A Greater COVID-19 Danger: Misinformation

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.  – Prophet Hosea (710 BC) 

The financial firm, Franklin Templeton, has teamed up with Gallup to determine people’s behavioral responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.  Their hypothesis: What people know and don’t know about the pandemic will play a crucial role in shaping the economic recovery. 

Maybe you’d like to participate in part of the survey.   If so, write down your answer to three of the questions based on what you know about the COVID-19 pandemic.  Here you go:  What percentage of total COVID deaths have occurred among Americans…
(1)  …age 55 or older?
(2)  …age 44 and younger?
(3)  …age 24 and younger?

COVID-19 Risk:  Survey Results
Now, let’s compare your answers to the actual COVID-19 mortality statistics from US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), as of July 22, 2020.  First, in order to make you feel better in case your answers are far from the actual percentages, here is part of the conclusion made by authors of the “Franklin Templeton–Gallup Economics of Recovery Study:”

These results are nothing short of stunning.  Six months into this pandemic, Americans still dramatically misunderstand the risk of dying from COVID-19.

Maybe you will be "stunned" as well.  To compare your responses with the responses of Americans included in the survey when the three questions were asked, here are the results:

Based on this sampling from the survey, can you see the stunning discrepancy between perceived health threat of COVID-19 and reality?  Amazingly, in spite of Americans having access the best health care system in the world and excellent access to information at our fingertips, we demonstrate a stunning misunderstanding of the risk of death from COVID-19.  

As the table below suggests, Americans 65 and older are much more aware of the heightened risk for their own age group.  On the other hand, the younger the age group polled the more misled Americans are about their risk of negative health consequences from the virus.  Shockingly, school- and college-age young people (age 24 and younger) overestimated the danger of COVID-19 by a factor of 40!!

What is even more unfortunate and even frightening is the way in which the misinformation causes fear among us.  The table below clearly shows the increasing fear of negative health consequences among the younger age groups in spite of the lowered risk of death from COVID-19.

The following statement from the Franklin Templeton report summarizes how misinformation can be used to generate fear and influence partisan outcomes (emphasis mine):

Fear and anger are the most reliable drivers of engagement; scary tales of young victims of the pandemic, intimating that we are all at risk of dying, quickly go viral; so do stories that blame everything on your political adversaries. Both social and traditional media have been churning out both types of narratives in order to generate more clicks and increase their audience.

Media and Partisanship Blamed
The more access we have to information about risks to our health and well being the greater the likelihood that we will make decisions that favor our safety and minimize our fears.  If this claim is true and the survey data is accurate, how can Americans make good decisions based on risk to personal health if they misunderstand the risk.  The same applies to making good policy decisions on the part of policymakers.

For instance, if the risk of death among school and college age young people is less than 0.2%, how can we justify closing classrooms and canceling sports?  If the survey results are accurate, the current debates about whether or not to open classrooms and schedule school or college sports this Fall are being made by poorly informed administrators, educators, students, athletes, parents, and policymakers.  But never mind the actual data.  If the media and political actors can create the “perception” of greater risk than reality, then they can use a falsely generated fear to manipulate us to follow unrealistic guidelines.

Proof of media involvement in creating a misinformed public is seen in the differences in responses between those who identify as Democrats and those identifying as Republicans.    “People who get their information predominantly from social media have the most erroneous and distorted perception of risk.  Those who identify as Democrats tend to mistakenly overstate the risk of death from COVID-19 for younger people much more than Republicans.”  Most cable news watchers are aware of the vast difference in messaging between CNN or MSNBC and FoxNews.

The Franklin Templeton/Gallup survey predicts that if “…those who can afford it are willing to pay significantly more for extra perceived safety, we might see a significant rise in inflation down the line.  Again, misinformation can lead to unwarranted fear which in turn makes a population vulnerable to manipulation in directions that fit partisan priorities and visions for a restructured American government and society.

It is becoming clear that misinformation and resultant unwarranted fear may be the greater threat from the COVID-19 pandemic.  Consider the following statement from the survey report:

From a public interest perspective, we believe the top priority should be better information and a less partisan, more fact-based public debate.  The fact that a large share of the population overestimates the COVID-19 danger to the young will make a targeted public health response more difficult to agree on. We think it is also likely to delay the recovery, causing a deeper and prolonged recession.

We Need to Be Informed
Maybe it is time we devote some extra time to becoming accurately informed by doing our own research and making decisions accordingly.  At the same time, we who are called to love our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12: 31) need to deal graciously with those who are more fearful of negative health consequences whether or not their fear is warranted. 

Hopefully, readers who look in more detail at the Franklin Templeton and Gallup Survey will be better informed and able to articulate truth to neighbors who are misled or confused.  Otherwise, the greater risk may not be COVID-19.  Instead, we may experience very dire consequences to our culture and nation from those who seek to use the virus for selfish political motives.

Remember the words from the Prophet Hosea, My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge (Hosea 4: 6).  If you’d like to stay informed as the survey continues to expand over the coming months, you can receive ongoing updates on the project's findings by signing up here.  

What Do You Think?
Do you consider yourself well informed about the pandemic?  How well did you score on the opening three polling questions?  If you’d like to respond to this blog with comments or questions, just use the “Comments” link below, or contact me at silviusj@gmail.com   Thank you for reading, and may God honor your efforts to be informed, make good decisions, and inform others as we try to learn how best to respond to the pandemic and the politics surrounding it.

COVID-19 Transmission: “Unmasking” Science

I’d like to think that most Americans still believe that truth exists, that truth can be known, and that we make the best decisions when we have truthful information.  Science, especially “good science,” is one way of finding and publishing correct truth claims.  However, in the era of COVID-19, it seems there are many “middle people” operating between what science discovers and what the average person reads or hears in the news.  For example, there are scientific studies of the efficacy of masks in preventing spread of viruses.  Then, there are news reports recommending whether or not we ought to wear masks.  What is the truth about masks?  

You are no doubt aware of the mixed signals regarding whether or not we should wear masks that have come from the Coronavirus Task Team members, especially Dr. Anthony Fauci.  This confusion could be an indication that political bias and efforts to influence policy may be creating static in the signals between the actual scientific findings on mask wearing and the recommendations we receive through media sources.

The purpose of this article is not to convince you of whether or not to wear a mask. Instead, as I tried to do with an April article, (See COVID-19 Policies & Outcomes: Learning Online), my purpose here is to simply reference several scientific studies to show how researchers report their findings, make conclusions, and offer recommendations based on their results.  In other words, I want to take us back to the primary sources, the journal articles from the scientific laboratories.  These are the sources of information from which newspaper and TV journalists obtain their information.  Resultant newsprint or media newscasts which most of us receive are considered secondary sources, and perhaps tertiary sources, any of which are subject to accidental or deliberate errors.

What follows are references to two primary (scientific journal) sources which report recent studies of the effectiveness of masks in intercepting COVID-19 and other viruses.  I am also including one secondary source compiled by the World Health Organization (WHO) based primary sources.  Each title is accompanied with the link so you can obtain the article in PDF format to read for yourself.  I have given each source a handy label which I can use to refer to each article as follows:

1)  Vietnam Study (2015)
MacIntyre CR, Seale H, Dung TC, et al.  A cluster randomised trial of cloth masks compared with medical masks in healthcare workers. BMJ Open 2015;5: e006577. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2014-006577
Locate Article:  HERE

2)  WHO Guidance Report
Advice on the use of masks in the context of COVID-19  -- WHO in April, 2020

Locate Article (automatic download of PDF): HERE

3)  Nature Medicine study:
Leung, N.H.L., D. K. W. Chu, et al. Respiratory virus shedding in exhaled breath and efficacy of face masks.  Nature Medicine 26: 676–680, May 2020
Locate Article:  HERE

Vietnam Study
The “Vietnam study” involved 1,607 hospital health care workers (age 18 or older) employed full-time in selected high-risk wards among 14 different hospitals.  The objective of this study was “to compare the efficacy of cotton cloth masks to medical masks in hospital healthcare workers.”  Their conclusions are as follows:

Caution against Cloth Masks:  “This study is the first randomized critical trial of cloth masks, and the results caution against the use of cloth masks. This is an important finding to inform occupational health and safety. Moisture retention, reuse of cloth masks and poor filtration may result in increased risk of infection. Further research is needed to inform the widespread use of cloth masks globally.  However, as a precautionary measure, cloth masks should not be recommended for health care workers, particularly in high-risk situations, and guidelines need to be updated.”

The results of the “Vietnam study” were summarized in the adjacent graphic presented by the Laura Ingraham Angle on Fox News.  This news channel is a secondary source that is seen by millions of viewers.  The Fox News summary accurately presents the conclusions of the study.  However, reading the journal article reveals several complicating factors that are typically missed in news reporting.  The following excerpt from the journal article addresses some of the limitations of the study:

A limitation of this study is that we did not measure compliance with hand hygiene, and the results reflect self-reported compliance, which may be subject to recall or other types of bias. Another limitation of this study is the lack of a no-mask control group and the high use of masks in the controls, which makes interpretation of the results more difficult. In addition, the quality of paper and cloth masks varies widely around the world, so the results may not be generalisable to all settings (MacIntyre C.R. et al, p. 7).

What can we take away from the “Vietnam Study?”  First, the “Vietnam Study” appears to demonstrate “good science.”  The researchers were objective, conducted experiments and analyzed data with care, tried to avoid bias, were careful not to overstate conclusions, and invited scrutiny and critical analysis by peers and readers.

Second, primary journal sources often contain admissions of limitations that may or may not affect the conclusions; and, usually suggest the need for additional scientific research.  However, news reporting based on these primary sources often do not include these details.  Therefore, I encourage readers to check out the “Vietnam Study” article itself to gain more of a sense of how science is conducted and reported. 

Finally, the “Vietnam Study” provides much reason for us to question the efficacy of cotton cloth masks in preventing transmission of virus, and suggests that “moisture retention, reuse of cloth masks and poor filtration may result in increased risk of infection.”  We ought to be asking, “Is it possible that by wearing a mask I am increasing my risk of infection?”  How will this scientific study affect your choices, and the current policies of our state governors regarding masks?

WHO Guidance Report
Unlike the “Vietnam Study,” the “WHO Interim Guidance Report” is a secondary source with recommendations based on primary research reports.  This secondary source by definition represents interpretations and recommendations made by at least some people who were not directly involved in primary research and reporting.  However, if the interpretations and recommendations are accurate, the secondary source can reveal patterns and trends based on multiple research results including the “Vietnam Study” by MacIntyre CR, Seale H, Dung TC, et al.  cited above. 

The “WHO Guidance Report” offers the following summation concerning the efficacy of wearing masks to prevent spread of COVID-19:
When infected people wear masks:  “Studies of influenza, influenza-like illness, and human coronaviruses provide evidence that the use of a medical mask can prevent the spread of infectious droplets from an infected person to someone else and potential contamination of the environment by these droplets.”

When uninfected people wear masks:  “There is limited evidence that wearing a medical mask by healthy individuals in the households or among contacts of a sick patient, or among attendees of mass gatherings may be beneficial as a preventive measure. However, there is currently no evidence that wearing a mask (whether medical or other types) by healthy persons in the wider community setting, including universal community masking, can prevent them from infection with respiratory viruses, including COVID-19 (WHO Interim Guidance Report, p. 1).”

This April, 2020 recommendation by WHO was consistent with the recommendation at the time from Dr. Anthony Fauci who informed Americans that “There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask.  When you’re are in the middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a bit better, and it might even block a droplet, but it’s not providing the perfect protection that people think that it is.” 

Facebook now flags the April interview with Dr. Fauci as “false information.  Dr. Fauci later recommended wearing of masks and explained that his turn-around was based on his concern that if everyone wore a mask, healthcare workers would be left in short supply.  However, another April study, this one published in Nature Medicine, seems to confirm Dr. Fauci’s original recommendation against the need for wearing masks.  Is it possible that Dr. Fauci was scientifically correct in his April recommendation?  Let’s have a closer look at the “Nature Medicine Study.”

Nature Medicine Study
This report, published online April 3, 2020, is a primary source from a reputable journal.  The study was conducted from March, 2013 through May, 2016 in a general outpatient clinic of a private hospital in Hong Kong.  Researchers “screened 3,363 individuals in two study phases, ultimately enrolling 246 individuals who provided exhaled breath samples.  Among these 246 participants, 122 (50%) participants were randomized to not wearing a face mask during the first exhaled breath collection and 124 (50%) participants were randomized to wearing a face mask. Overall, 49 (20%) voluntarily provided a second exhaled breath collection of the alternate type.”

Results of the “Nature Medicine Study” were summarized as follows:
Virus Transmission in Air:  “Our results indicate that aerosol transmission is a potential mode of transmission for coronaviruses as well as influenza viruses and rhinoviruses.”
Efficacy of Masks:  “Our findings indicate that surgical masks can efficaciously reduce the emission of influenza virus particles into the environment in respiratory droplets, but not in aerosols.”
Very Little Virus Shedding:  “Among the samples collected without a face mask, we found that the majority of participants with influenza virus and coronavirus infection did not shed detectable virus in respiratory droplets or aerosols…”

The “Nature Medicine Study” affirms that coronaviruses can be transmitted in respiratory droplets (size greater than 5 micrometers) and in aerosols (size = less than 5 micrometers).  Surgical face masks (# 62356, Kimberly-Clark) reduced transmission of virus in respiratory droplets but not virus transmission in the smaller aerosols.  This result should be unsettling to infected people who depend on mask wearing to reduce transmission to others, and even to noninfected people who depend on masks to avoid infection.  However, there is some good news from this study; namely, the indication that the majority of those infected with coronavirus did not shed virus in either droplets or aerosols!

Summary Considerations
In summary, I have reviewed two primary literature sources and one secondary source.  All of them provide significant findings that should be taken into consideration when policy makers and we as individuals decide on whether or not to wear a mask; and, for what purpose, or what kind of mask, or how to avoid increasing risk of infection as a mask-wearer.  Perhaps most telling to us is whether we have been surprised by any of the results reported in these three studies.  I suggest that the degree to which we are surprised reflects the degree to which we have depended solely on broadcast media (secondary sources) as most Americans do.  

Unless we have a media source that does the hard work of extracting results from primary scientific sources, and reports it objectively without political bias, we will not be able to do as many say we should do-- “just follow the science.”  In the case of mask wearing, as I have discussed here, there appears to be “good science” and at least some good journalism, suggesting that we do well not to put too much trust in cotton cloth masks even if there are dozens of websites that tell us how to make cloth masks.  Furthermore, depending how we use the mask we could even increase our risk of infection.  Nor is there clear evidence that masks are stopping aerosol transmission of virus as much as the fact that virus shedding by infected individuals may be much less than we imagine.

What Do You Think About It?

As always, I welcome your opinions, corrections, questions.  Just use the “Comments” link below.  And, if you would like another COVID-19 related topic to research “back into the science,” consider hydroxychloroquine which as been shown to be efficacious against COVID-19 if prescribed appropriately but which has been opposed vehemently by many in the liberal media.   See Hydroxychloroquine: “Good Science” Challenges Politicized Science and a recent interview with Dr. Harvey Risch, Yale epidemiologist.  Why aren’t we following the science?”

If We Had Only Known: But Why Didn’t We?

After nearly three months of social distancing and economic shutdowns aimed at preventing the spread of COVID-19, what do we have to show for the policies aimed at preventing the spread of the virus?  Answer:  Tens of millions of Americans out of work, thousands of businesses destroyed, our health care system disrupted, schools and colleges across the land shuttered, and over 40,000 at-risk senior citizens who were exposed to virus infection and caused to die.  The actual virulence of the disease and the number of lives saved by all of this remains unknown.

What a staggering price to pay in order to defeat a virus!  But was all of this really necessary?
According to The Blaze, "A U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report published April 1 cited the ‘potential for presymptomatic transmission’ as a reason for the importance of social distancing, the network said.”  However, there was significant dissension within science and medicine.  Now, heads are wagging and many are regretting not having listened to the dissenters; or, regretting that many dissenting voices of science were marginalized or silenced.

The World Health Organization (WHO), according to CNBC, now claims that asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19 rarely spread the virus!  According to a CNN report yesterday, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of WHO's emerging diseases and zoonosis unit has stated, "We have a number of reports from countries who are doing very detailed contact tracing. They're following asymptomatic cases. They're following contacts. And they're not finding secondary transmission onward.  It's very rare."

Based on an article this morning in BBC News, the Van Kerkhove statements may be a bit too emphatic given the size of the study she referenced.  The article stated that, “While people without symptoms do seem to be capable of infecting others, current evidence still suggests people with symptoms are the highest risk” of transmitting the disease. The article adds that a positive test doesn’t tell us the “viral load” (how much virus in a person’s system).  However, Dr. Van Kerkove still maintains that secondary transmission requires high viral load which are passed mainly through infectious droplets from coughing and sneezing.  She adds, “If we actually followed all of the symptomatic cases, isolated those cases, followed the contacts and quarantined those cases, we would drastically reduce (Parenthetically, she inserted:  I would love to be able to give a proportion of how much transmission we would actually stop.) but it would be a drastic reduction in transmission."

WHO:  Accountability and Admission of Error
Are you shocked?   Many are not.  If Dr. Van Kerkhove’s assessments are true, then prior suspicions toward the WHO are only being further confirmed.  While some still question how much virus transmission can occur just prior to expression of symptoms, it is looking more and more like the WHO is either incompetent or complicit in an effort to distort the truth.  At very best, it appears that the measures that resulted from WHO and CDC recommendations were much too drastic to be justified by the limited data and associated predictive models.

Although somewhat haltingly, the WHO is basically admitting that the decision to institute social distancing and business shutdowns, supposedly “following the science," was misguided.  If, instead of recommending the widespread social isolation and lock down of all but essential services, health officials had simply recommended tracking, tracing, and isolating symptomatic cases, the COVID-19 pandemic may have had no greater impact than annual influenza viruses that come and go.

If these recent claims of WHO officials are confirmed in the days ahead, history may record the “COVID-19 pandemic” as one of its greatest fiascos.  Of major concern already is not only the disruption of our economy, health care, education, family, social interactions, and worship, but the avoidable deaths of 40,000 of our senior citizens who were left vulnerable and then moved in large numbers into close quarters where COVID-19 infection and death were largely unavoidable.  But I believe we will be adding insult to injury if millions of Americans and billions worldwide do not raise some serious questions that justify a major investigation of exactly who and what led us down this costly and deadly path.  

Important Questions:  Answers Please?
Here are some questions for starters:
1.  What was the origin of the COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) virus?
2.  Why did the Chinese Communists silence several of their prominent scientists?
3.  Why did these Chinese leaders claim the virus was not contagious while they were restricting travel from Wuhan and grabbing up related health care equipment?
4.  Did the Chinese Communist regime conspire with the WHO to control information flow?
5.  Why was doctor-prescribed use of Hydroxychloroquine so strongly opposed by many?
6.  Who are those responsible for decisions that led to the deaths of over 40,000 residents of nursing homes and long-term care facilities, representing 40% of the COVID-19 deaths in the US.
7.  Why have the WHO and CDC now begun to admit to recommending measures that were unprecedented and apparently too drastic? 
8.  In what particular ways did the media fail America and other nations by essentially censoring dissenting voices?  See Hydroxychloroquine: “Good Science” Challenges Politicized Science.
9.  Were there instances in which scientists deliberately acted unethically by withholding data and assessments that might have led to an end of the lockdown much earlier.   See Bring a Speedy End to the Pandemic Shutdown
10.  Is it time for a national discussion to heighten our awareness of how important good journalism and honest reporting by the media is to maintaining our democratic republic?
11.  What changes need to be made to assure that our national leaders receive broader-based, expert scientific and epidemiological input and can make good decisions to protect American people?
12.  How can Christians strengthen their faith in God and sharpen their discernment of the issues of our time, and then position themselves to be able to represent Christ to people mired in confusion, anxiety, depression, addiction, and fear?

With Question #12 in mind, I am finding Luke 21, particularly verses 7-19, very relevant to the events of our day.  While careful study is needed to place the future events Jesus is describing into context, He makes two statements that should be very encouraging (New Living Translation): 
Luke 21: 9 -- And when you hear of wars and insurrections, don’t panic.
Luke 21: 13 -- But this will be your opportunity to tell them about me.

I do not want to pretend to have all of the answers to the COVID-19 pandemic, nor even all of the questions.  I realize that there are many dedicated, honest professionals that were and are involved in some aspect of the pandemic; and, I don’t want to impugn well-meaning, honest people, nor deny the fact that hindsight sometimes prompts great criticism of decisionmakers.  Yet, the questions I have raised are among those that we would do well to answer in the days ahead.

How About You?
Are there particular questions you have about how the pandemic was handled, or about factors that influenced policy to move in such an unwise direction?  How have these events influenced your trust in “science,” the media, our leadership in Washington, and health care professionals?  How has the pandemic influenced your faith in God?

Car & Driver, Technology & News Media

In spite of our rapidly advancing and increasingly complex technology, at least one principle has proven correct throughout human history.  We humans, as creators and users of technology, must take the responsibility for how it is used.  This article addresses two crucial elements of our technological society--human stewardship of science and technology, and the importance of accurate media research and reporting.

According to Genesis 1 and 2, God created the universe including planet Earth and its amazingly intricate biosphere.  Then, He created humankind in His image (Genesis 1: 26)—i.e. with personality, rationality, creativity, and all other capabilities necessary to exercise dominion as residents of Earth’s biosphere (Genesis 1: 27).  In Genesis 2: 15, we learn that our dominion is not to be exercised by shear force and disregard for creation.  Rather, as stewards, we are to be caring servants of what rightfully belongs to God.

Our stewardship responsibility includes both wise use of what God has created ex nihilo and wise use of the tools and technology we create from the “resources” of God’s creation.  If technology malfunctions causing harm to an animal, to the biosphere, or to an individual human being, the fault lies with the creator or the operator of the machine—not the machine itself.  Therefore, God judges the quality of our stewardship by the choices we make in how we use the technology; and, how news media research and report on science and technology.

Having laid out these time-honored principles, I invite you to listen to a podcast entitled “Blame Game” which was produced by Malcolm Gladwell.  Gladwell takes visitors to his “Revisionist History” website on a “journey through the overlooked and the misunderstood” events of history.  He believes that, at least for the cases he addresses, “the past deserves a second chance.” 

“Blame Game” which is episode #8 of season 1, contains both a 37-minute podcast and additional video and printed information.  All of these relate to the famous 2009 cases of the “suddenly and uncontrollably accelerating” cars manufactured by Toyota.  This case involving numerous deaths and billions in lawsuits as revisited by Malcolm Gladwell will offer you some surprising analyses and results.  As you listen to the podcast and check out the ancillary resources, please keep the following questions in mind:

1.  Should the blame for the “suddenly and uncontrollably accelerating” cars be aimed at human error(s) within Toyota Motor Corporation or at human error by the drivers of those cars?

2.  What does this “second chance” look at a historical event teach us about human stewardship of technology?  …and, about certain people in the media who claim to be authorities?

Relatively simple technology of car floor mats were suspected.

3.  Considering the relationship between technology, human error, and media research and reporting of the news as I have framed it in this blog article, what lessons can you take home from “Blame Game” that may apply to contemporary issues—e.g. calls to ban some or all firearms, violent computer video games, social media, hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”), and coal mining?

4.  Can you name events in this evening’s news, or perhaps under-reported news, the coverage of which may have major repercussions for the future?

5.  For those who wish to take this controversy and its implications a step further by reading a critique of Gladwell's "Blame Game," you may wish to read an online article published by Safety Research & Strategies, Inc., entitled "Tipping Point."

Thanks for reading (and listening). I would love to read your comments and questions.  Please use the “Comment” box below, or e-mail me at silviusj@gmail.com

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My thanks to our son, Bradley Silvius, who referred me to Revisionist History podcasts.  I dedicate this article to him in hopes that he will receive a double blessing—first, the blessing of knowing that we now share in the enjoyment of Malcolm Gladwell’s podcasts; and second, knowing that his dad can occasionally write a much shorter blog article without taking away from its value (I hope).

Media and Religion in the Public Square

Our age of instant communication affords us daily access to thousands of visual and auditory bytes of information. It is increasingly rare to find individuals and households that do not have access to abundant information and news sources. Instead, we are increasingly faced with three other challenges.

First, are the media presenting news accurately and with proper distinction between news and commentary? It is easy for news sources today to allow political agendas to dictate their decisions as to what makes the evening news or the front page. For example, many on both sides of the political spectrum agree that Barak Obama was preferentially favored both in quantity and quality of coverage during the 2008 campaign. Nothing wrong with biased reporting as long as we have the freedom and discipline to seek out alternative sources of information. This point brings us to the second challenge.

With such abundant access to information, and the tendency toward biased reporting, we must be disciplined to use our ability and time to analyze and reflect on what we hear or read in order to develop a reasoned response. Critical analysis of information takes time, discipline, and a wisdom that is committed to the pursuit of truth. According to Proverbs 1:8, The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Proverbs 1: 6-9
adds,
For the LORD gives wisdom;
From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.
He stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
He is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
Guarding the paths of justice,
And He preserves the way of His godly ones.
Then you will discern righteousness and justice
And equity and every good course.

The third challenge is to profess our opinions in a manner that is clear, logical, and wise out of a respect for our friends, colleagues, and neighbors. To profess, is to express truth that is consistent with our profession of faith. This faith recognizes that we are God’s subjects and He has entrusted to us the stewardship of our time, abilities, relationships, and material resources from the Earth. All these are to be used in a manner that expresses our love to the Creator God and to our neighbor as the two “great commandments” require (Matthew 22:35-40).

Today, Christians are asked to be tolerant in a society that is increasingly intolerant of biblical views, even when professed in a polite and “engaging” manner. The accusations of bigotry and harassment toward Christians are becoming more frequent. However, wisdom teaches us that we are created to be worshipers. All of us are religious. By nature, we will worship God or an idol–-another god, material wealth, or human reason itself. Therefore, the question is not, “Should religion (a system of beliefs and practices that justifies our life and behavior to a supreme authority) be allowed in the ‘public square’?” The question is, “Will there be freedom to express and practice one’s religion of choice in the ‘public square’?

To view a partly humorous rendition of a workplace situation in which two religions are both impolitely expressed, click HERE. The clip is provided by ZoNation on PajamasTV. In keeping with the challenges outlined in this article, take time to identify the two religions featured, consider the source of authority behind each profession, the accuracy with which they are presented, and how each might have professed their belief more respectfully. What is the difference between “environmentalism” and Judeo-Christian environmental stewardship? What motivations are there to care about "climate change" or the Earth in general? See
"Creation Care and Christian Character", and article in Creation Care, Summer, 2007.