Criminalization of Christianity is on America's horizon
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Don't be shocked when many "Christians" cheer the criminalization of Christianity. The number of supposedly Christian individuals whose moral compasses are calibrated to the spirit of the age rather than the authority of scripture has become astounding.
As I read the enraged responses from professing Christians at the news that Vice President Mike Pence would be the commencement speaker for Taylor University (a leading private, Christian institution located in tiny Upland, Indiana) I realized something.
Keep in mind that Pence has been one of the most outspoken Christian public servants in recent decades. He makes no effort to hide his faith, acknowledging himself as, "A Christian, a conservative, and a Republican…in that order." Therefore, it is completely logical that a Christian institution would invite him to speak, in addition to the fact that he was a long-time congressman from the Hoosier state, as well as its governor, before ascending to the second highest office in the land.
The odds of students at Taylor University getting the opportunity to have a sitting U.S. vice president deliver their commencement speech are minuscule at best. To say this was a coup for University President Lowell Haines and the rest of his administration would be a gross understatement. Haines announced the news by posting:
"Mr. Pence has been a good friend to the University over many years, and is a Christian brother whose life and values have exemplified what we strive to instill in our graduates."
And that, the fact that a professing Christian, native Hoosier, and sitting vice president would give the inaugural address at their school gave a number of alumni and current students the shakes. No, seriously:
"I have never been made to feel so physically ill by an email before. Taylor University, you should be ashamed of yourselves," Claire Hadley, who graduated from Taylor in 2015, began in a long Facebook post. "I am physically shaking. The fact that the school who claims to love and support me, and each of it's [sic] students and alum, would invite such a vile individual to speak on the most important day of the year??"
"The fact that Taylor would invite Pence as a speaker honestly kills me a little bit," Austin Linder wrote on the petition. "I can't imagine what it must feel like for lgbt students to have to see this man's harmful bulls**t be honored on the Taylor stage. Really disgusting stuff, Taylor. Really ashamed to be an alum right now."
Claire and Austin weren't alone. A few thousand signed a Change.org petition calling on the university to rescind its invitation. And that's when it dawned on me – when the criminalization of Christianity comes to this land (and it is coming), it will be championed by and met with the fanfare of many professing Christians.
The number of supposedly Christian individuals whose moral compasses are calibrated to the spirit of the age rather than the authority of scripture has become astounding. Leaning on their own understanding they choose the attributes of a god they want to worship, one who seems "worthy" of their worship, and they bow to it. The God of Scripture is too narrow-minded.
When another Christian actually clings to the words of scripture, not only are they reviled by the world, but a sense of guilt triggered by conviction prompts the culturally compromised Christians to react with bitterness, condemnation, and (ironically) a judgmental contempt. I say ironically given that being judgmental is the go-to condemnation heaped upon Bible-believers by this crowd. All this leads to a surreal spectacle of Christians attacking other Christians as terror-inducing, vile, and stomach-churning. And that's just at Taylor University; Chick-fil-A could tell you a bit about this as well.
A couple years ago when my local city council was preparing to enact a non-discrimination law for sexual orientation and gender identity, several Christians in the community spoke out against the unintended consequences – everything from opening up girls' bathroom facilities to grown men, to the potential violation of the conscience rights of Christian florists, bakers, and photographers.
When I stood for my public comment, I asked the council a simple question: "Your ordinance exempts ministers from this non-discrimination policy, ostensibly meaning that if a minister doesn't want to participate in a gay wedding, he doesn't have to. I'm curious as to why you've done that? What makes a Christian minister's right to conscience any less offensive, bigoted, or discriminatory than a Christian baker's?"
While no councilman could or would answer my question, it sparked a conversation in which a culturally compromising Christian journalist in the town admitted on Twitter that he thinks ministers should have to perform such weddings. And if they don't? "Government fines, jail, and/or loss of tax-exempt status for the church."
That's why I often tell fellow Christians that when the day comes that the government is telling them how they can and can't exercise their faith, the kind of beliefs that are acceptable and the kinds that aren't, and the type of public expression that will be allowed and the type that won't, don't be surprised when it comes accompanied by the raucous cheers of many wearing the name of Jesus.
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“And that's when it dawned on me – when the criminalization of Christianity comes to this land (and it is coming), it will be championed by and met with the fanfare of many professing Christians.
The number of supposedly Christian individuals whose moral compasses are calibrated to the spirit of the age rather than the authority of scripture has become astounding. Leaning on their own understanding they choose the attributes of a god they want to worship, one who seems "worthy" of their worship, and they bow to it. The God of Scripture is too narrow-minded.
When another Christian actually clings to the words of scripture, not only are they reviled by the world, but a sense of guilt triggered by conviction prompts the culturally compromised Christians to react with bitterness, condemnation, and (ironically) a judgmental contempt. I say ironically given that being judgmental is the go-to condemnation heaped upon Bible-believers by this crowd. All this leads to a surreal spectacle of Christians attacking other Christians as terror-inducing, vile, and stomach-churning. And that's just at Taylor University; Chick-fil-A could tell you a bit about this as well.
A couple years ago when my local city council was preparing to enact a non-discrimination law for sexual orientation and gender identity, several Christians in the community spoke out against the unintended consequences – everything from opening up girls' bathroom facilities to grown men, to the potential violation of the conscience rights of Christian florists, bakers, and photographers.
When I stood for my public comment, I asked the council a simple question: "Your ordinance exempts ministers from this non-discrimination policy, ostensibly meaning that if a minister doesn't want to participate in a gay wedding, he doesn't have to. I'm curious as to why you've done that? What makes a Christian minister's right to conscience any less offensive, bigoted, or discriminatory than a Christian baker's?"”
Just because most Christians consider pedophile priests and pastors "criminal" doesn't mean they are destroying Christianity. Yes, most Christians champion actual arrests and punishments instead of slaps on the wrist and relocation's, but that doesn't mean they have criminalized Christianity. They are just rejecting those Christians who think they can stick their "faith" anywhere they want without permission.
“The number of supposedly Christian individuals whose moral compasses are calibrated to the spirit of the age rather than the authority of scripture has become astounding. Leaning on their own understanding they choose the attributes of a god they want to worship, one who seems "worthy" of their worship, and they bow to it. The God of Scripture is too narrow-minded.
When another Christian actually clings to the words of scripture, not only are they reviled by the world, but a sense of guilt triggered by conviction prompts the culturally compromised Christians to react with bitterness, condemnation, and (ironically) a judgmental contempt. I say ironically given that being judgmental is the go-to condemnation heaped upon Bible-believers by this crowd. All this leads to a surreal spectacle of Christians attacking other Christians as terror-inducing, vile, and stomach-churning.” Those engaging in those crimes are the compromised/ compromising Christians who will be cut to their heart when confronted about their shortcomings that they will be like those who having their sins and error pointed out picked up their stones and hurled them at Stephen, our first post cross Christian martyr.
Last December in a The Washington Post , Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian of Foreign Policy magazine wrote the following under the the headline,
No, Christians do not face looming persecution in America.
Ms. Allen-Ebrahimian cuts rather to the heart of the matter, I think, but allow me to be even more direct.
What evangelical Christians perceive as persecution is actually the loss of influence and the diminishing of their power to persecute others. In fact, let me back up for a moment.
Christians have rarely if ever been persecuted for their faith.
All those stories of innocent Christians being thrown to lions? Most of them emerged from a period of about two to four years during the reign of the emperor Nero, who actually did some terrible things to some Christians.
Nero did terrible things to a lot of people, though. He was by many accounts a deranged tyrant, though peering through the haze of biased sources is challenging 2,000 years later. It seems he fixated on early Christians after the great fire of Rome in 64 AD. He may indeed have fed a handful of Christians to the lions.
Nero almost certainly executed more political adversaries and imagined threats to his power base than he ever did Christians, though.
After Nero’s death by suicide (to avoid execution or assassination) less than four years later, the small Christian community in Rome returned to anonymity. While sporadic persecution of some Christians is reported to have taken place after 68 CE, it appears to have been rare, highly localized, and contained to the provinces.
It wasn’t until almost 200 years later that things changed. In 250 CE, the emperor Decius proclaimed that everyone in the Empire other than Jews must perform a sacrifice to the gods in the presence of a Roman magistrate. Decius was squarely targeting Christians, as the exemption of Jews clearly highlights.
Christians would not sacrifice to the gods, and Decius knew it. Christians who would not comply were sometimes executed.
Persecution, yes?
Well, in a way, but probably not the way you think. Christians had it rough for about the next 50 or 60 years. Several general persecutions were enforced. They ended by 303, 311, or 313 depending on the region of the empire in question.
By 324, Christianity had become the favored religion of the Empire. Within 75 years of the first real organized resistance to Christianity, being a pagan in Rome became a political liability.
Within one generation, it was Christians doing the executing.
The Roman Empire had always been religiously diverse. The Romans tolerated and even emulated religious belief systems from all over the world. They gladly took on board elements of Greek, Persian, and Egyptian religions.
When Decius issued his edict, he was recognizing the existence of a vast culture war. The struggles over the next 75 years were a cultural fight to the death that the Christians actually won.
It was the early Christian Church that was intolerant, not Rome.
Christians had become powerful all over the vast empire. Early Christians rejected religious tolerance, seeking supremacy rather than acceptance.
Framing the Roman fight for cultural survival as persecution of the innocent was a neat propaganda trick. It worked. People today almost never learn of the vast pogroms committed by triumphant post-Constantine Christians in the effort to suppress the Roman religion. They rarely hear about inter-Christian, internecine disputes over the next few hundred years that led to enormous amounts of persecution and suffering in the name of religious purity.
The parallels to today’s world are obvious.
When Christians in the United States complain about anti-Christian bigotry, they aren’t complaining about their right to worship or practice their faith as they see fit.
Their right to do that is rock solid and undisputed.
Christians have the right to their faith and even to educate their children outside of general public education. No serious voice in the United States calls for that Constitutionally guaranteed freedom to end.
No, when evangelical Christians in the US talk about being persecuted, they invariably and actually talk about losing their privilege to oppress and persecute others.
Evangelical Christians in the United States don’t want equality and diversity, they want dominance. It’s not good enough for them to have the freedom to worship, they demand the “freedom” to enforce their religious beliefs on the entire nation.
They demand the right to discriminate against LGBTQ people. In many cases, they outright demand re-criminalization of same-gender sex. They demand to have their own religious views on marriage enforced at law.
They demand that other people’s children be taught in public schools about their peculiar and scientifically absurd notions regarding divine creation.
They demand laws that enforce their own peculiar notions about sexuality and other private human behavior. They in fact demand spiritual dominion of the secular world, much as the early Christians during the 4th century demanded dominance.
There’s even a term for that.
Dominionism.
Judge Roy Moore and Vice President Mike Pence are both publicly avowed Dominionists. So are many other evangelical politicians. They’ll tell you outright that their God’s wishes supercede the rule of law. Moore demonstrated his Dominionist political philosophy, of course, by infamously defying two US Supreme Court orders.
No, evangelical Christians in the United States are not persecuted.
Religious ideas don’t deserve to be elevated or privileged above other ideas in public discourse in the first place.
To the privileged, equality feels like oppression.
Evangelical Christians are free, and they are equal. But they’ve largely lost their power to dominate and persecute others.
As a gay man and an HIV activist, I personally know what it feels like to be persecuted and targeted by conservative Christians. I know what it feels like to have my basic humanity put into question, to have my right to love and marry challenged and denied.
I know exactly what it feels like to be the target of Christian homophobic bigotry.
Raised as an evangelical Christian, I can say without reservation that I was never persecuted for being a Christian. I never was the subject of bigotry for holding Christian beliefs.
Having lived in both worlds, I know what real bigotry is, what real persecution feels like. I know it is perpetrated by evangelical Christians against people like me. The difference is as stark as it clear.
Christians in the US are not persecuted, but many conservative Christians strongly desire to persecute others, and they do so whenever they hold enough political power.
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Pence has been one of the most outspoken Christian public servants
What a laugh
Pence is in fact a wonderful Christian man who lives according to his genuinely held beliefs.
Christians-- particularly clean-living White Christian males-- are the most discriminated minority in America today!
If the current trend continues, soon all pf our churches will be torn down by the evil gubmint!-- and The "War on Christmas" will be extended to other holidays as well! I wouldn't even be surprised if one day we will actually see a homosexual man running for president!
The fornicators are everywhere!
(BTW, anyone here ever notice-- America is fast becoming yet another Sodom and Gomorrah!!!! heck-- its worse than Sodom and Gomorrah!!!)
In the days prior to Noah and the flood and again at the time of the 2nd coming the whole earth was and will be as wicked as Sodom and Gomorrah. So even as we do what we do to get the whole world to see and hear the message we have the wickedness surrounding us will only become more intense. There will be a shaking out and many nominal cafeteria Christians will abandon the faith and lead the persecution of remaining and new believers. The article author is right and the liberal Christian/secular progressive alliance against believers on issues of faith and political social issues such as choice and life styles and matters of conscience and religious liberty will play out...
...aka reasonable persons who don't have their heads shoved up Ken's Hamm...
As opposed to Christian dominionists who suffer from major persecution complexes and couldn't understand science if it bit them in the ass.
And who told you that KAG, GOD?
There are only a tiny handful of actual dominionists and their influence within the evangelical Christian movement is minuscule.
So true. I’ve been attending Church for nearly 63 years and have been a minister for nearly 40 years. I’ve yet to ever meet a dominionist or hear one teach or preach in a church. Yet the left perpetuates this myth that most evangelicals are dominionists.
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Criminalization of Christianity is on America's horizon
Too bad they do not criminalize the promoters of ridiculous notions.
If not, I have found a market for my two lions and they have found prey, a win win as they say.
LMAO, I believe this comes under the subj of complete BS. Congrats on seeding the most ridiculous persecution complex article to date.
To date. At least until tomorrow.
Most of the comments here fit this quote from the seeded article perfectly........
“And that's when it dawned on me – when the criminalization of Christianity comes to this land (and it is coming), it will be championed by and met with the fanfare of many professing Christians.
The number of supposedly Christian individuals whose moral compasses are calibrated to the spirit of the age rather than the authority of scripture has become astounding. Leaning on their own understanding they choose the attributes of a god they want to worship, one who seems "worthy" of their worship, and they bow to it. The God of Scripture is too narrow-minded.
When another Christian actually clings to the words of scripture, not only are they reviled by the world, but a sense of guilt triggered by conviction prompts the culturally compromised Christians to react with bitterness, condemnation, and (ironically) a judgmental contempt. I say ironically given that being judgmental is the go-to condemnation heaped upon Bible-believers by this crowd. All this leads to a surreal spectacle of Christians attacking other Christians as terror-inducing, vile, and stomach-churning.”
there's a channel on youtube that shows thumpers getting their asses kicked. it's hilarious.
How can you be persecuted for your religious beliefs when we have the Free Exercise Claus of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights? You claimed that you read and understand the Constitution, but it seems that you were not being truthful.
The 10 Commandments require believers to tell the truth but you didn't do that.
The key words were is coming and when it does the persecuting powers will trample upon the freedoms we hold dear today to be able to do it. A lot of things will change in the final days countdown to the second coming.
So you're calling into question the Christianity and moral compass of the members who have commented in this seed. Got ya Xx. I suggest you and the author review Luke 6:41-42.
I’m not calling into question any individual member here. I’m pointing out broad issues and how groups in general a going to act in the final days. There is a widening schism in the Christian Church between literal believers who accept the whole message of God and cafeteria Christianity which picks and chooses what parts of Gods word they choose to believe and accept while discarding the rest. This rift will only grow wider and some who think they are on one side or the other now will switch to the other side in a great shaking out. That’s what the seeded article is talking about.
That is bullshit Xx. You said:
Only members can comment here only a select group of members commented here.
Then you go on to quote your seed which cites:
All of those charactorizations call into question the authenticity of a persons Christianity and YOU stated that 'Most of the comments here fit' that quote PERFECTLY.
Where the fuck have you been Xx? The 'Christian Church' has had schisms since it's inception. Have you READ Paul's letters?
Nope. The seeded article is about the author's alleged epiphany about the 'criminalization' of Christianity and that his insistence that 'real Christians' accept the bible, word for word and any Christian that doesn't is unworthy and an enemy to 'real Christians'.
That’s your interpretation and you are free to have it.
My stomach churns when I read about how current evangelicals and certain 'christians' want to wear the mantle of morality, at the same time they do not follow any of the tenets of Jesus or the message of the bible. Who cares about someone who wants to quote scripture and doesn't follow it, instead blindly following the wolves in sheeps clothing that pervert scripture and christianity for their own power and manipulation. That would be said Trump supporting 'christians' and their leaders. Sorry, but any values or moral authority they thought they had is gone. Culturally compromised christians? Look in the damn mirror. That would be every christian that excuses and lies about Trump and his behavior, and deems it good because ....winning! So righteous. Not.
Isn't this bs supposted to be against the site CoC?
This certainly dishonest and probably unethical.
One summer when I was about 8 or 9 (even then I questioned religion) my parents went somewhere and I went to church camp as free kid watching. I had fun at camp before and understood it let my parents have their kid free vacation.
This time they played the religion is outlawed scenario. It was a shitty thing to do to little kids, They told us we would go to jail if we were Christians and let free if we were not. They had some scary guys ask us questions. A few of us said we weren't going to jail and quit being Christians. They did not like that, later they tried to play it off. My father was really pissed. I never went to church camp again,
That is one of the things that made me question religion and 40+ years later I still remember it.
This stuff turns some people against religion
In the last days before the 2nd coming something like that will actually happen. Some Christians believe they will be raptured up to escape the tribulation while others myself included believe that we will have to live through it. Our lives will be preserved during that time but if we are imprisoned for our faith and put on trial for it, we will face other trials. The time it is said will be cut short due to the intensity and anger of the persecuting powers.
Another nonsensical article.
If anything the so called Christians shouldn't be complaining about Christianity being criminalized. They are more apt to criminalize another religion in the US then being the victims.
The cross must be getting awful heavy about now, KAG.
People are abandoning Christianity in the US at an ever-increasing pace, and their media sources need to keep them claiming that people will soon be treating them as they have treated woman, religious and ethnic minorities for the past 1500 years.
I'd like to know where are their evidence is that Christianity will be criminalized?
Not all of it will be.
Oh so now you know what parts will be criminalized and what parts won't be? Please enlighten us.
We as a society have been whittling away at the 'Levitical' laws for our entire history and criminalizing many of it's practices and decriminalizing most of it's prohibitions. How about you give us a list of what we've missed.
When will the same conservatives who want the Leviticus idea about LGBT also enforce the laws about mixed fabrics, eating shellfish, and separate bedrooms, or the Leviticus teaching of how immigrants are to be treated, among any other ideas?
Unless those are not politically convenient.........?
Lol he should be more worried about his soul getting heavy
Everyone should be concerned about their own soul and about bringing light unto others souls rather than hiding ours under a bushel. Many living in darkness and comfortable there will hate the light and try to make it go away.
Actually the article is in general correct. It will be morally compromised Christians, not atheists that will lead the turning on the literal Bible believing people who don’t compromise original beliefs in order to be one with the world...
Actually the article isn't correct in anyway. I have friends that are Christians and Jews, none of them are morally compromised and in fact are quite moral people. None of them spout the nonsense that you do about this so called battle...
This article is an example of moral compromise. The author is a fearmongering liar. There's a commandment about lying. So, in an odd way, I guess you might be right, but not in the sense that you think you're right.
Fearmongering, lies, and blatant hypocrisy are a great way to turn people against a religion, and this seed is an excellent example.
Because it hasn’t happened yet...
There is no doubt that far more will reject the message in the final days the article is talking about in the future than will accept it then. The only thing we are assured of is that all will have heard the message and and decided one way or the other to the point no mind will be changed and then the final tribulation before the 2nd coming and then the 2nd coming itself will occur. He’s simply writing about future events as he sees them and I believe he’s largely right though in the great shaking many people who believe now as we do will ultimately go the other way. The bulk of the church is currently luke warm toward God and in the end it’s membership regardless of denomination will either get hot in it’s belief or grow very cold. There is no way now that any of us can judge how others will ultimately turn out. We can attempt to persuade and we are expected to but ultimately each is responsible for their own fate.
Rejecting your message is not criminalizing it. Lies and fearmongering.
Since it is an opinion article about one persons viewpoint from a certain relatively widely held perspective of what will happen in the future it is neither lying or fear mongering.
The article doesn't say a damn thing about 'the final days'. You're inserting your 'Judgement day' BS into it.
More yawn from the corn field. Be afraid. The gawd people are coming.
What a crock. My daughter attended Mass last night & will be on Sunday. The church was full - seems no one is worried about being outlawed in her church.
Persecution: Christians not so much
Jews - definitely
Wiccans - pretty much (still portrayed erroneously in movies, tv and books)
Funny how the true people that are persecuted for their beliefs strive to move forward and enjoy their faith and life while the fake "persecutees" just whine and lie.