Ignorance Enlivened by the Straw Man Fallacy

"I don't care what people say
UOJ is here to stay
Sound off, one, two..."

A. Nony Mousehas left a new comment on your post "No, No, Nanette":

No, Greg, you're wrong. UOJ IS the same as the Atonement. I think you're just trying to stir up more trouble. I feel really sorry for the poor folks who are led astray by you, and they lose the comfort of the Atonement-UOJ. On their deathbeds, they will stuggle as they look to their weak and trembling faith, rather than to Christ crucified and risen!

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GJ - First let me address the ignorance of Rev. A. Nony Mouse (WELS).

Here is a quotation from Robert Preus, when he still supported UOJ (and the Church Growth Movement). Both go together.

Cited by Jack Cascione, another UOJ Stormtrooper:

THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE – "OBJECTIVE JUSTIFICATION"

The doctrine of objective justification is a lovely teaching drawn from Scripture which tells us that God who has loved us so much that He gave His only to be our Savior has for the sake of Christ’s substitutionary atonement declared the entire world of sinners for whom Christ died to be righteous (Romans 5:17-19).

Objective justification which is God’s verdict of acquittal over the whole world is not identical with the atonement, it is not another way of expressing the fact that Christ has redeemed the world. Rather it is based upon the substitutionary work of Christ, or better, it is a part of the atonement itself. It is God’s response to all that Christ died to save us, God’s verdict that Christ’s work is finished, that He has been indeed reconciled, propitiated; His anger has been stilled and He is at peace with the world, and therefore He has declared the entire world in Christ to be righteous.

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GJ - I have gathered most of the material on this subject in Thy Strong Word. Those quotations have shown people the error of their thinking, which can only come from being carefully taught error in one of the synodical seminaries. As they often said at the Sausage Factory in Mequon, "Doctrinal error usually starts in the seminary faculty." No kidding. At least Robert Preus had the courage to repudiate his former position, which was tied to his Norwegian heritage.

The equation of UOJ and the Atonement is wrong, just plain ignorant. Dr. Preus confessed a common error in the passage above, taken directly from Walther's infamous Easter Absolution sermon: to wit - UOJ is God declaring the entire world righteous, forgiven, full of grace without the Means of Grace, enjoying the Promises of God without hearing the Promises of God, guilt-free without knowing what guilt is.

Thus endeth the lesson on ignorance.

The Straw Man fallacy. One sign of a weak argument is the use of a logical fallacy or even a string of them. The Straw Man fallacy is distinguished by the hothead saying, "This is what you claim and it is wrong."

Mouse's Straw Man is - "You direct people to have faith in their faith." That is a common canard (French for duck) from the UOJ troops. How they march in formation - always in the wrong direction.

No, Mouse. Justification by faith teaches people to trust in the redeeming work accomplished for them by Christ. The Go

Purring Along

A reader was concerned that nasty, anonymous people were shutting me down. No, they encourage me, even more than the many pleasant people who phone and email me.

One person sent a long list of what was wrong with me and signed his name - Anonymous. He is probably a minister of the Wisconsin sect. They start with the Gospel and move to the Law, as Paul Kelm has taught them. "Everyone is forgiven (UOJ) and this is what is wrong with you." Since they move to the Law, they never move off the Law.

Apparently the Law does not condemn anonymous, spiteful, ridiculous messages. The civil law does cover such behavior over the phone.

I often wonder, "Did these guys have a mother? Were they abused and neglected children?" Apparently they really were abused and neglected. The old standard of WELS schooling was:
1. Drop the kid off in the fall.
2. See the child at Thanksgiving and Christmas.
3. Minimize contact, lest the poor thing be spoiled.
4. Surround the child with hazing, emotional and physical abuse.
One WELS layman said he followed the WELS norms and never realized how much his only son was suffering.

Seeing parents at odd times was considered an emergency. "Why are you here?" is asked in an alarmed and questioning tone of voice.

That is why East Coast is eager to see the parochial schools shut down. They encourage a weird, robotic attitude that justifies itself at all stages, no matter what is done. All I need to hear is, "In our circles..." to know pompous fertilizer will follow, by the truckload.

Any time I comment on well known Wisconsin sect tendencies, I can count on a new anonymous message. I am sure Bailing Water was shut down (three times) by that approach, plus contacting friends and relatives of the blogmeister each time. WELS is good at shutting down discussion of WELS.

Issues in WELS began to build up opposition to SP Gurgel. Then he showed up at a meeting, visibly annoyed, and attendance was frightned away. It doesn't take much to scare away the girly-men of WELS. Issues in WELS, never very daring, is almost comatose today.

But Church and Change is not shut down. They criticize and make fun of WELS all the time, but they do it as apostates. They have a huge website and following. They are eagerly planning their next doctrinal fiasco.

There you have the most obvious sign of apostasy in the WELS leadership - modest discussion sites are shut down while crypto-Baptist sites are linked from the main WELS website (until Ichabod reported it).

Ichabod posts may fluctuate in the next semester. I started teaching at a third online university and I study journalism (master's degree) on the side. Sometimes the written work is going to pile up. The petty vindictiveness of WELS is not going to change. I know that. But I am not gong to stop writing about apostasy. The only way to silence me is for WELS to start studying the Confessions.

Tom Cruise and Scientology

Some people are exposing the actual doctrines of Scientology. They have vowed to destroy it. The cult is strange and abusive, but there are a number of high-profile adherents. Hollywood makes fun of traditional Christianity but defends Cruise.

Click this link for a scary Tom Cruise interview.

Some well known Scientologists include:
Tom Cruise and his third wife.
John Travolta.
Kirsti Alley.
The woman who does the voice for Bart Simpson.
When Kirk Douglas gave an award to Travolta, the Grease star held the aging actor's head firmly and kissed him on the mouth.

L. Ron Hubbard began Scientology with his book Dianetics. Recently I found a book trying to unite all secret mystery religions. The poor slob spent 20 years studying them all and finding universal truths in them. He was close to being included as a member in one of them. He said he declined. Maybe he was lying.

The book made a good point about all the secret religions being similar. Same author - Satan, I would say.

Some young women identify with Wicca (witchcraft) as a means of obtaining power or meaning in life. When something like that comes up in class, there is also noise for neo-paganism or an affinity with an earlier religion. One student announced she was an ordained priestess of Egyptian paganism. She was also extraordinarily rude with everyone else.