Cranmer on incest - just wondering...?

Returning home from the Banner Conference, there's lots to catch up with.  Archibishop Cranmer is always worth a look; scroll down to April 13th ( can't work out how to link directly to this one) and see his comment on the case of Patrick Stuebing.  It's a sad case: Patrick only ment his sister after thy were grown; they fell in love and have four children together.  He argued that the law against incest discriminated against him - and he lost.  As Cranmer says, the law apparently does have the right to a say about what is allowed in the bedroom.  'In matters of sexual expression we are not free to do as we please.'

Hmm.  I agree, of course.  But I do wonder - don't you? - if incest between two brothers would have been deemed illegal?

Cranmer on Gaddaffi

Archibishop Cranmer - who knows a thing or two about the death penalty - reflects on the death of Gaddaffi.  Here's a flavour:

To those who object to Gaddafi's execution or the manner of it, His Grace urges you to save us your sanctimony. There are those who say there should be no rejoicing in the death of any man. Well, put yourselves in the shoes of those who have lived under the brutal dictatorships of the modern era - Mao, Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, Ceausescu, Saddam - and ask by what moral standard you judge the oppressed and persecuted? As you read your newspapers over coffee and lounge in the comfort of your cosy armchairs, reflect on the undeniable fact that some people are just evil. And when the sum total of the suffering they inflict reaches beyond endurance, those who have suffered will feel wholly justified in taking up the sword. Of course, they might themselves then die by the sword, but that is their choice. When the state ceases to bear the sword and justice is no longer seen to be done, judgement will fall somehow from the anarchic baseness of human nature.
What an awful shock death must be for the Muslim.  But in fairness to Muslim friends, I'm not at all sure many of them would want to count Gaddaffi as a faithful one...

What Cranmer thinks of Evangelicals

Over at Cranmer's blog, you'll find this:

• In His Grace’s experience, they are almost universally kind and hospitable; sing an awful lot of Shine, Jesus, Shine; believe the Canon of the Bible was handed down by God; praise the Lord when they find a lost saucepan; rejoice in Middle-East bloodshed and social breakdown, ‘for these things must be’; and their view of Church history begins with Acts and then jumps straight to Amazing Grace. Certainly, His Grace has never yet met an evangelical who grasps the Patristics, understands Chalcedon or appreciates the historical significance of any of the early Ecumenical Councils.

Now, that would be a bad thing, wouldn't it?

Message to Richard Dawkins

Don’t be intimidated!

The Daily Telegraph has reported that you will not debate with a foremost Christian apologist, William Lane Craig.  It has even reported that one of your fellow Oxford atheists – Doctor Daniel Came – has suggested it looks like cowardice on your part.

Cranmer – once an Anglican Archbishop, now a Catholic blogger – has even gone so far (scroll down to May 15th) as to attack your credentials:

• So, when we hear the shrill voice of Dr Richard Dawkins bleating about Professor Craig’s ‘relentless drive for self-promotion’, and rejecting the debasement of his eminent CV by debating with the distinguished Christian apologist, we should remember this: Richard Dawkins never contributed much to science; his Oxford chair was bought for him by a rich admirer; and the scientific ideas upon which he built his reputation are increasingly discredited. Those beguiled by his diatribes are listening neither to the voice of reason nor science.

Well, Dr Dawkins – here’s my advice.  Don’t be intimidated; don’t let these people bully you into the debate.

It is better by far to refuse to debate and let people think you’re a coward, than to debate and let them know without doubt that your arguments (not to say your credentials) don’t stack up.