Wednesday, June 29, 2005

What Would Jesus Do?

The New York Times has an article today entitled, "Christian conservatives to seek voters' support for government displays of Ten Commandments". Here's how it gets started:

Christian conservatives said they were taking their fight for government displays of the Ten Commandments to the polls, using the Supreme Court's bookend rulings on Monday for and against such exhibitions as a call to arms in the battle over judicial nominees.

Several lawyers and organizers for the Christian right said the most resonant part of the rulings was Justice Antonin Scalia's accusation, in his dissent defending one display of the Commandments, that the majority used the case to "ratchet up the court's hostility to religion."

"I am almost glad that it is so outrageous," Charles W. Colson, the evangelical Christian writer and Watergate figure, said of the ruling at a panel discussion on Tuesday on Dr. James C. Dobson's "Focus on the Family" syndicated Christian radio program. "People today now realize and can make no mistake about it that what happens in the court has profound effects upon religious liberty in America, and it comes in a week when there may be a resignation on the Supreme Court.

"People in churches across America had better get busy and demand the right kind of appointments to this court," he said. He added, "There is no bigger issue on the Christian agenda."

No bigger issue on the Christian agenda??? Funny, I don't remember Jesus saying anything about public displays of the Ten Commandments. I do remember rather a lot about feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting those in prison and loving our enemies. I would think those things would be big issues on the Christian agenda. But hey, that's just me.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous11:59 AM

    This sent a chill down my spine. The court wasn't being hostile towards religion--they were actually being very supportive of it. They were just not being supportive of one religion. Isn't that what this country was supposed to be all about?
    The Christian right really does want a police state in which they are the police. They already have their battle song/national anthem, "Onward Christian Soldiers".

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  2. Anonymous1:15 PM

    amen! i think you hit the nail on the head. it amazes me how we typically fail to see ourselves (those in the church) as who we are the pharisees and the sandherin. jesus was railing against the power and authoritarians of the time, not pushing for more. keep preaching!

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