I've been thinking about the "Duck Dynasty" controversy and what it means for religious people in America, most of whom — or at least very many of whom — adhere to a scheme of beliefs that includes forbidding homosexual behavior. They're seeing how badly it can hurt your career and your social standing to express this belief.
How can there be a norm against the expression of something that so many people believe on a profound level?
But it is not unusual at all. There are many things that religious people believe that they also know they can't go around saying. You're not going to do very well in American society, for example, if you come right out and declare that people who don't follow your religion are going to hell. You'll be drifting toward Westboro Church territory if you talk like that. You sound like a crazy hate-monger. The fact that you truly believe it and that it's religious won't help your standing in the community.
So it's not unusual that some widely held religious beliefs aren't fit for expression to the general audience, only a bit surprising when something new crosses the line from fit to unfit. How did that happen? It happens! The culture changes. Think about how that happens.
Speaking of Westboro Church, I see those people are making a show of their support for Phil Robertson. Now, they are religious people who have thrown aside the interest in social acceptance. They've chosen to be in-your-face outrageous, and they seem to believe that God is giving them credit for enduring social scorn.
Jesus said: "Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."
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269 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 269 of 269YoungHegelian said...
@sunsong,
There is no Third Vatican Council. There's only been One & Two.
The quotation you posted is fake, and for good reason.
OUCH!
"Oh darling, how dare that wild man in the hair shirt criticize our marriage -- he said it violates Old Testament law, but doesn't he know the culture has *changed*? We Romans are enlightened, and our civilization is invincible and new. Hope and Change!"
"Oh yes, my dear, and of course WE don't follow THEIR backwards rules. For Zeus' sake, the man eats locusts and wild honey. What a redneck! I'll have his head on a platter for you as a treat for our next feast."
"Ooh! Excellent, my darling! We will most certainly nip this sort of thing in the bud. He thinks someone greater than he is will come and back him up! Ha Ha! What a fool!"
“It's curious that the Church has become the most tightfisted at the very time in history when God has provided most generously. There's considerable talk about the end of the age, and many people seem to believe that Christ will return in their lifetime. But why is it that expecting Christ's return hasn't radically influenced our giving? Why is it that people who believe in the soon return of Christ are so quick to build their own financial empires -- which prophecy tells us will perish -- and so slow to build God's kingdom?”
sunsong said...
"Whether we call God, Jesus, Adonai, Allah or Krishna, we all worship the same God of love. This truth is self-evident to all who have love and humility in their hearts”
- Pope Francis at the Third Vatican Council"
I used to believe the same thing until I began a discussion which lasted about a year with a Muslim. Now I know that is not true.
YoungHegelian said...
My apologies. That is how it was presented to me. I have deleted it. I am neither Christian nor Catholic. I wouldn't know if you have councils at all. Again, I am sorry to have made that mistake, misattributing a comment to the Pope. I still like the quote :-)
I used to believe the same thing until I began a discussion which lasted about a year with a Muslim. Now I know that is not true.
A Muslim? That is what you are basing quite a sweeping generalization on? Wow.
So you now know the quote to be a lie… and yet you still like it?
Your'e even dumber than I thought.
Sunsong… where did you get it? I would be pretty pissed at someone who lied to me like that.
Sunsong said
"A Muslim? That is what you are basing quite a sweeping generalization on? Wow"
How many Muslims have you studied with Sunsong? Have you asked them how they interpret the Koran and the hadiths?
I didn't say I have only had discussions with one Muslim. However, the Muslim who taught me how to understand Islam from the perspective of a Muslim was the one I had intensive discussions with for about a year.
Perhaps Rumi would have uttered such words:
we all worship the same God of love. This truth is self-evident to all who have love and humility in their hearts”
I find them beautiful. I lot more people than you may realize worship Love. You'll find plenty of it in India, but also China, Russia, Africa, everywhere, South America, Europe and Mexico :-)...
Rumi, the 13th century Persian Sufi poet, the most popular poet in America, is said to have uttered this:
Some wild happy flood carries away
Logic and reason and
Every shred of neat thinking.
Loving escapes its old prison too,
on the loose and dangerous.
It's a mess!
No more comments please:
If you don't get it by now,
Just
Leave
Us
Be
~Rumi
Muslims? I read PERSEPOLIS!!! And as a result, I feel sorry for Iranians and other oppressed Muslims... they can't just go on a 12 pint pub crawl... 5 pints in...
But this guy was asked about his beliefs. It is not surprising that he spoke about them, and in fact unless an individual finds any talk about sin offensive (and even then, everybody's offended), it is impossible to find this bigotry.
You've got this all wrong. The Duck family isn't hurt at all by this controversy. It is GLAAD that is getting puked on in public by the public.
Robertson is not bigoted and his views are not bigoted, and it is not socially unacceptable for him to speak about what he believes in public. Only a tiny, tiny minority of the US believes so, and to the extent that it succeeds in raising a hue and cry over this sort of thing, it marginalizes itself, not the Robertsons.
The Westboro nuts are a completely different type of thing. But then they enjoy no popular support, and Robertson's crime in GLAAD's eyes is not that he is a believing Christian who speaks about his beliefs, but that the popular culture likes him, his family, and the products of his belief as it is played out in their imperfect lives.
If you asked Robertson what should be done about homosexuals and adulterers and fornicators his response would simply be "Preach the good word to them. And if they are sick, care for them, if they are in prison, visit them, if they are hungry, feed them, if they are naked, clothe them." This is what GLAAD is afraid of. This is why he's dangerous in their eyes.
Homosexuality isn't normative and some manifestations (those deeply engrossed in sexual immorality) are unhelpful because they are unhealthy, and unhealthy practices in the Bible are described as "sinful".
This basic type of Judeo-Christian morality and social engagement is very strong and builds healthy societies, and given our current economic circumstances it will only strengthen in our culture because it works. The sexual revolution has bred illness and social dysfunction which we are now too poor to afford, and anyone who seriously looks at modern life knows that.
But that basic social shift (have you looked at the polling on young people's attitudes to abortion lately?) need not involve societal exclusion of homosexuals, because in fact they are just like all the rest of us. The traditional Christian ethos is the ethos that involves not legalistic condemnation of sinners, but care for the afflicted. And Judaism has evolved along the same path, which is why Israel is a haven for ME homosexuals.
It is not the revolutionaries who created our kinder and more tolerant society, but the growth of the Judeo-Christian ethos.
At the end of the GQ article, the interviewer refers to the Duck guy's next task:
We hop back in the ATV and plow toward the sunset, back to the Robertson home. There will be no family dinner tonight. No cameras in the house. No rowdy squirrel-hunting stories from back in the day. There will be only the realest version of Phil Robertson, hosting a private Bible study with a woman who, according to him, “has been on cocaine for years and is making her decision to repent. I’m going to point her in the right direction.”
That's the man they fear.
@MaxedOutMama- I have compassion for your credit card, and your spouse.... and the subset of the "Judeo-Christian ethos" that supported-- sometimes at great personal cost-- free expression.
Oh wait... weren't they deists? Or heretics?
So you now know the quote to be a lie… and yet you still like it?
Hold on there smarty pants. I have not responded to you. To be frank your attacks just aren't very interesting to me. But I did want to comment for the record on this one. I don't know the quote to be a lie. I don't know that at all. I like it. I like the meaning of it, the content. I am not so concerned with who said it at this point. If it is true that there have only been 2 Vatican Councils - (and I have no idea whether it is or it isn't) then it more than likely was not the Pope who said it. And if you are correct in what I think you are claiming that a Pope would never mention the God Krishna in a positive way - then it was likely not the Pope who said it.
That in no way means it was a lie. It is beautiful, imo we all worship the same God of love. This truth is self-evident to all who have love and humility in their hearts It is as I said, I misattributed it to the Pope. Imo, you are missing the forest for the trees. And there is nothing wrong with that.
"If it is true that there have only been 2 Vatican Councils" might have cut it before the Internet, but 'sunsong' could have determined that it is in fact true in less than a minute's research. What kind of . . . person insists that something may still be true when he could have determined whether it was true in less than a minute? Someone who doesn't want to know the truth.
I'm one of those who holds those deeply held religious beliefs, but a decade ago it would just be typical public policy to encourage stable family life for children.
I still hold to the concept that marriage is a man and a woman, not because of my views on homosexual acts but rather my 'judgmental' views on heterosexual acts.
Even though we have the teaching of Marriage within the Catholic Church, as "by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring" I never saw it as a religious belief.
Marriage matters if you are non-religious as well, as I honestly speak that I believe gay atheist children should be loved by their mom and dad. How are those who I disagree with, come to the conclusion that this is hatred or bigotry, that I should be public shames and hide from view in my pathetic ignorance against equality.
Yes, equality. We need to treat things fair and equal, but when I get into good discussions about inequality even with progressives who want government influence in every aspect of a child's life will understand that there is no government program that replaces the benefit of having one's mom and dad.
Losing a parent is an objective lost, it creates an inequality for a child compared to a child who had both biological parents. It doesn't become subjective because a parent is gay or a parent want to move on with a new lover.
This is a hard concept,we want fairness and we want equality. I can not acknowledge someone has two moms, because no one has two moms. For you to have a mom, you have to lose your father. I would like to make CLEAR it isn't write for straight couples or single individuals to deny a child his/her rights. I do not believe in sperm/egg donation, and if a relationship breaks the mother can not push out the father for her new boyfriend.
It is so confusing one moment in public policy/culture has to do with sexual relationships but has nothing to so with procreation, but when you lean everything about sex and how it works and functions it is really about 'having babies'.
From Live Science (2013)
"The reproductive system is a collection of organs that work together for the purpose of producing a new life. Scientists argue that the reproductive system is among the most important systems in the entire body. Without the ability to reproduce, a species dies"
It sounds so objective, and obvious. It takes a man and a woman to have a child, they need to raise the child together in the best interests of the child or else 'a species' or in our case our community dies.
And it feels like it is dying slowly everyday, even with social programs to help the children most at risk and fatherless we're lucky if they can get a GED.
----------
I've been to a lot of Masses and heard a lot of homilies. I never heard one about oral or anal sex, but I did hear about the importance of marriage and the concerns of fragile families often. I didn't hear how we are tempted to look at pornography.
The only time I ever heard of homosexual activity was when I was in public school, and that was when sex outside of the conjugal act (masturbation/oral/anal sex) was to be promoted as normal and healthy ways of expression.
Whether it be on cable programming, Cosmo, or Planned Parenthood that is where I constant hear our culture obsess about these ideas.
Well I reject that. Not just out if religious belief though. We can't rewrite human anatomy, even if we tried by law. We can not make the procreative aspect of our sexual organs go away, and if we try our society will collapse.
And it's collapsing.
I'm not asking anyone to be straight or to have children, what I'm asking is to respect the procreative aspect of sexuality and not to distort to a mere personal gratification.
People want me silenced, because I acknowledge my sins and that I was mislead. It isn't just GLAAD, who wants me to shut up.
Sunsong said:
" imo we all worship the same God of love. This truth is self-evident to all who have love and humility in their hearts"
Perhaps you could share with us how you arrive at self evident truth and how you know it is the truth once you arrive? What about those who have actually studied the different religions and discover something different from your self evident truth.
Look, the culture can't be changed with merely bullying and anger...
Bosnian Muslims, Egyptian Copts and Rwandan Tutsis might disagree.
@furious_a
Am I willing to accept that fate?
@sungsong: You were a nice ruse while you lasted.
So long!
I've read your comments again and all I can find is self-flattery, self-congratulation and feigned ignorance. I've not read one single, substantive point.
The point he made is that , Somefeller is Awesome!
He reads the New York Times. Liberals what read the NYTimes are just better than you and me.They be our moral and intellectual superiors.
I imagine that A&E completely forgot about Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. "Sin" is a religious concept only. They knew Robertson is religious. His speaking about sin based upon his religion's Bible verse in Corinthians, and that not on their network, is to be expected. It is illegal to fire him based upon his religion.
GLAAD is on the way to becoming the confessional entity for queer stuff much as Al Sharpton has become the Pope of racism. This much be rooted out ruthlessly and now.
Pint number six-ish... Goriallz playing in the pub... Now it's something different... ska I think... I used to know their names...
NY Times? GLADD? One's a trash bag, and the other is a so-called "gay rights" group... Stop listening to their 13 gallons of refuse and they might just fade into oblivion...
PLEAZE DON'T PLAY LORDE!!! PUH-LEEZE...
So. Fucking. Gay.
Pint number 7, where art thou? Probably hanging out with the fucking Wavelets at the fucking infinite limit of the ratio at the the period-doubling points. Fucking Feigenbaum Number again... Ugh!!!
No blue-blooded robots yet, though, so we stumble onward... On and on and on...
On and on and on...
Beating against the current into the past.
Beating against the current into the past.
Pint seven-ish found. Things are spinning around me. "WHO WANTS TO FIGHT?" Oh fuck, that wasn't me, it was the immensely cultural Hemingway... And-- oh shit!-- it seems we have been thrust out of The World's End and into Midnight in Paris...
FUCK! Does anyone know how to say "pint" in French? Does anyone have Woody Allen's phone number?
Please help. Without your help, our pub crawl is totally fucked.
Oh fuck! Here we go on pint number eight... It be The Smiths playing in the pub... I am human and I need to be loved... just like everybody else does...
And I'm fucking amazed that mi y mi amigos pub crawl has not been censored by Althouse yet. Was expecting the ban hammer of the Almighty to come down many many posts ago...
Hangin' out here in the Moulin Rouge with Gauguin and Degas and this really quirky disabled dude... No doubt he's destined for hell.. or maybe heaven... I can't figure out which!!!
Dumsong: I don't know the quote to be a lie. I don't know that at all.
Hey, dumb shit… how many Vatican councils have their been? Do tell.
If it is true that there have only been 2 Vatican Councils - (and I have no idea whether it is or it isn't)
You didn't look it up already? You're not even fucking curious about whether a source you trusted enough to quote has been lying to you?So you just don't give a shit whether what your flapping your trap about has even the faintest alignment with what is truthful?
No wonder people call you shits "libtards." Except it's an insult to the retarded.
And if you are correct in what I think you are claiming that a Pope would never mention the God Krishna in a positive way - then it was likely not the Pope who said it.
And if you are correct in what I think you are claiming that a Pope would never mention the God Krishna in a positive way - then it was likely not the Pope who said it.
No shit, Sherlock.
That in no way means it was a lie. It is beautiful
You attempted to hijack the Pope's name and position and credibility to make your point and got called out in the lie. It's a lie from top to bottom.
Furthermore, all lies are ugly, by definition. There is no beauty in untruth. The "pretty" lies are the ugliest of them all.
Did you inherit this kind of stupidity from your parents? Or did you have to take years of lessons from union employees?
"Neither you not Birkel would put up with the network taking a show off the air if it's star suddenly converted to radical Islam?"
Let's see what sort of outrage results from Cat Stevens being inducted into the RRHOF.
"He must be killed. The Qur'an makes it clear - if someone defames the prophet, then he must die." Cat Stevens, in response to being asked about the fatwa against Salman Rushdie.
Note that afterwards (and ever since) he has insisted he really didn't think Rushdie should be killed. His point was that it is a simple fact that defaming the prophet is a capital offense.
I don't intend to boycott the RRHOF, and I have always enjoyed Stevens' music (and will continue to do so). But it just might open a few eyes and minds if some people banded together and pressured the RRHOF to rescind his invitation to be inducted. Perhaps GLAAD? There seesm to be something of a majority opinion that homosexuality is forbidden in Islam (it is punishable by death in a handful of Muslim countries).
@Crismo-
So. Fucking, Weak.
I endured all the mega-hours of "Joseph Anton". Of course, that was before this mega-pub-crawl, of which I have imbibed the 10th pint... still... great fucking book by a great fucking storyteller...
ANYHOW... You should fucking reject Cat Stevens.... he's a fucking malignant! I did... and nothing that the Muslim-apologists put forth could convince me otherwise.
It goes on and on and on...
I get tired of people nitpicking parts of the Bible and dismissing it in entirety by refusing to consider the civilization and culture that existed when it was written over two thousand years ago, yet these same people expect me to understand the "nuance" of cruel and hateful statements made by them yesterday.
Just because I wrote "seesm" doesn't make it okay for you to call me "Crismo."
But I understand, since you're probably seeing double right about now.
@Creamso -
Glad you understand the mechanics of the pub crawl. Cheers!!!
The Alinskyites can hardly complain when they are forced to live by their own rules.
Its a post-Christian society. Of course, we've done this dance before - and if we could put up with being tossed to lions, we'll endure whatever. Once this post-Christian civilization dies, we'll just start to rebuild it. Again. As a Christian civilization. Even with the full knowledge that some time down the road liberals will emerge to tell us we did it all wrong and they know how to make it all better.
Ann Althouse said...
Look, the culture can't be changed with merely bullying and anger.
I think you may lack a longer term perspective. Of course it can't be changed in a few years, but give it a few generations and things change (and those cultural changes can fly under the radar for the vast majority of that time.
Two words: Cultural Marxism
Two more words: "repressive tolerance"
If you are unfamiliar with those ideas or with Hubert Marcuse and the Frankfurt School and it's influence on the New Left, it might be worth familiarizing yourself with them. This game of subverting dominant culture and society has been played for a lot longer than I think you may realize. The constantly connected world has only further empowered those who already controlled the "organs of propaganda".
I've got an "organ of propaganda"... and I just used it to bang Sam in the Disabled!!! Thank got for that shuttle bus back to the 1920s... and then to the present day... we are back in our rightful cultural exposition. 10th pint killed me tho'. I'm about to pass ou
I think that all the talk about Title VII is missing the point. Sure, he might win, but it will never come to that. He has money, a lot of it already. The network is either going to apologize, or they will legitimately switch to another network, and A&E will suffer financially. Not only was this their most lucrative show, it brought viewers that stayed for its other fare. It was a stupid move on their part - there are a lot, lot more fundamentalist Christians in this country than godless gays and their supporters. Their problem is that many, if not most, of these religious conservatives live in fly-over country, while A&E operates in the creative capitals of the country where gays are grossly over-represented. The latter may provide much of the creative content, but few of the eyeballs that subsidize the network.
Bruce Hayden said: The latter may provide much of the creative content, but few of the eyeballs that subsidize the network.
I hear you loud and clear but the new business paradigm -- which trickles down from Washington, D.C. -- does not care about those old, outdated standards.
The customer is not king. The king is the prostitute.
Don't believe me? Check the OED: link
Anyone willing to state their un-PC beliefs, i.e. the sin of homo-sexualility, at the risk of job, career and financial wellbeing, is clearly modeling the love that the Bible prescribes.
Maybe getting back to what Ann said, and some others here have commented on - in the past, those on the religious side of the spectrum have held their tongues more and more as the pressure for cultural relation and progressive thought has continued to increase. Gays and Blacks in particular, but other groups too, such as militant feminists, have been able to cow their ideological opponents into silence through claims of hate speech and peer pressure of sorts from the cultural elite, including the elite's propaganda arms, including the MSM and liberal intelligentsia.
But times are changing. Big move in this country in getting back to basics in terms of religion. The multicultural Barack Obama has been probably the biggest coalescing force in the rise here of religious conservatism. He has shown a willingness to give up our power and moral authority in the name of multiculturalism, and repeatedly has shown a preference for Islam over Christianity here and around the world, despite our heritage and his own claimed faith. And, while doing so, has done great damage to our middle class, one of the pillars of our greatness.
What we are seeing more and more these days are people of faith standing up for their faith in the face of determined opposition by the secular left. Not just the Robertson family, but also the millions showing their support. This wouldn't have seemed surprising for most of the first 3 1/2 centuries since the start of our country, but had become ever more the exception in the last half century.
I think that this is a harbinger of what will come. The more that the more religious conservatives see that they are not alone, the more I expect that they will get the strength to speak out in favor of their faith.
Bruce Hayden said...
in the past, those on the religious side of the spectrum have held their tongues more and more as the pressure for cultural relation and progressive thought has continued to increase. Gays and Blacks in particular,
Curious but revealing comment. African Americans are the most reliably religious group in the country.
"...come right out and declare that people who don't follow your religion are going to hell."
If you cannot understand the difference between following the proper path and passing judgement on another then you are either remarkably ignorant for an 'educated' person or are yourself a bigot.
this free speech thing is no different than recess years ago. On the playground there were more of us than there were bullies. The one or maybe two bullies were able to get most of us in line. No different now. The bullies are just taller and richer.
So speech detective somefeller - are you on board with the latest leftwing thought police? You left some of Phil's comments on the cutting room floor.
Phil talks about growing up in the deep south:
"Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers," he explained. "I hoed cotton with them. I'm with the blacks, because we're white trash. We're going across the field [*...] They're singing and happy." ...
"I never heard one of them, one black person, say, 'I tell you what: These doggone white people' -- not a word!" he said. "Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues."
The perpetual whiner grievance mongers at the NAACP shit their pants over this.
Phil is not allowed to talk about his own memory -- What he saw through HIS eyes. How dare he relate his own personal experiences? Perhaps the NAACP, in conjunction with the authoritarian leftists who run the "democrat" party, can make it illegal to reminisce about a childhood in the deep south unless in contains pre-approved talking points about the mistreatment of blacks.
If he (or anyone) never witnessed a lynching, according to the holier than thou NAACP – you are a racist. Right? -- Speech Detective Somefeller?
What can be done to stop this man from talking about his childhood!?! Somefeller and his fellow whiners on the left cannot handle it.
Jesus also said "He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters." [Mt 12:30]
Either you believe Christ is the rightful ruler of earth or you don't. Either you believe He is the Son of God or you don't.
Is it loving to let people live in their unbelief (disbelief) if you truly think eternal life against God is pure hell?
Sin is about missing the mark - going off the path of righteousness. That people declare a judgement about others says they agree there is a right and wrong, but rarely question what they believe might be wrong. That's pride - precisely why Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed.
BTW - the word religion comes from the Hebrew word regel (resh-gimel-lamed) - which means to bend the knee (walk). If you look you can see the English word leg in there. Regel meant walking in the path - following a rabbi - as well as climbing to Jerusalem at least 3 times a year. Take another look at regel and you'll see the root for regulation. The US government is (as are all governments) a form of religion (regulation).
Blogger AReasonableMan said...
Bruce Hayden said...
in the past, those on the religious side of the spectrum have held their tongues more and more as the pressure for cultural relation and progressive thought has continued to increase. Gays and Blacks in particular,
Curious but revealing comment. African Americans are the most reliably religious group in the country.
And here I always thought it was us jews.
Don’t use the Voltaire defense for Phil Robertson
There’s a very good essay at the Federalist.com on the success of the Robertson family of Duck Dynasty fame. The family and its values represent a threat to the Left’s hold on the culture. If the Left had its way watching Duck Dynasty would be like Christians in China meeting in their homes with closed curtains to pray.
But make no mistake, there are no public figures that need the Uber-culture’s approval that will defend Phil Robertson without prefacing their remarks by giving us the Voltaire defense of I disagree with Robertson but he should have a right to speak his mind defense.
Stop it. If you disagree with Robertson, say so. If you agree, say so. But don’t try to have it both ways. For the Christian community, remember the book of Revelation, verse 3:15-16:
Message to the Church in Laodicea
"I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth."
By the same token, the legal defense is nonsense. The law always follows the culture. It's why judges are suddenly discovering the that homosexual marriage is required. If they decided the opposite, their friends and associates, their clubs and social groups would cease inviting them.
The thing that ticks me off about the DD gay flap is that the homos are demanding action be taken against Phil that they have been demanding the right to not be subject to.
And since the gay left and their supporters think its completely OK to fire someone for their answering a question put to him about his religion, then I think that the quickest way to stop this Stalinist trend is for them to be subject to the same rules they desire to impose on others.
Because if its cool to fire Christians for their beliefs, then the homos should be subject to the same treatment and legal standard. Otherwise, what we have is the gay left privileging and institutionalizing their own bigotry.
Someone mentioned earlier in a post about the lefts past campaigns re "no free speech for racists, sexists, fascists". The left was laying the ground work and redefining the 1st Amendment for what we are now seeing in the attacks on non-leftists. They seek carve outs to exclude speech that opposes their ideology. We are specifically seeing it at work here.
GLAAD are a pack of Stalinist anti-Christians bigots. They need to go the way of the Klan and any other hate groups.
Shall we make it illegal for the radical gay left to say mean and offensive things about Christians? They do so all the time.
btw- Speaking of the radical left. The girl who was shot by a radical socialist in a CO high school has died.
The media scrubbed any mention that the shooter was, in fact, an admitted and proud socialist.
He hated republicans and said so. He wore leftist shirts to school. He posted leftist hate on facebook.
The media washed all that away.
Re: How did that happen? It happens! The culture changes. Think about how that happens.
Been Pondering that Line. Made Me Pull Out a Leonard Cohen Album.
Give me crack and anal sex
Take the only tree that's left
and stuff it up the hole
in your culture
As for How it Happens -- to Paraphrase an Old Line: Slowly at First, Then Quickly.
Free speech has been trumped by political correctness in the country. Very little remains of the first amendment.
Curious but revealing comment. African Americans are the most reliably religious group in the country.
And, also one of the most "homophobic". Wonder if there is any connection?
somefeller said...Prediction: this is the part where Birkel declares Victory on the Internets!
The comedic gift that keeps on giving. After making this statement somefella stops commenting.
.
Hey, Sunsong! How's that research coming along? #LULZ
"Widely held religious beliefs that you can't talk about openly in America."
Environmentalism is a widely held religious belief.
God help you if you go against that belief.
Take a look at the length of recent comment threads. Don't know what it means, but the Robertson event threads....almost too long to wade through.
Time to stop treating homosexuality like it's special. It's a sin just like fornication, adultry, lying, stealing or killing. There are plenty of saved Christians that do all of those things. As a Christian, I don't care if you're a homosexual or a thief. I just care if you're saved. Once you are, the holy spirit will convict you with regard to your sins.
That doesn't mean I won't support you in repenting your sins, or gently rebuke you if you try to rationalize them, but your sins are your cross to bear, no pun intended. Just remember that refusing to acknowledge or feel shame for your disobedience to God's law is rebelliousness, and God tends to make the path rough for his family members that remain in rebellion.
I'd rather you be saved and gay than be straight and lost.
Oh, and I don't care if you're Methodist or Baptist, JW or Catholic, Morman or Muslim, if you don't believe that Christ is the son of God and that he died to pay the debt for your sins, you're going to hell. Sorry if that doesn't pass your ecumenical muster, but unlike the US Constitution, the bible is not an evolving document.
"We believe the next step is to use this as an opportunity for Phil to sit down with gay families in Louisiana and learn about their lives and the values they share."
Won't they be surprised if Phil takes them up on this - and then teaches them about his life and the values he thinks they should share?
"We believe the next step is to use this as an opportunity for Phil to sit down with gay families in Louisiana and learn about their lives and the values they share."
Won't they be surprised if Phil takes them up on this - and then teaches them about his life and the values he thinks they should share?
For some of us it's a leap of faith to believe there really is a Divine plan of which we are all a part. And perhaps it's not even necessary to believe. But we'll find the hours of every day gentler if we accept that a Higher Power is watching over all of us.
Being able to let others live and learn their own lessons is one of our lessons. The more we master it, the more peaceful we'll be.
@Tom
I think that is what is most troubling. We're not God, so we don't judge who goes to Heaven or Hell.
People don't like the idea if sin, so if you acknowledge and take responsibility for your own....
yeah... people can goes nuts if you say anything. Even if someone in an interview asks the question.
There's no common ground between what Phil Robertson believes and Westboro Baptist "Church" (if it can even be called such a thing). Your post seems to draw an equivalence between the two, effectively saying that Westboro is simply more outspoken and in your face in its beliefs. Before making statements like this, you would do well to actually learn what Robertson believes.
BTW - the word religion comes from the Hebrew word regel (resh-gimel-lamed) - which means to bend the knee (walk).
“Bend the knee” in ancient parlance (way beyond Hebrew and the Hebrews) typically did not mean walk, but kneel — kneel down (or even prostrate) oneself in reverence and submission before one's Master.
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