You seem to say Wilson and his church believe abuse in marriage is ok. You are wrong. They’ve engaged Clare Locke in Alexandria VA to counter such slander. Take care what you say.

Godith,

It is not slander to say the truth.
The truth is Doug Wilson covers for the abusers in his camp and throws the victims of those abusers under the bus. He does this in order to save face (keep up appearances) and minimize his own sins and the sins of his minions.

So put a sock in it Godith. Defending Wilson is not the brave and righteous thing you think it is. It just makes you another one of his minions.

Godith, you are one of Wilson’s little sock puppets or flying monkeys (not sure which). You and your faux tough-guy Doug Wilson are all bluster and can only pick on defenseless, manipulated, and bullied women. You and him will run away like scared little kids just like your Christian nationalist MAGA buddies cosplaying GI Joe when the Excrement Gets Real. And I will be there to film it and mock you relentlessly.

My church began a women’s Bible study using a book by Wilson’s wife called “Eve in Exile.” I thought I’d give it a try, and it’s fair. I was expecting her to say that women should wear floor-length prairie dresses and have 50 kids. I don’t agree with many of her conclusions, but she is more articulate than her husband.

If they choose another book like this one, I may find another Bible study.

“Doug Wilson Is Weird …”

Then it should be no surprise that John Piper promoted him when he launched the New Calvinist movement on the American church. The young reformers apparently like radical weirdo leaders … there’s been a long line of them (Piper, Driscoll, MacDonald, etc. etc.). But, it appears that ole Doug got too weird even for the NeoCals; he’s now a potato too hot to handle.

senecagriggs: Doug Wilson … is a unique thinker.

Only in the sense that the guy at the ice cream stand that puts a lot of Mister Proper on top of every portion is a unique gastronomer. Or, if you don’t like ice cream, the hot dog guy putting a lot of motor oil along every hotdog.

And Mister Proper and motor oil themselves can be very useful – more than could be said about most of the stuff propagated by DW.

If you want to know more: https://kbotkin.com/tag/doug-wilson/ and https://kbotkin.com/category/american-christianity/

Some of what you read at Kate Botkin’s blog is heartbreaking. And infuriating. And she has the receipts – she can document her allegations.

dee,

Bells went off for me the moment I saw “weird” in the title!

some different perspectives that can make you think.
senecagriggs,

Yeah. Like a man marrying a woman is very much like a man adopting a puppy from an animal shelter:
keep the puppy on a leash and train it to obey….. a sort of twisted Pavlov’s women thing.

dee:
I wonder if Wilson sues people for saying he’s weird?

The Neo-Calvinist male supremacists wish they could do more than sue people.

No doubt, they wish they could put anyone who disagrees with them in prison (or execute them), just like their hero John Calvin.

Unfortunately for the Neo-Calvinist wannabe tinpot dictators, they will never have such power.

So they have to settle for inflicting “church discipline” on their unfortunate victims.

With regard to The Gospel Coalition, like most corporate Christianity Inc organizations, they are neither left nor right, but simply say whatever they think will gain them the most earthly power, influence, and wealth.

With regard to the bowler hat wearing followers of Doug Wilson, I wonder if they got their inspiration from the bowler hat wearing Royal Black Preceptory, also known as the Royal Black Institution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Black_Institution

http://royalblack.org

This is a masonic-style Protestant fraternal organization whose members mostly live in Northern Ireland and Scotland. As you can see from the photos on the Wikipedia page as well as their own website, they like to go parading around wearing suits and bowler hats and carrying umbrellas or canes.

If Wilson studied in Scotland or lived there, he would probably have come across the Royal Black Preceptory/Royal Black Institution, especially if he moved in fundamentalist Protestant circles while in Scotland.

The RBP/RBI is closely affiliated with the Orange Order, a larger masonic-style Protestant fraternal organization. Many RBP/RBI members are also members of the Orange Order.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_Order

https://www.goli.org.uk

The Orange Order members also like to parade in bowler hats and suits, and often carry umbrellas or canes too.

Both the RBP/RBI and the Orange Order are controversial organizations. Most Catholics in Northern Ireland view these groups as Protestant-supremacist organizations, while the members and supporters of these groups feel that they are simply Protestant cultural organizations. Both the RBP/RBI and the Orange Order had close connections to loyalist (Pro-British) paramilitary groups during The Troubles.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_Order#Relationship_with_loyalist_paramilitaries

Historically, many members of the unionist (Pro-British) establishment (politicians, judges, etc) in Northern Ireland have been members of the Orange Order and the Royal Black Preceptory. For many years (1971-1998) the Grand Master of the Royal Black Institution was Sir James Molyneaux, a longtime member of the House of Commons and later a member of the House of Lords. There have been allegations against Molyneaux of child abuse on various blogs and websites that discuss Northern Ireland related issues. Apparently the Royal Black Institution is either unaware of these allegations or unbothered by them, because they proudly describe their ceremonial “Molyneaux Mace” on their website.

http://royalblack.org/mission-statement/molyneaux-mace/

Furthermore (and this is a VERY deep rabbit hole), the Orange Order and the Royal Black Preceptory have allegedly been connected to child abuse at the Kincora Boys Home in Belfast, which was run by a prominent Orange Order member named William McGrath. McGrath was a pedophile who had close connections to the British intelligence services, and also ran his own paramilitary group called Tara. Tara was supported and funded by Sir Knox Cunningham, a member of parliament and aide to the Prime Minister Harold MacMillan.

It is alleged that McGrath’s Kincora Boys Home was part of a larger network of orphanages throughout the United Kingdom where children were sexually abused by VIPs, with the collusion of the British intelligence services who compiled blackmail material on these VIPs. McGrath was eventually convicted of 15 counts of sexually abusing children, and sentenced to 4 years in prison, a derisory sentence considering the severity of his crimes. One of McGrath’s pedophile associates, John McKeague, was murdered by the Provisional IRA in 1982.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kincora_Boys%27_Home

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_McGrath

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tara_(Northern_Ireland)

Anyway, all of the above information may or may not be useful.

I just thought I would mention it, because when I read that Wilson’s followers paraded around with bowler hats and canes, I immediately thought of the Royal Black Preceptory and the Orange Order.

It would not surprise me if these Protestant fraternal groups were the inspiration for Wilson’s followers wearing bowler hats and carrying canes.

Nancy2(aka Kevlar): Yeah. Like a man marrying a woman is very much like a man adopting a puppy from an animal shelter:
keep the puppy on a leash and train it to obey….. a sort of twisted Pavlov’s women thing.

Good analogue!
Wilson hates women, plain and simple.

dee:
R’as al Ghul,

Do you think he reports in on a daily basis to get his pat on the head so he feels like an insider?

Maybe we should call him Renfield.

Linn,

Try suggesting this one, and see how the suggestion goes over: https://www.amazon.com/Vindicating-Vixens-Revisiting-Sexualized-Marginalized/dp/0825444136/

Commenter23: It would not surprise me if these Protestant fraternal groups were the inspiration for Wilson’s followers wearing bowler hats …

Or maybe Stanley Kubrick’s “A Clockwork Orange”, taking inspiration on what they would do to their “enemies” if they had the power and could get away with it.

Gus,

elastigirl,

Bowler hats, black robes, canes…….
I’ll admit, I have a strange imagination, but I see them as being more like Charlie Chaplin in Little Tramp .

If I lived in Moscow, Idaho, I’d be way too tempted to put a gigantic poster of the Little Tramp on a billboard…….(Eh, maybe half of a billboard, with a poster of Xena, Warrior Princess on the other half.)

> I believe Christians do best when they learn to care for and serve their neighbor instead of seeking political power.

I think that there may be, among many of Reformed theological orientation, a regretful longing for the lost era of Christendom, when there was a measure of public deference on the part of the civil authorities to the theological authorities, and Christianity was culturally unchallenged in the areas in which it was the dominant religion.

The New Testament precedents for “what the local church looks like” all come from a period in which the civil authorities were opposed to the Jesus movement and the cultural influence of (what would become) Christianity was small. The New Testament churches were suffering churches. That they ultimately prevailed in the cultural conflict with paganism was perhaps due to their manifesting a better way to be human.

(An interesting side note is that “suffering assemblies” is arguably a better characterization of diaspora Judaism than of Christianity during most of the period AD 135 to 1948. And achievement of political power post 1948 and the related pursuit of cultural dominance within the Land in recent decades may have a down-side.)

We’ll see, over time, how that works with the Federal Vision movement. I do hope that in addition to advocacy of husbandly “Federal headship,” there is advocacy that husbands “give themselves” for their families. That seems to be what Paul had in mind in his command that husbands love their wives as Christ loved the Church.

Nancy2(aka Kevlar): Bowler hats, black robes, canes…….

All part of the circus going on in Moscow, Idaho. I wonder what the regular citizens there think of the Doug Wilson show?

Max: Yep, there’s not too much fruit of the Spirit in NeoCal ranks.I can’t think of any NeoCal church leaders in my area who would be described that way.There’s nothing gentle and kind about their oppression of female believers … nothing faithful in their twist of Scripture to defend their rotten theology … no patience and self-control as they mete out discipline of church members, shunning and excommunication.

They savor the Oh-So-DELICIOUS tang of POWER over others.
After all, are they not GOD’s Elect, Predestined to sit at His right hand and hold His whip?

Here’s a few verses from their REAL Scriptures:

“The only goal of Power is POWER. And POWER consists of inflicting maximum suffering upon the Powerless.”
— Comrade O’Brian, Inner Party, Nineteen Eighty-Four

“There is no Right, there is no Wrong, there is only POWER.”
— Lord Voldemort, Harry Potter series

“POWER is Power.”
— Queen Cersei Baratheon-Lannister, Game of Thrones

dee:
R’as al Ghul,

Do you think he reports in on a daily basis to get his pat on the head so he feels like an insider?

And a Scooby Snack, thrown for him to catch.
“GOOD BOY! GOOOOOOOD BOY!”

senecagriggs,

Seneca, Wilson’s ideas attract people who actually don’t want to think, who want a supposedly tight theology. Calvinism as a whole falls if one of its tenets fails, and I believe a truly a priori-challenged thinking person can easily see the illogic of any of its 5 points. In addition, Federal Vision is not upheld anywhere in the NT. Paul’s comments on the covenant have nothing to do with it, and the early church wouldn’t have recognized it; it’s simply not how they interpreted Scripture.

I can’t see where Wilson pursuing humility in any way; that’s the most important test for me.

D.

https://www.uiargonaut.com/2023/08/14/opinion-christ-church-is-a-hidden-monster/

One opinion of Wilson by someone who lives in Moscow.

dainca: Federal Vision is not upheld anywhere in the NT. Paul’s comments on the covenant have nothing to do with it, and the early church wouldn’t have recognized it

Exactly. The New Calvinists find it necessary to distort what Paul said to make his writings support their belief and practice. If you read Paul first you might read Jesus wrong … but if you read Jesus first, the writings of Paul come into perspective.

Muff Potter,

“I think that Paul over the centuries has been vastly overrated.”
+++++++++++

he’s just easier to read & apply than most other part of the bible.

i’m not interested in applicable how-to’s.

i’d rather be inspired with hope, beauty, love and peace.

dainca,

Doug Wilson is not much of an influencer?!

He obviously influenced Seneca!

elastigirl: i’d rather be inspired with hope, beauty, love and peace.

Me too!
We humans are magnificent creatures.

Muff Potter: We humans are magnificent creatures.

You’d never know that if you listened to a lot of preacher-men Utter Depravity, Utter SIN SIN SIN, Vipers in Diapers. etc. All you’d know is God Hates Your Guts just for existing, and like Beta Incels, you will never ever be one of God’s Special Alpha Chads.

Nancy2(aka Kevlar): Yeah. Like a man marrying a woman is very much like a man adopting a puppy from an animal shelter:
keep the puppy on a leash and train it to obey….. a sort of twisted Pavlov’s women thing.

“PENETRATE! COLONIZE! CONQUER! PLANT!” is a RAPIST’s mentality.

Like the attitude about “real Furries” (genetically-engineered animal-human hybrids) you run across in the most pornified Furry Fanboys:
Just human enough so it isn’t bestiality, but not human enough for it to be rape.

dainca: Dee, Wilson’s influence is fading for multiple reasons. In addition, eventually he, like all of us, will pass beyond the curtain, so his time, like ours, is limited.

Like that famous Austrian cult leader with the funny little mustache, how much damage can he do in the time he has?

He is so disconnected from and ignorant of Classical Christianity (first 4 centuries particularly) and how it revolutionized society – not continuing to uphold the worst practices of the ancient world, but radically altering relationships toward humility.

“All our fathers died to loose,
He shall bind again…”
— Rudyark Kipling, “The Old Issue”, 1899

Muff Potter,

“We humans are magnificent creatures.”
+++++++++

absolutely true.

world travel makes this abundantly clear.

The point is that many conservative Reformed Christians and theologians (both Continental and Scottish (aka Presbyterians)) are against Federal Vision and have come out against it). R. Scott Clark, Michael Horton, and Kim Riddlebarger among others.

Why is there is this tendency on this blog to lump all those in that strain of Christianity together? How would all the folks here who are continualists in regards to the sign gifts react if people started to lump them into together with the Word of Faith and Charismatic wackos like Benny Hinn, IHOP, and Bethel?

Mara R: So what you are saying is, maybe, New Calvinists have rejected Jesus, the Chief Cornerstone and build their house on sand.

Well, I wouldn’t go that far … but they certainly talk about Paul more than they do Jesus. Heck, they talk about John Piper more than they do Jesus! If you listen carefully to their sermons, they preach a lot about “God”, with a spattering of recognition given to Jesus, and hardly a word about the Holy Spirit. New Calvinist icons, like Piper, get more airtime than Christ! They certainly live in a theological house of shifting sand, “tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine” (Ephesians 4:14).

My hubs is a manly man. Does not own a fancy hat, does not smoke cigars or pipes, and is not afraid of women who can hunt, fish, or handle a 4 wheeler. This weekend he has helped me with the corn. We are little old to grow pick and process it, but its done for this year. Put up over 50 ears of corn on the cob, and 80 pints of whole kernel. Now he is picking the green beans for supper, along with corn for that and some squash for tomorrow’s dinner. When he comes in he will wash up the corn mess as that aggravates my arthritis, then call a couple of neighbors and offer them each “row” of corn–I would guess around 25-40 ears of good peaches and cream for each of them. That’s what a manly man does. Sees a need and fills it.

The only influencing he is trying to do is show them how Jesus wants us to act, and to influence some tummies not to be empty this winter.

In my mind, that is real ministry.

linda,

Sounds like your “manly man” should rewrite the NeoCal book on “Biblical Manhood” … these wimpy dudebros have no idea what a man looks like. While they tweet their lives away at the coffee shop, real men are working 10+ hours per day and go home to love their wives and children rather than enslaving them to rotten theology. (P.S., that sweet corn sounds wonderful! I’ve got a great tomato crop this year.)

I’ve only made it this far in reading the newest comments on this post. 🙂

Commenter23: As I have mentioned before, when it comes to the Bible, I eat the meat and spit out the bones.

Commenter23,

I enjoy reading your comments, and your struggles with the Bible. 🙂 And I learn. 🙂

And there are other TWW commenters that, for many similar and / or different reasons, encounter similar struggles. 🙂 And I enjoy reading — and learning from — them as well. 🙂

Much of what I’ve learned in becoming a better person, more like “the hands-and-feet” of Christ on earth….the untwisted, non-abusive version, of “love thy neighbour as thyself”….I didn’t learn from the Bible. I read and learned from a number of well-written, well-researched, fiction books….mostly mystery and sci-fi fantasy.

A person — even a Christian 🙂 — can learn how to be a better person from books (fiction and / or non-fiction), TV, movies, observation, blogs, watchblogs, etc.

(Now back to eating my lunch. 🙂

Max: Well, I wouldn’t go that far

I would.
Reading just your following description, it sounds a lot like they do reject Jesus in favor of Peter, Paul, and Piper.

Observant Outsider:
“Weird”
Dee, I see what you did there. Love it!

No politics
REPEAT
NO POLITICS.

Yes we know there are some topics that can easily wander into this but we’ve decided to
Just Say No.

Max: Go to your local NeoCal church this Sunday

I’d rather go to a strip club.

senecagriggs: Doug Wilson … is a unique thinker.

So were the over-the-top Drooling Fanboys I’ve encountered, from masters of Mighty Magick to Otherkin. (I was out of the loop of Anime Fandom before the real Invasion of the Otaku began, but there’s a lot of Otaku horror stories out there.)

Headless Unicorn Guy,
And another Katie Botkin blogpost, this one about the subject of this blogpost and alluding to the Andrew Tate-sized cigars of him and his minions:

https://medium.com/@katherineheline/the-emotional-price-of-spanking-f1df6f4e4b85

researcher: Thank you for the links to the two Katie Botkin posts, Why the Devil gets all the good music and The Emotional Price of Spanking.

Here’s the reason Why the Devil gets all the good music resonated with me:

I’m a compulsive creative, and during my time in-country I got completely stifled.
For years afterwards, I had to shut God out completely to be able to create. Anything.

Here is a recent comment I made on the subject over at Wondering Eagle (while Seneca the Smug was doubting my salvation from the rooftops with a bullhorn):

Here are two online essays I’ve found on the subject of why any Christian attempt at creative/imaginative is always utterly LAME propaganda:

(the first was Botkin’s WHy the Devil gets all the good music)

And why in my chosen genre (F&SF) the only thing Christians are PERMITTED to write is Near-Future Persecution Dystopia with a Rapture Ready End Time Prophecy tie-in. NOTHING ELSE ALLOWED:

https://alanloewen.blogspot.com/2016/09/guest-editorial-why-is-christian.html

This was above and beyond what I observed personally, the Four Forbidden Subjects of CHRISTIAN(TM) attempts at SF:

1) NOTHING SET MORE THAN TWENTY MINUTES INTO THE FUTURE — Because Christ is Coming Soon (any minute now… any minute now… any minute now…) and It’s All Gonna Burn. “END TIME PROPHECY IS BEING FULFILLED EVEN AS I SPEAK! WE MIGHT NOT HAVE A1978!! OR EVEN A 1977!!!”
2) NOTHING SET OFF-WORLD — Because then Christ can’t take us in The Rapture.
3) NO ALIENS — “There are no ‘Aliens’. They are Fallen Ones come to Deceive Us. No, I am not a Conspiracy Crackhead.”
4) NO SEMI-HUMAN GENETIC CONSTRUCTS — Same reason as No Aliens.

Add the restrictions from the Botkin essay above and the only thing left after these God Saith Taboos is squeeky-clean Christian Apocalyptic (AKA Left Behind and 666).

(Aside – 666 by Salem Kirban is the absolutely WORST Christian Apocalyptic novel ever written, the Eye of Argon of that genre. It does not even qualify as Bad Fanfic.)

And after you’ve Boldly Gone Where No Man Has Gone Before, accompanied Frodo and the Ring to Mount Doom, ridden Shai-Hulud over the endless sands of Arrakis, and blotted the Bell with Lost C’Mell, Left Behind and its knockoffs are absolutely LAME. Consolation/Booby Prizes for those Forbidden to read/view/know the real thing under pain of God’s Wrath.

Headless Unicorn Guy,

Thank you for your reply, Headless Unicorn Guy 🙂 , as well as for including the link to the guest post (on Alan Loewen’s blog). (The guest post is titled Why is Christian Science Fiction Generally Such Rubbish?, and is by Randall Schanze.)

I’ve never read any Christian science fiction — indeed, until I’d read your comments, I’d not realized that such a thing existed. And from what you, and Randall Schanze (and Katie Botkin) wrote, it would seem there really isn’t such a thing as Christian science fiction. 🙂

I’ve read some science fiction, but I prefer sci-fi fantasy — I’ve read quite a lot of it. 🙂 And while there’s no way any of what I read would be categorized as Christian, I learned a lot about how to be a better person, about how to be “the hands and feet of Christ” on earth, about how to be more Christ-like….I learned how to be a better Christian. 🙂

And from what you wrote in your comments, and from what Randall Schanze (and Katie Botkin) wrote, I doubt I’d have become better at anything if I’d read any Christian science fiction. 🙂

As for “Seneca the Smug” — as you call him 🙂 — my only words for him (and others of his ilk) are too expletive-deleted for me to write….although I’ve said many of them out loud to my computer, where there’s no one around to hear me. 🙂

Headless Unicorn Guy: Another post on the same subject is “Sex, Death, and Christian Fiction” by British SF writer Simon Morden:

Headless Unicorn Guy,

Thank you for the link — the post was excellent! 🙂

I’m only copying-and-pasting two of the many things that Simon Morden wrote that stood out for me….

One of problems of preparing a talk like this and practising it over and over again is that it fails to convey just how cross I am. Christian writers, for the past 20-30 years, have been sold a lie: that there is one way to write, one message we need to communicate, that we’re only here for one reason. It’s led to the ghettoisation of Christian writers and a subsequent lack of artistic integrity and craft. We need to think very seriously both about how we got here and which direction we need to take next.

And:

When I create a character, I don’t tend to list a set of attributes, choose a name, and build them like I would a character in a role-playing game. Roll some dice, pick a race and a gender, pick a profession. Now, I know this is going to sound weird, but they choose me. I remember a conversation – rather, an argument – on the Subway list: one Subwayee was particularly affronted by the idea that I somehow called on my invisible friends to inhabit my books. It might affront you. But as an example, take the character of Va, the Finnish monk, from my next book, The Lost Art. He’s an incredibly complex individual – fervent to the point of fanaticism, utterly determined, single-minded in his devotion to God, yet damaged to the point of breaking by his past, which, quite literally haunts him.

I remember telling someone (and indirectly, telling other people) about a character in a standalone Laurie R. King book: “I wish you could’ve met her.” And I was serious — the character in Laurie R. King’s book was so real to me….

And I could tell you a lot about this character….her character, her fine woodworking (and how she sometimes worked with the most complex wood, and how she could take the simplest driftwood and make it into a thing of beauty), about her love for her granddaughter….and well, many other things. And this character is still one of my closest friends. 🙂

Headless Unicorn Guy: Remember that late Seventies song “Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll”?

Ever since I first read Morden’s essay years ago, I’ve been singing the title to that tune:
“Sex and Death and Christian Fic,
Doo doo doo doo doo doo…”

I hadn’t heard the song (“Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll”) before, so I Googled it and played a YouTube video of it by Ian Drury (The Blockheads). After listening to the song, I could see what you mean about singing “Sex and Death and Christian Fic, Doo doo doo doo doo doo….” 🙂