Mere Comments has been difficult (but still enjoyable!) to maintain, and we've hung in there through this fall and I plan to continue it, with help, going forward in 2009.
A number of the Touchstone editors will be gathering in Chicago in mid-January to discuss and make plans for the magazine, as we normally have done annually or semi-annually as schedules (and funds) permit. Plans for Mere Comments will be on the agenda.
The times dictate that we strive all the more diligently to emphasize the unchanging teachings of the creeds and the longstanding moral consensus of the church on matters under demonic seige these days: nothing less than the abolition of man seems underway, though we know that that project ultimately is doomed.
We also know that Christians around the world are being persecuted and that we must stand in solidarity with them. Whether persecution reaches those who do not expect it or not remains to be seen. We can only be ready.
It is all too apparent that a long sea change in culture--primarily in the concept of "family" broadly understood (i.e., sex, marriage, procreation, child-rearing, education, etc)--has rendered much (not all) of the church's witness in the West anemic and hardly fruitful, because so many have gone along with much of it by slow degrees over many decades. What is the real difference between a typical Christian and a comfortable secularist American? And beyond this, in some cases the witness in some "churches" has really become anti-christ, apostate.
A time for discouragement? Hardly. It would seem that any reading of church history, the fathers, the lives of the saints would suggest that this is not the time to slacken our efforts but the time to sharpen our witness, concentrate the mind and heart, and set aside diversions and worldly comforts in order to do so. It should be a pleasure for us to serve the Lord, whether in the best of times or the worst of times.
I welcome your comments, as always. But I also must ask for your financial support at this time. I know many have been hit by the financial (that is, the investment and mortgage sector) troubles and the general "downturn" in the economy. We are doing "okay" in the sense that we are still publishing (good stuff, if I may say) but have had to cut two staff positions this summer. We're leaner, but not meaner. And we've a great deal to say, and need your help to do so. We've made it easy to contirbute securely on-line.
We know that the generosity of our readers is always a sacrifice. We will make the best possible use of your gift. (Nothing plush here--I write from the attic of a Chicago bungalow, with an electric space heater running behind me--and that's not a complaint!) I am just happy to be alive and writing in these times. These are the times God has chosen for us, after all. So he must think we are up to the challenge.
Thanks for reading and for your support.
"It would seem that any reading of church history, the fathers, the lives of the saints would suggest that this is not the time to slacken our efforts but the time to sharpen our witness, concentrate the mind and heart, and set aside diversions and worldly comforts in order to do so. It should be a pleasure for us to serve the Lord, whether in the best of times or the worst of times."
Just moments before reading this, I read a passage in Ecclesiastes that struck a strange note in my spirit.
"For the living know that they will die; but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, their hatred, and their envy have now perished; nevermore will they have a share in anything done under the sun" (Ecclesiastes 9:5,6).
This "nevermore," like that of Poe's raven, was eerily sobering. I pondered the abrupt and utter cessation of earthly activity that death brings. I also thought how God grants us, as the verse says, a foreknowledge of death...something animals don't have, or at least not in the same way.
Our life is God's gracious opportunity for volitional obedience and self-giving. But in one irreversible moment, we will move from volition to eternal accountability. I cannot think of a better reference point from which to evaluate our choices.
Posted by: Diane | December 04, 2008 at 01:06 PM