Mark Elrod, a political science professor at Harding University (my Alma mater), has had a very popular weblog for several years where he, his colleagues, alumni, and other interested parties could discuss issues of the day.

Elrod has always been a Democrat, which puts him decidedly to the left of most of the Harding community. No big deal, right? Academia is big enough to handle dissenting views, isn’t it? Well…

“I’ve come to the realization that I have over-estimated the capacity of both my academic (Harding University) and my religious (Church of Christ) community to deal with critical thinking or dissent in a public forum.  In the last few weeks, I’ve grown tired with dealing with members of both communities who seem to view the world in black and white terms and think of all discussions as zero-sum games.”

This from his post announcing why he is making his blog private. Kind of makes a mockery of Harding’s pretensions of academic excellence and freedom, right?

Let’s clarify that despite his controversial political and social views, Elrod is a believer. Not once has he denied the existence of God, the divinity of Christ, or the authority of scripture. He deserves to be treated like a brother. Yet far too many of his readers, presumably Christians, have gone running like schoolyard sissies to the HU administration because big bad Elrod said something they didn’t like. Boo-friggin’-hoo.

I didn’t always agree with him; but I enjoyed his Political Science class as an undergrad for the same reason I enjoyed his blog; he made me think. You know, like good teaching and writing is supposed to do?

Sad stuff. This is yet another reason why HU won’t ever get dime one from me.

Update

Elrod has posted a clarification of the matter on his blog.

I want to make it clear why I’m making the switch from writing a public blog to a private blog.

I’ve been fielding questions all day about this and I think it may be better to deal with it wholesale rather than retail.

For the record, I was not “pressured” by anybody to change my blog from “public” to “private” status.

I made this decision on my own as the result of the general frustration I have with members of our fellowship who want to make a spiritual judgment about me based on my political views.

One of those views is my public support for Barack Obama for president.

In the last few days, much of that angst has been directed toward my employer and, as a result, toward me as well.

Because of this, I have decided that I would much rather have a private conversation about things that are important to me rather than a public conversation that leads to additional complaints about me to the Harding University administration.

I suspect that this arrangement is going to be beneficial to all of the parties involved.

So he is sick of people gunning for him and questioning his convictions simply because he supports Obama for president. Well, he is still within his rights. I know from experience (admittedly, on a much smaller scale) that it can be very hurtful when people question your character, integrity, and very commitment to the faith just because you have an unpopular opinion on a peripheral matter.

Regardless, Elrod says the school didn’t bust his chops and my respect for him dictates that I take him at his word. So be it. I was wrong, at least on that point. Look for me to eat a little crow in my next post.

When discussing musical preferences with people, I can usually tell a lot about a person’s musical knowledge by their reaction when I mention that I am a fan of Lyle Lovett. The most common response I get is “Wasn’t he married to Julia Roberts?”

Sadly, it is true that Lovett is probably best known to the general public as Roberts’ ex-husband. However, for those who know their music, Lovett is known for his brilliant songwriting and impossible to pin down sound. This year for Christine’s birthday I took her to see Lovett at Wolf Trap and it was time and money well-spent.

The Large Band took the stage on-time and burned through a jazzy instrumental. At it’s conclusion Lovett took the stage along with a 6 man, 6 woman vocal section and broke into the gospel-influenced “I Will Rise Up”; starting the show on a rousing high note. Lovett has always been virtually impossible to categorize by genre. When he broke big in the 80s he was billed as a country artist but over the years he has broadened his sound to include jazz, gospel, western swing, blues, folk, and bluegrass; with his voice in fine form and his band at the top of their game, they brought out all of these sounds on Wednesday night.

Lovett’s band lives up to their billing: a fiddle player, a cello player, two lead guitarists, a mandolin player, a keyboardist, a steel guitar player, string bass player, and a drummer (long-time session man Russ Kunkel) all helped to create a big, rich, driving sound. As if that wasn’t enough, Lovett brought out local legend Mike Auldridge of the Seldom Scene (arguably the best bluegrass outfit ever to come out of the D.C. area) to play Dobro for a few songs, concluding with the hilarious “Keep It In Your Pantry.” A generous band leader, Lovett allowed most of them a chance to shine on their respective instruments and shared lead parts with three of members of the vocal section. The occasional between-song banter and quirky introductions to some of the songs showed that the bone-dry wit of Lovett’s writing is also a part of his personality.

Lovett played numbers from just about every one of his albums, and they all sounded fresh. Highlights from the 2 & 1/2 hour set included “Cowboy Man,” “This Old Porch” (co-written with his Texas A & M roommate Robert Earl Keen), “If I Were The Man You Wanted,” “I’ve Been To Memphis,” “The Truck Song,” “My Baby Don’t Tolerate,” “Church,” “Ain’t No Cane,”"Give Back My Heart,” “That’s Right You’re Not From Texas,” and “San Antonio Girl.” He encored with the rousing “I’m A Soldier in the Army of The Lord” and one of my personal favorites, “If I Had A Boat.”

Without question, this show makes my top 5 concerts, ever. If you ever get the chance to catch Lovett, don’t miss it.

I guess that I am easy to amuse. I don’t apologize for it.

 How cool would it be to have a celebrity pop up with cool music encouraging good habits whenever you needed it?

This pearl of wisdom comes from a client who was arrested then bailed out by her mother:

“My mom was totally pissed about having to come and bail me out. But jail, like, really sucked. I didn’t like it man; not one bit.”

“Free pizza and dilly bars? [The Apostle] Paul spoke of this in weeping. This is certianly not following his example!”

If you want to know where this little gem came from, click here.

And I am offering a no-prize to whoever can find Paul’s condemnation of pizza and dilly bars in the New Testament.

If you are a Christian and you are disturbed by the ongoing efforts of certain para-church organizations in our country to co-opt our faith for political purposes, click here.

When your congregation sings “Heart of Worship” do you get the urge to hold up a lighter and sway back and forth, or is it just me?

When I first left church youth ministry I took a job as a residential counselor (read: houseparent) at a church-affiliated home for “at-risk” youth. I will spare readers the gory details of this job, but suffice to say that it was a nightmare. Insufficient fiscal support, spotty relations with local churches, and inconsistent approaches to managing and disciplining the children in our care were among the many problems we faced.

Taking responsibility for a child who has experienced wide varieties of abuse and very little in the way of corrective discipline is always a massive undertaking. We had one twelve year old boy who I am convinced had either oppositional defiant disorder or conduct disorder. Once, when I used minimal physical intervention to prevent him from assaulting another resident (which was perfectly legal for me to do, by the way) he looked at me shouted “You can’t touch me!”

Several experiences like this, along with my general pessimism, caused me to conclude that I needed to save up and get a vasectomy. As the years passed (and after I had left the children’s home) and my mental health, general attitude, and life circumstances improved, I gradually backed off from the position of never wanting kids. Christine and I look forward to having some in the future. However, every so often I relapse. Such as when I read the story below:

Court overturns father’s grounding of 12-year-old

Wed Jun 18, 2:08 PM ET

A Canadian court has lifted a 12-year-old girl’s grounding, overturning her father’s punishment for disobeying his orders to stay off the Internet, his lawyer said Wednesday.

The girl had taken her father to Quebec Superior Court after he refused to allow her to go on a school trip for chatting on websites he tried to block, and then posting “inappropriate” pictures of herself online using a friend’s computer.

The father’s lawyer Kim Beaudoin said the disciplinary measures were for the girl’s “own protection” and is appealing the ruling.

“She’s a child,” Beaudoin told AFP. “At her age, children test their limits and it’s up to their parents to set boundaries.”

“I started an appeal of the decision today to reestablish parental authority, and to ensure that this case doesn’t set a precedent,” she said. Otherwise, said Beaudoin, “parents are going to be walking on egg shells from now on.”

“I think most children respect their parents and would never go so far as to take them to court, but it’s clear that some would and we have to ask ourselves how far this will go.”

According to court documents, the girl’s Internet transgression was just the latest in a string of broken house rules. Even so, Justice Suzanne Tessier found her punishment too severe.

Beaudoin noted the girl used a court-appointed lawyer in her parents’ 10-year custody dispute to launch her landmark case against dear old dad.

I hope that this is an anomaly rather than a trend, because you know it won’t take long for such nonsense to drift south to the U.S. While I am very much for the rights of children to be protected from any and all forms of abuse and/or neglect, what this dad did does not qualify as such. Sometimes I think that all of the chicken littles who run about screaming “nanny state!” may be more right than the rest of us want to admit.

And if the law is going to screw with my ability to discipline my kids, I don’t want any.

Memo

From: Odgie

To: My Facebook friends

Subject: Applications, Games, etc.

Please stop “inviting” me to add more crap to my Facebook page/profile. I have no interest whatsoever in joining the Abused Pirates club, playing “Guess the Celebrity Thong” or adding the “Interesting Things I Found in the Kleenex After Blowing My Nose*” application. Nor do I wish to annoy the rest of my friends by being forced to invite them to add more useless junk.

I only joined Facebook for the easy networking so that I could keep up with my friends. That’s all I want. Really. I am glad to hear how you are doing, but that is all I need. Please.

Regards,

Odgie

*C’mon, you know that you check it too.

Yes, it’s true folks. Now your kids can have a talking Jesus to play with along side of their Transformers and Pokemon toys. Be sure and check out the site for the commercial; it’s priceless. I really like that they made sure his robe is pure white (like his skin) and that his hair is neatly combed and conditioned along with his beard, and that he speaks English with an American accent - it shows that high regard for historical accuracy.

Why do I feel like this is representative of everything that is wrong with modern Christianity?

*”Do not make cast idols.” (NIV)