I’m not a card carrying fan of Cardinal Pell or any Roman Catholic, but this article is worth reading and in particular this quote:
The key public task facing all Christians today is to make the case for Western civilisation and to replenish the sources from which it takes life and strength
I will have to read the book he has published about this. I wonder if we will agree exactly on the role of Christianity as the driving basis for Western civilisation. His challenge remains.
A fascinating essay on education: Dorothy Sayers, “The Lost Tools of Learning”.
“Modern education concentrates on teaching subjects, leaving the method of thinking, arguing, and expressing one’s conclusions to be picked up by the scholar as he goes along; mediaveal education concentrated on first forging and learning to handle the tools of learning, using whatever subject came handy as a piece of material on which to doodle until the use of the tool became second nature.” The lost tools…
“The inflected languages interpret the uninflected, whereas the uninflected are of little us in interpreting the inflected.” This is why learning Greek was so hard for me!
“The modern tendency is to try and force rational explanations on a child’s mind at too early an age. intelligent questions, spontaneously asked, should, of course, receive an immediate and rational answer; but it is a great mistake to suppose that a child cannot readily enjoy and remember things that are beyond its power to analyze”. Rationality can be an idol. A good servant…
“Theology is the Mistress-science, without which the whole educations structure will necessarily lack its final synthesis”. The Queen of the sciences – go forth and integrate!
“For the sole end of education is simply this: to teach men how to learn for themselves; and whatever instruction fails to do this is effort spent in vain”. Learning skills, not learning styles etc.
If you live near the Docklands, get yourself down to this new evangelical church being planted by Guy Mason and his team.
Often in the discussion of Christian ethics in the public sphere you hear the catch-cry, “we can’t go back to X“, where X is the Reformation, the first century, the 19th century and so on.
People normally say this for two reasons, both of them wrong:
Firstly, they have created an incorrect association between a biblical ethic and a certain era, that doesn’t logically hold. For example, when teaching Biblical roles of husbands and wives, it is common to hear people cry out: “we cannot go back to the 1950’s”. But actually Biblical teaching on roles has as much to critique of the 1950’s white picket fence marriage as it does the modern crash-and-burn egalitarian marriage. A pox on both your houses.
Secondly, the claim “we can’t go back” simply might be masking the fact that biblical ethics is challenging us to a repentance we are unwilling to consider today. Dorothy Sayers has an excellent discussion of this in her “Lost Tools of Learning” education essay:
“What, then, are we to do? We cannot go back to the Middle Ages. That is a cry to which we have become accustomed. We cannot go back – or can we? Distinguo. I should like every term in that proposition defined. Does ‘Go back’ mean a retrogression in time, or the revision of an error? The first is clearly impossible per se; the second is a thing which wise men do every day. ‘Cannot’ – does this mean that our behaviour is determined by some irreversible cosmic mechanism, or merely that such an action would be very difficult in view of the opposition it would provoke?”
In short, Biblical repentance is not physics!
Just a quick update about our new baby girl. Her name is: Charlie-Kate Louise Schuller.
Charlie – after the 19th C Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon – a great stirrer and earthy lover of God.
Kate – after Katherine Von Bora the godly runaway nun who became the wife of the reformer, Martin Luther.
Louise – after Lois, the baby’s maternal grandmother, and the bible teaching grandmother of that early church leader, Timothy.
Thanks,
Wayne, Helen, Josiah, Jemima, Lydia, Charlie-Kate.
Unfortunately we haven’t settled on a name yet. We will decide real soon now. 🙂
Lydia took to her new baby sister immediately and is very protective:
Baby’s first bath:
Taking them home (finally!):
A good close up shot:
Dear Friends,
We are happy to announce the birth of the fourth heir of Cair Paravel, of which all thrones are now filled.
Time: 9th October 2006, 11:56am.
Weight: 4.17kg (9lb 3oz)
Helen is doing well, she is a champion. The baby’s first feed was very good. The labour was about 8 hours.
She is staying a Frankston hospital and resting. No visitors please until 4:00pm Tuesday onwards (give me a ring first to check if all is ok).
Please don’t send any presents, not really needed.
The Apostle Paul said: “I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest in me” (2 Corinthians 12:9). May God’s power be displayed through the life of this child, so that through both her strengths and weaknesses Jesus Christ will show himself to be glorious and sufficient.
Tired + smiling,
Wayne, Helen, Josiah, Jemima and Lydia
A photo when she is 10 minutes old:
First cuddle with Mum:
Some nice closeups:
I am tired!
Praise God for the sending of his Son, Jesus Christ the boss, king, saviour, and coming judge of every person.
What a busy and exhausting month!
Among the busyness, we got our photo taken in the nativity scene at St Paul’s Cathedral (opposite Fed Square):
Better than a photo with Santa! In fact Channel Nine were there doing a news story that involved shots and interviews with us. You can download the digital version of the news item here (40 meg!) – this version contains extra interview footage that wasn’t shown on channel 9. (let me know if you have problems viewing this mpeg video file)
Our kids have really got into the Christmas story this year, they play-act with our nativity set non-stop. Here is what it currently looks like:
Josiah is quite difficult to get singing, but occasionally he comes out of his shell and really expresses himself – during such times it is good to have a tape recorder handy. 🙂
So enjoy: Josiah singing and playing the xylophone.
We are enjoying a nice holiday after a busy and hard year. Wayne has finished his four years of full time theological training at Ridley College.
For the last two years we have been involved in the local church of St Mark’s Family Church Reservoir West.
Jemima Ruth Schuller is born!
Josiah Lucas Schuller is born!
Marriage! Helen Pratt becomes Helen Schuller.
