Loren Seibold is jarred but not enough to do any research

  

I am going to do a couple blog posts on the subject of the recent ATSS presentation by Loren Seibold on What makes a Christian. You can view it on Youtube here.

Here is a transcription of the opening remarks.

I'm going to start out with some political quotations. Yet, I don't intend this to be political discussion. As I thought about it, I could have started out with . Quotations from some rap musician. Who had some pretty terrible lyrics in their song and it gets up at the Grammys and says, I think Jesus, for letting me win this award I just happened to stumble across this first quotation. And I thought this quotation really raises the question, you are welcome to have different views of what kind of Leader, you think Donald Trump is, but this one jarred me, Michelle Bachman said of Donald Trump in 2019 she said:

 

“Trump is highly biblical. And I would say to your listeners that we will in all likelihood never see a more Godly Biblical President Again in our lifetime.”

 

Now just in (unintelligible) that just even if it was with Donald Trump, even if any other politician or entertainer or athlete or somebody wouldn’t it cause you pause?  Wouldn’t you stop for a moment and think how you come to that conclusion. And then Donald Trump added himself,

 

“Nobody has done more for Christianity or for evangelicals or for religion itself that I have.”  

 

That's a huge claim more than Billy Graham, more than Pope Francis, More than Martin Luther, if we're going to go back in history. That's an audacious claim. So again, it raises that question, what does it mean to be a Godly biblical person? This is not an easy question to answer.

He then moves on to the idea that John 3:16 is subjective so you can’t really use that for defining a Christian, that will be the next blog post. But for now, I want to point out the kind of research that you get on Adventist today.  Seibold quotes a small section of Michele Bachman’s statement and asks how would not such a statement cause you to pause, and how you would come to such a conclusion. Interestingly enough for about three paragraphs before that quote Bachman explains why she makes the claim. Now you would think that if it raised that question in Loren Seibold’s mind that he might have taken just a few moments to research the quote and come to an understanding of the quote. But no, we find that he was not curious enough to even do that, instead, he just adds a quote from Trump made two years later, even stating it as if it was connected with Bachman’s quote. I won’t deal with Trump’s quote because people should know by now his New York tendency to superlatives. He does the best, his friends are the best, his buildings are the best, his kids are the best, his enemies are the worst etc. It does appear he means as a President he has done more, as you can see here at about 6:16

If you want critical thinking or even facts it seems that Adventist Today and Loren Seibold are definitely not where you want to go. Here Seibold is jarred by a statement and he does not even look into it. He assumes that his political knowledge is great enough that he can just quote a line from CNN and that is all he needs to do. Don’t think that Seibold does not know that he is being political even when he claims he is not being political, that is just one of the lies that leftist use to try and pretend that they are just objective people pointing out facts.  Quotes taken out of their context are not facts they are pretexts that he uses to shore up his very faulty views.

Here is the transcription of what Michele Bachman said, you can hear it here at about minute 33:

“This President has done more to advance with prolife movement and the prolife cause than any other President has ever done. Just this week, Secretary of State Pompeo had announced the Mexico City policy would be enforced even wider than it had before. The Mexico City policy says not one dime out of US tax.Taxpayer money will go to pay for foreign abortions. Well, that should be a given, but that isn't the way it was under Barack Obama. We were paying for foreign abortion to abortions of people in other countries. Not only have we said no to that, but now Mike Pompeo or Secretary of State, has said even those nonprofits that are contracting with other nonprofits.They can't perform abortion so that policy's gone even further. Plus defunding of Planned Parenthood, the largest provider of abortions in America. Planned Parenthood is being exposed for their deeds of darkness. And we're pulling back money from Planned Parenthood as well through the Trump administration. So that's just on the prolife issue on the area.

On the area of religious freedom. We are doing more to advance religious freedom and to protect Christians who are being murdered and persecuted in the Middle East. Like we have not seen before, [ Host comments: Christians can now flee to America. That's right couldn't under a previous administration], it was very, very hard. Barack Obama, practically. 99% of the people that he allowed in under the refugee resettlement programs were Muslims, certainly nonchristians. Now that has been completely flipped on his head. And President Trump is now allowing in persecuted Christians, people who are literally are being persecuted. And he's offering them protection in the United States and perpetrators, almost all of whom are Muslim are not getting access through the refugee resettlement Program. So this is a complete turnaround. But on so many different areas. We talked about Pastor Andrew Brunson that the President would not relent until this pastor was released out of Turkey. Now I spoke to pastor Brunson myself at the national for Breakfast and he is back. and his ministry has continued so that goes to areas we could go on with the president has done with standing for righteousness in so many areas one being Barack Obama had demanded and commanded that our military services had to literally go out and recruit people who are transgender to come into the military well it costs About a quarter of a million dollars to do sex reassignment surgery. Why would you recruit people who would come in and have sex reassignment surgery and be on the sidelines? It made no sense. So Donald Trump got rid of that mandate and that requirement. He has stood up where most Republicans.

Would dare to stand up. Donald Trump has had the courage in the fortitude. And I will say to your listeners in my lifetime, I have never seen a more biblical President than I have seen in Donald Trump. He is so impressed me what he's done. We haven't even talked about Israel, he is highly Biblical And I would say to your listeners, we will in all likelihood never see a more Godly Biblical President again in our lifetimes. So we need to be not only praying for Him, we need to support Him, in my opinion, in every possible way that we can.”

 

 

 

Protecting Progressive Adventists from truth

 

 

Adventist Today Sabbath School Class has taken its attack on truth to a new level this week. ATSS: “A New Reformation”: Adventist Fundamentalism and the Ku Klux Klan presented by Michael W. Campbell. I zoom attended this program which was going along normally, Campbell had begun with a review of Fundamentalism and had moved on to the KKK. He had actually just commented on the movie “Birth of a Nation” and he had still not acknowledged the fact that the KKK was acting in conjunction with the Democrat party. So I thought that would be a very good time to mention that I thought it should be acknowledged that the KKK was the militant arm of the Democrat Party. I thought this was a point that it should really be noted since the movie Birth of a Nation was: “It was the first motion picture to be screened in the White House, viewed there by President Woodrow Wilson, his family, and members of his cabinet.”

That movie was a technical breakthrough for movies but it was also a major turning point for the reinvigoration of the KKK.

After I made my comment in the zoom comment section I received a private message from Loren Seibold with the comment. “Quit making it political, or leave”. Of course, mine was not the first political comment in the chat section. At one point I read one comment that said something to the effect that Trump and the Republicans were doing the same things as the KKK. Someone then directed a question at me, but since I had been messaged by Seibold I told the person No I can’t answer and quoted what Seibold had said to me. I also said I honestly did not know how anyone can talk about the KKK without dealing with the politics of it. Then someone commented that it was a fair point but there had been a flip at some time between the Democrat and Republican positions. I put in my last comment which was that the flip was a myth.

Then I was dumped from the zoom meeting! Not because I continued to talk about the political realities of the KKK era because I did not say anything else about it. I am guessing I was kicked out because I quoted what Seibold had said to me. It is interesting that he did not just say something in the comments to everyone if he was afraid of political comments. If anyone has attended this zoom programs the comments can be pretty wide-ranging and they occur simultaneously with the speaker's presentation, They in no way interfere with the presentation.

I suspect that he did not address his comment to the total group in the chat room because the major emphasis at Adventist Today is Progressive politics. To carry that idea forward he has to attempt to cover up the history of Progressivism. That period of time that Woodrow Wilson and the Birth of a nation was also the time of the beginning of Progressivism (The Progressive Era). As Hillary Clinton once said in 2007: “... I prefer the word "progressive," which has a real American meaning, going back to the progressive era at the beginning of the 20th century…”

I have no idea where the connection of Adventism to the KKK was, one could go look up the presentation on the Atoday YouTube account though. I likely will not as if the presenter is not able to acknowledge the actual history of the KKK and the Democrat party how well is anything going to be.

But if you ever wonder why there is so much wrong information on the Adventist Today articles. I think it is all related to the idea that their new Woke Theology is actual Woke Democrat politics. When politics define your religion then your religion is politics. That is why the website no longer has conservative political or religiously conservative authors anymore and since the tendency is to restrict people’s comments even conservative comments in the Facebook section are few and far between. There is actually a fairly humorous article on Fulcrum7.com How Your Church Can Be More Woke

 

Politics seems to color everything Adventist Today publishes

 

By Ron Corson

Once again we see Adventist Today wallowing in their political leftists views.  They really should change the name of the site to Leftist Thoughts for Adventists. The latest article from Jack Hoehn entitled ComeAndReason.com Seems Unreasonable on COVID  The article’s third paragraph reads:

Anti-vaccination Views

That is why his political views now infusing health issues are so distressing. In the past he has come out in support of the twice-impeached past American president’s policies both on his Christian website and in an article published on the Spectrum website February 3, 2020.

That is interesting how the political left has forgotten that it was the Trump Administration that fast tracked the vaccine creation and production.  But now Trump is just that twice-impeached President, even though he was never convicted of any offense by the Senate which is needed to really complete an impeachment of a president. But now to the left Trump is synonymous with Anti-vaccination views. Interestingly Donald Trump had the COVID-19 virus and who was also vaccinated. Facts that in the world of insinuation have no place it appears.

The next paragraph is equally as silly:

Now Jennings focuses on masks, vaccines, and what he considers the threat of “mandates.” He calls the most-studied vaccines in the long history of vaccination “experimental injections,” as if this were some sort of isolated lab study instead of a crisis response to a death-dealing pandemic.

Let’s begin with the clearly false statement that the COVID-19 vaccines are the most studied vaccines in history.  It has not even been out for 2 years, we have no studies on the long-term effect or even the 5-year effect of the vaccines. It is impossible to believe anyone thinks it is the most studied vaccine in history but you see that is what Dr. Hoehn who was actually at one time a doctor thinks!

Why Hoehn is not equally concerned with mandates is peculiar since even President Biden and his Spokesperson have said that they would never do mandates. Kind of something that anyone with any regard for our Republic should be concerned with.  Of course, there is a fear side to a lot of leftists who feel that individual rights have no place when the world is in a pandemic condition even though the case fatality rates is pretty much less than 1% for those below 60 and does not rise to above 4% until the age of 70. So yes it is a death-dealing disease just like every other disease in the world. See the chart at https://ourworldindata.org/mortality-risk-covid#interpreting-the-case-fatality-rate

I will not bother to argue support or data against Dr. Hoehn’s position or Dr. Jennings position as that much more complex a subject and really there is nothing to Dr. Hoehn’s position he simply implies that Dr. Jennings is wrong by appealing to organizations. That, by the way, is not really how science works and that appears to be one of the key points to Dr. Jennings argument, pretending that science is a consensus business instead of a questioning endeavor.

Toward the end Hoehn states:

Only the last three on the list are not dangerous with possible serious side effects, and all have proven to be largely ineffective in preventing death or long-term disability from COVID-19. All have had their proponents, Petri dish or theoretical suggestions, and all have been tested in real life. There are now very few politically unmotivated supporters of any of those drugs. Dr. Jennings denies political motivation, but when you are agreeing mostly with QAnon conspiracists and irrational pillow salesmen, one gets a bit anxious.

Here we see again that Hoehn feels this is all political and indeed it is to him. I am sure that Jennings article mentions nothing about QAnon or Michael J. Lindell is the inventor and CEO of My Pillow, Inc. famously a supporter of Donald Trump. He is also a well-known Christian whose testimony from drug addict to successful businessman seems to make him one of the enemies of the political left. We can look at Dr. Jennings article here, something that Hoehn did not link to in his article or really even quote Dr. Jennings. Funny how that works isn’t it, a electronic publication that can’t even link to the article it is criticizing. That is a good indication that you are not dealing with an honest journalistic endeavor.

That is the saddest point in all this. I don’t really care that people have different views on the vaccine or masks. I care a lot more that the Adventist Church is becoming the playground of political progressives who have no interest in even dealing with other views and actively removes those who disagree with them from their pages.  I care most about people who are ignoring government over-reach by the state and Federal government claiming an emergency. No doubt the next emergency will be climate change which will likely be far more over-reaching than this pandemic but if there is no push back against government mandates now it will be far harder in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Atoday and Global Warming

Adventist Today posted another leftist article. Once again following the party line of acceptance of Global Warming. Which of course is termed Climate Change to hide the fact that Global Warming and cooling is not really something new or different for the earth. But instead of dealing with the article I was intrigued by the challenge that was given in the comments section on Facebook. Here are the two posts I am referring to:

Stewart Pepper I don't believe global warming due to CO2 is possible for a very different set of reasons than is postulated here. I do believe the driver of what I genuinely believe to be a hoax is a move to one world government. Having said that, I am NOT a fan of Stephen Bohr. I'd like to write my own article as to why I don't believe.

7

• 7h

• 

  Top Fan

  David Geelan I can't speak for the editors of the page, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if they'd be willing to publish a well-written piece with a different view, and I for one would be delighted if you wrote it and they shared it.

So here is my wager. AToday will not publish an article of a different view because they have no interest in different views. They have sold their souls to the Progressive Political world of the Democrats and that is why they never post anything other than Progressive Political material with an Adventist tilt. Though admittedly sometimes the Adventist part is hard to determine.

Important speech by a famous Seventh-day Adventist at the President Prayer Breakfast. It is nice to see some intelligence from a prominent Adventist for a change.



For more see: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/07/prayer-breakfast-speaker-praises-jesus-gets-political-calls-political-correctness-dangerous-hammers-fiscal-irresponsibility/

Longer version:

From C-SPAN 

The politics of emotionalism

In my previous two articles (not counting the fun one on American Pie lyrics) I have pointed out the deceptive practices of the political left in relation to the Adventist publications. Those two listed being Adventist Today and Liberty Magazine. I could and should include Spectrum Magazine (see this pathetic example) in this list as well. The troubling thing about this is that it reflects the puerile thinking of the political liberal/progressive who deal little with reality and heavily manipulate emotions. They assume that their listeners or readers are simply too stupid to think for themselves or question what they say, or they think that the reader/listener is just as prejudiced as the author. So they freely interpret usually incorrectly and with so much prejudice that their interpretations look more like arbitrary hatred then real analytical thought.

Since these gatekeepers of Adventist media have chosen to align with the political left and to use the same techniques of the left it becomes important for this blog to begin to deal with these political distortions. In the past this blog has rarely gone into political matters but it seems that they are too important to ignore since they infiltrate the church and it's leadership...even its alternative Adventist media leadership (in my opinion they have destroyed the Progressive Adventist movement).

As a particular example of the emotional manipulation of the political left here is a section from the Martin Bashir show on MSNBC as recounted by the Huffington Post:

MSNBC's Martin Bashir issued some extremely harsh words for Rick Santorum on Tuesday, comparing the GOP candidate to Joseph Stalin and Big Brother from the novel "1984." 
 
In his "Clear the Air" segment, Bashir said that watching Santorum speak before a crowd reminded him of the dictator in "1984," the classic novel about a totalitarian society under state surveillance. Bashir instructed viewers to "spot the similarities" between a clip of Santorum speaking, and footage from the movie based on the novel. 
 
He replayed clips from the film of "1984" featuring Big Brother proclaiming that "forces of darkness" must be wiped off the Earth and demanding the end of a "catalogue of bestial atrocities." Bashir contrasted them with Santorum's calls to end federal funding for contraception, among other things. "For example, he has asserted that the right to privacy does not exist and has equated same sex relationships with bestiality," Bashir added.
He then made his most severe comparison. He quoted a book reviewer who once dismissed Santorum as "one of the finest minds of the 13th century," and took the remark one step further. "If you listen carefully to Rick Santorum, he sounds more like Stalin than Pope Innocent III," Bashir said.  

You can also see the video of the segment on the Huffington Post site linked above. The similarities between Santorum and the movie 1984 is that the crowd cheers. They cheer in the movie they cheer for Santorum at a speech. Apparently Bashir has never seen any other political speeches or crowds, though you would think with the cheering and chants and fainting that occurred during Barack Obama's campaign he would have seen it at some point. He then says Santorum sounds like a theocrat and the then concludes that Santorum sounds more like Stalin then a Pope. Stalin a rather famous atheist and now I guess a theocrat at least to Bashir.

But what does Bashir report about Santorum? What quotes does he use of Santorum? Answer, none, like the authors referred to in my two previous blogs, no quotes are used, no references given, we are left to accept his interpretation of what someone said, though to Bashir's credit unlike the two previous authors mentioned Bashir at least tells us who he is interpreting, not just giving hints about some candidate running for President. Bashir could have quoted Santorum but he must have felt it was more important to play clips from the movie “1984”. That is emotionalism, and it is childish because it assumes foolish things and simplify complex issues into trite sayings. Is that something that the courts have defined or you can find in the constitution? If I do something in private does that mean I can do anything I want in private? How would you define the right to privacy? You will understand better once you actually see the quote from which Bashir is referring. Then of course you see that it is not as Bashir interprets and that Santorum does not equate homosexuality with Bestiality. Even though they could both be done in private.

From the AP interview with Rick Santorum in 2003:

AP: OK, without being too gory or graphic, so if somebody is homosexual, you would argue that they should not have sex?

SANTORUM: We have laws in states, like the one at the Supreme Court right now, that has sodomy laws and they were there for a purpose. Because, again, I would argue, they undermine the basic tenets of our society and the family. And if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution, this right that was created, it was created in Griswold — Griswold was the contraceptive case — and abortion. And now we're just extending it out. And the further you extend it out, the more you — this freedom actually intervenes and affects the family. You say, well, it's my individual freedom. Yes, but it destroys the basic unit of our society because it condones behavior that's antithetical to strong healthy families. Whether it's polygamy, whether it's adultery, where it's sodomy, all of those things, are antithetical to a healthy, stable, traditional family.

Every society in the history of man has upheld the institution of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman. Why? Because society is based on one thing: that society is based on the future of the society. And that's what? Children. Monogamous relationships. In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing. And when you destroy that you have a dramatic impact on the quality —

AP: I'm sorry, I didn't think I was going to talk about "man on dog" with a United States senator, it's sort of freaking me out.

SANTORUM: And that's sort of where we are in today's world, unfortunately. The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire. And we're seeing it in our society.

AP: Sorry, I just never expected to talk about that when I came over here to interview you. Would a President Santorum eliminate a right to privacy — you don't agree with it?

SANTORUM: I've been very clear about that. The right to privacy is a right that was created in a law that set forth a (ban on) rights to limit individual passions. And I don't agree with that. So I would make the argument that with President, or Senator or Congressman or whoever Santorum, I would put it back to where it is, the democratic process. If New York doesn't want sodomy laws, if the people of New York want abortion, fine. I mean, I wouldn't agree with it, but that's their right. But I don't agree with the Supreme Court coming in.

Now you may not agree with Santorum's reasoning but at least he is reasoning and not simply trying to manipulate with emotionalism. We can't really allow this kind of journalism or whatever people like Bashir call themselves to continue as it is extremely harmful to thinking people. And even produces a lowering of standards for other media. Of course few people watch MSNBC but Bashir's practices are done just as often in the mainline media and now even in Church media. Maybe not as ham handed as Bashir does on his show but the appeal to emotionalism over honestly dealing with the facts and representing someone else's point of view accurately is all too common.

The corruption of Adventist media

Recently I decided to stop contributing articles to Atoday.com. This was to some extent based upon the editor’s rejection of my article critical of the politicization in Liberty Magazine. I was critical of the assertions made in the opening paragraph of that article where there were accusations made against certain un-named Republican Presidential candidates, the accusations used no words of the candidates and did not mention or even footnote the candidates or their specific comments. You are just supposed to believe the author's assertions as the starting point for the article even though the writer is a fairly notorious political liberal writing about political conservatives and very evidently biased in his views. The Atoday online editor was incapable of explaining what should be changed in the article, just I should tone it down and rewrite it. Not particularly helpful editorial input and since I was feeling that the editor did not have the intellectual ability for his job or was consistent in how he did his job I quit writing for the column.

My thinking then was that he did not want to embarrass Liberty magazine by pointing out their terribly biased article. Then I saw on the Atoday website an article by Stephen Foster that did exactly the same thing as the editors of the Liberty article did. That is allow an article to publish anonymous accusations against a Presidential candidate without using or footnoting the candidate or the words or context of the statement. This kind of shoddy writing I have come to expect from Stephen Foster who is like the Liberty article a political liberal, writing against a conservative candidate. Here is what Stephen Foster wrote:

If you happen to be somewhat unclear as to what I mean about the religio-political class rhetorically lamenting the civil rejection of religion in order to reverse or undo the practice of conducting public affairs without a religious element; you should know that a well-known politician, who for now shall remain nameless, recently asserted that the United States is not a secular nation.
Now, look at those two definitions of secularism again. Is he right or wrong?

Here he asks for the decision to be made not upon what the candidate actually said but upon what Foster asserts the candidate was saying. With absolutely no context given or even referencing the candidate. Specifically saying: “religio-political class rhetorically lamenting the civil rejection of religion in order to reverse or undo the practice of conducting public affairs without a religious element;” That is a lot to assume, but assuming is what Foster does and apparently the editor finds such assumptions perfectly appropriate.

So as with the Liberty article  I researched and here is what we can ascertain Stephen Foster is referring to. Mitt Romney at a rally said:

“We are not a secular nation. We are a nation that believes in a provident hand.” [Edit: 3-30-23The link is no longer active]

For some reason Traditional Adventists like Foster seem to have a great fear of any political person who actually has religious beliefs even if those beliefs are well founded in the history of the United states. The belief in God is not something unfamiliar to Americans, not just a couple of words on money that say “In God We Trust” In fact 9 out of 10 Americans believe in God. http://www.gallup.com/poll/147887/americans-continue-believe-god.aspx

Traditional Adventists it appears have migrated to the atheistic side of politics because they fear people of their own belief system (Christians and theists). Not because of what those Christians have done but because of what they fear they will do based upon their rather silly eschatological beliefs developed in the 19^th century. These people can’t get past their traditions so they align with those raging against Christianity. The logic of their position is so poor that it requires making horrible assumptions which if anyone saw the actual quotes they were referring to they would laugh at their foolishness, as in the two articles mentioned above they hide the information and rely upon their biased assertions.  The people who should know better…the editors of these articles go along with it because they either don’t know the facts, and/or are so politically biased as to not even question this kind of manipulative writing.  

I can’t support these groups any longer, They are not behaving in any kind of accountable way and it is a tragedy to see this happen to Adventist media but it may be the inevitable consequence of having such a broken theological and eschatological system of beliefs where facts must often be ignored to hold to Adventist doctrine and traditions.

See the following quotes from famous American founders and their belief in providence.

George Washington was a spiritual man who recognized the paternal protection of God in not only his own life, but in the life of the country he was fighting to free from tyranny. His own witness of the many miracles that thwarted the victory of Great Britain over the often ill-equipped army he was leading likely inspired the following words he wrote in a letter to General Thomas Nelson in 1778: “The Hand of providence has been so conspicuous in all this, that he must be worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more than wicked, that has not gratitude enough to acknowledge his obligations.” https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-16-02-0373

“If it were not for my firm belief in an overruling Providence, it would be difficult for me, in the midst of such complications of affairs, to keep my reason on its seat. But I am confident that the Almighty has His plans, and will work them out; and, whether we see it or not, they will be the best for us.”

President Abraham Lincoln, Speaking to the Christian Commission during the Civil War

[Benjamin]Franklin maintained a firm belief, however, in "a Being of infinite Wisdom, Goodness and Power" (165) [3], a God who by "providence" [4] acts frequently in the world, a power who could and would suspend deterministic natural laws at will. https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-01-02-0090

Samuel Huntington

SIGNER OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE; PRESIDENT OF CONGRESS; JUDGE; GOVERNOR OF CONNECTICUT

It becomes a people publicly to acknowledge the over-ruling hand of Divine Providence and their dependence upon the Supreme Being as their Creator and Merciful Preserver . . . and with becoming humility and sincere repentance to supplicate the pardon that we may obtain forgiveness through the merits and mediation of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.⁵⁴

Benjamin Rush

SIGNER OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE; SURGEON GENERAL OF THE CONTINENTAL ARMY; RATIFIER OF THE U. S. CONSTITUTION; “FATHER OF AMERICAN MEDICINE”; TREASURER OF THE U. S. MINT; “FATHER OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS UNDER THE CONSTITUTION”

The Gospel of Jesus Christ prescribes the wisest rules for just conduct in every situation of life. Happy they who are enabled to obey them in all situations! . . . My only hope of salvation is in the infinite tran¬scendent love of God manifested to the world by the death of His Son upon the Cross. Noth¬ing but His blood will wash away my sins [Acts 22:16]. I rely exclusively upon it. Come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly! [Revelation 22:20]⁹⁸

I do not believe that the Constitution was the offspring of inspiration, but I am as satisfied that it is as much the work of a Divine Providence as any of the miracles recorded in the Old and New Testament.⁹⁹ Wallbuilders website

National Council of churches when politic become Ecumenism

Spectrum magazine online had a recent couple of articles on the National Council of Churches former President's presentation by Dr. Michael Kinnamon he gave a talk entitled, “The Ecumenical Movement and Why You Should Be Involved.”

What I find more interesting is what is the reason behind the NCC, if you read their website you see that though the language is very couched it has an overriding concern for liberal politics. In point 4 listed in the Spectrum article you read the following:

In seeking to manifest the unity we have in Christ, ecumenical churches refuse to separate theological truth from social justice; they integrate theology and justice.

Social Justice has become one of the code words of liberal politics (other such words, Environmental Justice, Economic justice etc). As you read the above sentence why would anyone include “social justice” in the first part of the clause and then theology and justice in the last part? (See my articles on Social Justice and here.) The insertion of “social justice” is to inform the listener/reader that  political aspects are being referred to. This reflects the Rev. Jim Wallis view that social justice is the heart of the gospel. So theology and social justice must be equated and social justice is the political lefts answer to the gospel therefore it is equal with theology, they cannot be separated. Likely no one would have a problem with the statement of justice, justice being doing what is right and fair but the political left is not trying for equal justice thus the favored term social justice.

A good quote on the subject is found from the Christian News Wire. Com:

IRD President James Tonkowich commented,

"Edgar's view of the church's role in society usually involved a more expansive federal government. While some hailed him as a prophetic voice on issues of war, poverty and environment, what he advocated exclusively pointed to liberal politics and human institutions as the answer.

"Edgar placed the council on a firmer financial footing by seeking funding from secular liberal foundations that were interested in a leftist political agenda, not the spread of the gospel.

"The NCC's ever-reluctant member communions were unconvinced by Edgar that they needed to further bear the financial burden of the activities done in their name. Clearly, the NCC's increasingly political agenda did not appeal to many of the member denominations, many of whom declined to contribute any financial support to the organization.

"Edgar often dismissed the precipitous membership plunge of many of the NCC member communions, saying that influence was more important than numbers. Both however seemed equally in decline as the national media, policymakers and everyday churchgoers increasingly directed their attentions toward mainstream Evangelical voices and away from older mainline leadership and tired institutional ecumenism.

"During Edgar's tenure, the NCC continued to prove unappealing to more orthodox faith groups, with evangelicals wary of the NCC's agenda and one member denomination choosing to permanently disassociate itself from the council.

"Bob Edgar's legacy is a financially sound council, but unfortunately not a strengthened ecumenism."

The Institute on Religion and Democracy is an ecumenical alliance of U.S. Christians working to reform their churches' social witness in accord with biblical and historic Christian teachings.

In 2005 in reply to such charges as the above Edgar responded:

“There are those who try to dilute our witness and mislead our friends by suggesting that the National Council of Churches is a partisan, left-leaning organization,” said Rev. Edgar. “But you know who it is that calls us to pursue peace, fight poverty and injustice, and care for the earth. It is the Prince of Peace who each day of his life showed his bias for the poor and prayed to the Creator who gave us this beautiful world,” he said.”

This always sounds good, as if right leaning organization don't want peace, don't fight poverty and injustice or care about the earth. It seems that only the political left uses this kind of logic. As most people of good will would agree with those goals the question is always how to arrive at them. Only when you start to think that your politics are the will of God do you become intolerant and become obsessed with seeing things only one way. Edgar went from his NCC position to the political liberal organization Common Cause.

During the recent so called budget debate (The US Senate has not passed a budget in over 1000 days) over the rise in the debt ceiling the leaders of the NCC took it upon themselves to protest:

The National Council of Churches out-radicalized even Jim Wallis, boasting about arrests of its officials in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda in protest against budget "cuts." "Our elected officials are protecting corporations and wealthy individuals while shredding the safety net for millions of the most vulnerable people in our nation and abroad," hyperventilated the NCC's former president after his arrest. Another arrested NCC official explained, "We are citizens first and foremost of the realm of God," When steps Congress is taking contradicts our call as followers of Jesus Christ, we must take action." Interestingly, Wallis, despite many arrests in his colorful past, declined to join the civil disobedience this time.

It may, in the short run seem that the way to protect the poor is to keep devaluing money or borrowing money from China but that may not be correct. But it does point out that there are differences in how people respond to problems. To claim that your way is the only way or the way that Jesus would do it is most often simply a gratuitous assertion, but it becomes even worse when it becomes attached to theology.

Unfortunately for Adventism, Spectrum and Adventist Today magazine and online have become havens for this kind of politics as theology. Thinking that Progressive Adventist is more about politics then theology and then equating the politics with theology has left them with with little momentum to deal with the actual theological problems in the Adventist church.

Ryan Bell's radio interview on Social Justice

I was just visiting Ryan Bell's blog Intersections and saw that he and some of his friends from the little video which basically repeated shows people saying they are "social justice Christians" and I noticed that they were interviewed by a Pacifica radio network affiliate on the subject of social justice Christians. For those of you who don't know Pacifica is a politically Progressive radio network. Possibly the last one remaining. What is interesting about this interview other then the amazing factual distortions the host and his guests make is that this is a Progressive host who is unable to quote Glenn Beck but fails to even acknowledge that his own political view is what Glenn Beck is calling attention to. Here is what Glenn Beck said:

"What is that? It seems like such an innocuous phrase. It paints a picture of fairness — many churches use the term as a substitute for "outreach to the poor." Who could possibly be against that? Well, if you've read the news lately: I am. In fact, I even learned from TIME magazine recently that I hate Jesus.

"I'm just full of hate and I want to stop justice!

I'm glad to see Time suddenly cares about God... or am I? The other "news" from The New York Times was that I recommended leaving church if those churches help the poor. And I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for those pesky, meddling "journalists"!

I'm not sure why I would expect the media to start searching for the truth now, when they've never let it get in the way before. The truth is this: The term "social justice" has been completely perverted and hijacked by progressives. It doesn't mean simply "help the poor" to them. It does to some people, but not to radical progressives.

And now, just for The New York Times and everyone else who thinks I hate poor people — I know your attention span is about 20 or 30 seconds, but try and pay attention — we'll set the record straight for you here on social justice. The kind I am talking about vs. the kind that they are talking about."

So was Glenn Beck right? Apparently as we see the Progressive radio talk show praise Ryan Bell for his little video. Now to hear the interview you have to go about 2/3 of the way through the program but it begins with a classical Progressive distortion. The host Ian Masters says after the introductions:

And all of you gentlemen are here to rebut I take it Glenn Beck who uh has warned people as to not go to churches who care about social justice (laughs) I must say that struck me as one of the most extraordinary statements and it really hasn't gone its uh largely gone unchallenged I think it is largely because we have such a polarized media now...my first reaction when I heard that him said what a terrible thing churches who preach social justice and hear the word social justice run because it either means you know the Nazi's or the communists...

That pathetic introduction was followed by the agreement of one of the video's sponsors. Ryan Bell goes on to say that it is a testament to how we in America have been co-opted by other interests. Apparently he does not see his part in the co-opting as he falls into lock step with the Progressive movement and distorts the Christian idea of justice into the political concept of social justice.

Glenn Beck actually describes the difference between equal justice and social justice:

"Let's start with equal justice. If I am an illegal alien and I'm stopped by a cop, if I'm here illegally, I pay the fine, go to court; I'm sent home. Under equal justice if somebody else, Canadian, Egyptian, Chinese, Mexican is stopped by the police and they are here illegally, they are get to take it, pay the fine, go see a court and then are sent home. Under social justice, I would be sent home but somebody, because they're somehow or another different than me, they're not. That's the difference between social justice and equal justice."

That is why it is so important to actually understand what the social justice people are saying. Because they attempt to shore up their position by ascribing justice to their social justice. Of course if what they really meant was justice then that is what they would say. But it is not because they are attempting to do politics in the name of religion. Simple the other extreme from the 1980's movement of the moral majority.

I don't mind having a religious perspective influence your politics but the assumption that their politics is the sum total of Christianity and that they have to back up their position with lies and distortions make me have little respect for people like Ryan Bell.

For more see the past articles

Social justice politics and useful idiots

Adventists and Social Justice

Update:5/12/10

I just saw this on the news as they are searching for a new Police Chief in Seattle. I was surprised to see the calls for social justice rather then equal justice:

"Police Search Committee members say the recent controversy over a racially charged incident involving Seattle Police Officers was not a factor in choosing Diaz.

"I don't think the video played a role. We were concerned about ethics and social justice, but we did not discuss the specifics on the video or about the incident," says committee member Charles Rolland.

Mayor McGinn thanked the 26-member committee, co-chaired by Kate Joncas and Rolland, for its work.

"I'm grateful for the hard work and commitment shown by Search Committee members during this important process," McGinn said. "I'm looking forward now to spending time with the finalists, allowing the public to get to know them, and choosing a chief for all of Seattle. I'll be looking for a chief who shares my values of public safety, fairness, and a commitment to racial and social justice."

I wonder does that make Mayor McGinn a social justice Christian or is he referring to his political values?