Flag Called On Christian Anti-Sports Playbook

 

A problem or concern with those the most enthusiastic about their faith in God is not that they are necessarily zealous but rather that they expect you to embrace their interpretation regarding those issues where those sincerely holding to the essentials of Christianity can view a particular moral conundrum differently. Take for example the issue of sports.

No Christian in their right mind will deny that professional athletic spectacles can potentially get out of hand to the point where those participating in them can be tempted by explicit sins such as greed, corruption, and even idolatry. However, in his essay “Professional Sports An Abomination To God”, theologian Michael Jeshurun argues that the sincere devout Christian ought not to have anything to do with sports beyond an occasional pick up game or ball toss in the backyard. In his condescension, Jeshurun provides a number of detailed reasons.

Jeshurun begins his analysis with an examination of the act of “Tebowing”. The name of the gesture is derived from Tim Tebow's practice of kneeling with head bowed in a posture of adoration following the completion of a play deemed successful on the part of the penitent supplicant.

To Jeshurun, it's not enough that a professional athlete amidst the hustle and bustle of the gridiron takes a moment to direct his thoughts as well as those with eyes upon him towards the reality of a higher overseeing power. To Jeshurun, the prayer is not complete unless the athlete enunciates a lamentation of his transgressions and heaps condemnation upon the venue in which the athlete finds himself. While he's at it, perhaps the athlete ought to rend his garments and adorn himself sackcloth and ashes. A little flagellation might also be in order. That would raise at least an eyebrow of interest in San Francisco.

Jeshurun's basic argument is that the Christian ought to avoid professional and organized athletics because sports is an idol and a work of the flesh. His first evidence raised in the attempt to prove such is Luke 16:15 proclaiming, “That which is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God.”

Jeshurun writes, “This verse alone should settle it once and for all whether 'professional sports' is well pleasing to God or an abomination to Him.” Without additional context, that verse might not apply in every situation but more a general principle that applies when a particular activity or situation is inherently evil.

There is overlap where both God and man highly esteem certain things. For example, both God and even the unredeemed that have not succumbed to outright debauchery value a good name as counseled in Proverbs 22:1. Both God and a number of non-Christian belief systems value the married heterosexual two parent household as the foundation of a stable family.

Next, because a sizable percentage have elevated sports to an unseemly position in their lives, that does not necessarily mean that sports is inherently evil or that the Christian should not participate in them. For a number of the criticisms leveled against sports could be directed just as easily at organized religion in general and even Christianity in particular.

As a statistic, Jeshurun cites a 1983 survey that 7 out of 10 Americans watches, reads, or talks about sports every day. Another statistic from that year lamented by Jeshurun from the World Almanac and Book of Facts states that, of 2000 students polled of whom they admired most, there was not a single name on the list that was not an entertainer nor an athlete.

What is so wrong if coworkers discuss sports? Isn't that preferable to a religious war breaking out in the office? And such a topic is certainly more pleasant to discuss than either your coworker's hemorrhoids, the fact that he needs a Viagra, or that it's his wife's “cranky week” on the calendar.

As to the statistic about children, what is to be expected? They are children. Aren't their answers supposed to reek of stupidity?

Regarding these kinds of surveys, those taking them can't really win. If the respondent answers truthfully, they are reamed a new one for answering in a way that displeases either the pollster or the polemicist co-opting the researcher to make a point. If the respondent attempts to game the situation by telling the researcher what the researcher wants to hear but does not live their life in a manner reflective of the answers provided, they are reamed yet again for the transgressions of deception and hypocrisy.

Following the elaboration of this statement, Jeshurun provides a number of examples as to why he concludes that professional athletics is idolatrous. He first turns to the preeminent and learned theologian Howard Cosell.

In reflecting upon the devotion of Dallas Cowboy fans, Cosell decreed, “The Cowboys are more than a football team; they are a religion.” To show that this just wasn't a fluke on the part of a sportscaster renowned for his flair at turning a colorful phrase, Jeshurun cites an incident where 75.000 fans of the Devner Broncos showed up for a game despite a blizzard that crippled a metropolis like Denver that was no stranger to harsh wintry conditions.

What can one say? The world is full of people that don't have common sense that do plenty of things they should not that endanger their lives largely because they are told to. There are some that would risk their life and limb to go to church in foul weather when they would be better off staying at home.

For example, one particularly snowy Sunday in the mid 1980's, my unabashedly devout grandmother decided that the weather was too cold and treacherous to risk the pilgrimage through the elements to the Baptist church my grandparents attended about 15 miles away. But come perdition or high water (or on this case about five inches of snow), my grandfather insisted he just had to have his Sunday edition of the Washington Post (by that point the Washington Star had folded and most good Christian folk were still leery regarding the Washington Times at that point as “that Moonie newspaper”).

My grandmother relented to the request, thinking it would be no more than a 5 to 10 minute trip to the corner neighborhood convenience store. She waited and waited. As her mind balanced that fine line between concern and worry, she called my parents wondering where grandpop could be.

Given this was several decades ago, I don't recall precisely whether my dad set out to the corner store looking for him or that Dad himself might have been at work that day. Irrespective, the entire family spent that morning quite unsettled until grandfather returned home around 12:45 PM.

For you see, he hadn't just ventured forth to acquire a newspaper. To paraphrase the title of Bilbo Baggins' adventure, my grandfather had gone all the way to church and back again without telling anyone where he set out to which he insisted wasn't even his wife's business despite the questionable weather.

Admittedly, that anecdote veers a bit from the main point but will be tied into this exposition for a matter of emphasis. Just because it might not have been the wisest thing for my grandfather to not only drive to church in treacherous weather but also not inform my grandmother where it was that he was going, his antics did not invalidate the central claims of the Christian message and their benefit in the life of the individual when parsed in a balanced and reasoned manner. Likewise, when free individuals without direct coercion decide to pursue sports in instances when participation could be a detriment does not invalidate the legitimacy of professional athletics altogether.

Jeshurun attempts to further buttress his arguments with a number of additional criticisms that could just as easily be applied to religion. A number of these aren't even necessarily incorrect in and of themselves if looked at from a different perspective.

The first reason given by Jeshurun is that professional sports is based on greed. Jeshurun writes, “When the well known evangelist Billy Sunday turned his back ... on a baseball career in 1893, he gave ten reasons for leaving. Reason number two was 'Because it develops a spirit of jealousy and selfishness; one's whole desires are for professional success regardless of what befalls others.'.” Jeshurun continues, “As a matter of fact, sports teaches us to be happy when our opponents fail or when another player is injured so that I can be promoted to his position.”

And organized religion does not? It's just that organized religion has been better at formulating a series of pious platitudes that an individual can enunciate that mask the true intentions of the individual verbalizing them and can position the individual from the perspective of the most spiritually profound light possible.

For example, in many churches, the same handful of people hold the recognized positions of leadership for year after year, decade upon decade. For anybody new to be allowed to try there hand at anything, eventually someone has to not so much be but out to pasture but rather six feet under it. Even if the congregation is magnanimous and free of cliques, there is only so much opportunity to go around in terms of teaching positions or for talent to even be developed if there is a single Sunday school class with that either taught by the pastor or head deacon.

The next argument as to why the Christian ought not to participate in sports is because professional athletics is full of covetousness. Most Christians think of covetousness as wanting what someone else has to such an extent that one is willing to fall into explicit sin in order to obtain the obsession. Apparently Jeshurun's definition is quite a bit different.

He writes, “Covetousness is one of the definitions of modern professional sports. Loyalty to the team or country is out of the question. Unlike the true Christian who is not for sale (because Christ has already bought him) the professional sportsmen will play against his own for a price!”

That barely makes sense. Despite the easily drawn and often at times appropriate analogies, contemporary athletics are not the Roman gladiatorial spectacles or even the Thunderdome of the Mad Max series. We are not quite yet at the point where the assembled crowds chat “Two men enter. One man leaves.”

As a hardline Calvinist, Mr. Jeshurun has probably published a number of diatribes against Roman Catholicism; however, his economic vision is not that markedly different than the viewpoints expounded by Pope Francis. For both of these theologians have cloaked barely disguised anti-capitalist sentiments in the garb of other issues.

For example, an athlete owes “the team” no more loyalty than the common laborer the average employer. Like an employee, the professional athlete agrees to provide services in terms of performance in exchange for compensation for an agreed upon time.

Is what Jeshurun prefers some sort of economic feudalism? In that particular sort of system, the laborer is not allowed to ply his craft or trade in an environment where he can negotiate to obtain either the working conditions or compensation most suited to his liking. Instead, the human capital is bound to either a particular piece of land or even member of the nobility. Such can only be dissolved through extraordinary legal effort.

Equating that the labor of the athlete should not be for sale because the true Christan has already been bought by Christ doesn't even make sense. These two concepts aren't even related.

One is in the sphere of the economic. The other is in the realm of the soteriological or in relation to salvation. Should messianic metaphors be applied to other aspects of existence that the Scriptures were not intended to be applied to so literally?

For example, if Jesus is the bread of life, should we condemn those connected with the production and consumption of the more mundane conventional baked good? Likewise, since perfect love is found in Christ, should those that desire the emotional and carnal love that flows from the marital relationship with a human spouse be looked down upon in contempt?

Relatedly, Jeshurun emphasizes that “Professional sports stinks of commercialism.” Why is commercialism always spoken of as if it was a bad thing? Fundamentally, commercialism is simply the making available of products and services in exchange for currency.

Jeshurun writes, “Today, by contrast, the commercial aspect of professional sports is all pervasive...Star players are granted million dollar contracts merely for permitting a company to use their name...The names and logos of businesses appear...everywhere. The stadiums are literally plastered with advertisements.”

What in society is not? Even religion has not escaped this tendency. Granted, those such as Jeshurun certainly denounce the likes of Joel Osteen, Brian McLaren or Rick Warren. But don't the fastidious dogmaticians also commercialize in their own ultrapious manner?

For example, these critics might not take in the book sales of these headliners listed above. However, many times before their respective denunciations draw to a close, they will put out their own outstretched hand hoping you will feel guilty enough to deposit at least a financial pittance.

Christians often receive in their mailboxes --- both physical and electronic --- every week numerous direct epistolary fund raising appeals that would put them in the poor house if they complied to the extent demanded by each. Many are from large institutional ministries that would rival global corporations in terms of organization and the number of professionals on the payroll.

However, size is not always an indicator of brashness. For in many cases in terms of ego, at times it can be hard to beat the missionary letter. In these epistles often sent to nearly everyone the missionary has ever known irrespective of whether or not the aspiring itinerant has even extended the targeted common human decency or courtesy in decades, the recipient is expected to reply with a token of financial gratitude for essentially just having had their own particular culture demeaned in favor of a less developed one, had the legitimacy of their own profession of faith called into question because they themselves are not pursuing some career along the path of ministry like the missionary in question, and that this piece of dreck in the kingdom of God is being extended a privilege that they are even worthy of being permitted the opportunity to contribute to this sanctified undertaking.

Jeshurun writes, “What is it that professional sports thrives on? You guessed it --- PRIDE! 'He is the best; WE are the best; WE win the most; hit the best; run the best; the best defense; the best offense; the best goalkeeper.”

Do not professional religionists in their respective spheres strive for this as well? Does not the Christian minister strive to hone their rhetorical craft in order to gain the widest possible audience? Even among ascetics, don't those prone towards acts of humility and mortification attempt to be the best at such? Doesn't every church that forms with the exception of a congregation that sets itself up in a previously unreached area say, “Hey, we are just maybe a smidgen holier or closer to God than the church right down the street”?

Jeshurun further condemns, “Professional sports stars are frequently in the news for their moral perversions, for rape and assorted charges, for public drunkenness, for drug arrests, ugly divorces.” Sadly, how is this appreciably different than what goes on in the circles of professional religionists?

When one ponders religious figures that have fallen into carnality, one cannot help but think of the Roman Catholic molestation allegations that came out probably in the 1990's or the televangelist scandals of the 1980's. However, in profound honesty, hardline Baptist and Reformed leaders have behaved little better. Despite talking a good game, a number have comported themselves in a manner that would make the employees of the fleshpots along the Vegas strip blush.

For example, supporters were shocked to learn of R.C. Sproul Jr.'s confession that his name ranked among those exposed in the Ashley Madison data breech. However, his wandering imagination seems as quaint as Jimmy Carter's Playboy confession that he had lusted in his heart in light of the transgressions alleged regarding others.

Interestingly, these shocking transgressions don't simply transpire among those that happen to profess traditional trinitarian orthodoxy and strive to live by the moral code of spelled out in the great commandments. Rather it seems these acts of lewdness are also committed by those that profess and advocate the most thoroughgoing varieties of the faith invoked to call into question the soteriological sincerity of anyone that fails to aspire to the same level of rigorous external devotion.

For example, most are no doubt familiar with the Duggars. To this family, it simply wasn't enough for the parents to homeschool their children in order to prevent their brainwashing at the hands of secularist progressive educators. Rather, the daughters were expected to wear dungaree skirts dragging the floor while growing their hair nearly as long. And out of well over a dozen children, not a single was seemingly allowed to pursue higher education of any organized variety be it traditional secular, religious, or even apparently unaccredited correspondence training.

Yet from the news that leaked out in conjunction with the Ashley Madison data breach it was learned the one Duggar son didn't just cheat on his wife with call girls famous among enthusiasts for alternative exhibitionist entertainment commonly referred to as “porn”. He also apparently couldn't keep his hands off his prepubescent sisters.

Some might reply that the example of one individual unable to keep his most depraved inclinations in check does not refute the values stood for by the Duggar family as a whole. After all, parents are not responsible for the decisions of their adult children.

However, if one steps back for a moment in reflection, one cannot help but notice that this kind of disturbing pattern appears to be endemic among those upheld as leaders in the sorts of circles in which the Duggars operate and are extolled as the ideal family.

Amongst the homeschool movement, it is not enough for individuals and families to aspire to the Biblical ideal of reserving sex for marriage and trying to avoid particularly raunchy entertainment. One is considered not “good enough” in the eyes of God and man unless one goes all out in pursuit of an extensive list of externalities.

In particular, one is viewed as little better than a brothel whore if you are a young women or a patron of such an establishment if you are a young man if you date rather than allow your parents to select your spouse for you by the age of 25 at the latest. Anyone waiting much later than that to wed is probably some kind of homosexual and guilty of compromising the number of compliant missionaries one will likely procreate as divine breeding stock.

Of course these rules did not seem to apply for decades to Bill Gothard. Despite teaching that the married were to be viewed as superior to the single and that taught nowhere in the pages of Scripture, Gothard himself never married. And really why should he have? For along with being heralded as a superstar of the faith in the theological circles in which he operated, Gothard was regularly having any number of his base desires at least momentarily satisfied by imposing his carnal affections upon one intern after another. Just don't you dare hold hands in a darkened movie theater or kiss your gal goodnight afterwards irrespective of how many toes Gothard is alleged to have sniffed.

Other ministers insisting that hardcore fundamentalism is the only form of Christian life acceptable in the eyes of God haven't done much better in setting a good example. For example, First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana and the accompanying Hyles/Anderson College in some respects make Bob Jones University look like Animal House in terms of the extra-Biblical standards imposed upon those that attend. At the height of his power, Pastor Jack Hyles would call the deacons forward before the congregation to basically swear a loyalty oath expressing a willingness to die at their pastor's command.

Had these ecclesiastical functionaries fulfilled this obligation, they would have done so for someone that was probably every bit a pervert as Hugh Heffner. At least Old Heff had the decency to leave God out of his lechery. For you see, it was not enough for Pastor Hyles to get the hots for the church secretary and run off with her in a classic church adultery scandal. Instead, the horny clergyman concocted an elaborate theory that the church secretary was his true celestial companion with whom he shared a bond more profound than that which he shared with his wife. In a gesture of magnanimity not seen most likely since the early days of Mormonism, Hyles was willing to swap wives with the husband of the church secretary if the parties had been amicable to the arrangement (no doubt with a copious and enthusiastic laying on of hands as well).

It will be retorted that Jack Hyles was just a single man that went astray into these temptations following a life of dedication as a servant of the Lord in the Independent Fundamentalist movement. He cannot be scrutinized as some kind of example from which patterns or theories of prediction can be deduced.

Maybe not. Yet one cannot help but begin to speculate if something is happening here systematically when Hyle's successor and son-in-law Jack Schaap fell into a number of behaviors nearly as shocking and perhaps even more so. After all, similar moral failings are invoked by Fundamentalist pulpiteers as proof regarding the theological interpretations and ecclesiastical traditions they find distasteful such as Roman Catholicism.

Given his faults, one has to give Jack Hyles at least a bit of credit that he had the decency to prefer skirts closer to his own age or at least over the age of consent. For it seems that his son-in-law preferred to let his freak flag fly in the company of minors or around those over which he was in a position of educational authority.

The first sign something was amiss was when Schaap spoke before a solemn assembly at his church's Bible college about the importance of shaft polishing. Perhaps it must also be pointed out that for rhetorical emphasis the oration was accompanied by a gesture more suited for a bawdy Saturday night comedy club rather than a church sanctuary. For it was not that much different than what got Pee Wee Herman arrested at a porn theater in the early 1990's.

Yet it would seem that Pastor Schaap was more than a homiletical exhibitionist deriving his jollies from pulpit shenanigans. Seems that he also, like Bill Gothard, could not resist the allure of young maidens. As a result, the defrocked Schaap now sits in a prison cell for going after jail bait hook, line, and sinker.

It would be reasonable to ask what does all of that have to do with professional athletics, idolatry, and why Christians ought to have nothing to do with such pursuits? It was a detailed way of pointing out that a number of those very behaviors and depravities that Mr. Jeshurun rightfully condemns taking place in the arena of compensated sports also occur in the realm of structured spirituality (or what might more commonly be referred to as organized religion) that the dogmatically enthusiastic such as Mr. Jeshurun suggest that we not only make an important part of our lives but rather must be in explicit exclusive constant consideration of during every waking moment.

As such, if his suggestion is that as a morally concerned or ethically aware individual that we ought not have anything to do with something where a number of its foremost practitioners or adherents end up committing unseemly or even heinous acts, does that principle also apply to outwardly manifested expressions of religion as well? After all, to the individual raised in the fear and admonition of the Lord, the ensnaring temptations of sports are rather obvious to spot. It is often those in life's more explicitly spiritual arena more likely to lure even the most devout slowly into compromise and even outright doctrinal error.

Seemingly the Christian is obligated to remain part of the visible church in terms of participating in organized religion despite the numerous dangers prowling for victims in the shadowy corners. Then why can't the believer utilize a similar variety of judicious discernment in regards to professional athletics?

One ought to indeed be cautious of the extremes to which sports is taken by some in contemporary postmodern American society. However, nearly the same thing could be said of a religious devotion so encompassing so as to crowd out the other good things that the Father in Heaven has created or allowed to develop as part of His world.

By Frederick Meekins

Plague Cult Thralls Obligated To Embrace Alchemical Elixir With Revolutionary Fervor

To the dictatorial mindset bordering on the cultic, it is not enough for the tyrannized person to do as they are told.

Such souls must articulate that they rapturously agree with the imposition placed upon them or at least refrain from verbalizing their disagreement.

As proof that the House of Mouse most identifies with characters amidst its assorted franchises such as Thanos and Palpatine, Disney fiefdom ESPN suspended broadcaster Sage Steele in part for admitting that, while she dutifully acquiesced to requirements to submit to the Plague Cult elixir in order to retain the opportunity to put food on the table and a roof over he head, to demand such obedience on the part of corporate vassals is in a sense sick and scary.

Steele recanted of nothing more than what most discerning people have already thought in the following bit of rhetorical self-denunciation: “We are in the midst of an extremely challenging time...it's more critical than ever that we communicate constructively and thoughtfully.”

Until recently, one would have thought that would have included vocalizing our concerns about governments and behemoth corporations in collusion forcing individuals to alter their very biochemistry ultimately against their will.

By Frederick Meekins

Conservative Protestants & Traditionalist Catholics Find Common Cause In Opposing Statist Tyranny

 

An article published in the April 2012 issue of “In These Times” asks in its title “Will Catholic Bishops Be GOP Pawns?” and warns in the subtitle “The Church and Evangelicals are finding common ground”.

The author suggests that American Catholic leaders ought to concentrate more on promoting the cause of “economic justice” rather than upon so-called cultural issues that have been thrust to the forefront of the American civic dialog over the course of the past several decades dealing with matters such as abortion and homosexuality.

But what the author fails to realize is that, in terms of Christian doctrine, the shared stance between conservative Evangelicals and traditionalist Catholics are more clearly spelled out in the pages of Scripture than something more nebulous such as “social or economic justice”.

For example, the Ten Commandments bluntly declare “Thou shalt not commit murder”. Murder is defined as the taking of an innocent human life.

Nefarious factions profiting from the practice, especially if they have seared their own consciences, might insist vociferously otherwise. But abortion is undeniably a form of murder.

Likewise, marriage is clearly defined in the pages of the Bible. The old adage derived from the Genesis account is that God did not make Adam and Steve, He made Adam and Eve.

Those preferring their Biblical exegesis with more of a distinction of solemnity are not left without textual support from the pages of Holy Writ. Mark 10:7-8 extols, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” Revelation does not say man and man or wife and wife.

If there are those that prefer living this way that want to go off and shack up together, that raises a whole other interpretative argument as to what good Christians ought to do if anything. However, those deliberately deciding to go off into such sin should not expect religious and social institutions to extend the same degree of cultural blessing as to those entering into sanctified matrimonial partnership. And this applies also to heterosexual couples living together without authorization of either clergy or state.

The issue of so-called economic and social justice is not quite as clear cut. It is pretty obvious whether or not an individual has been murdered and which relationships are not homosexual. However, there are various interpretations as to which policies will be the most effective at ameliorating the suffering of the poor.

It is not so much that American Protestants or Catholics of a more individualist or free market orientation want to increase the misery of the downtrodden or fail to comprehend the suffering that can be inflicted by excessively complicated institutions. It is precisely because religionists of a more distinctively Americanist perspective do understand profoundly threats posed by behemoth bureaucracies that those of such a worldview endeavor to limit power from whatever social sphere such intrusions might originate.

One aphorism, possibly attributable to Rush Limbaugh, posits that it is easy to be charitable with other people's money. While one may earn a good reputation for being concerned for the poor when calling for increased public spending, it isn't really going to crimp the lifestyle of elites calling for it if their taxes are increased should such policy proposals and rhetorical suggestions actually be put into practice.

Most levelheaded people, no doubt even a few American Roman Catholic bishops among them, have a hard time swallowing and complying with these exhortations to give more sacrificially when those higher up the ecclesiastical flow chart can't seem to keep straight the funds on the books of the Institute For The Works Of Religion also commonly referred to as the “Vatican Bank”. It has been argued that over $100 million has been embezzled from or laundered through the institution in a variety of scandals.

So should globalist planners --- both sacred or secular --- be successful in compelling regular people to surrender more of what we own, in all likelihood it will no more go to alleviate the suffering of the downtrodden than it already does.

There are certain universal truths that transcend traditional divisions within the broader Christian faith. Those redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb irrespective of on what side of this divide they stand must prioritize what transgressions of the moral law are more egregious than others.

By Frederick Meekins

Leftwing Religionists Applaud Godless Socialism But Not enough To Surrender Money Making Racket

 

Episode 41 of the Commonweal Magazine podcast addresses the topic of “White Churches & White Supremacy”.

The discussion consists of this leftwing Catholic outfit interviewing Robert P. Jones, a Southern Baptist wracked with White guilt, about his book “White Too Long: The Legacy Of White Supremacy In Christian America".

In the discussion, it is revealed that the title is taken from a quote by writer James Baldwin.

Isn't that itself an act of cultural misappropriation?

If we are to buy into the premise that White Christians are guilty for deeds from the past deemed by Woketopians as racist on the part of organized religion, why shouldn't Baldwin and his contemporary acolytes be held responsible for the bloodshed, death, and destruction of property linked to the socialist ideology of which Baldwin was a proponent?

And if the correspondents at Commonweal and Robert P. Jones want to invoke admiration for James Baldwin in their crusade against “White Christians”, don't they owe it to their readers to explain why they are downplaying or even concealing the ultimate conclusion of Baldwin's ratiocination that the concept of God should be abandoned altogether?

If Christians are to derive their social philosophy from thinkers that deny the existence of God, why are we to side with those advocating revolutionary upheaval over those such as Ayn Rand or Milton Friedman that advocated a more individualistic approach to life?

After all, in a world without God, no set of ideas is ultimately superior to any other.

Could it be that, unlike Baldwin to the acclaim of critics, these propagandists do not have the creative wherewithal to continue their scam without what would be considered a crutch or opiate of the masses if they were being more philosophically honest about the worldview that it is that these alleged intellectuals actually profess?

By Frederick Meekins

Joint Chiefs Chairman Sides With America's Enemies

 

Chairman Of the Joint Chiefs Of Staff General Mark Milley at a congressional hearing likened studying Critical Race Theory to reading works by Marxists such as Lenin and Mao. It is one thing to know your enemy.

It is another to read and assimilate these works as a sycophantic convert as Milley has obviously become.

For if the high ranking Pentagon functionary was the objective strategist he parades himself as before the American people, he would have spent as much time warning about the concrete threat posed by Antifa and Black Lives Matter as he did the amorphous “White rage” he never bothers to define or even accurately describe.

For while he was visibly discombobulated regarding the Capitol Kerfuffle of January 6th, looting and rioting of other people’s property is not that much of a concern to him. It is claimed he verbalized the vilest of profanities (perhaps language he picked up from the leftist theoreticians with whom he seems quite enamored) when a Trump advisor observed that protests had turned American cities into war zones.

Wonder if the General would have been as dismissive if it had been the Pentagon or the officers’ club on the verge of being burned to the ground.

By Frederick Meekins

Hit & Run Commentary #133

It's been said your first murder is always the hardest. So what is to stop this level of microdictatorship every time there is a flu or disease outbreak?

Does social distancing really prevent disease? Am not really that close to that many other human beings other than immediate family yet in the past still picked up colds and such mostly likely that did not originate with them.

If we are to be subjected to public service announcements urging us not to touch our faces, how about some targeting certain demographics on the importance of wiping their rear ends properly and washing their hands afterwards?

It has been hypothesized that those that do not submit to a future coronavirus vaccine complete with bio-tracking capabilities could be prohibited from travel. But if such a vaccination really does provide immunity for those that take it, what does it matter regarding those that do not?

It has been suggested that even if risk of the Coronavirus subsided to a reasonable level, those over 55 should remain quarantined indefinitely. Will that be a personal choice or imposed by the state under threat of violence which is how any governmental edict or law is ultimately enforced? Will those with elderly in a long term care or even independent living facility be allowed to see them ever again? So would one’s 55th birthday become a ritual like the trip to Carousel in “Logan’s Run” or the episode of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” where a scientist had to abandon his work that would have saved his planet just because he had reached a certain age?

The remark was made on Fox News that once the initial Coronavirus lock down ends, the elderly should continue their social distancing while the rest of us move on. Wonder how long until this results in the elderly being excluded from society and then eventually eliminated preemptively against their will? The threat of this disease lurking in the background even if no one is actively suffering from it is going to be used to justify all sorts of cultural deprivations and infringements of liberties. Sort of like how those Japanese Americans had to be placed in those facilities for “their own good”. This would also be a good way to get many of the more doctrinally solid churches shuttered as well. Wonder how much property will end up being seized before it’s all over with to finance these Coronavirus relief programs.

Wonder how long, in the name of compassion of course, until the elderly are herded against their will into quarantine colonies where they will never again be allowed to see their loved ones?

So if the New York lock down applies particularly to those with underlying health issues, does that mean they are snooping through the medical files of those detained?

Cuomo says “social distancing is needed EVERYWHERE.” Does that include our bedrooms where it was once insisted what two consenting adults did was their own business?

In regards to the enforcement of social distancing decrees, are we to assume that law enforcement is so superhuman that they can estimate the difference between six feet and 5 feet 10 inches? If this is going to be the racket through which governments finance assorted plague relief efforts, the least that a citizenry subjected to such an intrusive degree of scrutiny deserves is for these assessments to be determined accurately rather than as a result of someone not having gotten their doughnut before hypoglycemia sets in.

Apparently a number of prisons are releasing convicts over fears of the Coronavirus spreading among the inmates and even to the staff. So why would it be acceptable to detain those accused of violating social distancing decrees (at this point can these even be considered actual laws) and possibly even those over 55 now daring to show their unmasked faces in public?

Ironic. The states now inclined to crack down the most vigorously against the Coronavirus in terms of imposing near police state conditions were the most lackadaisical in enforcing immigration laws that could have played a part in curtailing this plague.

It was remarked, “Tim LaHaye made millions of dollars with his 'Left Behind' series and his movies. Personally, I think that it is junk. Can it be explained to me why Tim LaHaye's prophecy works are to be condemned for a more literalistic interpretation of eschatological portions of Scripture yet this same online theologian is noticeably quiet or perhaps even accepting of Pat Robertson's prophetic announcements? Both of these ministers are Premillennial with works published teaching that the Tribulation period is to be understood as foretelling events that will take place. So why is Tim LaHaye to be condemned for having been a workman worthy of his hire? At least unlike Robertson, LaHaye's fortune would have been made for the most part from the actual selling of books and not begging for it through questionable broadcast tactics with those proceeds going in part to pay for race horses and his own private jet and Virginia Beach air landing strip. Unlike Mrs. Robertson, I bet Beverly LaHaye never had to fear being kicked to the curb in favor of a younger replacement had she been stricken with dementia.

As of late, a popular theme among Gospel Coalition type churches is that what we have does not belong to us but rather to God. Technically, that is true. However,, it is hoped that such conceptual repetition will make it easier to manipulate the pewfiller into more pliantly surrendering the targeted financial resources or even acceptance of compulsory income redistribution commonly referred to as increased taxation. But if we are to view ourselves as mere stewards rather than as owners, don’t we have an obligation to look to the needs of our own households just as rigorously so that we won’t be a burden upon God’s people.

In a prayer, a pastor lamented the divisive politics “polarizing our nation at this time.” So just how many more fundamental liberties are we obligated to surrender and compromise? Does the income that should be redistributed also include the accumulated wealth of the church and the pastor’s housing allowance? Or do the higher tax rates to be arrived at in the name of compromise just apply to the dimwitted saps filling the pews? Should the compromises also include the bill like the one being proposed in Virginia where religious schools would not be allowed to fire crossdressers? The pastor lamented that partisan politics is now linked to the message of Christianity. But wasn’t that initially the fault of progressives going out of their way to blatantly curtail the expression of religious liberty and traditional values to the extent that those holding to these could not help but come to the conclusion that the only viable alternative in this country was some degree of participation in the Republican Party?

Jim Bakker hawking 5 gallon survivalist buckets of pinto beans. No wonder some folks need so much toilet paper.

Given that Prince Charles contracted Coronavirus, wonder if his father Prince Phillip remained as keen on the prospect of plagues wiping out vast swaths of humanity.

By Frederick Meekins

Setting Ablaze Paraphernalia Of False Belief Not The Best Outreach Strategy

In a video posted on Facebook, a legalistic evangelist set a flame of a pair of Mormon ceremonial undergarments. The evangelist claimed that the action was Biblically justified.

Acts 19:18-20 reads, “Many of those who believed now came and openly confessed their evil deeds. A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly.... In this way the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power.”

From the text, readers can deduce a couple of things. To set down such a decree regarding such requires the believer to look at both the context and content of the passage. Only then can a more definitive policy be put in place.

Because of this account, those figuratively on fire for God insist taking the flame to any doctrinally dubious object is not only permissible under Scripture but actually required.

These items were not snatched by authorities out of the hands of those wanting to keep them.

Rather, it is emphasized that those bringing the occultic works forward for destruction were those once owning them that no longer wanted this dark influence in their lives.

Furthermore, what we see in the passage of Acts is an historical account of how a specific set of believers decided to implement a particular set of Christian principles.

Though in particular circumstances their example would be a noble one to emulate, the account is not presented as that of a command that must be adhered to in every circumstance where the Christian finds himself confronted by religious paraphernalia with which they are at doctrinal odds.

For others, it may simply be enough to dispose of the object if they are its owner without raising considerable hoopla or fanfare.

It is usually admonished that Christians hold to the principle that Paul is to serve as the Christian's example in terms of ministry. As such, though the customs and traditions of unbelievers troubled him, it is debatable whether or not he would be that deliberately abrasive in attempting to persuade in regards to matters of error and truth.

The approach used by Paul in dealing with competing belief systems is found in Acts 17:16-34. In this passage, the Apostle is disturbed by the amount of idolatry he sees around him in the city of Athens.

To confront this distressing situation, Paul sets out to present the saving knowledge of Christ in those places in the foremost city of the Western world whose very name is synonymous with discussion and argumentation. In verse 17, we learn that Paul did not shy away from controversy as he took the Gospel into the very hearts of Mediterranean cultural life such as the synagogues, marketplaces, and forums.

We are not privileged to have a comprehensive transcript of the exact dialog that took places in those learned circles. However, we are given a summary with quotes of what Paul talked about and the response of the Athenians to it.

Upon hearing Paul's message, a number of Epicureans and Stoics inquired, “What is this babbler trying to say?... He seems to be advocating foreign gods.” Scripture then clarifies, “They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.”

From what the Holy Spirit decided to preserve of that encounter in the pages of redemptive history, one does not get the impression that all that much time was spent criticizing (at least in a condescending way) the shortcomings of Greco-Roman mythology. Instead, the Apostle to the Gentiles emphasized the distinctive particulars of the Christian faith.

However, Paul's homiletical approach did not avoid the beliefs he hoped to persuade as to the error and insufficiency of. If anything, Paul actually utilized aspects of Classical thought to show how all truths that humans might deduce or stumble upon are ultimately God's truths.

One might dispute this from the way in which Paul began his oration before the learned gathered on the Aereopagus. Paul pronounces in Acts 17:22, “Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.”

From where we stand along history's unfolding drama, both the triumph of the Judeo-Christian tradition and the Scientific Revolution are behind us in terms of being events that have forever altered the way entire civilizations perceive reality.

As such, to our ears, to be labeled “too superstitious” sounds almost like an insult. However, a number of other versions translate the text as Paul commenting on the religious nature of the Athenian intellectual class. Irrespective of where numerous exegetes come down on this interpretative issue, from that point forward there is virtually no debate as to the approach Paul takes.

Those whose missiological approach consists of literally setting ablaze whatever paraphernalia offends their religious sensibilities would have had Paul rip to shreds the inconsistencies and shortcomings inherent to paganism in general and polytheism in particular. There is certainly Biblical precedent for such a strategy where, in Romans 1, Paul holds nothing back regarding how forsaking worship of the one true God to worship nature rather than nature's Creator leads to the most pronounced of carnal sins.

Yet in Acts 17, the Apostle shows that the message can be tailored to fit the nature of the audience addressed. Paul went about this by pointing out the commonalities between Biblical beliefs and Greek philosophy. In terms of apologetics, this phenomena is known as a point of contact.

Paul shares in Acts 17:23, “For as I passed by ... I found an altar with this inscription, 'To the unknown God'. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him I declare unto you.” From that point, Paul proceeded to point out other commonalities between Judeo-Christian and Greek thought.

In verse 26, Paul declares, “And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell upon the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their habitation...:” He emphasized that this simply wasn't the ramblings of a crazed Hebrew babbler Rather, as we are told in verse 28, “For in him (God) we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, 'For we are also his offspring.'.”

As such, in his conclusion Paul does not ridicule the Greeks into capitulation and compliance. Instead Paul commends what the Greeks got right in their philosophy as a reflection of the law written across the heart as spelled out in Romans 2 as to what the Greeks ought to set aside of their pre-Christian thought as they come to Jesus in repentance.

The act of setting ablaze the revered and venerated object of a faith outside the parameters of Biblical Christianity is without question a very provocative act. Even if one opposes the faith, worldview, or creed that the object represents, only the most fanatic would fail or refuse to admit how such a deed does more to alienate rather than woo those one is taking such a course of action to gain the attention of.

For example, it is doubtful many Christians are convinced to the alleged doctrinal error within their own positions of faith when ACLU lawyers descend upon nativities across America and abscond with the ceramic baby Jesus.

Often many a Scripture verse is invoked to justify all kinds of shocking actions.

For once, it would be edifying to hear a minister of solid reputation to go out on a limb emphasizing those passages extolling individual conscience and determining for oneself those things not quite so clearly spelled out in stone.

By Frederick Meekins

Dogmatic Pluralism Results In Operational Intolerance

An old adage contends that it is all fun and games until someone loses an eye. Something quite similar could be said regarding living by the “live and let live” philosophy espoused by many early twenty-first century relativists thinking they are too cool and hip to be stifled by any one religious creed.

In a letter to the editor regarding an 4/27/2010 USA Today article analyzing the tendency of young adults not to be devoted to a particular faith, a respondent observed this trend is the result of being more educated than previous generations and “exposed to the realities of life in the twenty-first century.”

But rather than thinking for themselves, what may be taking place among the youth such as the letter's author is their indoctrination or brainwashing by those educators the young are spending record time around.

The correspondents on this topic claim to applaud and embrace an iconoclastic eclecticism. But in reality such souls do little more than parrot the notions expounded upon and bandied about the typical college lecture hall.

The author writes, “Who seriously believes that an infinite God, who created the vast complexities of the cosmos, can be understood by finite humanity, let alone be reduced to a statement of faith that's subject to the limits of human understanding?”

Some of humanity's greatest minds actually. It's actually a concept not all that difficult to get one's mind around.

The assumption that finite man cannot fully comprehend an infinite God is (to use a much maligned term) absolutely correct. Isaiah 55:8-9 says God's thoughts are not our thoughts.

However, though we cannot fully know God, it does not follow that God cannot fully know man. Since the infinite is beyond the finite, it is not beyond the realm of the possible for the infinite to reveal of itself what it knows the finite is capable of comprehending of that which is beyond our meager understanding.

In the New Testament, God's only Begotten Son Jesus Christ took on human form by being born of a virgin so that He might dwell among us, die upon a cross for our sins, and rise from the dead so that we might have eternal life if we admit that we are sinners and accept His free gift of forgiveness and salvation. In essence, God condescended to our level so that we might know Him.

When asked why evolution caught on as a theory of origins among the intelligentsia, a popular anecdote posits that Julian Huxley responded that Darwinism supported the sexual morays of that particular social class. Thus, all the grandiose proclamations against the dogmatism of the Almighty and the seeming existential nobility of the libertines ends up being a cover to sleep with whomever you want with the hopes of no regret the next morning.

One of the letters to the editor reads, “Beyond that is the nasty habit of many Christian fundamentalists to deny basic human rights to those who don't agree with them theologically.”

And what “basic human rights” might those be? Just about nowhere in the United States are “fundamentalist” Christians denying anyone the traditional rights such as freedoms of speech, creed or property where an ACLU media whore is not before a network news camera within a hour of such an alleged transgression transpiring.

When articulated by a progressive, the phrase “Fundamentalist Christians denying basic human rights” is actually a euphemism for daring to stand in disagreement of the trend towards sodomite matrimony or refusing to enforce preferences for certain groups simply because they are favored minorities. If anything, Christian “fundamentalists” are the ones having their “basic rights” curtailed and infringed upon here at home in America and most certainly around the world.

One cannot name a single regime around the world today where the rulers hold to an explicit traditionalist Christianity that abuses its power by persecuting its population. If anything, Christians unwilling to give up and compromise these truths that they hold dear by refusing to participate in the rejection of moral absolutes are more likely to be the ones persecuted (ironically by the ones that whine the loudest about the church's curtailment of postmodernist understandings of human liberation.

For examples, secularists and radical ecumenicalists applauded the decision on the part of the Department of Defense to disinvite Franklin Graham to the Pentagon's commemoration of the National Day of Prayer over his comments that Islam is an evil and wicked religion as evidenced by the 9/11 attacks and the treatment of woman in lands where that creed prevails.

For you see. Franklin Graham made the mistake of concluding that the First Amendment is something to live by rather than a abstraction to talk about in vague generalities. As Chesterton is credited with saying, the problem with the freedom of religion is that people end up discussing everything but religion.

It is of this fear of appearing impolite and offensively stepping on someone's toes in a manner that delicate psyches will never recover from that our society has come to such a screeching halt that it can become an act of considerable courage to simply state the obvious. And this is something the enemies of this great nation have learned readily.

For example, Eboo Patel, founder of the Interfaith Youth Core, in a 5/10/10 USA Today column titled “Graham's Anti-Mulsim Jabs Hurt Islam and America” applauded CAIR's public statement emphasizing the American value of “differing faiths united in shared support of our nation's founding principles” rather than the “message of intolerance that Graham advocates.”

But while CAIR puts forward a public face espousing tolerance and cooperation, the groups and individuals the organization supports behind the scenes advocate something else entirely. For example, CAIR has supported Islamic extremists such as Hamas who not only advocate a form of religious exclusiveness that goes far beyond anything advocated by Franklin Graham but also endorse violence against those with whom they disagree.

An old country song admonishes that you've got to stand for something or you'll fall for anything. Should Americans continue down the path imposed by cultural agnosticism, the result will not be a relaxed, easygoing paradise. Rather, the result will be the establishment of a sociopolitical milieu where the deceptive will manipulate the weak to undermine the liberty of all Americans.

By Frederick Meekins

Russell Moore's Tirade Targets Wrong Youth

 In an episode of his podcast, Russell Moore interviewed Senator Ben Sasse regarding how perpetual adolescence hurts the church.

One might immediately snap what's so wrong with that?

Nothing if by that one is referring to 25 year olds still on their parents' health insurance as authorized under Obamacare or having never worked a day in their lives by the same age.

However, that is apparently not what this phrase is referring to when articulated by certain professional religionists.

Moore states in the opening of his remarks that, no matter how hard his 16 year old lads work in their grocery store jobs, it is nothing in comparison to Sasse's own sons bailing hay and birthing cattle.

But doesn't Moore rank among this contemporary breed of Evangelical that condemns those that would retreat from concentrated areas of population, no doubt going so far as to call “racist” Whites preferring a more reclusive and less urban lifestyle?

Often what these religionists mean when they complain about “perpetual adolescence” is not being married off by the age of 23.

Perhaps Moore and Sasse's time would have been better spent condemning the perpetual welfare recipients that can't seem to keep their pants on and their legs together in terms of an unending litany of out of wedlock offspring where as in the case of potato chips many can't seem to stop at just one.

By Frederick Meekins

Democrats In Uproar Over Rightwing Conspiracy Theories No Issue With Leftist Tyranny

 

Representative Marjory Greene has been removed from her committee assignments in the House of Representatives not so much for anything that she has done but rather because of what she believed.

It was claimed that the so-called conspiracy theories she is accused of professing cannot be countenanced because of the “festering malignancy” of such ideas. Nothing similar was done to punish Raphael Warnock for questionable notions the pastor has peddled or lent support to over the years of his ministry.

For example, Warnock has downplayed the atrocities of Fidel Castro, calling the Cuban dictator’s legacy complex.

Yet it’s doubtful the Georgia radical would be that judicious in his assessment of the Trump presidency despite the administration having a significantly smaller body count in terms of citizens eliminated for merely expressing an ideology at variance with that preferred by regime functionaries.

Warnack is a bit more explicit in his admiration of the late theologian James Cone, whom Warack describes as his mentor and whom Warack eulogized at his funeral.

For those not as familiar with James Cone as they might be Fidel Castro, Cone is renowned as the developer of Black Liberation theology.

As part of that interpretative school of thought, Cone equates Whites or “Whiteness” with Satan and/or the Antichrist.

His acolytes will quibble that “Whiteness” is more about the way in which such people act rather than the people themselves.

Would a renowned theologian of the contemporary era be allowed to equate “Jewishness” or better yet “Blackishness” with the most vile works of evil and be permitted to retain their endowed chair or posh ministry position?

More importantly, if the Biden Autarchy and the regime’s legislative allies in the People’s Assembly (also known as Congress in times before the assent of one party rule seemingly intent on squelching as much dissent as possible) say nothing in condemnation it must likely mean that these powerful institutions support these forms of tyranny and oppression perceived as originating from the left side of the political spectrum.

By Frederick Meekins

Collectivist Utopians Won't Stop With Social Media Suppression

 Utopians, especially of the revolutionary variety, are never satisfied.

That is an undeniable truth of history.

One only needs to read an account of Jacobin France, Nazi Germany, Bolshevist Russia, or Maoist China to draw such a conclusion.

In the future, one must ask, will Biden's America be added to that infamous list?

It has been pointed out that one does not have an inherent constitutional right to social media.

Since those are private corporations viewed as individuals in the eyes of the law, to compel such would be to infringe upon its rights in a coercive manner.

Perhaps fair enough.

But it must be asked will the matter stop there in regards to those commodities or services that don't quite rise to the level of government but without which the individual's quality of life is profoundly hampered?

For example, most electricity is provided through what is ultimately private enterprise.

So what if in the future an electric company does not like how its commodity is being utilized in pursuit of a perfectly legal but ideologically unacceptable values or agendas such as to light a church opposed to homosexual marriage marriage or that professed the belief in Christ alone is the only path to obtain a beatific afterlife?

In the future, sophisticated computers and Artificial Intelligence will play a role in the way in which personal vehicles are piloted.

Should individuals known to express or even be suspected of harboring certain opinions have their ignition systems shut down entirely so as to inhibit their ability to travel in a manner not unlike the interlock system imposed upon drunk drivers?

Don't laugh.

It has already been proposed that those at the Capitol Kerfuffle should be placed on the don't fly list without even having been convicted of a crime.

And who before this time thought steps would be taken to silence former presidents and seated senators who did not actually call for violence but rather whose words were not those preferred by the gatekeepers of the means of communication?

By Frederick Meekins

For What Other Reasons Can Civil Society Be Suspended?

 

Across America, governments are invoking the power to essentially suspend civil society when hospitals are occupied at a predetermined numerical threshold.

So why does the same sort of emergency intervention not apply in other situations where human life is at stake?

For example, if there are a certain number of auto accidents for a particular period should most forms of vehicular travel be suspended for a spell?

Likewise, if the number of heart attacks and incidents of cardiac disease rise above a certain percentage in a jurisdiction, should most of the fast food establishments --- especially Starbucks --- in a given area be closed and supermarkets allowed only to sell an assortment of rudimentary vegetables?

If a particular number of domestic abuse incidents occurs, should liquor stores be closed until such an epidemic is gotten under control?

And if a state's adolescent obesity rates rise above a certain level, should Internet and smarthphone access be switched off in order to get the youth probably spending a considerable amount of time on these devices active outdoors?

By Frederick Meekins

Medical Profession Needs To Stay In Its Designated Lane

 

A meme of a women on a stretcher being put into an ambulance “Are You Taking Me To The Hospital?” “No ma'am. You need top medical experts. We're taking you to the comments section”.

But neither should these "experts" be allowed to run roughshod over the rights of individuals.

Also, if the non-medical laymen is to refrain from remarking on medical technicalities, how about medical professionals refrain from upending and destroying an entire social order in the name of a pestilence that while serious is likely not as deadly as propagandists have duped many into believing?

When we are told to "follow the science", what we are also being given is an overwhelming dose of philosophy and policy prescription as well.

Maybe a growing number would not be as leery of medical professionals if the rules were not changed midstream like those scenes in the Hunger Games when it appeared the characters were beginning to get the upper hand.

Might also help if those threatening harsh penalties for disobeying the rules also abided by them with their lives and livelihoods brought to the brink of destruction like nearly everybody else.

by Frederick Meekins

Have Yourself A Coronavirus Christmas

 

In “The Lion, The Witch, & The Wardrobe” by C.S. Lewis, one of the hardships Narnia suffers under is that it is always winter but never Christmas. Imposed upon the realm by the White Witch, the plot point serves as a powerful symbol of the extent to which despots are willing to suppress the basic joys of existence for the purposes of advancing their own agendas at the expense of those that they conspire to rule over.

For decades now, secularists along with those thinking they know how to organize the details of your life better than you do have conspired to impose any number of policies intended to disabuse the American people of their Christmas habits and more importantly the religious source from which such traditions stem. Fortunately, the nation has yet to fully yield to this particular assault against their liberties and most have at least been alerted regarding this threat arrayed against our own underlying Western culture.

Unfortunately, the agents of tyranny are seldom discouraged. Such operatives are always eager to try new strategies in the attempt to achieve their nefarious objectives.

Often the issue and policies are formulated in the following manner. A government authority forbids the erection of Christmas decorations or the holding of a holiday celebration on public property. But take heart, the discouraged yuletide reveler is admonished, you are perfectly free to commemorate these holidays in any way that you desire in the confines of your own home with whomever it is that you please.

However, now with the Conornavirus Plague, there exists a pretext by which thoroughgoing statists are unabashed regarding the extent to which assorted government bureaucrats and agencies intend to intrude into the lives of average Americans to an even more unprecedented level.

For example, a number of jurisdictions have decreed the number of visitors that that will be allowed into your home, often limiting the number to ten guests. And what if you allow eleven to fourteen; does it somehow though off the occultc numerology or Masonic geometry?

If that means cutting off family members from the family during Thanksgiving or Christmas, then so be it. In the opening days of the New World Order or what is being called “The Great Reset”, the primary disease to be eradicated is not so much a virulent microorganism but rather the notion that you as a free individual should be able to decide for yourself the risks one is willing to take in a world fraught with any number of dangers.

Like the giddy urchins depicted in propaganda posters erected by dictatorships spanning the ideological spectrum, your joy is no longer to be derived from traditional notions of family or even personal relationships. Rather that satisfaction is to be derived from knowledge of your dutiful obedience to the regime even if that means those small pleasures that gave life much of its meaning are obliterated in pursuit of collectivist goals and agendas. After all, to paraphrase the motto of the Psi Corps from the drama “Babylon 5”, “The State is Mother. The State is Father.”

Just as bad and perhaps even worse than the state telling you how many may enter into your domicile is its functionaries telling you which otherwise perfectly legal activities you may or may not engage in while ensconced within the four walls for which you will no doubt be required to pay increasingly crippling taxes on in the years to come in order to finance economic amelioration efforts to address conditions imposed by the state to not only address the virus but also manipulate the masses into embracing extensive authoritarian intrusion into their lives.

For example, the state of California views itself as so all-pervasive that, in an act of beneficence, permission has been granted for the occupants of structures (for at this point of existential regulation can one really be considered a “home owner” any longer) and their permitted guests to engage in the basic excretory functions in the confines of the domicile's designated facilities.

In a number of microtyrannies (a phenomena I foretold the pending of over a decade ago), the assembled are forbidden from singing or chanting. But it must be asked if the phrases articulated include “Black Lives Matter” or “This is what democracy looks like” (which apparently consists now of riotous mobs looting in the streets or assorted state functionaries imposing an increasing array of arbitrary restrictions in no way authorized by legislative law) does the edict still apply? After all, one of the main lesson learned in 2020 is that the rules promulgated by the technocratic elites do not have to be obeyed when countermanding them in violent protest advances the revolutionary conception of social justice advocated by the aspiring planetary administrators.

In the attempt to make these deprivations and impositions supposedly easier to bear, propaganda disseminated through various venues assures that “We are all in this together.” Nothing could be farther from the truth.

For example, throughout the 2020 presidential campaign, the rallies at which Trump devotees gathered to bask in their candidates stream of consciousness orations were condemned as “super spreader events” by the most thoroughgoing adherents of Harris/Bidenism. Yet as soon as the establishment media declared victory for the Democratic ticket, these partisans and their affiliated masses swarmed into the streets ignoring most CDC decrees that have been invoked for months to keep you away from cherished loved ones, recreational pursuits, and houses of worship and are still in place to prevent you from enjoying the simple pleasures of life most fully. Perennial media whore Charles Schummer was caught with his mask down until he realized a video camera was focused on his shenanigans.

In Washington DC, residents are discouraged from traveling outside the boundaries of the federal city and those coming into the district from jurisdictions characterized by high rates of Plague are threatened with demands to quarantine. Yet Mayor Muriel Bowser traveled to Biden's victory announcement in Wilmington, Delaware. This mere municipal functionary insisted such a pilgrimage was essential even though the office she holds is so insignificant that government there would probably operate more efficiently if it didn't even exist in the first place.

Relatedly, Mayor Lori Lightfoot of Chicago invoked what listeners of “The Sean Hannity Program” might recall as the Ariana Huffington Doctrine when that perennial airhead responded as to why she was riding around in private jets when the average American was obligated to flagellate themselves over their own use of automobiles and fossil fuels in that these aircraft were going there anyway. In a voice significantly less sultry than that of the flip-flopping Grecian pundit, Lightfoot excused her own frolicking amongst the Biden throng conspicuously failing to socially distance in that these celebrations would have taken place whether or not she participated. Mind you, Lightfoot's contempt for the Almighty runs so deep that in the name of the Coronavirus dictatorship that she blocked access to church buildings and threatened to tow the vehicles of assembled parishoners.

Throughout nearly every level of government across America, pronouncements have been issued threatening punishment ranging from punitive fines to outright jail time for citizens daring to decide for themselves what otherwise perfectly legal and inherently moral activities can take place in their own homes. Yet when the elected officials that ironically rank among the most strident in insisting upon unwavering obedience within their respective police state fiefdoms are caught violating their own restrictions, the errant such as California Governor Gavin Newson seem to think a rendition of Brenda Lee's “I'm Sorry” with Covid-specific lyrics ought to be enough.

See if the articulation of such formulations of contriteness prove sufficient when law enforcement operatives are beating down your door to enforce edicts that technically don't even arise to the procedural specifics of law. These statements on the part of governors such as Gavin Newsom insinuate that the vanguards of the proletariat such as himself should be showered with celebratory gratitude for providing an incarnate example of exactly how we ought not to do in furtherance of the grand experiment of transformative revolution we now find ourselves thrust into.

This holiday season your once-vibrant elderly loved ones will slip deeper into cognitive twilight locked away in their once mentally stimulating assisted living communities now likely not much different than a cross between a prison and a loony bin. Remember that as the governors yuck it up Etruscan vomitorium style ironically maskless and shoulder to shoulder in violation of social distancing decrees with the very hierarchs of the medical establishment bent on turning the nation into a pharmaceutical police state.

By Frederick Meekins

If Vaccine As Effective As Propaganda Claims, Why Will You Need Booster?

The American people are constantly reminded by news propaganda that the nation is on the cusp of being extended the beneficence of the Coronoavirus vaccine by the technocrats that seemingly grant us permission to exist.

And now, by the way, it has been admitted that this might not be a one time deal. Those wishing to comply with the increasingly dictatorial mandates imposed upon them by their overlords might have to get a booster inoculation sometime down the road. This raises a serious question.

Much of what we have been forced to endure for nearly a year and in the months to come has been justified in the name of a looming “herd immunity”.

If that is achieved, theoretically months or years could pass with almost no one suffering from the affliction.

Thus, if the virus allegedly can only survive for a few hours on a surface, how would it be reintroduced to the human population having gone so long without opportunistic hosts other than through a deliberate release on par with an orchestrated biological attack?

By Frederick Meekins

Biden Deserves No Reprieve From Trump Social Media Offensive

 

If Trump is compelled by election results to relinquish the Oval Office, the moment he steps out of the White House he should commence tweeting and podcasting in opposition to the shortcomings of the looming Biden regime.

For there will no doubt be many.

There should be none of this “a former President remains quiet for a year” hooey.

That is nowhere required by the Constitution.

It is a mere tradition.

The Democrats are the ones that have been threatening to undo any number of traditions in what will amount to little more than a third Obama term.

For whom do you think it will be guiding a President that most days couldn’t make it from the basement up the stairs into the living room?

Do those respecting tradition conspire to pack the Supreme Court or abolish the Electoral College?

Inflicting those changes upon the nation would do more to upend America’s precarious political balance than an once-elected official returning to the status of private citizen speaking his mind ever could.

By Frederick Meekins

To What Extent Compromise?

 

One must sympathize with musician Jason Aldean for having endured one of the most horrifying sort of events imaginable in the form of the mass shooting that occurred in Las Vegas on 10/1/17 during his performance at a music festival in which sixty were killed and over 400 wounded.

However, the solution he offered itself could potentially generate its own set of nightmares.

The performer lamented, “At the end of the day, we aren't Democrats or Republicans, Black or White. We are all human beings and we are Americans and it's time to start acting like it and stand together as one.”

On the surface that sounds all well and good.

But whose opinion is going to prevail when it comes to differences on profound moral and policy issues? Just what exactly is there left to compromise?

For the sake of this idealized unity, is Aldean going to surrender his no doubt significant bank account when socialists of the Occupy Wall Street and Bernie Sanders variety in the name of economic equality?

Just how far are we to compromise for the sake of unity and oneness when the adherents of Sharia law demand displays of temptation such as concerts from which Aldean has derived his livelihood and notoriety be abolished?

At one time, such dichotomies seemed abstract and highly unlikely.

However, the question of just how far you are willing to compromise becomes shockingly relevant amidst the tyranny of cancel culture and mobs pillaging supposedly in the name of an amorphous justice the terms of which never seem to be defined.

by Frederick Meekins

Religious Progressives Abet Dictatorial Agendas

It could be argued that the United States of America holds an unique position in the world in that for the most part the nation's sociopolitical system attempts to balance the competing needs of both the group and the individual. This impressive feat is accomplished in part as a result of distinctive foundations such as a constitutional framework of government and the underlying moral assumptions shared by various interpretations of the Judeo-Christian philosophical tradition.

Without these restraints, eventually this way of life so easily taken for granted would collapse in favor of tyranny or anarchy with it becoming increasingly difficult to tell such extremities apart. Startlingly, one does not have to expend too much time and effort to find influential voices advocating for the abolition of these safeguards. Often such thinkers do so from a perspective claiming to be religions in terms of its motivating orientation or at least on behalf of organizations having accumulated a significant percentage of the largess upon which they operate by appealing to that particular underlying behavioral motivation.

For example, in the 12/30/12 edition of the New York Times, Georgetown University Professor of Constitutional Law Louis Michael Seidman published an essay titled “Let's Give Up On The Constitution”. In this analysis, an intellectual employed by a prominent Roman Catholic institution advocates abolishing the document upon which the foundations of the governing structures of the Republic rest because of the numerous instances throughout American history in which adherence to the strictures of the document proved too burdensome and in which deviation from proved the expeditious thing to do. Examples cited include Justice Robert Jackson's admission that the decision handed down in “Brown vs. Board of Education” was based on moral and political necessity rather than any explicitly constitutional provision and Franklin Roosevelt's presupposition that the Constitution was a declaration of aspirations rather than binding possibilities.

Louis Seidman remarks with the condescension endemic to the professorial class, “In the face of this long history of disobedience, it is hard to take seriously the claim of the Constitution's defenders that we would be reduced to a Hobbesian state of nature... Our sometimes flagrant disregard of the Constitution has not produced chaos or totalitarianism; on the contrary, it has helped to grow and prosper.”

The Americans of Japanese, German, and Italian ancestry interred during World Wat II might argue otherwise. Therefore, invoking Roosevelt's admonition that the Constitution is only a set of suggestions rather than an obligation might not be that good of an idea after all.

In the remainder of his analysis, Professor Seidman attempts to assure the reader that what ensures the continuation of America's fundamental liberties and semi-functioning government (at least in comparison to what prevails in most other parts of the world) is not some piece of paper that would literally disintegrate if not kept under the strictest climate-controlled conditions. Rather, the proverbial American way of life is continued by what Professor Seidman categorizes as “entrenched institutions and habits of thought and, most important, that sense that we are one nation and work out our differences.”

But without paper the Constitution to keep competing and disparate interests and factions in check within a clearly delineated framework, would what we enjoy as Americans endure for very long? As examples of what he suggests as viable political regimes that provide civilized structures without relying upon a formalized written constitution are the United Kingdom and New Zealand.

But while these countries might hold hours of endless fascination of the setting of many a BBC drama or picture postcards, are either really a place the average American would really want to live? To put it bluntly, the population of New Zealand is about as white as the sheep for which that pastured land is famous. Would that country be able to survive and endure if its population were as varied as the United States with sizable hordes refusing to abide by the values that make a viable society possible?

In terms of the diversity we are obligated to applaud as nothing but positive or face accusations of assorted thought crimes, the United Kingdom might be more akin to its sibling society in the United States. However, in many profound ways, in this regard Great Britain is nothing to be proud of or desire to emulate.

There swarms from the Third World, like plagues of grasshoppers, eagerly consume the sustenance that is provided like none other. And like these ravenous insects, significant percentages of these migrants would rather destroy than preserve the bounty set before them.

For example, in Britain, instead of exhibiting a little respect and gratitude for being extended the privilege of even being allowed to reside in such a land to begin with, one Islamist of African origins murdered a member of that nation's military along the roadside and then proudly documented the act by testifying to the atrocity in a video while still soaked in the blood of his victim. Elsewhere in that same country, others sharing in this same particular so-called religion expect their hosts to accommodate their alien peculiarities rather than for the newcomers to tone these down as any polite guest might.. For example, a number practicing polygamy demanded that each wife be allowed entrance into the country where she is in turn granted additional welfare benefits for each new whelp she continues to push out at a rate that would probably exhaust a tribblbe (the fuzzy aliens from the original Star Trek that Bones McCoy pointed out were born pregnant).

In both the United Kingdom and New Zealand, those daring to articulate perspectives against this sort of cultural subversion could be charged with assorted thought crimes on the grounds of racial or ethnic disparagement. That is because, unlike in America, the United Kingdom and New Zealand have not enshrined freedom of expression as a fundamental right in a constitution, the very thing Professor Seidman cavalierly suggests we abolish in favor of a proposed brave new world.

In his proposal, Professor Seidman even goes out of his way to address concerns raised by those shocked by what it is their discernment warns he is suggesting. He assures, “This is not to say that we should disobey all constitutional commands. Freedom of speech and religion, equal protection of the laws and ... against governmental deprivations of life, liberty, and property are important, whether or not they are in the Constitution. We should continue to follow those requirements out of respect, not obligation.”

But if these are not protected by a constitution that exists somewhat to an extent beyond the whims of ordinary politics and expediency, who is to say such niceties should not be abolished or withheld from non-compliant segments of the population when doing so would be convenient. For example, is gay marriage any longer a “right” should fifty-one percent in a plebiscite or whatever other methods are utilized to determine these kinds of questions in a world where nothing is any longer set in concrete?

Professor Seidman continues, “Nor should we have a debate about, for instance, how long the president's term should last or whether Congress should consist of two houses. Some matters are better left settled, even if not in exactly the way we favor.” Once more, who is to say?

If there is no Constitution, by what authority does one impose the perspective that such things are hereby settled? You can no longer point to an article, section, or clause of the Constitution and say, “Look. It says so right there.”

Professor Seidman's gentlemanly view of society might be barely functional in a world where most of the population adhere roughly to a similar set of values. However, such a Western world in general and an America in particular sadly no longer exists.

There is now within our midst sizable Islamic populations that not only demand their right to practice their barbarous customs but also demand that the rest of us surrender to them as well or face overwhelming violence. And this is not the only movement seeking to remake America and to eliminate what little remains of that distinct way of life and cultural perspective.

For instance, no longer is it enough to allow those that derive their deepest carnal pleasures in ways most would be shocked by or not find so appealing to so do so off on their own. Now, under threat of financial ruination, we are forced to render compelled approval in ways that violate our own convictions and sensibilities.

According to assorted accounts, Christian bakers have been forced to provide cakes for gay weddings when there were no doubt numerous others willing to provide such culinary services. Elsewhere, young girls have been forced to look on in horror in the locker or restroom as the person undressing there before them turns out that at the most basic level is still a man no matter how vehemently they attempt to deny nature's manifest construction.

Given that Professor Seidman is a professor of Constitutional Law, one would think that in calling for the elimination of the U.S. Constitution that he was essentially derailing his own gravy train as Georgetown University professors probably pull in a hefty salary and are esteemed as part of the nation's intellectual elite.

But even if scholarship in traditional constitutional studies were to become an extinct discipline, those such as Professor Seidman convined they are so much better than the rest of us will still think it will be their place to tell the rest of us what to do. However, it will simply no longer be from the standpoint of a traditional understanding of morality. This is evidenced by the “New Social Contract” called for by Evangelical Christian Progressive Jim Wallis.

In classical democratic theory, in a social contract both parties agree to fulfill a delineated number of obligations in order to receive a desired benefit. This is done from a perspective of self-interest as much or maybe even more so than to meet the desires or needs of the other party.

For example, no matter how much they claim otherwise and might even pitch in during a time of crisis, the generic big box retailer or even the so-called “mom and pop” shop down the street really don't care one way or the other whether your nutritional needs are being met. What they really care about and might even be willing to go out of their way to see that your dietary inclinations are satisfied fot is if you are willing to relent to the agreed upon price for the desired commodity.

Something similar could be said of the individuals and institutions involved in the so-called social contract. Under that theory, if parties feel that the terms are not being met, individuals are free to look elsewhere for the purposes of finding their fulfillment. For example, in a constitutional republic, individuals are free to change church affiliations or their religion entirely. In terms of government, citizens are theoretically free to either change their leaders through periodic elections or the parameters of governing structures through the amendment process.

Such is not necessarily the case regarding the idea of a covenant. For unlike the idea of a contract, the notion of a covenant often does not possess the same degree of personal self-interest. Covenant carries with it the idea of being imposed upon the individual from without by a greater power irrespective of the desire of the individual or that the individual is expected to fulfill certain obligations without expectations of benefit in return.

For example, a number of such covenants are detailed in the pages of the Bible. Foremost among these ranks the covenants between God and the Nation of Israel as promised to the Patriarch Abraham. Although he and his descendants were blessed as a result especially when by living in accordance with these stipulations, it was God that sought this people ought and laid out the terms with little room for negotiation.

But probably the kind of covenant most are most familiar with is none other than marriage. Though marriage is usually entered into voluntarily by the involved parties, in a context that honors the institution properly, it can only be exited under the strictest of conditions that would leave the party initially guilty of violating the binding terms profoundly sanctioned often to the verge of ruination. The notion of contract provides for a way out even if there is a penalty for invoking this particular provision.

In January 2013, planetary elites met at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. One of the sessions convened was titled “The Moral Economy: From Social Contract To Social Covenant”. The purpose of the undertaking was to establish a framework that would foster “(1) the dignity of the human person, (2) the importance of the common good, which transcends individual interests, and (3) the need for stewardship of the planet and prosperity.”

What's so wrong with any of that, one might easily ask? After all, each of these things sounds noble almost to the point of being inspirational. The problem arises in regards as to how these are defined and who does the defining.

For example, one of the issues harped about the most by a variety of leftists ranging from the filthy slobs of the Occupy Movement all the way to Pope Francis is the need for income redistribution. So what if the technocrats overseeing the implementation of the social covenant decide to tackle that particular economic perplexity?

Most people are disturbed by the idea of their fellow man languishing in the deprivations of overwhelming poverty. But what if the overlords of the New Social Covenant decide that the way to address that is not by sustained acts of ongoing charity but rather through the forced confiscation of what you have earned with the seized resources supposedly directed towards those that really did not earn it but in reality much of it squandered by those administering such an unprecedented global effort. After all, the Pope has all that art work to upkeep there in the Vatican and assorted U.N. Functionaries like nothing better than to gather at posh resorts in the Swiss Alps or the French seaside to denounce reliance of the middle class upon automobiles while these elites fritter from conference to conference around the globe in private jets.

Those unable to expand their imaginations beyond the relatively comfortable reality that we at the moment are blessed to enjoy counter that should some sort of global authority move to seize what we have (beyond of course the increasingly exorbitant tax rates) concerned citizens can use their freedoms of speech and assembly to petition for the redress of their grievances and to raise overall awareness about policies that have expanded beyond the bounds of propriety. But does one need to be reminded that one of the very first liberties and freedoms curtailed by the social engineers of the technocratic elite is the very freedom of expression that was part of the Constitution that was abandoned earlier in this exposition as part of the reactionary past that was hindering the further development of the human species and society?

In this pending new world order, the law will not be the only social institution manipulating and conditioning the inmates of the planetary panopticon from exercising what at one time were categorized as individual rights. For religion in general and what passes for Christianity in particular will be invoked in pursuit of this agenda.

The foundation of this perspective can be discerned in an editorial published in the July/August 2014 issue of Christianity Today titled, “It's about the common good, not just the individual good.” According to the piece, the basis of America is not the individual or even the family as the union of two distinct individuals and the children that might result from such couplings but rather the COMMUNITY.

But if it is the larger group that is imbued with those restrictions upon concentrations of authority known as rights, what will protect the individual when the individual is viewed as nothing more than a malfunctioning cog in the machine or diseased cell in the larger social organism that must be eliminated or his flourishing curtailed over justifications no greater than the COMMUNITY has declared thusly? The Christianity Today article, in particular, briefly examines the implications of this in regards to children. Unfortunately, however, this analysis is disturbingly superficial and shortsighted.

The Christianity Today article quotes favorably of a Robert Putnam (the same sociologist that categorizes you as some sort of deviant if you bowl by yourself) at Georgetown University, “Kids from working-class homes used to be 'our kids' he said, Now they are other people's kids, and we expect other people to solve their problems. But young people are our future. Their problems are ours.”

The Christianity Today editorial realized that the remarks were speaking to the matter of inequality. In other words, the increasingly leftist Evangelical mouthpiece apparently has little problem in attempting to shame and manipulate you into forking over increasing percentages of what you have earned and saved. “What, you don't support the progressive income and inheritance taxes? Why do you hate children and refuse to do your part to usher in the revolutionary utopia?”

One would hope that the current editors of that particular publication would retain enough of its founders' intellectual heritage to realize that there exists more to life than merely the physical building blocks. As the such, the phrase “our kids” when spoken in reference to any youngsters other than those you might share with your respective spouse or have adopted as one's own ought to send chills down the spine of any reflective discerning individual.

For if children are to be seen as “our children” in terms of being the children of a respective COMMUNITY apart from a few basic needs such as minimal food, shelter, and maybe healthcare, what is to prevent governing authorities from intervening to dictate what you can and cannot teach in terms of religious doctrine and morality? For example, do you believe that belief in Jesus Christ as the only Begotten Son of God and member of the Trinity is the one true faith?

Well, in the New World Order where the good and preferences of the group come before those of the individual, such an outdated understanding of the ultimate cannot be allowed even if you are an otherwise peaceful individual with no intentions of harming anyone in a traditional sense of that concept. For the assumption that a source of authority exists outside the uniformity of the group consensus is the seed from which all conflict generates forth.

The First Amendment is not the only one of the derided and denigrated constitutional liberties endangered by those out to impose the fundamental transformation of America advocated by President Obama and embraced by certain radicals in the name of errant theology. For if the First Amendment is the constitutional provision upon which our foundational liberties rest, then the Second Amendment is the constitutional provision that attempts to make sure that the robust liberties elaborated in the First Amendment continue to endure. For despite what even the National Rifle Association has been intimidated into repeating, the Second Amendment is about far more that guaranteeing the right to hunt and participate in shooting sports.

Rather, the primary purpose of the Second Amendment is to recognize and enshrine the idea that each citizen has a role to play in protecting life, liberty, and property against threats to these precious commodities originating from both within and without the borders of the United States. And yes, as the very last resort after all other alternatives have been exhausted, that may mean solemnly with deliberation and reluctance taking up arms against whatever form the threat may take on the most regrettable of occasions.

But even more importantly, it is the Second rather than the First Amendment that actually serves as a barometer of the health of liberty and freedom throughout this land. For without a government and civil society that respects the right to keep and bear arms arms as described in the Second Amendment, the seemingly loftier protections of conviction and expression will not endure much longer. That is because a country or regime that refused to acknowledge the right to protect oneself will eventually not tolerate the right to think for oneself or in a manner not as directed by those holding power.

Even those claiming to view God as the highest authority cannot resist the temptation of the continuing centralization of power. This is evidenced in two 2013 issues of the Christian Century.

The editorial titled “Terror and Guns” examined the issue by comparing the three that lost their lives in the Boston Marathon Bombing to three that lost their lives that same day in acts of gun violence elsewhere across the nation. From that the editorial made the claim that 30,000 Americans are killed by guns each year compared to the seventeen Americans that lost their lives to acts of terrorism in 2012.

If such statistics are trustworthy, that certainly causes one to pause. But instead of making the case that the extensive national security and surveillance apparatus that these sorts of left-leaning publications condemn when applied to subversives of assorted revolutionary or radical perspectives be abolished, it is insinuated that a similarly heavy hand should be applied to the matter of gun crimes and even firearms ownership. The Christian Century writes, “Terrorist threats demand vigilance, and the government has responded by creating an extensive security and intelligence capability...Why can't the nation display the same kind of resolve when it comes to keeping guns out of the hands of the wrong people?”

As evidence of this lamentation, editors of Christian Century write, “In the case of the Senate gun control bill, a majority of senators voted to strengthen background checks in people purchasing guns, but the 54-46 vote did not attain the 60 votes required in the Senate. Something is wrong with a process by which a minority can derail legislation that is supported by 90% of Americans.”

Apparently the editors could not leave their analysis at that. These propagandists continued, “Many of the votes against background checks were cast by senators from small or sparsely populated states. Based on population the vote of a senator from Wyoming has 66 times more value than that of a senator from California. This kind of disparity in political power is not what the Founding Fathers had in mind.”

From that editorial, one would initially assume in terms of the issue emphasized on the surface that the concern would be a vast comprehensive national surveillance system that would determine who would be denied access to firearms. However, just as insidious is an underlying contempt for the structures of the Republic as envisioned by the framers of the Constitution.

For the United States of America does not consist solely of “We the people” merely as a singular mass or collective of individuals. Just as intrinsic to the understanding of this particular nation is “We the people” construed as fifty distinct jurisdictional entities known as states. From that particular vantage point, each of these is to be viewed as equal to the others in terms of the voice granted in the second body of the national legislature in determining the direction in terms of law and policy that will guide the nation as a comprehensive totality.

From the statement in the Christian Century commentary complaining that the political weight of a Wyoming senator is skewered in that jurisdiction's favor over that of California with its vastly larger population, the logic would conclude that right and wrong are determined by nothing more than majority opinion. So if we are to apply that principle in regards to the regulation of firearms, the shouldn't the good liberals at propaganda outfits such as the Christian Century allow the principle to be applied to other cultural issues nearly as contentious as those surrounding the Second Amendment?

For example, if most Americans were asked what they really believed without fear of retaliation on the part of the Thought Police, most would probably admit that they are not all that hip to the idea of gay marriage and certainly not open to the idea of transgenders especially men claiming that they are women as evidenced by their external endowments legally allowed to go into a public restroom where they can in close proximity to actual women and vulnerable children engage in some of life's most personal biological function as well as possibly seek these individuals out as victims to satisfy the most base of carnal impulses.

If a few senators can disrupt the will of the people in regards to one area of life, why should a few jurists not even as directly accountable to the electorate as these disputed legislators be allowed to impose a perspective at even greater odds with decency and common sense. For is not the chanted slogan of the ethical Thunder Dome in which the nearly constant social conflict takes place that there are no absolutes?

As interesting is how the appeal to traditional moral authority is only valid when it can be buttressed to support the preferred sensibilities of the prevailing elites. This was quite evident in a second Christian Century editorial published about a similar topic on 2/6/13 titled “Of Guns and Neighbors.”

The thesis of that broadside contends that individual rights are curtailed by the good of one's neighbor in Christian understanding. The editorial states, “In the biblical perspective, social issues are always framed primarily as questions of obligation, not of individual rights: not 'What do I get to do?' but 'What do we owe to God and neighbor?'.”

The editorial demonstrates how this reasoning is applied to the firearms debate by quoting Deuteronomy 22:8. The text reads, “When you build a new home, you shall make a parapet for your roof; otherwise you might have bloodguilt on your house , if anyone should fall from it.”

So what other nuggets of jurisprudence derived from the Book of Deuteronomy interpreted through the prism of the principle that “social issues are always framed primarily as questions of obligation, not of individual rights...” is the Christian Century editorial board going to come out in favor of? No doubt this propaganda rag of mainline Protestantism of the Episcopal and Presbyterian Church, USA variety has come out in full blown support of gay marriage.

Without question, it cannot be denied that the Old Testament legal books such as Deuteronomy explicitly opposed the homosexual lifestyle and by extension the agenda advocated by those most enthusiastically mired in these particular behaviors. Given the ethical standard called for by the Christian Century, is the publication now required to withdraw any support it might have articulated in favor of gay marriage? The editorial titled “Of Guns and Neighbors” just said ethics and morality are not determined by what we get out of something but rather upon what we owe our neighbor and, even more importantly, God.

As such, if it can be deduced from these texts that God does not endorse unrestricted access to firearms (something that is not clearly spelled out in the texts), shouldn't we at least admit that the only relationship with physical pleasure being one of the foundational cornerstones that God looks favorably upon without condemnation or criticism is monogamous heterosexual marriage? Those claiming otherwise have ignored the explicit directives of the Biblical text to such an extent that we might as well toss it aside entirely in regards to other issues regarding assorted ideologues desire to render behavioral, legislative, or policy pronouncements.

It is often assumed in Christian circles that the greatest threat to human liberty are often those that categorize themselves as atheist or agnostic in that their hostility towards God is outward and explicit. However, as has been emphasized in this analysis particularly in regards to the movement to either eliminate or comprehensively alter the understanding of America's most basic constitutional liberties, there are a number of voices claiming to be religious in nature utilizing the beliefs and principles derived from such for the purposes of manipulating those open to the perspectives of this particular social sphere into surrendering the sorts of protections not easily recoverable once they have been surrendered.

By Frederick Meekins