Written by Carl R. Trueman |
Thursday, May 11, 2023
Many aspects of Prager’s comment are disturbing, not least his failure to address the dark nature of the pornography industry itself. But it is also instructive, because it exposes the superficiality of some of what passes for conservative thought today. Prager’s statement reveals that he lacks a real grasp of what is causing the social and political problems that he claims to abhor: We live in a time of anthropological chaos, where the very notion of what it means to be human is no longer a matter of broad social and political consensus. 

Anyone who has been involved in pastoral ministry during the last decade will be acutely aware that internet pornography is one of the great scourges of contemporary society. And one does not need to be religious to believe that. In her recent book, The Case Against the Sexual Revolution, Louise Perry includes a chapter summarizing pornography’s effects on relationships, sexuality, and physical health. She also points out the obvious connections to sex trafficking and exploitation. And yet voices that claim to be conservative still make crass and ill-informed comments on the topic.
The most recent one of note is Dennis Prager. In conversation with Jordan Peterson, he claimed that pornography is “not awful” when used by husbands in tandem with, rather than in place of, a normal sexual relationship with their wives. Thankfully, Denny Burk has provided a clear refutation of Prager’s take in a column at World Opinions.
Many aspects of Prager’s comment are disturbing, not least his failure to address the dark nature of the pornography industry itself. But it is also instructive, because it exposes the superficiality of some of what passes for conservative thought today. Prager’s statement reveals that he lacks a real grasp of what is causing the social and political problems that he claims to abhor: We live in a time of anthropological chaos, where the very notion of what it means to be human is no longer a matter of broad social and political consensus.
Pornography is a great example of this. Behind the problems that should have been obvious to Prager—the objectification of other people, the human trafficking, the transformation of sex into something that is self- rather than other-directed, the reduction of the participants to instruments of pleasure for the spectators—lies a basic philosophy of life that sees me, my desires, and my fulfillment at the core of what it means to be human. Pornography is thus part of an anthropological shift that manifests itself most obviously in sexual mores but is far more comprehensive in its significance.
Everyday language hints at this. There has been an interesting shift in English idiom over recent years from the language of “making love” to that of “having sex.”
Read More
Related Posts:

God still loves His children and knows what is best for them. In His love, He has given us limitations. Limitations like our need for sleep. Or like the fact that the sun comes up and goes down in a regular cycle signaling the time for rest. Or that He explicitly set aside one day a week when no work was to be done, and even went so far as taking a day off Himself even though He was not tired so that we would do as He did. But in our rebellion, we refuse to honor those limits and justify our unwillingness to do so.

Most everyone knows the story, even if they don’t believe the story. In the beginning, there was only God. Nothing else. And then God spoke, and “nothing” became “everything”, including human beings.
Everything was good. Very good, in fact. All creation existed in perfect harmony, and at the center piece of everything was the crown jewel of creation. The man and the woman lived in perfect fellowship with God, walking without guilt, shame, or any other hindrance with Him. God gave His creation the twin gifts of freedom and constraint, all summarized in this simple statement:
You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die (Gen. 2:16-17).
The first people did not trust the Lord and His Word and chose their own way, and with that choice everything that was good and right and harmonious was corrupted. It is, of course, a well known story. Maybe the best known story. And at least for the Christian, it’s not only well known but essential because it is through this story that we find the answer to the question of what is really wrong with the world.
Yes, there are all kinds of answers to that question, depending on the person you ask and the particular issue at the forefront of a person’s mind, but those are all downstream answers. The upstream answer – the one at the source of the trouble – is sin. That’s what’s wrong with the world. And this moment in the garden is when it all started.
Knowing this story, then, is an essential part of knowing who we are and what is wrong with us.
Read More
Related Posts:

Marie Durand is quite well known in France, and a number of different causes have taken her as a figurehead.
During the nineteenth century, theologically liberal French Protestants held Marie Durand up as a heroine of freedom of conscience. They portrayed her as the woman who spent decades in prison for a cause being fought out by the French Enlightenment, by such great minds as d’Alembert, Diderot, Rousseau, and Voltaire. Liberal Protestants observed that, while the philosophes fought for freedom of conscience on the intellectual level, Durand’s decades of physical suffering made a powerful social-conscience contribution to the cause.
Conservative French Protestants, fiercely loyal to their religious and cultural roots, viewed Marie Durand as a heroic Huguenot, the ultimate example of a faithful Calvinist holding fast to her sixteenth-century Reformation heritage.
Evangelical Protestants in general have presented Durand as an example of steadfast faith in Christ under severe persecution. For them, Durand exemplifies the faithful Christian martyr, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:10). Simonetta Carr, for example, has written a beautifully illustrated biography of Marie Durand as an inspiring example for Christian children and teens.
During World War II, leaders of the French resistance used Marie Durand’s name and story to inspire the French people to resist Nazi tyranny. And in 2016 actress and author Ysabelle Lacamp portrayed Marie Durand as a heroine of religious freedom in a series of books dealing with all kinds of social justice matters.
In short, many have held up Marie Durand as an inspiring heroine for their own causes. Few, however, have examined her life. Fewer again have examined her remarkable forty-eight surviving letters, forty-one of which were written from her dungeon.
Marie Durand was born in 1711 in a remote southern French village called Bouchet-de-Pranles. It remains to this day a delightful region of chestnut groves, undulating streams, green hills, and ancient stone farmhouses. You can still visit her home, which is now a museum devoted to her church and family, the Musée du Vivarais Protestant.
On the lintel above the family hearth Marie’s father etched, in exquisite uncials, these words of praise:

GOD BE PRAISED, 1696, É[tienne] D[urand].