RE: Phillip Johnson at Northshore Church

From: Joel Z Bandstra (bandstra@ese.ogi.edu)
Date: Tue Apr 24 2001 - 13:38:09 EDT

  • Next message: Lucy Masters: "[Fwd: [Fwd: Good and bad lawyers (was Re: Phillip Johnson at Norshore...]]"

    On the issue of lawyers being a lower class: Matters of professional ethics
    in law do, perhaps, bear some similarity to those for science and
    engineering in that one of the most profound influences that a Christian
    may have is simply being involved in the profession itself and attempting
    to live a Christ like life in so doing. In this sense, it is important not
    to foster an attitude that lawyering (or science or engineering) is an
    immoral or sub-standard profession for the Christian to enter. Law (as
    well as science and engineering) is an area that has a significant
    influence on the development of our culture and Christians should be
    involved and not just as antagonistic by-standers (though Christians ought
    to be antagonistic bystanders on some things as well I suppose).

    On the matter of Phil Johnson being out to lunch: True enough, but it
    doesn't necessarily have to be linked to his having been trained as a
    lawyer, in-spite of what he may claim. One doesn't need a Ph.D. in science
    to spout scientific fallacies...then again, it does seem to help.

    -----Original Message-----
    From: John W Burgeson [SMTP:burgytwo@juno.com]
    Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2001 9:40 AM
    To: PHSEELY@aol.com; asa@calvin.edu
    Subject: Re: Phillip Johnson at Northshore Church

    >>Christians and Christian lawyers
    in particular should be openly calling this sin "SIN" and "EVIL",
    questioning
    it in legal journals, and confronting the truly guilty with their sin and

    with the gospel. This is what Philip Johnson for one should be doing;
    but, I
    wonder if any professing Christian lawyer is doing this? >>

    A friend of mine, who is a law professor at Texas Tech, gave me an
    interesting book recently which addressed all those issues both
    forcefully and rather completely. The book was a regular issue (I think)
    of the Texas Tech faculty and came out about three years ago. Don't have
    it with me right now -- so I cannot cite it directly. But in discussions
    with the professor, Susan Fortney, it was clear that ethical issues were,
    and are, a frequent topic of writing and discussion, in her world, at
    least.

    Here is one point. I spent most of my working days on projects which were
    morally either "good" or neutral, projects which raised few, if any deep
    ethical issues. Lawyers, by profession, have to deal with such things on
    a regular basis. It is very easy for me to assert that my professional
    career was unmarked by moral lapses -- indeed, I faced few of these. The
    lawyers are more in the thick of things. IMHO of course.

    Burgy (John Burgeson)

    www.burgy.50megs.com



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