Zen Buddhism comes up from time to time, in world religion class. One participant spent a years studying Buddhism and still found Zen impossible to explain. The cartoon above is the best explanation I can find, and it fits the Global Warming hoax as well.
Scientists have well defined rules. My high school introduction to chemistry and physics taught me a few things about lab work. The teachers were horrified that we tore pages out of our lab books. That was a sacrilege. We had to keep the notebooks of our observations intact and dated. "How else can you prove your observations?" My thoughts were, "Who cares what I observed?" Later I realized that the notebooks survived the scientist. As one account says - after the lab explosion blew up a scientist, they realized from his notebooks that he was storing one element in the wrong container.
The Global Warming scientists have admitted now that they do not have any original data for their theory, because they destroyed it. In fact, one cabal leader admitted that he always destroyed data requested under Freedom of Information, causing people to wonder why scientists needed to be forced to release data in the first place.
Dennis Miller has the best answer to Global Warming, uttered years ago: "One hundred years ago, people were still using outdoor johns. They did not care about measuring temperatures." Another critic pointed out that averaging temperatures is nonsense anyway, since averaging a 90 degree day and an 80 degree day yields a meaningless number that fits neither one.
I bow to Freddy Finkelstein in this area, because I am not trained in science. He obviously knows the technical side of things. His latest post on the topic and an earlier post are both worth reading.
Nevertheless, I am intrigued by the relationship between Zen, Global Warming, Church Growth, and UOJ. They belong together as vast conglomerations of nonsense.
Like Global Warming, Church Growth was founded on manipulated and meaningless statistics. C. Peter Wagner, who earned a named professorship in that fantasyland at Fuller Seminary, had to admit, years ago, that Church Growth principles "do not work." However, enough books and articles have been written to establish a network of CG fanatics in all denominations, from the Salvation Army to the Church of Rome. Wagner's admission had no affect on ChurchGrowthery, which changes names for the Fad du Jour: Contagious, Purpose-Driven, Missional, Emerging.
The CG network, thriving on semi-secrecy, unites people across denominational lines. Dom Perignon Patterson should have no interest in matters anti-Lutheran and non-WELS, but he gathered a bunch of WELSians for the Exponential Conference. He has "issues" with Church and Change, which fails to explain why he showed up at their latest conference to regain the momentum lost to Lutheran doctrine, worship, and a few choice convention votes. I noticed that the current list of Exponential speakers includes a lot of faves for The CORE and the Chicaneries:
- Babtist Ed Stetzer (hired to speak at the latest Chicanery conference but canned by popular demand);
- Mark Batterson - the Mogul of Movie Theater Ministry, on Katie's list at CORE;
- Two Granger staffers - where Ski and Katie trained and met a former member of St. Marcus, who loves Granger Community Church. Awkward!
- Mars Hill - where Ski, Glende, Katie trained, when not eating out;
- Etc. Etc.
- God declared the entire world absolved from sin, regardless of faith, giving every single person the status of guilt-free saints.
- Atoning for the sins of the world means that God declared the world free of sin - the double justification scheme kelmed from Knapp.
Some dissonance may stem from the differences in the original German edition of Knapp and the famous English translation, where the translator provided the double-justification in his own footnote. Walther and Pieper published in German, so it is most likely that they used the German edition of Knapp.
How did double-justification become the distinctive produce of the Synodical Conference when the mainline denominations were using Knapp in English until the end of the 19th century? My guess is that the mainlines simply became Universalist in doctrine and no longer cared about the topic of justification.
The ELCA/Seminex mantra of Gospel Reductionism (everyone is saved, regardless) is only one baby-step away from double-justification, since absolving the world of sin leaves nothing to justification by faith. Meanwhile, the Synodical Conference remained rather isolated, circling the wagons around Walther and Pieper. All the support for UOJ is based upon Walther, Pieper, and their numerous disciples in the Synodical Conference, whether Missouri, WELS, or the Little Sect on the Prairie. The common denominator is not Lutheran orthodoxy but Reformed doctrine via Pietism.
Church Growthing loves absolving the world without the Word, without the Means of Grace, without faith. The CG gurus are apostates who have little interest in Christian theology. They love their numbers, manufactured, manipulated, self-serving. As Luther said about the Enthusiasts - they hate the Word but fill the world with their words.
