Things You Won't Hear the Young and Restless Say

Published on by D. G. Hart

This video has not gone viral the way that the one about Jesus hating religion did, but it offers another window into Calvinism among the millennials and shows that the likes of Driscoll, Mahaney, Piper, and Keller don’t have a corner on the demographic. Deciphering the logos on t- and sweatshirts and interpreting the prayers indicate that this fellow is from a southern PCUSA background, likely went to Clemson, participated in PCUSA youth culture retreats at Montreat in North Carolina, and is now studying for the ministry at my alma mater (name dropping alert!), Harvard Divinity School.

I know this video is meant to be funny and lighthearted, but by implication it has a serious side. This fellow who is clearly capable will likely find out once he passes his ordination exams that many of the PCUSA’s orthodoxies on women, gender-inclusive language, and church bureaucracy will not be laughing matters.

Some viewers have commented that this video is a great example of “inside baseball humor” for Presbyterians. It is that. But it is also an indication of how easily mocked are some of the seismic shifts from the recent past that now define the mainline Protestant denominations.

I could well imagine someone making a funny video about the culture of Orthodox Presbyterians (and if anyone is inclined to do this please make sure that you feature untucked shirttails drooping beneath suit coats). But I also think an insider would have trouble poking fun at the beliefs that have mattered to conservative Presbyterians. It could just be me, but I always find mainline efforts to accommodate women and evangelical endeavors to promote real manhood much funnier than the nature and meaning of Christ’s sacrifice.

(Thanks to our Roman Catholic correspondent)

13 thoughts on “Things You Won't Hear the Young and Restless Say”

  3. Lily, I’m pretty sure that should go under the Rabbi Bret post, as in a biblical way to sign off. If he signs off with “Sincerely,” etc. then he’s borrowing more 2k capital and wrath is being stored up.

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  4. LOL and they wonder why we leave and take the red hymnals with us! (they sit right next to our copy of the Trinity hymnal on our shelf)

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  5. Zrim, Why are you always right?

    Anywho, I always seem to blow it with my warped sense of humor. I should know better, but get a bad case of silliness some days. I couldn’t resist the inanity of the idea of an “epistological eschatology” correct way to end a letter. I’m still cracking up. I may not be able to sign an email without thinking of it for a long time.

    If I can possibly redeem myself, here’s a link to some Lutheran Satire poking fun at all of us:

    Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,
    Lily

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  7. I was raised PCUSA, and for the life of me, even before seeing that video (3:20 I can never get back now; thanks a lot), I have wondered, what in Heaven or Earth makes folks that cynical even care about any sort of Christianity, except as a racket.

    “Candleth!”

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  9. Alas, T4G, along with that old Baptyerian from the South and quasi-half-to-quarters-confessionalist (and, as an Anglican, a non-wit liturgically), Ligon Dunker, is hosting the famed, yet unacquitted, AnaBaptacostalist, CJ Mahaney. Is there no sense? No shame? The T4G has NOT done the homework on Mahaney, to wit, the nitty-gritty of adversarial cross-examination. Loons, the lot of them. Caveat emptor.

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  10. Darryl, glad the OPC stands for dignity, decorum, and decency, as well as particularity, in the Westminster Standards. I deeply deny the tossing of the Anglican BCP in 1662 by the rebels and recalcritrant congregationalists while affirming the WCF in the 1640s. Call me a ABP James Ussher man. Both sides dislike my views. Both sides like some of my views. This much, an Anglican BCP man with a WCF standard. I’m hated on both ends and will not yield to either end. While dilating, why, pray tell, must we abide ACE (Ligon Dunker’s outfit), T4G, Gospel Coalition, and even Modern Reformation (Horton’s accommodationism) with the accommodations of erstwhile-half-witted evangelicals? Pray tell, who are these oddballs like Driscoll, Mahaney, Piper, Mohler, Dever, etc.? I remember when old Al Mohler discovered the “five points of Calvinism” in the 90s. Eegads, the predestinarian AnaBaptists talked as if the Second Advent had occurred. Who was Al from Louisville, KY? They are AnaBaptacostalists? Cranmer, in the 42 Articles, later reduced to 39, impugned and opposed Anabaptist enthusiasts? Why does ACE and even Ligonier Baptyerian Ministries support these Anabaptacostalists? Thumnail on ACE, T4G, and GC, “keep a close lookout, boys.” General Buford, USA, Gettysburg, day one of 1863, commanded his men as Bobby Lee’s boys approached from Chambersburg, PA, east of Gettysburg. “Boys, keep a sharp lookout.” The internet, social media, and blogosphere? Caution. The YRR crowd warrants belly-button scrutinization. Driscoll, Keller, Bulloney Mahaney, Piper, McDonald and others. We ain’t yieldin’ on the WCF and, for some of us, we’ ain’t yieldin’ on BCP worship, piety and doctrine,. Phoohey on the exhorters, enthusiasts, and other backwoodsmen. Nuff said,

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  11. Paul,

    The President’s religious formation has been through 20+ years in a church dominated by black liberation theology and UCC membership. The UCC formally supports sex education, abortion, gay rights, social justice, pro-Palestine, and other forms of activism. All of which can be seen in the President’s foreign and domestic policies.

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