Today's Links 11/3/2010

1. Remember I wrote about the Modern Parables of Jesus. Arpita and I downloaded and watched The Prodigal Sons. (Notice the title with "Sons" not "The Prodigal Son" as it usually is). I found it powerful and thought-provoking. If you have never seen these films before, this is a great parable to start with. I found myself thinking about this parable many times during the next few days. I think I was especially impressed with the realisation of how BOTH sons dishonoured their father with their behaviour, and how 'right' the elder sons was in his response, and yet how wrong.



2. Russel Moore writes back to a young woman who asks him how much she should find out about her boyfriend's sexual past. Its a thoughtful post, and has much in it for both the younger and older of the Prodigal Sons, and ends with this great statement of fact that had me spinning...

"Jesus was a virgin. His Bride wasn’t. He loved us anyway."

(HT: Denny Burk)



3. Missy, a mother of four, writes an open letter to her children while waiting for the next child to be adopted from Ethiopia, explaining why she does not want them to be happy. Yes, you read that right!




4. The Scandal of Gendercide — War on Baby Girls. Al Mohler writes a review of the Cover Article of this month's Economist. It discusses the issue of 'Gendercide' (which includes what we in India have come to call, Female Foeticide')

(while the whole investigative report is only available in the print editions, an editorial Gendercide: the war on baby girls can be found online)

Here are some quotes:
* 'In its detailed and extensive investigative report, the magazine opens its article with chilling force. A baby girl is born in China's Shandong province. Chinese writer Xinran Xue, present for the birth, then hears a man's voice respond to the sight of the newborn baby girl. "Useless thing," he cried in disappointment. The witness then heard a plop in the slops pail. "To my absolute horror, I saw a tiny foot poking out of the pail. The midwife must have dropped that tiny baby alive into the slops pail!" When she tried to intervene she was restrained by police. An older woman simply explained to her, "Doing a baby girl is not a big thing around here."'

* 'In one hospital in Punjab, in northern India, the only girls born after a round of ultrasound scans had been mistakenly identified as boys, or else had a male twin.'

* 'Wealth does not stop it. Taiwan and Singapore have open, rich economies. Within China and India the areas with the worst sex ratios are the richest, best-educated ones. And China’s one-child policy can only be part of the problem, given that so many other countries are affected.
In fact the destruction of baby girls is a product of three forces: the ancient preference for sons; a modern desire for smaller families; and ultrasound scanning and other technologies that identify the sex of a fetus. In societies where four or six children were common, a boy would almost certainly come along eventually; son preference did not need to exist at the expense of daughters. But now couples want two children—or, as in China, are allowed only one—they will sacrifice unborn daughters to their pursuit of a son. That is why sex ratios are most distorted in the modern, open parts of China and India. It is also why ratios are more skewed after the first child: parents may accept a daughter first time round but will do anything to ensure their next—and probably last—child is a boy. The boy-girl ratio is above 200 for a third child in some places.'

* 'Mao Zedong said “women hold up half the sky.” The world needs to do more to prevent a gendercide that will have the sky crashing down.'

(HT: Challies)