Bill Melone

Christian, Husband, Father, Prolife, Antiracist

[Bill Melone @BillMelone]

@TheAlanNoble Careful, those sound like famous last words lol

[Karen Swallow Prior (Notorious KSP) @KSPrior]

“…to the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost-blind you draw large and startling figures.”

— Flannery O’Connor

[Bill Melone @BillMelone]

@hunterbaker Skin is a biological reality, not race.

[Jonathan Haidt @JonHaidt]

The Anxious Generation was published two years ago today, in a very different world. Back then, the most common objection I got was resignation: "The train has left the station." "You can't put toothpaste back in the tube." "It's how the kids connect today."

Today, the world looks very different. It turns out that if our kids were all on a train and we learned it was heading toward a collapsed bridge, we'd find a way to stop it and bring them safely back to the station. That’s what’s happening now.

After the historic verdicts in Los Angeles and New Mexico, today is a great day to reflect on the capacity of people in democratic societies to take action, even when opposing some of the most powerful corporations in history. We're getting access to the courts. We're getting phone-free schools. We're seeing whole neighborhoods letting kids out to play, unsupervised, which is what we older folk all remember as the best part of childhood.

So I want to recognize:

--The mothers (and, right behind them, fathers) who rose up by the millions and powered the movement.

--The farsighted governors and legislators in red states and blue states who have been innovating on policy solutions.

--The leaders of a dozen of nations, who are raising the age to 16 for opening social media accounts (with a special shoutout to Australia, for going first).

--The teachers and school administrators who had their classrooms disrupted for 15 years, and who are now eager to think through new solutions as screens have taken over and obstructed learning.

--The grassroots organizations who have been dedicating their efforts to advocate for all of the above in their local communities.

--The millions of members of Gen Z who have been rising up, demanding agency over how they spend their lives in the digital era, and finding better ways to connect in real life.

And one final group: the survivor parents--the ones you saw in those pictures of people embracing on the front steps of the LA courthouse. I have met many over the years. I am in awe of their courage and tenacity, their willingness to tell their stories of loss, over and over again, to different audiences, in the hope that no other parent would have to endure what they have endured. At long last, juries and legislatures are hearing you, and are acting.

Together, we are calling the train back to the station. Together, we are rolling back the phone based childhood and reclaiming life in the real world.

The work continues. If you’re not already involved, join us: https://t.co/HdJDTKOQ3T

[Jonathan Haidt @JonHaidt]

Still more evidence that EdTech harmed American education: Across states, the year that the state imposed mandates requiring computers/tablets, that's the year that test scores stopped rising and in most cases started falling.

From Jared Cooney Horvath
https://t.co/TSH1bfp8lA

[Dan White Jr. @danwhitejr]

In 1-week our feed asked for our take on:
John MacArthur
Chip & Joanna Gaines
Michael Tait
Superman
Baylor U
Epstien Files
&
the IRS Decision.

We're being discipled to be a commentator rather than contemplative. Don't we find this exhausting?

We're opining ourselves to death!

[Nancy Pearcey @NancyRPearcey]

Why early Christianity was especially attractive to women:

"Rodney Stark, a sociologist of religion, writes, “The Greco-Roman world was a male culture that held marriage in low esteem.” It also held women in low esteem, expressed partly through a high rate of abortion, which was a huge killer not only of children but also of women in this period.

Infanticide was widely practiced as well. In fact, leading thinkers of the ancient world—Plato, Aristotle, Cicero—recommended infanticide as legitimate state policy.

Archaeologists have discovered sewers clogged with the tiny bones of newborn babies dumped down the drain. A news article explains, “During Roman times, it was not uncommon for infants to be killed as a form of birth control. It was not a crime, as newborn infants were viewed as being ‘not fully human.’”

Most of those babies were girls. In fact, it was rare for a Roman family to have more than one daughter. Historians have uncovered a letter written in the first century BC by a Roman soldier to his pregnant wife back home, saying, “If it is a boy, let it live; if it is a girl, expose it”(leave it to die).

In this context, the Christian church stood out for its high view of women. By prohibiting abortion and infanticide, it showed that it cherished the female contribution in bringing new life into the world, treating it as something worthy of respect and protection.

Little girls were not to be thrown down the sewer but loved and cared for as much as boys. The early Christians went beyond simply condemning abortion to providing alternatives—rescuing and adopting children who had been abandoned.

We should never defend Christianity by saying it is traditional. From the beginning, it has stood against the traditions of its day."

(From Love Thy Body)

[Mika Edmondson @mika_edmondson]

Women’s ministry isn’t segregation.
Men’s ministry isn’t segregation.
Youth ministry isn’t segregation.
Latino ministries aren’t practicing segregation.
Korean Churches aren’t practicing segregation.

These affinity spaces strengthen believers for fellowship in the broader church

[Thabiti Anyabwile @ThabitiAnyabwil]

The righteous care about justice for the poor, but the wicked have no such concern. (Prov. 29: 7)

[Peter Leithart @PLeithart]

We are so familiar with Christmas angels that we don’t realize how unique it is. Nowhere else in Scripture do angelic choirs sing on earth. Nowhere.

Heaven's angels sing on earth to celebrate the unique inbreaking of Heaven into Earth.

[Ari Lamm @AriLamm]

Why Read The Bible In Hebrew?

So, remember how Joseph gets sold into slavery in Egypt and eventually rises to become Pharaoh's second-in-command?

Well...why doesn't Joseph ever write home to his father to tell him that he's alive?

A thread (for non-Hebrew readers too!) 🧵1

[Ben Hein @brheiny]

We should not ask, “What is wrong with the world?” for that diagnosis has already been given. Rather, we should ask, “What has happened to salt and light?”

John Stott

[Kirk E. Miller @KirkMiller_]

Even though Roe is overturned, in many ways, the pro-life positions is in a worst place now than it was previously: 🧵

1. Abortions have gone up since the overturning of Roe.

2. Trump himself is not pro-life. And his influence has moved the GOP away from it as well.

[J.R.R. TolKee @Jeremyakee]

Nothing, just needed to stretch my legs.

[Amanda Held Opelt @AmandaHeldOpelt]

But as with all things Evangelicalism, I'd love if we could dialogue about the nuance & accept the reality of the moderate middle, rather than reducing all Evangelicals to the worst version of the movement.

[Drew @drewdyck]

Powerful article on how Malcolm Gladwell rediscovered his faith.

“Maybe we have difficulty seeing the weapons of the spirit because we don’t know where to look, or because we are distracted by the louder claims of material advantage. But I’ve seen them now, and I will never be the same.”

https://t.co/ryi8qZmXna

[Joy Marie Clarkson @joynessthebrave]

As a society we need to re-learn the basics of courtesy we were taught as children: please and thank you. Please curbs entitlement. Thank you curbs resentment. They remind us we are at each other's mercy. A world without please and thank you is exhausting, grating, and hostile.

[David French @DavidAFrench]

I think about these charts quite a bit. If you want to know why people often freak out when you talk about crossing party lines, they're operating under false impressions about the other side. People consistently think their opponents are more extreme than they really are /1

[Collin Hansen @collinhansen]

'Polemics are sometimes necessary—but they are medicine, not food. You can’t live on medicine. In the long run constant polemics are exhausting and they don’t build us up spiritually.'

[Peggy Blair @peggy_blair]

Dear 2024,
I have reviewed your manuscript with interest and regret to advise that I will be declining representation.
While the plot is interesting, it strikes me that there is a little too much of it. I fear that readers will become overwhelmed. 1/