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Posted by Anthony on March 24, 2010
“the “right” within the church attempt to leverage the gov. to legislate morality. The “left” within the church attempt to leverage the gov. to legislate compassion. Both approaches fail miserably and are an abdication of our responsibility to be the voice, hands and feet of Jesus in this world.” – spoken by a friend.
Someone slid this article across my desk that inquires as to why evangelical Christians are against universal health care. Now, strictly speaking, I’m not an evangelical. Also, I don’t think that all Christians oppose universal health care, and I will not presume that Christians who do will share all my reasons. I hope this caveat spares me the litany of comments accusing me of ‘generalizing.’
I will take the article as my foil as it is one of the finest expressions of liberal hubris and arrogance that I’ve seen in a while. The author begins by indicating he seriously wanted to know why Christians who are supposed to be all about love would oppose health care. The end includes a long screed:
(p.s. this opinion is reserved for those Christians who have not actually thought about the consequences, and decided that more people are harmed than helped by the new law. They are being consistent with their beliefs. That being said, if you think you are in that camp of people excluded, you probably aren’t. You probably are just being geedy [sic], selfish and jerkish, but convincing yourself that this is why you oppose it, while the truth remains you just dont want taxed, or adhere to some abstract notion of how this bill is UnGodly).
Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on July 22, 2009
Recently, I wrote a post calling on Christians to step up to their own obligations and not delegate them to others, in particular to the government. A couple of months ago I wrote a post drawing the connection between taxation and freedom. The first post and today’s are directed ONLY to Christians and should be read in that context. I submit that the two posts above be read in conjunction with this one in order to better grasp my points.
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For Christians who take the Bible as the authority, one must accept that the government has a certain, God-ordained, role. This is explicitly affirmed in Romans 13. Written during the time of Nero, the first Roman oppressor of Christians, the passage makes clear that submission to even the harshest governments is called for. But not absolute submission. Christians must still follow their moral conscience as that conscience has been informed by the Scriptures.
In the United States we have a democracy of sorts which creates problems in interpreting Romans 13 since at least in theory submission to the United State’s gov means submitting to ourselves. In theory, power and authority is delegated to the government and it rules ‘by the consent of the governed.’ This puts Christians in a unique position that I don’t believe is fully envisioned by Romans 13.
In short, since we are permitted to attempt to shape the policies of the government and even the form of it, the Christian church in America will be held accountable for how it has fulfilled the duties and obligations specifically described in the Bible as belonging to it… and it will also be held accountable for the actions of the government wherever it could be said that Christians had enough influence on it so as to be responsible for its decisions.
The Scriptures are clear: governments too will be judged. So, to the extent that the Christian Church is part of the government (‘consent of the governed’) or actually in control of it, we will be judged for that, too.
With the weight of this responsibility on our shoulders, we Christians must seek to fulfill the duties given to us as Christians and also think carefully about how we will influence the government’s conduct. Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on April 15, 2009
I once got into a disagreement with someone about the nature of communism. My sin apparently had been that I had issued a series like this… “Freedom and Democracy, Tyranny and Communism…” The objection was that the three preceding terms have to do with polity and governance while communism was merely an economic system. As such, it was said it did not belong in the series.
Frankly, given the course of history and its clear testimony linking communism with tyranny and piles of dead, I find the notion that communism is ‘only’ an economic system to be absurd. Similarly, with the close connection between capitalism, freedom, and democracy, I would resist the assertion that capitalism is merely an economic system, too. It is not my purpose to expound on the above. It is my purpose here to make the point that economics cannot be separated from ideology. If one wishes to insist that pure economics certainly can, I won’t belabor it. But can you have ‘pure economics’?
I think it is clear that you cannot. I don’t for a minute believe that capitalism is without its problems but the last century provides a testing ground that generates iron clad results. Capitalism tends to produce or facilitate free societies. Communism runs pell mell into tyranny, death, slavery, famine, purges, and oppression. These are simply historical facts. Evidently, there is a link between economic systems and morality, ideology, politics, values, and beliefs. Deny it if you like: to your own peril. Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on February 4, 2009
I am a libertarian-constitutionalist. By that I basically mean that the government should mind its business at almost every level but when it does become involved it should follow the letter of the law- and the highest law should provide for significant checks and balances to make sure that the government doesn’t overstep its bounds.
I’m pretty sure that the founders of this country had a similar view. They wouldn’t recognize the bloated thing we have today. One can guess what they’d say or do. (I have some guesses). Let us just assume that no one even tries anymore to have good, moral, proper, principled reasons for passing legislation any more. That has been abandoned. In its place are just two basic principles: 1. Will the legislation make money for the government (or those donating to officials)? 2. Will it extend the government’s reach?
I would suggest that in most cases today we can see that most legislation does just this. Oh sure, it won’t come out and say that. The government will tell you what you want to hear. They are corrupt, not stupid. Most likely, I am stating something true of all governments, even the absolute best ones. Power corrupts. So, perhaps the fault is ours for letting it happen.
This weekend I had a conversation about this. We were talking about all the laws out there that spring up because of one, and only one, singular event. For example, the attempt down in Missouri to create a new set of laws because one very stupid adult harassed one girl over the Internet- and the girl committed suicide. These new set of laws might reflect moral sense (ie, it certainly is wrong for adults to behave that way) but the laws are not going to curb such behavior and it only opens up all of us to accusations from random people on the net claiming ‘harassment.’
We could think of other examples.
When I was a teacher, I sometimes had to make rules on the fly to address specific incidents. The whole class suffered because one student was ridiculous. This is fine as far as it goes. It only affected 30 kids at a go. Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on June 30, 2008
A review of Nancy Douglas’s Freedom: Healing for Parents of Disabled Children (Buy from Amazon)
Book Description
In the pages of Freedom, Nancy Douglas candidly shares the pain, grief, and trials of having a disabled child. From the initial storm of discovering her daughter was Autistic, deaf, and Failure to Thrive, to the agony of knowing she would never receive physically healing, her compelling and honest account of life with a special needs child will transform the heart of all who read it. Walk with Nancy through the pages of her journey and discover for yourself the true and lasting freedom God has waiting for you!
Book Details
- Paperback: 228 pages
- Publisher: Nancy Douglas (February 18, 2008)
- ISBN-10: 0615188222
- ISBN-13: 978-0615188225
- Webpage: www.oliveleafministries.com
Nancy Douglas was looking forward to the birth of her daughter. It didn’t take long to realize that something was horribly wrong. After the dust had settled, she found that she was bound up in a conflicting mess of uncertainty, fear, guilt, and grief. Her daughter could not be healed: Nancy Douglas
would not be healed. Yet twenty years later she has emerged from the worst and is now in a position to share her experiences so that others might find healing- and freedom- sooner.
As the parent of a disabled child myself, I could resonate with much of what Mrs. Douglas wrote about. There were somethings about her experiences that were different for my wife and I but there were others that were very similar. I believe that this book will be well suited for the Christian parents of a disabled child where the parents struggle to cope even years later. This book is proof positive that skeptics and atheists are not the first or only ones to struggle with the problem of pain and suffering. Quite possibly, even those who are not believers but are the parents of disabled children will be able to relate to her candid discussion about her long time struggle with God… and see that God is waiting to help them, too.
The strongest chapter, in my opinion, is chapter three, which is titled “Good Grief.” She explains that someone doesn’t have to die in order for another to experience grief. This is absolutely true. I know that my wife and I endured a long period of what can only be appropriately described as grief, though what had died was not the child, but the whole host of expectations that were dashed when we learned our child would be disabled. While we have overcome most of the outright grief, there are still shooting pains when we realize that our child will never dance, play soccer, or climb a tree. Or at least, if these things happen, they will happen in a radically transformed way. However, as Mrs. Douglas points out, there is a ‘good’ grief which makes you stronger and more resilient, and what makes it ‘good’ is not the degree of the event but rather the attitude one adopts in and through it.
Read the rest of the entry… »
