Religion in the Homeland

Recently Twitter had such hashtags as:

#ExposeChristianSchools

#MarchforLife

#CovingtonCatholic

#WhatKindofChristiansDoWeWantinFlyoverCountry

Franklin Graham tweeted:

.@LadyGaga may be a talented singer & actress, but her comments about @VP & @SecondLady are misguided and unfortunate. 1/3

buff.ly/2CzVJN5

I was in the DC Area in the 80s and 90s.  I found two books especially useful:

[1] Holton, Gerald, “The Anti-Science Phenomenon,” Chapter 6, Science and Anti-Science, Harvard University Press, 1994.

[2] Bawer, Bruce , "Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity", Crown publishers, 1997

Control of the Desktop

My battle with the system to control my desktop continues.  I have learned that Google controls "devices".

My daughter ensures that I have a spectrum of devices:  Nixplay Frame and fitbit Flex.

The Open System Interconnection Reference Model had 7 levels.  IBM added an 8th level for User at both ends.

I'm at a library using the Wi-Fi to connect to the Internet.  Chrome still wants to be my default browser.

It may be that that is what I want for this device.  It is not what I want for my real HP Laptop computer.

Your Grandfather was a Theist

Our Founding Fathers Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson were avowed Deists.

To my daughters I can say, "Your Grandfather Brown was a Theist."

His beliefs were strongly influenced by The Fundamentals. The Fundamentals: A Testimony To The Truth (generally referred to simply as The Fundamentals) is a set of 90 essays published from 1910 to 1915 by the Bible Institute of Los Angeles. The Fundamentals were edited by A. C. Dixon and later by Reuben Archer Torrey. The Fundamentals was first published as a 12-volume set, and later as a four-volume set retaining all 90 essays. The 90 essays were written by 64 different authors, representing most of the major Protestant Christian denominations.

The essays were written to affirm conservative Protestant beliefs, especially those of the Reformed tradition, and defend against ideas deemed inimical to them. They are widely considered to be the foundation of modern Christian fundamentalism.

The project was initially conceived in 1909 by California businessman Lyman Stewart and his brother Milton. They anonymously provided funds for collecting essays to set out what they believed to be the fundamentals of Christian faith, and for printing and distributing copies of the collected essays.  The Fundamentals  was sent free to ministers, missionaries, professors of theology, YMCA and YWCA secretaries, Sunday School superintendents, and other Protestant religious workers in every English-speaking country. Over three million volumes (250,000 sets) were sent out.

The volumes defended orthodox Protestant beliefs and attacked higher criticism, liberal theology, Catholicism (also called Romanism by them), socialism, Modernism, atheism, Christian Science, Mormonism, Millennial Dawn, Spiritualism, and evolutionism.