Encounters

Back to Encounters

Here’s Your Sign

August 9, 2021

On a visit to family on the East Coast, I took a walk through the neighborhood and came across this sign, one whose message fit nicely with other signs along the sidewalk. It was that kind of neighborhood. Reading down through the sign, something came to mind at each line:


In this house we believe: I was reminded of Joshua 7:15, where Joshua puts the crucial choice to the people, adding, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” It’s the verse we put on my mother Agnes’s gravestone. I’m not convinced this house shares this perspective. 


Love is Love: The rainbow colors on this line and the last (the one about kindness), show that they think homosexual love is just as wonderful as heterosexual love. And that’s just the start, as you run the LGBTQ+ alphabet. BTW, does this also honor love of money, love of power, love of revenge, love of cruelty, etc.? 


Black Lives Matter:  The February after the August that Michael Brown was killed by a police officer he assaulted in Ferguson, Missouri, I was taking part in an American Philosophical Association meeting in St. Louis. Before leaving town, I drove up to Ferguson on the north side to see the scene of the rioting. That same day, I’d heard an hour’s worth of the multi-hour APA panel discussion of the “injustice” done Brown by the police. Once up there, I drove past a few burned out businesses on a basically unscathed strip, stopped by the chain link fence where folks had left messages, and visited the little quick stop where Brown stole the cigars and shoved aside the East Indian proprietor who tried to stop him. As it turns out, the “hands up” story was bogus and federal prosecutors under Obama found insufficient grounds to prosecute. Never mind that. The narrative was launched, and BLM took on a life of its own. While there, I stopped in the little establishment and bought a shirt. Walking out, I noticed that plywood still covered a panel that used to hold glass. 


Science is Real: They could have used a wordsmith here. Of course, no one is denying that science is real. What they mean is that “scientism” trumps everything, the naïve conviction that the deliverances of scientific elites are infallible, particularly when it goes against the convictions of “fundamentalists.” They haven’t read Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions or been paying attention when equally credentialed scientists differ over the reality of anthropogenic global warming or the best way to address COVID. The sign family likely says this out of contempt for creationists and for those opposing the use of aborted babies for stem cell research, to name two causes.


Feminism is for Everyone: Wonder if they’ve ever heard of complementarianism? And what about the feminists objecting to trans-males blowing away the cis-females at track meets? There’s confusion in the camp.


No Human is Illegal: Again, where’s a wordsmith when you need one. I’m sure they’re objecting to the expression ‘illegal alien,’ not to mention any policy that would stem the flow of “undocumented immigrants.” And do they mean that a serial killer would not be illegal? What about someone who breaks into their house and steals their jewelry? Was his entry “undocumented”? Of course, no human is illegal per se, whatever that might mean. But the burglar is a long way past per se.


Kindness is Everything: Huh? Was that the watchword during the Normandy Invasion? And what about the unkindness of this sign, insulting those who aren’t on board with all their “scientific” conceits, who dare to say, “All lives matter,” and who are reluctant to champion open borders and blanket amnesty for illegal immigrants? Also, try to post the text of Romans 1 in your yard to test their supreme devotion to kindness.


Maybe Christians should come up with their own version, perhaps posting one with “In this house, we believe” followed by the Apostles’ Creed. It would probably qualify as “hate speech.”


PS: Yes, Bill Engvall’s comedy routine inspired the title of this piece.