A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

Manhattan evisceration

If you’re lucky, you’ve been blissfully unaware of the recent Manhattan Declaration, a quasi-ecumenical “call of Christian conscience” signed by a veritable who’s who of right-wing ecclesiastical celebrities (largely overlapping with the First Things crowd). The basic gist is to reaffirm opposition to legal abortion and same-sex marriage as the paramount Christian principles, but wrapped in a cloak of self-righteous victimology.

These things tend to be forgotten almost as soon as the ink is dry, but if you’re interested in a thorough smack-down, check out these three posts at the Slacktivist blog: 1|2|3.

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9 responses to “Manhattan evisceration”

  1. Jonathan Marlowe

    I wouldn’t sign the document because I don’t think it is necessary, but I think Ron Sider is smart enough to know what he is doing. Ron Sider was not fooled by Colson or anyone else.

    Reply
  2. Lee

    That could be true, but both men seem to have very different understandings of the purpose of this document. Sider thinks he’s shoring up a consistent ethic of life, and Colson thinks he’s re-asserting the pre-eminence of these issues over all others. Considering that Colson is one of the co-authors of the statement, I have a suspicion that his spin will win out, to the extent that matters.

    Reply
  3. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus

    Does anybody have a problem with the dealth penalty for gays being advocated by Christian pastors in Uganda?

    Probably not these Manhattanists, no.

    But anybody else?

    Reply
  4. Lee

    Thinking Anglicans has been talking quite a bit about it: http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/

    Reply
  5. Marvin

    I, for one, have a problem with executing people for homosexual acts. Which is why I feel a lot sorrier for gays in Uganda than I do the bureaucrats running Catholic Charities in Washington DC, who are distressed about the boot of same-sex marriage being applied to their necks.

    That said, I think that the document can be critiqued on the merits, regardless of the social location of the signatories. That’s the argument worth having. Is the significance of marriage exhausted in procreation? Roman Catholics seem to think it is. I don’t.

    Reply
    1. Lee

      I agree with that, Marvin. Though surely even the Manhattan Declaration signers must realize that the ship of tying marriage explicitly to procreation in secular law has long since sailed. As a position within the Christian Church, though, it clearly still has some currency.

      Reply
  6. Trajectory and the Manhattan Declaration. | The League of Ordinary Gentlemen

    […] not set. See slacktivist for a somewhat more polemical response to the declaration. [h/t Lee] var addthis_pub = ''; var addthis_language = 'en';var addthis_options = 'email, favorites, digg, […]

    Reply
  7. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus

    Interesting links from the Ordinary Gentleman.

    Reply
  8. McCarraher on Christianity and politics « A Thinking Reed

    […] interview with lefty Catholic intellectual Eugene McCarraher (via). He has a lot to say about the Manhattan Declaration, Radical Orthodoxy (the line about the cult of Wendell Berry–ouch!), Herbert McCabe, and […]

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