Tuesday
ABORTION WILL BE ONE OF EACH
PARTY'S PLATFORM PLANKS
ONE THING WE KNOW FOR SURE: THE
ISSUE OF ABORTION WILL BE ONE OF
EACH PARTY'S PLATFORM PLANKS
In 1979 the late Jerry Falwell founded a political
organization called "Moral Majority." The group
was founded on 4 basic tenets: (1) pro-family,
(2) pro-life, (3) pro-defense and (4) pro-Israel.
It was his conviction that the church had not only
a right but a responsibility to make its voice heard
on political issues of a moral nature. Moral Majority
is credited with achieving Ronald Reagan's sweeping
victory in the presidential election of 1980. Based on
that background we feel free to comment on the
present political conflict from a Christian standpoint.
Traditionally, the "Pro Life" position has been one
of the hallmarks of the so-called "Religious Right"
-- the Conservatives, the Evangelicals, termed by
Hillary Clinton as a "vast right-wing conspiracy
-- and has been the position included in the moral
values advocated by the Republicans, along with
the defense of traditional Christian marriage as a
covenant between a man and a woman.
Barack Hussein Obama, presumptive Democrat
candidate for president, has made it clear that
abortion will be what he describes as "a critical
issue in this election." Just last week Obama
said "I was proud to get Planned Parenthood's
endorsement," (July 9) and added, "I will never
back down in making sure that women have
their reproduction rights (abortion) here in this
country. That's what's at stake in this election."
Offering a contrary, Christian view, Rev. Patrick J.
Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense
Coalition, showed up last week at Obama's
Washington offices with a sign labeling the Senator
as "The Abortion President." Obama is making
strong efforts to reach out to the nation's Evangelicals,
and even has an ad running on some Christian radio
stations including his religious rhetoric, such as: "I
submitted myself to His will, and dedicated
myself to discovering His truth." However,
according to Steven Waldman, Editor-in-Chief of
Beliefnet, "Evangelicals including young
ones, do care about abortion, and they don't
like his position on it." Waldman adds that 62%
of white Evangelicals are "anti-abortion."
There was a time when the Ten Commandments of
God (including Thou shalt not kill), were decisive
factors in decisions like the choice of a president.
We can hope that the killing of more than 40 million
babies since the court's Roe v. Wade decision will
not be ignored in this year's election. However,
Obama has expressed his conviction that religious
Conservatives must accept the fact that America has
evolved, as he recently stated, "Whatever we once
were, we're no longer just a Christian nation ..."
Whether the late rush to use traditional Evangelical
language after twenty years of the racial hatred
preaching of Jeremiah Wright will deceive American
Christians remains a question to be resolved on
November 4. Julian Krasta, writing in the Townhall
Blog, Novus Ordo Seclorum (title taken from the
Great Seal of the United States) summarizes his
opinion: "Obama requires a daily diet of total
compliance and idolization. His word salads are
a gross national product of cants and fantasies,
and is devoted to injecting chaos into the jellied
minds of people that play into his fantasies. He
has successfully accomplished this because his
is a cocktail personality, meaning: He senses
other people's vulnerabilities, he reads their
personalities, and performs accordingly. It is
the classic sign of a sociopath." (July 7, 2008)
They're getting desperate over the Biblical view
of homosexuality as a sin in God's eyes. Bradley
LaShawn Fowler, a homosexual, now claims that
his constitutional rights were infringed upon by
Zondervan Publishing Co, and Thomas Nelson
Publishing who publish bibles containing God's
opposition to homosexuality. Fowler's lawsuit
seeks $70 million damages from the two publishing
houses.. One very credible viewpoint is that Fowler
should have filed his suit against God who is the
author of the Scriptures being challenged. It appears
to be the traditional error of attacking the messenger
rather than the message. As far as we know, the
ACLU has not yet weighed in on the issue.
Simply because of its importance as the third
largest religious group on earth (after the Roman
Catholic and Orthodox churches), the Lambeth
Conference of the world-wide Anglican Communion
-- now in session, even as we write -- merits our
consideration. The prime object of the once-every-
decade conference is to prevent or at least delay
what appears to be an inevitable schism in the
Communion, brought on by the growth of
homosexuality within the church, highlighted by the
consecration of an openly practicing homosexual
bishop in New Hampshire, and by the recent move
toward the ordination of women bishops in the
Church of England. We will discuss Lambeth in next
week's issue, but if a forward looking prediction
could be permitted, it would be that not much of a
definitive nature will be achieved at Lambeth this year.
The term, Indaba, has been suggested as the rule
at Lambeth. Indaba is officially defined by the
Conference as being a Zulu word meaning "a
gathering for purposeful discussion ... and offers
a way of listening to one another concerning
challenges that face the Anglican Communion."
It has been noted that the use of such a word should
make the African bishops feel right at home -- except
more than one-in-four of the 880 Anglican bishops
are boycotting the Lambeth Conference and will in
fact be staying at home.
An interesting comparison from Cheri Jacobus,
writing in The Loft, "From the time Barack Obama
was sworn in as a United States Senator, to the
time he announced he was forming a Presidential
Exploratory Committee, he logged 143 days of
experience in the Senate... After 143 days of work
experience, Obama believed he was ready to be
Commander-in-Chief, Leader of the Free World
and fill the shoes of Abraham Lincoln, FDR, JFK
and Ronald Reagan... In contrast, John McCain's
26 years in Congress, 22 years of military service,
including 1,966 days in captivity as a POW in
Hanoi, now seem more impressive than ever."
Regardless of current rhetoric, the statements
of our Founding Fathers have real meaning today:
"It is a very great mistake to imagine that the
object of loyalty is the authority and interest of
one individual man, however dignified by the
applause or enriched by the success of popular
actions. If ever a time should come, when vain
and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats
in Government, our country will stand in need
of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin."
-- Samuel Adams, 1772
Some Random Afterthoughts . . .
These came our way this week, with no religious
application, but interesting: (1) "Did you know that
studies show the No. 1 factor for success is
communication skills?" Could this relate to the
US presidency? (2) Sign outside a drug store:
"Minute Clinic. You're sick; we're quick." Quite
a change from the days when doctors made house
calls. (Yes, Youth of America -- it's true; doctors
used to come to our houses to treat us.) (3) In a
stunning new poll from Rasmussen Reports ..."just
9 percent of those polled gave federal lawmakers
a thumbs up." (President Bush's approval rating at
only 30% makes him downright popular compared
to Congress' abysmal approval rating of 9%)
An ad that reads like a sermon: This ad for a new
book appeared on the Internet this past week. It is
worth re-reading: "For most Americans, the Bible
is a source of divine inspiration, moral guidance,
and the foundation of Western civilization. But
for an influential group of academic, government
and media elites, it is the source of most of the
evil in the world today... The critics say the
Bible is full of fables masquerading as history,
and that it has regularly incited people to
violence and immorality. But fear not: in 'The
Politically Incorrect Guide to the Bible,' award-
winning journalist Robert J. Hutchinson turns
the latest historical scholarship against the
mockers, skeptics and deniers to show that not
only is the Bible true -- but it is also the source of
Western ideas of charity, justice, reason, science
and democracy." One might also point out that the
Bible is also the source of God's way of salvation.
We sometimes think Britain is slow to act - but
not in this instance. Britain's government ministers
are scheduled to build eight new nuclear power plants
across England within the next ten years. New laws
governing the planning will be used in gaining the
necessary approval for the plants which Gordon
Brown, the Prime Minister, believes are crucial in
reducing Britain's dependence on fossil fuels. At the
G-8 conference in Japan last week, Mr Brown
spoke of the need for 1,000 new nuclear power
plants across the world in the next century. So much
for Britain being out of date, and slow to act.
A message from yesterday for today and for
tomorrow: "You and I have a rendezvous with
destiny. We will preserve for our children,
America, the last best hope of men on earth,
or we will sentence them to take the first step
into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail,
at least let our children and our children's
children say of us we justified our brief moment
here. We did all that could be done." -- Ronald
Reagan, 1964
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