These chapters offer workarounds,not only to help you succeed in reversing cognitive decline, but also to address the questions and criticism that have been directed at this approach.
Since the advent of'modern' medicine in the nineteenth century, physicians have been trained to diagnose disease- for example, hypertenion or congestive heart failure or arthritis -and prescribes standard one-size-fits-all treatment, such as an antihypertensive for hypertension.that is slowly changing, as with precision cancer
in Chapter 10-12, I explain the keys to achieving the very best results and o sustaining that improvement. These chapters offer workarounds, not only to help you succeed in reversing cognitive decline, but also to address the questions and criticism that have been directed at this approach.
Since the advent of'modern' medicine in the nineteenth century, physicians have been trained to diagnose disease - for example, hypertension or congestive heart failure or arthritis - and prescribe a standard one-size-fits-all treatment, such as an antihypertensive for hypertension. That is slowly changing, as with precision cancer treatments in which the genetic profile of a patient's tumor dictates what drug to prescribe. The push for personalized medicine could bring us closer to
2.8.2020 AN EVIL (HUMAN) TRAFFICING - By Jenny Lind Schmitt, pp 54 and following; World Magazine 2.1.2020
In the Netherlands, legal prostitution hasn't turned out the way advocates predicted and some are fighting to end it.
The streets were crowded on a recent Saturday night in Amesterdam's red light district. Thousands of pedestrians strolled the cobbled streets under pink neon signs and over canals where trash floated on brown water. High-pitched laughter occasionally punctuated the excited murmur of sightseers and crescendos outside an X-rated cinema.
Bachelor parties of different nationalities - the groom-to-be identifiable by his ridiculous costume - walked alongside couples strolling arm-in-arm. Shop windows displayed all the paraphernalia imaginable in a city where marijuana and prostitution are legal. The other ware displayed in shop windows: young women trafficked here from poor countries of Eastern Europe and forced into sex work.
By all accounts, it's just a normal Saturday evening in Amsterdam. The Netherlands legalized prostitution in 2000, a move politicians said would help curb trafficking and offer safety to 'sexual workers' by trying to normalize their employment and standardize conditions. The opposite happened. freedom of movement within the European Union made it easier fro trafficers to bring women from eastern countries like Romania and Bulgaria to rich western cities with liberal laws. It also made it harder to trace links between prostitution and organized crime.
*47 Amsterdam became a human trafficking destination.
But now some among the Dutch are fighting for the once unimaginable - the end of legalized prostitution - and they achieved enough signatures on a petition to force the Dutch parliament to debate the matter. One grassroots group, called EXXPOSE, wants the Netherlands to adopt what's known as the Nordic model, where authorities prosecute customers and give help to prostitutes in leaving prostitution.
The day before I visited the red light district, Exxpose co-founder Natasja Bos met me in Utrecht, a 30 minute train ride east of Amsterdam. in the group's headquarters - a barebones office space shared with video game programmers - a the tall, dark-haired, 29 year old Bos explained the Nordic model. Adopted in Sweden in 1999, this approach
criminalizes buyers,
decriminalizes prostitutes,
offers help to get out of prostitution, and
educates the public on the realities of prostitution and sex trafficking.
The model has been a success: Street prostitution in Sweden has dropped 50% and communications intercepted between organized crime members indicate the country is 'no longer a good place to do business'. Several European countries, as well as Israel, have since adopted the Nordic model.
The research behind Swedens approach resonated with what Bos and co-founder Sara Lous - both social workers - already knew from their experience counseling women leaving prostitution: Women exiting the profession exhibited the same symptoms as survivors of sexual abuse; disassociation, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. They also knew that contrary to the common Dutch view of women freely choosing sex work, those who 'chose' prostitution almost all came from vulnerable backgrounds of trauma and abuse. In 2012 Bos and Lous, who called themselves abolitionists, are both Christians, but they say their organization is for anyone who wants to fight the injustice of trafficking. Their work led to a social media campaign last spring. 'I Am Priceless' showed photos of young people asking,'what if she was your sister?' The campaign linked to a petition to end legalized prostitutiion, In the wake of #MeToo, the petition hit a social nerve and by early April had passed the 40,000 signature threshold required to introduce debate into the Dutch parliament. 'In the Netherlands we've educated our citizens with a lot of propaganda about prostitution, says Bos.
'If It's Visible You Can Control It.
if You Criminalize it,
it will go underground.
It's just a normal job -
it's the oldest job in the world.'
It's really hard to change those belief systems, so we focus on young people who are more open to change'.
They also want to educate visitors to Amsterdam. One campaign involves giving tourist facsimilies of 50-Euro bills. On the revers side is a list of possible options for how to spend them: rent two bicycles for the day, take a barge tour through the canals, buy a poor woman for sex. Bos says
the point is to demonstrate that the purchase of other humans has no place in a modern city.
Dutch society values freedom and choice, but the growing global spotlight on human trafficking has raised
*48 questions about how much 'freedom of choice' the women behind the windows actually have.
Frits Rouvoet ministers to prostituted women in Amsterdam's red light district with Bright Fame, a group he founded with his wife 14 years ago. Rouvoet estimates there are between 4,000 and 8,000 prostitutes with 10% trafficed.
Ease of international travel and cheap airfares from London, Dublin, and Hamburg mean Amsterdam's streets are often filled with drunken sex tourists coming to gawk and buy. that brings drug use, disorderly conduct, and crime. Femke Halsema, Amsterdam's first female mayor, vowed to clean up the red light district and in January banned walking tours of the area, even while declaring her support for the sex industry. But Rouvoet says the city council has begun to see the limits of Dutch pragmatism, and he sees a definite shift in public opinion: 'the council is asking, 'Do we have to be proud of the fact that drunken guys from England, Scotland, and Germany come here to abuse poor women from Eastern Europe?'
The city's youngest council member, Don Ceder, 30, wants to close the windows completely. 'Thousands of men judge women behind the windows every day: too fat, too short, too black, not tasty enough. is that the feminism we strive for as a society? Ceder, a member of the Christian Union Party, brought soup to prostitutes in the red light district as a teenager church volunteer. That's when he saw the dichotomy between the image the women projected and their reality.
'Amsterdam is the end station of a very evil chain, one of the best-known sex destinations in the world ,' he said. He says that even the most conservative estimates of trafficking (10% of 5,000 prostitutes forced into the work) still mean 500 women are regularly raped. 'I choose the side of the most vulnerable women, he said.
Rouvoet has seen firsthand the importance of having systems to help women out of prostitution. 'The women tell me, 'Yes, we need social worker and accountants to help us with taxes and so on, but what we really need is relationships'.
'Maria' is a Romanian woman who was first brought to Western Europe and trafficked by her mother at age 14. (WORLD isn't using her real name for safety reasons.)Soon after they met, Rouvoet invited her to a weekend personality assessment training. Afterward maria told him, 'You are the first person who invested in my life. No one ever did this for me'. That training started her on the road to changing her life; Through support from Bright Fame she received training and now works as a hairdresser. 'for the first time I have normal people in my life. I don't want to do prostitution anymore'.
Bos encouraged me to go to the red light district. 'If you can, take a walk through. It's important to go see the truth, so you can't ignore it'. It was a short disturbing walk, through narrow alleys where police officers directed unruly tourists into orderly traffic patterns. i prayed as I walked and forced myself to look at women being sold in shop windows, in a 'civilized' country, while hundreds of people strolled by. My eyes met those of a young woman, hair and makeup done to make her resemble a life-size doll. Our gaze met for a split second that haunts me.
at the end of that lane, the alleyway opened onto a canal across which stands the Oude Kerk -the Old Church -Amsterdam's oldest building, built in 1306. Bos explained it was congregants of this church who first decided to tolerate prostitution nearby, creating Amsterdam's medieval red light district Their argument was that without prostitutes, visiting sailors would rape their daughters. When asked if Dutch churches today support the work of Exxpose, she shrugs and says the same mindset remains today, even among Christians. Rouvoet says simply, 'the logic is wrong. why are we OK with protecting one person's daughter and not someone else's daughter? '
Exxpose formally submitted its petition to parliament at the end of the spring and committee meetings took place in the fall. Bos and Lous are awaiting the results of those hearings. Meanwhile, the minister of justice and some members of parliament have shown support, and there is a growing sense in the Netherlands that something has to change. The debate over what is legal and 'normal' is far from over.
note: other that the Nordic or Swedish model, spoken of earlier, there is also in other countries:
Full Criminalization This is the approaching the United States, with the exception of a few counties in Nevada. it fails to recognize the vulnerabilities of the prostituted persons and punishes them for their exploitation. in this model women are arrested disproportionately while buyers are less often apprehended.
Legalization or decriminalization. This approach is practiced in Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. Bien-Aime calls it 'an unmitigated disaster in every country where these laws have passed'. Local authorities see a rise in organized crime activity and trafficking of undocumented workers. Legal brothels propose 'menus' of degrading acts, some amounting to torture.
The streets were crowded on a recent Saturday night in Amesterdam's red light district. Thousands of pedestrians strolled the cobbled streets under pink neon signs and over canals where trash floated on brown water. High-pitched laughter occasionally punctuated the excited murmur of sightseers and crescendos outside an X-rated cinema.
Bachelor parties of different nationalities - the groom-to-be identifiable by his ridiculous costume - walked alongside couples strolling arm-in-arm. Shop windows displayed all the paraphernalia imaginable in a city where marijuana and prostitution are legal. The other ware displayed in shop windows: young women trafficked here from poor countries of Eastern Europe and forced into sex work.
By all accounts, it's just a normal Saturday evening in Amsterdam. The Netherlands legalized prostitution in 2000, a move politicians said would help curb trafficking and offer safety to 'sexual workers' by trying to normalize their employment and standardize conditions. The opposite happened. freedom of movement within the European Union made it easier fro trafficers to bring women from eastern countries like Romania and Bulgaria to rich western cities with liberal laws. It also made it harder to trace links between prostitution and organized crime.
*47 Amsterdam became a human trafficking destination.
But now some among the Dutch are fighting for the once unimaginable - the end of legalized prostitution - and they achieved enough signatures on a petition to force the Dutch parliament to debate the matter. One grassroots group, called EXXPOSE, wants the Netherlands to adopt what's known as the Nordic model, where authorities prosecute customers and give help to prostitutes in leaving prostitution.
The day before I visited the red light district, Exxpose co-founder Natasja Bos met me in Utrecht, a 30 minute train ride east of Amsterdam. in the group's headquarters - a barebones office space shared with video game programmers - a the tall, dark-haired, 29 year old Bos explained the Nordic model. Adopted in Sweden in 1999, this approach
criminalizes buyers,
decriminalizes prostitutes,
offers help to get out of prostitution, and
educates the public on the realities of prostitution and sex trafficking.
The model has been a success: Street prostitution in Sweden has dropped 50% and communications intercepted between organized crime members indicate the country is 'no longer a good place to do business'. Several European countries, as well as Israel, have since adopted the Nordic model.
The research behind Swedens approach resonated with what Bos and co-founder Sara Lous - both social workers - already knew from their experience counseling women leaving prostitution: Women exiting the profession exhibited the same symptoms as survivors of sexual abuse; disassociation, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. They also knew that contrary to the common Dutch view of women freely choosing sex work, those who 'chose' prostitution almost all came from vulnerable backgrounds of trauma and abuse. In 2012 Bos and Lous, who called themselves abolitionists, are both Christians, but they say their organization is for anyone who wants to fight the injustice of trafficking. Their work led to a social media campaign last spring. 'I Am Priceless' showed photos of young people asking,'what if she was your sister?' The campaign linked to a petition to end legalized prostitutiion, In the wake of #MeToo, the petition hit a social nerve and by early April had passed the 40,000 signature threshold required to introduce debate into the Dutch parliament. 'In the Netherlands we've educated our citizens with a lot of propaganda about prostitution, says Bos.
'If It's Visible You Can Control It.
if You Criminalize it,
it will go underground.
It's just a normal job -
it's the oldest job in the world.'
It's really hard to change those belief systems, so we focus on young people who are more open to change'.
They also want to educate visitors to Amsterdam. One campaign involves giving tourist facsimilies of 50-Euro bills. On the revers side is a list of possible options for how to spend them: rent two bicycles for the day, take a barge tour through the canals, buy a poor woman for sex. Bos says
the point is to demonstrate that the purchase of other humans has no place in a modern city.
Dutch society values freedom and choice, but the growing global spotlight on human trafficking has raised
*48 questions about how much 'freedom of choice' the women behind the windows actually have.
Frits Rouvoet ministers to prostituted women in Amsterdam's red light district with Bright Fame, a group he founded with his wife 14 years ago. Rouvoet estimates there are between 4,000 and 8,000 prostitutes with 10% trafficed.
Ease of international travel and cheap airfares from London, Dublin, and Hamburg mean Amsterdam's streets are often filled with drunken sex tourists coming to gawk and buy. that brings drug use, disorderly conduct, and crime. Femke Halsema, Amsterdam's first female mayor, vowed to clean up the red light district and in January banned walking tours of the area, even while declaring her support for the sex industry. But Rouvoet says the city council has begun to see the limits of Dutch pragmatism, and he sees a definite shift in public opinion: 'the council is asking, 'Do we have to be proud of the fact that drunken guys from England, Scotland, and Germany come here to abuse poor women from Eastern Europe?'
The city's youngest council member, Don Ceder, 30, wants to close the windows completely. 'Thousands of men judge women behind the windows every day: too fat, too short, too black, not tasty enough. is that the feminism we strive for as a society? Ceder, a member of the Christian Union Party, brought soup to prostitutes in the red light district as a teenager church volunteer. That's when he saw the dichotomy between the image the women projected and their reality.
'Amsterdam is the end station of a very evil chain, one of the best-known sex destinations in the world ,' he said. He says that even the most conservative estimates of trafficking (10% of 5,000 prostitutes forced into the work) still mean 500 women are regularly raped. 'I choose the side of the most vulnerable women, he said.
Rouvoet has seen firsthand the importance of having systems to help women out of prostitution. 'The women tell me, 'Yes, we need social worker and accountants to help us with taxes and so on, but what we really need is relationships'.
'Maria' is a Romanian woman who was first brought to Western Europe and trafficked by her mother at age 14. (WORLD isn't using her real name for safety reasons.)Soon after they met, Rouvoet invited her to a weekend personality assessment training. Afterward maria told him, 'You are the first person who invested in my life. No one ever did this for me'. That training started her on the road to changing her life; Through support from Bright Fame she received training and now works as a hairdresser. 'for the first time I have normal people in my life. I don't want to do prostitution anymore'.
Bos encouraged me to go to the red light district. 'If you can, take a walk through. It's important to go see the truth, so you can't ignore it'. It was a short disturbing walk, through narrow alleys where police officers directed unruly tourists into orderly traffic patterns. i prayed as I walked and forced myself to look at women being sold in shop windows, in a 'civilized' country, while hundreds of people strolled by. My eyes met those of a young woman, hair and makeup done to make her resemble a life-size doll. Our gaze met for a split second that haunts me.
at the end of that lane, the alleyway opened onto a canal across which stands the Oude Kerk -the Old Church -Amsterdam's oldest building, built in 1306. Bos explained it was congregants of this church who first decided to tolerate prostitution nearby, creating Amsterdam's medieval red light district Their argument was that without prostitutes, visiting sailors would rape their daughters. When asked if Dutch churches today support the work of Exxpose, she shrugs and says the same mindset remains today, even among Christians. Rouvoet says simply, 'the logic is wrong. why are we OK with protecting one person's daughter and not someone else's daughter? '
Exxpose formally submitted its petition to parliament at the end of the spring and committee meetings took place in the fall. Bos and Lous are awaiting the results of those hearings. Meanwhile, the minister of justice and some members of parliament have shown support, and there is a growing sense in the Netherlands that something has to change. The debate over what is legal and 'normal' is far from over.
note: other that the Nordic or Swedish model, spoken of earlier, there is also in other countries:
Full Criminalization This is the approaching the United States, with the exception of a few counties in Nevada. it fails to recognize the vulnerabilities of the prostituted persons and punishes them for their exploitation. in this model women are arrested disproportionately while buyers are less often apprehended.
Legalization or decriminalization. This approach is practiced in Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. Bien-Aime calls it 'an unmitigated disaster in every country where these laws have passed'. Local authorities see a rise in organized crime activity and trafficking of undocumented workers. Legal brothels propose 'menus' of degrading acts, some amounting to torture.
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