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What problem do any of you have with Doug Phillips? Curious. Also explain any parts where you are in agreement with him, please. Trying to understand due to terms such as "hyper Phillipism" and "hyper Uniting Church and Home".
I just don't like his catalog very much!
It comes across as pompous to me and seems to have a sort of siege mentality.
I don't like how all the fun stuff is in the "boy" section: old coins, zip lines, rockets and shooters, etc. The "girl" section is full of pewter sewing kits and tea sets. Now, my girls love dolls and tea, but we also love to camp, hike and shoot at things! And the girl stuff isn't super practical or fun for the most part. It just seems to be decorative.
I know that is just totally subjective, but i can't help that whenever I get one of those VF catalogs I have to roll my eyes at the little boy all dressed up in some $120 colonial soldier outfit complete with tri-cornered hat and drum defending his sister's honor. Like the world was a lovely place before indoor plumbing and if only we could return to those noble days, we'd all have big families that happily cavort in a pastoral meadow during an eternal springtime. I find myself half expecting for it to say that we can "live forever in paradise on earth"!
Honestly I know nothing about his doctrine. I figure he's reformed and baptistic, but I don't know. I'm just really turned off by his catalog.
It seems odd that I wouldn't like him: I'm a conservative, reformed, credobaptist, homeschooling mom of six children in my mid-thirties. Don't I seem like their precise demographic?
I'm curious why some people really dislike him, too, because there seems to be some anti-phillips vitriol around here that must have a doctrinal root, not just hokey feelings like mine!
I've seen a few of his catalogs and this post of yours pretty well sums up my exact reaction to them, too! You may think it's merely a subjective observation, but I don't think it's so subjective. Those silly pictures on the cover are a clear picture of the "agenda" behind the products they sell. To be sure, doctrinally, I don't know much about him. But those images (and you know they aren't limited to the cover) throw up all sorts of red flags in my mind for the reasons you've already mentioned.I just don't like his catalog very much!
It comes across as pompous to me and seems to have a sort of siege mentality.
I don't like how all the fun stuff is in the "boy" section: old coins, zip lines, rockets and shooters, etc. The "girl" section is full of pewter sewing kits and tea sets. Now, my girls love dolls and tea, but we also love to camp, hike and shoot at things! And the girl stuff isn't super practical or fun for the most part. It just seems to be decorative.
I know that is just totally subjective, but i can't help that whenever I get one of those VF catalogs I have to roll my eyes at the little boy all dressed up in some $120 colonial soldier outfit complete with tri-cornered hat and drum defending his sister's honor. Like the world was a lovely place before indoor plumbing and if only we could return to those noble days, we'd all have big families that happily cavort in a pastoral meadow during an eternal springtime. I find myself half expecting for it to say that we can "live forever in paradise on earth"!
Honestly I know nothing about his doctrine. I figure he's reformed and baptistic, but I don't know. I'm just really turned off by his catalog.
It seems odd that I wouldn't like him: I'm a conservative, reformed, credobaptist, homeschooling mom of six children in my mid-thirties. Don't I seem like their precise demographic?
I'm curious why some people really dislike him, too, because there seems to be some anti-phillips vitriol around here that must have a doctrinal root, not just hokey feelings like mine!
I am also not keen on the whole idea that they (and many others I might add) promote about the Christian duty to ‘take dominion over the earth’. Yes, Adam was told that, but that language was never repeated in the Law of Moses or in any of the Epistles. The New Testament addresses work five times (Eph, Col, Timothy, Titus, 1 Peter) and never brings up ‘taking dominion’ over the earth as something to be sought after in a christian’s work.
That's the fallacy of argument from silence. Its like saying the apostle Paul didn't believe in the Virgin Birth because he never mentions it. Now, some could be overdoing it in the dominion area (I rather doubt it) and a possible critique could be made, but not using this kind of logic.
I don't have to produce the verse. The bible says it in a foundational chapter. I do not accept the quasi-dispensational view that something must be specifically repeated in the NT for it to be binding.
As images of God we are called to image God to the world. Our labor is to be done to the glory of God. All facts bear witness to God. They are already God-interpreted facts and we are to be receptively-reconstructive in how we re-interpret these God-interpreted facts.
As to how it plays out in every specific situation, I don't know. I haven't experienced every specific situation fathomable to man. It would look different for different people.
By "taking dominion" I do not mean having 20 babies, teaching them knitting and log-cutting, and passing that down to the next generation. Taking dominion is to see how the Christian faith informs and transforms my work-environment, my community, etc.
Alright, thanks.
For what its worth, the having 20 babies thing was never what I had in mind.
The catch 22 I see them in, and have been in myself, is the conflict of the first two items. They will either influence in some way or be run off by the church. Granted, they be permitted to follow their conscience, but when they are the few within the church, then there is the pressure for them or their children to conform with the rest of the congregation...thus, they are left with no other choice than to seek like-minded believers. If they influence, which many times happens simply by their presence or others asking them questions, then they are seen as trouble makers. On the reverse, I do understand and have seen extremists that attempt to form a coup (Gothardites).
It sounds like The Village.
Everybody seems to get nervous if so and so doesn't toe the "line of orthodoxy" (always vague and undefined). I used to be like this. But I think Phillips is refreshing, and even when he is wrong, he is refreshingly wrong.
I mean, pretend you are at the mall on Friday night and you see these girls dressed in a way that would make swimsuit models blush. They have earings coming out of their arms, they look like female lucifers and you think, "Is this what the world has come to?"
Then you go home and see girls dressing like ladies and everything looks so wholesome. That's refreshing. We might not like everything Phillips does, but there are worse ways to go wrong with your kids and we can't fault him on that.
PS: He was also very gracious with his time and set aside a few moments to speak with me when he didn't have to.
Fair enough. I'm in one of the manliest professions imaginable. All I'm saying is that I think that some people think the only way to train such principles is to use the obvious props. The props themselves become the focus. The potential "horror" is that you create a Pharisee. They're nice, respectful people but they are whitewashed sepulchres.Rich,
About half of your post lost me. I have no idea who Dora is. And my refreshingly wrong comment still stands. If someone goes all "movement mentality" then they got issues. I can't answer for them and I really don't care.
I really don't thnk I will fall prey to such a movement because:
1) I am poor, and movements are expensive.
2) I am a public school teacher.
3) I live in the suburbs.
I view his catalogue like anything else. Again, I say, Reformed people awlays want someone to "toe the line" just like them, don't make them "nervous", etc. SO what if we disagree with him? What is someone reads his catalogue, is encouraged to be more manly, and avoids the extremes? Imagine the horrors in the situation.
And few people have yet commented on the goods his service provides: excellent apologetic and historical lectures, excellent public policy and political resources, etc.
While Reformed people are arguing apologetic methodology, he is taking "apologetics to the streets."