Jimmy Akin on Hugh Heffner's achin'...

... and Christopher West's interview with ABC:

This post is going to be about the current dustup in the blogosphere regarding Christopher West and the recent ABC News piece on him.

Before I get to the controversial stuff, though, let me say a few words about the task Chris is undertaking.

Christopher West has a difficult job. As a chastity speaker, he's got to juggle several things at once:

1) He's got a very sensitive subject

2) On which different audiences have different sensibilities

3) The audience that most needs his message is very hard to reach

4) Part of the reason why they're so hard to reach is that they have a pre-existing stereotype of Christian sexual morality that they think gives them a license to tune out anything a Christian says on the subject

5) To reach this group you have to effectively batter your way past this anti-Christian prejudice and get them to take you seriously while simultaneously

6) Not offending the sensibilities of those who already take Christian sexual morality seriously

7) Some of whom have rigorist views on the topic

That's a tall order. It is humanly possible to juggle seven things at once (SEE HERE), but it's not easy.

Click here to see and judge Jimmy's juggling. He makes several worthwhile, thoughtful points.

Past posts about this topic:

• Going to the Source of the Christopher West Controversy (May 13, 2009)
• "The Playboy and the Pope" (May 12, 2009)
• Christopher West: "I never said Hugh Hefner is a hero, never..." (May 11, 2009)
• "Catholicism, properly understood ... is one of the sexiest of the world's religions." (May 7, 2009)

Comments

[Ed Peters]

Very thoughtful post from Jimmy. As per usual.

It fleshes out my own sense that CW needs to hone his message and that this bruha serves mostly as a learning opportunity for him to improve an excellent project he has undertaken.

I was really glad to see JA's notes on Song of Songs. I had almost specified that one myself, but I am glad someone who knows Scripture better than I do (man, is THAT a long list of folks) did it first. Anyway, I second JA's remarks here strongly. SofS is much more, as I understand it, about love of wisdom than love for a woman. And it cannot be called the "center-anything" of the Bible, or even of the OT. That's an unsustaineable claim for it.

[Jitpring]

Regarding the Song of Songs, Peter Kreeft, for one, might differ with its allegedly tangential status:

http://www.ignatius.com/ViewProduct.aspx?Product_ID=759

[Bryan]

What a great post by Mr. Akin. The guy just makes so much sense. Very, very classy on his part.

[Jitpring]

^I think there's a whole lot wrong with his post, but I'll save it for the comments there.

[Rachel]

Thank you for summing things up so clearly! Janet Smith would probably give you a thumb's up too--she had some really logical and clear things to say here: http://www.headlinebistro.com/hb/en/news/janetsmithresponse.html