Bow Your Heads

(I've been away for a few days. 'Tis good to be back.)

George W. Bush, you'll recall, has often been chided for his associations with the "religious right". He has been mocked for admitting during the 2000 presidential campaign that his favorite political philosopher was Jesus Christ. He has been ridiculed for revealing that he prays every day that God would guide him to do the right thing; militant Bush critics even believe this revelation is tantamount to the Commander-in-Chief waging a holy war against Islam, all proof that Mr. Bush holds theocratic ambitions.

But darkness descends on the minds of too many men and women, blinded to the overwhelming fact that there is religion aplenty driving those who adhere to liberalism, or who work to transform the world into the image of the Democratic Party. Without question certain "believers" accept the grandiloquent damnations hurled at religious right activism; and without question they shut their minds to religious leftism and other forms of theocratic emanations.

Who is going to stand up to the great and swaggering behemoth which is the Democratic Party as it bowed its head in prayer the other day? Who is going to demand redress of great religious and ideological grievances brought upon Democrats for their unthinking connivance to appear tolerant, devout, and ever so peaceful?

If you have not already done so, please watch this video clip provided for us by HotAir.com of a Muslim imam invoking "god" at the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) Winter Meeting. It is enough to make one's prayer shawl crawl. It is enough to make one daven in disbelief; to genuflect in semi-conscious bewilderment.

Here is a transcript (thanks to Frontpagemag.com) of the whole prayer (the HotAir excerpt is too abridged):

In the name of God the most merciful, the most compassionate. We thank you, God, to bless us among your creations. We thank you, God, to make us as a great nation. We thank you God, to send us your messages through our father Abraham and Moses and Jesus and Muhammad. Through you, God, we unite. So guide us to the right path. The path of the people you bless, not the path of the people you doom. Help us God to liberate and fill this earth with justice and peace and love and equality. And help us to stop the war and violence, and oppression and occupation. Ameen. [Emphasis added]

I am sure we all would agree that it would be wrong for a President of the United States, the Chief Executive of a nation devoted to separation of powers, particularly the separation of Church and State; it would be wrong of that leader to invoke God's "perfect will" in declaring war against a neighbor, all in the name of Christ. Americans recoil at such religious vigor; they expect there to be a "wall of separation" between the State and its many churches.

But I am equally sure that we all must agree -- along with the deconstructionists among us -- that nowhere in the history of America has any founding document called for the erection of a wall between Mosque and State. For it appears, or so it seems, our friends in attendance at the DNC's meeting have no problem sharing the same podium with an imam invoking Allah to guide national affairs; the Mosque is our political friend. All facetiousness aside, we must (must we not?) be perplexed by the sudden Islamophilism of the DNC.

How interesting it is -- or am I wrong about this? -- that the DNC would be of nearly one mind that it is wrong for any leader to seek God's guidance in starting war, and yet it is somehow right for leaders to seek God's guidance in ending war. How interesting it is that the DNC would countenance a prayer by a man asking for exclusive privileges for a certain set of special people, the good people, and that there would be no such privileges on those God has kindly chosen to "doom." And how interesting it is that God should -- with the Democrats' help and Islam's fervent plea -- bring an end to "occupation" and procure "equality" for all.

Ahh, men.



PEACE.

©Bill Gnade 2007/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Jamie Glazov & Dinesh D'Souza On Islam, 9/11, And The Radical Left (Updated)

We all hear a lot about "dialogue" and "debate"; about talking together through difficult issues. Currently we are hearing this sort of rhetoric coming from the "new" US Congress; some of us Episcopalians in New Hampshire are STILL waiting for the great dialogue promised three years ago by our controversial bishop.

I must say that the sort of dialogue exemplified between Jamie Glazov and Dinesh D'Souza in their two-part conversation at FrontPageMag is reassuring and inspiring: here are two thinkers, conservative and academic, who disagree profoundly. And yet there is a gentlemanly quailty that prevails throughout; and there is no shortage of interesting parries and thrusts. Both men score points; and I give the win to Mr. Glazov. Part of that small victory, unfortunately, comes as a result of Mr. Glazov slipping into a monologue for which, it appears, Mr. D'Souza is absent. But that hardly matters, since Glazov is amazing on his own.

This really is an excellent series. Take time to read it if you are at all interested in Mr. D'Souza's thesis that it is American liberalism, the radical leftist sort, that led to 9/11 and America's current standoff with Islam. Mr. Glazov issues a very serious and compelling challenge; Mr. D'Souza makes a few worthy rebuffs. Part 1 is here, and Part 2 is found here. From Abu Ghraib to sexual immorality, from Moses to Muhammed, this series offers key insights.

And make sure you take time to read Mr. David Forsmark's challenging review of Mr. D'Souza's new book, The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left And Its Responsibility For 9/11.

Peace.

BG

Replay: Celebrating The Forgotten Martin Luther King

[This essay first appeared here on January 16, 2006]

I don't really care what anyone thinks about the following statement, so I say it without hesitation: The 1960's in America were pretty sick years. I have no nostalgia for them; no awe of their alleged liberation or romance for their upheaval, no glee over the sexual and drug revolutions. I stand in protest of the 1960's and their legacy.

And one salient feature of the illness of the 1960's was the shocking death of Martin Luther King Jr. It is not shocking in that it was unexpected, for even Dr. King anticipated it, I believe, in his very final speech. It was shocking in that it was emblematic of truly profound social conflicts that marred that decade, perhaps the most vulgar and violent one, in America's history. Dr. King, after all, was a pacifist in a tumultuous and vicious fight for equality among the races. That his death, his martyrdom, may have spurred Americans toward a more just and kind world is disconcerting, as death should not be required for what seems intuitively to be a simple lesson: All men are created equal.

Of course, as a man bent toward the philosophical, I ask myself whether it is indeed true that all men are created equal. Is it? If we are strict Darwinists, if we are secularists without appeal to God or some transcendent force responsible for mankind's existence and equality, then we must concede that equality is not an ontological (metaphysical) reality. Evolution, in its dynamic "natural selection" process, abhors equality, as disparate species fight and morph for dominance and survival, with nary a hint of egalitarianism. To the secular mind "equality" must be a religious fiction created by that secularism, for there is nothing in the entire cosmos that even resembles "equality." As I've stated elsewhere, including here at Contratimes, neither "equality" nor "rights" exist in any place other than the faith-based imagination of secularists.

Unless, of course, there really is a God. Then one can indeed talk, not only of "equality" but of "rights" as well, rights rooted in the imago dei, the image of God. And that is why the concepts of "rights" and "equality" are rooted in theological language in the founding documents of America. If there is no God, there is no equality and no rights, except in that fictive realm wherein the secular mind places them. If there is a God, there is at least the potential for there to be real qualities to equality and rights; a real, ontological quality.

Of course, the philosopher in me also sees this astounding problem: If there is indeed a God, then only humans are equal one to another, for God surely is not equal to His creation. In short, a world wherein God exists is hierarchical, with God sitting in the highest seat. With that said, it is no wonder secularists abhor a theological structure for social governance, as God confounds their love of absolute equality.

While today we celebrate the memory of Martin Luther King, I would like to celebrate what is absolutely forgotten about Martin Luther King. And what is forgotten is that Dr. King held no expertise in social or political scheming; he was not trained to be a rebel or a revolutionary. No, Dr. King was first and foremost a Christian theologian and ordained minister. Sadly, in most celebrations of his life, these seem to be the first things that are forgotten about him. I wonder, how would this make him feel?

Today is really a religious holiday, but you wouldn't know it. It is a holiday celebrating the liberating power of the Gospel, the very power that liberated a young Martin King when he first attended church, and when he first attended college. It is a day, not of civil rights, but of the power of love and justice and this wild notion that God loves ALL MEN EQUALLY, which manifests itself in justice and truth in the Christian Savior walking the streets offering a message of hope to the oppressed and harassed: those persecuted by the powerful; those harassed by the terrors of their own sins. It is right to be civil, and it is civil to be right; but neither truth means anything without the civilizing and righteous power of the Christian God who calls all men and women unto Him: that neither Greek nor Jew, neither slave nor free; neither man nor woman nor black nor white, are to be excluded from His banquet hall. This is not unconditional universalism, but that universalism with a caveat: that all invited guests must first accept the invitation, shedding their filthy clothes for the formal clothes that come as a result of God's sacrifice, with all men and all women attired in the grace of God's forgiveness. Those who refuse the invitation, or the forgiveness, remain, freely, outside to dine alone. The maître d' bids them Bon appetit! if they would just humble themselves and accept their reservations.

But this great day is for me in many ways a day of sorrow, for the great man Dr. Martin Luther King is cheapened, gutted and reduced to something other than he was, for he was not a secular member of the vanguard; his power was not intrinsic to him; his cause was a cause that has nothing, ultimately, to do with him at all. For it is God's cause, and Dr. King knew that, and he embraced that powerful fact. How sorrowful that our schools and culture want to forget what ultimately made Dr. King a great man.†

For me, Dr. King represents the fight to keep the cardinal virtues together in harmonic balance. G. K. Chesterton argued that the Protestant Reformation smashed the union of the cardinal virtues, causing them to run amok, befouling the earth with their zeal. Just think of love, hope, faith, justice, prudence, temperance and fortitude helter-skelter on the earth, unbound from each other. Justice untethered becomes a church or legal fund or race riot insisting on its own verdicts, neglecting the temperance which is mercy. Temperance alone turns into flagellation and legalism. Prudence in isolation turns into the idolatry of caution, dreading the imperfect choice. Love runs to and fro without the truth of justice or the restraint of self-control, and blindly affirms acts and deeds that true love, in balance, would not countenance or so casually condone. Today, I can hear Dr. King call for the orthodoxy which holds all of these virtues together, the orthodoxy of Christ. It is this part of Dr. King's message that I remember today with sadness, for it is the part of his message and his life that is forgotten.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

†There are those who don't think Dr. King was a great man, but I think otherwise. His peccadilloes, his sins, do indeed count against him. But all of us have these charges against us. What made him great is that he held to his convictions without being paralyzed by the fact that he was a man of imperfections. Too many of us permit our imperfections to sway us from our course. We fall prey to one of the greatest social evils, which is the fixation on the purity of the messenger rather than on the accuracy of the message. It is the "Who are you?" fallacy. It is the devil's line of discredit.

The religious left is no less threatening (A letter to the editor)

[This essay is a letter sent to the editor of the Peterborough Transcript, a small NH weekly. It is in response to comments made retired Franklin Pierce College professor, author and political activist Taylor Morris, who lives nearby. It is related to my "God Bless You Please, Mr. Robinson."]

Criticisms of the religious right, expressed in sundry letters to local papers and the audacious remarks of Bishop Gene Robinson of the NH diocese of the Episcopal Church, strike me as wildly hypocritical at worst and misinformed at best.

Taylor Morris, for instance, in his letter, How to define freedom? (Transcript, 4/14), fails to even consider that there might be a religious left equally bent on establishing a theocracy in America. Imposing religious ideals and principles in the public square is hardly a right-wing activity. The religious left has been doing it for decades.

One need only glance at Unitarian Universalism to rightly conclude that there is hardly a more strident and politically active religious institution in America. Its involvement in shaping society and politics in its own religious image is not only part of its foundation; it is its pride. If the religious right is against gay marriage, for example, the Unitarians are all for it. In other words, the legalization of gay marriage by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts was a decision that promoted and affirmed the religious ideals of Unitarians everywhere. In fact, the two ministers who performed the first 'marriages' in New Paltz, NY, marriages now deemed illegal, were Unitarian ministers. Does anyone think that those two ministers performed those ceremonies because their church opposes gay marriage?

Moreover, the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) is nearly monochromatic in its political views. Find a Unitarian Universalist who is a conservative Republican, and I say you've found a miracle. (In contrast, the Roman Catholic Church, at least politically, is infinitely more diverse than nearly any Unitarian society on the planet.) The UUA in America endorses almost every political position held by the Democratic Party; and it rarely, if ever, supports one ideal that could be found to the right of that party.

Remember that the "religious right" is not a church. Unitarian Universalism, however, is very much a church.

Mr. Robinson's recent remarks at Franklin Pierce College, germane to this discussion in their hypocrisy, no doubt received applause by his liberal peers. But is there a more troubling irony than a man using his religious office politically in order to censure religion in politics?

And is it not hypocritical that Mr. Robinson would sow fears of theocracy by claiming that 'God is horrified' (Robinson's words) by the things being done in God's name by the religious right? For Robinson claims to know God's mind, a claim that should sound alarms in liberals the world over: Robinson assumes he not only knows what horrifies God politically; he knows what doesn’t horrify God. And what doesn't horrify God? Apparently the political views of Mr. Robinson, whose views are unsurprisingly identical to the Democratic Party platform.

Lastly, one wonders how Mr. Robinson can use his religion in politics to beat back religion in politics when the Book of Common Prayer, without flinching, expects fervent prayers in which weekly, if not daily, Episcopalians petition their Lord Jesus Christ to guide the 'President, Congress and Judiciary' so that they will perform, not some secular act, but God's very will. Perhaps Mr. Robinson would have me skip over that part of my Prayer Book.

The theocratic ambition of the left is also a real threat to the separation of church and state. Messrs. Robinson and Morris apparently hope to protect that separation. I pray they will.

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved

Technorati tags: Religious Left, Religious Right, Gene Robinson, Episcopal Church, Episcopalianism,ECUSA, Unitarianism, Unitarian-Universalism

The god of love

Permit me to announce my rejection of Christ. For if Christianity is as the United Church of Christ (UCC) suggests in its recent TV commercial, then I have no interest in being a Christian. Such religiosity is anathema to me; and I'm anathema to it.

The commercial in question - Bouncer - depicts people queueing up outside a church. Each person is subjected to a security screening by two black-garbed musclemen determining each person's legitimacy. A homosexual couple is tossed aside, as is a young, jewelry-pierced man, apparently hispanic. Also rejected is an African-American child; and even a young man in a wheelchair. Finally the screen fades to black and the words 'Jesus didn't turn people away ... Neither do we,' appear in white. Then a male voice-over: 'The United Church of Christ. No matter who you are, or where you are in life's journey, you are welcome here.' (To see the ad for yourself, go here and follow the links.)

When I first saw the UCC ad (stumbled upon while sifting through sundry TV channels), I genuinely thought it was a parody, perhaps created by The Daily Show; for the piece is that laughable and absurd. But my first impression was quickly replaced by shock when I saw the official UCC logo emblazoned on the screen, topped with these words: God is still speaking.

Yeah, sure he is.

The important point presented in the commercial is of Christ's acceptance. It is the claim that Christ accepts all people 'no matter who they are.' But one wonders what this means. If we know anything about Christ, he rebuked the self-righteous, condemned not only adultery but even lust (a very biological drive), castigated 'money changers' in the holy temple, and exorcized demons from disturbed people.

(I wonder if the UCC's Jesus demonstrated expansive tolerance with his disciple Peter. One need only recall Christ's gentle, approving words issued to that first Bishop of Rome: 'Get thee behind me, Satan.')

Yeah, Jesus just accepted everybody.

What's disgusting is that if the UCC is about openness, its doors are rather closed; closed to people who are Christian fundamentalists, or alleged homophobes, or members of the Boy Scouts. Each of these is not permitted to cross the UCC's tolerant threshold. But maybe that's unfair. A homophobe, for example, is no doubt welcome on the condition that he or she doesn't seek a position of leadership in the UCC, unless such a person changes.

(Apparently some people can and must change.)

Remember, according to the UCC, where ever you are in life's journey, you are accepted by the UCC, unless, of course, you are an unacceptable person. With compassion like that, it seems the UCC might actually keep the real Jesus out of its churches, the man who was rejected and despised for the sins of the world.

Contrary to the UCC, there has never been a church that has tossed out people before they even enter. Until now. After all, the Christian Church has always been about saving people from their sins. It's only a gross misunderstanding that the Church is the household of the whole. Rather, it's the household of the broken. So to suggest that people were banned for being sinners is absurd.

But that's not the suggestion, is it? The suggestion is that homosexuality, for example, is normal, and that homophobia is sin. But with the UCC's ban on homophobic Boy Scouts now well known, it's clear that the only church to ban sinners, for the first time in history, is the United Church of Christ.

Let's assume the UCC is right: churches are un-Christlike. But if Christ taught anything, it is the love of one's enemies. How then does the UCC's commercial demonstrate its love for those people with whom it categorically disagrees? It invokes Christ in a slick TV ad, using him to mock and rebuke the UCC's neighbors. Shame!

Give me a Christ that wants to smash the world to bits. That's a Christ worth following. For love is ferocious, if it's anything. I've no interest in a deity that is neither loving nor divine. A Christ that accepts everyone as they are is worthless.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

Technorati tags: United Church of Christ, Bouncer Advertisement

God bless you please, Mr. Robinson

Rindge, NH (3/28/05) - In a speech at Franklin Pierce College entitled 'What in God's name is going on in America?', Gene Robinson, the feted bishop of the Episcopal diocese of New Hampshire, takes umbrage with that bogeyman of American politics, the 'religious right.' (www.mledger.com/2005/archives/1-news-033105.shtml)

Perhaps Mr. Robinson is referring to the audacious declaration found at this well-known religion's website:

'BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED that the UUA urges its member congregations and individual Unitarian Universalists to proclaim and promote our principles by becoming active participants in public institutions such as schools, libraries, political parties, and governmental bodies.' [General Assembly, 1996]

Of course, Mr. Robinson could not be referring to that kind of activism.

That the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) baldly calls its members to express their religiosity by directly and unabashedly promoting UUA principles in all aspects of American political life hardly raises Robinson's eyebrows. Why is he so indifferent? Because the UUA is a supporter of Mr. Robinson, the first openly gay bishop in Christendom; and he shares with the religious left the hope of creating a liberal, tolerant theocracy, where an 'all-loving God (read 'permissive') is going to be victorious.'

The UUA as a self-described beacon of the religious left is gratuitously political in its agenda, and is, in all ways, a promoter of ideals unsurprisingly similar to the Democratic Party (particularly the left wing of that party). Find a Unitarian-Universalist who is a conservative Republican, and I say you’ve found a miracle.

Is it not a grotesque picture, or a macabre irony, that a religious official would use his religion in politics to censure religion in politics? Mr. Robinson himself is clearly fixated on reproaching the Bush Administration’s policies on everything, and this in the name of his church and his God. Is everyone OK with that?

Moreover, Mr. Robinson claims that God is 'horrified' by the things being done in God's name, ostensibly by the Republicans, and that he, Robinson, not only knows what God is thinking, he knows what God would not be horrified by: namely the political ideas of Mr. Robinson, which, again unsurprisingly, are identical with the Democratic Party platform. What a prophetic voice! (Just think that Mr. Robinson believes conservatives are arrogant.)

Sadly, lost on Mr. Robinson, is that he is guilty of promoting a theocracy that pleases the religious left.

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

-'It will never be known what acts of cowardice have been motivated by the fear of not looking sufficiently progressive.' Charles Peguy